Alexander Stoimenow

A Quiz

I seek the identity of a world-famous mathematician, call him Mr. X. Soon after I got to know him, I noticed that he has a big and illustrious family, and started collecting information about various family members. I introduce some of them below, and ask: who is Mr. X?

Historical note: I started this project decades ago, some time in the late 90s. My original intention was (and I like to keep it) to restrict myself to names whose encounter I have some personal memories about (and which give me a certain sense of achievement to have collected them). I aimed to gather about 40 people, but I increasingly realized that, on my predetermined terms and at that time, this length was too hard to attain. Moreover, I saw little priority, which were main reasons why I increasingly lost motivation and abandoned the project. But I kept on coming across interesting people, in particular through the internet. In the meantime, it exploded, and now allows me to find a myriad of others I had never heard about. (Wikipedia has an extra page with a list.) At some point, I decided it is worth taking the project up again, and bringing it to some end. The internet remains a main and indispensable resource, but conforming to my old intention, I restricted myself to personalities I encounter without deliberate search. Even among these, some selection was necessary, in part because I found some too colorful to make the cut. (There were such posing without underwear, or bandites ‐ I mean, true ones, not only people looking so, like the majority of ingenious mathematicians!) Moreover, in order to avoid it getting a lifetime's achievement (it certainly took longer than anything else I've written, yet it is not even comparably as important as most of it), on May 28, 2015 I decided to set the release deadline to end of 2016 (timely for Mr X's birthday) ‐ but with the option to update the list after release. And I tried to speed it up (thanks to Don Regan and, of course, M.m.m. M.M.!). My modest output reached the original goal of 40 on Feb 28, 2016. I also apologise that the descriptions are to a small part a bit outdated. (One famous person who was in quite from the beginning died at the final stretch of the project. May he rest in peace!)

• Tom: The family is well-represented in the music business. Here is the Tiger. In old days he adored the green grass of home, but more recently he likes to be turned on with some particular type of bomb.

• David Robert: An equally famous personality in the branch, though better known under his pseudonym. Also called the Chameleon (due to his changing musical style, and maybe different color of his eyes).

• Mick: Still in the same branch, and more well-known together with his other band members, who all want to know what love is. (Also produced my favorite album of Billy Joel.)

• Howard: A colleague of the above, who is also well-known for asking: "What is Love?"

• Grace: Known for her extravagant appearance and clips during the 80s, tried also (unhappily) to answer her colleague's previous question with an enemy of James Bond.

• Norah: A more recent appearance on the market, but now also quite well-known.

• Quincy: An icon in the same business.

• Brian: A stone which rolled and fell into the water.

  

  (A photo by Linda McCartney, as seen at the Daelim art museum Seoul.)

• Jaspa: A German DJ who, together with his partner, released music inspired by the Cologne Cathedral.

• Gareth: Working more on the side of the mixing desk. I noticed him on an album of one of the 80s synth icons, where he was promoted to a quasi-band member after a long-term fellow had left. (It was the best album they made, IMHO, despite that I recognize now how much the departure of that guy cost them.)

• Tommy Lee: Moving on to actors, here is a good one. Unfortunately(?), he plays lots of evil-guy roles, but was also active as Santa Clause in Japanese can coffee commercials.

• Catherine: A female representative of the acting scene, due to her compound family name apparently a former wife of Mr. X. Now she's married to one of his colleagues (specialist in the same field of mathematics) from Rutgers University.

• January: Another female colleague of the previous one, specializing at killing others (not only, but also, and already) with the way she looks at them.

• Felicity: Running with Tom Hanks out of (or into?) the inferno.

• Rashida: Actress told to be best known for her work in "The Office" and "Parks and Recreation". I didn't know her or anything she did until I came across a clip on her latest project, which is "hot" but very serious.

• James Earl: I admire him not only for his movies (one is among the mentioned below), but even more so for his patriotic attitude (like the president who shares his small names). But was also a voice of the Dark side of the Force.

• Alex: Special not only because he shares names of both of us - another passionate (info) warrior for his country.

• Patrick: Still on the mike, but buzzing sixty as NASA's spokesman about creatures with green antennas. (Allegedly, UN appointed them an embassador already, ts, ts.)

• Trevor Rees: Among some other assorted colorful personalities, the bodyguard of a famous royal family member, and only survivor of the accident in which this royality was killed.

• Sophie Rhys: Successful saleswoman, now married into the same royal house, and sometimes claimed to resemble the aforementioned dead.

• P.: Who was that? She came after Jennifer and before Monica. Their official opponent knows details, but her emails seem to be a bigger problem right now.

• X-y (Here `X' is to be substituted with the family name of Mr. X): The sonar operator of a certain US submarine in the movie "The Hunt For Red October", who tried to convince his captain that they are following a brand new Russian nuclear submarine, while a $40 mio equipment was telling him that they are following an earthquake.

• X-y: This one was truly called "Dr. X", in a science fiction horror film adaptation of Stephen King (too horrible for me to watch it until the end), but suffered (as far I did watch) a tragical traffic accident.

• X-yboy: The most colorful name among all, but also the most unfortunate one. I remember a western where two cowboys were fiddling with a prisoner in the desert, and one said to the other: "Put away the gun, X-yboy". It was really long ago, but I think after I had learned about Mr X, and I still regret that at the time I was so sloppy not to check in the TV program what it was. I found, though, recently that with high probability it might be something included here.

• Bobby and Steve: now moving to sports; the one is a legend, the other one at least a major champion (in the same discipline).

• Marion: ran fast (on the track, and apparently also later her career into the ground).

• Leslie: A ghostbuster looking for a designer to dress her up for the premiere.

• David: Australian fashion store founder encouraging others to lead an extraordinary life.

• Kenya Kinski-: Wearing the stuff for the camera in LA and dreaming of a lunch date with Carl Sagan in a cat cafe in Tokyo. (Sadly, it has to be the Tokyo of the other world...)

• Alfred Winslow: Another capitalist from Down-Under who went up-over Wall St. by pioneering the hedge fund (greetings from Larry at Harvard). He had a friend, Louis Fischer, who wrote a biography of Lenin (did he say anything good about the class enemy?)

• Dow: The measure of prosperity the guys over there work for...

• Melvin: A lion who didn't want to ask for money for doing something good.

  

  A commemorative stone of his organization in the park right outside GIST.

• David: This one was kicking in both number and season 14 on the EPL lawn.

• Phil: Off the lawn (but for a smaller ball) at the Royal England Club for interviews.

• Owen: A younger compatriot also on the mike, but more passionate about his country's course.

• Gawain: with the pieces on the board, but often seen losing, or too lazy to play, drawing in 8 moves at the Tata Steel 2018 Round 12.

• Lord Digby: Trade Minister 2007-08. Likes debating Brexit (he got it now), concerned in particular about short-term job cuts, and interrupting women. I also found that his successor in office mutated from an acting role in the 80s as the leader of an interstellar 7-member rebel squad I enjoyed watching.

• Van: former president administration official and heating up on the other side of the water about their own new version of Super-Brexit.

• Mother: she also heats up (mostly) on politics, but in written form and on the same side of the ocean.

• James: This black Cavalier failed Iguodala's shot, and then his handshake offer, but could not prevent the Warriors from tying the NBA final.

• Roy Jr.: former world heavyweight boxing champion, more recently fighting with the Russian language (after given Russian citizenship by the president personally!)

• J Bruce: Council member (or similar) of BEWAG, the company providing me heating while I was living in Berlin (and sending me bills for that, on which I found the name).

• C K R T: a colleague from dynamics with a contribution to unlimited mathematics.

• Stephanie Sobey-: a British cellist who accompanied five gentlemen as they pissed their spectators up (or were done so by them?) on dry land in a brewery. (Not the knitwear designer of the same name - I know nothing about her.)

• Bridget: I never watched what was in her diary, and whether she went out of reason in the sequel 3 years later. But it seems that at least her mother was played by a true relative.

• Indiana: the legendary treasure-seeker. I admit (in shame) I haven't seen even one of his adventures, so I know only one thing really well about him: you know more about him than I know.