1986-87 寒假，老闆不在學校，要求我把 s \to d gamma 在 Skyrme model 下的 weak radiative decay計算，從 spin 1/2 \to spin 1/2 推廣到 spin 3/2 \to spin 1/2。
我採買了大量的食物，主要是牛奶、吐司、cheese、peanut butter 等不用費時料理的食物，準備足不出戶、長期抗戰。
很快進入吃飽、計算、睡眠的 cycle，發現自己的活動 pattern 是五小時醒、五小時睡眠。有時很餓但是很累，會帶著飢餓睡眠，常常夢到自己在吃大餐，驚醒時在咬棉被。但是大致上一直維持五小時醒、五小時睡眠的 cycle。
因為我看得到陽光、聽得到街道與同屋室友的聲音，加上有手錶，不至於像關在地穴的受試者，無法掌握時序。
當時感覺自己像張三丰閉關一樣，時間大概維持十天或一兩個禮拜（已經不記得多長的時間，也不記得這期間有沒有浪費時間洗澡，也許只有不到一個禮拜），計算完成就出關，讓我一直以為每個人的生理時鐘可能都不一樣，至少我的應該是5-5，和太陽12-12的 cycle 不一致，很多人無法適應「常態」的生活，很可能也和生理時鐘無法適應太陽時鐘有關。
Three years in a cave - and trying for six
· Scientists to monitor daily cycles of solitary sojourn
Maurizio Montalbini is Italy's least gregarious citizen. The 53-year-old sociologist has distinguished himself by spending almost three years of his life in total on his own and underground.
Yesterday Mr Montalbini vanished into the gloom of a pothole near the eastern Italian town of Ascoli Piceno having instructed his support team that, so long as all went well, he should be left undisturbed for another three years. He is already credited with the longest time spent alone underground - more than 12 months between 1992 and 1993.
By spending lengthy periods alone in the dark, Mr Montalbini has helped scientists to explore such riddles as why human beings who are shut away have longer daily cycles. "When I stayed underground for 366 days, I thought that only 219 had passed," he was quoted as telling the daily La Repubblica.
When another Italian hermit, a 27-year-old interior decorator, Stefania Follini, lived by herself in a sealed cave for 130 days in 1989, she tended to stay awake for 20-25 hours at a time and sleep for about 10 hours. Her menstrual cycle stopped.
Similar experiments elsewhere have led to psychological complications and, in one extreme case, a suicide.
Mr Montalbini plans to while away his time in the "Grotta fredda" (literally Cold cave) at Acquasanta Terme. His support team has created a 10-square-metre "home" for him, equipped with running drinking water and an electricity supply to power the array of medical devices that will monitor his physical condition and relay the data to the team on the surface.
At night - or rather, at what he will think is night - Mr Montalbini will be able to snuggle into an enclosed wooden bunk. Most of his nourishment will come from pills and capsules of the sort used by astronauts. But, as a concession to indulgence, he will have with him four kilos of honey, two kilos of walnuts, and one and a half kilos of chocolate.
He was also reported to have a library of 85 books that could be read by the glare of a lamp.
Italy's star loner has been toughing it out at intervals over 20 years. In 1987, at the age of 33, he emerged blinking into the light near Ancona to claim the then world record of 210 days underground.
His last monumental stint of shadowy inactivity lasted until April 16 1998 (which he thought was February 9). Over a period of 166 days, he had lost almost two stones and never slept for longer than five hours.
While he was beneath the surface, the area in which his cave was located was shaken by a major earthquake and he admitted to the reporters who greeted him on his emergence that "for the first time, I was frightened".
Asked eight years ago if he preferred life in the cave, Mr Montalbini replied: "Are you trying to be funny? I'm not going back in there. I need the sun. I used to dream about the dawn. It's an experience I would not repeat."