T for Ten, for 2010! Have an Happy New YEAR!!!

I'm working on a paper and some classes! This after Xmas as been so slow that I do urge 2010 to hurry up to make all this numbness go away.

Today a warm breeze flew through Lisbon. Although we still had rain, the 18ºC degrees invited for a walk outside. I did two... both to my car mechanic!

Today it was a day of hacking some code. Since Xmas that I've unable to concentrate in work and everything stopped! I've been procrastinating as never did before. I know that in the end this all comes back to me and it will make work double shifts to get everything up to date... but sometimes I need a break. Something to hold on to and just rest a bit. That's it.

Back from Xmas at my father in law house. I'm now back in Lisbon for a few days before heading to my parents for new Year. Living far away from both of them, we do have to divide our time between both families and Xmas is usually a time to travel around the country. Merry Xmas for you all.

I don't know what to make of this picture. One could easily be mistaken on the purpose of this pan at the feet of the statue. Is it poverty or is it a pan with food for pigeons that this square is filled with?

(this is Rossio in Lisbon)

Spent most of this saturday grading exams. Curiously I ended up finishing this task earlier than I thought. Probably it's just a matter of a good time management although I would say it was just pure luck! I usually see myself as a lousy time manager as I get dispersed very easily! Well, at least this time I didn't. (and I'm not taking into account the time it took to write this post)

by the way, do you know where does this clock keeps his time?

Week is over, lot's of work with a need to empty my head... But... then... nothing is like what it seems...

It's almost winter in Lisbon... The temperature has dropped to some bare 14ºC during the day and the nights are getting very cold. I do think we need to get this global warming right otherwise I'll be frozen for the next few months... and my electric bill will go up... (joking about the global warming, but what can we do if the world leaders don't get their act together? at least we can joke about it... )

There are some days in the year that are almost perfect. The last few days have been almost those days. The air is cold but the sun shows up almost all the time and there's no rain. This keeps you walking and taking pictures.

So "lisbonesque"!.

Anyone that visitis this city will see the clothes hanging out like this... It's a energy saving measure for a greener planet! Sun and wind dry the clothes as no drying machine can,. So if you think this is strange... you probably should look into your Drying machine power consumption and realize what you're doing to the planet... (I'm usually not this grumpy)

If everything goes well, my PhD will be about SYNC. Well, not Sync in the the general sense, but applied to communication networks. I'm now just starting to gather stuff to read and to finally understand the problem I'm going to be buried under for the next couple of years. And for starters... why not Mr. Sync himself: Steven Strogatz! For anyone that doesn't know... Steven Strogatz is a BIG name in Complex Systems Studies... BIG NAME!

Lagos is going under some construction in downtown. The mayor architects decided in favor of small lake in front of "Infante D. Henrique" and as with almost all project that include water... they sunk it... and in summer it will stink also... but that's another problem...