Caroline in Barcelona

I'm almost back to running, plus many thanks!

2012-02-16T17:09:00.000-08:00

It's been a week and a half, and I'm only 5 days away from being done with the boot, if everything is going according to plan inside my foot. I'm so excited to get back to running! It's not hurting at all anymore, which is definitely a good sign. And the boot hasn't gotten too stinky, luckily.

Today I'm going to jump right in to the thank yous to my donors, because I'm so excited about how awesome things are going. So here goes - thanks so much to Marc and Rachel S, Rachel P, Sam and Shari, Fiona, Brent, Emily and Scott, and Zuzka! I'm so grateful to you guys! I'm up to $2555 out of $4000, which is well beyond my halfway point goal of $2000 by tomorrow, February 17. Thanks again to all my donors! Only $1445 left to go! Here's the link, as usual: http://www.mos.org/marathon/meettherunners.php#lowenthal And here's an idea - send it to your friends! Especially the ones who like science and/or kids! I'd really appreciate it!

I'm starting to get into the rhythm of going to work every day. Well, 4 days a week at this point, but hopefully it will be full time soon. And of course, the last day of the week isn't all couch and bonbons. I'm babysitting for more hours now, which is actually really fun. When I have 5 hours with the kid, I can take her to do more fun stuff, like going to museums. We've been to the Museum of Science and the Children's Museum, and both were really fun. Tomorrow we're going to go swimming! I used to teach swim lessons, so I'm pretty excited about it. Apparently she's pretty enthusiastic about going in the water. And this will be my first time navigating a locker room with a kid, not to mention the boot. It's going to be interesting!

Work at the museum is going pretty well. We're getting ready for a bunch of different events that are coming up, and there's a ton of variety in the things I'm getting to work on. Life is pretty good!

Happy Birthday to Sam!

2012-02-09T17:04:00.000-08:00

Today is Sam's birthday! Happy Birthday to Sam! He had some good days of teaching this week, which is appropriate for a birthday week. We're going out to dinner at Stella on Friday to celebrate! Thanks to Sam's parents!

My foot is doing ok, but I'm getting pretty ready to be done with the boot. It makes my ankle pretty tired wearing it, because it is heavier than regular shoes. I've taken to biking distances that I would normally walk because it's so much easier to bike than walk. But only 12 more days of the boot, which is pretty manageable. At least the doctor gave me a smaller one than Erin had lent me, so it's only to mid-shin instead of all the way to my knee. I'm really missing running, and I'm worried that I'm losing all the progress I had made.

Both of us got a lot of nice birthday cards, so thanks to everyone for thinking of us and for sending birthday wishes!

Fundraising is going well, but I haven't gotten a donor report yet this week, so I can't do my shout outs to donors yet. I think I'll get a report tomorrow, so I'll do shout outs in my next post. In the meantime, thank you mystery donors! If you'd like to become a (short-term) mystery donor, here's the link: http://www.mos.org/marathon/meettherunners.php#lowenthal

That's all for now!

Yep, it's a stress fracture, but I'm only out for 2 weeks!

2012-02-07T14:33:00.000-08:00

So I finally sorted out the insurance situation and went to the doctor today, and it turns out I have a stress fracture, as I had thought. I got x-rays and everything. It's pretty small, and it's just a stress fracture, not a complete fracture, which is better. I have an aircast boot to wear for 2 more weeks (thanks Erin for lending me one for the last few days!), and then I'm allowed to get back to running. In the meantime, I'm supposed to cross train on the exercise bike and lifting, so that I'll be ready to go in time for the marathon. The doctor was really nice and she totally seemed to understand how I'm feeling about running, and she really helped me feel like it will be ok and I'll be able to get back to running in plenty of time. So overall, good news!

I'm also completely done with my thesis and with school, so that's a huge relief. I'll get my degree in another couple of weeks, and that's it! I can't believe that I made it!

For anyone who wasn't already aware, my birthday is tomorrow. If you haven't donated already, a donation to my marathon fundraising effort would be a great birthday present! I'm going to be 25, so you could donate $25 in honor of my age! Here's the link: http://www.mos.org/marathon/meettherunners.php#lowenthal I'm more than halfway done with my fundraising, and I'm really grateful to all of my donors. I don't have any new shout-outs this time, so please donate so I can thank you on my blog!

Foot situation

2012-02-03T15:54:00.000-08:00

So, my foot situation has worsened. I think I may have a stress fracture. For diagnosis purposes, here's a photo:

The area with the circle is where it hurts the most when I push on it. When I walk, it also hurts more towards the ankle bone. I've taken off of running this week, and I'm going to have to skip the long run this weekend. I think the important thing is to make sure I get better now, so I'm taking it easy and cross training for a bit.

I've also surpassed my midpoint fundraising goal, which is wonderful! Thanks to my most recent donors - my parents, Junjay, Aunt Ruthie, Wendy and Howie, Katherine and Sheldon, Raquel, Liz, Jen D, and Eitan! You guys are great! Here's the link, as usual: http://www.mos.org/marathon/meettherunners.php#lowenthal

14 miles on Saturday, but now my ankle hurts, and more shout-outs to my donors!

2012-01-30T08:56:00.000-08:00

On Saturday, our long run was 14 miles - well, 14.55 miles to be exact. Alan's phone tells us exactly how long it was. But this was by far my most painful run ever. I had been having a little bit of a feeling in my right foot lately, and on Saturday at about mile 7 it started getting much worse. By about mile 9, I didn't think I was going to be able to finish the run, but obviously my personality wouldn't let me quit. Luckily, Alan is such a great friend, and even though I needed to slow WAY down, he stayed with me and didn't complain, even though he really wanted to finish the run. I'm lucky to have such a great running buddy! I'm taking a couple of days off of running, so I'll cross train instead today and tomorrow. Probably I'll swim or bike. It's too bad, because the weather is really good for running today, and I'd like to be out there. I think the problem is related to my shoes, so I'm also going to try switching back to my old shoes for a bit to see how that goes.

I would have posted a picture of my foot/ankle, but there's really nothing to see, it looks just like the other one that doesn't hurt at all. Very strange.

Also, yesterday was our forum, and boy was it a busy day! I started reasonably early in the morning, and was go-go-going all the way until 7pm. It was very tiring, but it went well and I was very proud of our team. We had hundreds of people attending the event, and I think most of them were very happy with how it went. I got one really nice comment at the end about how this woman really appreciates that we have these events and that they're so well run, which made me feel really good. But I'm also glad that we don't have another forum for a few months, because they're a ton of work and I am ready for a slightly more relaxed pace!

This is also my last week of classes, and I'm really glad about that. I have one more class session on Thursday, and then I'm done for real! Actually, if you count glass mosaics class, I'm not really done :) I signed up for the spring semester, because apparently there's a one semester grace period where you can still get the student pricing after you're done being a student, so I thought that was a pretty good offer and signed up again. I'm really enjoying it, and the non-student price is more than $100 more, so now seems like a good time to do it.

I'm also signed up for a glassblowing class in March, which I'm really looking forward to. I've never tried glassblowing, but I think it's another thing that will make me the coolest person I know. I'm enjoying having time to try things like this now that I'm done with school (or very nearly so!).

If you want to donate, I'd appreciate it! Here's the link: http://www.mos.org/marathon/meettherunners.php#lowenthal

And a shout-out to my most recent donors - thanks to Jen B, Erin, Vidya, Clara, John and Sassy, Stephanie, and Tali! You guys are so great, and I really appreciate your help at the midpoint! Everyone else, feel free to try to be as awesome as them by donating through the link above!

Whew, just ran 5.8 miles

2012-01-26T16:22:00.000-08:00

I was supposed to run 6, but I got confused about my route and accidentally cut off a tiny bit. I felt ok while running, but it was snowing a little (not like it was on Saturday). When I got back, I realized I had run a very fast pace! But not quite as fast as I thought, since I accidentally shortened the run. Oops!

Yesterday I started learning to read Hebrew for when we go to Israel. There's a requirement that you spend 8 hours learning Hebrew for the program, so yesterday I had my first 4 hours. Next week I'll have the remaining 4 hours. Now, you might think that 8 hours is not very much to learn to read an entirely new alphabet. Well, that's true. The class goes very fast, and our only goal is to be able to read, not to have any idea what we're reading. I showed Sam what I was reading last night, and he laughed. They could make us say anything, and we wouldn't know the difference. It turned out I was saying, "Who is large? Dad is large! Also uncle is large!"

After Hebrew, I went to work a little more on my glass mosaics, even though it wasn't class time. I grouted my second piece, and I did a little bit of work on one that is a present for my mom. Mom, if you're reading this, don't worry, I won't spoil what it is. But it's not my first try, so hopefully it will be a little better :)

Then I went to yoga, which was one of the less enjoyable yoga experiences I've had. As with almost every class, what I've realized is that it's not so much what you're doing or learning that matters, it's the instructor. A good instructor can make a boring subject fun, and a bad instructor can make an interesting subject miserable. And it's the same for yoga. I realized that I've been doing yoga on and off for almost 10 years, which is very strange to realize. Anyway, yesterday was not the best.

We're getting ready for a big forum at work, and things have been super busy this week. I feel like I've sent approximately a million emails. But I'm having a ton of fun getting ready for it, and I like that I get to do so many different things. I've gotten to coordinate speakers, design the program packet, research facts, figure out logistics, and a bunch more. It's not all that science-heavy for this particular forum, but I don't mind the change of pace.

Ok, now my sweat is making me freezing, so I'm going to go take a hot shower. I'll do some more shout-outs to my donors in my next post, so if you want to be one of them, here's the link: http://www.mos.org/marathon/meettherunners.php#lowenthal My runner is totally wearing pants now!

My runner is wearing pants!

2012-01-25T12:32:00.000-08:00

And I'm officially registered for the Boston Marathon! I received my confirmation email and everything! This is getting pretty real!

Check out my runner, who is now wearing pants: http://www.mos.org/marathon/meettherunners.php#lowenthal Woohoo! I'm 38% of the way to my goal!

I'm also having a lot of fun with my glass mosaics class. It's slow going, but I think I'm going to be able to register for the class again in the spring. Ok, back to work!

Half marathon in the snow

2012-01-23T09:00:00.000-08:00

This was a big weekend for me. My dad came to visit for his birthday, and I turned in my thesis on Friday, and Alan and I ran a half marathon in the snow on Saturday. It was a lot of fun overall! Here's a picture of us from during the run:

And here we are after the run:

We thought people wouldn't understand how hard core we were if we were smiling, so we decided to make serious faces:

Afterwards, my hands were way too cold. Here's why: we got back, checked our distance, and realized we'd only done 12.4 miles. I knew Alan wouldn't be happy about that, since this was supposed to be his first half marathon. So I said if he wanted I would do the rest with him, and we went out and ran 0.7 more miles. But by that point, my gloves were wet, and my hands got so cold!

Luckily, this time I thought of bringing warm clothes to change into afterwards. What a difference! I was still cold, but it was much better.

And in bigger news, I finally turned in my thesis!!!! I have now completed everything I need for my dual masters degrees! Woohoo! And I've cleaned out my office at school. I just have 3 more sessions of the class I'm taking, and then I'll really be done!

It was really nice having my dad visit this weekend. We had a celebratory dinner and saw a play, and my mom sent cookies for dessert.

If you're glad you weren't out running in the snow on Saturday morning, that's a great reason to donate so that I'll do it instead of you! Here's the link: http://www.mos.org/marathon/meettherunners.php#lowenthal My runner is so close to wearing pants!

Today I filled in my Boston Marathon application

2012-01-18T18:58:00.000-08:00

Today I got my application form for the Boston Marathon. It asked for occupation, and I wasn't sure what to put. I ended up putting Scientist, after debating between Student, Scientist, and Teaching/Education. Museums weren't a choice. This is the first time I'm not a student! Even though I'm still a student now (for a couple more weeks, at least), the form asked for your age on the day of the marathon, so I figured it would also be fitting to put my occupation on the day of the marathon. Maybe I should have put professional runner...

There's a number inside, but I don't think it's my bib number, just my application number. I first thought it was my bib number and got very excited, but I think I was wrong. Anyway, it's 4302, but we'll see if that turns out to be my bib number. I don't think I'll know till March at the earliest.

I completed another round of edits on my thesis today, so hopefully that will be the last round. It's supposed to be due on Friday, but my advisor said he emailed the department and we can have a few extra days if we need it. I DON'T WANT A FEW EXTRA DAYS!!! I just want to be done!

I've been hard at work at the Museum of Science, and I'm feeling very productive. I like it a lot! There's a forum coming up on January 29 about the farm bill, and we've been very busy getting ready for it. Over 300 people have signed up so far!

Fiona mentioned my blog on her blog, so I would like to return the favor. If you're interested in a different take on the marathon and training, or if you want to support Community Servings, which gives healthy meals to critically ill people and their families, head on over to her blog at http://fionarunsboston.tumblr.com/

And if you haven't yet donated to my marathon effort, there's no better time than the present! http://www.mos.org/marathon/meettherunners.php#lowenthal I'm trying to reach $2000 by February 17 (our midpoint goal), so please help me out!

Thanks to Jen B, Erin, and Vidya for your donations! You guys are so great!

Finally, I suppose you're all waiting on the edge of your seats for a blister update. Well, things are looking good. I popped it as I mentioned a couple of posts ago, and now it's almost back to looking like a normal toe! So things are good.

1/3 of the way through fundraising!

2012-01-16T13:38:00.000-08:00

Woohoo! Thanks to my donors! I'm currently just over 1/3 of the way to my fundraising goal. Today we ran 3 miles and it was supposed to be an easy run but we were a little too excited and ran a bit faster than we should have. But I'm feeling good about my shoe situation. If you want to help me get up to $2,000 by February 17, which is our team midpoint goal, you can donate here: http://www.mos.org/marathon/meettherunners.php#lowenthal

I also got some feedback on my thesis from my thesis reader, which means I have a bit more work to do writing about policy implications and recommendations. So obviously the way I'm handling that is by procrastinating and blogging. I also am procrastinating working on my assignments for my class that I'm taking. Ugh.

Tomorrow night I have glass mosaics class again. Hopefully I'll remember to bring my camera and take some pictures of what I'm working on. I'm very excited for that!

12 miles today and shout outs to my donors!

2012-01-14T16:50:00.000-08:00

Today we ran 12 miles at our team run. The weather was pretty nice for January in Boston, but it was pretty windy. I wore my cool new shoes for the whole run today, which doubled the longest distance I had ever run in them in a single run. Here they are:

And for comparison, here's a picture of my me wearing one of my old shoes and one of my new shoes. I tried them on at the same time today almost incidentally, while I was switching into my new shoes before the run. It felt really weird to have them on at the same time. You can really see how much less substantial my new shoes are. I feel so cool when I run in them. And so far, my calves and Achilles are holding up to it.

My friend Fiona came to run with us today. Here we are before the run:

And I wore my new glittens which were a present from my supervisor at the museum. They kept my hands very warm:

Here's a picture of all of the members of our team who were at the team training run today. We sure are a reflective bunch:

And here's the three of us after the run, only a little the worse for wear:

But my blister was significantly worse for wear, at almost double its original giant size. Check it out:

I decided to pop it, against my dad's suggestion. But the team coach recommended popping it, and I really wanted to, so I did. It was really fun. Now my toe is back at the normal volume, and I have a bandaid on it. And a note to Keith and Rebecca: I'm wearing those fuzzy warm socks you gave me!

As usual, here's a plug for my fundraising effort. Things are going really well so far, thanks to my donors. I'd like to thank Keith and Rebecca, Lindsey, Sarah R, Sam N, Farah, my parents, Sally C, Sally P, Mike M, Jessica, Nancy and Mike, Debbie and Gil, Nicole, Bob, Louise and Jerry, Kirthi and Isaac, David F, Kevin M, Catey, Sarah S, Danny and Mindy, Lin, Connie, Pranay, Kathryn, Jayson, and Luvena for being so awesome and donating to my marathon fundraising effort. You can all be expecting something in the mail soon! Here's the link if you want to donate: http://www.mos.org/marathon/meettherunners.php#lowenthal Thanks!

Today was cross-training, and I finished the edits on my thesis!

2012-01-11T16:04:00.000-08:00

Today I swam with the masters team for my cross-training. It gives my blister a little break :)

And in bigger news, today I also finished going through the enormous mountain of comments from my advisor on my thesis! Which is not to say that there won't be another round of this, in fact I'm sure there will be. But it can only be less from here! And the whole thing is due next Friday, January 20. Unfortunately, I got stuck taking a class this month, so I'm not going to be quite as done as I wanted on that day, but the class is pass/fail and I'm trying not to worry about it too much. Certainly having my thesis done will be a big relief, and a big weight off.

And hi to my friend Rebecca, who also made calzones. I'll try to remember to take some pictures of my mosaic projects so I can post them.

That's all for tonight!

And now, 100 miles of training complete!

2012-01-10T18:50:00.000-08:00

Today, after a 5-mile training run, I have completed 100 miles of training! Which leaves only 402 miles of training, plus 26 miles for the marathon itself. So far so good, except that I've got a giant blister on my big toe on my right foot. Check it out:

Side View

Top View

So you can see, it's pretty giant. And since I haven't posted any food pictures in a while, or any pictures for that matter, here's a picture of what we had for dinner last night. They're delicious homemade spinach gruyere calzones with red sauce for dipping. So yummy!

Also tonight, I had my first session of Glass Mosaics class. It was really fun! My first project is a mirror with a mosaic border. It's quite a lot of work, but it makes me realize that I should take some more art classes because I'm really enjoying it.

And as usual, here's my plug for donating to my marathon fundraising effort: please do! Here's the link: http://www.mos.org/marathon/meettherunners.php#lowenthal

Enjoy the oddly warm weather!

100 days till the marathon!

2012-01-06T12:27:00.000-08:00

It seems like a lot when I put it that way, but it's coming up in just over 3 months! Tomorrow we've got a 10 mile team run. I'm going to run half of it in my new running shoes and half in my old running shoes. I read the book Born To Run, and it inspired me to try the new (or old, depending on how you look at it) minimalist running. I tried barefoot running a few times, but I don't think I'm really cut out for that, especially in Boston in the winter. So I got some minimalist shoes, the New Balance Minimus (women's). They look like this.

I feel very cool when I'm wearing them. But I'm being very careful not to jump into using them all the time, because you have to reformat your running style and you can injure yourself if you go too fast. Depending on how the switch goes, I'm considering wearing them for the marathon!

As for fundraising, I'm very proud to say that my extremely generous donors have helped push me over $1,000! My runner almost has pants on now! Our team goal is to have raised $2,000 each by Friday, February 17. We're celebrating by running 17 miles the next day!

I'm also making good progress with my thesis. It's due January 20, and I can't wait to be done! I have most of it written, but I still have to write the second part of the abstract and my conclusion. Other than that, it's just revisions to go.

In extremely random news, I am doing an experiment where I am trying lactaid milk. I've been a little lactose intolerant since about sophomore year of college and I've been using soy milk on my cereal. I tried the lactaid milk yesterday and didn't notice any problems, so I'm trying it again today. We'll see how it goes!

At English High School...

2012-01-04T15:17:00.000-08:00

Last school year, the Traveling Programs went to English High School. In October they had the Heat and Temperature program in the 9th grade. 160 students attended, and it was scholarship funded. Here are the things the teachers had to say:

"Liked how it was very aligned with the MCAS standards for Heat and Temperature"
"[The educator] did a great job not just of demonstrating and explaining the concepts behind the demonstrations, but also of getting the students involved and managing the large group of unruly kids."

In November, they had the Motion: Speed, Velocity, and Acceleration program, again for the 9th grade, with 160 students, and again it was scholarship funded. As one teacher said,"The content was perfect!"

As for a running update, I am happy to say that my heart is still intact after Heartbreak Hill, but I can definitely see how it's going to be quite a challenge 20 miles into the marathon! It's not unbelievably steep, but it sure is long, and it comes after a bunch of other smaller but still intimidating hills. Good thing we're practicing!

Also, yesterday I went running outside in conditions I would not have imagined running in, worse than in Minnesota! It was 25 degrees with a huge amount of wind, and by the time I got back I couldn't feel my ears even though I was wearing a hat!

Ok, time to stop procrastinating on my thesis by blogging :) It's due in 16 days! Yikes!

By the way, here's the link to donate to my marathon effort: http://www.mos.org/marathon/meettherunners.php#lowenthal

The work of the Traveling Programs at MOS

2011-12-30T12:14:00.000-08:00

Tomorrow we're going to be running Heartbreak Hill for the first time, which is a major hill in the Boston Marathon that comes up about 20 miles into the marathon. We're running 8 miles for our long training run of the week, and it includes Heartbreak Hill. As a present from my in-laws, I got a cool new running shirt that says "See you at the finish" and I'm planning to wear it to the training run tomorrow.

We also got a team email this week about the recent work of the Traveling Programs at the Museum of Science. Here are the things they've been working on lately:

The team has taught programs for over 17,000 people in the past two months
Currently prototyping demonstrations for their new multi-grade sound assembly Now Hear This: The Sounds of Science which will premiere in March (funded thanks to Marathon donations)
Premiering a new PreK-2 engineering program in January
Purchase of a new van in January (funded thanks to Marathon donations)

If you want to help out with this wonderful program, please donate through my link on the Museum of Science website. Thank you and Happy New Year!

P.S. I should mention that I've been super hard core this week, running outside in Minnesota in the winter. To be fair, the weather has been unseasonably warm, but still!

My friend Fiona is also running the Boston Marathon!

2011-12-27T21:40:00.000-08:00

She's running to raise money for Community Servings, which is a fantastic organization. Here's the link to her blog (if you want to donate, scroll down to the bottom): http://fionarunsboston.tumblr.com/

Happy Holidays!

Thanks to my donors so far!

2011-12-21T16:10:00.000-08:00

Thank you so much to my MOS donors so far! I'm up to $150, which is a great way to take the lead on my team for fundraising. However, I would love to raise more this week! This week we got a list of the things that different donation amounts will pay for in the Traveling Programs. Here's the list:

Museum of Science Traveling Programs Marathon Donation Amounts

$10 - 100 balloons for shrinking in liquid nitrogen for our States of Matter school program
$25 - A dozen wine glasses to smash using resonance and a speaker (no opera singer needed) in our ‘Now Hear This: The Sounds of Science’ school program
$50 - A tank of gasoline for our small vans which will allow us to drive over 350 miles to serve schools and libraries
$75 - One night stay at a hotel in rural Maine for an overnight traveling program
$100 - 4 tanks of liquid oxygen that we can condense into rocket fuel for the finale of our Heat and Temperature school program
$250 - A full scholarship for a traveling program assembly to visit a library or community center
$500 - A full scholarship for a traveling program assembly to visit a school (serves up to 200 people)
$750 - A full scholarship for 2 traveling program assembly programs at a school (serves up to 400 people)
$1,000 - Scholarships for a full day of workshop programming at a school (serves up to 8 classes)
$2,000 - 100 hours of staff time in the Museum shop spent building equipment like a musical tesla coil for our school program on sound that we are currently developing

As you can see, the Traveling Programs do a lot of cool things and reach a ton of students. If you haven't donated yet but are feeling the holiday spirit, you can donate here. Thanks again!!!

In other news, I'm home in Pennsylvania now and I've been running in the surprisingly good December weather. I ran 4 miles today and thoroughly enjoyed it. I also just finished reading Born to Run, which was an excellent and inspiring book. I would definitely recommend it if you have any interest in running. It's not a book about the mechanics of running or evolution, which is what I thought it was after hearing about it from friends and my brother. It's a true story about the author and ultradistance running, which is anything longer than a marathon. Who knows what I'll get into next?

A training video!

2011-12-15T17:46:00.000-08:00

We've been training for the marathon for 3 weeks now, and last week one of the other runners took a video of Alan and me running (while he was running himself, which is why it's a bit jumpy). Alan and I are both running to support the Museum of Science Traveling Programs. Here's the video.

I am also extremely proud to report that I'm currently leading the team in fundraising. I've raised $150 already! Please help me keep my lead! Here's the link again. Thanks so much to my first few donors! You guys are great!

Please support me! (also Happy Birthday, Mom!)

2011-12-13T07:16:00.000-08:00

As you hopefully read in my last post, I'm running the Boston Marathon in April to raise money for the Museum of Science Traveling Programs. Since not all schools can get their students to the Museum of Science for field trips, the Traveling Programs take the museum to them! They do all sorts of science programs at the K-9 grade level, and the programs are available on a scholarship basis to schools that can't afford them. My husband's school has been one of the beneficiaries of this program. Last year, they got to learn about heat and temperature in October, and motion, speed, velocity, and acceleration in November.

I'm really proud to be running for this program, and I would be honored and happy if you wanted to support me by donating to the Traveling Programs. If you want to donate, the link is here. If you were thinking of getting me a present this holiday season, this would be a great present! You don't have to get me anything else!

Of course, I'd also love to have support on the day of the marathon, so if you can come to Boston for April 16, 2012, that would be wonderful!

I'm running the Boston Marathon!

2011-12-04T17:21:00.000-08:00

I haven't posted in a while, have I? Well, it's been a busy semester. I've been a teaching assistant, taking a full class load, working on my technology and policy thesis, babysitting, and I started an internship at the Museum of Science at the beginning of October. And I recently found out that I'm going to be running the Boston Marathon! It's on April 16, 2012, and I'm really excited! I'm going to be running to raise money for the Museum of Science Traveling Programs. We had our first training run yesterday, which was 4 miles. We'll be working our way up over the next 4.5 months, and I'm lucky enough to be running with 2 of my closest friends! I just can't wait to finish up with classes and my thesis so that I can concentrate on my internship and running. We'll see how this whole winter running thing goes - there's no chance I'll be running 18 miles on a treadmill, that's for sure!

Things are moving along

2011-09-20T17:45:00.000-07:00

It's a few weeks into the semester now, and I'm happy with the classes I ended up with. I'm taking a math requirement and a fun elective, and both classes are interesting with good instructors. Unfortunately, the weather is starting to be fall, which I don't like. It's getting cold :(

I'm also making some good progress on my thesis and it looks like I'll be publishing a paper soon, which makes me feel really cool. I also did a podcast, but I learned that there's quite a backlog of podcasts for them to put up, so it could be another month or so before mine goes up.

I am doing the Boston Half Marathon in a couple of weeks, and I'm excited but not feeling prepared. I haven't been running as much as I'd like, but I'm getting back into a routine and I think I'll be ready by the time it gets here. On a crazy note, I've wanted to do the Boston Marathon (not the Half) since I moved to Boston. I know I'll never train enough to qualify, since the qualifying times are pretty fast and you have to do another marathon to qualify! So my idea this year is to run the marathon for charity, which means I'll have to raise money for the charity and they will give me a race bib. If I get a spot on a charity team, I'll be posting on here to ask for donations! :)

Tomorrow is the career fair, and I'm not sure exactly what I'm looking for. There are a lot of moving pieces in my future, so I'm going to go with an open mind and see what I can find out.

I can't believe that in less than 5 months I'll be done with school! I have been in school my whole life! I'm so excited to try out real life!

The semester is about to start

2011-09-04T13:31:00.000-07:00

I'm about to start my (hopefully, most likely) last semester of school, and classes start on Wednesday. I feel like I've been working really hard lately and school hasn't even started. I did a podcast, I'm working on getting my thesis together, I'm working on getting a publishable version of my thesis together, and I'm trying to figure out what to do with my life. Plus going to 3 weddings in August, plus my family vacation, plus I did a triathlon yesterday! Yep, I'm pretty busy. And I'm going to be a teaching assistant (TA) this fall, rather than a research assistant. It will be pretty different, and I hope I like it. The instructors for the class are interesting and smart people, and I'm going to be giving a lecture in November, which is frightening. I'm also thinking of trying to run the Boston Marathon for charity in April, so I emailed a few charities today to see if they might have space left for me to run for them. If I get a spot, expect that I'll be asking for donations! The organizations that I emailed all have really good missions, so it would feel good to raise money for them.

It's hot today and it's going to be hot again tomorrow, but later this week it is going to be surprisingly cold. I'm not looking forward to winter, that's for sure!

Something yummy we ate

2011-08-03T10:07:00.000-07:00

We had our friend/wedding photographer over for dinner on Monday night, and she suggested we try a recipe for vegan avocado pasta. It was delicious! And then we went out for non-vegan ice cream :)

Here's the pasta:

Yum!

We're off!

2011-07-05T17:50:00.000-07:00

After an exhilarating wedding weekend, followed by a ton of packing and tying up loose ends (including figuring out what happened to our marriage license!), we're at the airport and about to head off on our honeymoon. We'll be in Reykjavic, Iceland for 3 days, then in Copenhagen, Denmark for the rest of our 3 weeks. We're extremely excited! Look for more posts coming soon!

Thanks so much to everyone who helped make our wedding an incredible success!

Finishing up the last few details

2011-06-27T18:38:00.000-07:00

It's been a crazy hectic time, and my thesis is a bit the worse for wear, but the wedding is finally coming up this weekend and I'm really excited. There are a few last details to take care of, and our parents are arriving on Wednesday (we're so excited!). Soon it will all be real! We went to our friends' wedding this past weekend and had a blast. This is really the summer of weddings for us - 1 in June, ours in July, 3 in August, 1 in September, and 1 in December - and those are only the ones we know about so far! Next summer is already starting to fill up, believe it or not. My fiance's brother got engaged last month and is starting to plan a wedding for next May, and there are a few others for next summer that haven't picked dates yet. Anyone who wants us to come to their wedding should get married before the end of August 2012 though, because then we're going to be going abroad! Another thing that I'm excited about :)

If only I didn't have this thesis to worry about, everything would be great :( We're also keeping a close eye on the weather forecast, hopefully those isolated thunderstorms will hear all my wishing them away and they'll get the message and not happen. Or at least not happen till the afternoon, after we're safely inside the reception.

One thing that has been super nice is how many friends and family members (and future family members!) have been so eager to offer their help with anything we need for the wedding. I can't imagine how we would have managed without all the help, and it really makes us feel good that so many people are there for us.

Ok, back to work on the thesis. I'll try to blog from the honeymoon in Europe! It won't be Caroline in Barcelona, but it will be awesome!

One month till the wedding!

2011-06-01T17:03:00.000-07:00

I can't believe it's coming up so soon! We're getting really excited, and we're starting to see the light at the end of the planning. Just a few more things to take care of!

As usual, here is a picture of something I ate. This was a portabella mozzarella pesto sandwich from Flour, which we went to when my dad was here in early May. It was delicious!

We also went to a Red Sox vs. Twins game at Fenway, and it had a 2 hour rain delay. The guys had to keep putting out the tarp and putting it away, running it back and forth! It was fun to watch, but probably the game would have been better. Luckily, the Red Sox won the game, when they finally got back to playing!

MIT 150 Flash Mob

2011-04-30T20:37:00.000-07:00

This was so much fun! We spent hours learning this dance, then performed it in a flash mob for the MIT 150 celebration. The first video is all from above, which is a pretty cool view. The second video is the one that was done professionally, so it has a bit more context and shows what happened at the end when we went outside. I'm so glad we came back early from the bike ride for this!

And now I have some cool dance moves!

The possibilities are endless!

2011-04-17T14:58:00.000-07:00

This post is dedicated to my dad, who wanted to see some pictures of things I'm eating. Here is some frozen yogurt with kiwi and passion fruit sauce that I've eaten twice now. It's delicious!

Did I mention we're in Israel? Yep, my fiance and I are here with his parents, and we're having a great time so far. There are all sorts of things to buy at the open air market, so I took this (cliche, I know) picture of some spices that we didn't buy but were really pretty.

And now I'm going to fight jet lag and try to go to sleep! Good night!

It's my birthday!

2011-02-08T19:09:00.000-08:00

After a long day of classes and meetings, I was excited to come home and open cards from family and presents from my fiance and friends! Things have been busy around here as usual, with 3 exciting weekends in a row: my parents visiting, my bridal shower with friends visiting, and a trip to NYC to visit another friend. This weekend coming up will be a little break with nothing major scheduled, then the weekend after we're going to visit my fiance's family! It's all fun, but exhausting!

Wedding planning is going pretty well lately, with most of the big decisions made. We've got my dress, a location, a band, and food, plus an officiant. That's all you need, right? The rest will take care of itself, right Mom? :)

As you might have guessed, classes have started up again and I'm trying to get at least the first half of my dual thesis done by May (or June?). Yesterday one of my good friends defended her PhD thesis, and now she's a Doctor! I can't believe that, and I'm so proud of her. I'm also so jealous that she's done!

Speaking of done, I am really ready for winter to be done. It's been so cold, windy, and snowy lately, and I've had enough. I'm about ready to move to Australia for the rest of the winter :)

Keep your fingers crossed for a warm spring starting soon!

My house has a new driveway

2011-01-11T16:04:00.000-08:00

My house at home got a new driveway, and we held an opening ceremony when I was home for Thanksgiving. Here it is, in all its glory:

I'll miss the old one, but the new one is very nice and smooth, as you can see.

I haven't been posting as much lately, which is because I've been very busy. Lately, I've completed a couple of 2-day courses in bike mechanics. I've done things like change my brake pads, adjust my derailleur, re-tape my handlebars, degrease and re-lube my chains, and watch a whole bike being built from just a frame. It's been pretty cool, and I know a lot more about bikes now.

I've also started writing the background section of my thesis, which is hard to do. It's hard to get started, it's hard to know what to write, it's hard to do all the research that is necessary, and so on. But I've got some done now, and I'll keep going. My advisor wants to see a preliminary version by Friday, so I've got a deadline.

Planning a wedding is similarly a lot of work. Little by little, we're making progress. From where we are now, it's hard to see how we'll get it all done, but I'm sure we will.

It looks like it's going to be a snow day tomorrow, with Boston getting 12-18 inches of snow, so I'm not going in to work and I'm going to stay home and stay warm!

Happy New Year!

Mmmmm...

2010-12-24T21:34:00.000-08:00

My mom wanted me to put up a new post, so here goes. Don't these cinnamon buns look delicious?

Merry Christmas, and I'll post more soon, I promise!

Apples and visits and games, oh my!

2010-10-15T15:44:00.000-07:00

So we took some pictures of our apples when we got home from apple-picking, but it wasn't immediately after (there might or might not have been a pie made in the meantime...). Anyway, we wanted to take a picture that looked like as many apples as we had originally picked, but with the number of apples that we had left. Here is the amount of apples we had left:

Here's how we tried to make it look like more apples. I would say it worked:

We had some friends over for a game night, during which we played 2 new games: Ticket to Ride, which we bought, and Dominion, which some friends brought. Both of them were really fun! Now I want to get Dominion, but I think we're going to put it on our wedding registry :)

Here's our feast from game night:

Note the apples that are pink on the inside! How cool is that? They taste pretty good, too (and that's coming from someone who doesn't really like apples):

We also had a visit from some of my fiance's family last weekend, which was nice. We got to play with his cousin's kids, who are 1 and 3, so it was really cute. We took them to the Boston Children's Museum, which is a great museum if you're ever in Boston with kids. It's also pretty fun for adults!

We're having another game night tonight, but this one's not at our apartment. We're about to head out for that, so I'll write more later!

Here's another thing I did

2010-10-04T15:30:00.000-07:00

Pretty cool, huh? I am sometimes scared of heights, particularly when it involves climbing things, but this was totally worth it!

We went apple-picking today

2010-10-03T17:07:00.000-07:00

I went apple-picking today for the first time ever, if you can believe that. It was much more fun than I thought it was going to be, despite the unfortunately cold temperatures. I went with 7 of my friends, and after a morning of picking all different kinds of apples and testing some out to make sure we liked them, we had a delicious picnic. On the drive back, I fell asleep in the car :)

Here are some apples from the orchard where we went today:

That's all for now, just a short update because I figure that's better than nothing, and I don't have time for a long post.

My 10th Veg-iversary

2010-09-12T07:51:00.000-07:00

My next few posts might be a little out of order, time-wise, but this is the order I feel like writing about things in, so hopefully you'll bear with me.

This past weekend I marked the 10th anniversary of my becoming a vegetarian by having a vegetarian potluck picnic out in a plaza by our apartment. Here are the stars of the show:

Israeli salad (cucumbers, tomatoes, red peppers, and parsley).

Fruit salad (kiwis, pineapple, grapes, and nectarines).

Caprese salad (tomatoes, mozzarella, and basil, drizzled with balsamic glaze).

Guacamole.

Banana bread.

Zucchini cakes.

Key lime cookies.

Pasta salad number 1.

Quinoa salad with tomatoes.

French bread and cheese.

Bruschetta ingredients.

Pasta salad number 2.

Peanut butter chocolate ice cream.

It was great to have my friends celebrate with me and eat so much delicious food. It made me want to have a veg-iversary every year!

Half marathon training is going well. Yesterday my best friend and I ran 11.5 miles, which was a distance record for both of us. We won't run that much again until the actual half marathon, which is in less than 2 weeks! I got a blister on my toe, but other than that the run was really successful. We ran along the Emerald Necklace, which is a string of pretty green areas with nice trails to run on. We ran all the way from the beginning to Jamaica Pond and back. The weather was perfect for running, and we were really proud of ourselves. I'm excited for the half marathon!

Classes have started again, and so far, mostly so good. I'm really excited about a couple of them, and I think I'm going to learn a lot of new things. This is the first time I've ever taken any sort of economics, and the class I'm taking is not introductory level. It should be a good challenge!

I'm going to go do laundry now. I really need to get more running shorts. Actually, I guess sooner than I'd like it will be pants season :(

Continuing with the updates

2010-09-04T10:36:00.000-07:00

I left off with my family vacation in Maine at the beginning of August. This post has a lot of pictures, since I really enjoy taking pictures in Maine. This is the house we were staying in:

We've gone to Maine every year, but this was the first time we'd stayed in this cottage. It was nice, and it had a great view. My dad really liked how the trees framed the view from the front porch:

Check out that sunset! Also, check out this delicious pizza, with Maine blueberries, gorgonzola cheese, and walnuts on the side. Probably this is the most delicious pizza in the world:

We got this pizza for me and my fiance, and we went with my parents to a lobster place so that they could get lobster. We ate our food in the lobster dining area, and it had this beautiful view:

Also, my dad and I did our annual kayak race. Here's a picture of us practicing for it earlier in the week:

Don't we look cool? The race went well. We got 18th place out of more than 30 boats, with no serious mishaps. Overall, Maine was great. My parents, brother, and I were there for the first part of the week, then our family friend came up from Boston for a day, and then my brother went home and my fiance came up for the weekend. We had a lot of ice cream, went to a movie, took some relaxing naps, and read books on the porch.

I'm still very excited about my new bike. And now I'm going to babysit, so I'll continue with this later. Have a good day!

Caroline's bicycle emporium!

2010-08-24T20:07:00.000-07:00

It's been ages since I last posted, but my latest news is that I got a new bike! Currently I am in possession of 3, yes 3, bikes! I'm calling it Caroline's bicycle emporium, and here's a picture:

And here's the star of the show, my new bike:

I sold my "old" bike on Craigslist (the person didn't want to take it home today in the rain, so he's coming to pick it up on Thursday if the weather is nicer, which is why I still have it) and my fiance found this new one at a yard sale around the corner from us. It's probably 15 years newer, and much fancier and nicer. It's lighter and shinier and the gear shifters are on the brakes instead of on the down tube, which makes it easier to shift. And thanks to my serious bargaining skills, I managed to buy the new one for the same price I sold the old one for! So basically a free upgrade, and everyone's happy. And now I will be so fast!

In other news, I can't believe I haven't posted since my triathlon. It went great, and I got 3rd place in my age group, and first place for women in the swim, second to only one guy! Here I am getting numbered:

I definitely want to do another triathlon, but my schedule has turned out to be so busy since this one that I don't think I'm going to have time to do another one this summer, at least before it becomes wetsuit season (and I don't plan on buying a wetsuit anytime soon). I'll probably try to do some more next summer, packed in between the 7 or so weddings that we're going to. And with my new bike, I should be even better!

I remember what I've done and what I want to write about in my blog by looking through the pictures I've taken. Here are some of those things:

-One of my close friends visited in July, and we went to the Boston Public Library. It's a cool place to check out if you're visiting Boston. There are two parts, the old part and the new part, and they're both really impressive, with an atrium in the middle with a fountain.
-Later that week, my lab went to see the Hubble 3D Imax. I highly recommend it, if you can stomach Imax movies. Personally, I don't think I've ever met an Imax movie that I didn't like.
-The next weekend I went to visit my fiance in New York City. We stayed with two different couples that we're friends with, and saw the Broadway show American Idiot. The performance was really good, but it didn't have much of a plot, to say the least. But the singing was good, and we had front row seats thanks to winning the rush ticket lottery (you still have to pay for the tickets, but they're much cheaper and usually for excellent seats). We also had a celebrity spotting - we saw Jennifer Garner at Chelsea Market!

Yes, that's my shoulder making a cameo on the right.
-We went to Minneapolis to visit my fiance's family. While we were there, we checked out the new Twins stadium by biking there to watch a game. Minneapolis has these cute bike paths with mini signs for stop and yield and such. We had a really nice visit, and enjoyed this sign a lot:

The next week was my family vacation, but it's time to go to bed now, so I'll finish updating in a later post. Good night, and leave me a comment!

It's been rainy here in Boston...

2010-07-14T20:20:00.000-07:00

Last Saturday I went up to Peabody to do a day of Habitat for Humanity. As we were driving back, it started raining really hard, and the roads were flooding. We were in an SUV, but by the time we got back to drop some people off in the dorms, the water was so high that the car stalled! We had to get out and push it! Here's a picture from after we got it to a parking lot on higher ground:

After the build day, my fiance and I went with my friend's boyfriend to watch her play in the pit orchestra for a high school level production of The Producers. It was a great show, especially considering the ages of the actors. The next morning, we had blueberry pancakes for breakfast, and we marveled at the oddity that is this blueberry:

It has 2 stems! One coming out of each end! Incredible! Well, I thought so, anyway. It's life and glory ended in the usual way that blueberries go, which is to say it was eaten. I can't personally vouch for its taste, but the rest of the batch was delicious.

Less than 4 days till my triathlon! I'm very excited! Perhaps I should be practicing my biking more, but I did get a fancy new pair of shorts for the bike/run and tinted goggles for the swim. I checked the results from last year, and there were only 3 participants in my age/gender category. I hope it's the same this year, since the top 3 get awards :) We'll see.

Good night!

Happy 4th of July!

2010-07-07T21:45:00.000-07:00

Some friends and I went out for brunch (pictured below), and then some other friends and I went to watch the fireworks. The Boston Pops play a concert before the fireworks, and hundreds of thousands of people show up to listen and watch. The fireworks show was great, as usual. From brunch, banana chocolate chip pancakes with patriotic sprinkles:

A cool shot of a pretty evening sky:

My best picture of fireworks:

I think these fireworks look like jellyfish:

And that's it for tonight! A post of mostly pictures. Wish me luck with sleeping in this heat!

Yesterday I biked to Salem

2010-06-28T20:46:00.000-07:00

My cousin, her husband, and their 2 adorable kids live in Salem, and they were having a backyard party sort of thing yesterday with a bunch of their friends and their friends' kids. I had been meaning to visit, and what better day than a day when they would feed me and I'd get to play outside with a bunch of cute kids? Biking there was easier said than done, though. It should have been about 18.5 miles, but considering how much I got lost, it was probably at least 20. Every few miles, I'd have to call my fiance, tell him where I was, and ask for the next step so that I could get back onto the directions I'd written out beforehand. I don't know if it's a Massachusetts thing or what, but there are an incredible number of intersections where none of the roads are labeled, or only one is, and you get to play the game of guessing what road you're on or crossing. But in the end, I made it to Salem safe and sound, and just in time to put in my order for a veggie burger on their new grill :)

I hung around for the whole afternoon, including a brief rain shower. I got to hold my 3-month-old first-cousin-once-removed for a good amount of the time, and he is so cute and snuggly! On the down side, he did spit up on me at one point. His older brother is 2 years old, and similarly adorable. Unlike the stereotypical terrible twos, he was friendly, well-behaved, and excited to play with me. I also got to see my cousins' new house, which they moved into less than 6 months ago. It has some fun 1950's decor, which I like because I've been watching Mad Men. Unfortunately, they don't have period furniture. Well, one step at a time.

Getting home was much less of an adventure because I decided to take the commuter rail. It's really convenient, even with a bike, since they have slot sorts of things to slide bikes into, and straps to secure them.

I figure this bike ride was good for me, though, since I've signed up for a triathlon that's coming up in less than 3 weeks. I somewhat spontaneously joined the Triathlon Club here, and I've been to a couple of their swim practices now. With my running for my half marathon in September, I should be ok to make it through a triathlon in 3 weeks, even if I don't leave my competitors in the dust. I'm actually just planning to finish :)

On a surprising note, my research has been going a bit better lately. In fact, we might even get to put some of it in the Science Museum! I don't know how certain that is, so I won't describe it too much now, but I'm very excited and hopeful!

Leave me some comments if you're still reading! Good night!

I haven't posted in a while

2010-06-22T17:11:00.000-07:00

It's been a while, but things are going well. A lot has happened since I last wrote, including the end of crew and classes, the 5 Boro Bike Tour, an OK Go concert, 2 weddings, a weekend at the Cape, a trip to Vermont, and oh yeah, getting engaged! That's right, my boyfriend (now fiance!) and I got engaged about 3 weeks ago! We're starting to plan a wedding for next summer, and it's a lot more work than we thought it would be. But don't worry, this isn't going to turn into a wedding blog.

I just got back from running 7 miles in preparation for the half marathon that my friend and I are doing at the end of September. Now that crew is over, I am partly luxuriating in and partly lamenting the freedom/burden of determining my own workouts every day. To counteract my occasional indecisiveness, I'm considering joining the triathlon team. If you don't know me from real life, it might help to know that I've been swimming for my whole life, I bike everywhere I go, and clearly I run at least somewhat. So triathlons are not completely out of the blue. I went to my first triathlon swim practice yesterday, and it was a fun and interesting experience. Unlike normal swimming, triathlon involves more than just swimming as fast as you can by yourself. In the case of this practice, that meant practicing swimming in formation to take advantage of drafting off of other swimmers. We also practiced coming around from behind and passing the rest of the formation. I'd never done anything like that before, and it was fun! I also felt hardcore when we were swimming in the diamond formation and to pass people we had to break through the front of the diamond. So that's my athletics update.

My fiance (!) and I made blueberry muffins last night because blueberries were on an excellent sale at the grocery store (buy 1 container, get 2 free!). They turned out delicious, even though we substituted applesauce for some of the butter.

One of my friends offered to take engagement photos for us, so last week we went around Boston and Cambridge and took some pictures. She's a really talented photographer, and we had a great time. In the end, we ended up with some professional-quality shots, which you can bet will be on our wedding website! Here's one, just for fun:

Ok, so even after all that time, I don't feel like writing any more, plus I could really use a shower after running. I hope you enjoyed the update!

I saw Bill Gates!

2010-04-25T19:08:00.000-07:00

On Wednesday, Bill Gates came here to give a talk called "Giving Back: Finding the Best Way to Make A Difference." There was a lottery for tickets, and even though I never win anything, I won a ticket! The talk was really interesting, since it addressed an issue I've been thinking about a lot lately. Unfortunately, he didn't give any concrete suggestions for recent or upcoming graduates. So I went up at the end for the question and answer part to try to get his advice, but there were too many people before me and the time ran out just before my turn :( I tried to find him afterwards to ask him in person, but my search was unsuccessful. I guess he's a pretty busy guy.

Today I babysat again for the first time in over a month. I really missed the little boy I've been babysitting, and it was fun to see him again today and play outside together. Speaking of kids stuff, on Friday my boyfriend and I saw the kids' movie "How to Train Your Dragon" in 3D. It was really good! I definitely recommend it.

And in camera news, I ordered a new camera and the memory card arrived on Friday, but the camera hasn't arrived yet. I am very excited to get it, though. Hopefully it is better than the old one! I will be relieved to have a way to take pictures again, and then I can get back to the important business of posting pictures of things I eat. This time it's a Panasonic, so we'll see if it is better than the Sony.

Last week my boyfriend and I went out to dinner with his uncle and his uncle's girlfriend. We went for sushi, and it was really delicious. Also, we had a great time spending time with them and having delicious dessert afterward. It's really fun to have people visit, even if the visits are short. If you're thinking of coming to visit me, you should!

Academically, our lab had a dessert bake-off a couple weeks ago. I made chocolate chip cookies, and I wish I could post a picture of them - they were very tasty! Other competitors were super-chocolate brownies, pear and key lime pies, cookies and cream mixture, dirt (pudding with gummies and oreos), cupcakes, a Portuguese egg custard dessert, and maybe some more that I'm forgetting. We didn't end up voting, but I'm sure that my cookies would have won. Right?

Our last home crew race is this Saturday, and my dad is coming to watch. Then on Sunday, we're riding in the New York City 5 Boro Bike Tour . It should be a fun, busy weekend! The only problem is figuring out how to get my bike to and from New York. But I'm sure I am up to the challenge.

And that's it for tonight!

It's so windy!

2010-04-09T16:59:00.000-07:00

We're in New Jersey now for crew, and it's so windy! We had a really hard time getting our boat into the dock because we kept being blown off course. We almost crashed into another boat on our way in, which was scary. Hopefully tomorrow will be calmer, but I'm not optimistic.

Being at races makes me feel like I really need to get a new camera. I returned the one I got not too long ago because it was so bad, but I haven't replaced it yet. I miss taking pictures! Especially of things I eat. But picture this, if you can: bananas, white cheddar rice cakes, bagels with cream cheese, and clementines. I know that wasn't 1000 words, but hopefully they were worth a small picture :)

In other exciting news, I got a share certificate, or certificate of deposit, this week. It gets a teeny bit more interest than my savings account, so this is pretty big news.

I guess I don't have much to say if I'm talking about my share certificate, so I'll call it a night. Keep your fingers crossed for good weather!

Today was a beautiful day!

2010-04-07T18:52:00.000-07:00

I'm very busy with work right now, but I couldn't help commenting on what a beautiful day it was today! The rest of the week has been and will be a pretty normal week for early April, but today it hit 90 degrees, with a lot of sun and a nice breeze. It was perfect for taking my computer outside to do some work while sitting on a bench under a tree in a courtyard that I think of as the "Secret Garden". It's really pretty, and I don't think many people here know it exists. Anyway, for most of the two hours or so that I was out there, I had it all to myself. So peaceful, and surprisingly conducive to getting work done. I was working on figuring out which cognitive tests for executive function we're going to use, and there are more than we had originally thought. It's probably going to come down to the Stroop test, just because we have easy access to it. But there's another test, called the letter-number task (creative, I know), which I think might be better. I won't bore you with the details, but I think it's a cool test.

Anyway, back to work! We're going to New Jersey again this weekend for crew, so I won't have much time for work on the weekend. Depending on how things go, we might have to race 4 times in 2 days! Yikes!

P.S. I'll be happy if you leave me a comment!

Spring break

2010-03-24T18:32:00.000-07:00

It's currently halfway through spring break, and I'm procrastinating working on my homework by writing in my blog. We're having two-a-day practices for crew, and we have our first spring race this Saturday. It will be nice because my parents are coming, and afterwards I'm going home with them. Other than that, I'm being a grad student between practices and going to bed early since I'm so tired, which is unusual for me. I'm also trying not to eat as much as I want to, since I have to make weight for crew!

This past Saturday was quite an athletic day for me, with 2 crew practices, about 45 minutes of bike riding, and about an hour of tennis. Needless to say, I slept well that night! I feel very hardcore for having so many practices.

Tomorrow we have a meeting with the people from the hospital side of our study, who are responsible for the sleep side of things. They're really nice people, and their areas of expertise are very different from ours. It's interesting to work with them. I've prepared a spreadsheet of some cognitive tests and robotics tasks that I think would be good to have our subjects do. Depending on what happens tomorrow, we might have a lot of coding in our futures!

Next week will be back to classes, but it's about halfway through the semester already. Put another way, we're only halfway through the semester?! Sometimes it feels one way, sometimes the other. But I'm very much looking forward to warmer weather, and summer especially. I haven't been in Boston for the summer since the summer after my freshman year, and I'm excited. It is a much more friendly place when everything's green and the weather is warm.

Ok, maybe I should work on my homework now. Wish me luck!

I'm going to run a half marathon!

2010-03-18T13:08:00.001-07:00

My best friend and I have signed up for a half marathon for this September! We're running the Wicked Half Marathon, which will give us a good reason to train hard this summer. The course looks like it will be really pretty, and it's near where my cousin's family lives, so that will be nice too. I'm pretty excited about this, because I've wanted to do a run like this for a while, and we think the t-shirts will be cool-looking. I've only got 2 months left of crew, so it's time to start thinking about what I'll do next. I'm also considering triathlons, and I wouldn't be surprised if I find myself doing some of those, as well.

In other news, I got a new computer, which is really awesome. It's so much faster than my old one, and it has so much more hard drive space! The only thing I don't like is that it's widescreen, but it seems like all new computers are that way, so I guess I don't really have a choice. It also came with a cool thing that lets us watch things on the TV wirelessly from my computer.

I also got a new camera, which was not so awesome. I think something was wrong with it, because all of the pictures came out really yellow, even after messing with the settings. Luckily, Amazon has a really great return policy, so after a quick phone call, they emailed me a return label and I sent it back for a full refund. I'm going to get a new camera soon, but I have to figure out what to get. I think I might want to get something a little nicer, because it turns out that photo quality is more important to me than I thought, based on this experience.

Other things that have happened since my last post, which was far too long ago: my birthday, our big indoor crew race (on ergs), Valentine's Day, for which my boyfriend got me the largest flower arrangement I've ever seen, and which we both thought was a little absurd, a novice crew team dinner, a concert by my boyfriend's band, a friend's birthday party, my best friend's swimming championships, the Jewish holiday of Purim, a visit from my boyfriend's sister, and a bit more work on my research. Oh, and I got admitted to the policy program I applied to!

Here is the flower arrangement, which is more than a meter tall, by my estimation:

The little blue thing in the left side of the picture is my new computer. It's a Toshiba, and so far so good. I hope it has as long and successful a life as my old one did.

I went to the Open House of the policy program on Monday, and I think it's going to be a fun and interesting group to be a part of. People's interests range over all different areas, but a lot of them are focused on energy and sustainability. The people who run the program also seem really nice, so I'm excited to start. I won't start classes with that program until the fall, but it will take me at least another semester, and likely another year, to finish the two master's degrees. I might start thinking about how to tie policy into my research this semester, though.

My classes are going pretty well, I think, but they are a TON of work. My space policy class requires a ton of reading, plus writing memos, preparing for role plays, and a group term project. My other class, human supervisory control, also has a lot of reading and a series of projects. The upside is that I have no tests and no finals, but it's a lot of work in the meantime.

Research is also going well, but I'm starting to feel antsy about when we're actually going to get started running our experiment. I've tried out some of the cognitive tests we're thinking of using, and I have to propose a battery (aka a series) of tests that we will use. We also have to come up with a series of robotics tasks, and at some point we will have to write the code for the tasks. That will be pretty challenging, I expect.

The river finally unfroze a couple of weeks ago, and it's been really nice getting back out on the water. Yesterday and today have been beautiful days, so it's a pleasure to go out, especially now that it's light all the way through practice because of daylight savings time. Next week, for spring break, we have 2 practices per day. It's going to be tough. On Friday, we leave for a race in New Jersey. After that, I'm going to go home for the weekend to hang out with my friend who is getting married in June. I'm missing her bridal shower because of the crew race, but I thought it would be nice to see her even if it's not at the shower.

Since I know a lot of you like to see pictures of what I eat, here's a picture of the vegetarian chili we made for the novice crew team dinner:

So things have been busy. But now it's time for me to go to practice, so I guess I'll have to wrap up this monster post. I'll try to post more frequently, but no guarantees. Check back every once in a while, though!

Happy Spring!

Term starts tomorrow

2010-02-01T18:20:00.000-08:00

I can't believe January has gone by so quickly. It's been a lot of hard training for crew, but I'm feeling like I'm in pretty good shape. Classes start tomorrow, and I'm taking two in addition to Journal Club. My officemate is taking both of them with me, at least for now. So that should be fun, since we'll get to work together. My other officemate is about to start running her experiments. We're all pretty excited about it. And that's about it! A short post this time.

I went skiing last weekend...

2010-01-20T10:29:00.000-08:00

And my parents are coming to visit this weekend! January has mostly been pretty low key, since there are no classes and I'm just doing more research stuff. I'm working on helping my officemate get her material ready for the experiment she's running at the end of the month. I'm researching handedness now, specifically tests for handedness. It's not as straightforward as you might think, especially if you're like me and almost 100% right-handed. For example, which hand do you use to open a jar? Which hand is on top when you use a broom? So that's what I'm working on. Also, today I gave a tour of the lab to a prospective student.

Last weekend I went skiing at Mount Sunapee in New Hampshire. It was my second time skiing ever, and I had a pretty good time. I fell down once at the end and got a bruise, but overall I did pretty well, especially considering I had only ever skied once before and that was 2 years ago. Still, I think it might be another 2 years before I ski again. I went with my boyfriend and two of our friends, and we had to get up really early to get there. Getting up early is not my strong suit :)

And this weekend my parents are coming to visit! It's my dad's birthday on Friday (happy birthday, Dad!) and we are thinking of going to see a free Imax at the Museum of Science, thanks to a donation by the Mathworks. I love going to see Imax shows. Earlier this month, my boyfriend and I saw Antarctica. I was worried it was going to be targeted at a much younger audience, but it was really good. In fact, I can't really think of any Imax I've ever seen that hasn't been fantastic. One of my favorites is Adrenaline Rush, but I don't think my mom would like that one.

I also finally finished my application to the other program that I mentioned a while ago. I don't know exactly when I'll hear from them, but it should be within the next 2 months for sure.

I'll end with a brief crew update. We've been practicing pretty hard since we got back from Florida, and our first competition is on Valentine's Day, at the CRASH-B erg event. Obviously our outdoor races can't start until the river unfreezes. In the meantime, we've been erging a lot, running more than I'd like in the icy conditions, and doing a lot of circuits. Every once in a while, we also row in the tank. I'll be glad when we can row outside again, except that I'm sure I'll be freezing.

Oh, and I ordered a new digital camera! If I ever get back to posting pictures of my food (and maybe other things), they'll probably be from my new camera!

And that's really it for now. Lunchtime!

Hello from Florida, and Happy New Year!

2010-01-01T18:32:00.000-08:00

I have so many blisters! And bugbites! But we're having a fun time, with lots of team dinners and hard workouts and bonding. The internet is intermittent, though, and unreliable. This is just a small post, but I'll write more later. I have to go to sleep soon!

Home for a week, then Florida!

2009-12-27T15:26:00.000-08:00

This month has been quite busy with term wrapping up. Both of my main classes had big term papers, and it was a big push at the end to get them both done. But they are done now, and I am off on break! I'm home now, which is very nice, and on Tuesday I will be going to Florida for 9 days to train with the crew team. I just checked the weather, and it's going to be warm! I packed a bathing suit, so I hope I get to use it!

Today I got new running shoes, which is very exciting. The store I go to has people who know a ton about running and shoes, and it seems like everyone there runs at least 50-70 miles a week, and there are some that run way more. The guy that was helping me also had the cutest little dog (except Pita!), it looked like a pug but it was something else. Anyway, she was 11 weeks old and so soft! I have to say I got a little distracted from the shoes. But I ended up with a purple pair of sneakers that are very comfortable and almost make me hope that we go running in Florida so I can test them out :) Almost.

It's been pretty warm while I've been home, at least for December. It's been in the 50s the last few days, and raining instead of snowing. When I got home, everything was covered in snow from the storm last weekend, but now it's almost all gone.

I've decided that I'm applying for a dual master's degree with a more policy-flavored program. The application is due in early January, so I've got to get it finished up soon. But before that, I've got to get it started :P The only real hard part is the statement of purpose, as I know from applying to grad school last year. But it's hard to get started, and it's hard to tell when you're done. I'm really excited about this program though, so I will just have to buckle down and start writing.

And now it's time for dinner. Here's a picture of our Hanukkah menorah, my Christmas tree, our Kwanzaa flowers, and our atheist plant. Also some cereal and sugar, and our new curtains in the background, made by my mom! Happy holidays!

The semester's ending, and it's getting cold

2009-12-02T12:14:00.000-08:00

I haven't been writing too much lately, but there have been a lot of things going on. This week is the last week of official crew practice until we go to Florida at the end of the month. We've been practicing inside since our last race, but inside sometimes means outside when we're running, so it can be kind of cold. I miss rowing on the water, so hopefully Florida will be a good way to get back into that. I'm not sure how this trip will compare to the swimming trips we've had to Puerto Rico, since the team dynamics are very different on the crew team and the swim team.

Other than crew, research is going all right. I've been working on a slightly different project, and I submitted a first cut at a piece of it to my advisor, so now I'm waiting for him to get back to me with his feedback. Things are going well in the lab, with our Lab Thanksgiving last week and a holiday party coming up in the next couple of weeks. We're also playing an online game called warfish, which is a pretty fun thing to play with 15 people. It provides a nice distraction from resesarch every once in a while.

I've been feeling a bit stressed with final papers/projects for my two classes, but a couple of weeks from now it will all be done and turned in, which I'm very excited for. I've enjoyed my classes this semester, and I'm hoping I can put together a schedule that I'll like as much for next semester. So far, I'm not sure how well that's going to work out. I'm going to be taking at least one more technical class, so hopefully that won't be too much of a shock after the slightly less technical term I've just had. Other than that, scheduling is turning out to be a bit of a problem. Grad school classes don't keep the 5-7 pm block open for sports the way undergrad classes do. I guess this makes sense, because most grad students aren't participating in varsity sports, but it works out to be a problem for me.

It was nice to go home for Thanksgiving and see my family and run in my high school cross country team's annual alumni race. My boyfriend and I drove this year, which didn't take as long as we expected and was much less stressful than taking the overcrowded bus or paying for the train or plane. We listened to some podcasts, which was fun.

There's always more to write about, but I'm going to stop for now. Here's a picture of our crew race, in which you can see how rainy it was:

My square made it into the blanket :)

2009-11-12T15:24:00.001-08:00

You can see it on my friend Rebecca's blog: http://chemknits.blogspot.com/2009/11/knit-thon-tally.html.

Cool!

Halloween!

2009-11-02T16:27:00.000-08:00

My lab went as the periodic table, and we won most creative at the department's costume contest! The prize was a $5 gift certificate for ice cream, so I guess we'll each get a bite of ice cream :)

Here we are:

And my knitting square is more than halfway done, and I'm going to work on it this evening. It's looking good!

I'm knitting a square

2009-10-28T08:14:00.001-07:00

My friend Rebecca inspired me to write this post because she is knitting a blanket to donate to a homeless shelter in Boston and wrote some on her blog about it. The blanket is made up of 35 squares, and our other friend Jenn and I are each knitting a square to contribute to her blanket. We are alternating little squares of knitting and purling. I'm a little more than halfway done with my square at this point, but it's slow going. I'll try to remember to take a picture of it when I'm finished.

In other news, I rowed port yesterday at practice (I'm usually a starboard), and I got some new blisters on my right hand as a result. I'm getting what's known as "crew hands", which means basically a lot of blisters and/or calluses. We are racing in the Foot of the Charles on November 14th, and I'm looking forward to it. My parents and maybe my brother are going to come watch, which is very exciting. They haven't seen my new apartment or my office (except my brother), so that should be fun.

Research is going ok, but I wish I knew Python (a programming language) better. I spend a lot of time trying to figure out how to do something using the pieces that I know, and then I ask someone for help on one little aspect of it, and they point out that there was a much easier way to do the exact same thing. Also, there is still a never-ending pile of background reading to do, which gets a bit tedious. On the other side, I'm thinking that I might apply for a dual degree in technology and policy, along with aero/astro. I have to run that by my advisor to make sure he's ok with that, which I'm nervous to do (on the chance that he'll say no).

The weather here is getting colder and yuckier, which isn't fun for crew or biking everywhere or just being outside or wearing skirts and dresses. It's raining today and it rained yesterday, but hopefully tomorrow will be better.

Oh! I can't believe I almost forgot to mention this, but President Obama was here on Friday to give a speech about clean energy! You can watch the speech from the link here. There was only room for 200 students in the entire auditorium (I think the capacity is over 1000), so most of the community was watching the speech from other rooms with projectors set up, including me. It was very exciting!

My brother is visiting!

2009-10-12T09:41:00.000-07:00

He's the first one in either of our families to see our new apartment, and it's very exciting! Yesterday we went to the Boston Public Library, which I'd never been to. It's beautiful, and now that I've been, I'm definitely adding it to the list of places people have to see when they visit Boston. Here's a picture of the courtyard:

It seems like I start these posts and then don't get around to finishing them, but I guess it's better than not posting at all, even though it's short. Life is busy!

Sometimes we row by eights

2009-09-29T18:13:00.000-07:00

And today we did! It's a lot harder to keep the boat balanced when there is no one to hold their oars flat on the water. But it's so much fun! We have two races this fall, both in November. I'm excited!

Here's an amusing picture to keep you entertained:

The new apartment is looking great, and it's finally starting to feel like we've moved in and unpacked. There's always a little more to do, but it's overall really coming together.

My classes are a swamp of reading, which is pretty different from previous semesters. I'm not taking any classes with problem sets, which is also unusual. I'm finding the material interesting, but I'm not used to doing this much reading and I'm sometimes finding it hard to get through it all.

This weekend we're going to Minneapolis to see my boyfriend's family. They don't subscribe to quite the same "busy-all-the-time-don't-stop-to-breathe" lifestyle that I do, so it's a nice place to go to relax. And maybe take a nap. And with that, I'm going to go to sleep tonight!

Sorry for not posting more!

Super quick post

2009-09-21T18:24:00.000-07:00

Well, I have at least two readers still, so I'll keep going. I have a lot of homework due tomorrow (oh, if only I had started it earlier!), so it's going to be short, but hopefully sweet.

We had our housewarming party on Saturday night, and it was a ton of fun! A lot of our friends came, but we didn't get any noise complaints and no one spilled anything on the couch. I was too busy to take pictures, but I'll put some up soon of the apartment. It's getting more and more set up, and it's really fun!

On Sunday I went sailing with some people from my lab on a boat that belongs to one of the professors in the lab and her husband (are they married? not sure, but in any case they have a boat together). There were 14 of us altogether, and it was also a ton of fun! Here's a picture:

Oh yeah, and no big deal, but they let me drive the boat for a while. I only stopped when it became necessary to eat a brownie. Isn't my lab great? Lucky for me, it was a beautiful day. Otherwise, I would have been freezing!

There's also a fun place to sit up in the front of the boat (called the bow, I now know):

Crew has also been going well. We've gone out on the water a few more times, and it's a slow process of "improvement". Well, even though we're not that good, I'm having a great time. I'm not going to be rowing in the Head of the Charles, in case you were wondering (we can't even row all 8 at a time yet), but I will be there cheering!

And, as promised, this is a super quick post, so this is the end. But check back every once in a while, because I'll keep updating!

I haven't posted in a while

2009-09-18T21:12:00.000-07:00

Hello anyone who's still reading this! I haven't posted in a while, but things have still been going on. My boyfriend and I moved into our new apartment, grad school started, I've visited with friends, and I took up crew, among other things. I'm having a great time so far this school year, but things are quite busy. I'm taking two classes and a seminar, and all of them require a fair amount of reading. (That might actually be an understatement.) Anyway, I'm enjoying them, and I'm really enjoying crew, the apartment, and having an office. I feel like a real person! Who still goes to classes.

Today at "work" (if you can call it that, I'm not sure how to refer to grad school), we cleaned out our office and put some new things in there. Some of the stuff we got rid of looked like it hadn't been touched, much less cleaned, in the last 15 years. It's a lot cleaner now, but it's also sort of bare. I need to bring some more pictures and posters to put up. We also had a teleoperations team meeting, where we discussed an article about sleep processes that we had read. Next week, we're going to Brigham and Women's Hospital to see the suite where they do sleep studies. The idea is that it will give us a better idea of what we're working with for our research, which addresses fatigue in space telerobotics.

Crew has been surprisingly fun, even though it's quite hard. In just a week and a half of practice, I've felt like I was going to throw up several times. It feels good to be finally getting back in shape, and learning to row makes me feel really cool. For some reason, I feel like those people in ancient times who were rowing those huge boats, even though our novice team is not even coordinated enough to have all 8 of us rowing at once. There are 12 people on the team so far, including the coxswain. I'm not sure how that's going to work out, since only 8 can be rowing in a boat at once. Luckily for me, I'm pretty sure I'm safe. I'm hoping that once I get coordinated, perhaps in the spring, I can be on the varsity team. I really like the people on the team so far, so that's good. They're mostly freshmen, but there are also a couple of sophomores and a junior, which makes me not feel as old. Ironically, they all thought I was a freshman. Is that ironic? I'm not sure. But the point is, I still look like I'm 18. Oh well. I'll try to put up some crew-related pictures soon, but I'm not sure I'll get around to it.

There's more to say, but I'm not sure anyone is still reading this, so I'm going to call it a night. If you're still reading, leave me a comment or send me an email, and I'll keep writing!

A report from home

2009-08-23T19:09:00.000-07:00

Day 4 of training was pretty good, but the real excitement was on Friday morning, when I got to operate the real robotic arm! Obviously it's not the one on the shuttle or the space station, but it's a real arm that is 14 meters long when it's all stretched out (over 45 feet!). Needless to say, I felt really cool while I was doing it. Here's a picture of me with the arm after I operated it (where's Waldo?):

Here's me operating it:

So as you can see, it was pretty awesome. This post has been in progress for a while, so I'm going to post it even though it's not finished. Check back for more in a few days!

A quick update

2009-08-19T21:38:00.001-07:00

Day 3 of training went well, but things are getting a bit more challenging. It's really interesting and fun, but it's starting to be a little frustrating that we're not as good at the skills as we'd like to be. It makes sense, since we haven't been practicing as much as would be ideal since we're squeezing it all into a week, but still. Here's a picture of a special thing I got to try today that isn't really part of our training:

Notice the robotic arm. And in the theme of putting up pictures of things I've eaten, here are some things I've eaten:

The first one is a veggie quesadilla and the second one is a cookie with ice cream on it. It has a name, but I can't remember it.

Yesterday we went to the Houston Space Center (I think I mentioned that), and here's a picture of me with a spacesuit:

Today we went out for that ice cream cookie thing after "work", then relaxed for a while, then went running and did some pushups and abs. I hadn't exercised in way too long, so it was good to get some exercise in. I feel much better now, and I hope I'm not too sore tomorrow!

We also went to Rocket Park after work. Here's a couple of pictures:

I'm exhausted! And I finished my book last night (the second one in the Golden Compass series, if you're curious). I'll start the third one when I get back. The second one was really good!

P.S. It's hot in Texas!

Training is going well

2009-08-18T21:34:00.000-07:00

I'm having a great time here in Houston, but things are very busy! We're doing a lot of robotics training, which is fun, but it's hard because we're doing what normally takes six weeks all squished into one week. It means we're not as good at the skills as we'd like to be, but at least we're seeing what there is to know. Maybe we can practice when we get back to school.

Today after our lessons we went to the Houston Space Center, which is extremely fun. It's aimed at kids, but that doesn't mean it's not fun for grad students :) We went on a ropes adventure thing and a bouncy obstacle course and dodged lasers and shot squishy balls at targets, among other things. I didn't hit the target even once.

Tonight I went into the city to see my friend from home. We went out to dinner at a Tex-Mex place, and then hung out for a while at her apartment, which I'd obviously never seen. It was really nice to see her.

Ok, I hope you can bear with me as I know this post is not up to my normal quality, but I'm still adjusting back to the time zones and I'm not getting much chance to rest! I'll write more later this week, which will hopefully be better.

P.S. There are Spanish radio stations here, and I am happy to say that I understand most of what they're saying!

Hello from Houston!

2009-08-16T22:37:00.000-07:00

Well, we made it! I'm in Houston, which I've realized is my first time ever in the South, not counting Florida because it doesn't really count. I've now had my first experience of Southern manners, when the bus driver between the airport and the rental car place helped every female with her suitcase, but not the males.

Anyway, I'm pretty tired now, believe it or not, so this is it for now. We've got training starting early tomorrow morning and we have to get badges before that. I'm excited! Good night!

Back in Cambridge, briefly

2009-08-15T14:49:00.000-07:00

After dragging my body weight in luggage all over the world (ok, just Barcelona and Boston), plus two flights on British Air (Barcelona to London, London to Boston), it was fair to say I was pretty tired. Luckily, my bags both made it all the way to Boston, and with the help of some elevators I even managed to take them home on the T.

When I got back, I went to hang out for a while at my old house and pick up my cell phone charger and keys before going back to my boyfriend's apartment. He's home visiting his family, so he's not here, but I'm only here for about 24 hours before I go to Houston tomorrow. I'm not sure how the jet lag is going to work out. Theoretically, it should help me wake up early, which is not normally my strong suit. We'll see if that actually happens. I still need to unpack/repack for Houston, but I was too tired to do it today.

So tomorrow evening I leave for Houston. Monday morning bright and early we start training, and then we're there all week until Saturday morning when we fly back. "We" is the other girl starting the same program as I am, and me. Then sometime next week I'm going to go home to see my family. Did I mention I'm about ready to be done traveling? Whew!

Here's a picture of a pizza I ate on Wednesday night. Note how it's too big for the plate:

Last post from Barcelona :(

2009-08-14T14:21:00.001-07:00

Well, this day is finally here. It's Friday night, and I'm finishing up packing my suitcases. I didn't post last night because I went out to a celebratory dinner with my friend and some coworkers and was too tired when I got back. So here's a quick summary of yesterday and today, and then some reflections on the summer.

Yesterday I went to work and finished up my revisions on my report. Everyone who was there (only 8 of us) went out to lunch together, because today was the last day of work for 3 of us, and more are finishing within the next month or so. For some reason (probably because it was 6 guys and only 2 girls), we ended up spending a lot of the meal talking about gross things that people have eaten or seen people eat on TV. Needless to say, I did not enjoy that conversation. But the food was good and we did manage to talk about some other things. After lunch, my supervisor pointed out that if I finished my work that afternoon, I didn't need to come in on Friday. That was awesome, because I knew I would be able to finish my work that afternoon and was looking forward to going to the beach today, but still it sort of freaked me out because I hadn't mentally prepared for yesterday to be my last day. Luckily for my peace of mind, I remembered that I had a few things that I had to drop off at work today that I had borrowed from coworkers, so I still had an excuse to go. That probably sounds weird, but I have really enjoyed this summer and the people I worked with, so it makes sense to me.

After lunch, I finished my revisions slowly and then went home before going out to the dinner I mentioned above. We went to a fancy restaurant on Passeig de Gràcia and I had a salad with truffles in it. It was not as excellent as I had hoped, but the bread there was delicious. Afterwards, we went to a bar called Dow Jones, where the prices of drinks go up and down like stocks according to how many people are buying them. At certain points, the market crashes and all the prices go down. We agreed that a bar like that would probably do well in Boston/Cambridge.

Today I got little presents for my boss and my supervisor, wrote thank you notes to them, as well as my other supervisor and the director of the company, gathered all of the things I had borrowed and my beach stuff, and went to work. I distributed everything and checked in for my flight tomorrow (sad), and they gave me a big card that everyone had signed like they give to everyone when they leave. It was really nice to read what everyone wrote, and almost everyone had written in Spanish, which was a nice challenge. Then I went to the beach for the last time before I leave. Since it's late summer at this point, the water is really warm and nice. There were a ton of kids there, and I was sitting near an especially adorable little boy who kept filling his bucket with sand and then dumping it out. I also finished my book (Life of Pi), so I could finally return it to the library, only 4 days overdue. Then I came home and worked on packing and eating and talking on the phone and showering. All hard work.

So here I am, at the end of my summer in Barcelona. It's been great overall, though I did spend a larger than usual amount of time being sick. I am really sad to go, which was something I was not sure would be true. As I've mentioned, there are a lot of things that are better about Boston and the US, such as way fewer people smoking, but there is something about Barcelona and Europe that is just really enjoyable. I know I can come back and visit, but I also know that it won't be the same when I'm visiting as it is when I'm living here. But who knows? Maybe I'll get to live here again sometime. I'm going to miss my coworkers a lot, and I'm hoping at least some of them will come visit in Boston. My supervisor told me I'd be welcome back if I ever wanted to come back and work here again, which was really nice to hear both from a not-wanting-to-part-with-Barcelona standpoint and a professional you-did-a-good-job-with-your-work standpoint. I'm going to try to keep in touch with people at work when I go back.

By popular (ok, one person) demand, I'm going to try to keep posting when I get back, at least for a little while. The plan is that I'm flying back to Boston through London tomorrow morning. I get into Boston on Saturday afternoon. Then on Sunday evening I'm flying to Houston to do some robotics training for a week. I fly back to Boston for good on Saturday morning, and I'm going to go home for a little while during that week. It's a lot of traveling, and I will be relieved when I can just stay in one place for a while. Still, though, it's nice to have all these opportunities. And on September 1 our lease starts for our new apartment! Very exciting!

Now I should go to sleep because it's very soon that I have to wake up for my flight, and I have to put the finishing touches on my packing. Buenas noches for the last time!

Sunday in Seville: Torre del Oro and the bullring (plus catch-up)

2009-08-12T14:40:00.000-07:00

I didn't have much time in Seville on Sunday because I had an early afternoon flight that I hadn't checked in for ahead of time, and I was a little worried about getting to the airport. Still, I managed to pack in a good amount before I left.

I woke up pretty early (for me) and packed up all my stuff. My time-saving plan was to take everything with me so that I wouldn't have to go back to the hostel. It worked out well enough, but it was annoying to carry my stuff around. Then I checked out of the hostel and headed for the Torre del Oro. I stopped by the statue of Don Juan, who, in case you don't know, is a fictional character. Here he is:

I stopped to get some breakfast on the way, and I was ignored by the (not particularly busy) servers for a while before I got my food. Oh, Spain. Then I passed the University of Seville:

With breakfast taken care of, I walked the rest of the way to the Torre del Oro. For those who don't understand Spanish, that means Tower of Gold, also translated as Golden Tower. Golden Tower is a bit misleading, though, because the tower is not and was never made of or covered with gold. There are a couple of possible explanations for the name, depending on who you ask. It definitely has something to do with the time when Seville was a major trading port. Some say that it was called the Tower of Gold because it collected a lot of money from traders wanting to use the port. Some even say that there was a chain across the river connecting to another tower to prevent non-payers from entering the city. Others say that the tower across the river was called the Tower of Silver, and if you wanted to get into the main part of Seville, you had to pay gold to the gold tower, and if you were willing to downgrade to the other side of the river, you could pay silver. Either way, here's the tower:

There's not really that much to see there. Apparently there's a naval museum inside, but it's closed for all of August, so I couldn't go inside. A little farther up the river is the bullring. I was running out of time and I had been ambivalent about it to begin with, so I just looked around from the outside and didn't go in. Here's the outside:

Then I went to go catch the bus to the airport. I got there with plenty of time to spare (uncharacteristically) because everything went right even though I had allowed cushion time in case something went wrong. On the flight I shared a row with two girls from Houston. They were really nice and we talked for a lot of the flight.

When I got back, I went to the beach for a little while and then went out to dinner with my friend.

Monday was a really long day at work trying to finish up the draft version of my report so that my supervisors could review it. After work, I went to the library to try to renew my book, but they were closing and wouldn't let me explain my situation. Thus I made the irresponsible decision to keep my library book out past its due date so that I can finish it. It's going to be 4 days overdue. I guess I'm a moral failure.

Tuesday was another long day at work because I had to add figures to my report and prepare my final presentation and go over it with my supervisor. It was kind of frustrating because they had told me I would have 15 minutes to present, but my supervisor kept asking why I hadn't put this piece or that piece of information in the presentation. I wanted to tell him that I would love to put that information in the presentation, but if I did, there was no way it was going to be anywhere close to 15 minutes. In the end, I guessed that it wouldn't be a problem if my presentation was closer to an hour, so I just put in all the information he (and I) wanted. And it turned out fine. I gave the presentation this morning (Wednesday), and unsurprisingly for me, it did take an hour, including people stopping me to ask questions. Everyone said I did a good job, so I hope that means they weren't bored during my presentation. There were only 8 people there, which was all but one person in the office today. August is a slow month in Europe because everyone goes on vacation, and this company is no exception. Even my boss is on vacation!

Anyway, yesterday my roommate left to go on vacation, so now it's just me and her boyfriend and his friend who is staying here for a few days. My roommate is going to come to the US in September (she's American), so we're going to try to see each other then.

Today was a more reasonable day at work. I gave my presentation in the morning and in the afternoon worked on making revisions to my report based on feedback from my supervisor. I'm hoping to wrap that up tomorrow so that I can just go in on Friday to tie up any loose ends. Then I can leave early to go to the beach for the last time!

Tonight I went out to dinner with my friend and some other people from school and a few of their friends. We went to a pizzeria and then I went with a couple of them to get some ice cream. It was a fun night!

I'm mostly packed at this point, except the stuff I'm using this week. I'm going to be sad to leave Barcelona, but I'm also looking forward to going home and seeing my friends and boyfriend and family (hopefully) and being able to drink the tap water. I'm sure I'll be back here sometime in the near future, though probably not for such an extended period of time. It will probably feel really different to be here as a tourist than as a (temporary) resident.

It's been a great summer. I'm definitely going to post over the next few days, and I haven't yet decided if I'll keep this up once I get back and school starts. If I do, it will probably be less frequent, and the URL carolineinbarcelona won't make sense. We'll see.

Saturday in Seville: Cathedral, Alcazar, and more!

2009-08-11T11:09:00.000-07:00

Saturday morning I got off to an early start because the two girls I met the night before had a bus to catch at 1 pm and wanted to do the Cathedral and the Alcazar before they left, and I wanted to go with them. We tried to go to the Cathedral first, but the tourist part wasn't open until 11 am because there were services going on. Here's a picture of the front of the Cathedral:

It's hard to tell from this picture, but it's the third-largest cathedral in Europe, after two other large cathedrals that I can't remember anymore. I think one of them is the Vatican. (Is that right?)

So we decided to go to the Alcazar while we were waiting. It was easy, because they're across the street from each other. And luckily for us, it turned out that the Alcazar admission was free for students with ID! The Alcazar is an old Moorish fort with a palace and gardens inside. I sprung for the audioguide by Rick Steves' recommendation, and because the admission had been free, but it turned out that it wasn't as interesting as I had hoped. Here's a picture of my new friends outside the entrance:

Here's the palace inside:

As you can see, the style of architecture is a lot simpler than palaces that I'm used to. The gardens were really pretty, too. Here's a bird coming to land on a lily pad in a pool sort of thing:

We tried to figure out how deep this thing was by sticking some sticks down into it, but it turned out to be deeper than our sticks, which were about a foot long. Also, it had fish in it.

I took a lot of garden pictures, but I won't make you look at all of them. Just one more:

Since the other two girls were in a rush, we didn't spend too much time inside the palace. Just before 11 am, we headed back over to the Cathedral so that they could make sure they had time to go up the tower before they had to leave. An interesting thing about the tower is that it was built so that people could ride up it on horseback. That means that it has ramps to get up instead of stairs, and the ramps are wide enough for a horse. They're also pretty tiring to go up. Once you get to the top of the tower, you get some pretty good views of the city:

That big circular thing in the middle might be the bullring, I'm not sure. After we looked around the tower for a little while, the other two girls had to leave, but I stuck around and looked out a little more, then went down to explore the rest of the Cathedral. There's something that they call a treasury, but looks to me more like a musuem. It has this crown, which is apparently made out of 11,000 precious stones, and the angel in the front is made out of the largest pearl ever:

Also, they have the alleged tomb of Christopher Columbus, carried by four guys that represent Castille and León and two other things. There's also a room with an oval-shaped dome and a courtyard with an orange tree grove.

I decided to try to go back to the hostel a different way than I came, and I ended up walking past the Archivo de los Indias, which I subsequently wandered into, and where I was informed that the exhibit inside was free. It seemed like one of those exhibits that was free because no one would pay to see it, and even so it was short on customers. Still, the price was right, so I went in for a look. It was an exhibit that hinged on a word that I didn't understand. I think it was the name of a group or a place, but when I asked the guard what it meant, his description wasn't illuminating.

I discovered a room with a video going on about the building itself, and it turned out to be pretty interesting (I know because it had English subtitles). It explained that the building had been constructed originally when Seville was a big deal trading port for ships (it's on a river, not the sea). Traders needed a place to conduct their transactions, and thus this building was constructed. Then Seville got surpassed as the important trading port of the area and the traders moved away and the building wasn't used for anything for a while. In fact, people were secretly living in it! But then some guy was looking for the perfect building to store a bunch of paper archives of historical significance, such as letters from Queen Isabel to Columbus. And there it was, ready to be used. So that's what it is now, in addition to having some exhibits.

My next mission after this random musuem was to find a fabric store. I went back to the hostel and the guy at reception called one of his fabric-inclined friends to see if they knew anything that might be open. He gave me one recommendation and suggested I walk along the two main shopping streets if that place was closed. Well, it turned out to be closed, and so was pretty much everything along those two streets. I guess Saturday is a slow day for Sevillanos. Here's one of the streets:

So no fabric. I wandered back towards the Alcazar and bought a few postcards on the way there. I had a plan of sitting in the gardens somewhere and writing my postcards. I also bought some chips. When I got back to the Alcazar for my second free admission of the day, I found a nice place to sit in the garden, started writing my postcards, and dropped a piece of chip. Then this happened:

After a while, approximately a million ants were swarming over that little piece of chip. They had the goal of carrying it over to the wall and then carrying it UP THE WALL. And they were doing it, too! I took a video of the process, and some of you lucky people will get to watch it.

After all that, I was exhausted, so I went back to the hostel to take a much-needed nap. After the nap, I went to another flamenco place I had heard of. It was too early for anything to be going on, but the guy outside told me to come back in about an hour for the show. I was hungry, so that meant it was dinner time. I went to a much less awkward dinner than the night before, consisting of gazpacho and spinach croquetas that I felt too embarrassed to take a picture of. Then I went back to the flamenco place, which is called La Carbonería. Unlike the expensive place the night before, admission to this place was free, and the drinks, including sangria, were cheap. There were fewer performers, only one each of dancer, guitarrist, and singer, but the place was packed and the audience was enthusiastic and the performers were as well. Here's a picture:

I stayed for an hour and a quarter and then went back to the hostel to sleep so that I could get an early start on Sunday before catching my early afternoon flight. That night was the fateful snorer-poking chin-bumping-on-the-ladder night. I still have a little bruise and a scratch. And she barely stopped snoring when I poked her! That strategy works better on my dad.

The Seville chronicles will conclude tomorrow, and then I'll catch up on this week. It's been busy with work and avoiding returning a library book by its due date. I know, I'm a bad person. I just need a couple extra days!

Friday in Seville: Flamenco galore!

2009-08-10T13:21:00.000-07:00

Friday started off with a very short time at work before I had to leave for the airport. This was the first time I've ever traveled anywhere by myself, where I didn't know anyone in the city. I'm used to flying by myself, so it wasn't weird yet.

When I got to Seville, I took the bus from the airport into the city. Even though Seville is much smaller than Barcelona, the bus still took 25 minutes. I got off the bus and walked in the wrong direction trying to find my hostel. I stopped and asked directions from a French family who was leaving, and in addition to pointing me in the right direction, they also gave me a ticket for one of those tourist buses that you can hop on and hop off that was valid for Friday and Saturday. I didn't end up using it, but it was very nice of them. I found my hostel without much trouble after that.

The hostel was pretty nice. I was staying in a room of 8 people, unfortunately one of whom snored. The hostel was really nice overall, though, and they gave me a free map. There was also free internet, which was a plus. Here's a picture of my room:

That's my bed on the bottom right. On the second night, I was trying to get up to poke the snoring girl above me to make her stop snoring and I whacked my chin against that ladder. Not the best feeling.

Anyway, once I checked in and dropped my stuff off, I decided to head to the flamenco museum, called the Museo del Baile Flamenco. Seville, especially the center, is very hard to navigate. The streets are very twisty and small and disorganized and even worse about being labeled than the streets in Boston. Eventually I found it, though. The museum was really cool, and it used a lot of different multimedia. There were photo exhibits, video exhibits, computers with options to learn about the different types of flamenco, costumes from history through today, and more. Here are some historical flamenco costumes:

They're not all neon, though. After the museum, I figured it was time to see about getting tickets for a show for that evening. I took the long way, as it were, to Plaza Santa Cruz, where the tablao called Los Gallos is located. I bought my ticket and asked the guy there what I should do for the hour or so while I waited for the show to start. He recommended that I go to the Plaza de España and pointed me in the right direction. On the way there, I walked through some gardens called the Jardines de Murillo. Murillo was a famous painter from Seville. The gardens were really pretty:

And so was Plaza de España:

After wandering around there a little, I started back towards Los Gallos. The show was good, but probably not worth as much as I paid for it. There were 10 performers, of which 4 were dancers, 2 were guitarrists, and the rest were singers. Here's a picture of the show:

After the show, I was pretty hungry, so I decided to get some dinner. On Rick Steves' recommendation, I went to Pizzeria San Marco. It turns out that going to dinner by yourself, especially at the sort of restaurant that has tablecloths, is pretty weird. And it's made even more so when the waiter asks you out for a drink after he's done with his shift. Probably best not to go on that date, since his shift doesn't end till 1 am. Instead, I went to check out the cathedral, and then back to the hostel. Here's the cathedral at night:

Oh, and one other thing about dinner: I got a three cheese pizza, and I decided I had to finish it before I could leave. Here's the before:

It was a good pizza, but it was quite a challenge. At this point, it was between me and the pizza. One of us was going to come out on top:

And it was me. I conquered the pizza. And then I went back to the hostel by way of looking at the cathedral. Back at the hostel, I met two girls from another school in Boston who are going to be living very close to me this fall! We ended up going to the cathedral and the Alcazar together the next day, but I'll write about that tomorrow. I also met a couple of guys from Australia and South Africa. The moral of this story is that staying in hostels is fun.

And now I'm exhausted, so I'm going to go to sleep. I'll write about Saturday (and maybe even Sunday) tomorrow so stay tuned.

In Seville...so far, so good

2009-08-07T15:19:00.000-07:00

Hola from Seville! I have only a minute more on the computer, but I am here safe and sound and having fun so far! More later!

UP in 3D...and in Spanish!

2009-08-06T14:10:00.000-07:00

After a relatively productive day at work, my friend and two coworkers and I went to see the movie Up in Spanish and in 3D! I saw Up in English just before I came to Spain, and it had been one of my goals to see it in Spanish before the end of the summer, as a measure of how far my Spanish has come. Well, I have to admit it hasn't come as far as I'd like, but I am still very proud of how much I've improved. I can't say for sure how much of the movie I would have understood if I were seeing it for the first time, because I already knew what was going on and even two months later I remember the story and even some of the dialogue pretty well. Still, it was a lot of fun and my coworkers and friend really enjoyed the movie. I forgot to take my camera, so I don't have pictures of us in the 3D glasses, but you can imagine we looked pretty cool. If you haven't seen the movie, I'd recommend it, in either language.

Tomorrow after a short day at work I leave for Seville! I've made a list of the things I want to see based on recommendations from friends, coworkers, and Rick Steves. I've heard it's really hot there, but after checking the weather for this weekend, it doesn't look like it will be too bad. As with Athens, I'm not taking my computer, so unless there's free internet at the hostel, I probably won't post until Sunday or Monday when I get back. Don't worry, though, I'll do a big post when I get back to make up for it.

Have a good weekend!

Dinner with friends

2009-08-05T15:24:00.000-07:00

Another fun evening tonight! My friend and I and one of my new friends from last night met up at the Plaça Catalunya and went to an Indian restaurant for dinner. The food was good and we had a great time talking and hanging out.

Afterwards, we wandered around the Barri Gòtic (Gothic Quarter) for a while having nerdy conversations, mostly about airplanes. We discovered a guy playing guitar behind the cathedral and joined the crowd that was listening to him for a while. He was pretty good, especially for someone who was randomly playing on the stairs behind a cathedral.

Then we continued wandering, and decided to get some ice cream. I got coconut, and it was delicious:

Then we had to leave so that we could get the metro before it closed, so that was that. I guess I don't have much to say today, sorry! I'm excited for Seville!

Update: I just noticed that this was my 50th post, so woohoo!

Also, here is a link about the tower-building tradition: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Castell. Here's an especially impressive picture.

A fantastic jazz concert!

2009-08-04T15:43:00.000-07:00

After work and a quick stop home, I went to Sitges to meet up with my supervisor to go to a jazz concert. We had seen some signs for cultural events in Sitges when he showed me around a few weeks ago, and we'd been talking about going to one of these concerts since then. And tonight we finally went!

And the concert was fantastic! There were three guys playing piano, double bass, and drums. They were all really good, and they made awesome faces while they were playing, especially the double bassist. I also liked that they explained their songs before they played them, with even an abbreviated explanation in English! Thanks to that, I know that they played a song that goes with the human-tower-building tradition, one that goes with a holiday that's coming up this weekend, one that's adapted from a Sardana (see my post about the Sardana dance), one that a guy wrote as a funerary march for himself when he thought he was going to die during the Spanish Civil War (he didn't die, at least not then), a love song, a Christmas song, and more. And they were all great! Here's a picture:

The concert was in the Cau Ferrat, which is a cool old building inside here:

After the concert, we wandered around the town for a while until I had to catch my train back. We encountered another musical event going on, which my supervisor said was a group that plays at the city hall. They were practicing, all on drums:

It was fun to listen to them. After that, we had enough time left to stop into a bar to try some tapas from the Basque Country (El País Vasco). Then he walked me to the train.

While I was waiting for the train, I heard two guys speaking in English with American accents, so my ears perked up and I talked to them. We ended up talking on the train all the way back to Barcelona Sants, and now I have two new friends! They might join me and the other people from school tomorrow night for dinner, which has been determined to be Indian food. Fun!

Cooking! (Believe it or not)

2009-08-03T14:12:00.000-07:00

Today was another normal day at work, working on documenting my research so far. After work, I went to the library to return 3 of my books and go to the fruit and vegetable store that I like that's nearby.

At the fruit and vegetable store, instead of just getting fruit and salad vegetables, I got vegetables for cooking! My roommate had offered to help me cook something to use up the leftover potatoes and tomatoes from when my boyfriend cooked dinner. In case it wasn't already obvious, I'm not much of a cook. I can make pasta and other easy stuff, but once words like saute get in there, I'm out.

Anyway, so my roommate made me a shopping list and I went to get the vegetables after work. She told me to start chopping them and I chopped and chopped. Except I didn't really know what to do with the onion or - get this - the eggplant. I've never cooked with them before because I don't really like them. But it turned out to be ok. I chopped all the vegetables (peppers, potatoes, tomatoes, onion, zucchini, and eggplant), and my roommate sauteed the onion and then we dumped the rest of my chopped vegetables into the pot (the mushrooms came sliced, I didn't have to chop them):

Then she added water, oil, and spices, and we cooked it for a while, stirring occasionally. This is what it looked like when it was done:

Mmmm, looks good, huh? The potatoes got all mushy-delicious. If you know me in real life, don't get too excited, though, because these skills are not coming back to the US with me.

And that was that! My cooking adventure. I've got enough food for the whole week, it looks like.

Tomorrow, my supervisor and I are probably going to a jazz concert in Sitges as part of their Sitges Cultura festival. Wednesday might be a night out to dinner with some people from school, and Thursday my roommate and I are going to a movie. The Friday I fly to Sevilla! It should be another fun and busy week!

CosmoCaixa (Science Museum) and the Picasso Museum

2009-08-02T10:32:00.000-07:00

Whew! Another good, but busy and tiring day. Today my friend and I went to the science museum, which is called CosmoCaixa after the bank that sponsors it (La Caixa). It was a little tricky to get there, but not so tricky as to explain why no one I've talked to had been there. Some people, as I mentioned, hadn't even heard of it. Anyway, it exists:

It's more targeted at kids than some science museums, but we still had a great time, even though we were the only ones our age who were there. It was free to get in, thanks to the free first Sunday of the month deal. Not that paying would have been that big of a deal, since even the full adult rate is 3 euros. Look who we ran into when we walked in:

He's made of wax. It's actually kind of creepy, because you can't tell at first.

Anyway, it's a pretty good museum! For the most part, they had everything in Catalan, Spanish, and English. Allow me to get a little nerdy. There was a really cool numbers exhibit that sort of started at 1 and went up (and occasionally down, or other directions), showing many important numbers and why they're important. The golden ratio, pi, e, a googol, 9 to the 9th to the 9th, i, and more. Also, it had some interesting visual aids, but unfortunately my camera eats batteries and it was only working very sporadically, so no number exhibit pictures. My favorite thing at the musuem was an interactive exhibit that played music and sound depending on where you positioned a bunch of blocks:

It's a lot like that (online?) game called Auditorium, but it's got more functions. I liked it a lot, and so did all the kids swarming over it. There were also cool exhibits on ancient versus modern technology, waves, a random block of ice, robotics, the history of the Earth, oh yeah, and a rainforest! With an aquarium part! Here are some pictures:

That fish is way bigger than I am, even though it's hard to tell. I could have spent a lot more time at the science museum, but my friend wanted to make sure to see the Picasso Museum as well (understandably), so we headed back into town. We got falafels at Maoz on La Rambla for lunch, and a yummy kiwi smoothie between there and the Picasso Museum.

There was a huge line at the Picasso Museum, which I had not expected, but mostly because I hadn't thought about it. Luckily, the line moved pretty quickly and we got inside without much hassle. They don't allow photos in the museum, but here's the front:

And here's a picture of Picasso's version of Velázquez's Las Meninas, taken very surreptitiously:

The original Las Meninas is in the Prado Museum in Madrid, and I saw it last year when my dad and I were there. It was cool to have seen both the original and Picasso's version of it, because, while they're obviously nothing alike, I can still see how Picasso modeled his version off of the original.

Interestingly, there were also some photographs of Picasso in the museum, which is something I'm not used to. Often artists will do a self portrait, but it's very different if it's a painting, even if it's very lifelike or realistic. Real photographs were cool to see, but Picasso didn't look like what I expected. I'm not sure what I expected, though.

After we finished at the museum, we had a little more time before we had to head back so my friend could go to the airport. We decided to check out the Parc de la Cuitadella, which was nearby. It's a nice, big park, and it has some museums on its edges, including a natural history/zoological museum in a building called Castell dels Tres Dragons (Castle of the Three Dragons):

Then we took the metro back, I walked my friend to the train station, came back and hung out with my roommate for a little while, did laundry, and wrote all this. Now I think I will eat some dinner and get to bed!

Also, I'm planning for Sevilla for next weekend, so if you have any suggestions, please tell me!

Casa Mila (finally!), beach, and the return of the Magic Fountain

2009-08-01T15:14:00.000-07:00

Today was another good day. I'm continuing to feel better and we had a busy and fun-filled day. We started off by going to Casa Milà, which I've been meaning to do all summer. I kept going there, but not going in for various reasons (I was sweaty from running, I didn't have enough time, I didn't feel like paying, you get the idea). But now I've finally seen the inside, and it was great! Here's part of the indoor courtyard:

My best pictures are from the roof. Here's the general topography of the roof:

And in this one you can see the Sagrada Familia in the background:

Inside the building, there's a museum sort of thing on the top floor, then what used to be an apartment and is now just for looking on the next floor down. The museum shows things that Gaudí used for inspiration, such as this:

The apartment is set up like it was in Gaudí's time, around the 1910s. Here is a bedroom:

I would like to have that bed. As usual, I have tons more pictures if anyone's interested (and maybe even if you're not).

After Casa Milà, we walked past the rest of the Block of Discord, through Plaza Catalunya, down Las Ramblas, through La Boqueria, and tried to go to Palau Güell. Unfortunately, it had closed for the day shortly before we got there. This was clearly a sign that it was time to go to the beach, so we got on the metro, then the train, and went to the beach. We had a nice time at the beach, reading our books, lounging around, and going in the water, which was a perfect temperature.

It started getting cooler, so we left the beach to go home to take showers and make dinner. We finished dinner in time to go to the Magic Fountain (for my third time!). I didn't take a camera this time (sorry, fountain-loving readers), so I tried to pay more attention to the fountain. It was pretty much the same. Nonetheless, we enjoyed it.

A person can only take so much fountain before it's time for some pudding. We came back to the apartment to have a dessert we got from the grocery store called natilla. Sounds exotic, right? I'd been eyeing it all summer, thinking it was some unique Spanish dessert like arroz con leche, and with my friend here I finally decided to buy it. As you might have guessed from my careful foreshadowing, it turned out to be just your average chocolate pudding. Well, now we know.

Somehow my friend discovered that there's a science museum here, which no one I've talked to seems to have been to or even heard of. Tomorrow, we will find out for certain, as we attempt to take advantage of the free admission to many museums on the first Sunday of the month. We've also got our sights set on the Picasso museum.

Happy August!

Friday: Feeling better, my friend is here

2009-07-31T14:42:00.000-07:00

So it seems like I'm back to posting regularly, and I'm sure everyone is relieved :)

Today was a good day for two reasons: 1) I'm feeling a lot better, and 2) my friend arrived from Italy.

I got into work much earlier than I have been all week, though still not as early as I'd like. I'm working on making some human factors recommendations with regard to displays, both for aircraft cockpits and for air traffic control towers. I got my thoughts organized in a good way today, so I felt good about that. For the next two weeks, I have to type up my research and recommendations into a comprehensive document and prepare a presentation based on the document that people from the company can reference. It sounds like it shouldn't take two weeks, but you should see how many pages of notes I have!

After work, I met up with my friend and we hung out for a while, including looking at pictures from Athens and going to the grocery store (fun, right?). Then we went to a restaurant I found on the internet for tapas. The food was fine, nothing special, hence no pictures, but the water was outrageously expensive and I will not go back to that place. That was the most expensive water I've had since I've been in Europe, I think! Grr.

We walked back from the tapas place to the apartment and decided to watch a movie since we were both tired. The movie was pretty good, but kind of depressing, and my friend fell asleep. It was just like a night at home at our house at school!

Now she's gone to her hostel and I'm pretty tired, so I'm going to read a little bit and go to sleep. Tomorrow is going to be another busy day full of touring Barcelona (or maybe going to the beach), so I'd do well to be rested. This Sunday will be the first Sunday of the month, so a lot of museums will be free. We're going to have to figure out which things to do to take advantage of that deal. If you have any suggestions, please leave them in the comments!

Sunday: Swimming and the Dali Museum

2009-07-29T13:23:00.000-07:00

Sunday morning, I woke up feeling a bit more sick, but my dad and I decided to go swimming with the hope that the cool water might help lower my fever. Right. We swam a little, then went back to the apartment, ate a little, and decided to go to the Dalí museum despite my impending sickness.

After a small incident of taking the wrong train (you'd think I'd have learned after the last time!), we got on our way to Figueres, the hometown of Salvador Dalí and the location of the Teatre-Museu Gala Salvador Dalí. It's hard to describe the place, but if you're familiar with Dalí at all, you probably have a good idea of why it's hard to describe. Here's the (relatively normal-looking) entrance:

Apparently from a different side of the building it's pink with huge egg-like things on top, but we didn't see that side. There are a lot of strange things in the Dalí museum, and Dalí himself is buried in the basement in a crypt. The building was the town's theater before the Spanish Civil War, hence the name. Dalí revamped it and filled it with all different types of his art. Somewhere outside I think there's a Dalí's jewels exhibit, but we didn't have time to see that. Here are some more pictures from the museum:

And, for the scale of that painting, check out the people in this one:

In this one, if you squint, you can see Abraham Lincoln, and if you look closely, you can see Gala, Dalí's wife, from behind:

Here's one of the Mae West room:

The story with that is that Dalí really liked her attitude, so he made a room that looked like her when viewed from a special angle up some stairs. Her mouth is a couch, her nose is what appears to be sort of like a fireplace, her eyes are paintings or photographs of eyes, her hair is a big curtain, her earrings are drape-y things, her skin is the floor and the wall, and so on. It's pretty crazy, but what of his stuff isn't?

Here's one more picture, but I have tons more:

We left the museum, but I wasn't feeling so well, and we started walking back to the station but only made it part of the way before I threw up. We got some tylenol-like thing from a nearby pharmacy, and after a while I made it the rest of the way to the train. The train ride was 2 hours in each direction. Needless to say, we got back and I went straight to sleep.

All this week I've gone in to work late, some days because I felt too sick in the morning and some days because I wasn't sure yet and figured it was better to get a bit more rest before testing my body. Today I'm finally feeling better, but there's still a ways to go.

A quick recap of Monday through today:

Monday when I got home from work we went to the same restaurant again. Here is a picture of dessert:

Tuesday was pretty uneventful. My dad left in the morning, and my boyfriend and I were going to go to the beach after I finished at work, but I felt too sick to go to the beach. He came to meet me at work, then we went home and I took a nap while he cooked dinner. After dinner, we watched a few episodes of How I Met Your Mother on DVD, and he packed, and that was that.

Wednesday morning he left, I was sick, and I did almost nothing after getting home from work. I probably left an imprint on the couch.

Thursday (today) has been pretty similar to yesterday, but I'm feeling a bit better. I went to the fruit and vegetable store and bought, among other things, a couple of really expensive avocados. I haven't been as short of money lately as I thought I was going to be, so I figured an avocado splurge was probably ok. I've only got a little more than 2 weeks left here, so I think my budget is going to work out!

Tomorrow's Friday, and my friend is arriving from Italy. I think her being here will finally be the occasion I need to go inside Casa Milà, which so far I've only seen from the outside. Other than that, we might try to go to Palau Güell (different from Park Güell), or maybe the Picasso Museum, or whatever else she feels like doing. She's here until Sunday, but hopefully she won't make me wake up too early on the weekend!

Saturday: Sagrada Familia, Magic Fountain, and Barceloneta

2009-07-29T12:43:00.000-07:00

As promised, I'm working on catching up. On Saturday, my dad and boyfriend and I decided to hit the highlights that I'd already determined, which included the Sagrada Familia and the Magic Fountain.

We started out with the Sagrada Familia, but this time we were a bit more daring than we'd been when I went with my friend. It's supposed to be the case that there is an option for paying to take the elevator up to the top or taking the stairs for free, but for some reason (hm, I wonder why?), the free stairs option wasn't available. Well, a little thing like that never stopped us. Some people came out the exit of the stairs (even though you pay to take the elevator up, you still take the stairs down), and we made the best of the situation. It was more than a little cramped trying to get up the very narrow spiral staircase while other people were trying to get down:

But we managed. And the views were even sweeter this way:

By this time, I was starting to feel hungry and a little cranky (I didn't know it at the time, but I was starting to get sick), so we went to a vegetarian chain restaurant called Maoz which serves delicious falafels to which you can add your own toppings from their self-serve topping bar. Then we made our way over to the Magic Fountain by way of Plaça Reial, the Barcelona Cultural Center (on Las Ramblas), and a dessert place that we got to just in time to order some delicious arroz con leche (basically rice pudding, with cinnamon and sugar, literally rice with milk).

There were tons more people at the Magic Fountain this time than there were the last time I went. I'm not sure why. We got seats on the steps behind the fountain, near some nuns:

The fountain was great, as expected. Here's a picture where it looks like molten lava:

After the fountain, we decided to take the metro to Barceloneta, which is the beach area in the city. The Barceloneta beach was man-made for the Olympics in 1992, and it's not as nice as the beaches outside the city, but it has a bit more nightlife. We walked along, got some ice cream, and then called it a night. I was very ready to go to sleep!

Sorry for the lag, I've been sick again

2009-07-29T06:27:00.001-07:00

I haven't been feeling well the last few days, and combined with having my dad and boyfriend here, I just didn't get around to blogging. I promise there will be more to come soon, possibly even tonight if I feel up to it. So check back soon!

Wednesday, Thursday, and Friday

2009-07-24T15:38:00.000-07:00

I've been so busy, I haven't had time to blog! On Wednesday I went to work a little earlier so that I could leave early to pick up my boyfriend from the airport. We came back to the apartment to drop off his stuff and relax for a little while before going to a dinner with other people from my company.

The dinner was at the Fabra Observatory and it was a very nice event with a speaker (I can't remember his name) who does research in astrobiology. His entire presentation was in Spanish, which was fun because I actually understood the majority of it, which I take as a good sign for my Spanish. The food was quite good, too, but it took a couple of tries to get vegetarian meals. It's funny in a frustrating sort of way that when you tell them you're a vegetarian, they bring you the fish option instead of the beef. Eventually, though, they brought us a tasty risotto with vegetables. Dessert was mango ice cream with a pudding sort of thing and fruit. Here's the observatory:

And here's the astrobiologist speaker:

After the presentation, we got to go into the observatory and look through the telescope:

It was pointed towards a pair of binary stars. The stars were cool to see, and we could also go out on the observation deck, which gave us a great view of the city. Afterwards, we got a ride home with one of my coworkers. The road down the mountain is very twisty and it made me a little nervous, but of course it was fine.

On Thursday, after sleeping in pretty late, we went to Sitges to go to the beach and walk around and explore the town. Here's a picture of the beach at Sitges:

When we got tired of the beach, we walked through the town for a while, specifically to get some ice cream (raspberry and lemon). Accidentally, we ended up in a shoe store, and we found some brown dress shoes that my boyfriend liked for only 12 euros. Obviously they're not very high-quality, but for 12 euros (at worst, $18, but actually less), it was hard to go wrong. We didn't have socks with us, and after I explained that to the shopkeeper, she brought us a plastic bag for him to use to try on the shoes. I thought this was hilarious:

He ended up liking the shoes, so we got them. For dinner we went back into the city, to the same restaurant I went to with my dad on Monday night. We got a couple of the same things, but we also got a hummus, babaganoush, and guacamole with pita thing (notice the goat cheese salad making a guest appearance at the top of this picture):

For dessert, we tried to get the red berry thing again, but they were out of it. Instead, on the waiter's recommendation, we got something called marscapone maki, which was delicious. The little chocolate-covered things on top are something like pop rocks, which was weird but fun:

By the time we finished dinner, the metro had closed, so we decided to walk back to the apartment. It was a nice walk through Las Ramblas, Plaça Catalunya, and Passeig de Gràcia (including the Block of Discord and Casa Milà), but it took over an hour to get back.

And now I'm up to today! I think I forgot to mention that I took yesterday and today off of work, but now you know. I'm going back on Monday. We woke up late again today, and went to La Boqueria to get some food for a picnic. Here's a picture of the entrance to La Boqueria:

We got fruit, two kinds of cheese, and chocolate, as well as kiwi coconut juice and pineapple mango juice, which I bargained down from one euro each to 1.50 for two. A proud moment for me. Then we took our picnic food to Park Güell, where we sat and listened to music and ate our food, which was only slightly melted and squished by the time we got there. After we ate, we wandered around and explored the park for a while. Then we found a bench under some nice shady trees and read our books for what felt like a short time but turned out to be rather long.

Eventually, we came back to the apartment for a very quick dinner before going to see Bruno (version original, which means it's in its original language). I have to say, I was pretty disappointed with the movie. I had high hopes after Borat, but it just wasn't nearly as funny. Oh well. Then we came back to the apartment to wait for my dad to arrive back from Italy, which he did. Now, it's about time for bed, because we've got big plans for tomorrow (Sagrada Familia, among other things).

Monday's highlight: dinner at Cuines Santa Caterina

2009-07-21T10:23:00.000-07:00

On Monday I had to go to work, so my dad went to Girona to meet a friend for lunch. After work, I returned one of my library books and renewed the other 4, so hopefully I can finish them all by August 10, which is when they're now due. I've done a pretty good amount of reading this summer, which I like. I have hardly any time to read during the school year, so I always try to make up for lost time during the summer. I've lost track of how many I've read so far this summer, in fact.

There's a nice area with trees and benches between my apartment and the train station, so I went to sit there and read while I waited for my dad to get back from Girona. It was kind of windy, so my hair kept getting in my face and my pages were not cooperating, but it was still nice.

When my dad got back, we did a quick run to the grocery store and then took the metro to the El Born district. I hadn't been there yet, but I really liked the neighborhood. The Parc de la Ciutadella is there, so we took a quick look, but we were too hungry to spend much time there. Here's a picture of something that's not the ciutadella, but looks similar:

The first two vegetarian restaurants we tried didn't work out. One because it turned out not to exist, and the other because the food didn't look that good. The one that turned out not to exist was quite a mystery. We had written down the address and brought a map, and we found the street it was supposed to be on, and even the right number of the address. But it wasn't there, and the people who worked in the store across the street had never heard of it! Such a mystery.

Fortunately, the third restaurant we tried not only existed, but had AMAZING food. I really liked the atmosphere of the place, too. Here's a couple of pictures (it reminded me a little of a Pier 1 store):

For some reason, there were trees inside. I liked it, though. As for food, we got mushroom ravioli with delicious mushroom sauce, asparagus risotto, really delicious bread, goat cheese salad, and "red berry lasagna" and tiramisu for dessert. As usual, I forgot to take pictures until we had already started eating, but here they are anyway:

And the after picture of dessert:

After dinner, we just came back to the apartment and went to bed after wasting some time on the internet. This morning, my dad flew to Rome to visit some friends, and I went to work. He'll be there until Friday or Saturday (he doesn't have a return ticket yet, surprise surprise). And tomorrow afternoon, my boyfriend arrives! I'm going to pick him up from the airport after work. Woohoo!

Ok, time for dinner. Buenas noches!

Sardana, the cathedral, and a guitar concert

2009-07-20T15:11:00.000-07:00

First thing when we woke up on Sunday, we went to see the weekly Sardana gathering in the plaza outside the cathedral. Sardana is a traditional Catalan form of dance, where anyone who wants to shows up, puts their stuff in the middle of a circle, and dances to the music played by an 11-member band. Here's a picture to help explain:

And here's a picture of the band:

Then a random parade went by, including several people wearing costumes of really tall people. Here's one:

I have no idea what the parade was for. It also had this guy:

Then we went in to the cathedral:

It was Sunday afternoon, so there were services going on, but that doesn't stop tourists. There was a rule that you had to be modestly dressed (i.e. no tank tops), and a lot of tourists hadn't planned on that. Luckily for them, there was a street vendor right outside willing to sell them a tacky sparkly scarf! And luckily for me, I had chosen that day to wear a dress with short sleeves, so I was good to go.

The inside of the cathedral was pretty standard for a cathedral:

After the cathedral, we went swimming again. This time, we went to one of the Olympic pools on Montjuïc, called Piscines Bernat Picornell. There was an outdoor pool and and indoor pool, and of course we swam in the indoor pool ("of course" is if you know my dad at all). We hiked up the hill because we hadn't figured out which bus to take ahead of time. It was a long walk, but it was pretty and we got a nice view. We walked past the Poble Espanyol, which is an artificial village constructed as a bunch of houses in different styles of architecture from around Spain. The houses are not used as houses, but are used as gift shops, and yet you have to pay to get in! Needless to say, we skipped it.

The woman who works at the desk of the pool was running off to do something when we arrived, and the door to the pool was open. Long story short, we ended up with two swims for the price of one. Here's the indoor pool:

Then we had a very quick dinner at a mostly vegetarian buffet restaurant called Fresc Co off Las Ramblas before we hurried over to the Church of Santa Maria del Pi for a classical guitar concert by Manuel González. He is a very impressive guitar player. I couldn't believe how many different sounds he could make with his guitar! Here's a picture:

We were sitting in the upstairs area because we weren't as early as we would have liked, but we were far from the last to arrive. People kept getting there even as the concert was going. I guess that's Spanish time. After the concert, we got our picture taken with Manuel González! Then we headed back to go to sleep because it was a work day today! I'll try to catch up with these posts tomorrow. We've just been so busy that it's hard to keep up!

Swimming, Park Güell, and Port Vell (Part 2)

2009-07-20T09:15:00.000-07:00

(This is a continuation of the last post.)

We sat at the top of Park Güell for a while looking at the view, and then we went to dinner at a vegetarian restaurant named Biocenter near Las Ramblas. Here's some of the food:

After dinner we walked along the waterfront near Port Vell. There's a Maritime Museum, and a huge shopping center, and a ton of guys trying to sell fake designer purses, belts, and so on. Here's a picture of my dad and some big arch thing:

Eventually, we got tired of walking around, and went back to the apartment and went to sleep. What a good day!

Swimming, Park Güell, and Port Vell (Part 1)

2009-07-19T03:09:00.000-07:00

My dad and I had a full day yesterday, even though we got off to a late start. Sometimes it's nice to sleep in! We started off by going to swim at Piscina Sant Jordi, which was a very nice 50-meter indoor pool in which you're not allowed to take pictures. Here's a picture:

After the swim, we went back to the apartment to have breakfast, and then we set out for Park Güell. There isn't a metro stop at the top of the hill where it is, so we had to walk all the way up the hill. The hike was well worth it, though, because the park was awesome. The idea of the park was that it would be a gated community for rich people around the beginning of the 1900s. It didn't work out that well as such, but it's a great park, and tons of people go there every day. Here's the entrance:

The houses to the right and left of the entrance are supposed to look like gingerbread houses like in Hanzel and Gretel. Inside the structure with the columns in the center of that picture, the ceiling has mosaic sorts of things made out of random items, such as broken glass bottles. Note the broken bottle in the dark green part:

It also has prettier mosaics:

But the coolest part is a big open space above this area, with an amazing view of the city and a bench that goes all the way around the area. Here's a picture:

The bench is also made out of the mosaic style, and it's really pretty:

Here's the view from this area:

We're going swimming now, so I'll finish this post later. We're going to one of the Olympic pools this time!

My dad is here!

2009-07-17T15:59:00.001-07:00

My dad arrived this morning, a little earlier than expected. Annoyingly, US Air flies into Terminal 1, which involves an extra bus ride once you get to the airport. I met him at the arrivals area and took him back to our apartment to take a nap while I went to work. I got to work a bit late as a result, but it wasn't a problem.

After work, I went back home to meet my dad, who had just woken up from his nap. We walked over to Casa Milà and the Block of Discord as I had done last weekend, and then we continued along to Plaza Catalunya and then to Las Ramblas. We wandered into a farmer's market sort of thing, where they had all sorts of fruit that I'd never seen before. I wimped out of getting any new sorts of fruit, but at some point I want to try a papaya. And maybe a passion fruit. Also, there were a large number of street shops selling birds and other pets in cages along Las Ramblas, which I thought was really strange. One of them seemed to be trying to sell a ferret. It's a really touristy area, so I'm not sure why they were selling them there. Who would buy a pet on vacation? Especially a bird! I don't understand.

We took the metro back and met up with my boss and his wife and another coworker to have dinner at an Indian restaurant called Namaste. The food was good, and not too spicy (good for my dad), but the dessert left something to be desired and the service was intermittent at best. I guess when waiters aren't working for tips, which they don't in Spain, they don't feel the pressure to be as attentive. Go capitalism, I guess.

Tomorrow we'll probably go swimming when we get up, then go to Park Güell, and then I'm not sure. The weather looks like it will be a bit nicer, luckily.

I'm going to Seville!

2009-07-16T12:59:00.000-07:00

There was a really great deal on Vueling (an airline), so I am going to Seville the weekend of August 7-9! I had been wanting to go there since I got here, and I was worried I wasn't going to have the time or money to make it. But with the price being so cheap, I couldn't resist! If you know me at all, you know I won't go to a bullfight, but I'm really excited to see some flamenco! And I've been reading in Rick Steves about Seville, and it seems like it's going to be really fun. Yay!

Today was pretty good at work. I'm feeling like my project is going in a good direction now and I'm going to have something I'm proud of at the end of the summer. For now, I'm making a document of all the research I've done so far, and it's pretty cool. I'm going to be looking at things from a more human factors-ish angle for the rest of the summer, so I'm excited about that.

After work, my roommate and I went running and did abs, and I did some general preparation stuff for when my dad arrives tomorrow. I've got a little bit of a plan, which includes dinner with my coworkers tomorrow night and Park Güell on Saturday. This plan needs more details, obviously, but planning ahead is not our family's strong suit. We'll also go swimming, maybe on Sunday. I'm picking him up at the airport first thing in the morning!

A jazz concert!

2009-07-15T15:15:00.000-07:00

I'm continuing to feel better, so that's good! Tonight my friend and I went to a jazz concert at a place called Jamboree, which is in the Plaça Reial off the famous Las Ramblas. Here is a picture of Las Ramblas, which is really just a long street with a lot of people on it:

At the concert, there were two bands. The first was called Rafa Madagascar Trio, and was (unsurprisingly) made up of three members: a drummer, a bassist, and a piano player. The bass had 6 strings, which seemed like a lot to me. Here are pictures of the first band:

The first band was pretty good, but the second band was even better. I especially liked that they had a saxophonist. They were called Clics, and there were four of them, including a double bassist! Here's a picture of the second band (the piano player is off to the left, unfortunately out of the picture):

Interestingly, the guy who introduced the bands and the performers made all of their announcements in Catalan. I like to think that it was because we were such a comfortable, intimate audience that they just asssumed everyone was a native, and we blended right in. We were able to get the gist of what they were saying, anyway.

We had to leave half an hour into the second show in order to take the metro home before it closed at midnight. We were sad to go, but we haven't really figured out the night buses yet, and we figured this would be easier. Plus, it's a work day tomorrow!

I can't believe it, but I'm over halfway through my time in Barcelona. It's been five and a half weeks since I arrived. I'm definitely feeling more comfortable knowing my way around and knowing what to expect in different situations, but I don't feel like my Spanish has progressed as far as I would have hoped by this point. I think I was expecting a lot more of an immersion feeling by being in Spain, but it turned out that almost everyone I deal with on any sort of regular basis speaks English. Also, now that we're not going to lunch every day, I am missing that opportunity to practice as well. I'm going to try to make these last 4.5 weeks as Spanish-filled as possible, and hopefully that will help.

I also haven't been exercising as much as I should be...

Feeling better, and catch-up

2009-07-14T10:27:00.000-07:00

I'm feeling better today, and work went well, so I'm going to write a catch-up post to make up for the last few days.

On Sunday, I was feeling pretty well, so I decided to try to go for a short run. I've also been feeling like I haven't seen enough touristy things, so I decided to run (with my camera) to Casa Milà, also known as La Pedrera. Casa Milà is one of the apartment houses designed by Antoni Gaudí. Here's a picture:

Further down the street (the famous Passeig de Gràcia), on my way to the Illa de la Discòrdia (Block of Discord), I spotted this in a window:

I don't think that was intentional.

The Block of Discord is composed of three houses designed by the three most important Modernisme architects (don't tell the others!), and it's named that way because residents felt that the three houses appeared to be fighting with each other because they're so different. The one in the middle of this picture is by Gaudí, and the one on the left, which is under construction apparently, is by Josep Puig i Cadafalch:

Here's a close-up of the Gaudí:

Here's what the one under construction looks like up close (also, you can look at it on wikipedia):

This one is by Lluís Domènech i Montaner:

As you can see, they are three very different-looking houses. I believe you can go into all of them, plus Casa Milà (for sure), as a tourist. You might have to pay, but I didn't find out because I was sweaty and wearing running clothes. Something to consider for future weeks, perhaps.

That evening was the much-awaited 4th of July party (yes, on July 12th). I had worried that no one would come due to the rescheduling, but as you can see, we had a pretty good turnout! I'm not even in this picture, so one more!

We had a picnic on the beach and then went to a restaurant when it got dark. I'm not sure how people had any appetite after our picnic, but somehow everyone else was still hungry. Maybe I wasn't hungry because I was sick :(

Eventually, we went home. I had been planning to take the bus, but two of my coworkers gave me a ride, which was really nice.

I've already mentioned this, but to get things in order, that was Sunday. On Monday, I went to work and got sick and went back home, and now it's Tuesday. I went to work and didn't get sick, so that was an improvement. Other than that, it's been a pretty quiet day. Tomorrow evening my friend and I are thinking of going to a jazz concert. And then on Friday my dad arrives!

Lastly, I miss getting comments! If you have anything to say, you're already here! Tell me something!

Sick again, but a longer post tomorrow

2009-07-13T15:04:00.000-07:00

I went to work today, but had to leave early because I got sick. It's sort of embarrassing to get sick at work. People were nice about it, but I would rather not repeat the experience.

Keep your fingers crossed for me for tomorrow!

I'm up way too late, but the party was fun

2009-07-12T17:31:00.000-07:00

I'll post more of a recap tomorrow, but for now I need to go to sleep. The party was fun! I wasn't all by myself! And I'm feeling better!

Sorry for the series of short posts, but I'll do better tomorrow!

Still sick, not much to report

2009-07-11T14:54:00.001-07:00

I'm feeling a little better than yesterday, but still sick. I didn't do much today, mostly just sat around and read. I'm almost finished my book!

The 4th of July party is supposed to be tomorrow, but considering how much it's been shifted around (both location-wise and time-wise), I'm not sure how much of a turnout we're going to get. I got some watermelon to share, so at least we'll have that!

I put some more pictures up on facebook, if you're interested.

And now I'm going to go to sleep. Good night!

I'm sick :(

2009-07-10T08:35:00.000-07:00

I'm sick, and I didn't go to work today because of it.

Also, the 4th of July party is postponed till Sunday due to weather and my being sick.

I don't have much to say, but I've been sleeping a lot today.

Hopefully tomorrow is better.

Rain, books, and an indoor picnic

2009-07-09T15:09:00.000-07:00

Today was an unusual day for Barcelona, at least for me. The last couple of days have been cooler and less sunny, but without anything to show for it. Then today, finally, it rained like cats and dogs! (Side note: living in Spain makes me reconsider all sorts of figures of speech like that, and try to figure out how I would explain them to a non-native speaker, whether I'm going to have to or not. In case anyone reading this doesn't have English as their first language, basically that just means it was raining very much, for a long time.) Luckily, the whole time it was raining, I was inside at work, so I stayed dry. Also luckily, we have a cool translucent roof, which meant that when it was raining so hard, I could look up and see the rain pounding on it.

On a separate note, yesterday I had mentioned to my supervisor that I have trouble reading in Spanish at any sort of reasonable speed. So today he brought me three books of short stories to borrow that have the same story in English on one side and Spanish on the other. They're made for Spanish speakers to learn English, though, because they have little footnotes explaining some of the more unusual English words in Spanish, and no corresponding notes explaining unusual Spanish terms in English. I think it will be helpful, though. I started to read one of them on the train on the way home, and so far, it's slow going.

Finally, tonight my friend and her friend and some other people from our program and I had what was supposed to be a picnic, but due to the weather mentioned above, it occurred indoors. It was a lot of fun, with everyone bringing something to share. My friend made tortilla, which is basically an omelette with a little more structure, as I think I've mentioned before. I brought bread, cheese, and mini chocolate croissant-ish things. For some reason, we kept discussing the meanings of random words and expressions in English, such as "the skin of your teeth." I hadn't met most of these people before, but I had a very good time.

Tomorrow I'm having a 4th of July party for my coworkers and friends at the beach. I am going to attempt to show them what a proper 4th of July party is like, but we won't have a parade or the real kind of fireworks, so I'll just have to do the best I can. I've instructed everyone to wear red, white, and blue :) I hope it's fun!

Sitges, and a picture of the bottle-motorcycles

2009-07-08T13:58:00.000-07:00

By special request, I'm including a picture of the wine bottle motorcycles from Freixenet:

After a rather long day at work, which included my first (and last) monthly state of the company presentation, my supervisor offered to show me around the town where he lives, which is called Sitges. The town is just a couple of stops beyond the beach I've been going to on the train. And it's so pretty! According to my guidebooks, and verified by my supervisor, Sitges is the gay capital of Barcelona, and possibly of Catalonia/Spain. And indeed we did see quite a lot of gay people and rainbow stuff. Unfortunately, my camera is sort of permanently on low batteries, so I didn't get to take as many pictures as I would have liked.

Basically, we walked around some of the streets of the town, which look like this:

Then we walked along the famous street that goes along the beach, where houses that are not that large sell for millions of euros. The view is pretty fantastic, and the architecture is gorgeous, but I can't understand spending that much for a house. We wandered into a tiny art gallery, which was empty except for us and the woman sitting at the desk. She gave me a postcard as a souvenir. We also walked by an old church which is prettier than you can tell by looking at this photo:

There's a campaign going on in Sitges to turn some of the streets into pedestrian-only streets, and as a promotion for this, they have some giant shoes. I really wished my camera would work, but unfortunately I don't have pictures of the giant shoes. There were lots of kids climbing on them, too.

It seems like Sitges might be a fun place to go shopping, because they have tons of little shops with dresses and sunglasses, which are two things I want/need to buy. I suspect it might be quite expensive, though, since it's such a tourist hotspot. I did at least buy a chocolate with white chocolate crepe. Obviously, it was delicious! And much cheaper than Paris!

If anyone comes to visit me and wants to see Sitges, I'd be happy to go again! It was fun!

I could write more, but I'm tired, so I think this will be all for tonight.

Magic Fountain and cava vineyard visits

2009-07-06T14:24:00.000-07:00

I'm a bit behind on this blog, so as an attempt to catch up, I'm going to write about the whole weekend in one post.

Starting with Friday, as I've already mentioned, two friends, one of their friends, and I went to the Magic Fountain of Montjuïc to have a picnic and watch the show. On our way there, we discovered some sort of biking event going on, which we were told was a 24-hour event from 7 pm that day to 7 pm the next. I couldn't figure out what the purpose of it was, except maybe Catalan pride, but you can try to figure it out here, if you're willing to brave the Spanish. Here's a picture from the event:

We watched a couple of "handoffs" between cyclists, then we continued on to the fountain. Basically it's a water show with light and music . It's not magic, it's science! But it was a lot of fun. I included a picture of it in my post yesterday, but I'll put some more because I think it's interesting how different it looks before and after sunset. While it's still light out, they don't use the colored lights. I have so many pictures like these:

I want to post them all, but no one would have the patience to look at all of them. So that was Friday.

Saturday started off early, because the three of us were going to tour two vineyards and we had to take the train at 7:25 am! For some reason, on Saturdays they're only open from 9 am to 1 pm. Because we were a little early, we walked around the town of Sant Sadurní d'Anoia. I liked this a lot:

These are like recycling bins, but for compost! I was happy.

Our first tour was at Codorníu, where we ended up getting our own personal tour. I guess a vineyard is not the most popular place to be at 9:30 am. Here is a picture of an antique grape press in the building where the fermenting cava is stored underground:

It looks like some sort of medieval torture device to me. According to our tour guide, they have approximately 30 km of tunnels underground, all storing cava! Two notes on that point: 1) that's 18.6 miles! and 2) cava is the Spanish equivalent of champagne, a term they used to use until the French got angry about it and made them change it. Cava just means cellar, technically, which is where the bottles are stored. At the end of the tour, we got to try two different types of cava, a brut and a brut naturale, both of which mean not very much sugar added.

Our second tour was at Freixenet, which is the biggest cava producer in the world. Apparently this one company makes more cava than all of France produces champagne. This tour was a bigger group, with a tour guide who spoke better English and just overall gave a better tour. Here's a picture of the outside:

They also have a car and two motorcycles in the shape of wine bottles on display just to the left of this picture.

After the second tour, we had a quick lunch in a small place in the town, and then took the train back to Barcelona. I took a long nap when I got home, and that was pretty much it for the day!

On Sunday, my roommate offered to take me to his gym since he had a guest pass, so I went to lift, ride the bike, and try to swim. I say try because the pool turned out to be extremely crowded, extremely warm, and have only three extremely narrow lanes. It turned out to be more of a play-swim type of pool, rather than a serious-swim type of pool. But I had had a good workout in the gym beforehand, so I didn't mind just playing around in the pool for a while. The pool itself had a lot of cool features, such as see through panels on some areas of the bottom where you can see through to the people walking around beneath. I was glad I had my goggles!

On Sunday afternoon my other roommate arrived back from her vacation, and as you can see she fixed the internet first thing on Monday! On Monday (yesterday) I went back to the library, since I've been getting through books so fast without the internet to slow me down. The same guy is always working there when I go, and he's pleasant but never looks that happy.

I'm worried I'm going to exhaust the entire English section at the library, since it's only 4 shelves and I don't really want to read all the murder mysteries. Right now I'm reading Burning Bright, which is by the same author as Girl with a Pearl Earring. It's pretty good! There's another library closer to my apartment, so maybe I can use my same library card there.

Another long post! But now I'm caught up, since I didn't do anything too interesting today.

Buenas noches!

The internet is fixed! Pictures galore!

2009-07-06T08:32:00.000-07:00

As you can tell from the title of the post, the internet is fixed! Which means I can finally post some pictures from the last week and a half! So here goes, a post composed mostly of pictures.

Starting with Athens, here's a picture of me in front of the Parthenon (I'm the one in the blue):

And here's a view from the top of the Acropolis, where you can see so much of the city. Notice also the Temple of Hephaestus in the foreground. If you remember, that one is the best preserved:

Here's a recreation of the top of the western side of the Parthenon, which shows the competition between Poseidon and Athena, which is the mythological beginning of Athens. Athena won with her olive tree, which beat Poseidon's fountain:

I think this picture turned out pretty well (it's the Parthenon from below):

And from the changing of the guard, this picture. Note the shoe pom-poms:

I always remember to take pictures of my food after I've started eating them, so here are some things I ate. The first is cheese pie, and the second is dessert that tastes like baklava but is in a different shape:

From the new Acropolis Museum, a figure of a pig from between 2500 and 2300 B.C. It's pretty clearly a pig, too:

This is the set and the background of the theater where we saw Don Quixote. As you can see, the set is modern, but the back part is original, and the seating area is redone. It's hard to tell in this picture, but the seating area is huge, and it was packed during the show:

This post is getting unwieldy because of all the pictures, so I'll leave you with a final picture of the Magic Fountain from Friday night. It turned out to be really cool, and I might write more about it in another post, so stay tuned. Here's the picture:

I'm going to see a magic fountain!

2009-07-03T06:20:00.000-07:00

As the internet’s still down and I’m blogging from work, this is going to be a short post. Also, I won’t be able to post over the weekend for the same reason, but it should be fixed by Monday!

Tonight two friends and I are going to see the light show at the Magic Fountain of Montjuïc. Tomorrow, we’re going to visit two vineyards, Freixenet and Codorníu. I’ll take pictures if they’ll let me and I’ll give a full report on Monday.

Oh, and I went to the beach again yesterday, based on the following comment from my supervisor: "Why wouldn't you go to the beach? Are you too busy?" Needless to say, I thought this was awesome.

Happy 4th of July! I’m sad to be missing it! Enjoy the fireworks a little extra for me!

Intensive schedule = beach after work!

2009-07-02T04:14:00.000-07:00

I took advantage of the first day of the intensive schedule to go to the beach after work. My supervisor suggested that I go to the beach at Garraf instead of Castelldefels, where I had been before, so I decided to try the new beach that he recommended. Well, new to me, not that it was a new beach. This one was much smaller, and looked like the sort of beach that ought to be quiet and private, but it turned out to be anything but. There were so many people at the beach at Garraf that I had a hard time finding a place to put down my towel. (Dad, of course I was wearing sunscreen, don’t worry.) The beach is inside a cove, with rocky areas on either side that define the edges of the beach. It’s very pretty, but I probably won’t go there again because it was so crowded. I was trying to take a picture of myself as I was leaving, and a girl offered to take it for me, which was nice.

It’s not that much fun to go to the beach by yourself, it turns out, because no one can watch your stuff while you go in the water. I ventured in a couple of times to cool off, because even in the late afternoon it’s still hot, but I had to stay within view of my stuff, so it wasn’t as relaxing as it could have been.

Tonight another friend from school is coming to visit, and we are going to go out to dinner. This weekend, we are going to try to visit some vineyards where they make Cava, the famous sparkling wine from Cataluña.

This post will be short to make up for the last two, which were extremely long!

Day Two in Athens: Don Quixote, the musical comedy, in Greek

2009-06-30T23:58:00.000-07:00

Day two in Athens was on Sunday, and it was similarly busy. We got started earlier, stopped by the hostel breakfast area for a quick breakfast, and headed straight for the Agora. The Agora was the meeting place and marketplace of ancient Athenians, similar to the Forum in Rome. It has the foundations of stalls from vendors, open areas, a drainage system, and now it has a little museum as well. Apparently there is the regular Ancient Agora as well as a Roman Agora, and I honestly couldn’t tell you if we saw one or both, because sometimes it’s hard to tell what things are what.

In the Agora is the Temple of Hephaestus, which I mentioned yesterday as the best preserved temple in Athens. Unfortunately, you are not allowed to go inside, but you can see in through some of the doorways. I’ll post pictures next week when the internet is fixed.

We barely left ourselves enough time after the Agora to make it to the Parliament building for the changing of the guards, but we did make it. The guards are similar to those at Buckingham Palace, but their outfits, if you can believe it, are sillier. They have tutu-like puffy skirt things, tight leggings with bands tied around their knees, shoes with huge pom-poms over the toes, and red hats. They also perform a very strange march when they are changing the guard. It would be unwise to make fun of them, though, because they all have guns.

The actual changing of the guard was a pretty standard ceremonious sort of thing, with music played by the guard band and marching around and such. Interestingly, they are not behind any sort of enclosure when performing the change, so police officers continually have to shoo tourists back away from the area. I took a video of part of the ceremony, so I might post that later.

We made our way back from the Parliament building by way of some streets with a lot of shops and an old church which we were unable to identify. We tried to shop, particularly for dresses, but we couldn’t find anything that was both inexpensive and attractive. It was easy to find one or the other! Eventually we gave up and headed for the National Archaeological Museum of Athens, by way of a quick lunch on the go.

The Archaeological Museum of Athens is very well-known and well-respected, and with good reason. It has all sorts of artifacts from “pre-history” (what is pre-history, exactly?) through more recent, though still ancient, history. One thing to note about Athenians, particularly museum workers, is that they don’t like you to pose with the statues. We found this out by (repeated) trial and error. You can take as many pictures as you want of the statues and artifacts (with a few exceptions), but as soon as you try to be in a picture with the item, they come and scold you. Nonetheless, we persevered, and I have a very few pictures of us posing with statues. And pottery. We saw it as stimulating the Greek economy by preserving the need for museum guards.

In any case, the collection is very extensive, with statues, weapons, jewelry, paintings, a ton of vases and pottery, and so on. I especially liked the Stathatos collection, which consists primarily of jewelry, but also some other vases and things, collected by a woman who was very interested in ancient Greek history and had married a rich man who supported this interest. Most of the items are in extremely good condition. The couple donated the collection to the museum in the 1950s, where it has a special exhibition hall that is much nicer than the rest of the museum.

Also, there is a collection of statues and artifacts that were discovered from a shipwreck in the Mediterranean off the coast of the island of Antikythera. One of the artifacts is the Antikythera mechanism, described as the first mechanical computer, used to calculate astronomical positions.

After the museum, two of us headed back for dinner and the other went to catch her flight. We took the metro to get back from Omonia Square, which is supposed to be a landmark but it was unclear why. As for the metro, some of the stations are the nicest I’ve seen anywhere, and I consider myself a public transportation aficionado. The one where we got off had a mini museum inside!

We ate at God’s Restaurant again. I had the most delicious Greek salad I’ve ever had (good thing, because we were in Greece!) and we shared a flat fried cheese thing with lemon that was also really good. And of course, we had baklava for dessert.

At that point, we started seeing a lot of people walking in the direction of the theater, so we figured it was time to get going. For a few more minutes, we hung on to the hope that the show would be in a language we could understand (first choice English, second choice Spanish, which seemed a reasonable hope for a production of Don Quixote). As we walked with the rest of the crowd, though, we could tell this wasn’t really a show geared towards tourists. When we arrived and the programs were entirely in Greek, our suspicions were confirmed. Fortunately, the atmosphere was exciting, the theater itself is magnificent, and the actors were good. There was also a scene with pyrotechnics when Don Quixote is fighting the windmill! The theater is a mix of preserved parts of the ancient theater and restored parts that are intended to look the way the theater did when it was new. One difference is that squishy seat pads are provided. I think we need more outdoor theaters in the U.S.

As for the production itself, to my surprise it turned out to be a musical comedy (I could tell it was a musical myself, and other people laughing told me it was a comedy, even though I had no idea what was going on and obviously didn’t get the jokes). It would be misleading to say that I stayed engaged (or even awake) through the entire performance, but I still enjoyed the experience.

And that’s pretty much it for Greece! After the end of the show, we got our stuff from the hostel and went to the airport, where unsurprisingly our flight was delayed, but we got back to Barcelona just fine.

As for Monday and Tuesday, I have nothing special to report, except that the intensive schedule didn’t start until today. Also, spinach turns out not to be a good investment, because it goes bad very quickly after you open it, even if it’s in the fridge.

Also, the girl of the couple I’m living with is on vacation visiting her dad, so it’s just me and her boyfriend, which forces me to speak in Spanish at home, which is good. Spanish isn’t his first language either, so we get a kick out of sitting there with our dictionaries trying to have a conversation. Her absence is also the reason the internet is not fixed, because she’s the one who needs to set up the new system. She’ll be back on Sunday, though, so by Monday hopefully I’ll be able to put up pictures!

Whew! Long post!

The first day in Athens

2009-06-30T00:54:00.000-07:00

I've been back from Athens since yesterday, but the internet isn't working in our apartment, thus the delay.

In any case, Athens was extremely fun! My friend and I arrived a bit later than expected in the airport (new as of 2001), and took a bus to Syntagma Square, which was only a short walk from our hostel. A kind taxi driver pointed us in the right direction, without even trying to take us in his taxi. (The walk was pretty short.) His friendliness was a good introduction to the city.

We went to sleep as soon as we could in the hostel, where our other friend was already asleep. It was a room with 6 beds (3 bunks) and a bathroom, and I now realize that I forgot to take any pictures of it. But the whole facility was very new and clean, and other than that there wasn't much to note about it. The most important feature was the location, which was right near the Acropoli metro station. You might be able to tell by the name that the Acropolis is right there, as well. All of the major historical sites in Athens are very close to each other, which makes touring easy.

We briefly considered waking up at 8 am, but considering that we didn't arrive until 5 am, you can guess how that went. When we got up, our first priority was the Acropolis and the Parthenon. I really wish I could post some of my pictures here, but I promise they'll come when the internet is fixed. Most of the historical sites in Athens are on a shared ticket, which costs only 6 euros for students! It's 12 euros normally, so either way, it's a great deal. Included on the ticket are the Acropolis, the Parthenon, the Ancient Agora, the Roman Agora, Hadrian's Library, the Temple of Zeus, and maybe something else, I can't remember.

The Acropolis and the Parthenon are incredible! I honestly thing the two of those alone are worth the trip to Greece. When you climb the Acropolis (I think this is Greek for hill city), you have an amazing view of the entire city, which was built around it. The view includes some unbelievable ruins as well. Then at the top you get to the Parthenon, which was the finest temple of its time, according to various sources. For comparison, the Temple of Zeus was the largest, and the Temple of Hephaestus is the best preserved. The Parthenon is sort of continuously undergoing preservation efforts, which currently include a lot of scaffolding. Despite this, it is still incredibly impressive.

With little to no breakfast between the three of us, we decided to go for lunch. One of the employees at the hostel pointed us towards a traditional Greek restaurant that was slightly off the beaten path (or so we want to think). Ordering food was an interesting experience. The waiter brought us a whole tray of options, and we picked 7 of them to share between the three of us. My little dictionary came in handy when I wanted to explain, "I don't eat meat." However, almost everyone we dealt with spoke English, including this waiter. On the one hand, I'm disappointed by this, because it seems to diminish the traveling experience by making us too comfortable. On the other hand, it sure did make thing easier. I'll post food pictures later as well, for those of you who are interested. We had some really tasty tzatziki and spinach pie, and the meat eaters had mousaka.

After lunch, we went to the Kallimarmaro Stadium, which was the site of the first modern Olympic Games in 1896. It was really big, and made from marble from the same mountain as the Parthenon, but we couldn't go in and it was pretty much just a stadium. Apparently the track isn't big enough to use for regulation races, so they only really use it for the finish lines of marathons.

We wandered back through the National Park, which was more tree-filled and less flower-/other plant-filled than I had expected. It was more like an arboretum, I guess.

As we left the park, we found ourselves at what appeared to be either the headquarters or a concert site for the Athens International Children's Games. Oddly enough, no one seemed to care that we wandered through the very pretty building and took pictures. It was pretty deserted at the time, possibly because it was the break between the end of the games and the closing ceremony.

We saw the Temple of Zeus as we were walking back to the hostel. Besides a few extremely big columns, there's not much to see. This temple is not as well preserved as either of the others.

As if this weren't enough, we then went to the brand new Acropolis Museum (only 1 euro admission!). It only opened on June 21, 2009 (last There are a ton of artifacts there, including pottery and art as well as panels from around the Parthenon, and statues, and see-through floors. These are cool on the ground floor, because you can see some excavation going on underneath, but they can present a bit of a problem when you're not on the ground floor and happen to be wearing a dress. Fortunately, you can walk around the see-through areas. On the top floor, they have a video about the Parthenon's construction and symbolism.

After the museum, we went to "God's Restaurant" for dinner on the recommendation of a hostel employee. The food was good, and the dessert was delicious.

Then we went to the hostel to go with some other people to a club. We stayed for a little while, but the music was a little too loud and we were pretty tired, so we went back to the hostel and went to sleep.

And that was just day one! I'll write about day two later, so stay tuned.