Well, I've entered that stage in my life everyone had warned me about: I'm not making any new friends, and it's a bit of a struggle holding on to the old ones. Life is so different outside of academia. Fortunately, I've got the Big City out there, and in the coming few months things should get better, as I find things to do. (For example...)
This last thursday I spent a few hours in Bryant Park, playing chess. I think I will never tire of chess, at least at the level of a few hours a week that I currently play it at. I have so much room to improve... there was one old russian there, who they called "Grandmaster" (he probably wasn't, but I didn't see him lose a game, even spotting pieces/time) who beat me spotting me a knight. That was embarrassing, but not really, and a lot of fun. If all else fails, and I can't break into the Yeshivish "scene" (ha!), I may become a regular at the Park (and probably washington park too, where they play for money. and backgammon!). I could see myself sitting there muttering about gambits and politics over coffee after work, being thrashed by Russian phd "web designers" who win chess tourneys in their spare time. Not so likely, but at least a place to go when I'm lonely.
I saw my good friend Dave the other day, back from Japan. I've known Dave since... fourth grade, we go way back, certainly farther back than any other friend I'm still in contact with. We both play poker, and have done some of that. We went to a bar in Fair Lawn (so we could both walk back home), and oddly enough half of our middle school was there back from college, and one of them recognized us. She introduced herself, and I remembered her only as the first girl to grow breasts - really, this was the only recollection I had of her. This sparked a long, snobby conversation with Dave about how stupid most people are. Most of my life has been spent in Elite Institutions, where everyone is assumed to be on the same track, and rather ambitious about it; the other kids in this bar led lives consumed by drinking, flirting, and sports. It was an odd experience.
My mother is so holy. Friday night, I was trying to learn something, not having done so basically all week, and I randomly (ok, not random, arbitrarily) opened up to the first page in Berachos. She asks me what I'm studying, and I tell her I'm learning gemera, and she got so proud. Deep down, she's so jewish. She actually sat down for a while, and we read the first mishna and a rashi or two, and then had a long conversation about a lot of different stuff, and she unknowingly gave me some well-deserved mussar - "so how much do you study, about a page a day?" -- "Eh, no, I'm kind of a bum" -- "Well, start off slow, a little bit every day, maybe a quarter of a page, whatever you can do, it's very good, very important". What a yiddeshe neshoma. G-d bless her. Hopefully I will start learning more - if you talk to me, harass me about it. I've been a real bum lately.
Work is interesting. I am totally in love with concept of volatility; the way an option's price is equal to its hedging cost is really surprisingly beautiful, in that a-priori obvious but deeper-than-it-looks kind of way. And in practice, it's like this eternal war of gamma against theta, and everyone is always fighting the inescapable fat tails. It's amazing how new markets for volatility (and for risk, really) are, (despite being older than time in some cases, i.e. life insurance), and how much everything has evolved in really just the past 30 years. There's still tons of work to be done (and I don't just mean on the productiong/trading side.) Someone's got to figure this stuff out eventually.
Overall things are going well, but I really want to hear from people, and I apologize if you've been trying to get in touch with me and can't. The best thing to do is call me, it will make me so happy.
Shavua Tov to all, and now I must sleep.
