I thought about doing NaBloPoMo, but I thought it was probably not wise. Instead I'm going to do Localized Blog Posting Fortnight, and write something each day until November 30. Jump in and join me if you're so inclined.
Life is busy just now and I am working hard to stay on top of things. This morning I led a mothers' meeting and then came home to hacksaw PVC pipe in preparation for tonight's Cub Scout meeting. (At this moment, agreeing to lead the Tiger den feels like an act of madness.) It was Northeast Feast day for the fourth grade, so I just got back from school. I'm hoping to get the laundry all folded before I have to turn around again and pick the kids up, which means I need to keep this brief.
In my stats class lately I've been whimpering quietly, because we've moved past what I remember from the course I took as a master's student, and I need to sit down with my book and my problem sets and get some things straightened out in my head. I have been tempted to write sad little posts that say, "Barbie was right! Math is hard!" but it occurs to me that blogging during lecture is not the best strategy for diminishing my confusion.
I have been hesitant about asking stats questions of my husband because I don't have good math intuition. I can get it -- I've never yet not been able to get it -- but I have to think about it. I remember in high school being very suspicious of the distributive property. I was on board with 9*4 + 9*3 = 9(4+3), but to propose a (b + c) = ab + ac as axiomatic -- well, I was skeptical about that for a while. I've been asking my husband math questions for 19 years now, since differential calculus in my first quarter at college, and his mind makes leaps that mine does not. For me getting to the other side means rappelling down one side of the question, trudging across the bottom of the figurative canyon, and climbing laboriously up the other side to the answer.
Recently Elwood was trying to explain the Fisher-Rao metric to me. "I don't understand your question," I said flatly. "Maybe you should try to understand it," he said (nicely). "Okay," I grumbled, "let's try it in small bites." I was following for a while and then I waved my arms and said, "Mouth is full now!" Did you ever play Chubby Bunnies at camp? You stuff jumbo marshmallows into your mouth and say "chubby bunnies" around them. The winner is the person who can speak around the most marshmallows. It's got to be illegal now, you figure? Choking hazard, obesity risk, and general weirdness? Anyway, our "small bite" conversation turned into a chubby bunnies flashback moment. But I do know more than I did about Fisher information.
What a gloomy post. Sleep deprivation makes me gloomy, and Pete is not sleeping well lately. LoBloPoFo: it can only get cheerier from here.
Recent Comments