Interesting news ahead

This Tuesday, keep your eyes open for physics news. If you follow any physics blogs, you may have already heard rumors that CERN has scheduled a seminar to present the latest update on the Higgs search. It is being billed as a report on "significant progress", but not "any conclusive statement": assuming the Higgs boson turns out to exist, it looks like its mass is right in the range that's hardest to detect, so we shouldn't expect any definitive results until next summer or even fall. Still, it could be some pretty exciting news... I'll be watching very eagerly. Here's a long writeup on the state of the Higgs search, and a shorter note of caution about statistics in particle physics.

I'll also be writing exams and grading papers and doing all the other things that come along with finals week, of course. Not so much fun (especially since my finals are all at the end of the week, with just a few days before grades are due). But the semester is winding up, and I've got a long block of research leave time to look forward to after we're back from our Christmas travel. I'm looking forward to it!