Statistically Significant

Another week in the life of Hoxie.

This week’s math topic was multivariate calculus. I took MA225 at BU with Professor Blanchard in (*checks transcript*) the fall of 2006. I was terrified of calculus after struggling with AB and BC at Pine Crest, but was pleasantly surprised by the course. Professor Blanchard was a great teacher, and vectors made it possible to do lots of cool things very easily. In my review, I refreshed my memories of dot and cross products, lines, planes, gradients, multiple integrals, path integrals, cylindrical and spherical coordinates, and Green’s Theorem. Next week should see differential equations and linear algebra, along with set theory, probability/statistics, and combinatorics if I have time.

Grad school applications are also coming along nicely. I spent a few hours yesterday working on my personal statement, and the thoughts were flowing surprisingly easily. For the last couple of weeks, I’ve been wavering between confidence and unease with regards to admissions. After getting my story onto paper and remembering all the cool things I’ve been doing for the last few years now, though, I’m feeling consistently good about it. Plus, at the end of the day, the decision to admit me lies on the shoulders of the admissions committee, so I should let them worry about it, not me. I know they’ll make the right decision

I finished the Harry Potter 5 audiobook and have moved onto Harry Potter 6. Now it’s getting exciting! Not too many adventures to report, although I’m getting together with a friend of mine from Pine Crest for some lunch today and hanging out with a friend of mine from work tonight. I’ve also got an adventure planned for tomorrow night that should be a lot of fun. Details to come…

I realize that these updates are pretty mundane, but GRE prep and applications are basically consuming my life right now. I take the GRE on October 10 and hope to have my applications in pretty good shape by then, so things will be getting more interesting shortly thereafter.

Until next time!

Another week in the life of Hoxie. I’m finding myself quite busy these days, although that’s certainly better than being quite bored.

With the Mathematics GRE on October 10, I’m in full-scale test prep mode. I whipped through the highlights of univariate calculus this week, visiting such old friends as implicit differentiation, max/min and related rates problems, integration by parts, the FToC, areas between curves, volumes of solids of rotation, arc length, and various power series. I’m still planning to do a lot of practice problems in the next month, but these topics all seem so much easier than they did in 10th grade. I didn’t understand most of calculus when I saw it for the first time, instead just memorizing the procedures for problem-solving and praying that I’d apply the correct algorithm to the appropriate problem. After seeing these topics mentioned and alluded to in various regards over the last ~5 years, though, they’re starting to fit together more coherently.

I also discovered a great source of entertainment this week. For years now, people have extolled the virtues of audiobooks as an easy way to consume useful, relevant information. I love reading and learning but thought I would be frustrated by the slow narration, so I never got into them. Until now. Finding myself with a fair amount of going-through-the-motions time while making food, doing dishes and laundry, cleaning, and walking around the neighborhood, I acquired the Harry Potter audiobooks and loaded HP5 onto the iPod. And Merlin’s beard, it’s great!

I feel pretty comfortable with what happened in Books 1-4. Starting with Book 5, though, the combination of quickly reading borrowed copies at band camp when I probably should have been practicing and having not-refreshed my memory beforehand meant that I didn’t follow most of it. (This became apparent the other day when a girl was telling me about the things left out of the sixth movie and I didn’t remember a single one. Even important main characters had slipped away. Voldemort? Who’s that?) But no longer. With Stephen Fry’s excellent narration on my side, I’ll be up to speed in no time!

I think that Harry Potter is probably the perfect audiobook, though, and that others might not be as good. I know most of the characters in the stories already, as well as the major plot points. It has a higher entertainment value and a lower educational value than most of the books on my Amazon wish list, so I probably don’t need to concentrate as hard. And although I’m sure most audiobook narrators are good, Stephen Fry really is great. The characters are really well-voiced, and hearing the story with an English accent is such a great touch. After I finish the Harry Potter series, I’m sure I’ll be trying others… I just hope they’re as good.