7.07.2008
Moving into Halstead Tower
To movers chuckling that I wouldn't have enough space, and still about a third of the boxes yet to come into the guest room,
and me starting to think they were right, from the looks of the main room,
I started unpacking the hundreds of boxes and flattening them in a pile in front of the couch.
And this is where it's gotten me a week after the movers left. I hate that things have to get messy before they get clean when you're moving in someplace new. That stack of boxes is nearly three feet tall!
6.20.2008
Packing
6.18.2008
Good Bye Sherman
6.12.2008
Halstead Tower!
Bring on tomorrow.
6.11.2008
Google Maps
Floorplan C3 (mirrored) - 1149 Sq.ft.
13th floor
Kitchen
Master Bathroom
2nd Bedroom
Main Room
Main Room / 2nd Bedroom
5.10.2008
Family! Graduation!
On a more somber note, My grandmother passed away yesterday after a long and full life. She had been personally ready to go for quite some time, but was still sharp as a tack and fun to talk to even only a few weeks ago, when last I spoke to her. She will be missed dearly, even though distance didn't let us see each other as much as I would have liked.
4.23.2008
Plane Nonsense
Thirty Thousand Feet
Soaring like kings
or maybe sardines,
for a fare
cloudscapes from above
become commonplace.
The wonder is there, in the back
of my mind, craning
to get a better view
and drink it all in
with an unending draught
of amazement.
Who would have thought
a thousand years past
- or maybe only enough that
you still had trouble tying
your shoes –
that such wonderful sights
would someday be ignored, or worse –
forgotten even as they appeared –
in favor of everyday things
brought from below
to keep us grounded. Travesty?
Maybe there’s more lost
than appreciation
to be gained and spent
on aesthetics, when perspectives
can be changed for a charge
to heights as lofty
as this.
Still,
it’s too easy to forget
that aircraft grade alloys
are just dead weight
but for ground-level nuts
and bolts.
Can I find a balance
on the wing?
3.31.2008
1.07.2008
Sugar mama.
Before: 27" Daewoo CRTV, Aiwa receiver (w/ only 2 composite inputs working.)
Reciver Comparison: Onkyo on top, Aiwa below
After: Onkyo TX-SR605 receiver, Samsung 50" plasma HDTV, Xbox360
Woot! Surround sound and a huge HD screen make me never want to leave the couch! I'm never going to graduate!!! (oh, and rock band, too. did i mention rock band?)
10.25.2007
Mexico Pictures
9.30.2007
Porch
9.15.2007
Doin' the porch
9.13.2007
Kittens, Kittens, and more Kittens
How could we keep this little bugger outside any longer?
So we brought them all inside and kept them in the bathtub for a little bit while we medicated some of their crusty eyes.
Hello! I'm too cute for words! Now bow to my commands!!!
7.18.2007
Return of the Pointless Blogger!!!
Not that there's been anything to read since April, but what the hell. Now there's more. Read away!
So instead of updating all that's happened in the nearly three months since I last posted, I'll just jump in with what's going on now - it's kinda hectic.
Last Saturday, we (wunnerful gf and I) rented a Uhaul and moved my roommate to his new apartment in the Galleria area. He really didn't have much stuff, so it only took about an hour - after which we went and got the rest of April's stuff from her now ex-apartment. She gave up a ten minute walk to lab for a 3 mile drive and the chance to live together for a few months. I'm really excited, too. It's been great so far, even though there are still boxes everywhere. And the roommate bedroom (Quads room, Aaron's room, Tim's room) is now the guest bedroom, computer room, and cat room, since they're still petrified of Shiva, the 75lb terror that she is. (I think she'll pounce on just about anything that moves quickly as long as it's less than a quarter her weight.)
So this new "guest bedroom" has already seen its first guest! On Sunday we get a call from April's dad saying that he'll be in Houston on Monday to pick up a new Kawasaki KLR650 with his friend Ray, and they need a place to stay. So we borrowed an air mattress and shoved some boxes aside and played host for a few hours after a nice dinner at Goode Company Seafood. Trout Almondine - tasty! They left at 8 to get to the shop by the time it opened so they could get back to Lake Chapala at a decent hour the next day. Right. Did I forget to say they drove from Mexico? Hell, I'd do it - those bikes kick ass!
The last and strangest thing at the moment is that now the animals in our house outnumber the people 2 to 1. A very vocal 1.5lb orange kitten decided to take up residence in the storage shed on the porch over the weekend, keeping me up for two straight nights. For my own health and sanity we finally caught it and managed to keep it quiet in the 2nd bathroom last night. But really, we just don't need another animal in our 2 bedroom condo. April's vet says that at this time of year the ASPCA will just put down any kitten under 2 lbs since they're already overcrowded with cats, so we're not sure what to do with it. It's really scared of everything, obviously misses its mother, but now lets us pet it and play with it, albeit only in the relative safety of the bathroom. After all, Shiva's too scary to let your guard down if you're only 2% of her weight.
So do you know anyone who wants a ridiculously cute kitten? It's free to a good home, and I'll probably put up a posting on craigslist tomorrow if I can't find anyone I know personally to take it. Think of the kitty! (Please hurry, April's already nicknamed it Sydney.)
4.24.2007
Long Overdue
So, to keep this from exploding into a long, drawn-out post that nobody will want to read (even more than usual) here's the abridged version of what I probably would have posted in my absence.
Easter Weekend: Overall - Great! Family - Great! Food - Great! Vegas - Hot, but great! Excalibur hotel - Meh. Not bad, but not great. April losing her cellphone - Really not great!
Beer Bike: Not even. The badly-planned and poorly executed rain date for this Rice tradition was turned into Beer Run because of the high winds blowing the puddles all over the track. Lame. The rest of the weekend was Great, though! Saturday after the B.R. had a pool party (heh, i almost typed poop larty! just pretend i'm five.) with fantastic food, a frozen margarita machine, keg-riding, windy temperatures in the fifties, but water temps in the high eighties! a call from some friends had April and I rushing from the pool to downtown in less than an hour to catch a showing of "Wicked" at the Hobby center. Fantastic. Then another party after that made for a busy Saturday. Sunday had a BioE-sponsored trip to see the Houston Aeros minor-league hockey - also fun. All in all a fun-packed weekend.
Typical work week with too many hours spent for the amount of tangible goals accomplished. Gotta stop doing that if I ever want to graduate. Trust me. I really, really do. Really.
Last weekend saw April and I driving up to Corsicana to visit her family. Her parents were in town from their normal abode in Mexico, and I got to meet the rest of her immediate family after we went sailing Saturday morning. (A really light catamaran and 20-30 knot winds make for some fast, nerve-wracking sailing.) I finally got a motorcycle-fix, too, getting to ride Jerry's SV650 along some of the fun back roads while he was on his Valkyrie. Bowling after some tasty dinner at the Old Mexican Inn (OMI to the locals) was fun, but I've literally never bowled worse - which was embarrassing in front of everybody, especially 200+ bowler Eric. Ah well.
Haydon and Peyton were bunches of fun, too, and kept us entertained for much of Sunday. Or was it the other way around? Either way, it was a good weekend, except for April's car needing fixing, but that ended up being a pretty minor fix.
This week has some more Matlab work to be accomplished, with hopefully interesting data analysis results to follow. Thrilling, I'm sure. Pics to follow when I've got a chance.
4.02.2007
Cowabunga, Dude!
3.30.2007
Two things...
Second, and less immediately pertinent, but interesting none-the-less, is the widening income gap in the country. As explained by the NY Times article about newly released 2005 tax data, the top 300,000 earners in the country had the combined income of nearly 150,000,000 of the bottom earners. The real ratio is closer to 440:1 between the two groups, but it's still almost double what it was in 1980. Another stunning comparison is that the top one percent of incomes in 2005 enjoyed the largest share of the total increase in US earnings since 1928! Egads. For me, the fun part is that I could possibly go from one extreme to the other over the next few years, (hell, I could quadruple my current income and still not make the top ten percent, so it's not likely) but I still think the imbalance is far too large, and even a bit foreboding. But maybe that's a good thing. Maybe it will spur some much-needed change here in way taxes are assessed and maybe even used. A man can dream, can't he?
3.29.2007
Net Neutrality
3.27.2007
Vegas, Baby!
3.26.2007
OLPC Thoughts
Going to hear SJ Klien talk was kind of a waste of time today, except that I got to play around with the laptop. I didn't really hear anything you can't find online, including people who seemingly only want to throw thinly veiled insults at the project for no other reason than they don't see the need for it. (Some guy decided to phrase his long-winded "questions" extolling the virtues of Nokia in such a way that it was hard to believe he was listening to the same presentation that I was. People really need to decide if what they're going to say will foster further dialogue or just piss people off before verbally vomiting all over everyone in earshot.)
Such douchebaggery, however, seems to miss what I see to be an important point - Negroponte and those working with him obviously think that the project will do some good in the world. Indeed, facilitating education is rarely a bad thing. Even if it doesn't work, was born of mis-placed motives, or is thriving on media attention a bit more than some people find tasteful, there's still potential for the OLPC project to spur change more positive than negative, no matter the scale. And if someone else can do it better (Nokia, perhaps) then please give it a try.
On a personal end, I'm a little disappointed that due to production constraints, lone consumers won't be able to buy them for a while. It's so completely hackable that it would be really fun to see what you could make of it, especially if all your friends got one for the easy mesh networking. I guess I'll have to wait for a while to see if the project is as successful as people are predicting. They've thought about a lot of angles, as Klein made clear, and I hope it works, but I have a feeling that things won't go exactly as they've planned.
OLPC
3.23.2007
I love Techdirt
... for things like this article about the cover-up of huge problems in e-voting machines used in Florida. Not that anyone will ever be held accountable, of course - that's just passe - but it's nice to see people uncovering the truth about incompetence and corruption. I just like to spread it around.
Quick Lab Update
As it stands now, if both these things work well, I could be writing my thesis in a month. Cross your fingers. I'm trying really hard to be out of here with my defended PhD by August, so the next logical question is - what are you going to do after you graduate? Answer? I have absolutely no idea. I know I don't want to go into academia (at least for now) or government research, and somewhere in industry is where I'm aiming. Can I get a little more broad? Here I feel like I've narrowed it down to a third of my original possibilities, but that still leaves, oh, about a million more to explore.
So if you happen to know of any companies that could benefit from having a nanophysicist around - wait, let me rephrase that. We all know that everyone could benefit from having a nanophysicist around. If you happen to know of any companies that are looking for a nanophysicist, be sure to let me know. Because while my education and experience may be valuable, it's not exactly a plug-and-play situation with potential employers, as it would be for someone in Houston with a masters in geology, or chemical engineering, for example. I'm basically going to have to find a company I want to work for, and then convince them that my strange mix of skills, over-education, and experience is just what they need in some random position - maybe even one that doesn't even exist yet. So that may be a bit challenging. I'm never above accepting a little help in situations like these, so feel free to throw suggestions or ideas my way. I'll ingest and process them as best I can, all the while working frantically to write everything, research everything, and convince everyone I need to graduate.
3.20.2007
Happy Birthday April!!!
Happy Birthday, cutie!
3.16.2007
No Mama!
Weekend Weather
3.14.2007
Motorcycle Repairs: Part 1
3.13.2007
3.12.2007
Breckenridge, Baby!
Wednesday around noon, I checked out of the Adams Mark Hotel in Denver, fleeing the scene of APS after only two and a half days to meet April, Vince, Jennifer, David, Nikhil, and Brian at the airport. After a forty-minute production with the guy at Dollar, we got a Chrysler minivan and a Jeep Liberty for about $150 less than we should have paid. Score. The two hour drive across I-70 and down 9 was great, though the cars weren't too happy with the long steep hills and all our gear they had to haul. After finding our great little condo, we picked up our rental gear, did some grocery shopping for the next 4 days, and after dropping it all off ate at the Breckenridge Brewery before calling it a night at about 9:30. The first day at nearly 10,000 feet is exhausting.
Thursday morning showed us the incredibly short walk to the Quicksilver lift, and the beginning of a great day of skiing and snowboarding, with about an inch of fresh powder falling in the afternoon. With aching legs and April's great "Bella Pasta" and a few beers under our belts, we turned in early again.
Friday was a perfect bluebird day. Clear skies, no clouds, highs on mid-mountain hovering just around freezing - perfect for pictures. Those of us not taking lessons, in either a moment of clarity or insanity, decided to take the highest chair lift in North America (12,840 ft) and hike the rest of the way up to the 12,998 ft. summit of peak 9. Though altitude made it much more difficult than I'd imagined, with clear skies for miles, the breathtaking view completely made up for the difficulty of the short climb.
Saturday saw the crowds increasing, and by lunch the lifts I wanted to be on had 10-15 minute waits at the bottom. Luckily, it started snowing that afternoon, dissipating the crowds, cutting visibility to two-chair-lengths at times on the lifts, and laying down the most incredible powder I've ever been lucky enough to carve. Even with exhausted legs, I ran a few short mogul runs down some blue slopes - not something I'd consider easy on a snowboard. The powder just let you float over it, as smooth as you can imagine. It was an absolutely incredible end to three great days of snowboarding. As soon as I can afford it again, I'm definitely going back for more. The people I went with were great, the conditions were amazing, the condo, location, and atmosphere were just about perfect. Best. Vacation. Ever.
3.05.2007
Quick Update from APS in Denver
2.26.2007
Premature Octogenarian Vacillatory Bipedal Locomotion
There's a good deal more bruising down my left side that's not easy to show on a family-friendly web site, but what's really got me sore at the moment are the small areas of road rash on my left knee and ankle. They're not swollen anymore, but starting to heal up and scab over, so they're really stiff and inflexible. Just that little amount makes me really appreciate the leather jacket I was wearing, since I slid most of the 30 or so feet down the road head-first on my torso. And I'm not even going to talk about my helmet. Considering that I was only going about 35 when I hit the ground, and looking at the rash and scrapes it has, I'm amazed at the amount of skin my jacket saved. So yeah, mom - get yourself a good motorcycle jacket before you go off terrorizing the neighborhood again this spring. Don't make your son worry.
2.21.2007
Tragicomedy
I just got my bike back Monday afternoon with nearly $800 worth of work done, including a new rear tire, chain, sprockets, engine cover & gasket, and new oil & a filter. All necessary, but lots more than I was expecting to spend. And I paid in cash. So what happened next?
Last night I wrecked my bike. Thrashed. Washed out the front tire going about 35 mph on my 4th trip in 20 minutes down the same stretch of road next to campus. I'm fine. A little sore, swollen, bruised, and with minimal road rash, but more pissed off than anything. My bike is completely ruined. Repairs would be more than it's worth, and I don't have collision coverage. So, basically, while I couldn't afford full coverage for the past three and a half years I've had the bike, saving a few thousand dollars, I've paid for it in the long run. I no longer have a motorcycle, and won't for the foreseeable future. Fie. What's even remotely comical about the whole thing is that I just dumped a huge amount of money (for a grad student, at least) into the damn thing the day before! "Here's $800, can I go wreck it now?" I'm a freakin' idiot.
2.12.2007
Weekend Rundown
Thursday was cool because former president William Jefferson Clinton came to Rice for a lecture. He only spoke for a little more than half an hour, but it was purposeful and to the point - a really neat experience.
Friday attacked me with the beginnings of a nasty cold, through which I rallied that evening to go to a Mardi Gras dinner party with April at Matt and Tracy's newly furnished house. A bunch of other friends were there to make it a great time, even though I was lethargic enough to be considered legally dead, I think.
Saturday Jonah and I rode up to Metric Motorcycles so he could change out his front tire, and on the way through the insane traffic, I noticed my engine casing was leaking prodigious amounts of oil that ended up spraying all over the rear tire - a recipe for disaster. So, intending to get a new rear tire and chain soon anyway, I left my bike at the shop. It seems it will be at least a week before I get it back, and not before dropping at least another five hundred bones on my main mode of transportation. (That's more than twice the number I have in my body, so I guess I'm going to have to find a donor.) Saturday was also Jonah's birthday, which a bunch of people celebrated at Slick Willy's and The Gingerman. I think the alcohol killed a bunch of the bugs swimming around in my head, but the cigarette smoke riled up my throat even more.
Sunday was laid back for the first part, but we had an indoor soccer game - our last of the season - that guaranteed our first place finish! By that time I think my body had just about given up trying to fend off this cold any more, and I started crashing hard after getting home last night. So today I feel like complete crap, and I'm writing this from home. I'm going to work on my paper on my laptop so the day's not a total waste, but when I seem on course to go through all the tissues in my house before the close of the day, I don't think much will get done. Of course, had I refrained from all my activities over the weekend, this cold would probably be kicked by now. But who wants to do that? (Ask me when I get fired.)