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July 27, 2004
there is something deep and pulling
so i just glanced at my planner and written at the top of today is
dude. 3 years.
can you guess?
3 years ago today i broke my neck. happy christina didn't die day! i can't believe that it was 3 years ago i started out from some town in utah that i can't remember toward wyoming and ultimately my grandparents house in longmont, co. didn't make it. nor did i make it to derek and cori's wedding that saturday. nor really did i make it to start school that fall. though i did end up in atlanta in september for some rehab. still remember the camp rehab shirt from shel. still one of my favorite memories. camp rehab. he rocked. probably still does. though i seriously think (from the sound of his blog) that he is dating someone under 21....or at least has friends under 21. dude. and i though i was dating young. ; )
anyways just a moment to remember how amazing my family and friends were. as an example of how crazy i was...i was half unconscious, pumped full of steorids that might or might not kill me, but if they don't hopefully will allow me to walk again, with a tube down my throat, with three screws in my head and with my nerves going so crazy i could not bare to have anyone touch me, i made jenny go wake up my parents to make sure that the just arrived chris got something to eat. oh morphine. i'm also pretty sure i told jenny more than she ever wanted to know.
There are just so many memories of that first day. how i was so alone. i could not bare to be left alone at all. (something about not being able to move, much less punch the nurse button facillitates that.) I was so glad when jenny got there. (she got there first as she was in darango, co, and it was quite easy for her for get to salt lake city quickly.) I can't imagine what any of them walked into. tubes....machines....halo screwed into my head. me hanging on with more ferious determination than anyone would really realize. me asking jenny if my toe was moving...her saying no...me saying that it will.
and this morning i ran 3 miles. effortlessly. beautifully. and enjoyed every moment for everyone who was not as lucky as me...is not as lucky as me...and will never feel their feet again, much less watch as they hit the ground under the green summer trees.
thank you God.
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Posted by christina at 4:16 PM | Comments (0)
So i'm in short course
So i'm in short course land. it actually is interesting. as i mentioned, this is on surface engineering, which is what i'm all about. though so far i've been exposed to all of it before...a little refresher is nice. my add brian can't just listen, so i've also been reading papers...which makes me feel some what productive. i do which i was doing research this week...but alas, not so much. i am getting a tad done after the lectures, i was here until 7 last night. my first 11 hour day in a while. i was glad to get home to the kitty, who is always super happy when i spend the night with her. i brush the heck out of her and then "bathed" her with the kitty wipes i had picked up at petco. i think she prefers that method than an actual bath in the sink. (me too....less wet)
i scanned in some pictures in...will post them soonish.
oh oh oh
i got a new cellphone. i was perfectly happy with my old one. i conceed that it was old and therefore had old software and sometime, especially in saturated places like ben's apartment, it was take nine years to connect. and it wouldn't ring in though situations even though it showed a couple bars. ben got a new phone a couple months ago with sprint's upgrade plan ($150 off if you've had your phone 18+ months and you sign a 2 yr contract). (Note - it AMAZES me the base cost of cell phones. i know it is because of the color screen. i don't need no color screen.) anyways, his reception in his apartment improved dramatically with the new phone and ever since he's been on me (tee hee) to get a new one. i've been open to it, but just haven't had the time to deal with it. last week i was finally motivated enough as i went over my mins last month and now wanted to change my plan to their new fair and flexible which bumps you up to the next level of minutes if you go over. and so i got a new phone. i am quite in love with it...especially now that i've found the messageing feature. ben's right. it is addictive. i love how we exchanged messages this morning during the lectures. though he made me laugh and so i wasn't that quiet.
random camp kids are annoying.
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Posted by christina at 12:49 PM | Comments (0)
July 22, 2004
'scuse me please, one more drink / could you make it strong?
I always knew that georgia tech was a great school, but some how I’m still amazed at the amount of alumni that I come across. I’m talking this short course next week. One of the main instructures got his phd from Tech (a scientist I’ve mentioned here before) and one of the guest lectures got his undergrad there…his grad here…though all in ChemE.
Let’s see. It is thrusday. And my advisor is in town. Yipee. I’ll get to have him sign a bunch of PO for me. Yeah for new lab stuff like a timer that works…and a new ion gauge filament. Mine has been broken for a while while, but I just recently had time to figure out what was wrong with it.
Why is my summer student no where to be found! I’m seriously annoyed as I need to show her something and want to do it right now. Only 3 week until she leaves and I’ll be out of the office all next week for a course on surface engineering. Lectures all day are hard, but at least I’m way more interested in this topic than I was in the topic last summer. (How did this year fly by so fast? I just signed my lease again. That always reminds me of the passing of time.) so she’ll be gone soon. Though she is finally asking questions, thank the lord. It had become obivous to me through her mistakes that she hadn’t been remember everything I had been telling her…maybe because she didn’t understand me. But she never asked. And I can’t read her mind. So she has to ask.
Mostly I’ve been working. Keep on keeping on. Yesterday was a good day as I figure out it wasn’t my films that were sucking, but the friction tester. I fixed it and am now getting coefficient of friction values that I expect (and that are way better for le research). So I hesitate to say, but the research is going well. I know just typing that is going to make something crash an burn this afternoon. So I should say it is going bbbbbbbbbaaaaaaaaaaaaaddddddddddddddllllllllllyyyyyyyyyyy. : )
Done a lot of catching up with friends. Tom moved while I was gone.
Tom: you can come visit anytime
Me: what if you’re indisposed?
Tom: I’ll give you a key
Me: really? You’d do that?
Tom: sure. It isn’t like you are going to steal my tv.
Me: exactly.
I got our pictures developed from yellowstone. I got them done at motophoto for the white boarder. They look great. The border really compliments all the scenery shots. And the bison. I’ll have to scan in some choice shots this weekend.
About Those Fearsome Black Holes? Never Mind
Interesting…though just reminds me how impossible it is for experts to even understand quantum physics, much less me…much less the average person.
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Posted by christina at 3:38 PM | Comments (0)
July 16, 2004
come fill me up / oh, fill me love when i'm empty
Whew. So I’ve been a slacker about writing. In my defense life has been extremely busy lately.
Yellowstone
Yellowstone was amazing. The whole trip was amazing.
monday
We got out with no trouble (the beauty of traveling first thing in the morning). A cab, two planes (including the turboprop from Denver to Jackson Hole), and then a car got us to our campsite. It was not a rural as I expected, though with that area in grizzly country, one doesn’t want to be in the middle of dense woods. And there was the whole flush toilet requirement of both the campers. We set up the tent, went and got maps, and tried to build a fire. Our wood was wet, so it a failure. We had gotten charcoal, so all was not lost. We built a fire out of it to cook the hamburgers and then to catch enough of the wood on fire for my s’mores. It was so cold that we thought we were going to die, but sleeping on top of each other helped stave off death for another day.
tuesday
We got up and cooked yummy oatmeal…perfect for the cold mornings. We then headed off for the Canyon region of the park – our section for the day. We hiked a little to see the amazing canyon and river region. I was amazed by all the people everywhere. They have done a great job in creating overlooks and trails to make the region accessible to a wide range of people. The downside is that a wide range of people get in one’s way. There were some many kids and older people. I was amazed, but more because old people and kiddies are not a part of my daily life in Chicago. We picnicked and looked more and headed back for showers before dinner. We also got dry wood and kindling. And like any male I’ve ever taken camping, ben fell in love with fire building after his first try (he's never built a fire or even been real camping before). I hope that the pictures of him and the fire turn out. It kept him entertained for 4 hours straight. We had burgers again and I had another set of a million s’mores. And we talked about all sorts of stuff. That was one of the best parts of this trip…that some how we still found stuff to talk about…and that we talked about stuff we never would have gotten around to in Chicago with all its distractions.
wednesday
Old faithful day. We repeated the previous day’s schedule though in the geyser part of the park. It was like stepping back in time to the dinosaur age. It was awesome. And we did 3 miles before lunch. And ben thought I was trying to kill him. We ate lunch in the old faith inn. It is more than a hundred years old and quite beautiful. And we bought twice the previous night’s firewood on our way back to camp. Ben was so manly with his fire. I was so amused…and so in love.
thrusday
back to the canyon region… especially to hike to the base of both falls. But the upper falls base was closed for some reason, so we just hiked uncle tom’s trail to the base of the lower falls. After lunch we did an actual hike on dirt over tree stumps and through the woods. I’m certain ben though I was going to kill him with that hike. It was beautiful though. And there was more firewood, though we went out for dinner. I miss the s’mores.
friday
See previous entry.
All in all, an amazing trip…especially since ben and I existed amazingly well together. We did finally get out luggage, 3 bags on Sunday, the 4th on Monday. I ended up just buying new running shoes on Saturday, it was about time anyways. And I do love the new running shoe runs. Yum.
My boyfriend is amazing.
This week has been busy…catching up with work…catching up with friends. We had dinner with the harpers Tuesday. I chatted with kit while ben and his dad, steve, watched the all star game. It is funny…just is. I’ve excited cuz I’m house/cosmo sitting while they are all in hawii. I love cosmo…and you can’t beat that commute. Wednesday we saw spider man 2. v. good. Though people, my nano comment still stands. Jesus.
So now I’ve just been handing out. A part of my body is under the weather. And so it causes me to minimize my moments, so I’ve been working from home today. (I slept all day yesterday.) sigh. Annoying. v. annoying, but in the scheme of things…so so minor.
But my boyfriend is amazing.
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Posted by christina at 4:25 PM | Comments (0)
July 14, 2004
http://www.nytimes.com/2004/07/13/science/13qna.html --------
http://www.nytimes.com/2004/07/13/science/13qna.html
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Posted by christina at 2:21 PM | Comments (0)
July 10, 2004
life's a dance
so we survived...barely.
i shall post more about the actual yellowstone trip later as it was amazing, but first i much share the story of our journey home.
Friday, July 9.
Yellowstone, Grant Village Campground
7.30 am
so cold. think i might die. leave the warm sleeping bag bed to pee and check the time as our tent clock had stopped. frost covers the car. return to the warmth that is my b/f.
8.30 am
force ourselves out of bed into the cold morning. must pack up everything for check out time. amazing, everything goes back in bags easily. helps that we throw the tarp away as embers from fire had burned holes. holes, according to master camper ben, make the tarp worthless. for $7 it is disposible to me.
10 am
check out. on our way south to jackson hole, 65 miles away, through the beautiful grand teton national park. get stuck in massive construction traffic. don't care as have more time than anything else and the views are beautiful. though still bitch about the inefficency of the construction situation. many things in both parks are in need of a good IE.
12.30 pm
roll in to jackson hole, wy, have yummy lunch, ready the rental car for return.
2.30 pm
return to the jackson hole airport. car rental guy tells us story about how he almost hit a bison one night as he was driving between base camp and hunting camp. after checking our bags, hang out in lobby of small airport as security is closed. realize that i checked my other book and was almost done with the one i was reading. boredom panic temporarily sits in.
4 pm
so happy to see that plane to denver is a decent size jet instead of the turboprop we took coming up.
4.30 pm
every single person in the airport gets on our plane. do crossword to save what little reading i had left.
5.50 pm
get into denver. make the easy connection to our 6.40 plane to chicago notice plane is a 777.
6 pm
plane to chicago starts boarding. thinking it is better to sit on plane than in waiting area.
6.30 pm
plane loaded with people. plane is freaking huge.
7 pm
still at gate. no real information on the delay, though pilot assures us we'll still be basically on time.
7.30 pm
wheels up. huge honking plane. only ~30% full. cool as the screens are in the back of the seats. have finished my book. have taken to reading ben's over his shoulder, problem being i read twice as fast as him.
10.15 pm
annouced expected arrival time - 10.30 in chicago. thunderstorms over o'hare and our lack of enough gas diverts us the 70 miles up the coast to Milwaukee for gas
10.30 pm
land in Milwaukee. sit on jet way waiting for fuel. still reading over ben's shoulder. his book is quite interesting. plane turned off for fuel uptake.
11.30 pm
fuel loaded. when they tried to start the plane again, one of the four generators goes out. major problem as for some reason it makes the aircraft unable to fly. and united (who we were flying) does not have a presence at all..not even a little bit...in Milwaukee, no ground crew, no maintenance, no nothing. They also do not have the equipment to unload the baggage as the 777 have big steel baggage countainers that must be removed via fork lift.
12.30 am
still trying to fix the generator via phone. no luck. other problem - no ground crew in general as Milwaukee is a realivety small airport that closes down at night. we face the fact that the plane might not leaving the ground. united is planning on bussing us to chicago if the problem cannot be fixed. ben and i brainstorm people we could harass to come get us. it is only about 1.5 hours. but can't think of anyone who would be awake and sober.
1 am
they declare the plane offically dead. Besides the busing problem, the immediate problem seems to be that milkakee is not equipped to handle a plane bigger than its terminal. They have one gate with a jet way that can reach the door. but a diverted air frace plane had gotten there first and so we had to wait for them to leave. i teach ben about the speed dial on his phone and develop a ranking system for his speed dial entries.
1.30 am
i convince them to start the movies. Air France has mechanical difficulties
3.00 am
in disbelief that we watched a whole movie, we are still waiting. at least the plane is huge with not a lot of people and lots of potties. air france cannot fix its mechanical difficulties. head of opporation decrees that it will move so we can get in. but turns out air france cannot move until their crew and plane goes through customs. Customs had to be woken up and we wait until they get to the airport.
3.15 am
customs arrives (i now know lots as i've taken to listening to the air traffic control channel on the arm choices). They have 7 people + 1 plane to clear. we wait.
4:15 am
still waiting. glad we didn't have anyone come and get up as they would have now been waiting for 2.5 hours in Milwaukee
4:30 am
pilot finally give up on the air france jet moving. finally they bring air stairs over. see sun starting to rise.
5 am
air stairs not quite tall enough to reach door. big step down. so glad to be off plane
5:15 am
cannot find waiting buses. do find open hertz counter. revert to eailer plane of renting a car and driving home. get in line. ben goes to figure out what the deal with the buses are. he finds complete mess. not coach buses, but weird conglomerate of stretch limos and shuttle buses. i get car. so happy to get car. car just makes more sense as we can drive straight to ben's and go to bed.
5.45 am
on a way to chicago. i'm feeling pretty good, especially considering. armed with an egg mcmuffin and some how more conversation between ben and i. we head home in the sunrise.
7 am
make it to ben. brush teeth, wash face, fall fast asleep.
11 am
woken to errant alarm in middle of dream about travel nightmares. brain too full to sleep anymore. get up to check my e-mail (nothing too bad) and then come home to my beautiful kitty. currently way more annoyed that i check my running shoes than anything else.
still to do -
return rental car
find out where our stinking luggage is.
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Posted by christina at 1:17 PM | Comments (0)
July 4, 2004
where you end, where I begin / is like a river going through
sometimes i look up from watching my feet and notice the amazing beauty of the world.
on friday, the moment we boarded the plane, a thunderstorm rolled over boston. i know enough about how planes work to know that a thunderstorm is bad news for a plane, and so was pretty content to sit and watch the lightening move across the sky as boston went into ground stop. thankfully it was only one cell and we ended up being second on the list of push backs. so we did have to wait on the tarmac in a line behind the planes that had already pushed back when the ground stop came down. it was also really beautiful to watch all of these planes line up and take off. there was a surprising number of commuter type planes in line. though i then realized that things in that part of the country are really close together and it was friday afternoon.
so my plane was only an hour late. saturday i had a great morning doing laundry. ben had left early for a wedding in indy. i ran during laundry. it was a cubs/sox game in wriggleyville and there were amusing pairing of cub and soxs jerseys everywere. it was a nice run, though i have had to modify my route around here on games days due to the explotion of crossing guards around the field that make me stop at crosswalks.
i spent a great afternoon/evening with liz out in naperville. it is always great to spend time with her. i do wish we lived in the same city. i was reminded of my enternal question of how different my relationship with ben would be if my close friends lived in the same city as us.
today i went to church...though wasn't a fan of the patriotic twist, but i guess that is what i get when i go on the 4th of july. the intern paster spoke. she had a red wig on as she has cancer and is losing her hair. i enjoy church, but i more enjoy when the other paster speak. it is more her inexperience that bothers me. which is stupid, becuase as an intern, she is spefically working on that.
so we're packed. 3 black duffels bags that look like we are totting bodies instead of camping equipment. one backpack with our clothes. i've never packed with anyone else. but we had no choice. it seems a little too committed for me. but i am also crazy. i think my family has started a pool on the likelyhood of ben and i surviving this trip still together. i'm not worried...well not about us breaking up, but i have over the past week gotten real use to being alone. and to jump right into a 24-7 situation, even with the man i love, is kinda scary.
but i am so excited, even though our plane leaves at 6.30 am! am! that mean we're leaving here at 4.30 am! That means our cab will be the same one the takes the drunks home at that hour. but we get into jackson hole at 11 am, which is awesome as we'll have plenty of time to drive the 2 hours to yellowstone and go to the store and set up the tent before nightfall.
so excited.
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Posted by christina at 9:28 PM | Comments (0)
July 2, 2004
nowhere and everywhere
i'm sitting in the boston airport. they have these white rocking chairs a la the crook/cames household porch. i probably would not have found them except that i am a totally space cadet today and didn't realize that b10 is not between b14-b20. so the connection between the pods have white rocking chairs looking out on the skyline of boston. (security is at a high level the voice just informed me.) small planes siton the ground in front of me. it is a calming sight. i'm just not a traveling fan. i love visiting new places but airports etc get on my nerves.
so science camp is over and i'm actually quite sad. yesterday at lunch i realized that it was the last lunch of science camp and realized that i was quite sad about that. on sunday i just really wanted to survive this week and kept telling myself that i could make it through this week of socializing. sometime on monday i realized that the conversations weren't on that hard and at point after that i started to look forward to the meals and the conversations that would occur. i just can't express how cool it was to interact with these scientists on a personal level. it was strange when i thought about it. i spent the week talking to professors and researchers a like. people i would never have the balls to go up and chit chat with anywhere else. but here i was sitting with them taking about yellowstone or how to care for one's cds.
i also had an amazing experience just getting feedback. the northwestern materials department is not a supportive atmosphere. my group has a supportive atmosphere, but the department as a whole is not supportive. it was so nice to be in this incredible supportive atmosphere and have the pioneering scientist of my work tell me and my advisor that he is excited about my work. and how my prof wants me to start the patent process. how random is that. to me this is just science...but the engineering side of me does see the applications. i just never thought of it. though i must admit that this project is getting bigger, and that is nice as i would like to see it at least for my qualifier. though some guy was telling me, just what i've done so far would get be a phd at some schools.
so i'm all inspired and have lots of ideas for the lab. of course, the irony is that i am going to be yellowstone next week and therefore not doing any of this work. sigh. i didn't know that this conference was going to rekindle my burning passion for science. not to mention that when we decided on the date for yellowstone, i didn't even know this conference existed, much less that i was going.
one of the best things about this week was listening and being listened to. i makes me think a lot. i've always dated technical people. since moving here, back when i was dating, i learned quickly that it is a bad idea to date people you work with...and on the long term plan, it is better to date someone with a more flexible career goal than you. as there are few places that one can put their phd into practice. it is really really hard to find two phd jobs that both people would be happy with in the same city. and so dating a scientist in general is something i also shyed away from. though i must say that there is something about dating something who shares your passion and understanding of science.
i have a billion mosquito bites...including one on my eyebrow!
i'm too old for all this traveling. ; )
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Posted by christina at 4:42 PM | Comments (0)