So why am I back at Stanford? Well, I think that working in Silicon Valley, perhaps with a startup, might make me happy. And I think that getting this degree is a good step towards doing that. And I think that classes won't be very hard. Together, that seems like a good set of reasons.
How am I doing so far? Well, so-so. Like last year, because of my undergrad major being math, this coming quarter I have to take dumb intro courses. However, after this I will be done with them. One of them, in particular, a class that I dropped last year, really sucks. Scientific Computing, a class in which an entire lecture was taken to explain the IEEE floating point standard (which we did in 5 minutes and a single slide in one of my other classes), and another whole class on Newton's method. The professor is the worst I've ever had (although admittedly, going to Mudd spoiled me), he babbles on in semantically empty statements, speaks slowly, says "uh" a lot, and makes me want to scream, even on video. This class is offered every quarter, but by other professors in other quarters. However, there are only 2 other classes that I need this quarter, so I sort of have to take it. I am taking it pass/fail, right now, figuring that i can learn enough on my own to pass it. Maybe I'll just drop it and take some fun class instead. Mats pointed out to me that I don't have to just take classes towards my degree, he is taking his time and taking some neat stuff (internet entrepreneurship, for example).
My classes are not only on video, they can be watched over the internet, so I get to "go to class" naked, when I want to. This is neat. Its been a little rough to keep my nose to the grindstone, since I don't care about my classes, and am contemptuous of the level of the material (I could learn this stuff on my own so easily, but stanford requires these intro courses to have actual coursework done), but being smart has proved to be more important than my apathy.
By far the greatest problem I've had this quarter is insomnia, which has been worse in the past three weeks than ever before. I know it sounds like a cop out because i want to blame my academic laziness on something else, but it isn't. People who have never had problems sleeping may find it hard to understand what it is like, so I will try to explain.
Usually I can fall asleep at night, although sometimes it takes an hour or two. Then I sleep for 4-6 hours (usually 5), which is just not enough in a row to make me anywhere near rested, especially when its every night. Then I wake up, irregardless of the time, the noise level, my bladder, or how exhausted I am. I then spend another 4-5 hours tossing and turning, usually sleeping for a few more scattered hours which don't do much because they aren't deep sleep. I am exhausted the whole time and I don't want to waste my time lying there, but I also don't want to get up because I am not rested. Eventually I give up and get up, exhausted from my nights rest. The whole process takes an average of about 10 hours, which makes my days short. The only time I have energy is the late afternoon/early evening, before I start getting tired again.
Other than the insomnia, life is pretty great.
I'll write to you next week (hopefully) with some stories from the past 6 months.
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