Even though it's against everything I've been taught as a Twins fan, I am rooting for the White Sox to win tonight. That's what September will do to you. If the White Sox AND the Twins win the Twins will be in first place in the division for the first time all season. They will have come all the way back from being 12 games out- virtually unheard of. Morneau (Baby Harmon) went 5 for 5 last night; Hunter AND Barlett went over the Green Monster. Garza had his best outing yet. All this after every reporter said the Twins were done after losing Liriano. My boys just keep finding ways to win.
*~*Sorry to anonymous blog buddy's girlfriend K who is a Red Sox fan. You guys have had you requisite World Series win for the next 86 years.*~*
Wednesday, September 20, 2006
Monday, September 18, 2006
Married Life Part I
I’m back! And I’m married!
Dean and I flew to Las Vegas last Friday night and were married Saturday afternoon in the Bel Amour Chapel on the strip. We enjoyed cocktails at the Wynn and then had a steak dinner at Excalibur hotel (where we stayed). We spent the weekend walking around Vegas, gambling a little, drinking a lot, seeing the hotels and enjoying our status as newlyweds.
Monday night we flew to Minneapolis to visit our families. We spent time bonding with our in-laws. It’s not like we didn’t know each other for six and a half years, but somehow things are different, more concrete, when you get married. We went to two Twins games, visited some of our old haunts at the University of Minnesota, savored the beautiful early autumn weather.
Friday evening my parents threw us a kickass wedding reception at Famous Dave’s. In attendance were my extended family and Dean’s immediate family. They rented a back room that could be closed off and had about 5 or 6 tables. There was an open tab so everyone got their fill of cocktails, wine and beer. The wait staff brought out for each table a garbage can lid full of ribs, chicken, brisket and pulled pork as well as fries, coleslaw, beans, corn and muffins. It was the best wedding dinner I’ve ever had! My stepdad designed a wedding cake for us that had a girl and a boy under a palm tree with flamingos in the background. It tasted pretty good too! We had the Twins game silently on the TV and in the main restaurant there was live blues music. Quite honestly, it was nothing like I’d imagined it would be when I was a little girl. But as a grown woman I wouldn’t have wanted it any other way. It was absolutely perfect. And the money my parents would have spent on a lavish traditional wedding it sitting safely for us when we buy a house. Really, how many weddings have you been to where you have fantastic barbeque and live blues music? (Pictures of all this will come eventually once my mom gets the films developed and sends me the copies.)
Saturday afternoon, Dean’s parents threw us a picnic-style party at their home with homemade pulled-pork sandwiches, calico beans, potato salad, other traditional picnic sides and a buffet of delectable desserts made by my master-baker mother in-law. I ate on and off all day and well into the evening. Dean’s extended family was there so I could see exactly what I married into as well as many neighborhood friends from their close-knit community. My parents came too and my 10 year old step sister insisted on playing poker with Dean’s 17 year old brother and his friends! Dean and she played the same hand and he helped her with strategy. I can’t wait to see the pictures.
I think I will leave it at that for now, even though I have much more to say. I’ll post more pictures when I get some. Thank you all my friends in the blogosphere for stopping by and leaving well wishes for my new husband and I.
Saturday, September 09, 2006
Wednesday, September 06, 2006
Baseball Baseball Baseball
I apologize, dear readers, for being somewhat absent. I have been in a baseball haze where my thoughts have centered around the batting title, Cy Young award, and the pennant race. I have tried to refrain from intaking too much alcohol, and I did well until Monday when Dean and I went to the game with friends of ours from college who doubled as designated drivers.
Over the weekend we watched the Twins flounder against the Yankees. And I got violent feelings towards Derek Jeter with his smugness and his fake comaraderie with Joe Mauer, both competing for the batting title. I think since Baby Jesus has been in a serious slump, he has since relinquished the lead. But I've been too discouraged to check for sure.
Saturday Dean and I went to the Rays game to get the Dewayne Staats/Joe Magrane dual bobblehead. They are the FSN announcers for the Rays and the bobblehead has them both seated at a desk. And they talk! It's very neat but the kitties are scared of it. We ate at the posh stadium restaurant out in left field and returned to our seats just in time to see the FIRST TRIPLE PLAY EVER TURNED AT TROPICANA FIELD. It was very cool. It was only the second in Rays history and the first 2-6-2 triple play in MLB history. After half the game Dean and got bored so we wandered around the stadium. We discovered a free game room we hadn't seen before that had several couches and video game systems. While all the kids were taking turns and crowding around the PS2 and XBox systems, Dean and I had an absolute blast playing RBI baseball on an old Nintendo. We felt ancient and the the kids couldn't understand what we could possibly find amusing about the poor graphics and players they had never heard of. Oh well.
Monday the Twins started their series agauinst the Rays. It was a pitchers dual that never should have happened. Boof looked great (he had lots of fans since he is from St. Petersburg) but our offense should not have struggled against the Rays. Our two runs came from a Rondell White homer. Go figure. At least we won. Like I mentioned above, our two friends who got married last summer and moved to Orlando drove over to go to the game with us and we had a fun time reminiscing about the good old days.
Yesterday evening we returned to the stadium to watch Johan Santana pitch. He was filthy. He pitched 8 shutout innings striking out 12. He made the batters look absolutely ridiculous. We happened to sit in the middle of the Venzuelan Santana fanclub. It was fantastic. They were waving flags and going beserk when he struck anyone out. I felt sort of bad that most of the crowd was Twins fans coming out to see Santana pitch. Normally when the Twins come to St. Petersburg it is much earlier in the season and much more laid back so that Dean and I either root for the Rays our keep our emotions in check. Not so last night. We hollared and jeered when Gardy got tossed and were on our feet when Mauer finally got a double. Sorry Rays, nothing personal, just pennant race baseball.
We won't be making the hour trek to see Silva pitch tonight. I think I have to return to my career and get some reading done. Not to mention save my energy for the rest of the home stretch.
Over the weekend we watched the Twins flounder against the Yankees. And I got violent feelings towards Derek Jeter with his smugness and his fake comaraderie with Joe Mauer, both competing for the batting title. I think since Baby Jesus has been in a serious slump, he has since relinquished the lead. But I've been too discouraged to check for sure.
Saturday Dean and I went to the Rays game to get the Dewayne Staats/Joe Magrane dual bobblehead. They are the FSN announcers for the Rays and the bobblehead has them both seated at a desk. And they talk! It's very neat but the kitties are scared of it. We ate at the posh stadium restaurant out in left field and returned to our seats just in time to see the FIRST TRIPLE PLAY EVER TURNED AT TROPICANA FIELD. It was very cool. It was only the second in Rays history and the first 2-6-2 triple play in MLB history. After half the game Dean and got bored so we wandered around the stadium. We discovered a free game room we hadn't seen before that had several couches and video game systems. While all the kids were taking turns and crowding around the PS2 and XBox systems, Dean and I had an absolute blast playing RBI baseball on an old Nintendo. We felt ancient and the the kids couldn't understand what we could possibly find amusing about the poor graphics and players they had never heard of. Oh well.
Monday the Twins started their series agauinst the Rays. It was a pitchers dual that never should have happened. Boof looked great (he had lots of fans since he is from St. Petersburg) but our offense should not have struggled against the Rays. Our two runs came from a Rondell White homer. Go figure. At least we won. Like I mentioned above, our two friends who got married last summer and moved to Orlando drove over to go to the game with us and we had a fun time reminiscing about the good old days.
Yesterday evening we returned to the stadium to watch Johan Santana pitch. He was filthy. He pitched 8 shutout innings striking out 12. He made the batters look absolutely ridiculous. We happened to sit in the middle of the Venzuelan Santana fanclub. It was fantastic. They were waving flags and going beserk when he struck anyone out. I felt sort of bad that most of the crowd was Twins fans coming out to see Santana pitch. Normally when the Twins come to St. Petersburg it is much earlier in the season and much more laid back so that Dean and I either root for the Rays our keep our emotions in check. Not so last night. We hollared and jeered when Gardy got tossed and were on our feet when Mauer finally got a double. Sorry Rays, nothing personal, just pennant race baseball.
We won't be making the hour trek to see Silva pitch tonight. I think I have to return to my career and get some reading done. Not to mention save my energy for the rest of the home stretch.
Friday, September 01, 2006
My Bad Attitude
I have a bad attitude today. Dear readers, aren't you happy I've chosen to vent to you?
Classes started this week. This time a year ago I was taking what I thought to be my last two classes. No more homework, exams, projects. All research all the time. With the NSF fellowhsip I am required to take four additional classes, two for two semesters. I've been cranky about it, but I haven't really expressed my crankiness because I know it will be received with, "Yeah, but you're making way more money than the rest of us. Suck it up." They have a point. And I should see it as "free education" since my tuition is waivered on top of it.
The classes are supposed to be not very difficult because they are mainly to promote an interdisciplanry way of thinking. I'm supposed to come out of them knowing how to speak with engineers, biologists, chemists, doctors, etc. You may be thinking, "You're all scientists, you all speak the same language, namely 'geek'!" You'd be amazed at how different dealing with these people can be. Even talking to physicists that have a different focus than I can be difficult. We are much past the age of the great physicists where you can contribute to quantum mechanics and relativity in the same lifetime.
However, the next generation of technology will have to incorporate all the natural sciences. Drug therapy researchers are turning to the nanotechnology researchers for more efficient, localized treatments and engineers are building sensors which use complimentary DNA strands to encode information. Society will reap the benefits of scientists using the best of all worlds to make better products. This sounds marvelous! But in practice it's terribly frustrating.
My first class meets on Tuesdays and Thursdays. It is called Chemical/Biological Sensors and Micofabrication. It is taught by the engineering department. I think it will ultimately be interesting if I can get over all the acronyms- MEMS, LOC, GMS*- I need a key just to keep all this straight. Plus it doesn't help that the teaching assisstant gave a lecture yesterday in wish he singled me out saying, "You're a physicist, right? Tell us what a Schottky barrier is." That simply won't do.
My class today was a nightmare. It meets Fridays, 9-12 which I'm afraid is just going to ruin all anticipation of Fridays in general. It is a class from the business department called Strategic Market Assessment for New Technologies. Cool, right? I have no f-ing clue what this means!! I sat through this course for three hours this morning and I have no more idea now than I did at 8:55 a.m. what the class is about, why I am taking it or what I'm even supposed to be doing. It is mostly business students so I was the only one not dressed in a suit (knit shirt, jeans and sandals, thank you). I thought I would look like a complete idiot raising my hand to ask, "What, exactly is strategic market assessment?" I know I'm supposed to put together by semester's end some sort of portfolio in which I assess something. I think. Most of today was spent listening to people from local businesses describe their products which I can't discuss because I had to sign a scary confidentiality agreement.
The only thing that makes these classes remotely tolerable is the fact that my grades in them won't matter. In October I will be doing my Ph.D. candidacy in which I gather together my committee and give them an oral presentation of my completed research and my proposed research for the rest of my time here. They look at that along with my Master's thesis, my grades and my publications and then sign off on whether or not I should be granted my Ph.D. under the condition I finish the research I propose. Luckily, the sheet of paper will be signed months before grades are due for this semester.
*MicroElectroMechnical Systems, Lab-On-a-Chip, Generic Microfluidic System
Classes started this week. This time a year ago I was taking what I thought to be my last two classes. No more homework, exams, projects. All research all the time. With the NSF fellowhsip I am required to take four additional classes, two for two semesters. I've been cranky about it, but I haven't really expressed my crankiness because I know it will be received with, "Yeah, but you're making way more money than the rest of us. Suck it up." They have a point. And I should see it as "free education" since my tuition is waivered on top of it.
The classes are supposed to be not very difficult because they are mainly to promote an interdisciplanry way of thinking. I'm supposed to come out of them knowing how to speak with engineers, biologists, chemists, doctors, etc. You may be thinking, "You're all scientists, you all speak the same language, namely 'geek'!" You'd be amazed at how different dealing with these people can be. Even talking to physicists that have a different focus than I can be difficult. We are much past the age of the great physicists where you can contribute to quantum mechanics and relativity in the same lifetime.
However, the next generation of technology will have to incorporate all the natural sciences. Drug therapy researchers are turning to the nanotechnology researchers for more efficient, localized treatments and engineers are building sensors which use complimentary DNA strands to encode information. Society will reap the benefits of scientists using the best of all worlds to make better products. This sounds marvelous! But in practice it's terribly frustrating.
My first class meets on Tuesdays and Thursdays. It is called Chemical/Biological Sensors and Micofabrication. It is taught by the engineering department. I think it will ultimately be interesting if I can get over all the acronyms- MEMS, LOC, GMS*- I need a key just to keep all this straight. Plus it doesn't help that the teaching assisstant gave a lecture yesterday in wish he singled me out saying, "You're a physicist, right? Tell us what a Schottky barrier is." That simply won't do.
My class today was a nightmare. It meets Fridays, 9-12 which I'm afraid is just going to ruin all anticipation of Fridays in general. It is a class from the business department called Strategic Market Assessment for New Technologies. Cool, right? I have no f-ing clue what this means!! I sat through this course for three hours this morning and I have no more idea now than I did at 8:55 a.m. what the class is about, why I am taking it or what I'm even supposed to be doing. It is mostly business students so I was the only one not dressed in a suit (knit shirt, jeans and sandals, thank you). I thought I would look like a complete idiot raising my hand to ask, "What, exactly is strategic market assessment?" I know I'm supposed to put together by semester's end some sort of portfolio in which I assess something. I think. Most of today was spent listening to people from local businesses describe their products which I can't discuss because I had to sign a scary confidentiality agreement.
The only thing that makes these classes remotely tolerable is the fact that my grades in them won't matter. In October I will be doing my Ph.D. candidacy in which I gather together my committee and give them an oral presentation of my completed research and my proposed research for the rest of my time here. They look at that along with my Master's thesis, my grades and my publications and then sign off on whether or not I should be granted my Ph.D. under the condition I finish the research I propose. Luckily, the sheet of paper will be signed months before grades are due for this semester.
*MicroElectroMechnical Systems, Lab-On-a-Chip, Generic Microfluidic System
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