Depressing realisation:

My mother and I have both been working on term papers for the past few weeks, Mom more so than I. Mom is studying towards a PhD in Religious Studies (I think - it may have a different specific name) at Fordham University, home of the Jesuits; I'm working towards an MS in Management Information Systems at Kean University, home of . . . um, well, someone named Cipher Deavours. I've got two pages left to go on my term paper, maybe three, and then I start fiddling with the formatting. I realised something this morning as I was looking over the paper:

If I read my mom's paper, I could probably understand it if I were given long enough and allowed to ask a few questions of her. True, a lot of the concepts would be stuff I'd never yet learned, but low-level theological and philosophical concepts are enough like high-level ones that I would have a good chance of understanding what she'd said based on extrapolation. I've read complicated theological stuff before, mostly as part of an effort to compare temporal perceptions in literate societies versus temporal perceptions in nonliterate, shamanic societies, so given enough time I could probably understand it without resorting to the books.

If my mom read my paper, which is a comparison of XML standards used in bioinformatics research, I have a nasty feeling her eyes would glaze over. The biological and chemical aspects she'd most likely understand, as she had to take courses in stuff of that nature to get into her original psych degree program, but XML as a language and its capabilities, well... outside her realm of experience entirely.

I don't think anybody in my family could read my term paper and understand it.

Somewhat less depressing realisation

I was out of clean trousers this morning other than jeans and a pair that I unwisely put through the dryer, thereby making them about an inch too short unless I wear a particular pair of shoes. Since I do not like those shoes, as they have higher heels than I normally wear, I was a bit stuck. I went through my dresser and found another pair of black pants - the pair I bought for my karate classes...

So far no one's noticed that I'm wearing my big warm Monday morning sweater and a pair of karate uniform pants. And you know what? The karate pants look better on me than most of my business pants, which are baggy in all the wrong places. $25 for drawstring pants that can stand up to a lot of abuse and look good enough to wear around the office as long as you wear something that covers the PRO FORCE logo on the front... that's a pretty good deal.

2 XMLs to go on my paper. Maybe add another after that just in case, but the end is in sight and it's not even four AM.

For those of you

who're into the NationStates game, the site's back up. You probably have issues waiting for you. Go, tend your nations.

For those of you who haven't been there yet, you might want to pop by http://www.maxbarry.com and check out the section on the book Jennifer Government, then look at the NationStates game (http://www.nationstates.net). It's a promotional tool for the book, which I intend to buy once I have money again, and it's a lot of fun.