Wednesday, December 16, 2009

It's beginning to look...

a bit like Christmas. Over the weekend, D and I went on an adventure. I had gotten it in my head that I wanted to go to a local tree farm and cut down a Christmas tree. Thank goodness he was willing to humor me, especially since it meant he had to do the cutting and the ground had a good covering of snow/ice. It was a fun adventure. I also now know I should bring work gloves among other things. Here is the leaning tree. It has since been straightened (my geometry gene wasn't working over the weekend). The tree is slowly getting decorated and my ornaments we collected every year when I was younger are on there way here. Thanks Mom! I can't wait to open the box since I only remember one ornament.
Also, D and I made some delicious stuffed mushrooms over the weekend. The stuffing is rather like a hummus. It is quite tasty and so I'll share the stuffing recipe with you. I modified it from a book called Cooking with Pumpkins and Squash by Brian Glover.
Defrost two one lb packages of pureed butternut squash (the recipe tells you to roast the squash, but sometimes that just takes too darn long, so this short cut is perfect for the holidays). Puree one can of garbanzo beans (minus the liquid). Combine these ingredients. Add 1 T olive oil, a small bunch of chopped thyme, 1/4 teaspoon hot red pepper flakes, 1 chopped garlic clove, 1 teaspoon ground cumin, juice from 1 lemon, 2 T chopped parsley. Salt and pepper to taste. You can just puree the whole lot if you have a large food processor, or you can combine a small amount of the earlier puree with these last ingredients in a smaller food processor. Everything should be well combined and smooth. This is delicious on crackers. It was pretty good in the mushroom caps (add and cook at 375 for 10-20 minutes). And I had it as part of a simple salad tonight. There is a yogurt sauce that goes with it, however, I cannot attest to how good the sauce is, so I won't report the recipe here. See I told you I wish I was a food blogger.

Sunday, November 29, 2009

Insulated

Last year during a power outage some of the pipes that supply hot water to my baseboard radiators froze. They froze in a corner on my house that has always been cold. I had used towels and a small blanket to try to insulate that area but it always seemed that cold air was blowing in. After reminding my landlord about this again this year and proposing a solution that he hated, he decided to have a contractor do the work. It's much warmer in that room now and the hole to the outside in the basement has been filled with insulation. Here's the work in one corner (they ended up doing all the corners in the living room):
You see the funny colored wood cut out next to the upright post? That had basically just been a hole in the floor, though it didn't go all the way through to the basement. They added insulation and closed up the hole. The contractor also ran caulk (in brown) along each side of all of the posts in the room. I'm hoping that I don't have the same freezing problem this year.

In order to be even more insulated, I've just finished the plastic on my windows. I have 5 new windows in my place - upstairs. But there are a total of 8 old windows. These are old windows where I have to slide the screen up and a second pane of glass down in the winter. Yet, cold air still blows into my house. I've done the plastic trick each year and it seems to help. I also do passive solar heating, meaning I open the blinds during the day and close them at night. This works especially well since I have a southern exposure in 80% of the windows. Here's a photo of my handy work.
Hope you all had a great Thanksgiving. I was visiting friends from grad school. It was fun, the food delicious and the chance to catch up wonderful. But, I ended up driving quite a bit; I must give a shout out to the toll transponders... what an awesome invention.

Saturday, November 21, 2009

Sometimes I wish...

I was a food blogger. I made a delicious dinner tonight. Simple whitefish with lemon and herbs accompanied by orange-glazed brussels (is that "s" at the end really correct?) sprouts and carrots. There is also some Arborio rice cooked in broth which was left over from last night but made a nice addition to the plate. Here's a picture:
(Okay, so I'm not the best food photographer, but it was delicious.) This is my first attempt at cooking fish in parchment paper. I've always wanted to try that but never had. It turned out quite nicely. And I must say it's a little funny that I just had parchment paper lying around. I can't remember what I purchased it for, but there it was in the cabinet just waiting to be used.

Otherwise, I had a fun day. I slept a lot last night. I needed it. This morning, I worked on an assignment for my students. I am about half way finished. I need to do some of the calculations myself before deciding exactly what I will ask them to do. That can wait until tomorrow morning. This afternoon, I did my part to stimulate the economy. I shopped and shopped some more. I had some brilliant ideas for holiday gifts for friends and family. And so I got a significant amount of gift buying done. It was fun. I sometimes need some retail therapy, even if I'm not buying things for myself.

Saturday, November 7, 2009

Blooms

I have been neglecting my blog recently. I have been busy at work and in my personal life. But many of the things that have been happening are not things I want to blog about or I feel like I can't blog about them (especially when it comes to interactions with students). Things are blooming around here. It's especially nice since there's a chill in the air on some days. Here are a few recent blooms:
I think my cacti must be Thanksgiving cacti. They bloomed at about the same time last year. I'm looking forward to the white blooms opening on the mixed cactus. See the coral and pink flowers above. You might also be able to spot a white bud or three that haven't yet opened. The larger cactus (entirely pink) is in full bloom. It's lovely.
These were a big surprise. There was a dozen but I didn't think to snap a photo until some of them were a little droopy. They are absolutely beautiful. And even a few weeks later now, 1 or 2 of them still look great! I have them in the cut out between my kitchen and dining room. I can gaze at them while I do the dishes.

Sunday, October 11, 2009

Yelp!

I verbally yelped when I heard about Obama's Nobel Peace Prize win on Friday. It was surprising. But I think it speaks to the change that's possible with him in office and the hope he brings the people of this country and perhaps even more importantly, the world.

I also yelped earlier in the week about this:


I looked back at my blog and the date corresponds to almost when I posted buds on the Christmas cactus last year. Funny.

Also, I was delighted to see:
on the curtain in my living room today. Can you tell it's a little lady bug.

Otherwise, things are going well.

Sunday, October 4, 2009

Still Smiling

So I gave the guy (not my student, but the guy I'd been on a date with) from my "What they do, not what they say..." post a few weeks ago a second chance. We had a movie and dinner date last weekend. And yesterday, we spent the good part of the rainy day together. We had wanted to go hiking but decided on indoor activities instead. So, we went bowling. This was New England style bowling. I had never been candlepin bowling before - apparently this has been around since the 1880. It's like normal bowling, but with thinner pins and smaller balls without holes. In each frame you bowl three balls. It was hard to get the hang of and I was beat the first two games (in fact the first game I only got 22 points). My date made the observation that I seemed to do better when I was really following through with my throw; this proved to be completely correct once I started paying attention to it. By the last frame, I got a strike and then knocked all 10 pins down on the second ball of the extra frame. At the beginning, I was worried how it would all work out, but I would totally go again. We also had pizza at my favorite place and baked some awesome cookies (oatmeal with chocolate chips instead of raisins) at my place. It's going surprisingly well. And my prior comments about him can now be considered false. I think this will likely be the last time I blog about him. I just want to enjoy the moments.

Thursday, October 1, 2009

Extensions...

I have two comments about extensions. First off, I do not grant them unless it's an emergency. If my students can't get things in on time, I don't think they will be able to meet deadlines in the real world. There should be some sort of penalty. But I do understand that they have a lot of demands on their time. These could be things that I also think are important or things that I don't think they should be spending time on in a million years. So I just make it a policy that I don't care why a paper is late, I just give it the late penalty.

The other extension connection is something I recently observed. It's the cell phone is an extension of the hand/ear of the current student. I have a classroom near my office and I happened to be walking back to my office as a class was letting out recently. At least 90% of the students pulled their cell phones out immediately after walking out of the classroom. They were texting, getting messages and making calls. It makes it really hard to navigate a hallway when it is full of students who are not paying attention to walking or where they are going. And it is very annoying.

Tuesday, September 29, 2009

Delicious

I just made the best dinner in just about 30 minutes (take that Rachel Ray)! I made pan seared scallops with walnuts and spiced carrots. (Note: I think this would work equally well with chicken or shrimp. Chicken could marinaded and then go in the oven and just be finished on the stovetop.) It was not pretty to look at so no photo. But it made me very happy. Add a glass of red wine and I'm thinking I'm not going to work any more tonight. Yesterday was a marathon at work - approximately 7 am - 10 pm. That's too much work, especially when I worked 5 plus hours on Sunday and at least a few hours on Saturday. I was also up at approximately 4 am this morning, ate something, tried to sleep a little bit more but gave up and went to the gym and then to work. Plus I dealt with some fun student issue today with my chair observing. Nothing like nerve wracking! Everything smears together when you work this much. You forget which key goes in which lock, and you haven't even had anything to drink.

PS: Sorry to disappoint about the Roomba and the puppy. A puppy is on the wish list. I just have to figure out how to get around the clause of no pets in my lease. There is a good bit of pet damage in my apartment. And my neighbors (we share a landlord) have a dog. I don't think this will be too difficult a task. And, surprisingly, I actually don't mind vacuuming.

Saturday, September 26, 2009

Here it is...

Thanks for your guesses and for being patient waiting for my camera to emerge. Here is what I purchases with my gift cards.


I've been wanting a KitchenAid mixer for at least 5 years. Now, it's on the kitchen counter and it looks lovely. Just need to find time to use it.

Monday, September 21, 2009

These arrived...

over the weekend. Can you guess what I'm going to get with them? I'm hoping that with discounts (yea! 20% off) and a current promotion, it will basically be free. I'll share with you once I have it. This is part of the reward system for productivity at work; made even better because I don't have to pay for the reward with money. The productivity is that I finished writing two grants this summer, one is submitted and one is being edited.

Sunday, September 20, 2009

What they do, not what they say...

I tend to disregard the title phrase. I believe what people say. But this week, in at least two separate incidents, I think I've decided I need to pay more attention to what people are doing. And to focus less on what they say. People lie. And I think they lie a lot. The main reason for this is that I've gotten burned one too many times. So here are the example from this week. The first is entirely jaw dropping. I'm still totally in awe that this actually happened and the other party involved basically denied it to my face. I know what I saw and what I saw was cheating pure and simple.

So here's the first story. I was collecting papers from my students this week. We were in a non traditional classroom (eg no desks). The students were milling around and handing me thing, asking questions, talking to each other. I looked around and noted that one student had two papers in front of him. He was very clearly looking at one papers and copying answers onto another. Cheating pure and simple. When confronted, I believe I said something like, "Am I really seeing what I think I'm seeing?", the student replied, "Um, I'm just checking my answers with my buddy's." I think I said something to the effect of, "Well, checking answers doesn't involve writing anything down and aside from that fact, how do you know your buddy has the right answers?" I told him to come to me in the future to check answers. Last night, I pondered this incident with a friend who is a woman on the faculty at my U. I wondered if this might have been a result of my gender. My thought is that the student didn't think I would call him out or something along those lines. I know I'm probably going to get a bad evaluation score from this particular student now. But I really don't care. He was clearly breaking the rule and didn't even admit it when called out. The worst kind of cheater in my mind. He did absolutely horrible on the assignment. But I haven't figured out what if any penalty I am going to enforce.

The other incident, is just related to me and my one on one interactions. It doesn't have to do with work at all. So, what I was going to reveal at the end of my last post was that I had had a nice date with a guy I was excited about seeing again. I didn't want to jinx things, so I didn't tell you all about it. Well due to circumstances I knew about, I couldn't see him last weekend. We had planned to meet for an adventure this weekend, something that would overall take about a day, though which day wasn't decided until late in the week. Meaning that I had kept my entire weekend clear to make sure that whatever he decided I could go along with. Well, no more! He canceled late in the day on Thursday! I understand that work gets in the way sometimes and that sometimes the unexpected happens. Believe me, I understand this. But I had worked hard all week to make sure that I had a day free over the weekend and I kept my schedule clear. I'm kicking myself now. And I'm really on the fence in my decision as to if I'm going to give him another chance. I'm disappointed and I'm angry at myself for falling into my usual pattern of waiting for a guy. I think what I've decided is that unless he is really willing to go out of his way to set something else up, to really step up, I'm not going to see him again. (BTW, he canceled in a voicemail and I have returned two phone calls since then, both of his calls included apologies and the later asked for a rain check. But, the ball is currently in his court. And I was pretty disappointed when he said in the last voicemail that he wasn't going into work until 1 pm on Saturday, so I could call him at home until then. What I don't understand is why he didn't ask me to come meet him for breakfast on Saturday or something else that wasn't a whole day adventure but could be done with the small amount of personal time he had over the weekend. I think this means that something has changed and he's really not interested.)

This later incident just seems to be another in the long string of such incidents. I was actually fascinated at a comment made when I met up for dinner with one of my former roommates from grad school a few years ago now. He and I were aware of each others dating lives or lack of them during grad school. I told him a story during dinner about my current status. His response was something along the line of how he thought I really had never gotten the respect that I deserve. I was surprised that he said that, but really I guess it's true. I was excited about this new guy because he said that he wanted to see me again and that he enjoyed out date. He even called me a few days later (that almost never happens to me). But currently, this seems like just one more to add to the list.

Tuesday, September 8, 2009

What...

What have I been doing you might ask during this nearly month long blog absence? I have been super busy. For example, the weekend before last, I had submitted one of the two big grants from the summer (the other is still being edited and I hope to submit it by the end of October). So, I did the things I had been meaning to do all summer. I got a second cabinet for my bedroom (so I don't have clothes all over the place). Here's what the two look like:
That's a cute owl on the upper handle. I also fixed the pulls - the cabinets come with white pulls, but I like the stainless/chrome much better since it matches the other accents in my room. But when I originally got them, the screws were too long for the cabinets. I've fixed this with some added washers. I could have purchased different screws, but the washers seemed faster since I didn't want to have to figure out the threads on the screws.

That weekend, I also cleaned all the floors in my house (well, okay, I haven't yet gotten around to vacuuming the guest room, but everything else is clean). It's lovely to have clean floors. I used some new fangled Meyer's lavender scent cleaner. It was quite soothing and nice and is supposed to be eco-friendly.

I also finally got around to painting the kitchen. I'm not totally thrilled with the results but it's growing on me. So here was the inspiration, these are the pulls on the kitchen cabinets, along with the color of the cabinets:

So are you ready for the finished product:

(the counters are actually more blue that it shows on my monitor.)
Also, I had a painting error that I have yet to fix. This is the ceiling above my sink. I have white paint to fix it with, just haven't had the time yet.
What else could I possible have fit into that weekend? Well, I'll tell you. Pilates, the farmers market, getting some new umbrellas and a funky orange blazer (very cool), some cooking of farmers market things, including my favorite potato salad complete with tomatoes from my garden plus my roast eggplant dish (super easy, just dice and mix with tomatoes and other veggies, drizzle with olive oil and balsamic and roast at 400 for 25 minutes or so).

This past weekend was much the same. Running, Pilates, farmers market, helping a good friend pack and load for a move (very sad!), to IKEA (bad idea, forgot about college move in, duh!), to Trader Joe's (yea! pizza dough) - that was Saturday. Sunday was a long 8 mile run outside. I have a hunch that's why I've also been MIA - the weather has been delightful! A few other things that I might elaborate on at some point. Then I worked on Monday and was very productive since there were no distractions from students. Monday night I made a delicious frittata with farmers market eggs, local smoked swiss cheese, roasted corn and basil! Yum! And now it's back to the usual routine. Teaching, seminars, advising (and sometimes badly), faculty meetings, and the like. It's been busy!

Saturday, August 15, 2009

Things that make you go hmm...

Okay, so I've been posting in bursts lately, often two posts at almost the same time. I wonder what this does to folks following on a reader? Anyway, I have a few short comments for today.
  1. I drove a Yaris last weekend. I got 42 MPG! This was mostly highway driving, but some of the highway driving was slow as molasses (<20 mph) due to construction and weather. I was pretty impressed with this. I had driven a Yaris when I was researching new cars, but I didn't like how close my head felt to the ceiling. I did have probably 4 inches (or possibly more) clearance, but I didn't like it. It was a four door and had a large trunk.
  2. I don't like the Verizon wireless program NE2 - getting a new phone at a discount every two years. I'm super tempted to get a smart phone, but really I don't need one and it's an added expense that I also don't need. I mean really, is a cell phone worn out after only two years of use?
  3. The bounty at the farmers market is awesome!
  4. My tomatoes are out of control. Yum! I may have a delicious recipe to share later this weekend. I'd like to have a photo and my camera is currently hiding out at work.
  5. Pilates this morning was awesome. Small class and good flow.
  6. I was very lazy this week and only ran once. Need to get back in the routine.

Thursday, August 13, 2009

More of the beach

Out towards the point, it was a lovely day!
From the porch, can you smell the ocean?
From the farmers market, yummy snacks. The blackberries in the top bin were picked by yours truly.

The Bug

A quick get away last weekend took me to the midwest. I have a good friend from college there. She lives in a cool town. And more importantly, I was going for her baby shower. When I decided to go, I was prepared for a lovely shower with decorations and food orchestrated by another friend from college. The flags above and the roses below are part of the loveliness that I was expecting. But...
unexpectedly, I also go to meet the bug (as they have nicknamed her). She was born 6 weeks early, and not in her home city - there's a long story that goes along with this. But she is beautiful and is doing just fine. Mom and dad are doing well, too. They both absolutely adore their new addition! It was awesome to get to see their growing family!

Monday, August 3, 2009

Sound of the waves

Lost and Found

I misplace items from time to time. I usually do okay with keys, cell phone, etc because I either have places for them or I leave them in plain view. It's the things I use less often that tend to get lost. Anyhow, I have been missing several items. Today, I found my black kitten heal shoes that have been missing for months. And, I also found a guidebook for a nearby city that had been missing since around July 4th. Yippee! I wonder what else I'll find? Buried treasure, a pile of gold, science funding??

Beachy Keen


I spent a lovely weekend at the beach. No computer, no internet. It was quite possibly the best Saturday of the summer - weather wise, too! Here's some of what I saw:
Clockwise from upper left: Morning glory among the grape vines, soon to be blackberries, hydrangea, the surf.

Left to right: Cabana door and a dewy spider web.

More soon...

Thursday, July 30, 2009

I did it...

A while ago, I wondered on this very blog if I could run 100 miles in one month. Well, I did it. This month my total is 100.4 miles! Yipee! That is all.

Saturday, July 25, 2009

today

I have been wanting to show you a photo of my lovely tomato plant for a while but keep forgetting to take one. Earlier this week, I had a tomato accident. It was quite stormy one night and when I got up in the morning the tomato plant (despite the tomato plant cage) had toppled over. I let out a yelp of oh no! I now have an additional stake in so hopefully that won't happen again. I did loose a branch that had a bundle of tomatoes growing and lots of promising flower. But as you can see from the photos, there are still ones that are looking okay on the plant.
Today, I have done very little work, but I needed a tiny break. I've been processing things in my head though and have taken notes and will make improvements in my writing tomorrow. What did I do instead? I ate some delicious food. I stuffed some zucchini and other squash tonight - I invented the stuffing based on what I had in my refrigerator - this included onions, garlic, mushrooms, rice pilaf, crushed tomatoes, sunflower seeds and cut up squash. The remaining stuffing, I added some wine and more tomatoes to make a sauce I'll eat with pasta for lunch this week. Delicious. I also ate some wonderful strawberries and enjoyed delicious lemon frozen yogurt!

Wednesday, July 22, 2009

Please do, please don't...

I had my neighbors over for dinner earlier this week. They were so funny in the conversation when I invited them. They said a new roommate would be moving in to their place. With the economy as it is, I thought, okay. I know they have an extra bedroom. But I didn't at all put two and two together... so then they said, the new baby would arrive at the beginning of January! How exciting. And congratulations! They brought me beautiful flowers when they came to dinner (so that's the please do...). Here they are:

But, I had bought some "good" salsa in the produce section. You know the kind. What Chipotle calls "fresh tomato salsa." I thought it would be a good second option to fresh guac with chips for an appetizer. Well, this is the please don't... please don't put cucumber in salsa. It does not belong!

Sunday, July 19, 2009

Feet up, but working

This morning, I have my feet up, but I am working. I am drinking spiced iced tea, have my computer on my lap and am surrounded with books and papers. It is lovely outside and I hope to escape at some point today to enjoy it!

Tuesday, July 14, 2009

Random Photos

This wine bottle makes me think of grad school and the postdoc I worked with who talked about cricket a lot. I thought it was pretty neat. Though I never did really understand the game.

Ahhhh! This guy (the scream) is always in my bathroom!

Paint samples for my kitchen on the kitchen counter. I'm planning to paint between the cabinets and counter and around the pass through - not the whole space. For those of you who've seen my kitchen in it's old state, currently all of the walls are white, there is no more blue sponge painting. The colors are pretty true. The one of the right is close to one of the colors in the knobs on the cabinets. I really have no idea what I'm going to pick. I'm always up for opinions, so consider the polls open.

Monday, July 13, 2009

Blooming

This is Grum's blooming wax plant (Hoya carnosa). The buds are just opening here. I ended up with quite a few buds this year. It's a funny plant as the blooms smell very strong and have a viscous liquid on them so it looks like the buds are crying! Also, each of the buds here is on it's own little stem and they all fall off once the flowers have gone brown. I really like this plant - it's in a hanging basket in my East facing window.

Wednesday, July 8, 2009

Floating away?

Yes, I know I have been away from my blog for an extended time. And, no, I have not floated away in the rains. While I was away, I have been house hunting, but I am done for the year. There is nothing on the market for me right now; npr has confirmed that banks (and likely individual owners) are holding onto properties while the market is bad. I did put in a very low ball offer that was not accepted. I will stay put for at least another year, and potentially until I get tenure. This is fine with me. I like where I live, despite the negatives. Also, I was traveling, mostly for work, but I did get to catch up with some friends, both here and there recently. I got to meet a very new baby! and a slightly older baby, and see a friends' new condo, and catch up with a friend and her husband - they're pregnant, and see friends I haven't seen in about a year. I also met a whole slew of new and exciting people, who I have not been doing a good job at keeping in touch with. There is also some awesome science percolating and some work writing going on. And I had an absolutely fabulous 4th of July adventure with about 1/2 a million other folks. Otherwise, I do not have terribly much more to say at the moment.

Monday, June 8, 2009

A Gift!




These flower photos are quite old and I have been meaning to share them for some time. A series of blooms happened on significant days this year for my one day bloom plant. And these doubles were especially rare.

Saturday, May 30, 2009

Off the list

I've been productive today and recently, in fact. Earlier this week, I cleaned all the floors in my place. This involved 5 different cleaning methods - broom, swiffer, generic cleaning solution, Murphy's oil soap, and a vacuum. And I'm very pleased with my results. I'm a fan of having clean floors under my feet and I had almost forgotten what if feels like.

Today I had breakfast at my favorite place, ran a bunch of errands, had a late lunch, ran some more errands, had a nap, went for a long run outside, finished two things on my work list and now I think I'm going to watch a movie (or some old TV) or I might end up reading. Though I should spend a little time making 3 other lists. One list is for shopping I need to do tomorrow at Trader Joe's. Another is for my upcoming trip - I'll be traveling for about 2 weeks, most of which is work related. And the last list is for my house hunting.

The house hunting is coming along fairly well, thought I haven't yet found the one. I have seen more than one that could work. I'm still mulling my options and I will see three-four more options this week along with a revisit of three of my favorites.

Sunday, May 17, 2009

Breakfast

edited to correct typos:
Breakfast is by far my favorite meal of the day. Sometimes I eat it three times in one day. I recently finished reading Happens Every Day by Isabel Gillies, which was highly recommended by NPR and a bit heart breaking. One of my favorite parts of the book was her talking about a breakfast she had with her family. The special was savory pancakes. It was pancakes covered with asparagus, Gruyere and ham. Covered with two sunny side up eggs and drown the whole lot in maple syrup. I'd pass on the ham. But otherwise it sounds divine. Though I don't think I could eat it right now. I have been having a culinary adventure that I would rather have avoided. I have switched my whole way of eating to try to stay healthy. I eat bread topped with applesauce for breakfast - a trick learned from my sister. And I've been eating a lot of roasted vegetables and way more meat that I normally do. My new favorite roasted vegetable is fennel. If you aren't totally averse to licorice and can find it at your local market, roast it up (400 degree oven for about 30 minutes or so) with what ever other veggies you'd like. I recommend precooking potatoes slightly. Couscous has become a staple again, too. Today I broke all the rules and had breakfast for lunch. I ate delicious lemon poppy seed toast coated with cream cheese. The cream cheese had lavender mixed in. This was a wonderful invention, but I think I would have also added a little honey and lemon zest to the cream cheese, too.

Monday, May 11, 2009

Mothers

I have been reading for pleasure a good bit over the last few weeks. Yesterday I finished a short book that I highly recommend. Ruth Reichl's new book Not Becoming My Mother was excellent. It is all about how the women of earlier generations didn't get to do what they really wanted. Ruth talks about her mom being an incredibly intelligent women who just ended up bored - partly because her parents discouraged her from becoming a doctor. Ruth is glad she didn't end up with that kind of life and knows that it's partly because her mother thought she could do anything. (In case you don't know the name, Ruth Reichl is the editor of Gourmet and a former food critic of the NYTimes and LATimes.) I think there are still walls and ceilings that women hit from time to time (and a good bit of it comes from others who still have a certain belief about what women should do with their life). But anyhow, it's a great read if you are looking for a short, funny, enlightened book, I highly recommend it.

Sunday, May 10, 2009

Random Musings

It's been a busy couple of weeks...
I was dating one of the guys I mentioned earlier. But it turns out I'm pretty blind when it comes to someone being interested in me. This guy was all wrong from the beginning. When I think about it now, I can't believe I missed all these things. I know I was hesitant for a reason, but I went along with thing for too long because he called me and was in general interested. Sad. But I learned something.
I used a natural drain cleaner that worked like a charm. 1/2 cup baking soda + 1/2 cup vinegar put down the drain and plug the drain for 5 minutes. Then pour boiling water down. Impressive.
I went and looked at houses this weekend. I found one that I liked, but I think it's out of my price range. The location is great. I listened carefully as the real estate agent doing the showing said the builder had done a similar build nearby. The other property is way cheaper. I did a driveby today of the other property. It's in a good location for work, but not near a town, which I was hoping to find. I'm looking at a couple of other options later this week.
I did my shopping today and got about $40 worth of groceries, etc for about $5. I love the deals that stores have right now that you can get $10 off coupons. Good stuff.
My running total for the week was about 18 miles!

In the classroom

I had an interesting conversation recently with two colleagues outside of my department. It's funny, it doesn't sound like this should be a rare occurrence, but it sort of is. In academia, we don't mix well across departments. And outside of our building is even worse. I wonder if it's like this in the humanities and social sciences? I know that everything is not the same between the arts and the sciences. Some folks in the arts get the summers off (I wouldn't say all, nor do I even know if a large % of them take the time off), but most (if not all) folks in the sciences work in the summer. This is even if we are only making a 9 or 10 month salary. We'd never get our scholarship/research done if we didn't.

Okay, back to the conversation. It was about students who come to class but don't pay attention. The faculty member who initiated the conversation was speaking about a class where the students bring computers and are working on projects with them, but that he suspects that they are surfing the internet or doing other things. He suggested that he'd like parabolic mirrors in his classroom. I strongly disagree with this. But, this semester has been the worst for students multitasking in my course. At various points in time, I have had students texting, reading novels and/or listening to iPods. I wonder if they think I can't see them? I'm pretty sure that they don't think about if I can see them when they are doing it. But I'm not really sure I know what makes them do it. I know my lectures aren't 100% engaging during 100% of the class time to 100% of the students, but such blatant disregard is a bit astonishing. I've thought about taking points off for students who have been grossly off task. I know all of my students by name, so I could easily do it, if I made a point of keeping track from the beginning. I have added into my grade book this semester notes on students who have participated in class a lot. I could also add notes for students who are absent a lot and/or who are off task a lot. All of this is super interesting to me because I always went to class (I think I missed <10 classes in my 4 years at college) and I always was on task (there weren't so many distractions back then, no cell phones and hardly anyone brought computers to class, but I don't think I would have been distracted even if I had this technology). But I am also of the ilk that the students are adults and they should make their own choices. I have been thinking that I might say a few words about classroom etiquette at the beginning of the year next time around. But it seems that a large number of students forget everything from the first week of classes by the last week of classes, so I don't know how effective this would be.

Hmm... I just had an interesting idea. Thinking back, one of the reasons I went to all my classes in college was because a professor early in my career mentioned (almost as an aside) that we were paying ~$100 for each class hour. I wouldn't throw $100 away, which was how I thought about not going to classes (and not being on task in class). I might be able to incorporate this into my class in an interesting way. One of the things that we do is work on statistical handling of data. I might see what happens if I ask my students how much they think they are paying to come to class and we could do some statistics on the data. We could easily look at the class average and the standard deviation, etc. Then I could tell them what the answer really is. This might be very interesting to try next fall because I'd be teaching concepts while also getting a point across that might translate into improved etiquette.

Saturday, May 2, 2009

Gone Away

I've been away from my blog for awhile. I was at an event last night and the speaker said that in our current culture, we spend too much private time in public spaces. This was in response to thinking about the fact that more people are dining at home (especially with the economy as it is) but there was also an element of connecting to people through online media. I was sort of beginning to feel that I was being too public, although this blog isn't truly public (in that I think the only people who read it are friends and family I've mentioned it to). I have also not been feeling 100%. Within the last week, I started to try something new and am beginning to feel better. I hope that my trajectory will continue in this direction. One week earlier in April, I only ran 3 miles (in the whole week). That was very sad, but I couldn't muster any more. I have also been working on writing projects at work and so have been a little less inclined to write here. I hope to write you all a bit more this weekend. But I need to get moving this morning so I can make sure to get a few errands done.

Saturday, March 14, 2009

Three Strikes

Yesterday was a day of three strikes...
Strike 1 - I have a graduate student who is not engaged in work. A clockwatcher, the student leaves promptly at 5 pm every day and arrives at 9 am on the dot. Research is not a 9-5 job, rather it needs to happen in patches and it's best not to leave when you are in the middle of a thought or experiment. You get out of research, what you put into it. Yesterday, I arrived at work at about 7:40 am. I walked past their office and noticed the light on (it is usually not on when I arrive). I looked in and was excited to see the student there working. I thought, maybe the seminar speaker yesterday brought things around for the student or maybe it was just figured out. I got to my office and downloaded my email and found that my excitement was totally unfounded. The early arrival was simply to "make up" the time since 3:30 would be the end of the day. What? What? What? There was also no explanation as to why this was happening.
Strike 2- Space and money = power in academia. Oh, and maybe rank factors in. I have none of these. Well, I guess I should say that I currently have space but that won't last long due to some complicated factors that mean that I can't stay in my current space. I had thought I had found a solution that would work perfectly. I even had a verbal agreement going back a few months and that was reaffirmed recently. But no - over the last week it has come crumbling down. This is making me very stressed out because it means that I will be letting down my students (they need space to do their research and research to get their degrees) and (of less importance), it will be very hard to get tenure. Have I made a giant mistake?
Strike 3- I got a wonderfully impersonal email at exactly 5 pm yesterday that said my recent grant submission is NOT funded.
Three strikes! I am not doing any work today!

Friday, March 13, 2009

If you were wondering...


what the blooms would look like, here is the first one that appeared this week. They only last for about 12 hrs, but luckily each pod has more than one bloom (usually three) and I have 5 pods on this plant and 4 on the other. Usually they open in the morning, but this one opened sometime while I was at work and was gone the next morning.

This plant is really easy to make more plants from. I have already given away two (that have 3 bundles each). A bundle comes from the pod once all the blooms are finished. I stuck this in water and once roots were growing, planted it. One of the ones that I gave away has already bloomed multiple times this year.

(I'm not sure if my terminology is technically correct about the plants.)

Sunday, March 8, 2009

I'm melting, melting, melting (ALA Wicked Witch)

A lovely weekend and I made myself get outside for a long run on Saturday! It was sunny and warm (no jacket required) and the scenery was beautiful.

Now, everything is melting and from beneath that blanket of white appears something that is brownish-green and hairy. What is the foreign species? Oh, grass you say... it's been a while.

Thursday, March 5, 2009

Getting back out there...

So after a long hiatus (and recovery?), it seems that I have found 3 appropriate guys to date. I saw one for the first time tonight (guy one), tomorrow I will see a guy for the second time (yes, the guy I wrote about a bit ago, this is shocking because I am the one date wonder), and Saturday, I might be meeting another (third) guy for the first time. (I hope they will all end up with more appropriate nicknames in the future, but this will have to do for now.)

The first date exceeded my expectations (does this mean my expectations are too low?). Guy one is great - has been since I first started corresponding with him. He is not "in science," (though he has done some science-y things in the past) but is definitely smart enough to talk with me about science things. This makes me happy. He is pretty liberal - which also makes me smile. And he makes me laugh - which is very important.

That is all for now. Possibly more in the future or possibly not.

Tuesday, March 3, 2009

Two secrets (or confessions)

I some times indulge in reality TV. I used to watch Survivor back in the day. But last night I watched the Bachelor final. I had a mini crush on Jason, but I think I'm cured after the craziness that happened. I also am fascinated by the Biggest Loser, though I don't know why. I often watch it while I'm at the gym... is that weird?

I had been eating a lot of chocolate. I have stopped cold turkey. I think it was making me feel a little off. It was either cutting out chocolate or starting to do Pilates (and trying yoga) that seems to have solved my problem.

Tuesday, February 24, 2009

Totally Opposite!

My friend Kyle posted this about the train station in Warrington, England. I thought I'd counter with something of a different sort from a park-n-ride that I know! I like this idea better.

Friday, February 20, 2009

Just when...

The snow was melting and you could see the grass, more arrived. Luckily it wasn't too much. But it does make me long for a garage.

For the record it is Friday night at nearly 8:30 and I am in my office working. I am listening to my very favorite radio station (other than NPR) on my computer so that makes this situation sort of okay. I am trying to decide if I should try to grade another problem before I go home. I think I will.

I was very sick earlier this week. I slept for a good portion of M and T. Thankfully, I had a flexible enough schedule that I only needed to come in for short amounts of time. It appears that I haven't infected anyone else. I am trying to catch up.

I am going on a "date" tomorrow.

I had a "fight" with my financial planner last week. I told him to stop my auto invest. I want to keep the money I have saved (and continue to save) for a house safe. He disagreed. I think I proved him wrong this week as the market continues to tank. I have decided to try to plot my investments in Excel. It might be depressing.

I might get to do a really cool workshop this summer in an awesome location!

I think I am going to buy flowers on my way home tonight. Some of you might know what this means, most of you don't. Happy, Happy to those of you who know!

Saturday, February 14, 2009

This past week

Busy, busy, busy. This is what I've done in the past week:
  • Ran >16 miles
  • Went to a defense
  • Took my students to see a very famous scientist give a seminar at a nearby school
  • Baked banana bread with chocolate chips and pecans
  • Had a marathon faculty meeting (Where I learned that there's a whole lot more politics in my department than I realized. I know this because one of my colleagues had told me he supported my preference several days before the meeting, but then when the other way during the meeting. AKA: my honeymoon is over.)
  • Met with a visiting speaker
  • Began learning a new instrument (another new piece of equipment will arrive next week)
  • Went to dinner at the house of a friend I met through AWIS
  • Participated in a study session for a super interesting project
  • Spoke with a visiting prospective student
  • Spent countless hours (>5) helping my slightly clueless students who are working on a large project (which is due next week)
  • Supervised 1/2 of a lab session for a sick TA.
  • Plus the usual stuff!
It was a pretty jam packed week. I am working today and will be working tomorrow. I hope to get out of here by 4:30 so I can run errands and get to the gym before it closes.

Tuesday, February 10, 2009

Random

I've been busy. Here are some random musings...
  • Does tea expire?
  • Negotiating prices at Kohl's isn't as difficult as you might think.
  • Why has it gotten so much warmer since I purchased snow shoes on Saturday?
  • How can I get my students to do better at synthesizing information? One of my very best students has been in my office recently asking question about an assignment I commented on about a week ago. The assignment was more or less complete. But, these questions are leading me to believe that she doesn't understand what she did or why she did it.
  • Is it possible for me to run 100 miles in a month? Have I done this in the past? (I'm not quite sure as I can't access my 2005 running log right now.)
  • Is there any chance I could get more hours in the day?
  • Why was everyone I know at my favorite breakfast place on Sunday morning? (Well, maybe not everyone, but at one point I knew 6 people getting breakfast. I don't know that many people in this area.)
That is about all for now.

Sunday, February 1, 2009

Springsteen is AWESOME!

despite the Walmart "mistake."

From the Other Side

It has been an interesting adventure to be on the search committee for a new colleague. I very recently got my position (which is a discussion for another time), but suffice to say, it is very close to me. An academic interview in the physical sciences is at least a day long. It involves shuttling between all of the faculty in the department (and some outside the department depending on interests) for 30 minute blocks. There are several ways to approach these sessions.
  1. You can just listen. Most academics are able to fill 30 minutes talking about themselves and their science.
  2. Talk the whole time about your experiences and basically don't let the professor get a word in edge wise.
  3. Mainly let the professor control the discussion but make sure to ask a few questions that either come up or are things you want to know about the department. If asked questions, make sure to answer completely, but keep it short.
Interesting to observe, we have had candidates in each of these categories. About the candidate who talked the whole time, I wrote on my "score card," that he didn't listen much. This came out in his interview talk as well.

Speaking of the interview talk, that is another piece of the process. This is typically an hour long talk about the science the candidate has done. Some candidates talk about work from their first post doc appointment, or their second, or some mixture, but rarely do the candidates talk about their Ph.D. work. We did have one of the later in this round, which I thought was unusual. In addition, our candidates have to talk about their proposed research and teaching. One piece of the application packet is a teaching philosophy, so the candidates will have thought about the basics, but sometimes not the specifics. Before you actually get up and teach, it's hard to say what specific examples you may use. I think it's unfair to ask these types of questions. I don't think I could have answered these well when I was interviewing, but I wasn't often asked.

Finally, there is a chance for the dean, who will make the hire official, to interview the candidate. This was perhaps the piece of the interview I was most intimidated about, but in reality, it wasn't too bad. I was always surprised that the dean had read my whole file, unlike some of the faculty.

In addition to the formal pieces of the interview, there are always meals that are typically shared with faculty. I have been on dinner duty and have had at least one dinner with each of the faculty candidates. It's fun in the sense that I get to go out and try new places without the expense, but it's also really restrictive to my time. It makes the evening a no go for getting anything else done. I often work into the evenings and on those nights, I have to leave at the designated time no matter what I'm in the middle of working on. It makes me less productive.

Overall, it has been an interesting experience. But I hope not to have to do it again anytime soon.

Tuesday, January 20, 2009

New Beginnings


Blooms to come!

Monday, January 19, 2009

New Dinner

Here's a new recipe I created tonight:

Baked Apple Salad for 1

1 baking apple (center cored out)
1/4 cup apple granola (Trader Joe's)
1/4 cup cut up cheddar cheese
1/4 t cinnamon
1/4 t demura (sp?) sugar
2 cups lettuce
1 t apple cider vinegar
1 t EVOO
1/4 t cinnamon

Mix up the granola, cheese, cinnamon and sugar and stuff into the apple. Put the apple in a glass baking dish and add 1/4 cup water. Bake in a 350 oven for 30 minutes until tender (more for firmer apples). In the meanwhile, wash the lettuce. Mix the last 3 ingredients well. When the apple is done, cut up into pieces and add to the lettuce. Top with dressing. It was quite good. Salty, sweet, savory. Winter salad.

Wicked Cool

I just hooked up my new wireless printer and tried it out. It's awesome. I can now print from anywhere in my house. How cool is that. Now if only I had a pool boy to bring me my print outs, I'd be all set. Do you think I could train a dog to do it??

Snow For Sale!

I have snow for sale here. Get it cheap while it lasts. I have no where else to put it, so am happy to ship it to you.

I admit to being incredibly jealous of those of you who have temperatures over 50 degrees F. It's cold here and more snow. We are well above average snow fall this year, but somehow are not keeping pace with last year. Though it seems to me like we are ahead. I'm done for the year.

In our last cold snatch, we unfortunately lost power for 4 hrs in the middle of the night. I was surprised when I woke up to find it 46 degrees downstairs. Hmmm... something was wrong with this picture. Called some folks. The heater guy came and concluded that there was nothing he could do with the plastic piping in the heating system frozen! Frozen pipes. This is new to me. At least it wasn't a frozen sewer line - I hear that this happened. So turns out the remedy is just to heat up the house as much as possible. Glad I had two space heaters. They helped on the main floor and I used a hair dryer in the basement to heat the exact location that was the problem. I had things flowing within about 4 hrs of realizing the problem. My neighbors - we share a duplex - on the other hand needed 10 hrs to get one zone working and 3 days for the other!!! Yipes.

Sunny beaches are sounding really good right now!

Tuesday, January 6, 2009

Being the Best

When I was visiting my family, I observed an interesting exchange between my dad and stepsister. She was saying that she didn't really care if the US was number 1 in the world when she was a grown up and my dad was noting that this is a common thought with the folks that are about 10 years behind me in age. I think I agree but I think that this negativity (or perhaps more precisely this not wanting to be the best or not searching for the best solutions) is a huge problem right now! And not just with a particular age group. Not sure what is causing it, but I have experienced twice since this time someone not seeking to be the best they can be. The most recent happened in a meeting today when someone who is doing some planning for our department said that he couldn't come up with a perfect solution. If you begin a process by thinking that, isn't your outcome just going to be mediocre? The other was with someone looking to change jobs and instead of trying to be the best, he was just trying to fit a perceived limitation instead of what he said he ultimately envisioned.

This goes back to another conversation that I had with my dad about goal setting. He tells a story similar to this in a class that he teaches and I'm debating including it in my class in the future. The story goes something like this. In the Business School at Harvard, there was a survey done years ago about the goal setting of the students. It was determined that out of the class of ~450, there were 15 students that were considered to be goal setters. All of the students were followed after graduation and in the subsequent years the salary of the goal setter fraction (15/450 or 1/30, which is ~3%) was compared to the remaining 435. It was found that the goal setters as a group earned more than the other 97%! This was surprising to me. But I forget that there are people out there who are not goal setters like myself.

My opinion: Set out to be the best, it just might happen! If you set goals, it's probably more likely to happen.

Monday, January 5, 2009

Recently

I've been busy. There have been lots of things on my plate. I enjoyed a trip home. Since I've been back, I have done lots of projects. One of the first things I did was to water my plants and trim those that needed it. I have a violet that is just about ready to bloom and the fushia one is still in full bloom.
I also went to the local outdoor sports store and bought some heavy socks. From left to right, I got a pair of wicking socks, an awesome pair of Smart Wool socks and some grey fleece socks. My feet are no longer cold. I think I need to get another few pairs of the fleece ones. These are definitely a good thing!
Over this past weekend, I took one day off and enjoyed an afternoon at the art museum. I also enjoyed a great Thai meal. I worked on Sunday and that night when I got home at 9 pm, I decided it was time to paint my kitchen. If you'd seen the previous speckled blue paint job that was stained from one too many exploded sodas or other kitchen disasters, it's all gone! It's now white. I was using up a leftover can of white paint, but I ended up needing to get a second can. Too bad Home Depot isn't open at 11 pm on Sunday night. I finished the job tonight. Now I just need to reinstall the pot rack and hang up some new decorations. I'm very pleased with my adventure in painting. It was fun to have an outlet since work has been and will be crazy for the near future.