Recording dreams

Cosmology ended at one forty-five, and Xiǎomī (小咪) was home by around two twenty. He has been far too tired lately and had no choice but to take a nap.

The pizza meeting was at four thirty in the afternoon. (This is the first time the term has appeared in the blog. At a pizza meeting, physics PhD students take turns giving talks about physics.) Xiǎomī could sleep for about an hour and a half, then return to the department and rely on pizza for dinner. (He ate three slices of a medium Domino’s pizza.)

The title of this post is Recording dreams. That means Xiǎomī had dreams during his nap. (By the time he recorded them, it was already close to midnight, and his memories were not as clear as they had been just after waking.)

Japanese class

Xiǎomī was in a Japanese class taught by his adviser, Y-san, a formidable Japanese physicist. As he remembers it, everyone in class was discussing how to speak with the station staff after losing something at a railway station. There seemed to be a Japanese word for the lost-and-found office, but it was not quite the same as the one used in everyday life. Xiǎomī seemed to want to say otoshimono, but his adviser apparently gave an answer written with extremely complicated kanji. (Too much time had passed since he woke up, and he had already forgotten it.) After accepting the answer, Xiǎomī thought to himself for a while. His Japanese was supposed to be so good, so how could he never have heard of it? His cheeks burned.

An adult doing 67

It was obviously a meme used by the new generation, from late Gen Z to Gen Alpha. Xiǎomī thought there would be an amusing contrast if he did it himself. But then he went around the office doing 67 over and over with abandon, and everyone found him annoying.