Whoa! I am a PhD^* now.

I didn't sleep too well last night. I was way too nervous. There was really no reason for me to be though: I do not know (which is different from there doesn't exist) of a case when the advisor agreed to hold the Final Public Oral and then proceed to fail the student. In general the advisors tend to keep enough abreast of the students' work to prevent something like that from happenning. But I was still nervous. I kept worrying about whether all the right forms were filed and whether the PDF slides work and little details like that.

Also last night was very cold. May have something to do with the fact that wife is in Chicago right now for a conference.

In any case, as always happens when I am nervous, I got up way too early (6:30am). So I got myself an egg for breakfast, and took a shower. Then the worrying paid off. I double checked the list of stuff I need to prepare and remembered that I needed to prepare an electronic copy (in PDF format) of my dissertation, burnt on a CD, to be given to the Mudd Manuscript Library along with the two bound copies and a check for $175. The bound copies were on display in the department, as customary prior to the defense. The check and the CD, I completely forgot. (There's also a form, but I filled that out yesterday, and it was on my desk in my office.) So those were prepared.

Since I was up anyway, and couldn't find anything else I forgot to do, I hopped on a bus and came into the department in time for Peter Constantin's lecture given for the Fefferman Conference. I didn't understand much.

Around 10:30, I went back to my office, threw the champagne into the fridge. (The bourbon I left at room temperture.) Met up with Pin and Xinliang, the two of whom graciously accepted my request to be the bearer of the food and drinks after my defense.

I had an early lunch at 11:30.

At noon, I headed down to the room to "inspect it". Also to find John Vincent (thank you, John, thank you so much), our resident "computer doctor", who kindly provided me with a laptop and a video projector to use for my defense. It took us a good 10 minutes to complete the set-up. John found in his bag a new infrared clicker for advancing and rewinding the slides, so I had the honor to be the first person to use the clicker. :)

One of the unfortunate things is that the power cord for the slide projector was rather short. This forces us to put the projector rather close to the wall, which made the projected image rather small. So everyone huddled to see the slides.

My nerve was still a mess when the audiences started arriving. First was Aaron Naber, with whom I chatted for a bit. Then people trickled in, and I was rather pleasantly surprised by the number of people! I had close to twenty people in the audience (roughly bigger than a normal analysis seminar here!), probably due in no-small-part to the fact that the Fefferman conference is also happening. (Spyros also showed up, which was nice.)

After all the committee member arrived, I started talking. And the next hour or so is a blur! I was completely on autopilot for the presentation and the answering of questions. So I quite honestly don't remember most of the questions asked during my defense. I am really glad that I prepared PDF slides. Doing it on the black board would have meant that the presentation would have taken much longer, and much less clear. In the end I finished the presentation in about 50 minutes. The committee then deliberated for about 5 minutes, and then the Monopole (Champagne) and the bourbon were opened!

(Also a big thanks to my lovely wife who made blondies.)

* Actually, I am not 100 percent sure what I am right now. Technically I have fulfilled all degree requirements, and people have been referring to me as Dr. Wong in jest. But I am pretty sure my official degree is only conferred in June.