Talented Bear

This bear tried to escape from the Berlin Zoo on bike!

Look! Mountains!

Big Sky Montana

Drsac, the Merciless

Here are some pics from my weekend in Binghamton, featuring Dr. Craver.

Office!

Office Directory

DC Soon

This past week, Ethan had a guest blogger blogging from DC. Because of this, I now know about some cool places to hit, like Air. I think I'm going to go that first weekend (Hello 25!) that I'm in DC and check out the scene, and see who I can drag with me!

Theremin

I spent the weekend in Binghamton to see how university faculty live. Scott and I hit campus for the Binghmaton University fest. As is true of almost every first week of campus life, they had a big tent selling posters. I remember the days of me buying posters to stick up to my walls. I've thrown most of those out by now. (They don't wear well after being moved around, year after year.) I've moved onto a obsession with vintage travel posters, mostly of the Indiana/Chicago area.

Oh, and everyone should sign up for Scott's class, EE 559 Cryptology!

Here's an article on the Theremin by Bill.

DJ Optometrist

Wednesday night, Rich and I went into New York for some fun. It was a very nice evening; sunny and without protesters (yet). We'd decided to go to New York because we were going to meet Beth and David for the Comic Strip Live Comedy Cruise. Unfortunately, the boat broke down that day and the cruise was cancelled. It's been rescheduled for Sept. 8th, but I'll be in DC by then. Since we'd already been planning on going into New York, we decided to meet up with Cynthia and Ed, and Mike "Polo Model" Vea, and other people, as well as meeting up with Beth and David at some point.

(Side note: We met Beth and David while standing in line for the Daily Show. [ahh, that Jon Stewart.] They're cool.)

Since about 1/2 (or so it seems) of the PACM graduates go to do their post-docs at NYU, they get housing in Greenwich Village. We wandered around outside until we found a place to eat, at Salon de Tapas. Cliona and Sinan joined us there, and Mike Vea showed up to go to Bubble Tea at Saints Alps (but at a different location on Bleeker!). Rich, Mike, and I then went to the Hog Pit to see Beth and David. They'd spent the evening with a friend at his optometrist's who'd had a DJ and an open bar at the store. (Best way to get people to buy expensive designer frames, get them liquored up first.)

Around that time

I've gotten somewhat sucked into watching the Olympics. It helped that I wasn't really around the TV that much last week in Montana. But, now that I'm back, I keep on hearing how the women in beach volleyball (with porn star names?) are competing practically naked, how the men swimmers are *very good looking.

Another notable is Google's Olympic doodles, archive found here. They're fun!

August, with a vengance

I'm back from Montana. I met a lot of great people and learned about a ton of other conferences to go to, like the AAAS Annual Meeting next Feb. in Washington DC. What's great is that if you volunteer, you can go for free! I'm all over that.

Yesterday, I went into Brooklyn for a BBQ/session at Suzanne's place. Colin and Patrick from Irish Arts Week were there, as well as a few other of Suzanne's musical friends. It was lots of fun! My fingers hurt from all the lack of practice I've had. I need to put my information seeking skills to use to find Colin some German resources.

I also found a link for DC area knitters, so I can figure out how to finish Dean's winter jacket and start on a new batch of scarves.

Take a look at Dr. Xcott's August photo [montage]. (Thanks, Emily!)

Updated: 12:58 am, Aug. 26th. (Montage is now offline)

Montana Conference

I'm here in Montana for the next week or so for the GRC on Science and Technology Policy. I'm presenting a poster on Software Security and Standards for Electronic Voting. It was quite an adventure getting the poster printed. Since I finished the poster on Wednesday night, I ended up getting my poster printed at the Princeton Office of Printing. Anything that you want printed that is 36 in. x 54 in. will be expensive and also difficult to carry around. Hopefully, I can answer everyone's questions on electronic voting!

Boulder Hill 2

Tuesday, July 27th
We drag things up from Scott's basement and load them into the rental car. Things of note: big tools, like a circular saw and a big sander. After dragging things around in the morning, I declare "I want to go to a nice independing, outdoor cafe for lunch and have a smoothie." To which Scott responded, "The Chili's or the TGIFriday's?" In the Boulder Hill area, small, independent cafes are not as plentiful as in Chicago, or any other major metropolitan area. The only places that can afford to build in the middle of nowhere are big chain stores. Oh well. We ended up having lunch in a diner around the corner.

Afterwards, I drove in to Chicago to have dinner at Fiesta Mexicana with Julie, Holly, and Brian. (Notice a pattern of favorite dining places yet?) It's always a good time when you get to see friends, even when they start arguing about politics.

Wednesday, July 28th
I got up early in the morning to drive down to Indianapolis to see Caille. She was back in the US with Chris to plan the final details for their wedding in December. I picked up my bridesmaid dress (mine is a light gold/cream color) and picked up a pair of shoes. It was really great to see Caille, since she's moved to England and all. She's finished getting her Masters of Education (or whatever you call it in England) and has a full time teaching gig lined up for the fall. After we run wedding errands, I drove back up to Chicago. I had dinner with my family, and then went back to Scott's ancestral home for the rest of the night. Scott's mom had added a velvet-clad mannequin to the General Store. It's the kind of thing that you'll see gliding down the hallway in the middle of the night. Spooky.

Thursday, July 29th
Got up nice and early to make the drive back to Binghamton. We ran into a lot more construction on the way back than we did on the way there. That slowed down our time by at least an hour (~12 hours total.) Scott did most of the driving back since I'd done most of the driving to Chicago. We got back nice and late and made pasta for dinner. Afterwards, we headed to Scott's local Irish pub for some drinks. Scott wore what Rich calls his Indian Casino shirt. On the way back to the pub from the State St. scene, we passed a guy who was biking past us. He gave us a nod like "Oh, yeah..." It was funny. To me at least.

Friday, July 30th
We return the rental car at 8:02 am. We'd driven over 2,000 miles. Thank goodness for unlimited mileage. We walked to the library, and around town a little bit. Scott and I played a game of chess in the Cyber Cafe West. I won! (twice) Scott won originally, but allowed me a redo. Rich came up that evening for dinner, and we made the Brazilian Shrimp Stew. It was still delicious.

Saturday, July 31st
Back to Princeton! I'll get to stay in one place for 2 weeks. Yay!

The Outing Heard Around the Nation

I was in the New Jersey State House today Gov. James McGreevey annouced that he is gay. Unfortunately, that means that he also has to resign. I think it's incredible that my governor is gay, but it's sad that he had to resign because of his sexuality (and pending lawsuit.)

Crabcake Obsession

Over the Christmas Break my junior year at Northwestern, I went to visit Brian in Baltimore. On this trip, we had some Maryland crabcakes. They were are big as softballs and were so incredibly delicious. Being from the midwest, I'd mostly had crab that came in little rows from the freezer aisle of the Jewel with that fake red coloring on top. Ever since then, I've had this crabcake obsession. Anywhere else you go in the United States, when you order crabcakes, you get these little fried things the size of silver dollars. Nothing comes close to comparing to these Maryland Crabcakes.

I went down to DC this weekend to find myself a place to live. Rich and I went down on Saturday to see Sarah and Chopper, Michael Roston, Jane, and Chris and Shelly. Since Scott had come down on Friday for Cynthia's surprise party, he decided to come down to DC with us, seeing that Chopper is his brother and all. Rich, Scott, Sarah, and I went to Takoma Park, MD to check out a few apartments, and then we hit Michael Roston's place on the SE side of DC. I've decided to take the room in Michael Roston's place because it's 2 blocks from the Patomac Metro Stop. Rich and I stayed in the Omni Shoreham Hotel and dined at the Little Fountain Cafe in the Adams Morgan area. Afterwards, we hit the Pharmacy Bar with Chopper and Scott.

The next morning, we met up with Chris and Shelly and Jane for lunch with Scott and Sarah back in Arlington. We visited another apartment in Takoma, and then headed out to go back to New Jersey. On the way back, we stopped in Baltimore for some CRABCAKES at the Olive Grove Restaurant and Lounge. The crabcakes were just as delicious and huge as I remembered them. I was only able to finish 1/3 of mine after filling up on breadsticks and salad. Ahh, happy. Thanks, Brian, for getting me hooked! I have to go visit your parents since I'm in the area!

The Capitol in the Fall

I'm moving to Washington, D.C. for the Fall! I'll be there from Labor Day - Thanksgiving. If you guys want an excuse to visit DC, now's your chance!

I've been selected for the Christine Mirzayan Science & Technology Policy Internship Program for the Fall 2004! I'll be working with the National Academy of Engineering with the Committee on Diversity in the Engineering Workforce. It should be a fun and exciting time.

Boulder Hill Road Trip

Last week, I was gone on a road trip from Binghamton, NY to Boulder Hill, IL to move all of Scott's stuff to his new apartment. We rented a full-size car in Binghamton with my Hertz Gold Club membership. Renting a car is pretty cool, especially since I'm not 25 year, yet I get all the benefits of a corporate membership.

We took off in the early morning of Monday, July 26th. The drive is a few hours shorter from Binghamton than it is from Princeton. We got to Chicago around 7:00 pm. Because we were so early, I decided that it'd be fun for us to have dinner in Chicago. I picked my favorite Ethiopian place, and called Stradios to meet us down in the Wrigley area for some dinner at Addis Abeba. They had a different type of injera that night, so I'm not sure if I liked it as much. Scott had told his parents that we'd hit Boulder Hill around 10 pm, so that gave us plenty of time to enjoy some milkshakes after dinner. This is coming to the point where things get somewhat complicated. Scott's plan had been to drive to Evanston to drop Stradios the whole time. I thought Stradios was just going to take the El back up. Instead, Scott wanted to drop him off in Evanston. So, we went up to Evanston, stopped by Rich's aunt and uncle's house and saw Rich's grandfather. I was a bit anxious because I didn't think we'd be able to get to Boulder Hill by 10 pm. It wasn't until the drive back that I realized that the clock in the car was still set to East Coast time, and therefore an house fast. I'd been driving around like a maniac for no reason.

More to come.