andy reagan only the interesting stuff

Big Decisions

Taking on four math, and one programming course this semester was never something I intended to finish.  That was before I realized about two weeks ago that if I do finish what I'm in now, I'll be one class from graduation.  I found out today that Dr. Laubenbacher will be getting his grant renewed for another three years, and so it is looking very likely that I will be in Blacksburg this summer.  And so I'd take my one remaining course during the first summer session...and be done with undergraduate.

It has all been dumped on my pretty quick, and I'm looking at taking the GRE's pretty soon so that I can start looking at graduate schools.  At VT, there is as program that my research advisor, Shernita Lee, is in and it sounds pretty awesome.  Not so hard to get into, a guaranteed stipend for two years, and a Ph.D. in 5 years.  I could, in theory, start this fall. And then I would be coming out at 26 with Ph.D. done.  It's called Genetics Bioinformatics and Computational Biology (GBCB).

Thinking about the type of other graduate programs that I would be looking for...I would definitely want something interdisciplinary.  Straight math is abstract and very very difficult to get at PhD in.  Applied math is out there, and would be something I would be looking for at the minumum.  At VT, there are other applied mathematics programs as well such as ICAM and ICTAS.

Here is one that just popped into my inbox right as I am typing: http://www.rit.edu/emcs/ptgrad/_program_detail.php?id=58

The GRE's can be taken anytime...and Shernita said they send scores to five schools for free right after it, so I would in theory want to know where I'm interested in going by then. By the end of the month, perhaps.

That's a lot on my plate right now, to think about.  Where I go to grad school, and even more specifically who I research with will have a profound impact on my future opportunities and where I end up in the long run.  I learned that in my Human Origins class...where these people making big discoveries gained their knowledge and developed their careers was under important people in their field, which positioned them to become successful.  Over the course of history, that has been the case.

I think I'm going to chill tonight, I haven't gone out hardly at all because I've been working so hard.  There's a bike race tomorrow morning, then I may be going over the Ben B's to see an all-grain brew.  Then a potluck at Will and Stephan's tomorrow night, and Super Bowl Sunday!! Jason from the tri team is having a super bowl party, and sent it out to the listserv earlier this week...and I acidentally hit reply all, telling him that I'd bring my home brew keg, whoops!! Alcohol is definitely not allowed on those listservs, as soon as I realized I'd sent it to everyone, I had like a mini oh-shit sweat rush over me...but it was okay, really.

Okay, later!

Found

I unknowingly lost my hokie passport today on Harding Ave, but luckily Kristen F found it, and dug the interwebs to find and email me! I just wanted to thank her, and share the story because it made me think about how accessible all this information is... Although I am pretty hard to find without sharing my VT account (on VT-stalk as some people call the vt.edu people-search engine) and without having a Facebook, which I deleted this semester as one more distraction, it was possible to find my email, phone number, address...all with just my name!  I'm proud of my number one google ranking for "andy reagan" searches, and it helped save me $20 (paid for the website for two years!).  I think that some people would worry about having that information accessible, and maybe I'm naive, but I'm really not bothered at all that someone who can navigate the web can look me up, I think that in itself is pretty harmless.

Here's the email correspondence:

K: Hey...
I found your Hokie Passport on the side of the road...
Did you cancel it and get a new one? or do you need it?
Just let me know!

Me: Kristen, thanks so much for taking the time to email me!  If you could drop it off in the lost and found in Squires next time you're near there, that would be perfect.  Thanks again!

K: Sure- no problem... It was on the side of the road on Harding Ave, just to let you know...I have class at 9:30 tomorrow, so I will drop it off either before or after it. By the way, it was really hard to find your email address because you aren't on the Student Look-up thing.Haha anyway, no problem! Should be there tomorrow!

Me: Awesome, and it makes sense that it was on Harding, I live up Harding and bike to class.  Sorry that I was hard to find though, how did you find me haha?

K: Haha well I googled you and found your Linkedin and Twitter but there wasn't an email so then I found your website, but your email address wasn't anywhere, and I couldn't find your Facebook. So I had to creep pretty hard and I found your resume and it had your email. Haha Don't judge. It worked

Me: Wow, I'm impressed!  Yeah I have a really hard semester, so deleted my Facebook cause I would spend an hour a day procrastinating on it lol.  And I'm not sure why my VT stuff doesn't show up.  Sounds like it just became a challenge to find me haha but don't worry I don't judge, I'm glad you could find me!!

K: Haha yup... and that makes sense... I'd hope someone would do the same for me!

Etc...

And I finished my numerical methods HW, so I'm not just procrasting right now either. Check out one cool little code I wrote, it saves me work:

And for that matter, check out some of the cooler code I wrote to do work for me in Number Theory Problem Set 1.

That's all for now, goodnight!