Diploma

Received the diploma today.

The whole event was awesome and inspiring in a lot of ways. The lectures were good. The chorus songs and orchestra were amazing beyond expectations. I was blown away.

Rector of the university (somehow the father of the only friend I had while I was still in the kindergarten) congratulated me in a really personal and a warm way. Or maybe these were well-crafted lines to resonate with everyone. Regardless, it worked.

I think my monkish behavior showed when I received the diploma and its folder. They were upside down and for some reason I had to turn them upright before I could walk on. Only then did I realize that everyone was waiting for me to already disappear so they could get on with the schedule XD.

At the after-event, I met a PhD in psychology and enjoyed the discussion about EEG experiments. Then met a honorary professor (friend) with whom we got to discuss a lot of the weird. I had previously received hints that he might have similar interests but I had not really had / taken the chance to chat with him on these topics. While it was a refreshing discussion, I was a bit afraid for his reputation because there were people passing by. But then again, times may be changing.

A truly wonderful event with perhaps a couple of minor things to note down.

Cascading spill

An empty water glass tipped over. For some reason, my simulation / intuition told me that my glass would tip over also. I didn't see how that could happen because the water glass fell in the opposite direction (but I did not account for table tilt while people were trying to save it). Regardless, my glass was also about to tip over and I tried to save it. Well, I was clumsy and failed so that the rest of my alcohol-free champagne soaked the table cloth.

Glass shard

Took my second glass of fruits.
Took some fruits from there and for a moment, I thought I saw something which looked a bit strange but it slipped my mind which was busy with other matters.

Encountered the texture of ... glass. Curious about it, I spit it out to see it. Since I had already bit pieces off of it, I made sure to chew them properly before I swallowed anything. Ate the rest of the fruit pieces one by one, checking if any of them had pieces of glass on them. None of them did.

Since the glass itself was in one piece, the only theory I could come up with was that the piece of glass had somehow flown from somewhere else and landed between the fruits.

Pointed it out to a waitress later and her face didn't look particularly happy about it.

Grain of glass

The situation described in the prior section reminded me of another similar experience.

Last week at work I washed my cup and poured in hot water for tea. Then I noticed that on my finger (still wet from the water), there was a small grain of what looked like glass. My first reaction was: sugar? But the sugar should have melted in the warm water. I thought it might've been just a grain of sand but I was freaked regardless. I poured my cup empty, washed it again, poured the water kettle empty, washed that, and heated some more water.

Probably thanks to that event last week, I did not freak nor panic today evening. While I'm pretty sure nothing will happen, eating glass is still not a particularly nice thing to think about.