Quals, life, and 42

You know, if the answer to everything is 42, why really bother?

Well, just as Douglous put it, You still don't know the question. That's why.

I spent most of my waking (and a lot of the sleeping) time in the last three months studying for the quals. For those of you who don't know what Quals are, I envy your quals less haven of earthly pleasure. Those of you who do, I am pretty sure have at some point have gone through it. Well, in the Layman's words, quals are those exams which people who are going to grad school all fret about and apparently feel compelled to still take while no clear benifit is seen. In a sense the Layman would be right, there is no clear benefit to be seen from passing the quals (or as some would say, in going to grad school itself), it doesn't really get you graduated, people spend years after the quals working on their research in order to graduate. All it does, is that the mighty overlords of academia allow you to be happily bound in their service for a bunch of more years in order to pursue a PhD. If you fail the quals (twice) you are set free from the bounds, deemed fit for the real world, and thrown into it.

Alas, I am unfit for the real world, a lot of time have I to be spent in low paid graduate assitanceships to study for the quals it seems. For I have passed them and been deemed to be bound...

Where is the benefit you ask, why write this post, why force yourself to be confined in a room with two professors for 55 minutes thrice in a day you say. All that I will splutter in my complete state of utter exhaustion is that you have asked the right question.

The answer of course, is still 42.