Today I spent my writing time on my course notes, Mathematical Preparation for Finance: a Wild Ride through Mathematics. Had to update chapter 6 on continuous random variables, although I added to it theorems that also apply to discrete random variables! Oh well. Markov’s inequality and Chebyshev’s inequality got a bit of space. I also need to update the sections on transformations and convolutions, and add more finance-specific examples that I’ve gathered this year. I’m always learning more and always want to add more, but should probably stop at some point.

Went to the Mia (Minneapolis art museum). Interesting paintings in the special exhibit, though not as thrilling as I rather hoped. I liked the new installation in the contemporary wing, though, the way they got someone to paint all over the walls and then installed art throughout and around the painted walls. Can’t find a link to it but I like the vibrancy of the walls, instead of just having white.

A fun math/science link, in line with my recent interest in order that emerges from randomness/randomness that emerges from rules: Dice become ordered when stirred, not shaken. Basically, gently stir dice and they’ll end up nicely stacked.

Kid crying again 🙂 It’s an 11 pm thing.

Alright. Can it be that I have not posted since September? I guess having a kid makes a time warp occur. I swear that was just a few weeks ago, not a whole semester ago.

Putting the log back in blog: I sold some coloring books at a local Thanksgiving weekend holiday fair. It was fun! Really enjoyed seeing other peoples’ art, too, and am fixing to buy some art for the house. Regionalist-type art. Minnesota. December 9 I’ll be at a local author fair, hanging out with the kinds of people who think about entertaining plots for murder. Wow. Gloria Dei church Gathering Room, 10 am-2 pm. Come check out the local stuff.

I presented last night for TCRUG (R users group) and it was fun and refreshing to learn from all the other presenters and attenders. I am trying to clean up my presentation just a bit so I can post it online (here? Github? Haven’t decided). Today had tons & tons of interesting talks, though, on configuration spaces and insurance (?! I learned about the Tweedie distribution) and brace algebras, and I had to finish writing up the homework for the class I teach. Sure, I had a full version of the homework in my phone’s notepad app, but that’s not enough to give to students.

The presentation was on tools for topological data analysis, but in some ways it was just a case study in doing math in R.

What else? Stuffed peppers with lamb are good. Six-month-olds have somewhat erratic sleep schedules. Having fun with watercolor paints — was seduced by Wet Paint’s holiday sale and got some new watercolors, and they are so much brighter than the ones from middle school.

Will share some fun math art tomorrow. This is truly just a rambly post because I’m challenging myself to write every day in December!