Second stop: MathFest

 As I write this, I'm on the bus back from my second pre-Panama stop, the awesome annual summer meeting called "MathFest".  The name itself says how much fun this event is; it has 1600-ish mathematicians gathering for 3 days of reunions and talks and such.  

These big math meetings are kind of like high school or college reunions, except that they're even more fun than that, because I remember the mathematicians better than my high school mates, and we have a lot more in common.  Plus, of course, there are cool math talks!

Here were my three big activities plus one little one.

1. Reconnecting with math friends

This year's MathFest happened to be held in the same city where I first started working on the geometry of perspective.  It was Marc Frantz who steered me in that direction and who became my collaborator on two books, two NSF grants, multiple journals, and countless workshops.  He and his wife Paula also became good friends of mine.  So it was a real treat to come back and connect with them and our other collaborator, Fumiko Futamura. 

A co-author reunion: Fumiko Futamura, Marc Frantz,
me, and Marc's wife Paula Frantz

And of course, many more friends -- people I've served on committees with, who inspired me, who give me advice, who ask me for advice, who advance through the stages of our careers with me, etc. So many happy meetings!

Just a few of the people I caught up with.

2. Panels, Talks, Workhops

I was invited to speak on a panel about supervising undergrad research, which was a lot of fun because even though I'm done teaching (and definitely done grading!!!), I will probably keep trying to find ways to supervise research projects going forward.

"Nurturing Equity, Inclusion, Diversity, and Belonging
in Undergraduate Research: Strategies and Insights"

I also gave a fun 20-minute talk in Dave Richeson's Invited Paper Session on Mathematics and Art; it was a short version of the talk I'd given the week before at Bridges, giving a quick overview of the book project I'm planning on optical illusions in perspective geometry.

And then Fumiko and I did a workshop on Geometric Puzzles and BrainTeasers.  The workshop was Saturday morning at 8 a.m., and we figure that meant noone would show up.  I mean, would YOU go to an 8 a.m. Saturday workshop on geometry puzzles?  To our surprise and delight, we had two dozen really enthusiastic people there, including my soon-to-be-host in Panama, Jeanette, and we spent 80 minutes drawing dumpster/cubes and figuring out fun-but-tricky solutions to problems that seemed both simple and impossible at the same time.

Workshop participants proudly holding up their pencils.

3. Exercise

I miss running with my friends, and after a week of no running at Bridges I was antsy to get out on the road.  Fortunately, Indianapolis has some really lovely running trails in the middle of the city.  A block from my hotel, I could bop down to the canal walk, which runs below the street level so that I didn't have to worry about traffic or crossing streets.  A while back, I discovered a website (onthegomap) that lets me figure out how far I ran.

My running route along the canal walk,
according to OnTheGoMap.com

It was such a lovely run that I planned to do it two days in a row, but the second day I spied a pedestrian bridge across the river, and beyond that a lovely river-side run with amazing limestone edifices (kind of like running through an Art Deco Stonehenge), so I explored that route, plus an extra park exploration at the end.  The run, being in Indianapolis, was very flat, which you can see in the altitude map below. Those two dips in the altitude map are running down about 10 steps to cross the canal entrance.

My "explore the river and then get lost" route,
with altitude changes below.

I don't know if onthegomap will work this well in Panama; I hope so!

Plus one: Silliness 

MathFest has real math talks, but it also has game sessions and story telling and other aspects that are as much about people as they are about math.  A couple of people, knowing my interest in optical illusions, pointed me to a photo opportunity in the Exhibit Hall.  I enjoyed this particular piece of silliness --but silliness with a mathematical flavor!

Balancing "precariously" on an anamorphic drawing of a stack of balls.

MathFest feels so rich and full that it's hard to believe it was only three days long.  I'm glad I got to connect and reconnect before heading south.  

From here, it's back to Lancaster via bus and train (a whole other blog post!!), then gathering up odds and ends . . . and then Panama, here I come!