England was fantastic. I probably should have blogged from there, but I didn’t and I won’t try to recap. You can see my pictures at my Google photo album.
The fall semester at UTD had already begun when I got off the plane last Saturday, and so this week I went to my classes for the first time and began to get a sense of what the fall semester’s going to be like. In a word, it’s going to be scary. My classes are going to be amonng the best I’ve ever taken, but attendant with that will be a LOT of work. I’m also doing other stuff, none of it important enough to mention now, that will keep my out-of-class time busy. Thankfully, the heavens have smiled in my direction, and some key changes at UTD should make my life easier … and not a moment too soon.
I had mentioned the paper I worked on for much of the summer, and the course I took at the University of Essex earlier this month was perfectly timed to help me figure out data problems with that paper/project. I learned a lot, but in the process figured out I had a MAJOR data problem that was endemic to the dataset itself. In other words, I couldn’t fix it. Thankfully, in the last week, one of my professors has steered me in a slightly different direction and helped me figure out what to do next. I’ll be presenting this project at a conference in New Orleans in January, so this is good news. 🙂
My brother’s girlfriend turns 21 in September (and he turns 24), so a whole slew of us are using the occasion as an excuse to head to Vegas again! My parents (both of them, even!!), Daniel and I are meeting Bobby, Joyce, and her mom there for a few days. I’ve never been to Vegas with my dad before, and I’m hoping he will befriend me at the nickle video poker machines while my mom and Daniel head for the blackjack tables. We’re also looking forward to going to Hoover Dam in the daylight this time. It should be great!