Simulana

And how can I resist, something...more than this..

2009-11-02T05:35:37Z

Whenever I finally get around to posting again, I always read the last entry I wrote, just to see how much things have changed. Usually I'm surprised. Not this time...

So, the usual update first. Finished the prelim, took some classes, got married, went to Pennsic. Holy cow, busy year. Halloween was mellower than normal. Finally got to see Tranquilatwist on Devil's Night. Again, I recommend them whole-heartedly.

Research:
Here is my stuff: http://www.pas.rochester.edu/~chaig/

This is where it comes from: https://data-store.pas.rochester.edu/bearclaw

The general idea is that my adviser, the aforementioned Adam Frank, has me working on modeling accretion disk formation and shocks at the surface of said disks, in the effort to match observations of NGC 1333 IRAS-4B, a cute little system that we happen to be lucky enough to be staring at directly down one of its axial jets.

I have been working on this project for awhile, exploring a lot of different possible methods of simulation, all the while trying to get up to speed with different programs, numerical methods, and MHD. Let's just say...it's going. This week I am working on understanding Hypre, an elliptical solver that can be used for self-gravity in hydrodynamics (also cleverly called 'gravitohydrodynamics'), along with some work on adaptive mesh refinement.

And, of course, I'm in my third year now. I've finally passed that hump in graduate school. I've taken all the classes I absolutely needed to take, I've passed the prelim, and they awarded me my MA in Physics. Yipee.

So, blah blah blah, you say. Well, here comes the good part. I've put in my time, and a change is a'comin'. After much discussion, hand-wringing, and possibility-exploring, Pete and I have decided that the best choice for us, personally and professionally, is to move to a place where we can both continue school, and that means moving to a city with a public institution. For many reasons, including good educational opportunity for both of us, we settled on moving back to Raleigh. Upon continuing discussion with my adviser-to-be at UNC, Chapel Hill, I will begin to transition my work to his goals of larger molecular cloud collapse. Pete has already applied to NCSU. Although it's not Phoenix, I always felt comfortable in Raleigh, and it's definitely a great deal better than Rochester. Given my cold-blooded nature, and need for big-city livin', it's one of the best choices we could make for the long-run-short-term.

Of course, 3-4 more years, and we'll have to move again...

Come with me if you want to live.

2008-09-08T01:15:18Z

This journal entry had started out being a sort of update to my life, hey-what's-going-on sort of thing, but it rapidly turned into a steam vent. As frequently happens in journals, I scream in this place the things I can't express any other way.

But before I subject you to all that, the semi-unbiased update:

May 2007 - Graduated from ASU, had a little good-bye trip to two of my favorite places, Sunset Crater and the Lava Caves. Pictures can be found on my Myspace page: http://www.myspace.com/simulana.
Moved to Raleigh, NC to stay with Pete for one month.

July 2007 - Moved to Rochester, NY with Pete and his best friend John, to start my tenure as a grad student. Started research at LLE - eventually discovered that many Mech E.'s are generally disdainful of physics grad students - especially at the LLE. After interesting time being completely unsupervised and expected to read minds, move on to...

September 2007 - Started graduate classes and TAing pre-meds in second-semester University Physics (E&M to the layperson). Rough semester. First year of graduate school generally rough all around. Whew.

January 2008 - Started second semester of graduate classes. A little easier than first. TAed silly PHY101 course for non-science majors. Really easy, and really eye-opening. Some people just really don't belong in college. Period.

May 2008 - Started working for Adam Frank. Now doing computational simulation in astrophysics, in which I get to learn about real physics (surprising, I know). This is much better than Mech E. experimental work which pretty much only involves matching x-ray emission data to theoretical curves produced by someone else who does real physics, to infer electron temperature and density information, to hopefully match a theoretical simulation by someone else who also does real physics. Downside to new position - Have to use Fortran 90.

August 2008 - Narrowly avoided taking the preliminary exam this go-around, and decided to study and wait until January. Also, sprained ankle. Again. Woot. Also, attended Pennsic for the first time (in early August). Been getting sucked back in to the SCA more and more...for reasons I will detail below. Unbiasedly continuing on...

September 2008 - Just started second year graduate classes last week. Taking one and auditing 2 others...trying to work through the balance of research and classwork. Maybe later I'll even show you my nifty simulation page...after I get some good results.

Obviously, I only have time to write this update because I'm sitting here trying to rest my ankle...and I ran out of Daily Show episodes on Hulu. Yes, I could be studying, but it's surprisingly hard to write equations on paper (or in book margins) when you're being sucked into the couch, trying to keep your foot above your heart.

Now for the good/bad stuff:

** Rochester bashing about to ensue - if you love your fair city, please don't read on **

Mostly I am a happy, upbeat person..and generally I stay that way most of the time. However, since moving to this place, I've been having a rough time of keeping up the show. I am not very happy here...in fact I don't think I've been so depressed anywhere else. At first I thought it was the lack of friends, or even the lack of knowing what's fun to do around here. I even pinned it on the very scary coldness that I experienced all winter. But after a time it really started to sink in...the sucking feeling that I was really just in the wrong place - a place I didn't belong. I miss Phoenix still, as if something in my blood has tied itself to the desert, and it wants back very very badly. But I never experienced this feeling living in Boulder, or when visiting California. Something about the West is fundamentally different in culture, and the culture here will probably never be home to me, no matter how long I stay.

Some people here are okay. Some are polite, and nice, and intelligent. But they make a very small minority. The very oppressive general impression I get every day that I walk out my front door is one of self-interest and a sense of entitlement. Everyone here seems to exude it. No more so than when on the road, but also just in talking to people. It makes for horrible drivers, and terrible people. People without the smallest shred of intelligence have an undeserved and disgusting attitude of authority. And that's exactly what it all is - the New York "attitude" - that bothers me so much. I can say it again and again, but it won't sink in until you come here. Everyone here feels a sense of entitlement that is overwhelmingly false, and the attitude that they are God's gift to the World. If you are from Phoenix, or anywhere else for that matter, you understand that this is not a prevalent attitude, nor should it be.

And then, there's the rest of the culture...or lack thereof. Phoenix is a shining beacon of culture and civilization in comparison to this place. New tunes are scarce in this town. They'll occasionally play a fresh, hip song (very occasionally), but mostly they just stick to 90's alternative rock, with some 80's and classic rock thrown in for good measure. So basically, everything you here on the radio is 15 years old or older. This is reflected in their dress and manner of speech. Somehow I still find this odd, and slightly spine-chillingly creepy. It's as if someone plucked me out of the modern day and gave me a fresh chance at high school. I know we've all had nightmares like this, so I'm sure you can understand what I'm talking about when I say, 'ew'.

Now, I think the sexually conservative part of Rochester is just another extension of the culturally conservative part. And when I say culturally conservative, I mean a little something like this. Phoenix can be represented by an upstart experimental 20 year old, whereas Rochester is best represented by a grumpy 50 year old man, who doesn't want to try anything new, and god forbid you change his pea soup to fajitas. And this is why, of course, Phoenix has 24 sex stores in a metro area population of 4.1 million, and Rochester has 2 (good luck trying to find them) in a metro area population of 1 million. (I won't even get into the food choices...we all know there's nothing to do in a hot place like Phoenix except to try new restaurants)

From my little missive here, you might get the mistaken assumption that I think Rochester is all bad. Really, I truly believe there are some awesome people here. Particularly the intelligent sorts that the SCA can attract. Even some cool people at the goth club. And hey, the Physics Department at UR attracts all kinds of people from all over the world. There just aren't enough of them to make up for the shitheads. And we're hemorrhaging more and more good people every day. And every day this leaves the roads just a little unsafer, and the minuscule list of decent restaurants and hotspots a little closer to shutting down.

** Rochester-bashing mostly over **

Two closely related tiny motes of luminance in this otherwise dim existence found me, however:

This band, who may play in Rochester again sometime soon, I hope.

Also, the fact that The Crüxshadows have again seen fit to play for me on my birthday, in Rochester with the Azoic, which is about as awesome a birthday gift as I can imagine, Take two.

And, of course, a lot of good things have happened in the past year along with bad. Pete and I have grown closer together, and as it turns out, we were meant to be together. So for once, all that drama panned out something good. We've also met some really cool and froody people here that we are becoming better friends with. I put myself (and Pete) here in this city and in this situation, and somehow we are both making the best of it. So, overall I can still say that I am happy, even though I get my moods.

I guess that's all for now. I'm not ready to say "THIS HOUSE IS CLEAR!", but I feel a lot better.

P.S. - Here is a brief list of bands and songs on the radio in Rochester that I once loved as a teenager, but now makes me want to cry about moving here every time I hear them, because they play it so goddamn much.

Anything by Collective Soul
Soundgarden - "Black Hole Sun" only
Green Day
Rage Against the Machine - "Bulls on Parade" and "Killing in the Name"
Smashing Pumpkins - "Bullet with Butterfly Wings"
Dishwalla - "Counting Blue Cars"
REM
Gin Blossoms. Wow, do they love the Gin Blossoms. Like, I think Rochester wants to marry them.

And when I say they play it a lot, I mean like once every couple hours, rotating on the 4 main "new rock" stations here, every day. Songs that are at least 12 fucking years old. Oddly, they never play anything by Nirvana, and they also play a shit-ton of really god-awful 'new alternative' music, made by bands riding on the downslide of this culture's obsession with the 90's. If it wasn't made before 2002, they really don't want to hear it. Maybe they're just not ready for that kind of culture shock.

P.P.S. - From the list of unforgettable quotes - The title of this journal entry is what I wish someone living in this city would come up and say to me. Show me the light!

Our society is a funny ol' thing...

2007-07-22T16:40:25Z

And for more technological innovations that you occasionally think upon and wonder: 'What happened to that one?'

Now, we all know that hovercraft have been around for years - since the 70's apparently. Back when I was a youngin', I remember a special being shown on the production of "Back to the Future II" (in 1990), in which they described the basis for the hoverboards featured in the movie. I believe the quote was something like - 'The (insert governmental agency here) feels that this technology is far too unsafe to currently be used in the production of commercially available vehicles, but we hope to see this technology out on the market soon'.

http://www.engadget.com/2007/07/21/moller-m200g-hovercraft-heading-into-production/

http://www.engadget.com/2005/09/29/m400-skycar-prototype-available-at-neiman-marcus/

So when will the FAA become the MVD? Don't hold your breath. The kind of bureaucracy changes necessary to facilitate that kind of transition makes bureaucrats cringe...and it's getting harder every day. It may have been better for everyone involved if they had just started the process in the 70's.

Why did Jefferson say that a country should have a revolution every 200 years or so? Because otherwise society slowly grinds to a halt. Unfortunately, our society has grown so complicated that an actual revolution would throw a seriously large wrench in the gears; one that would take a long time to fully recover from. I am personally what you might call a 'scary liberal'; one who believes that governmental controls are sometimes necessary in order to save people from themselves - i.e., our current environmental woes. Yet still, after moving to a state where the Democrats took hold, and well...they took it...I am wondering exactly how much government we have is necessary, or how much was just for the sake of an official getting a paycheck. Here in New York, if someone ever said 'There should be a law against that sort of thing..', there probably is one. However, there are other forms of quiet revolution going on around us - it's just too bad that they are so quiet. As KMFDM said, there are peaceful means to resist and to change - but we still have to be loud about it.

So, when we finally have a real revolution, perhaps we should agree to some penalties on over-governmentalization, or at least some means by which laws must be reviewed every so often. I am a firm believer in the Confucian system of running a government like you would run your household, which includes balancing your budget, keeping your house clean, and 'spring cleaning' - have a garage sale or give some stuff to Goodwill every now and again.

And damn it - give us our hovercars.

P.S. - For those of you who actually read my journal and are wondering whether or not I dropped off the face of the Earth - well, I'm still here, amazingly. I made it through 2 long-distance moves (Phoenix to Raleigh, Raleigh to New York). I started working here: http://www.lle.rochester.edu, with these guys: http://www.lle.rochester.edu/03_publications/03_01_review/03_llereview.html. Sean Regan is a senior scientist at the LLE, and Hiroshi Sawada is his graduate student. Now Hiroshi is finishing up his Ph.D. thesis, and I am taking his place. We are working on all sorts of interesting things, which I hope to go into detail about later. If you bother to read the article, I am working on the pre-heating portion of shock transport through a target. It's all exciting and new, just like last summer when I was learning about magnetospheric physics. They once told me at NOAA that all the money in plasma physics is in magnetospheric research, but I'm not doing too badly at all, for a graduate student. Rochester is colder even than Boulder (more like the UP in Michigan, for those of you who know what that means), and I'm not certain how I'm going to deal with the winters. Admittedly, everyone claims they are milder than they once were (thanks to climate change), but I'm still a lizard. Rochester is about the same any other American city, although as a community it has some stagnancy and population exodus issues. The Northeastern suburbs are about the same as the Southwestern suburbs, except in that the people here are generally more rude and haughty. Still, I found a lovely Indian grocery yesterday with nice people. More about city life later, I suppose.

Party. Party? Party!

2007-05-24T16:53:15Z

So it occurs to me that I haven't posted here in awhile, because of various reasons. Yeah, that whole 'busy' problem again. It's a real killer.

But, anyway, since I am moving to Raleigh in T-minus 3 days and counting, I've decided to have a little get together this evening at my place, for those of you here in Phoenix. Please, if you know me, take that as an invitation. Just respond to this message and I will send you directions!

At the shock boundary, the relativistic wind kinetic energy is randomized.

2007-04-08T04:34:15Z

I couldn't think of a witty title tonight, so I pulled something random from my notes - I'm not reading much of anything else these days, anyway (other than the occasional snippet from "Robot Visions" in the bathroom).

Despite being quite difficult to piece together myself, this project is interesting. For my final individual research thesis, I am applying principles of plasma physics toward understanding the Crab Nebula. It's like all my other theses and projects and labs, except without the difficulty of equipment failure. I'm going to give this experimental physics thing one more good ol' college try before I fade away into obscurity as a theoretician. But for now, I take my respite in researching things that other people have already done.

In other news, I have a job. Sort of...it's the same job I always have, except I'll get paid a little bit more. And, instead of wallowing in the relatively challenging, but ultimately banal tasks of an undergraduate, I'll be living it up with a research position and some wonderfully imaginative graduate classes (I hope). I have recently accepted an offer from the University of Rochester's Department of Physics. Which means, of course, that I'll be moving to Rochester, NY. It's going to be quite a change, but I think it's all for the best.

Since I don't post here very often, more recent updates, in convenient bullet-point format:

- Relationship: Still long-distance, but has evened itself out. Drama, though drawn out, is finally over. Life is beautiful. The birds are singing, the Sun is shining, happy puppy dogs are out frolicking in the grass. You get the picture (now don't gag on me yet). Thankfully, it won't be long-distance for very much longer. The longer we spend together, the more we both realize how wonderful we are together, and how well we fit together (You can gag now).

- Friends: Hope they forgive me for being a ghost. Love you guys.

- Career: I could've sworn that I was all about magnetically confined fusion. However, Rochester specializes in inertial confinement fusion. But still, high energy density plasma physics is what it's all about, so I am satisfied for now. Life takes you down these paths...sometimes you just have to follow along. Not too crazy about the location, but I may be switching schools before it's all said and done with.

- Location: ...location, location. Now I'm in Phoenix. I love Phoenix. Soon (late May) I'll be in Raleigh. I love Raleigh a little less, but it's still nice there. Later (early July), I'll be in upstate New York. Crime looks bad, weather looks bad, city is smallish, and the people are New Yorkers. However, it's right on a Great Lake, it will never get so hot as it does in the desert, and the city looks somewhat cultured. I think I could be satisfied. Though, that high crime rate (particularly high rape rate) is quite bothersome. Time to start training again...

That's all for now folks. Graduating in a month. Maybe I'll post again before, maybe not (it's always a surprise!).

If it weren't for Edison, we'd be watching TV by candlelight!

2007-02-10T19:12:24Z

At first I was tempted to write a post describing this amazing story and its overall effect, and further illuminate the shadows of inspirational influence I found throughout this story on many of the works by Asimov that I know and love. Yeah, I know I'm a sucker for sociologically and culturally profound sci-fi.

Then, I got to Part III: The Homeless. Creepy. I think I'm going to go try to find an original idea now, perhaps while taking a shower.

http://brighton.ncsa.uiuc.edu/prajlich/forster.html

P.S. - And one more thing... Tee hee, racing the Sun. That's only like Mach 3. We are totally so beyond that. As in 1984, the author foreshadowed trends in human civilization, but completely underestimated that pesky human desire to extend to greater heights, to fight against that which constrains him, even as one of his main characters (Kuno) feels the pull. Technology comes from that pull, and will never continue to advance without it. In that mode, I don't see how technology could ever overwhelm us completely....even as the masses embrace it, the few (and we are really not so few) will always question it.

P.P.S. - I should really start attributing my quotations to their sources, though I think some should be obvious. Credit where credit is due and all that. Title by Al Boliska.

Do you believe?

2007-02-09T02:11:04Z

Vying for the top spot of favorite songs from one of my favorite bands are two songs, excellently written. Each of these is pretty and ugly in its own way.

The first, because it reminds us of the world we lived in when we were young; the one we still carry around inside us, that holds all of our dreams of this world and the other.

The second, because the music is absolutely beautiful, and it's very telling of what we want to believe of the world, versus what we get out of it, and how we often overlook and misunderstand the thing we want the most.

I wouldn't necessarily recommend reading the songs without listening to them, but one can still get something out of them. The lyrics are where the story resides, but they only tell a piece of it...the music and voice hold the emotion.

Voices
In our secret place..hiding here..dying inside..our precious make believe
Here where our perfect world resides
Our perfect storytelling dream
Exists the breath that gave our lives
This meaning now in memories
Now in our perfect world we cry..cry to fall asleep and pray
Pray that we can stop this screaming..but it's not the way we were
One voice. .one world..one life..here in make believe..one heart..
One voice is screaming.
Sometimes nowhere..we don't try to find these
Meanings, memories, haunting inside these dreams
We try sometimes..understanding why and..we care, not when
Giving up inside we fall
Behind our secret walls within
Our secret thoughts pretending..alive to hide the voices screaming
It's not the way we were
This was our perfect world..this was our voice
This was our perfect world..this is our voices screaming
This was our perfect world..this was our perfect dream
This was our perfect world..this is our voices screaming
This was our perfect world..this was our perfect dream
This was our perfect world..this is our voices screaming

Do You Believe in Angels?

There was so much to grok, so little to grok from...

2007-02-08T06:55:34Z

In the next installation here during Christina's crazy wonderful poetry week, I'd like to open it up to song and prose.

This would be one of my favorites from The Last Dance.

In slow motion all seems right, she said
As she closed her eyes
Disappear into you and pretend

She could be the star
Falling between worlds
Through her painted sky
In her silence
Behind her shadow no one sees
Behind her shadow
Lost and finding reasons she romaticizes

With a glance she brings the sky,
Alive she hides behind
a smile, never a word
Until her heart is breaking still

More than just a whisper in her,
Suddenly a tear from nowhere,
Quietly she's in slow motion,
Wishing silently as time stands still

She could be my perfect star
Falling in my broken world
Unaware, her perfect sky
Silently she

Thou art God....and forever Strange.

2007-02-08T00:07:44Z

As I was lying down for a long winter's nap, I got struck by one of those particles of raw inspiration sleeting through the universe. Normally I wouldn't know what to do with one quite like this. But, I lay down in my bed, trapped in my head with my eyes shut, and opened up that dusty closet of my brain that used to write poetry.

This is in no way related to the previous post I made, nor is it specifically related to anything going on in my life right now. It just is. I guess we'll call this crazy wonderful poetry week in the life of Christina.

2-7-07

We extend our reach,
As time goes by.

The more we live,
The more time flies.

We live, we love,
We sigh, we die.

But time marches on,
So why can't I?

And for the hell of it, here's one that I wrote many years ago, at the tender age of 16.

10-3-97
I always see the better road.
For my life, the ugly road
Has crossed my path
More often than the lovely one.
And the light of excitement is always far, on the wrong road,
The road that is not mine.
Is this what is seen through the dark glasses?
To walk the road of desolation and despair,
Or to rise above,
To find happiness in whatever may be,
Is the choice we all must make.
Like the faeries of the forest,
The truth is only there
When you let yourself see it.
And in this absence,
The darkness of ignorance
And, ultimately,
Death
Set in.
So take what road you will
But always remember, the choice is yours
Alone.
And when you see the Dark come,
Always remember to ask yourself
"Does it really matter?"
And face the night.

And finally, time to go back to sleep.

Not mine, but still truth to the very core...

2007-02-06T22:42:38Z

04/16/06
Woman
Willow Krystina M******

I am woman

Hear me snarl
with the unfettered violence and vitriol of a thousand sonic booms

Let my anger be forced out from the place it has sat for so long
let it blot out every construct you have enforced on to this world

Let Me Live.

Let me break out of your mold

For it does not matter who I am who I was
Or who I tried to make myself be

I AM WOMAN

And I am the antichrist
I am the devil

I am the seed that destroys everything

because.... I am Woman

I am a giant among men

And I cower before no one

I am woman

and it does not matter what you think lies beneath my clothes

All you must know is I am Woman.

I am She who survived a thousand deaths
and a thousand loves

and she who is still here

I am woman
I am strong

Beneath you it devours

But it cannot even find me

For I am free

And alive

I am she

The darkness can not take

Me

I will be here when everyone has gone

And a thousand pains on you that call me disturbed or wrong

It is your gender construct
and your social mores that cause your own hatred

it is not male or female it is self

and that is all that matters

I am woman

And I am a force to be reckoned with

And I will bite
I will fight
and I will break free of any tyranny that besets me for being female

I am woman
and my scream is the sound of a thousand women

Crying out to be free

I am fighting to be who I am
And I will not be locked in your cage

Or bound with your chains
I will not be raped by your society
nor will I be fettered with a social construct that goes against my very
soul

I am Woman

and I will not stop until I am free.

My Mythos

2007-01-30T18:59:58Z

The Oracle

33% Extroversion, 100% Intuition, 44% Emotiveness, 52% Perceptiveness

Heuristic, detached, and analytical to a fault, you are most like The Oracle. You are able to tackle any subject with a fine-toothed comb, and you possess an ability to pinpoint nuances and shades of meaning that other people do not have and cannot understand. Accomplishment and realization of ideas are, for you, secondary to the rigorous exploration of ideas and questions -- you are, first and foremost, a theorist. You hate authority, convention, tradition, and under no circumstances do you accept a leadership role (although, you will gladly advise leadership when they're going astray, whether they want you to or not). Abstraction and generalities are your interests, details and particulars are usually inconsequential and uninteresting. You excel at language, mathematics and philosophy.

You are typically easy-going and non-confrontational until someone violates one of the very few principles that you deem sacred, at which point you can fly into a rage. Although you possess a much greater understanding of process and systems than the people around you, you are always conscious of the possibility that you've missed something or made a mistake. You don't tend to become attached to particular theories, and will immediately discard mistaken notions once they're revealed to be incorrect (but you don't tolerate iconoclasts who try to discredit validated theories through the use of fallacies and bad data). Despite being outwardly humble, you probably think of yourself as being smarter than most other people. That's because you are. In fact, in your dealings with people your understanding of their motives is so expansive that you know what they're going to say before they say it, and in world affairs, you usually know what is going to take place before it actually does. This ability would make you unbeatable in debates if only you were a little less pensive about your own conclusions, and a little more outgoing.

Famous people like you: Albert Einstein, Charles Darwin, Adam Smith, Thomas Jefferson, John McWhorter, Ramanujan, Marie Curie, Kurt Godel

Stay clear of: Apollo, Icarus, Hermes, Aphrodite

Seek out: Atlas, Prometheus, Daedalus

My test tracked 4 variables How you compared to other people your age and gender:

You scored higher than 99% on Extroversion
You scored higher than 99% on Intuition
You scored higher than 99% on Emotiveness
You scored higher than 99% on Perceptiveness

Link: The Greek Mythology Personality Test written by Aleph_Nine on OkCupid Free Online Dating, home of the The Dating Persona Test

Ohhh, Texas...where the wind comes sweeping across the ... sea?

2007-01-30T18:29:50Z

Random post # 1

This is amazingly cool. Thank the gods that Texas doesn't have any 'delicate natural beauty' to screw up like Cape Cod.

http://www.wired.com/wired/archive/15.02/wind.html

Random post # 2

I love art that informs science:

http://www.liquidsculpture.com/fine_art/index.htm

Round 4 - Ding!

2006-11-28T20:35:40Z

** Disclaimer ** Don't read this if you are easily disgusted, or bored with my sick rantings.

So right about now is when I start wishing deeply that I had someone here to hold my hair and go to the store to get me Sprite, saltines, and more toliet paper. How ironic and sad that one person who was here to do all those things for me stepped on a plane this past afternoon.

Normally right now I would be sleeping the deep sleep of a college student, but I cannot. Thus, you get writing. Yay.

I began this entry right around 6AM, just after round 2, but I ended up passing out.

So, let's count the days, and the workload. I have 3 final projects to do, 2 assignments, 2 finals to take, 1 GRE, and a Poster to finish for AGU. All in the next two and a half weeks, essentially. Oh yeah, this is going to be fun.

So, I fly out to San Fran on the 10th, and fly back to Phoenix on the 15th. At some point I have to move my apartment, and then fly to Raleigh on the 19th.

Thus, please do not be offended if I do not respond to any messages between those times. After I'm in Raleigh, I can message to my heart's content (In between finishing grad school applications).

Being sick probably couldn't have come at a worse time. But, such is life recently. I'm just riding the waves here.

Sometimes, the devil-may-care. Other times, not so much.

2006-11-28T12:04:41Z

Though tasty, I must say that I don't think it was worth eating that last small serving of fish. I really need to be more careful about what I eat and when.

Food poisoning, anyone?

For something to do before I go get sick again:

What Kind of Reader Are You? Your Result: Dedicated Reader You are always trying to find the time to get back to your book. You are convinced that the world would be a much better place if only everyone read more.
Obsessive-Compulsive Bookworm
Literate Good Citizen
Book Snob
Non-Reader
Fad Reader
What Kind of Reader Are You? Create Your Own Quiz

Good night, sleep tight, and don't let those damn bedbugs bite.

The Queen of Hearts, she made some tarts, All on a summer day...

2006-11-12T23:29:35Z

Stolen shamelessly from xkcd, found courtesy of Aaron.

This is funny, funny stuff people. Some cute sketching in the beginning too.

I'm a sucker for three things: well-written literature and jokes, good sketching, and cute baby-goths who hang around malls (they're almost as adorable as puppies, seriously).

Combinations of the first two particularly tickle my fancy...hence the web comic fascination.

P.S. - Does anyone have any recommendations for a good laptop backpack? I know it's an uncommon request, but I think I'd better take advice from friends before making a mistake again (like in buying from Dell).

simulana @ 2006-11-10T11:56:00

2006-11-10T18:56:42Z

"Three passions, simple but overwhelmingly strong, have governed my life:
the longing for love, the search for knowledge, and unbearable pity for the
suffering of mankind."
-Bertrand Russell, philosopher, mathematician, and author (1872-1970)

How true this quote rings for me. If you don't remember...

http://simulana.livejournal.com/22041.html#cutid1

In other news, I want to see this movie: http://thefountainmovie.warnerbros.com/

Things are...well, things are crazy, and so am I.

More to come.

Let the Games Begin...

2006-10-08T22:30:12Z

Video Geeks Unite!

This is an interesting article. I especially liked the 'Let the Video Games Begin' Audio slideshow. You might remember, many a year ago, when the US looked like it was taking this route...back when movies like The Wizard and shows like Sliders were popular.

I find it fascinating how so many technocracies in Southeast Asia have managed to pick up where the US left off (and got left behind) in technology. Makes you feel downright rural and backwards, living in the US.

The whole of this strange turn of events reminds me of when I was a young teen with stars in my eyes, reading the likes of Neal Stephenson and Pat Cadigan, pondering on what state of affairs the world would exist in when I was an adult. Well, in at least the case of the US, we've traded the dystopian industrial cyberpunk future for the dystopian 1984/Fahrenheit 451 future (or so it seems). Talk about retro.

To better understand my fascination with this topic, you might as well read The Hacker Crackdown, if you have the time and inclination.

Questions? Comments? Lunatic Ravings? Colorful stories?

We'd like to hear from you.

No nepenthe for me, love, but I take my whiskey straight.

2006-09-28T07:55:51Z

Sometimes there is definitely something to be said for having long hair.

Especially when you just need to drive, and you roll all the windows down, and open the moonroof. And you speed along the dark, empty, endless stretch of road, straight into the blackest night sky. Guided only by the yellow sodium lights, which move by too fast for you to count their seemingly endless number.

And the wind whips your hair around like a halo of silk, caressing your face, to the contrast of your music blasting out your windows. (The Craft, if you must know)

And to top it all off, a lone coyote crosses the road (Baseline, if you must know), to set a counterpoint to the ever-present sounds of the city whispering around you.

The desert, like love, is a harsh mistress during the day, but at night her slightly cool touch makes you shiver with both anticipation and longing.

I don't know why it took me so long to write this entry. Why it took me so long to write about something going so right in my life. Why am I writing about this only now, when I feel like I'm about to lose it? Because I thought it was the most wonderful thing in the world, and I guarded it like a jewel - writing about it only in my personal velvet-skinned book. And now, when I want to scream, I have to scream it to the whole world. It is beautiful, it is daunting, it is amazing, and it scares me. And in some tiny way...it makes me long for more.

Mais, c 'est amore.

And perhaps, just perhaps...this time it could go right - the way it's supposed to go. The way they always said it would.

Me, Myself, and I

2006-09-09T06:03:51Z

My Personality


Neuroticism	13
Extraversion	95
Openness To Experience	99
Agreeableness	56
Conscientiousness	40

Test Yourself Compare Yourself View Full Report

Bebo, Discount Ugg Boots and MySpace Layouts by Pulseware Survey Software

Brain fog..

2006-09-07T23:15:49Z

Here's an odd one to post, especially after I've gone so long without posting. However, it makes me relieved, and thus everyone else should know.

After spending the better part of the last 48 hours in a tonsillitis-inspired feverish brain fog where no light of sense or sanity could touch me, I finally made the realization that if I didn't submit my abstract to the AGU Fall Meeting site by 23:59 UT today, I wouldn't get to go and present in December. I then rushed to piece together an abstract from what I had already written, called my co-mentor Terry to get his AGU membership number, and went to the site to submit, on the almost hopeless chance that they would accept my abstract and invite me to present a poster during one of the sessions.

All of this, with minutes to spare, and no hope of deadline extension.

Only to find out that, voila!

http://submissions3.agu.org/submission/convenerview.asp?ref=8633

My brilliant mentor Janet Green (I could kiss the ground she walks on) obviously knew that I would be busy with schoolwork, and decided to write and submit an abstract for me.

These past few weeks have been a time of extremes. Extreme lows and extreme highs seem to plague me every minute. It's like a roller coaster. Whee...

Just tell me that everything will be okay. Really. One last semester of nothing but physics courses, 2 GRE's to do well on, grad schools to apply to, a research poster to prepare, and a weeklong meeting to go to that cuts into finals week. But it'll be okay. I'm sure.

Oh dear...Gotta catch 'em all !

2006-06-27T06:03:35Z

create your own visited states map
or check out these Google Hacks.

Okay people, here's the story. I need the East Coast, the Pacific Northwest, and at least Lousiana in the Southeast, hopefully in the next two years. Who wants to help me collect them?

In other news, I'm sick. More to come tomorrow.

So very groggy...

2006-06-21T12:10:59Z

But I should post this before I loose the sensation.

Golden red light, suffusing my room. Looking at the bricks on the walls outside glowing like a red sun. Though I cannot see the Sun, I can see the effect it has. As the wind picks up, the branches of the young tree outside my window get blown backwards. I wonder how it stood when it was less strong.

I begin to realize that I could experience this every morning, if I really wanted to. But yet, I am so very tired. Because my days never seem to want to end themselves at a reasonable hour, my days never seem to want to begin again.

And now everything grows darker outside. The wind has died. The clouds have rolled over, but the Sun is risen.

For those of you who keep calling or messaging me at 11PM, my time - well...just stop it. ;-)

Summer Solstice

2006-06-20T23:41:49Z

Oh, the summer night
Has a smile of light
And she sits on a sapphire throne.
~Barry Cornwall

For those who are so inclined to know:

The summer solstice occurs tomorrow at 6:23AM MDT, and the sunrise occurs at 5:32AM here in Boulder.

So, who wants to watch the sun rise? :-)

http://aa.usno.navy.mil/cgi-bin/aa_pap.pl
http://scienceworld.wolfram.com/astronomy/SummerSolstice.html

Look, here come the naked people!

2006-06-18T00:25:16Z

You wouldn't believe how many pensises I saw today! Well, among other things...

I went to the Boulder International Festival today. Very fun shows, lots of street performers and vendors. Gods, how I wish I had money to spend. Well, 'window' shopping was fun anyway.

More to come tomorrow, after I go to Disintegration tonight.

In time, this too shall pass.

2006-06-01T03:13:57Z

Started my first day of work yesterday. That was inevitably rushed and empty at the same time. Too much paperwork, both for the Hollings Scholarship people, and for the DoC security clearance.

Since my mentor was not there yesterday, I got shuffled around doing one thing or another. I spent an absolutely brillant and enrapturing hour and a half listening to one guy talk to me on coronal mass ejections and solar energetic particles, along with his exciting project on a pair of stereo satellites taking flux and magnetic field data along with 3 dimensional coronagraphs of the Sun; all of which I will be doing nothing on during my stay here at NOAA (that's another intern's project).

I also went to lunch with my mentor's lead. Even though he wasn't quite sure what it was I would be working on, we had a great chitchat about my various interests within physics, and what he knew about those fields. I don't think I've ever really gotten to discuss in depth what I've been thinking about my career future and where I hope to go with my research. It was exciting and it felt good to hear my thoughts echoed and validated. It gives me an idea of where I might go. Hope abounds.

Today we just jumped right into the thick of it. Starting from the bottom up, I must pull magnetic and position data from NASA's website (pick a satellite, any satellite), and use IDL to find a way to easily identify all magnetopause crossings that satellite has made in its lifetime. I got a little taste of IDL when I was working on photometric data from the Braeside telescope last semester. Now I get a banana cream pie full of IDL in the face, and I have to learn how to work with it. This is really my first big push into the programming world...wish me luck.

But then, there's Boulder. Beautiful Boulder. I keep hearing from everyone (roommates, etc) how dry and barren it is compared to 'insert wet climate here'. But it is neither barren, nor dry. It's so green here, and the weather is always perfect! (almost, anyway). Every single day, it is always sunny in the morning, rains just a touch between 2PM and 4PM, and is mostly sunny again with puffy white clouds by the time you get out of work. Although, today it did rain again after I went to Shao-lin at 6:30PM, but it only lasted a half hour. Apparently, the only complaint I can possibly make is that it's a bit colder than I'm used to (brrr...).

And, of all surprises, I saw my first freak today. Some punk with a leather jacket and plaid pants. So, apparently they do exist in this model community! I feel more at home now.