Since the last post I and spouse did take Amtrak from Nebraska to Emeryville, California. We got a sleeping car and enjoyed the view and the meals. Train food is a good order of magnitude or better than plane food, I must say, and although it took a bit of energy to make small talk with random people we were seated with for three meals a day it was also interesting and I enjoyed it. I got to learn about Sacramento, Germany, Australia, and geology and history from our meal companions. I took some pretty poor photos from the train windows -- really you've got to make the trip to believe it.
The Amtrak employees were all really nice and interesting people. Our train was late (4 hours?) but the blame really must be put on Union Pacific; one of their repair trucks tipped over on the tracks right outside of Chicago, delaying the train immediately after departure. Here insert requisite comments on the tragedy of American transportation and the fact that passenger rail does not have dedicated lines and freight takes precedence and etc. I need to go to bed so won't include such a discussion tonight.
The geology and nature visible was really amazing. Spouse was reading a history of the transcontinental railroad on the trip and told me lots of stories about Theodore Judah, who sounds like a brilliant man, and the construction of the American Gorge piece of the railroad.
I've just finished up my first week in Berkeley, attending the Connections for Women conference/workshop. Great speakers. Very busy. Great math. I learned a lot of connections in mathematics, many from women and many from men: more about cluster algebras and the Deodhar stratification and mirror symmetry for Grassmannians and Plucker coordinates and all sorts of things. This math is really beautiful -- I would like to try an expository post on the ideas of cluster algebras soon! We'll see what happens! The Joint Introductory Workshop for the semester starts Monday :)
