Am I the only one who find saturday the most boring day of the week?
Well here are a couple of thoughts that I haven't been able to organize in a
coherent and organic way.
Let's start with the pandemic update.
The new government led by Mario Draghi took office here in Italy for a couple
of weeks. Many believed that there would be a relaxation of the measures
(openings of shops and restaurant without time limitations, no curfew, etc.).
The truth - as I expected - is that nothing has changed, quite the contrary.
Some regions, including mine, from tomorrow will pass in the "orange zone"
(Italy has been divided into three regions for months: yellow, orange and red.
The colors reflects the severity of the infection and the measures taken).
That sucks, but I must admit that it is unavoidable: the number of infections
is raising again.
Yesterday I attended a Zoom (no comment, please) conference held by two
researchers from University of Minnesota. They studied here in Italy and then
moved there to pursue their scientific career. The topic was interesting (DFT)
but perhaps the most remarkable aspect was the path of the two guys. The status
of the research in this country is so miserable that, in order to do what one
loves, one is often forced to fly away. In a certain sense nothing has changed
since the beginning of the last century.
