Calculus happened, as did so many other courses. Economics was for sure a bore, but we didn’t really do anything - so I suppose it has grounds to be a bore for now. Physics the same, though it seems I’m incredibly rusty and prone to getting questions incorrect as always. I’m sure I’ll get back into the swing of things, althogh I’m ashamed at some of the basic stuff I’m getting wrong. Perhaps it means I have a bad foundation. That makes this a good time to build up the foundation.

Calculus is about the infinitely small and large; thus my calculus professor saw fit to tell a story. In calculus, you can calculate the area of a three-dimensional solid with the use of integrals. You do this by chopping up the 3D solid into infinitely small “slices”.

“You can find the volume of a cube easy,” my professor said. “But what about irregular solids? Here, I’ll draw one.” He sticks his chalk on the board, and as he draws this curious shape, he speaks:

“So, this is a pretty irregular solid. Yes… a loaf of bread. Now, you sell bread by volume. So in order to sell bread, bakers used to dunk their loaves of bread into buckets of water and measure the water that was displaced. Naturally the bread got pretty soggy - that’s why European bread has such thick crust, to prevent it from getting soggy.

But then a man came along, by the name of Newton, and invented integral calculus. And what do we do to calculate the area of something? We chop it up into slices. And thus, sliced bread was invented.”

We all laughed.

I sit under the stars as I write this, comfortably in a chair beneath a tree, watching students pass me by in the sidewalk lights’ glow. There is a beautiful cobblestone walkway just ten feet away from me, and a magnificent engineering facility some two hundred feet behind, but you wouldn’t know it from looking, because it looks more like a castle. I suppose if Archimedes had to discover that the volume of a solid is equal to the amount of liquid it displaces, such a building would be the appropriate place to do so. I read here, I write here. I check out some of the many cute girls here (I’ve abandoned my quest to garner a girlfriend in one week, which is up tomorrow, in favor of exploring all of my options, to which there are many).

And still not a single sign of a party. I wonder where they all could be… because that would be how I’d meet someone, if I did. That, or look for a photography club. By the way, I’m working on a new short story… I’ll probably have it finished rather soon. Especially since my favorite month of the year is just around the corner.