10th January 2025

• Took my last exam yesterday morning. Had my first class of the year the same fucking day, in the afternoon. Skipped class to go climbing with two classmates.
• Barely climbed because it was too crowded. Still did three four finger pull-ups, three three finger pull-ups, three two finger pull-ups.
• Realized there’s a non-zero chance I pass each of my courses (I already passed algebra). Can’t wait to see my supervisor’s face when he’ll see my grades (he told me I would never pass algebra).
• Had an existential crisis while thinking about what kind of research I could do next semester. Went through the list of research topics offered by my professors and found all of them boring. No I don’t care about isotropic quadratic forms. No I don’t care about the arithmetic of elliptic curves. Wait. What do I even care about. Have I ever been interested by a math problem per se?
• Can’t pinpoint what I like in math. The more I study the more I feel like I don’t understand anything we do (and that’s okay). Fourth year studying math and I still cannot wrap my mind around continuity. What the fuck is infinity. What the fuck is a “limit”.
• Pretty sure I’ll end up doing a PhD though. If someone asks me why, I’ll answer: I liked math, then it got weird and annoying. I wanted to go as far as possible in the subject just to make sure it doesn’t get any better.
• Started considering specializing in analysis and applied mathematics. Getting dirty looks every time I say it. Sorry if the biggest assholes I’ve ever encountered are doing algebra and the nicest people I’ve met are doing analysis (ummmhhh akchtually there isn’t a real distinction between analysis and algebra in higher levels of mathematics).
• Will choose my second semester courses based on whether the professors are nice or not (idgaf). Can’t wait to see my depressed classmates look down on me because I chose to have fun in the mathematical neurosciences course instead of crying while studying Galois theory.
• Learned so much in 2025 and will probably write about it. Spent New Year’s Eve with my boyfriend at home, cooked a delicious bourgignon with home-made seitan and expensive vegetables (still cheaper than your average restaurant), got slightly drunk and listened to good music.
• Am going to see Edmar Castañeda at a concert next month and it’s keeping me alive.
• Thank you for reading and Happy New Year.