So my graduation ceremony was yesterday. It went well.  My mother didn't bring the battery for my Nikon with her so her little pocket digicam sufficed.  We had a supposed record number of graduates this year, 76, but I was the only doctoral grad from my department (one other guy graduated but didn't come to commencement for some reason).  Thankfully there were handlers all around to wave everyone around the gauntlet we had to walk up on stage to shake various bigwig hands while our lives for the past 5 years were being annouced to the audience, and get photo'd and hooded, then get photo'd again, and again, and back to the regular spot.  At the end of what was a ridiculously long endeavor, because it was U of Texas, everyone in the room threw up the horns and sang the UT anthem and booked it out as the faculty lined the walls and applauded. I was happy that it went pretty well without problem.

My boss even showed up to hood me, and I got a picture with him.  Instead of wearing a nice shirt and tie under that holocost cloak they call a gown, I wore my Piled Higher and Deeper tee shirt, and as you can see, it was pretty hot under there. Note the similarity of the pose on the shirt to the guy wearing it as I walked away with a hood. Of course, that wasn't the real diploma, the real one is something like a foot and a half by two feet, and it came with a little laminated wallet-sized card copy to whip out as expanation for why a 'doctor' drives a six-year-old pickup truck. Afterwards we all went to this fancy-shmancy restaurant for lunch.  Later on I went out for mexican with my cousin and got sauced, and he ralphed in the john.  I imagine the pro pictures will be available for me to buy online soon, and I'd like to take a look at the video my sister shot.

Today I had breakfast with my family and they drove back to BR.  I took it way easy all day and chilled out.  Tomorrow starts another week.