Colourful theatre and a trip around Europe

Wow! What a fast couple weeks it has been. Please note that the spellings in the title are proper British spellings :) Two weeks ago today, I saw Les Miserables. It was absolutely incredible! They'll be in Boston in Feb/March, so if you'd like to go you can definitely have my company! The music is great, the dancing and stage/set are incredible, altogether an amazing show.

I'm writing you from Barcelona at the tail end of my week off in Europe. Traveling about with my friend Carolina, I have visited Venice, Florence, Naples, Rome, and Barcelona is our final stop. It's been a whirlwind adventure of seeing Europe. Venice was beautiful, with canals lacing the city left and right. We took a traghetto across the Canal Grande, which served as a nice 30-second gondola experience. I really enjoyed the city. With good gelato, walkable distances, and streets with no room for cars, what more could you ask for?!

In Florence, Marco was the manager of our hostel, a very friendly and helpful person. We had a nice dinner there, a two course meal with salad for dessert (interesting thought, the salad after the meal :) We visited some nice gardens, saw a great panoramic view of the city, and enjoyed it quickly, after which we headed to Rome.

We found it quite a hard time getting into our hostel in Rome. Ended up spending the night in a nearby B&B for a little over 1.5 times the price :( Luckily we got into the hostel for the next night. From Rome, we took a train to Naples where we visited a small town that had an ancient Flavian Amphitheatre. Unfortunately, all the archeological sites in that town were closed on Tuesdays ... grrr. Anyway, at least it provided a wonderful panoramic view of the Terranian Sea/coastline. Naples had some great seafood, then we were rushing to make the train back before our 24-hour ticket expired, so we got to see some old buildings down the main drag of the city very quickly!

Rome, of course, was amazing. We visited the Colosseum first thing in the morning, and took a tour that was definitely worth it. It started to rain, but then let up for a while as we explored the Palatine hill area and the Roman Forum. The history there dates back as far as 430-something BC. AMAZING. It rained again as we made our way to the Vatican, where we arrived (most unfortunately) as the Sistine Chapel closed ... grr again. It closes very early at 4.15/4.30. Anyway, we got to see St. Peter's basilica, where they purport to have his ashes in a little box beneath the floor...you can look in and see a sign that says this is St. Peter, but I'm amazed if they really know it's him. The church is a little bit gaudy in that it has inscriptions on the floor saying how large several other large cathedrals/basilicas are, and making the clear point that this is the biggest.

We cruised around Barcelona a little bit in the rain yesterday, but that made it kind of a bummer afternoon. I'm praying for sunshine for today or Saturday morning so that I can hit the beach once before getting back to work. I'm looking forward to jumping into a pool starting Monday and starting to get in shape for the end of the season upon my return to BU. I'm looking forward to seeing the famous Gaudi cathedral, the zoo, and some other Barcelona attractions, but the sunshine is definitely what I want to experience, so that our "Sea Point Hostel" will be worth the walk (it's right on the beach, a ways from the city!)

Please pray for a job for my mom, a sunny day for Barcelona, strong friendships in London, and a good internship experience.

Let me know your mailing address if you desperately desire a postcard from Rome or London!

Stay strong and do keep writing...I enjoy reading your emails :)

-Brian
--
===========
Brian Patton
http://people.bu.edu/bjp/
http://people.bu.edu/reallife/ourstories.html

London, Scotland, etc.

Hi all :)

I've been enjoying myself here in the UK, getting to know London, the Tube, the TV stations, Scotland, the national rail system, and loving the 1.84 exchange rate (not really!). I'm taking a class in European capital markets, which has been very interesting. I finished applying for BU's nomination for the Rhodes and Marshall scholarships for two years of further study (in economics) here in the UK at Oxford, LSE, or St. Andrew's. I had a telephone interview with such figures as Sheldon Glashow (Nobel in Physics) and Jon Westling (former BU president) earlier today. Pray that I have made a great impression on the selection committee so that I can progress further in this.

In the past couple weeks, I've found a church I'd like to attend regularly and met a weekly small group not far from where I live. I went to see a play with them last Thursday night (Pericles, Prince of Tyre) at Shakespeare's recently-rebuilt Globe Theatre. Tonight I will watch Playing With Fire at a venue closer to the West End (London's theatre district). The show at the Globe, by the way, was really impressive. I was a groundling and got slowly soaked by a very light drizzle, but their use of the theatre was incredible. We went to The Anchor, a pub, afterwards and relaxed for a few minutes in the warm place that Shakespeare's men used to use as a changing room (a pub since the middle ages!).

This past weekend, my flatmates and I traveled to Edinburgh, Scotland. We stayed at a hostel there that wasn't incredible, but it was a bed. We climbed Arthur's Seat, a mini-mountain on the first evening and barely missed a huge rainstorm, approaching from all sides, then scattering into a beautiful, 180-degree rainbow (2 of them, actually). The next day we visited the Museum of Scotland, then caught a train out to Stirling, where William Wallace won an important battle in the 1300s (cue Braveheart music). We visited Stirling castle; not very impressive relative to Windsor and Buckingham, but a fun time nonetheless. That afternoon, we walked briefly around Stirling, visited the oldest townhouse in the area (quite melodramatic!), then caught a local bus to a couple cities away to visit Alva. Even Edinburghers don't know exactly where Alva is, but we found out that there was a local festival, the Alva Glen Illuminations, going on and we just had to see that :) Actually, we thought we might hike there; the Illuminations were an afterthought. We got in there too late to hike, but we did get to see the end of the Second Duck Race (kids racing rubber duckies down a creek), enjoy dinner at a local pub/B&B with a lovely Scottish lass as our waitress, then head back out the the Glen for the real Illuminations events. A band of local pipers (including a little 8-or-10-year old) played some great tunes, I bought some assorted homemade cakes in a baggie (these were yummy), and then we walked through the glen to see much of the vegetation lit by candles (historical) and halogen lights (not too historical). Got some fun pictures of a guy juggling fire; he breathed it too. Listened to a local band play some older and recent hits. We got a bus back to Stirling, where we walked around the town for a little while (I got some McDonald's for the first time since I've been here). Not much of a night life at all there; actually pretty dead at night :) We caught our train back to Edinburgh and got to sleep shortly thereafter. The next morning, Sunday, I took off on my own to see a bit more of the city; I bought a Claymore, the sword William Wallace used, and am enjoying swinging it around and seeing how shiny it is :) Don't worry, it didn't cost a ridiculous amount, although I did think it unusual that I would buy such a thing, wise a spender as I am.

I'm enjoying classes; working hard on occasion, doing reading and writeups. Most of the time, enjoying the city. Will probably end up working with an accounting firm or an investments firm. Hope all is going well back in the states. Let me know if you have any London friends I should meet.

-Brian

--
===========
Brian Patton
http://people.bu.edu/bjp/
http://people.bu.edu/reallife/ourstories.html

London

I am in London for the semester. Send me an email if you care to find out how it's hanging.
Call if you really want to hear my voice (probably better to pre-arrange this; I'm 5 hours ahead of the East coast): 011 44 207 590 7005

Mario Music

This is amusing:
http://homepage.mac.com/mrspleen/iMovieTheater6.html

Carlton St.

I'm all moved in now, Dave's a good roommate, we've visited our roof (accessible via fire escape), and I've bought food so I can eat this summer. I posted my mailing address in my last post, please send me a letter or something.
I've now worked for a week. Really fun people to work with. I'm learning stuff that BU computer science just doesn't teach, but which is really important to actually getting an information-systems position out of school. I work downtown in the financial district, which is a new experience. People are more dressed-up (myself included) and faster-paced than home, or even back at BU.
Watched Star Wars 3 last night with Derek. Great movie, tied up all the loose ends for me; Derek and I will be watching Star Wars 4 tonight, to see what other loose ends got tied up for us :) It's pleasant to be here, but feels a little more lonely and tiring than last summer, perhaps because more traveling is involved in getting to work. The weather has been bummer until today, also. That's probably a big part of the whole tired-out thing. Today is beautiful and sunny, was cloudless all morning. I got some fruits & veggies at Haymarket and all is well.
Hope your Saturday is beautiful as well.

Phantom! Mailing address

I'll be living with David Hill this summer, at the following address:
Brian Patton
45 Carlton St. #8
Brookline, MA 02446

I saw Phantom of the Opera last night with Ellie, Derek, and Rob (see pics). It was as incredible as I had ever imagined it could be! And then some. What a show; I love the music, and having scenes to put with that music now makes it even better than ever.

Some of my favorite lines, sung by Raoul as he proposes:
"Then say you'll cherish me: one love, one lifetime.
Let me lead you from your solitude.
Say you'll need me with you, here beside you.
Anywhere you go, let me go too.
Christine, that's all I ask of you.

...Love me, that's all I ask of you."

Finals halfway done

Well, I'll be in town for the summer, which is pretty exciting. I'm excited for the guys who will be in town (girls too, I guess :) because I think we'll be able to learn a lot from each other in a more relaxed environment that summer brings. I'm so excited for my job. It was completely unanticipated, but God provides in mysterious ways.
I'm going to miss a bunch of Boston people after this week :( so I have to be saying my goodbyes this week. Also, SMG just informed me that I can't take the Management & Finance core class while I'm in London since I haven't taken SM323 (Core). Maybe I can get signed into the class once I get to London, 'cause I would really like to take it "European Institutions & Enterprises"... That's all for now. Time to get coffee with a friend soon.

Finals Week!

Ah, the end approaches. This year, I'm kind of wishing the end didn't come upon me so soon, as I'm thinking I'll miss Boston a lot during the fall :( I'll be studying abroad in London, which should be a really fun experience. But I'm bummed to miss all that's going to be happening with BU Real Life and all my junior friends that are returning to campus.
Alas, I guess this is how college goes. At least Carolina and Kathleen and others will be in London, when I need a good American accent :) I will miss this year's seniors. Of the past three years, (obviously) these are the seniors that I've gotten to know the best. I'm excited for the summer. I have a job at Fidelity in Investment Operations Systems, and look forward to hanging out with all my Boston friends and making new ones over the summer. I pray that it will be a powerful time of growth and maturing. I praise God for the job, and for the friends in Central Asia that I will be able to bless because of it. I pray for huge change on my campus, that people might resist the temptation of academic ignorance. That people might think critically about what they view as success and what they will build their lives around. I will get to live with David Hill this summer, which is an exciting opportunity. Certainly, big things will be happening in Boston during summer-fall 2005!
May your summer be blessed as well.

New pics blog

Click the link in the title or here

See my BlogMap :)

Be sure to click the number (currently 57) - not the map.

UPN!!

United Praise Night was last night! It was amazing. Seeing the whole body together as one is an amazing experience, and meeting believers from all over campus rocks my world. Praise God that he has set us apart to be at work for him.

Worked on CS all afternoon, like last Sunday. At least this assignment seemed a bit more manageable, or perhaps I had a better attitude about it :) Continuing work on bronchial tree detection/modeling in 3d, which is pretty fascinating. I'm looking into course 6.170 on MIT's openCourseWare so that I'll better understand the buzz words thrown around in SW engineering. Also trying to pick up Java and Perl on the side of all my classes :-\ whew!

Sweet, 3.0% :)

Sweet, my savings rate went up again. If you're not in on the fun yet, now's a better time than ever to dump that old savings acct. and get an ING Direct account. It's even FDIC insured up to $100K (do you have that much?). Drop me a line and I'll refer you (you get 25, I get 10 bucks). Or get it yourself at ingdirect.com

Gmail accounts are (theoretically) infinite (big grin)

Gmail has one-upped the world of web-based email accounts once again. They've now given me 2061MB of online mail storage space (more than I can imagine using), and this is increasing at a rate of about 1KB per minute (visit www.gmail.com). If you want a gmail account (Trust me, you do! It even works w/ any POP3 email client like Outlook Express), you might be able to simply register at their site, or you might still need an invite (of which I have fifty to give away). Let me know if you're interested.

CS is taking over my life

I've been putting off quite a bit of CS homework over the past couple weeks, and, admittedly, it's wearing on me. Our last assignment for CS332 was pretty brutal (I spent all Sunday afternoon working on it :^( ). We have (outstanding) a pretty tough assignment for my CS410 class, in which I'll have to do something with multiple processes, multiple threads, matrix multiplication, and a shell prompt (all in one assignment). The thing I'm currently most interested in getting done is our CS585 project, but the CS585 homework of computing disparities between stereo images must have my attention for the current week. That could be painful, we'll see starting in a few minutes.

I'm excited about United Praise Night, which is coming up this Saturday night. It was big my freshman year, and I'm hoping it will be just as huge now. Please pray for it if you read this posting. Have a great week!

Life, 2.80%

Applying for a bunch of stuff in the next few months...
Marshall & Rhodes Scholarships (!)
Summer Jobs (still looking?!)
CAS Merit Scholarship

These are the priorities. Now, let them be accomplished!
In other news, I posted some pics on Snapfish from America Easts 2005... let me know if you'd like to peruse them.
Our new pool is still amazing :)
My savings rate just went up to 2.8%... not a bad return for a risk-free investment.
Let me know if you want into ING Direct (you get $25, I get $10)

New Pool!

Well, at long last I finally got to swim in the new pool yesterday, and what a beautiful experience that was! The natural lighting, quality lane-lines, 7-foot depth, and wide lanes will all combine to make our pool certainly the best in the conference, one of the best in Boston/Cambridge, and probably the third- or fourth-nicest pool I've seen. It will be an exciting season!
After swimming a bit, I gave myself a quick tour of the rest of the facility. This is a great place, with basketball, squash courts, an elevated track, tons of workout machines, and pretty much every amenity you could dream of. Perhaps the saddest part is the lazy river, which comes at the expense of a 50m pool (we get like 42m instead), and isn't intensely interesting in and of itself. Hopefully, someone will enjoy the 30yd-long river quite a bit :-\ Altogether, a beautiful BU construction, and it looks to be quality that will last.
That's all for today.

Check your credit (finally) for free

(from http://www.ftc.gov/opa/2004/11/freecredrpt.htm)
November 23, 2004

Credit Bureaus Announce How Consumers Can Access Free Credit Reports

The three nationwide consumer reporting companies – Equifax, Experian, and TransUnion – today announced the Web address, toll-free telephone number, and postal address consumers can use to request a free annual credit report. Beginning December 1, 2004, consumers in 13 Western states will be able to begin making requests by visiting www.annualcreditreport.com, calling 877-322-8228, or mailing a standardized form to Annual Credit Report Request Service, P.O. Box 105281, Atlanta, GA 30348-5281. The 13 eligible states are Alaska, Arizona, California, Colorado, Hawaii, Idaho, Montana, Nevada, New Mexico, Oregon, Utah, Washington, and Wyoming.

---

(from http://www.ftc.gov/bcp/conline/pubs/credit/freereports.htm)
Consumers in the Western states — Alaska, Arizona, California, Colorado, Hawaii, Idaho, Montana, Nevada, New Mexico, Oregon, Utah, Washington, and Wyoming — can order their free reports beginning December 1, 2004.

Consumers in the Midwestern states — Illinois, Indiana, Iowa, Kansas, Michigan, Minnesota, Missouri, Nebraska, North Dakota, Ohio, South Dakota, and Wisconsin — can order their free reports beginning March 1, 2005.

Consumers in the Southern states — Alabama, Arkansas, Florida, Georgia, Kentucky, Louisiana, Mississippi, Oklahoma, South Carolina, Tennessee, and Texas — can order their free reports beginning June 1, 2005.

Consumers in the Eastern states — Connecticut, Delaware, Maine, Maryland, Massachusetts, New Hampshire, New Jersey, New York, North Carolina, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, Vermont, Virginia, and West Virginia — the District of Columbia, Puerto Rico, and all U.S. territories can order their free reports beginning September 1, 2005.

Home

I'm home for Spring Break... Good to see the family... Will be working on an exciting project this semester involving segmenting the bronchial tree from CT scans of the lungs. Just got it to compile under VS.NET, which is an upgrade from VC++6. Enjoy your spring break :)

Rates went up!

Savings rate just went up a notch...Great News!

On February 25th, we increased the variable annual percentage yield on your Orange Savings Account to 2.60%!

That's my ING bank :)
Let me know if you want in on the nice interest. You get a free 20 or 25 bucks just because a member refers you!

Is MS going down the right track?

Microsoft (MSN/Hotmail) just sent me this email:
Recently, Hotmail® announced that in order to improve customer experience and reduce spam and junk e-mail abuse on MSN® services, Hotmail will no longer allow new e-mail accounts to be accessed via Microsoft® Office Outlook® and Outlook Express.

We are pleased to inform you that because you are an existing and valued customer, at this time your current Hotmail and MSN account(s) are exempt from this restriction and you will be able to continue enjoying access to those accounts from Outlook or Outlook Express. However, any new Hotmail or MSN accounts you create will not be accessible via Outlook or Outlook Express.
(red, bold text mine)

Now, I have no intent of paying for an email account, and if Microsoft decides that they'd like to charge me and make me stop using Outlook Express one of these days down the road, two things are true:
1) I won't do it - I'll use only my GMail account, which allows me to access the account using POP anyway.
2) MS becomes truly evil in my mind. I will admit to some level of dependency on my Hotmail account. I use it for almost any purposes except personal/professional ones. Anyone who might spam me, Hotmail. Anyone who needs my email for their frequent flier club, Hotmail. To make consumers dependent on your service and then, several years later, to start charging, is both a brilliant and completely unethical idea. I love it and hate it!
More on this subject if that highlighted red text above ever goes out of effect!

Also, if you want a GMail account (www.gmail.com), I have 50 referrals to give away now, so just drop me a line!