Imablog

The Hutterite made leather wallet that I’ve been carrying around for the last 20 years finally gave out on me this year with the stitching starting to become undone.

This Wallet has served me well since I bought it at the Old Strathcona Farmer’s Market back home 20 years ago. After I moved from Edmonton, it also served as a reminder of home, bringing back memories of my weekly visits to the farmer’s market where I would do a good chunk of my grocery shopping (and munch on some phenomenally good sausage sticks, also made by the Hutterites, while shopping).

After the stitching started coming apart, I even entertained the idea of trying to find someone who could restitch it for me (still considering it). Needless to say, The Wallet carries more than a little sentimental value.

When I saw the stainless steel wallet at Thinkgeek.com, I decided that when replacement time finally came, this would be the one to take the place of The Wallet. A couple of days ago, I finally got tired of the loose thread always getting caught on stuff so I decided it was replacement time. Today, New Wallet arrived.

New Wallet is a little larger than I expected, but much thinner too. Since it’s made from woven steel threads, it’s not nearly as flexible or stretchy as The Wallet is, so I’ve had to drastically cut down what I stuff in New Wallet to just the essentials. It’s fairly light and feels nice. Doesn’t look like it’s made from stainless steel threads. It’s also supposed to protect RFID enabled cards from attempts at drive-by readings. I wonder what kind of reaction I’ll get when it goes through an airport x-ray scanner.

Since Thinkgeek was also giving away these cool QR Code shirt as well, I decided to throw one of those in too. This is the code that came on my shirt.

I’ve been offered a very tantalizing opportunity to get started on something that’s been on my TODO list for a very long time: a PhD.

It’s been something I’ve wanted to do for a long time now, but never really had a good opportunity to do. Medical physics programs are pretty few and far between, with the closest one being offered at Duke. There are a couple other programs in Georgia, but still too far away to be practical, and quitting work to go do a PhD just isn’t all that practical for me.

Last year I was starting to consider doing a PhD in the biostats/biometry department at MUSC, but the coursework required didn’t really fit my background and I just wasn’t all that enthusiastic about it.

Now there’s the possibility of doing a PhD through the Clemson/MUSC Joint Bioengineering program. Although it’s in bioengineering and the course work still involves a lot of bio, it’s much closer to my physics background. I could also do it all here without having to make road trips to Clemson (bonus). There are a few details and administrative things I need to find out (like if they’ll let me do it part-time) but so far things are looking pretty promising. This prospect is one I’m much more excited about, and would likely involve me working on doing Monte Carlo simulation/modelling work.

It’s been a long time since I did the student thing and I’m pretty sure it’s going to be a big shock to the system once I start taking classes again. I doubt I’d be able to do more than 1-2 courses/semester and it wouldn’t leave much time for farting around on the computer like I do now. It’ll probably take me about 3-4 years to get all the course work done, but I’ll be able to do it concurrently with my research as well, so I think I’d still be able to complete a PhD in about 4-5 years.

Now I need to start learning about this GRE thing they make prospective grad students take.