Life, sewing, and theoretical physics

Three things meme

Fri, 27 Jun 2008 04:01:58 GMT

Well I handed my draft to the committee, I gave my departmental colloquium, and now just revisions and edits and studying and a few research tasks until my defense in a week and a bit.

So here is that interesting three unique things meme!

Post 3 things you’ve done in your lifetime that you don’t think anybody else on your friends list has done.
See if anybody else responds with “I’ve done that.” If they have, you need to add another! (2.b., 2.c., etc…)

1) Taught English to schoolkids (and teachers) in Thailand and Laos.

2) Written BASIC code on a Tandy laptop.
2 b) Let's try... Eaten live wiggling larvae. Possibly silkworm.
2 c) Had open chest surgery?

3) Spent 10 days without speaking to the people around me. (Meditation retreat).

(I wanted to put "sewn my own wedding dress" but I know at least one person on my friendslist has also).

Thesis!

Thu, 24 Apr 2008 05:25:50 GMT

Thesis thesis thesis. Thesis thesis? Thesis thesis thesis thesis. Thesis thesis thesis, thesis thesis, thesis thesis thesis thesis thesis.

Thesis.

(current pdf is 58 pages)

Earth Hour

Sun, 30 Mar 2008 02:06:53 GMT

Uwe and I just spent an hour playing Carcasonne by candlelight (specifically, by the light of the Massive Candle of Love from our wedding) with all the servers off and everything. It was pretty awesome! He beat my by six points, but I kept not noticing my cloisters had been completed and leaving the little dudes on there, dammmit. We had a total farmer stalemate at the end, too.

And then we went straight back to the computers :)

I saw a flower! It's spring!

Tue, 18 Mar 2008 21:18:59 GMT

1) OMG OMG OMG I have like 3 months to my defense OMG OMG OMG OMG. OMG.

2) I've been tracking my food intake on fitday.com, mostly out of curiosity. Also to make sure I have proper nutrition for dissertation writing. Also maybe possibly for procrastination.

My daily calorie intake varies between about 2000 and 2500 kcal, average aobut 2300. I get 36% of those calories from fat, 11% saturated. And 20% from protein - 112g protein a day. I eat 27 g of fiber a day. I don't eat enough zinc! Also I'm a bit shaky on folate and vitamin D.

3) I saw flowers! Snowdrops. It's spring!

4) OMG thesis OMG

12 thoughts on the "Instructor's Choice" workout class today

Sat, 08 Mar 2008 20:04:04 GMT

1) Cardio in classes is kind of like DDR but with arm movements too. Yay!

2) Someday I will be able to bounce around like an overexcited monkey for 30 minutes without temporarily losing the ability to move my limbs.

5) I like lifting the heaviest dumbbells!

6) I dislike realizing I am a foot taller than everyone else and so proportionally I should be lifting the heaviest dumbbells.

3) I hate "toning".

4) I hate "toning".

5) Seriously, there is no reason to do that many leg lifts and I never need that much lactic acid in my butt ever again.

6) There is also no need for three full minutes of exercise ball crunches.

7) The fact that I can do fewer exercise ball crunches than anyone else in the class may be influencing my opinion.

8) I still hate "toning".

9) But I do like doing a few sets of machine assisted pull-ups after the class!

10)Walking into the weight room, doing pullups, and walking out feels pretty bad-ass.

11) Eating a whey protein bar afterwards, even one which objectively pretty much tastes like cardboard, is like eating the nectar of the gods.

12) I can practically feel my muscles going "nom nom nom nom nom" a few minutes later.

Wed, 13 Feb 2008 20:08:08 GMT

I'm feeling kind of together and productive with my life lately, so I think I'll start blogging again! What can I say, it's a lot more fun to discuss accomplishment than talk about how I spent a whole weekend in an armchair surfing the internet.

I went to the gym on Saturday with KP. She tried to kill me. Well, OK, we did the Zumba class which was fun but tiring, and then she said she wanted to go lift weights. So why the heck not? I mean, aside from the fact that I'd just gone from couch potato zero to sixty minutes of cardio and had turned a delightful shade of magenta.

But anyway, we did bench presses together and I felt pretty good considering it's the first time I've done them in forever. And I can bench more than her! (shh, it doesn't matter that she's approximately half my size). And then I went and played on the assisted chin-up machine for a few sets, until my forearms died. And then KP still doing things with dumbbells so I wandered around, found a plyo box, and discovered that if I'm on the box so my free leg can dip down, I can do full-depth alternating one legged squats a bunch of times! And a ginormous muscley guy with pretty blue eyes complimented me on being able to do them, so yay!

And then I was sore till Tuesday. But good sore! Body working again sore! And I did some 20 minute yoga things on Sunday and Monday, and then played with my barbell a bit this morning, and I'm kind of back in an exercising groove.

But if I don't mention it again next week though, you should probably assume I've slipped back into slackerdom.

I am also learning German! I'm halfway through the BBC's German Steps program, which is awesome (and I got to send in a correction to one of their pages where they'd linked the wrong flash file, so I feel contributy). I feel like it's coming along pretty well, I could exchange some pleasantries with Uwe's mom the other weekend.

The interesting thing though, is how learning German is bringing back some of my French and Thai. I actually went through the BBC French Steps challenges a couple weeks ago for fun, kind of bringing that back. And now sometimes when I'm trying to remember the German for things I sometimes remember the Thai, which I haven't thought about in ages and probably couldn't have thought up that quick before I started studying German.

It feels like there's a whole segment of brain that's kind of waking up and turning over and starting to chug away. I was listening to some Paris Combo and actually picking out the words, without trying - before I'd been just hearing the French lyrics as kind of instrumental. But with just a little bit of French recollection, they start making words.

I really like learning languages. I remember talking at the KITP conference with some people about how different languages are suited to things. Hungarian sounds like a very interesting language to learn. The description I got of it actually reminded me of lojban. I was going to say "except with much more conceptual ambiguity", but really lojban does have tons of conceptual ambiguity because complex concepts must be constructed, and different people tend to do that in different ways. I think. Been a while.

I want to learn all the languages in the world ever. I will put it on my to do list after "become a ninja".

Future

Sat, 12 Jan 2008 07:38:16 GMT

So, it looks like by this time next year I'll be living in Berlin. I have a postdoc at the Albert Einstein Institut in Potsdam. Exciting! A bit scary.

Sometime next week y'all should be able to hear me talk at the KITP, should you be so inclined. I gave a talk today in the friday afternoon session.

There are so many nifty research things that I want to do.

Thu, 10 Jan 2008 07:07:54 GMT

In 2008, enigmania resolves to...

Put fifty geeks a month into my savings account.
Ask my boss for a math.
Go to the nerds every month.
Overcome my secret fear of web-comics.
Find a new lojban.
Spend more time with my wearing pants.

I'm in Santa Barbara! At a workshop. It's freaking fantastic. Also, trying to decide where I want to go for a postdoc next year. More excitement. Research is awesome. I'm awesome! Also, I had some beers. And wine. Oh, physicists.

Happy Thanksgiving, Americans!

Thu, 22 Nov 2007 21:07:46 GMT

Having declined a four day trip up north to stay in town for various school-type workings, Uwe and I are spending, I think, our first Official Holiday alone as a couple. Which mostly means we are doing every day sorts of hanging out things today, but we just picked up the fixings for dinner.

Uwe is making crock pot ~~chicken~~pheasant and dumplings with sweet potatoes and maybe lambic, and we also have little black forest cake and some Guinness. His friend Heather mentioned to us some time back at Paddy's that Guinness mixed with raspberry lambic could be quite tasty, and I'm intrigued.

School stuff is stressful right now but my life as a whole is really quite wonderful. I wish everyone a good holiday.

Ramen without the ramen

Wed, 14 Nov 2007 02:40:19 GMT

Tired from sorting out embarrassingly last minute details of a postdoc application, I decided to make myself a nice simple lazy meal of ramen this evening. But of course I chopped up some cabbage and spinach to add for vegetables, and then decided to add some chopped garlic and soy sauce and balsamic vinegar and sesame oil and things to supplement and, adding some more, to replace the crappy powdered broth of the 17 cent ramen packs. And of course I dropped an egg into the broth to add some protein, and then I looked at the result and figured it was really deserving of something better than the also-crappy ramen noodles, so I cooked up some soba noodles to add to it instead of the ramen noodles. And so I am having my 'ramen' with no actual ramen contents. Mmmm.

This, Uwe says, is why he is the baker.

Also, my excellent taste in enjoying The Grand Sophy has been confirmed by professionals!

Things that are funny

Mon, 12 Nov 2007 13:49:00 GMT

I finally wrapped up reading The Confusion by Neal Stephenson yesterday morning, which I've been making my way through in little bits and pieces for quite some time now. Yay! Now I need to track down a copy of the last one to complete my collection. I am enjoying the elaborateness.

It turned out I'd only had a little bit of that book left and I was still in the mood to read, so I cracked open The Grand Sophy by Georgette Heyer, which I'd picked up from the library on a third hand livejournal recommendation. It's hysterical! I didn't put it down till I was done, cracking up the whole time and attempting to read bits to a bemused Uwe. I may have found a new favorite comfort sort of read, like Jane Austen but more so. I'm going to trade it in at the library for a whole stack of her books this week sometime. I'm pretty sure it would be impossible to stay stressed out or sad while reading that book. It's brilliant.

Uwe has figured out what he wants to do when he grows up, courtesy of xkcd, although he says he needs to work on his one handed typing speed.

And also: Eureka, baby.

handwave

Tue, 06 Nov 2007 13:54:19 GMT

I'm a big fan of waving my hands around when I'm trying to figure out how a problem set up works. I do it in talks, too, when I'm trying to get a mental picture of something people have talked about. Back in elementary school, I counted on my fingers for almost every math problem. It's actually a bit startling, now, to realize that I don't do it so much any more. I guess I've finally managed to memorize the results of most small number additions and subtractions. I remember learning how to count on my fingers with my hands flat on my lap, just giving the slightest twitch with each finger, so that the teacher wouldn't criticize my method. Mathematical intuition has always been a strong suit with me, even since Grade 1, so it's kind of interesting that the above-linked article connects the two.

In other news: I won a speaking award at the conference last weekend, and I finally got my recommendation letters for postdocs sorted out---which were happily offered, once I got up the guts to figure out who I should ask and actually do so. So I'm having kind of a "good research week" which is awesome, because I think I need to be feeling kind of cocky to do a good job writing up my statement of research.

Worse than fuck

Wed, 24 Oct 2007 03:07:32 GMT

I guess I'm not the only one waiting for the rest of the swearing: Guardian Story on The worst swear word in the world.

Hola

Thu, 11 Oct 2007 15:46:02 GMT

What have I been doing lately?

Thinking about postdoc applications. I have a list of places to apply now. I have the start of a research statement outline. They are slightly less scary, though I still am not entirely sure I know what I want to do when I grow up. At least it is a question of so many interesting things, rather than so few. Also, I really wish I could do this *after* I've finished my thesis and felt more solid about my accomplishments. But will that ever happen?

Taking actual! simulated! data! and matching analytical things onto it, for exciting future paper. With plots! that I probably shouldn't show here because tooo soooon.

Thinking about starting a blog to talk about interesting ways to imagine interesting bits of GR and other stuff, with little pictures and also equations and possibly animations or videos of my waving my hands about.

Stuck in the paper-that-never-ends of polishing up a project for publication. Pthbbt.

Going back to meditation every Wednesday night, which, last night, was very very good for me. And I should do it more times a week, probably, but even once a week is grounding.

And playing with fire in a social situation, which is probably bad, but oh so tempting.

Adventure

Sat, 01 Sep 2007 07:40:52 GMT

I went to mad planet! And danced! To music! There may have been some drinking of Old Fashioneds. And dancing! And girls in very short skirts! Not me though, I wore a long skirt. A high waisted long skirt, and got asked if I was a librarian, because I was wearing glasses also. Whee!

ETA the next morning: Wow, it's easy to stay up really really late when you're going out with a friend who works second shift and you don't even arrive at the bar until it is almost one. That was almost three hours past my normal bed time. Finally getting fresh coffee and restarting our mongo morning cafe au lait must've made more impact than I realized.

Calgaranium!

Wed, 29 Aug 2007 18:07:27 GMT

As an Asimov fan from way back, I am delighted to hear about positron science . For sheer cool words, as much as anything. Dipositronium! Positronium condensates! Our robot overlords must be imminent.

I am back from Canada, where I watched the entire third season of Corner Gas, went on several hikes into the mountains, saw a pine martern and a pika along with bighorn sheep, chipmunks, and squirrels both tree and ground, jumped in a lake, read The Golden Compass, saw Calgarian friends of seven years temporal remove, and marveled at the many advertisements for entry-level employment at coffee shops and office supply stores for significantly more than my current summer wages.

It was a really great vacation. We have many pictures, which are currently being industriously sorted, categorized, and cropped by our crack team of photo gnomes to ensure only the highest quality photographic documents are gleaned for your internet-viewing pleasure.

Curses

Wed, 15 Aug 2007 05:29:34 GMT

I was so disappointed as a child to find there were not whole onion-like layers of unknown-to-me swear words past things like bitch, shit, and fuck.

I grew up reading a ton of fantasy novels in which one commonly encountered crusty old swordsmen or sailors who could easily spin off solid minutes of inventive cursing, euphemistically described. It was only natural to assume that there were sufficient naughty words in existence to support many unique sentences.

So I figured I'd found out some common ones, as above, but there would be, oh, at least ten or twenty *more* and even *naughtier* such words yet to be discovered. Alas, it was not to be the case. Continuous minutes of cursing seems merely to have implied liberal sprinklings of the type of swears I had already known and inventive usage of regular English vocabulary.

Which is an impressive skill, I will grant, but still.

Some answers

Mon, 13 Aug 2007 13:39:35 GMT

The cheap duct tape was enough, helped by a blanket draped over one side.

No new word on my sustained admiration for ruffles and lace on tailored style clothing.

I brought the rest of my sewing stuff down from the attic, gaped at the pile which was about twice as big as my recollection, sorted and organized it and condensed it down to a reasonable volume, and remembered I have an all-but-hemmed grey pinstripe high-waisted skirt to finish before I should be starting up new things all willy nilly.

Desk still fairly tidy, and served admirably as a buffet table for company last night.

Have decided to think of documentation issue as interesting challenge, as making technical writing clear, concise, and most of all absorbing reading is a useful skill. Bloody difficult though. Need more drafts.

Questions

Sun, 12 Aug 2007 05:48:08 GMT

Will the cheap duct tape be enough to keep the snake from making another midnight escape from his eating cage, or should we have used the good duct tape, or even the gorilla tape?

Why do I have an urge to buy every fitted tuxedo-ruffled shift I see? Is it some trauma from when they first came into style three or four years ago and I searched in local shops in vain? Where did I get this lace craving anyway?

Will I work up the energy to bring the bins of fabric down from the attic in time to make a one-seam convertible jersey dress before it snows?

How long will my desk area stay tidy after my latest cleaning binge?

Why does nobody seem to read my documentation until I open it in front of them and point to specific pages?

Bear tongues.

Sat, 11 Aug 2007 06:19:29 GMT

Jocelyn: That expression looks like it's time for bed!
Uwe: Noooo... I need more bear tongues... bear tongues...

I, uh, haven't really been posting much lately. Impromptu hiatus? So I figured I'd post something silly that made me laugh while I'm staying up past my bedtime so I could feel less weird about posting something insightful or summary-y after such a break. Hi!

The Relativistic Turducken

Wed, 25 Jul 2007 14:35:57 GMT

I am hypothesizing that there was drinking and/or a bet or two behind the terminology of this paper.

Although I am mildly disappointed, as it seems it is only one type of stuffing instead the apparent horizon instead of of multiple levels or ooh! some sort of recursive method (would that be at all usefull?), which would *really* justify using "turducken" as a verb multiple times.

Usefulness

Mon, 23 Jul 2007 18:47:13 GMT

I got a new Leatherman multitool last week - the Juice CS4. Simply "a" leatherman, perhaps, as it is not replacing anything but the ghost of a youthful swiss army knife long lost. Anyway, people have been asking me if I've used it for anything.

Why yes! I used the scissors to trim my thumbnails after I trashed them trying to get the screwdrivers out. And then I used the pliers to bend a paperclip into a little loopy tool to fit over my finger and catch the thumbnail catches so I could get the fucking screwdrivers out.

In other news: It is a great day.. FOR SCIENCE!

Back from Australia

Thu, 19 Jul 2007 20:34:30 GMT

I'm still a little discombobulated, and had been planning to post more notes and random impressions (like how Australians don't seem to slow down at all on sharp corners, and how koalas move more like chameleons than anything I was expecting, and how awesome platypuses and wombats are), but I felt I should at least make some mention of being back. I did make some facebook albums.

I managed to succumb to a cold right in time for the 13 hour flight from Sydney to San Francisco, which made it and the subsequent 14 hours of transfers and continental hops rather draining, although I did have a pleasant interlude of meeting old friends in San Francisco on my layover there. So I'm still a bit exhausted from the whole thing.

Oh yes, but both my talks went well. So that is good!

You know you're at a physics seminar when...

Fri, 29 Jun 2007 20:03:41 GMT

The question "Is that obvious?" from the audience leads to several minutes of serious brow-furrowing contemplation and discussion, ultimately leading to a conclusion of "I don't *think* so, but maybe."

Events of the past few days

Mon, 25 Jun 2007 13:45:11 GMT

1) We forgot that the snake has figured out how to get out of his feeding cage and left him overnight, so I discovered him stretched across the living room on a mid-night bathroom run. After debating waking Uwe, I hauled him up on my bokken (because he can be a tad too feisty after a feeding for me to want to grab him by hand) and managed to carry him over and into the cage. He is freaking heavy, especially draped at the far end of a stick. But I am mighty snake wrangler! Rar!

2) KP and Ben proposed a bicycle ride, and so I got to get up off my lazy butt and cycle around Milwaukee for an afternoon. It was a lovely ride, although KP had to bail out midway due to a busted tire :( But then we went down to the new Lake Front pathways and cruised around. Blue sky and water all around, hazy downtown buildings as a backdrop, sun shining and a cool breeze. Gorgeous.