Talking with the Boys and Giants' Holes

I was invited to go on a 18 km walk night before last. I tried to find a graceful way to decline but was eventually talked into walking part of the way (5 km). Somehow, Sture misunderstood the directions and we failed the rendezvous. We walked for about an hour anyway, and met the gang (5 men of mature age as myself) at Sven's house afterward at about 9PM. Physically, these guys were pretty imposing, Sture and I were like the runts of the litter: they were all at least 6'2" and built strongly to match.

Sven then served a light supper of tea, bread, cheese, and liqueurs. I kind of expected the evening to gravitate towards male bonding activities like telling sports stories, complaining about women, and generally swapping lies, but once Sture introduced me and explained why I was in Sweden, I rather unexpectedly was asked to explain why I thought my system of programming was better than what is current practice. It turned out that most of these guys were professionals (not amazingly surprising considering they were Sven's friends), but that in some cases they were fairly heavily involved (at least in a supervisory level) in their companies' IT programs. Anyway, we had a good discussion, and there was a general consensus, I think, that IT systems were generally far too complex. I don't suppose I completely disgraced myself (I thought I dominated the conversation a bit much.), as they were kind enough to invite me back for another jaunt next week.

Sture has organized a mini-conference on 4 October, where Stat Mech and colloid people from southwestern Sweden will be attending. I will be giving two talks there (neither's main topic being programming). Sture is trying to coax me back into Science, but he is finding a lot of resistance. He is still shocked that I gave away all of my scientific books.

Sture and I went on an interesting walk last night to another site of "giant holes" which is located less than a mile from his house. Here are some pictures:


This granite wall is hiding a few giant holes. As you may recall, giant holes are holes made in the ice ages, by rocks being trapped in crevices, and spun around over the course of years make deep holes in the river beds. Now that the ice has receded, we can see these deep bore hole embedded in the granite.

In this crevice there is a large giant hole, but it is covered with leaves and debris. Sture suggested that it might not be a bad idea if this cover was cleared off, as a big hole like this might be deeper than a man's height, which I can tell you in Sweden is mighty deep. Anyway, it might be a real struggle getting out if you stepped in one.

Here is a longer view of the granite formation over which a river once ran.

Here is Sture with his "measuring stick."

Here Sture is showing how deep even a small giant hole can be.