On May 1st I headed up to Ouistreham in the jumper with Nono, Soso, Liz, Angie, Cris and Ashu. Ouistreham were having their club anniversary and were hosting a gala game between the nearby pro team from Mondeville and the N2F Ouistreham girls bolstered by a couple of Avenir players (Liz & Agnes) and a couple of girls from La Glacerie.
The game was fun. the N2 girls hung in there for the first half, and in fact the pros were only really kept in front by their French national team point guard. In the second half they got their offense going, though, and pulled away to win by 30 or so. A few of the N2 girls really looked like they belonged, notably Liz, Agnes, Rachael, and in the second half the german girl from La Glacerie.
After the game we had a drink, followed by a session in the carpark with the ever-crazy Julie and Charlotte from Ouistreham. We even adjourned to a MacDonalds on the way home for a very pulp-fiction buying Royale with Cheeses and beers for the road.
Sunday, 20 May 2007
Sunday, 13 May 2007
meta-update
Its been a busy couple of weeks, between family visiting me and me visiting family. I have a possible family-free window this afternoon, in which I might try to record the hilarity here.
Monday, 30 April 2007
post-defense
Since the defense, I've actually been pretty busy, if you can believe that.
On Tuesday, we ran a little workshop with presentations from each of my jury members. Krzysztof had to leave early, but Robert, Bernhard and Birger all gave good presentations, and we had a lunch afterwards, which gave a good chance to chat a little further.
On Wednesday and Thursday, we had our team retreat up in Dinard. We had some good acivities on Wednesday afternoon and Thursday morning trying to apply the techniques we work on to real domain problems. We also played a card game called Loups Garrous (or something to that effect - means werewolves) for a few hours on Wednesday night.
On Friday Mum and Dad headed off to Jersey for a 5 day visit to see Aliki. At my last day of work, I managed to clean out most of the stuff from my office, before heading off early for my last physio appointment in town.
On Saturday night I went out to Acigné for dinner at Erwan & Manu's place with Liz, Ashu, Nanou, and Manu's sister's family. The three little kids - Noam, and Tara & Elliott - amused us for a couple of hours, then once they were to bed we sat down to the usual Ashu feast, with Nono and Fabien turning up later on.
On Sunday I had big plans to go for a big ride, but I left my run late, and only got about three-quarters of the way out to Betton before turning around and heading back to Avenir for the cadettes game.
On Tuesday, we ran a little workshop with presentations from each of my jury members. Krzysztof had to leave early, but Robert, Bernhard and Birger all gave good presentations, and we had a lunch afterwards, which gave a good chance to chat a little further.
On Wednesday and Thursday, we had our team retreat up in Dinard. We had some good acivities on Wednesday afternoon and Thursday morning trying to apply the techniques we work on to real domain problems. We also played a card game called Loups Garrous (or something to that effect - means werewolves) for a few hours on Wednesday night.
On Friday Mum and Dad headed off to Jersey for a 5 day visit to see Aliki. At my last day of work, I managed to clean out most of the stuff from my office, before heading off early for my last physio appointment in town.
On Saturday night I went out to Acigné for dinner at Erwan & Manu's place with Liz, Ashu, Nanou, and Manu's sister's family. The three little kids - Noam, and Tara & Elliott - amused us for a couple of hours, then once they were to bed we sat down to the usual Ashu feast, with Nono and Fabien turning up later on.
On Sunday I had big plans to go for a big ride, but I left my run late, and only got about three-quarters of the way out to Betton before turning around and heading back to Avenir for the cadettes game.
elaborating
OK, so just to elaborate a little.
The defense was in the afternoon, and there were about 25-30 people showed up to listen: the jury of 5, plus most of our research team, plus my parents, Liz, Ashu, and Valentine.
I presented for 45 minutes, and I was pretty happy with how it went - the feedback I'd gotten on the two practices I'd done was really valuable, and I got in a better zone than I had on the Friday previous.
After the presentations, each of the jury members asked questions. Krzysztof asked lots, and the others asked a few, and it wound up taking a bit over an hour, which I think is a lot by normal standards, but I didn't feel especially stressed.
Once the questions were done, the jury retired and deliberated for a while - half an hour, perhaps - then came out and conferred upon me the title of Dr of the University of Rennes 1. They don't give mentions any more, which was disappointing because I'd anticipated it, but in general its a good policy, as they had become meaningless.
We then retired outside for champagne and nibblies, which also went really well. I was worried about how much food we would need, but as it turned out we got it just right, and the tartes were really good, and pretty much everything got eaten. The only catch was that the Australian bubbly I'd ordered got lost in delivery, so we had to settle for some Blanc de Blanc de Limoux that Dad and I had bought on Saturday as a backup.
In the evening, the jury, myself, Mum and Dad, and Pierre Alain all went out for dinner at the Taverne de la Marine, a seafood restaurant in town, which was a good opportunity to chat and relax a little.
The defense was in the afternoon, and there were about 25-30 people showed up to listen: the jury of 5, plus most of our research team, plus my parents, Liz, Ashu, and Valentine.
I presented for 45 minutes, and I was pretty happy with how it went - the feedback I'd gotten on the two practices I'd done was really valuable, and I got in a better zone than I had on the Friday previous.
After the presentations, each of the jury members asked questions. Krzysztof asked lots, and the others asked a few, and it wound up taking a bit over an hour, which I think is a lot by normal standards, but I didn't feel especially stressed.
Once the questions were done, the jury retired and deliberated for a while - half an hour, perhaps - then came out and conferred upon me the title of Dr of the University of Rennes 1. They don't give mentions any more, which was disappointing because I'd anticipated it, but in general its a good policy, as they had become meaningless.
We then retired outside for champagne and nibblies, which also went really well. I was worried about how much food we would need, but as it turned out we got it just right, and the tartes were really good, and pretty much everything got eaten. The only catch was that the Australian bubbly I'd ordered got lost in delivery, so we had to settle for some Blanc de Blanc de Limoux that Dad and I had bought on Saturday as a backup.
In the evening, the jury, myself, Mum and Dad, and Pierre Alain all went out for dinner at the Taverne de la Marine, a seafood restaurant in town, which was a good opportunity to chat and relax a little.
Tuesday, 24 April 2007
what's up, doc?
Yesterday morning I had a beard and no PhD. Today I have a PhD and no beard.
All communications may be addressed to Dr Steel.
Friday, 13 April 2007
holiday leave
I just noticed that I now have 68.5 days of accumulated holiday leave. France has the most generous government in the world in terms of leave, particularly for people who are paid by the government, which I am. I am entitled to 35 days of leave per year, plus 5 days of RTT assigned by my employer, and another 5 assigned by me.
The problem is that despite having all this leave, I actually only have 11 working days left on my contract, and once I finish, the leave is not paid out (as is often the case). Otherwise, I'd be able to start a holiday in two weeks and remain on paid holiday through all of May, June and July, and halfway into August. As it stands, it will just fall on the ground.
This country is crazy.
The problem is that despite having all this leave, I actually only have 11 working days left on my contract, and once I finish, the leave is not paid out (as is often the case). Otherwise, I'd be able to start a holiday in two weeks and remain on paid holiday through all of May, June and July, and halfway into August. As it stands, it will just fall on the ground.
This country is crazy.
Saturday, 7 April 2007
busy boy
You would have thought that the time between submitting and defending would be calm. You'd be wrong.
In the next week, I need to:
Its all very daunting.
In the next week, I need to:
- Make corrections to my thesis and explain them to my examiners
- review two papers, and write another
- fill out administrative crap in order to placate people bent on teaching me English and presumably selling rice to China
- polish up some of the implementation of my thesis work in Kermeta
- organise my examiners into making their visit to the lab even more productive than attending my defense
- try to wrangle some of my financial affairs back in oz
Its all very daunting.
Thursday, 22 March 2007
you can't see me.
Big fat over-ear headphones are a wonderful way of hiding in plain sight. If someone tries to establish eye contact while you are wearing them, you are quite within your rights to not notice, since such an impressive piece of equipment will obviously block all 5 senses, not just sound.
Tuesday, 13 March 2007
4000 up
This was a much better weekend.
For the first time in probably 4 months, I had a weekend with no thesis work hanging over my head. (Which is not to say that every weekend in that time involved thesis work, but each probably should have).
On Saturday, I rode out to Decathlon and put my bike in to be fixed, which wound up involving a new chain and gear blocks, both front and back. In the afternoon I went for a shop out at LeClerc, then went back to pick up my refurbished bike. The difference was really noticable - the first time I've been able to stand up without the chain jumping for many months. In the evening I went to see the Avenir game, and caught up with Tortue for the first time in a long, long time. Avenir played one of their worst matches on memory, but still got away with a win against an RPA team that played hard but just doesn't have the personnel for that level. I hung around after the game, but not for too long - those nights haven't been the same since Audrey left.
On Sunday I buggerised around most of the day without too much guilt, then in the afternoon went out for a ride. Actually, I first spent an hour playing around cleaning and tuning my bike. I rode up to Betton along the canal, which isn't looking as pretty as it has, with a fair bit of work being done both on the cycle/walk track and on the canal itself. It was a really beautiful day, and there were lots of people out walking, running and cycling. I wound up riding along in a T-shirt, in a good sign that spring is right around the corner. I clocked up about 35km by my reckoning, and pushed my bike computer over the 4000km mark since I started with it about 2.5 years ago.
pot calling the kettle balck
After 3 years of correcting my colleagues' franglais, the shoe passed to the other foot last week, as I pulled my finger out on writing the french summary of my thesis. Franck C, Franck F, Jacques, Sophie and Erwan all helped me with my copious spelling, grammar and style problems.
Coming through my various (and admittedly not particularly deep) studies of English throughout high school, I was usually the kid who had only a few comments on his assignments when they came back. I was kind of a nerd. Shock, horror. It was weird this week to get documents back awash in red, blue and even green ink. It gave me a little insight into some of the students I went to high school with. Its not that I didn't understand the rules of french grammar. Its just that when I read English, errors just seem obvious, whereas in French, I really have to look for them. Anyway, the net result is that I'm pretty crap at French written expression.
I declared the french summary innings closed today, though. I actually played the bureaucracy game last friday, but the doctoral school handed me a Skip-A-Turn card because my boss had signed the wrong page of my thesis. Fortunately, the scolarité (postgraduate studies?) didn't seem to care, and processed the rest of my paperwork with nary a batted eye.
Tomorrow I'll take my thesis back to the doctoral school, and I should be done with it until my examiners come back with corrections.
Coming through my various (and admittedly not particularly deep) studies of English throughout high school, I was usually the kid who had only a few comments on his assignments when they came back. I was kind of a nerd. Shock, horror. It was weird this week to get documents back awash in red, blue and even green ink. It gave me a little insight into some of the students I went to high school with. Its not that I didn't understand the rules of french grammar. Its just that when I read English, errors just seem obvious, whereas in French, I really have to look for them. Anyway, the net result is that I'm pretty crap at French written expression.
I declared the french summary innings closed today, though. I actually played the bureaucracy game last friday, but the doctoral school handed me a Skip-A-Turn card because my boss had signed the wrong page of my thesis. Fortunately, the scolarité (postgraduate studies?) didn't seem to care, and processed the rest of my paperwork with nary a batted eye.
Tomorrow I'll take my thesis back to the doctoral school, and I should be done with it until my examiners come back with corrections.
Monday, 26 February 2007
to london, to london, to milk a fat pig
When I'm done with INRIA soon, I will miss its seemingly eager approach to travel funding. To cash in while I still can, I chooffed off to London last week for the MAST workshop, having initially been invited by Laurie way back just after the Australian cricket team finished belting the English 5-0 in the Ashes (just in case anyone had forgotten).
I flew over from Rennes airport via Paris, bringing to three the number of different modes of transport (with train, ferry) I have now used to get across the Channel. Upon arriving, I headed straight over to Earl's Court and caught up with Afe and Trish for dinner. We had a pretty intense talk about movies, something I've enjoyed doing in the past with them, and something I haven't done often enough in the last few years. They seem to have settled in really well in the last couple of weeks.
The workshop was really good, but I'll leave that to my other blog. After it was done, we adjourned in good research fashion to a nearby bar, and then to a dinner with waiters with an obsession over maintaining our glasses entirely full. After that was done and they booted us out, Laurie and I went for one more in a pub in Holborn.
On Thursday I made the worst of the miserable weather and went for a walk. I walked from my hotel up to the Natural History museum for a look through a couple of exhibits, then from there up past Imperial College to Hyde Park. I walked the length of Hyde Park to the corner tube, and jumped across to Piccadilly. From there I walked over to Leicester Square, where I temporarily surrendered and went into Starbucks to read my book for an hour or so. I met up with Ben for a nice Japanese lunch, and we continued walking, down to Nelson's Column then down Fleet Street to St Paul's. By then it was time for me to fly home.
I think the whole time I took one photo, in a continuing pathetic lack of photographic effort. I'll probably put it up sometime, if it doesn't look too awful.
I flew over from Rennes airport via Paris, bringing to three the number of different modes of transport (with train, ferry) I have now used to get across the Channel. Upon arriving, I headed straight over to Earl's Court and caught up with Afe and Trish for dinner. We had a pretty intense talk about movies, something I've enjoyed doing in the past with them, and something I haven't done often enough in the last few years. They seem to have settled in really well in the last couple of weeks.
The workshop was really good, but I'll leave that to my other blog. After it was done, we adjourned in good research fashion to a nearby bar, and then to a dinner with waiters with an obsession over maintaining our glasses entirely full. After that was done and they booted us out, Laurie and I went for one more in a pub in Holborn.
On Thursday I made the worst of the miserable weather and went for a walk. I walked from my hotel up to the Natural History museum for a look through a couple of exhibits, then from there up past Imperial College to Hyde Park. I walked the length of Hyde Park to the corner tube, and jumped across to Piccadilly. From there I walked over to Leicester Square, where I temporarily surrendered and went into Starbucks to read my book for an hour or so. I met up with Ben for a nice Japanese lunch, and we continued walking, down to Nelson's Column then down Fleet Street to St Paul's. By then it was time for me to fly home.
I think the whole time I took one photo, in a continuing pathetic lack of photographic effort. I'll probably put it up sometime, if it doesn't look too awful.
Thursday, 8 February 2007
trimming
To reassure those, notably Jesse, who were concerned about my beardedness, I have trimmed it. Part of this was due to the responses I got comparing me to various wild and unkempt things. Part of it was because I had soup for dinner last week and ended up filtering it rather more than I would have liked. From a metaphysical point of view, it would be nice to say that the trimming of the beard coincided with the beginning of the trimming, or revision, of my thesis. That would be a lie. It was more the comments and the soup thing. Perhaps I'll take a photo at some point.
I still need a haircut though. There was a reason the last photo had me wearing a beanie.
I still need a haircut though. There was a reason the last photo had me wearing a beanie.
Friday, 2 February 2007
decisions, decisions
MOF and other metamodelling documents have some history of including reference to the quokka. For the moment, I've put a glossary in my thesis expressly for this purpose. I'm now tossing up whether to go a little more subtle, and include the quokka's closest relative, the pademelon, instead.
petit pas
I gave a copy of my thesis to my boss yesterday, complete except for the conclusion. This is a good thing. I'm getting closer.
Thursday, 1 February 2007
A bush in the beard is worth two...
I have a shocking confession to make. I have a thesis beard.
Actually, this is hardly a secret. Such things make poor secrets. I stopped shaving back in early October, and although for a while it looked pretty pathetic, it now does actually resemble a beard.
My initial plan was that I would keep it until my thesis was sent off to the examiners. My physio, Jerome, however, reckons that's cheating, and that I should keep it until they give my PhD. He has a point. A playoff beard doesn't get shaven when you make the Stanley Cup finals, only when you win or lose them.
On the other hand, Sophie and Rosalie have both refused to greet me in the proper french manner until my cheeks are once again available for kissing. I'm going to put them down as being against the idea.
Its a dilemma. So, in the spirit of, erm, not being able to make a decision, I'm going to throw it out to a straw poll. Does the beard go when I send of my thesis in the next couple of weeks, or do I keep it going until they give me my ticket'o'leave sometime in April? Leave your votes and, if you feel the urge, reasons, in the comments.
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