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Personal/About Me

All about Willie.

2009.11.16 19:17:31 GMT Luc visits; Willie doesn't check e-mail Holy cow! I just realized that I spent a day at work without checking e-mail! Okay, to be honest, today I was hosting Luc Nguyen, who we invited to speak on his work about the regularity near the sing

2009.09.02 12:42:44 BST New beginnings: first days at Cambridge Heh. Did you, dear reader, notice the change on the date-stamp for the previous entry? It was posted in British Standard Time. Yes, I am now taking a position in the Department of Pure Mathematics and

2009.07.24 13:09:43 EDT There are some things money can't buy. For a visa, there's MasterCard How much I am spending on applying for a Tier 2 (General) visa to Britain: Visa application fee: $424.00 Return postage: $12.00 (for them to return my Diploma and other originals of supporting docume

2009.06.12 11:42:48 EDT Introducing my new blog: Asking Questions After thinking about it for a while, I've decided that I will get a WordPress account. Most of the reasons are given in this post from a few months ago. In any case, this will not mean the death of bl

2009.05.06 16:45:31 EDT Journal: Call me doctor 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

2009.04.17 18:22:07 EDT Dissertation status: finished! The dissertation is done! Actually I finished it yesterday around 2:30 pm. But I haven't had the chance to blog about it until now. Something about having a late afternoon seminar yesterday, more semi

2008.12.16 22:43:46 EST Illustrious company My advisor invited me over for dinner tonight. He wrote the book on nonlinear PDE techniques in the global theory for general relativity. Around the table were also I. M. Sigal, who wrote the book on

2008.09.10 15:58:02 EDT Some news Good news: With the weather pretty nice outside, it doesn't take long to bike over to the Institute of Advanced Studies. I took it easy on the way over, and the ride was 15 minutes from Fine Hall to S

2008.07.02 23:10:39 EDT Fireworks after moving in For some reason, Princeton Township decided to run its firework display this evening. Not exactly on the same calibre as the one given next to the Charles with the music of Boston Pop, but still quite

2008.06.27 18:46:15 EDT Honeymoon pictures I have returned from my Honeymoon in Britain. There will be text-based descriptions a bit later, after my wife and I sort out some more mundane details about moving into a new apartment, getting car f

2008.06.08 23:48:09 EDT It's finally sinking in... I am no longer a bachelor! By the great noodly appendages of the flying spaghetti monster, I am a married man! Ceremony was great, people were awesome. More detail to follow tomorrow or Tuesday.

2008.03.11 22:20:13 EDT Removal of Wisdom tooth and other stuff Much happened today. In the morning shower, I realized a mistake I've made in the calculation that I did yesterday. It is a good realization, whereupon I rid myself of a pesky term that I hadn't until

2008.02.07 10:28:33 EST Happy New Year Happy Chinese New Year! I think my penmanship (or should it be brushmanship?) was better two years ago. And strangely I cannot find any pictures of last year's. (Though, I composed the Lian myself th

2007.04.27 13:06:46 EDT Journal: the flight back; lost luggage Home sweet home! But not so for my luggage. First let me back track a bit. Dinner had been plentiful for the past few days: Tuesday, we treated Ms Yu and Tian to dinner (we being Pin and I) at the res

2007.04.25 17:21:15 CST Journal: hair cut, uses of Chinese ancient medicine-fu This is the first time I've been to the barbershop in almost two years. It feels good, to have someone professional, someone who knows how to handle thick Chinese hair, to give me a decent haircut. Th

2007.04.23 22:19:04 CST Journal: Elevators and badminton Elevator The elevator in this building allows for passengers to "cancel" a request. There had been several instances prior where, for example, Sergiu leaned against the panel and accidentally pressed

2007.04.18 21:15:40 CST Journal: Recap Lots to talk about here, so I'll actually include section headings. More Good Food Sometime around last weekend, I was in my office on the computer, and a westerner knocked on the door and asked in En

2007.04.13 08:38:03 CST Journal Whee! Two wonderful dinners in a row. Wednesday afternoon, Ionescu was invited to give a seminar on some recent stuff he has been studying with Sergiu. The problem is that of unique continuation: in p

2007.04.07 21:41:26 CST Journal: YiHe Yuan Yay! I went out to play today. (And thanks to S's wonderful suggestion of bringing a USB cable with me, now I have pictures!) Our wonderful host, Ms. Yu, took Sergiu, his family, Alex, and Jean-Michel

2007.04.06 08:56:26 CST Journal: Another day in China So wind-chill seems to be a big factor in Beijing. Without the wind, even the cool morning air feels wonderful once I am in the sun, but when the wind starts blowing, staying outside for long is unbea

2007.04.05 08:29:11 CST Journal: Smog, gaijin, pineapples I got up this morning, looked out the window, and it looks dank and dark and grey and all other kinds of unpleasant. As I put on my backup extra sweather, Pin said, triumphantly, to me, "This is what

2007.04.02 11:01:58 CST China: Journal 2 Yesterday we went out to lunch with Alex Ionescu (and Klainerman and the whole gang). We found out that at one of the cafeterias, they have a booth just for Islamic food (right next to the one for veg

2007.04.01 11:33:27 CST China, First few days I am currently in Beijing. At the invitation of Sergiu Klainerman (my advisor), my officemate Pin Yu and I traveled to China to join him, who is taking part of his sabbatical year at the Institute for

2007.01.17 00:43:14 EST My "English Education" It was junior year coming up for me, and my advisor noticed that I still hadn't any classes for the Literature and Art category of the basic distribution requirements for the bachelor of arts. I opted

2006.11.28 16:25:30 EST Toilet training I think S has in fact, potty trained Oz. She made the observation this morning that as soon as she set Oz over the toilet bowl, he defecated into the bowl. I struck that off as co-incidence this morni

2006.10.07 17:46:10 EDT There should be no biting in this household Oz is amazingly nibbly. I think that is a result of two things: the first is that he has gotten used to his environment and is now "unafraid" to "try new things"; the second is that he has gotten used

2006.09.16 18:30:22 EDT Hydrino talk At the invitation of Eric Krieg, I spoke today to the Philadelphia Association for Critical Thinking on the subject of "Classical Quantum Mechanics", a "theory" by Randell Mills, MD, which purports to

2006.08.27 16:49:55 EDT Pictures of pig/frog Pigs pigs galore. My pig shelf at home is almost full. Funny frog picture. This is what happens when I tried to take a picture of a frog hanging on a screen door. I probably had the camera too close

2006.08.16 15:09:26 EDT Office Assignment Office Assignments are out. I will be in 408 Fine next year. The office phone number would be x4219. I'd be sharing it with Kevin, Aaron, Phillip, Zhong Tao, and Pin (with the exception of Zhong Tao,

2006.07.14 04:18:08 EDT Journal: Grounds for Sculpture Well, not really a Journal per se, but, well, just think of it as my following that old Kodak (or was is Konica?) ad about writing my diary with a camera... Anyway, today S's mom, whom we shall call O

2006.07.03 23:51:12 EDT Journal: Cake! It is the Twins' birthday. In T's (not so exact) words: "I've heard that my sister has a birthday coming up, so I baked myself a little cake." We don't have icing at home, so mom first suggested nutel

2006.06.19 21:10:44 EDT Some more recaps More quick recaps of past weeks. May 29 - June 8 I spent in Boston. Notable events: completion of the first episode of Xenosaga, lots of Pikman, a going away party for S, dim sum with some other resid

2006.06.14 15:47:48 EDT Backlogged Journal: NC Trip III, Mem Day--05/23-28 backlogged update 3 (May 23) After getting up relatively late in the morning, we drove from Ashville to the outskirts of Charlotte, where we would stay. T and P were originally intent on making a stop

2006.06.12 10:29:40 EDT Backlogged Journal: NC Trip II--05/22 backlogged update 2 (May 22) Strangely, the only day with sub-par weather when we visited NC was the day we wanted to go see the Biltmore Estate. The estate is apparently the largest private home in t

2006.06.12 00:06:07 EDT Backlogged Journal: NC Trip I--05/20,21 backlogged update 1 After my general exams, father came to visit and we picked up my sisters from their schools during an overnight drive across 5 states. (May 20) The next morning, we set out for a f

2006.05.18 19:08:23 EDT General exam: barely cleared I made a complete fool of myself. If I were the examiner, I might not have passed me. It was disappointing and horrible. But I passed. Here's a transcript of what happened: Examiners: Sergiu Klainerma

2006.03.12 20:04:41 EST Journal: Orthogonality It got a tiny bit colder today, mostly because of the rain. I was originally planning on going out running (first time, like, ever; I decided that it would be a good way to work up my endurance). The

2006.02.28 00:12:24 EST Ode on the Death of a Favourite Cat Through fifteen winters, springs fourteen, Their love this orange cat had glean-- Deserved we all agree. For he's not just a pretty boy: With brains and brawls he oft brought joy, Or preys caught from

2006.02.27 19:08:17 EST French exam I met with Professor Nelson today to take the French language exam. He asked me to bring with me a book or a paper that I would like to use, so I brought Yvonne Choquet-Bruhat's Distributions, Th&eacu

2006.02.12 19:16:51 EST Journal: NAQT SCT + Blizzard Quite a blustery day. The Princeton area has over a foot (home has more like 15-18 inches). EWR just reopened a bit earlier. JFK and LaGuardia are still closed. New record snow fall in central park (2

2006.02.01 22:06:23 EST Emil 周華健, a.k.a. Emil Chow, is one of my favorite Mandarin singer. The release of his CD Emil and Friends coincided with the end of 8th grade for me, immediately prior to my leaving Ta

2006.01.01 22:09:15 EST Ich Habe Schwein Gehabt / The Proposition First post of the year! I did, in fact, have pork today. For "lunch" (actually, it was an "early afternoon" dinner), I enjoyed maple-glazed ham, macaroni and cheese, hopping johns, a salad, and miscel

2005.12.20 21:27:44 EST She said YES! (...more details after I return to NJ)

2005.12.09 20:30:11 EST Journal: snow, library computer bug, pooh have you ever witnessed lightning and thunder during a blizzard? i have now! Says S. White seems to be blanketing Massachusetts. Her flight out of Logan tonight was delayed until tomorrow morning. M

2005.12.03 23:30:33 EST CJE/PUJE2 concert today Concert today. Titled "Parker Shorter Nelson Nimmons", referring to the composers of the music that we played, i.e. Charlie "Yardbird" Parker, Wayne Shorter, Oliver Nelson, and Phil Nimmons. The first

2005.10.16 00:35:39 EDT Journal: CJE plays Kansas City Suite Concert today went well. More on that later. Last night, my sister T arrived home with two friends: she sort of forcibly recruited them to come to listen to my concert. For that I am grateful. The two

2005.10.10 21:07:01 EDT Journal: Yellow Sale Wheee! Cheaper books! I am still waiting to see if Thierry Aubin's Some Nonlinear Problems in Riemannian Geometry will ever be on the yellow sale (151 dollars is way more than I want to pay for that b

2005.10.09 02:33:53 EDT Journal Long day today. Just got back from school. And I left home at 8 am. The day started with rain. It seems that it didn't stop raining at all since yesterday (Friday) around noon. It drizzled yesterday,

2005.10.03 20:26:16 EDT Update to website; Cooking Journal The spider mystery has been solved: it is a wolf spider. Am in the middle of some renovation on the website: the "papers" and "teaching" sections will be up shortly, probably within the next 10 hours.

2005.10.02 17:51:51 EDT anti-wine and cheese Originally I planned to go to school today. There's a Towney vs Gowny Tourney in the badminton club yesterday and today. But after playing yesterday, my knee (and several large muscle groups) is feeli

2005.09.29 12:25:09 EDT Three happenings on a Thursday morning Three things marked this morning: a mathematical Eureka, a hug, and a discovery. The mathematical thought is directly related to yesterday's post on fluid dynamics so I just added it to that entry as

2005.09.26 22:45:35 EDT Willie the pooh Finds One The story began about 3.5 months ago, when we moved into our current house. I went to the local Bank of America to change my address (being a computer whiz actually resulted in my mistrust of doing fi

2005.09.22 23:44:39 EDT I grew up there 這是我的故鄉，我成長的記憶。這，是Google鳥瞰世界的影像&#

2005.09.19 17:24:49 EDT First day of class; At the supermarket The first day of classes is surprisingly uneventful. I woke up at nine, after sleeping a mere 6.5 hours. But my body feels like it wants to be up, so I let it. Showered, read some news on the web, and

2005.09.16 18:08:05 EDT Perplexing audition results Yay! For Me! Okay, I am actually more perplexed than happy at this moment. So, I went to Woolworth to check on the Jazz Ensemble audition results. To be honest, I wasn't quite expecting it to be poste

2005.09.15 23:00:56 EDT Two-day Journal, in which Willie discovers the Blue Line and Auditions for PUJE Yesterday I made an awesome discovery: the campus shuttle service. Actually, I knew that they existed since sophomore year, but while living on campus, taking the shuttle from one place to the other f

2005.09.12 22:05:17 EDT Department Reception; Cooking Journal Today was the reception for first year grads. I woke up earlier than usual (8:30am), showered, dressed, doodled around, had breakfast, and left home at 10:30. Got to school by 11. Spent about half an

2005.09.06 20:50:04 EDT Cooking Journal Mom left for Taiwan today. Had to get up early (4:30am) to take her to the airport. The large number of people at the airport at 5:30 in the morning, and the 5-minute queue in front of the "Departure"

2005.08.28 01:45:37 EDT On remembering Lane wrote in his LJ entry about the overflow of emotions from memories that just popped back into his head one night when he was in Kyoto. What really shook me was his comment near the end My memori

2005.08.26 00:00:00 EDT Private Entry First Private Entry. If you are a LiveJournal Friend, you get to see it.

2005.08.20 00:36:09 EDT Journal Woke up this morning with a really bad aftertaste of a bizarre dream. S knows all about it, and why I shouldn't include it in my journal entry. Note to self: the details of the dream is in a e-mail co

2005.08.18 22:30:24 EDT Journal (in memoriam of PG) After three months, I pulled out the ol' saxophone again. I was a bit rusty and playing with some of the up-tempo tunes was difficult for me. I should spend some time to work on my scales again. In ge

2005.08.17 22:19:28 EDT Journal Woke up. Late. As usual. Surprised to find e-mail from Elika, Princeton Unix User's Group's president, announcing the coming Student Activities Fair. As usual, the P-ug has a booth (half a table long)

2005.05.28 12:28:00 EDT misc. personal news and downtime to server Grrr.... don't feel like blogging now. I am jet-lagged from coming back from Taiwan just 36 hours ago. And S seems to have caught bronchitis. So I am not really up to doing anything just now. I just w

2005.05.08 13:00:00 EDT Personal News Argh... itai! Funny, after Friday's drill by Coach Jones, I was feeling quite alright on Saturday morning when I woke up. I was a little tight on my left oblique and that was it. But after playing for

© 2004-2008 Willie W. Wong, Sortir en Pantoufles: http://www.math.princeton.edu/~wwong/

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