I discovered the Whistler Public Library the other day. I realize that this isn't the biggest or most exciting discovery but it's making my stay at Whistler way more enjoyable. I come home from training and have lunch and then stroll down through the village to the library. Fifteen minutes-- just enough time to enjoy the sunshine and the scene and shift my focus from skiing to financial mathematics. A couple hours studying and then home for the afternoon practice again with a nice walk to banish equations from my mind and start thinking about what I want to accomplish during the afternoon workout. Chair, desk, window, it's perfect. My textbook even had a footnote saying "the history of statistics is entertainingly related in Bernstein (1996)." I thought that sounded like a book I would like to read and so I looked up and the mathematics section was in the aisle right behind me. Sadly, they only had like 10 books even remotely related to mathematics and definitely not Bernstein's ("Against the Gods: The Remarkable Story of Risk" in case you were wondering).

Oh how I miss Penrose Library. I used to do my math homework in the basement at the table by the (extensive) math section. There was something reassuring about having all of the famous and esoteric math books right there. Plus, if I needed a break I could go sit in between the aisles and flip through the works of my favorite mathematicians (Poincare, Leibniz, Pascal, Agnesi, nevermind... the list is too long). Although the philosopher-mathematicians had a lot of their works up on the 4th floor in the philosophy section. Despite the lack of books in the Whistler Library it is really nice to have someplace to study.

Training is good, more on actually skiing later.

Labels: 2010 Venue