Sep 26
Thesis & Festa Major in Barcelona
I flew to Barcelona on September 15th, and will be here until December 13th. By next Tuesday 29th I need to deliver the document and some forms to the department, starting formally the process of finally finish my PhD. Last time I posted here, I was working hard on the document. I have had finished a whole draft but many issues were pending, so we decided to delay an extra month the process. Some friends, who I'm very grateful to, have reviewed some text. Most of the new text just sucks, seriously, but it is slowly improving.
Some catalan friends went and visit us in Venezuela. I've confirm them many months ago that I could have time to spend with them. I didn't have the time, formally, but took the compulsory vacations anyway, and they were great. Venezuela is a wonderful country, except for a few important things, as being robbed at gun point in the Médanos de Coro. We manage to continue the journey, thanks to my possible reckless action of removing the money of my wallet. They get pissed off when the notes started flying and threatening me to be shoot. Nothing happened as I expected, and I saved the license, ID, and stuff that allow us to visit Mérida, Puerto Ordaz y la Gran Sabana. I was back to work by beginning of September, and was doing something real by 7th or 9th. It was hard to get into it again. Some time was consumed on dealing with errands, as dealing with Cadivi for buying euros for surviving during three months here. (Cadivi is hard to understand, BTW). I manage to get some support of it. I arrived in Barcelona just in time for going to the Planning conference - ICAPS - where we have a paper accepted. It was motivating to see other people's work and see what's going on. My advisor was right when he said I should attend if I want to continue on this business. The sad part is that my beloved wife is in Venezuela. Three months is a lot of time. There are no other options. I need to finish and she has work to do. And here I am. Barcelona is burning in Fiesta, concert everywhere in one of my favorites periods of the year. There is nothing as a free concert. This time I just coming office every day and working on the document. It is the way it goes. I'll finish, somehow.
