The n-Category Café

…I’m writing this at home at my desk, with a window next to me that I had open to let the breeze through, and just outside that window is the branch of a tree. As I was tapping away at the keyboard, writing the start of this post, there was a sudden scrabbling commotion. Before I had time to realize what was happening, a squirrel had leapt off the branch and landed on the carpet.

I think it quickly realized that it had made a mistake and wasn’t somewhere it wanted to be, as it did a couple of rapid, panicked, chaotic circuits of the room, bounding off things and over things and round things until, finally, it came to rest perched on my desk.

By that point, I’m not proud to say, I had flattened myself against the wall in a not-very-heroic manner. Our squirrels are small, but they’re wild animals and I guess can defend themselves if they want to. Fortunately, this one was in no mood to fight. Once it had landed on my desk, it stopped dead in its tracks and seemed to regain a kind of calm. I looked at it, it looked at me. As I looked, I noticed that its cheeks were bulging, presumably with acorns or seeds or whatever it had been foraging for. And right then and there, it bent over and coughed up the contents of its cheeks onto my desk, next to the computer where I’m writing this. With that, it hopped onto the windowsill and bounded out of the room and back into the tree.

Once I’d closed the window, calmed my nerves, and straightened out the things the squirrel had knocked over on its frantic circuits round the room, I came back to the pile of disgorged food on my desk. It turned out that it wasn’t food at all: it was a chewed-up wad of paper (which maybe explains why it wanted to get rid of it). I straightened the paper out and tried to figure out what it was. Eventually, I got it: unbelievably, it was the full citation for John’s award! You’ll understand that after its long and unusual journey, the letter was in a sorry state, illegible in parts, what with the rips and toothmarks and squirrel spit. But here’s what I could make out:

From all of us in the Graduate Division I want to congratulate you on being this year’s recipient of the “Doctoral Dissertation Advisor/Mentoring Award”. […]

It was a real pleasure to read the many nominating letters that came from current students and colleagues as well as many of your previous graduate students who are now highly successful in their own right. From their letters it is clear that your intelligence, enthusiasm and mentorship have attracted many outstanding students to UCR and that you have populated the mathematical community with professors that appreciate your mentorship even more deeply. Many of the letters emphasized your infectious enthusiasm for mathematics […]

writing and speaking about mathematics whilst being generous and kind. It should also be noted that your colleagues benefited from your strong voice and leadership in the highly successful Mathematics Workshop for Excellence and Diversity for which we are particularly grateful. As one letter writer comments your “impact goes well beyond [your] own students” […]

You are a treasure for all at UCR.

Congratulations, John!