Conor Houghton

From Mathsoc wiki

Conor Houghton was Mathsoc President for 2008-2009 and says funny things:

• Conor the perfectionist: "I don't want you to think I'm not very good at drawing diagrams - I am very good at drawing diagrams, to the point of obsessing over them for three weeks. And that's why there aren't any diagrams in your notes."

• Conor the futurist: "Of course, in the future you will all have wireless transponders implanted in your brains that will allow you to experience everything that's happening here from at home, while being pleasured by robots. It's important not to fear the future."

• Conor the fertility symbol: "Usually people just leave me messages saying that I have a crap taste in clothes or something like that. Sometimes they ask me to father their children, but because it's anonymous I've never been able to act on that."

• Conor the religious icon: "I haven't acquired a godlike status amongst you yet, but I can see it becoming a problem as time goes by."

• Conor on theoretical physicists who achieved nothing because they were ignoring field theory: "They might as well have not lived."

• Drew a picture of a starfish to show what a star-shaped domain looked like; then drew a picture of Spongebob Squarepants as an example of a non-star-shaped domain... without making any comment...

• Conor on being a father: "My daughter has tonsillitis so I stayed up all night watching "The Wiggles" with her. For those of you who don't know who the Wiggles are, they are a group of children's entertainers from Australia whose song about fruit salad is the equivalent of Stairway To Heaven for the under three generation."

• Conor explaining PDEs: "It's a confusing thing, but of course that's not the most confusing thing here...that involves men and women."

• Conor the Father figure:(having discussed Einstein's Cosmological constant) "My son Cormac was born on Einstein's birthday, so we called him Cormac Cosmo Houghton because -as I said earlier- Einstein's Cosmological constant was -by his own admission- his greatest mistake. . . (mutters quietly) we had always intended having just two children. . . but then that may be more than you need to know. . ."

• Conor the Father figure:(later in same lecture) "I should emphasise that Cosmo is not the stupidest name I have given to one of my children. We called our second child Aine Eight Houghton. . . After. . . The number. We went into the registrar's office to name her and the registrar said I was the stupidest person she had ever met. . ."

• Conor the Dramatist: "Of course you can just learn this formula off, but if you know where it comes from you can just figure it out as you go along. One way is easier, the other more glorious."

• Conor the Architect: "It is a Lecture theatre so it contains seats. . . usually in rows. . (mutters) you might not be surprised by that. . But the important thing is to only sit in every second row. (Draws diagram) If you sit here that's fine. If you sit here (points to empty row) you are a bad person and will be smote down. This is a way of enjoying my power."

• Conor the Grammar-Nazi: "No spelling is wrong. . . Spelling is human expression. . . We now have machines to spell for us."

• "I Had a teacher in 3rd class who used to humiliate me for my spelling. Now I hate it. H-A-T-E-E"

• (Sounds under the weather) "Sorry about my voice I was up late last night reading Northern Lights to my son, which is very exciting and I kept reading it out loud about three chapters after he had fallen asleep."

• Conor the Thespian : "Today's tutorial will be on in the J.M. Synge lecture theatre, writer of Playboy of the Western world, staple of the Irish theatre circuit and of course hero of lecture theatre naming."

• "My father was a lecturer and somebody once threw a rabbit at him. That was back in the 70's when times were more turbulent. That's not a challenge by the way! Doing that would disappoint me. . ." "Another student once threatened him with being sprayed with a fire extinguisher. My father said "pull that trigger and you're finished" and he didn't. . . and presumably went out and joined the rabbit guy. . . Anyway the point is please be quiet.

• "A noble part of my father's lab animal experience was smuggling toads from Northern England into Ireland when I was young. . . I am not trying to advocate toad smuggling!!"

• "I have often noted that people with staplers do better in exams. . ."

• "I'm sure you've noticed that I'm dyslexic and its important to me that you realise you can be a mathematician without being able to spell. (notices numerical mistake on board) or even being that good at maths."

• "The star prize (of the famous Christmas Quiz) is an empty ostrich egg. It's a wonderful thing. I bought it on ebay for 5 pounds."

• In one lecture a student corrected Conor's spelling of auxiliary. He then proceeded to spell it in the following ways throughout the lecture, clearly taking the piss:

"auxilarry" "auxilliary" "auxhilliary" "auxhiliarie" "auxhiliary."

• Conor beginning a lecture:
• CJH:"(husky voice) Yesterday. . .(pause). . . Sorry I failed to get started there, I'll have more coffee."
• CJH:"Yesterday (breaks into fit of coughing then sips more coffee)"
• CJH:"Yesterday we were dealing with forced damped-"
• Student:"That was Tuesday"
• CJH (sips coffee. . . pauses)"On tuesday. . ."