Those Hardy Highlanders

To set the scene, imagine a persistent drenching, windswept rain. It is the kind of rain where every surface outside is wet, the ground is flooded in many places, and it is difficult to see through windows because they are covered in water drops. Now, imagine a group of students sitting in a classroom, second floor of the old mathematics building, which looks something like a peculiar, large, aging stone house from the outside; the classroom itself is of rather odd appearance, with an almost yellow-looking floor, creaky-hinged windows, desk-chairs facing towards the blackboard, and a large wooden blob in the front that must have been intended to be some kind of desk. In the middle of a lecture about eigenvalues and eigenvectors, the distinct sound of bagpipes was suddenly heard from outside.

Snickers emanated from the room. One person said, "He must one dedicated bagpiper!" as we imagined the bagpiper standing outside in the soaking rain.

Eventually, the bagpipe music faded away, but it reappeared two more times.

Well, it certainly helped make diagonalizing matrices more entertaining.

-Philip