Louise's thoughts

Going to the country

This weekend I am going to the country side with my brothers and cousins. Our family has a house, well actually 3 houses but they are small, right across from the beach. I hope I don't run into any cows, seals, jellyfish or spiders. And yes, I will be bringing my sneakers.

Friends saved my day

When I finally got online around lunch time I realized what a small world this is. Today I happened to have a lot of emails from friends and acquaintances around the world (well, mostly California) and it was just such a rewarding feeling to see that someone thought about me enough to write me. There was even one job related email, which freaked me out because that means that I have to finish up my thesis. Right now.

TDC ruined my morning

So my coffee shop failed me today. I was there at 8.30 ready to type and check my email. I ended up spending an hour trying to get online; somehow the redirect function in the browser did not want to redirect so I could log in. It just said 'page cannot be displayed'. At first I thought it was my computer, that it was confused about suddenly having to use wireless after a couple of days worth of wired LAN. I gave in and called their hot-spot hot-line and after a couple of re-directs ('sorry, they printed the wrong number on the brochure') I got a very competent young admin guy on the phone.

As most often happen to me, they are very specific about things, asked me about all the things that I had already tried (check 'connect even though it is an insecure network', restart the computer etc.) and I spared him my sarcasm when he instructed me 'go to the start menu, click 'run', then write C.M.D. and then type in ipconfig \renew ('Oh you mean open a command prompt and renew the IP config?'). In the end he suggested me to pay for extra help desk service, 120 kr an hour unless of course I knew someone else who could help me out. I thanked him for his service so far and hung up. Being in computer science means that I should never have to pay for any kind of computer service. After an hour and a half I gave up and started writing on my thesis despite not being able to download the newest version that I had made on my desk top computer in my office yesterday. But my annoyance was constantly surfacing and I couldn't really concentrate. I wanted to check my email!

As it turned out it was neither my wonderful Vaoi, neither my incompetence in diagnosing non-working wireless networks. It was the hotspot itself that was malfunctioning and after chatting with a cool, skinny coffee shop guest who offered to call TCD (I had sort of talked to them already) I felt much better. Despite not having checked my email the whole morning. I still wondered how the nice TDC guy did not even consider the fact that this was the case and only offered me pay-per-call help. When all comes down to basics, I think I would make a better help desk worker than this guy; he didn't offer me any suggestions outside what I could have thought of myself and I tend to think of all possible options and worst case scenarios. Like the time I helped this hot-shot professor (no name mentioned) connect to the wireless internet that was key protected ('but it doesn't ask for the network key anywhere!', 'no, but you have to input it in this wonderfully blank field'). I might not know everything in this world about computers but trying and trying and thinking is a good step on the way.

DSL

I got a wonderful 512/128 Kbit/s DSL connection at home today. Now I don't have to walk downstairs to my coffee shop to get the real world inside my computer, now I can stay home all day. Thank you TeleDenmark. I still need to make it wireless, though, but that will be some other day.

Royal Carriage

Only in Copenhagen do you get stuck behind a royal horse driven carriage on the way to work...

How to write a thesis

I reread my blog entry from yesterday this morning because I was worried that it might be too personal. As I read it again, I concluded that since I generalized out a bit in the end about how it is to be in Copenhagen, it was just fine. Not too personal. An hour later as I struggled with my method chapter as usual, I realized that this entry had an exact shape of what a thesis should look like. Not only had I written an entry that resembled a thesis in structure but I also realized that this was the very core of how to analyze and present data.

First you start off with something cheeky, like 'we have a problem from real life' (I felt guilty about not having seen my parents and called them up). Then you present the circumstances and the setting (I had no dinner, I was hungry), before presenting the data collected (I had exactly three tomatoes, two lemons and a couple of ginger cookies), the data even have important characteristics that I have analyzed myself (the ginger cookies were old, hence I should probably not eat them at all, even though they could have made some sort of dinner). The story is culminating by the core results after careful analysis (I went to my parents and had nice fish and rice) before broadening out to the greater generalizations and implications for the field (I often end up being spontaneous here in Copenhagen), exemplified from the representative data (like discussing sociotechnical theories with my dad) and concluding on the bigger scheme (I like being in Copenhagen). Finally the thesis should end with yet one last cheeky remark (I didn't get to write that much on my thesis).

However, I think this says less about the structure of my entries and more of where my thoughts are right now...

Meet the parents

As I was getting in this evening, I gave my mom a call. Since I hadn't seen my parents for about three weeks, I thought that I should at least call and ask if I could come over some time this weekend. When I asked how she was doing, she replied that she was cooking dinner and asked if I wanted to come over. Quickly realizing that the edible things in my kitchen were limited to three tomatoes, two lemons and some very old ginger cookies, I weighed the options of either getting no dinner but get some writing on my thesis done or getting nice salmon with basmati rice and lemon sauce and hang out with my parents and brother. I was out the door in a second. So the good thing about living in Copenhagen is that I always end up doing very spontaneous things, like drinking white wine with my parents discussing my dads latest acquired gadgets; this time being a network monitor that should try and at least diagnose why their wireless network worked so bad in the apartment. you could be on the network for about three minutes before getting kicked off, which had annoyed the h... out of me at Christmas. Or we would discuss Wiebe Bijker's work on sociotechnical theories in relation to bicycles, bakelite and bulbs. So Copenhagen is not a bad plact to be right now. But this means that my magic number of the day is a steady 1000 which I managed to reach at my coffee shop this morning.

494

Like my friend I went to the ICT workshop today and had a good time. Except for the horrible coffee I had to drink all day, the talks were interesting, some even comprehensible and relevant for my field. A lot of the research was preliminary, in its fragile state of initiating and carrying out the early tasks of larger projects. But the visions were there and despite some people's inability to make readable slides, the field of mobile information communication technologies and beyond is flourishing in the academic parts of Copenhagen.

Besides this wonderful workshop I went on a 'networking date' with an ancient friend of mine later today. It was nice to catch up on what is happens in corporate Denmark but I must admit that I am not envious of his job. Opposite a corporate manager I don't have to yell at people, I can just shake my head and walk away; I don't have to answer to nitty-gritty big bosses who's world evolves around budgets, I can just tell my advisor that my draft is late or that I have a headache and won't be in for a week (not that I ever did any of those things, but it is merely the option that gives me a sort of freedom). If I feel like taking the rest of the day off to go shopping I do that (I think I have done this a couple of times but I view it rather as field trips). Times like this I realize that I am in the right area for my mindset, so I biked home with a great sense of satisfaction and wrote another 494 words on my thesis.

2.5 pages = 1250 words

This is how much I need to write per day in order to follow my insanely ambitious time schedule. Today I was at a critical stage, since I needed to redo a whole chapter completely, that is rewrite it from scratch. I had written a draft to my method chapter about six months ago, but I didn't know how such chapter should look like at the time and I have gotten much wiser since on what research method is (thanks to certain people and books). So I took out a blank screen and wrote two section headings. Then I pointed to curser to the menu, clicked 'tools' and then 'word count'. I had 4 words. Bummer. Hope the counter will give me some more words tomorrow.

Cool but untrusty

So I finally got enough ice cubes, smileys and hearts on my Orkut profile for it to show and besides indicating me to be 10 hearts sexy (it must be my shoes), I am apparently also cool. However, I am not nearly as trusty as cool; where I have a score of 12 ice cubes, my trustworthiness is a low score of 6. I am considered precisely half as trusty as cool. So what should I make of this? At first it worried me but after some careful thinking I realized that it is in fact cool to be untrusty. It indicates that you should not always take my words for granted and that I might tease you and tell lies just for the fun of it. I cannot always be trusted to tell the truth about what I do, where I've been and what I want. Despite my Orkut friends’ rating of me as less trusty than cool, I must warn you that when it comes to other people, I tend to be nice. I usually only gossip about myself (but do that quite often) and I am trustworthy of personal secrets (I keep several of them at the moment). So let me be mysteriously untrusty but totally cool and I will be happy with my Orkut friends' opinion about me. No matter what, I care more about real-life friends' interaction than what they say about me on a website.

Burned out

After three weeks of conference, workshop and seminars I have now returned to Copenhagen with no exact plans to leave any time soon. A scary thought. But despite my elaborate plans to get going on real work, that is serious writing on my thesis and preparing for a talk on Tuesday, I woke up this morning totally burned out, with a major headache; this made me realize that perhaps I should do what other people do once in a while: take the weekend off. After taking a little blue pill that would magically make my migraine disappear, I rearranged my plans of the gym, shopping, writing and going to the movies into relaxing, shopping, light reading and staying in at night. I had briefly forgotten that a side effect of the blue pill is sleepiness, so my new plans got slightly modified to sleeping, grocery shopping, reading and catching up with some of my email.

My past weeks have been fantastically fun, rewarding, exciting, inspiring, essential for my career and a little too social. And that says a lot when it is the most social girl in the world talking! The last week was especially heavy on interaction because the seminar was scheduled until 9pm almost every night and alone-time was limited to an hour each afternoon. I did well though, participating in the whole series of lectures and it was only the last evening where my head suffered alcohol injuries. The next morning that made me proclaim that I would not go out drinking anymore, before I turn in my thesis. I had several witnesses of senior research staff kind, who all laughed, but I was serious; I don't say I won't have a glass of red wine with good friends, but the numerous cosmos and drambuie (what was I thinking?), no way.

Despite the heaviness of socialization these past weeks, I also got a lot of academic input. I had an excellent review and discussion of my thesis research, which I didn't just enjoy, it made me think that it is possible. It is reasonable for me to think that I can write this thing, describe an actual contribution to my field and submit about 150 pages on the subject. As a friend of mine said last week: it will be tough, but it will be done. I am trying to structure my days differently, attempting to work at home a little more, because the social person that I am, I cannot keep my mouth shot for more than half an hour when there are people around me. We will see if I die of boredom.

Finally I have to admit that one of the best part of these social weeks was in fact the chance that I got to have a girly night with one of my girlfriends; we spend the whole evening drinking cosmos, eating candy and talking about guys, research, sex and more guys. It is so good to be back in Copenhagen among girlfriends that you can tell anything, and get a straight answer to life's big questions.

Away

I am leaving for a week again, this time going to a seminar in the northern part of Sealand, Denmark (wow, I don't have to fly again!). This seminar is one of my favorite activities of my PhD studies, because we meet interesting people, read interesting literature that we then discuss and finally, get a good review of our PhD project as it looks like now. This is also where I met my favorite advisor last year and thereby having my project (and later my life...) take an interesting turn. This year I don't expect to have the seminar change anything except perhaps my view of interesting issues and people. The reason I look forward is simply because it gives me a good chance to hang out with people like me, participate in fruitful discussions and get some of the 12 ECTS that I still need to finish my degree. How dull that may sound.

Partying in Cambridge

Last night I went out with some conference fellows, we took the traditional British route: pre-dinner beer at the pub, curry dishes at the Indian restaurant, after dinner beer at another pub, and finally clubbing until they closed at 2 am. Strangely enough this pattern is all determined by British closing hours, since the pub closes at 11 pm, you have to get as much out of their opening hours as possible. I was quite surprised by the average age at the pub; people explained it as being Cambridge, a student town, but some of the people didn't look a day over 16. They were all asked for their ID and quickly got plastered, stumbling around. It was worse at the club and I was again appalled by their lack of taste (clothes) and lack of ability to just stop drinking (or switch to coke as I practice sometimes). In the bathroom I overheard a girl, who could hardly make herself understood, talking to the girlfriend, who desperately wanted to know why she was angry. Obviously it had something to do with a guy (understandable on my part).

I got to hang out with fellow researchers and for once they were not only students 5 years younger than I, but actually people with real jobs. For once I felt like I was perceived as a fellow researcher and not just another student. Although I was my company's token women, except for dinner, I didn't think too much of it as I sometimes do. I guess it is all about my own attitude towards the situation and my level of intimidation of people who do work that I admire but don't understand.

Partying in Cambridge was fun, but that was just as much due to the company. I don't feel the need to party until 2am anytime soon, but know very well that I will be talked into something similar next week. That is the point about having conferences, workshops and seminars for a whole month: I will not need to, not want to, not have time to do any kind of social thing for the next couple of months, because that time is devoted to the most important thing in my life right now: my PhD thesis.

Buying a book

Buying a book is not as simple as it seems. It is not just taking out your MasterCard and paying for 300 pages of paper with text and sometimes pictures, it is a whole cognitive process of picking out the one you had in mind or had been recommended, glancing through it and evaluating to which degree it will gratify your need. Then comes the great process of actually making a decision as whether to buy it or not. It is always something that takes me long time, because there are so many issues to consider: is the book worth the money, do I have money on my expense account (well not really anymore), will I ever read more than the introduction?

But buying a book involves more complicated measures than even these practical but time consuming actions described above. I realized this the other day when I ended up in a social science section of Borders. I needed a specific book on qualitative research methods by Patton, and since none of the other 3 bookstores had any copies of this, I ended up at Borders, just in case. I found several other books on qualitative research methods but I particular looked into one by Silverman. I decided to give it a cup of coffee's attention and started on page 74 where the author explains the main concepts of theory, concepts, framework, method and methodology. As I was sitting with my skinny latte (that's what they call it here) I realized that buying a book has more layers than I initially thought. The author explained in a reasonable way what he understood by the five concepts and although I have a general understanding of them from studying social science and computer science, it was refreshing to see a tangible explanation of what someone else think lies behind these notions. However, I didn't buy the descriptions as the facts of research. The explanation was simplified and lacked examples, it was not exactly what I needed to know for my research. The positive part was that I am well aware that there a as many descriptions of what theory is as there are researchers and I therefore decided to buy the book for a while until I could create my own notion of the five concepts. Of course I then hope some day, to be able to write insights and descriptions of relevant concepts that other people will weigh and perhaps even buy. In the end you don't just pay money for a book which enables you to take it home, you buy the book or parts of it according to your own interpretation. That is the beauty of books.

Stereo MCs

So I reached Cambridge and everything is just so neat. I walked around the first night and besides the pleasure of seeing green things again (fields, trees, grass etc.), I was quite impressed by the cuteness of the town, the pretty architecture and the numerous book stores. On top of my wonderful walk through tiny pedestrian streets I found a cozy coffee shop serving good quality cappuccino. I was thrilled sitting there preparing for the three next days' workshop.

Since I stepped out of the train station I had been humming the Stereo MCs great 80s hit 'step it up'. I was terrified that I would get run over by left driving cars that I didn't notice before too late. By humming the song, I could remind myself to keep left and look right. 'To the left ... To the right ... Step it up, step it up, it's alright' had magically transformed into: 'Keep it left ... .Look right ... Step it up, step it up, you're alright'. And magically enough, I didn't have many problems surviving my first day.

Cambridge

I am going to Cambridge to a workshop on trust and security in ubiquitous computing for the rest of the week. Besides the obvious relevance to my PhD thesis and further research, I look forward to seeing Cambridge and some old friends. I am horrified though, that I will get run over, because I have spend less than a handful of days in left-driving countries and the last time I had a really good guide who constantly told me to watch out and lead me through the pedestrian streets of Glasgow rather than the countryside full of fast cars. But I guess that is one of the risks one takes in life. Discover new countries, new traffic rules, new accents and new powerplugs. If it wasn't for the deviations in this world, it would surely be a boring life.

Back in Copenhagen

I have now returned from Vienna and are slowly recovering from a week's worth of interesting and less interesting talks, seeing old friends and acquaintances, meeting potential employers and going out every single night. Although I was hungover and dead-tired I went to a party last night an hour and a half after my flight had landed and today, it seems as this finally canceled out the exhaustion. I am now the proud owner of a slight headache but no hangover and no tiredness. Pictures from Vienna will be up later this afternoon at the usual address followed by CHI2004.html.