Research ideas

The first research ideas are starting to appear and I haven't even yet talked to the people in the lab. But the presentations yesterday and today were good to show me some indication if what can be done.

Now I'm going home to do a bit more work there.

Talk at CS Department

I just came back from a talk from David Lazer from Harvard. He gave the talk at the CS department here at NEU. The talk was very interesting and was about Computational Social Sciences. It relates to how computer science is helping social sciences people do a better job understanding human behavior. This is done via the concept of networks and the analysis of their characteristics. I spoke to him after the talk and I hope he can help me with some questions I have related to the research we're doing with the Enron email dataset. 

If you'd like to watch his talk, Google video has a copy of (almost) the same talk he gave here. The link is here.

(Sarah he looks a lot like Marcos André!!! lol)

Slow today

It's kind of slow today. I'm leaving to a talk in the CS department.
Maybe after that I'll fell like writing the paper I started. It's due
on the 16th. Currently I'm struggling trying to find the concept of
clans in Networks. I know what is a clique but "clans" I've never
heard of. Do you know? :-)

Brazil

Called my father-in-law and he is felling well. That's good news! Told me he might go home this weekend.

A bit late

My idea to work until 1:30 and then wake up today at 7:30 did not go so well. I got up at 8:30 instead. Then I had my shower and ate my cereal bar. I wanted to get out of the house soon to see if I could find a key ring. Yes, I'm still looking... The local dollar store had none but at least I got a mug to drink coffee at work. I'm kind of giving up on this key ring.

Now I'm again on the T going to work. I still have 35 minutes before I get there.

Photos of my Room

Before going to bed, I thought I'd share some pictures of my room. Everyday I clean it a little bit. Just now I got rid of a dying old plant that was here (you can see in one of the pictures). The bed is nothing more than a mattress on the floor but I have to say the bed is okay and comfortable. The rest is not good, the table is wobbly, the chair is okay but since the floor is not leveled, the chair keeps "sliding" backwards when I sit. Anyway, I only spend 8 hours (max) of the day here and 7 of these I'm asleep. 

In any case, today I wrote to the landlord and complained about the shower of the upstairs bathroom that doesn't work. He said he is going to fix. We'll see. He claims he didn't know but the guy that has the other room in this floor told me the shower has been broken for months. The problem with the shower is that we get only hot water and the water is very hot. Sure it cleans but you also burn your skin. 

First Meeting

Today I had the first meeting with Prof. B. Very nice meeting and lots of interesting stuff. I'm more confident that this may actually work. But the result is that I may have to give a seminar on Friday. 

Key ring, not Kiwi!!

I went to get my soup and after I went to try to buy a key ring to safely put my keys. I get quite a few keys for the NEU and need to make sure I don't loose them. However I went to this store inside the NEU where all the employees are Chinese. Anyway, I made the mistake to ask if they had key rings.... it went more or less like this

- Excuse me, do you sell key rings? 

- Kiwis, yes we have kiwis! 

She then shouted to the back

- Pum Lao, did we get kiwis today?

to which I said, 

- Sorry, not kiwi, key ring. 

- Yes, we do have kiwi, go to the back, it's over there!

- No ma'am, key rings, to put keys.

- No, you can't put keys on kiwi, you eat kiwi!

- I know. I need "something" to put keys on it.

then I show her the keys

- Ahh you want "kiring". No, we don't have "kiring"!!

- Thanks!

I had to control myself not to laugh because it was quite funny. The result is that I don't have a "kiring" nor a "kiwi". I'll try to find later and hopefully the people there won't sell kiwis.

No soup for you!

No luck. No soup (husky card) for me yet. That means no squash or gym for another 2 days.

Husky card

I'm in line to get my Husky card. Hopefully after this I'll he able to  play some squash or at least go to the gym. Tennis doesn't seem to be  an option. I got an email yesterday saying that the only indoor tennis  court has been transformed into a baseball indoor arena!

Good morning. First Monday!!!

First Monday here in Boston. I decided to wake up early to see if I can get to work before 9am. It's kind of hard because I still have to face the bathroom (the dirtiest in the planet) and get 45min in the T. 

I don't have a camera here but guess what? I have a mac with camera!! Cool! So here is a picture of the "view" from my room.

Before going to bed... Some fun...

The Onion continues to do their funny work. This video with the "MacBook Wheel" is quite funny

http://www.theonion.com/content/video/apple_introduces_revolutionary

Good night!

Done for the day

I'm heading to Davis square. Today was a productive day. But I think I  might still do a bit of work when I get to my room. But first, dinner!!

Kudos to Kalil!!

Just accessed the Stone Middle School site and saw that Kalil was featured there for having finished 2nd in the Math competition (http://stone.ms.brevard.k12.fl.us/html/index.html). Nice!! I see that the guy that got 1st place is twice the size of Kalil....  so he should have answered twice more questions! (lol)

Anyway, keep up the good work. Next time shoot higher and answer all 25!!

It stopped: finally!!

It stopped snowing. It was about time!! The forecast is for 2 days without any flock of snow. I hope they clear the sidewalks. It's hard to walk anywhere with this accumulation.

On a different note. Kalil, our Fortaleza won the first game of the year. 4x1. Very good result given the team is very young (avg. 22 years of age).

Fortaleza Esporte Clube

The state soccer tournament in Fortaleza just started. I'm happy because it is one thing that I can do from here... that is, I can follow my soccer team. Fortaleza is playing now and we are  winning 1x0. Earlier today the juniors under-18 and under-15 won't their matches in the national league. Bora Leão!!!!!!

(update: We won 4x1!!)

O Quatrilho

While eating my chicken gumbo soup with wheat bread I finished watching the movie called "O Quatrilho". Very good movie. I recommend. The soup was okay, not as good as yesterday's (Moroccan tomato with lentils).

And the snow keeps falling....

Lunch Time

I have to go eat something. This cold weather is making me hungry. 

I just called my father-in-law and spoke to Marcos André. Everything is fine. He explained somethings that Sarah had already told me but it is nice to call. In this way, my father-in-law get to know that I'm worried as well. I'm happy they are going to move to an apartment. In Fortaleza one cannot live in a house... it just to dangerous. 

Heading to NEU

The Apple store here is huge. Got my laptop sleeve. Now work.

Snow

Wow! It was hard to get here to Davis square station. At this time of  the day only a few people cleaned their sidewalks. In fact, as I walked I saw some of the homeowners doing this. Can you imagine having to do this during the whole Winter? I'm not even doing it and I  already miss Florida.