I went to grab a quick lunch today at the student-run coffee shop. I had exactly one piece of money on me -- a five dollar bill. I handed said bill to the cashier in order to purchase my little container of aloo gobi. She pointed to a little nick in one corner of the bill (like a hamster had taken a bite out of the bill), and told me she was sorry, but she didn't think she could accept my money. Did I have anything else I could give her?

I beg your pardon? I didn't have any other money and said so. Much consternation ensued. Finally, she decided to go out and ask her manager, who was on her lunch break. She came back and cheerfully told me that she could accept my money after all.

This kind of blows my mind. Has this person never handled money before? It turns out that it's made out of paper, and can on occasion get slightly frayed, even torn. And even then, it can be exchanged for goods or services. It's not like I handed her a pile of ash and told her I had had a fire. It wasn't half of a ten dollar bill. It was a perfectly reasonable fiver. Perhaps this is a person who should not be put in a position where she has to handle cash transactions for hours at a time. Mind you, given that she interrupted her boss's lunch and held up a line of hungry patrons, she might not have to worry about it much longer.

Long-time readers (who don't use RSS) will have noticed that the Stagnometer hasn't worked in a few months. I always assumed that the problem was due to the web server being upgraded, but never actually bothered to diagnose the problem.

Recently, as I was helping Nath set up her blog, I decided it was finally time to deal with this important usability issue.

As it turns out, the problem was entirely my fault. I had moved some scripts around and neglected to update the python import statements so that the CSS script could find all the infrastructure it needed. The fix required a one-line change to a single file. I had simply never thought to look. I'm an idiot.

The downside is that, well, the Stagnometer works. In its absence, I had been living relatively guilt-free. Now I've reinstated my earlier blog-or-die policy. Unfortunately, I don't have anything in particular to say. Be prepared for some serious fadeage.

Saturday evening was a new experience for me. I'm not sure I've got the correct terminology here, but let me give it a shot. Apparently, I "watched the game" with "the boys". Did that sound right?

I was invited to a neighbour's house to watch the sixth game of the Stanley Cup playoffs. The itenerary was to consist of hockey, beer, scotch, and snacks. Now, this by itself is probably not enough to lure me out of my cave, but (a) the guys in question are a great, friendly, and fun group, and (b) the hockey was to be watched outside, in the hot tub. Where do I sign up?

Anyway, the event was just the kind of relaxed, fun, small-group socializing that I enjoy. Beer doesn't excite me but the scotch was tasty, and the hot tub was certainly comfortable. Nobody watched the game too closely, though I know that our extra bit of rooting did help Edmonton achieve their decisive victory. And sure, I went home with a bit of a headache. That was most likely caused by scotch and dehydration, but who knows -- maybe it was an overdose of Don Cherry.

Presumably, Poker Night is next...

I'm officially a father now, in the academic sense. On Friday, one of my PhD students successfully defended her thesis. Once some minor revisions are out of the way, she'll be a doctor and I'll be passing out cigars.

It's unusual to be graduating a PhD student after only three and a half years as a professor. I happened to get lucky -- things weren't working out between her and her current advisor, so two of us inherited her halfway through her PhD. Better yet, she was just about to "burst into flames", as her co-advisor put it. Since transferring to our supervision, she has produced four or five papers, including a best paper award and another that was nominated. All I really had to do was stand back and occasionally correct errant punctuation.

In general, Friday was a day of celebration. The defense was in the morning. In the afternoon, I represented the faculty at our school's undergraduate convocation, where I clapped a lot and waved at students I knew from teaching. In the evening, a very generous member of the admin staff threw a party for my student, where much wine was drunk and much delicious lasagna consumed (the start of a weekend of excellent food, by the way). I also decided to rip off a tradition that my advisor has. After toasting with champagne, I had my student sign the bottle, which I will proudly display in my office. I hope it will be the first of many.