So now I'm home in Oklahoma. My time here will be spent doing grad school apps and hopefully GRE prep and some exercise. I went running yesterday and felt slow, though my time wasn't too bad. I'm sore today though, but maybe I'll go play some basketball.
Speaking of Grad School, odds are I will be in one of the following places for the next 6 years of my life starting in the fall:
Corvallis, OR: Oregon State
Eugene, OR: U of Oregon
Seattle, WA: U of Washington
Fairbanks, AK: U of Alaska
Kingston, RI: Rhode Island Grad School of Oceanography
Flagstaff, AZ: Northern Arizona
Madison, WI: U of Wisconsin
and maybe one of these:
Tampa, FL: South Florida
Albuquerque, NM: U of New Mexico
Yup, now back to watching football.
Sunday, December 24, 2006
Ski Tahoe.. sort of
After the conference ended my dad flew in and we drove to Kings Beach for 4 days of skiing at Lake Tahoe. Or least that was plan, the weather didn't really cooperate. For our first day at Squaw Valley there were effectively 2 lifts open with a couple trails each on about a 12 inch base. Fortunately the stuff that was open was pretty interesting, with lots of slaloming through small tree and rocks sticking up through the snow. I practiced jumping 3 to 5 ft. cliffs and learned that's its not smart to follow the Squaw Freestyle Team when they ski off into the trees. I ended up getting cliffed out and had to hike back uphill for a bit.
The second day was at Alpine Meadows, which is right next to Squaw, and we luckily had about 8 inches of new snow. That gave us one pretty nice powder run before it all got skiied out. The rest of that run didn't go all that great for me. I got one of my poles stuck in a tree and snapped it in half, and then also ended up stuck in a creek for about 5 minutes. The rest of day went better. Or, since that's not saying much, the rest of the day went well.
The third day was at Heavenly, and it reminded me of eastern skiing. Heavenly was much more restrictive in opening their terrain, so while there was enough cover on some trails for them to be open at Squaw, the ski patrol at Heavenly had pulled 130 tickets in one day off of people poaching closed trails. So the only trails open where groomers on man-made snow. Quite a few lifts were open, but each lift only had one trail open, and it was really crowded. And windy. And icy. The views were nice though, and there was one steep trail open, which was fun to ski. For me at least, it was decidedly not fun for the person I saw fall about 2000 feet down the slope because it was so icy he couldn't stop.
Fed up with the lack of open terrain and wanting to give our poor ripped-up skis a break, we went snowshoeing on the 4th day. I knew a place near Emerald Bay where I had been on the stretch, and it was very scenic and snowy, definitely a nice change of pace.
On the trip home we stopped in San Fran for a while to eat and Christmas shop in the Ghiradeli square/Fisherman's warf area, so I finally got to see the golden gate bridge.
Highlight of the trip home: Winning $20 in a slot machine at the Las Vegas airport.
Lowlight of the trip home: Not getting home until 3:30am! That sucked.
The second day was at Alpine Meadows, which is right next to Squaw, and we luckily had about 8 inches of new snow. That gave us one pretty nice powder run before it all got skiied out. The rest of that run didn't go all that great for me. I got one of my poles stuck in a tree and snapped it in half, and then also ended up stuck in a creek for about 5 minutes. The rest of day went better. Or, since that's not saying much, the rest of the day went well.
The third day was at Heavenly, and it reminded me of eastern skiing. Heavenly was much more restrictive in opening their terrain, so while there was enough cover on some trails for them to be open at Squaw, the ski patrol at Heavenly had pulled 130 tickets in one day off of people poaching closed trails. So the only trails open where groomers on man-made snow. Quite a few lifts were open, but each lift only had one trail open, and it was really crowded. And windy. And icy. The views were nice though, and there was one steep trail open, which was fun to ski. For me at least, it was decidedly not fun for the person I saw fall about 2000 feet down the slope because it was so icy he couldn't stop.
Fed up with the lack of open terrain and wanting to give our poor ripped-up skis a break, we went snowshoeing on the 4th day. I knew a place near Emerald Bay where I had been on the stretch, and it was very scenic and snowy, definitely a nice change of pace.
On the trip home we stopped in San Fran for a while to eat and Christmas shop in the Ghiradeli square/Fisherman's warf area, so I finally got to see the golden gate bridge.
Highlight of the trip home: Winning $20 in a slot machine at the Las Vegas airport.
Lowlight of the trip home: Not getting home until 3:30am! That sucked.
AGU Fall Meeting, San Francisco
The conference was definitely a very cool experience. I spent most of my time perusing the Volcanology posters, and I think I learned a lot. I also managed to talk to numerous potential grad school advisors from different schools. A postdoc at the menlo park USGS office (and a member of the Volcano Hazrds Team, my dream job), took me under her wing and introduced me to every prominent volcanologist she could find. It was awesome. Have you ever seen that documentary about the geologists who go to the Phillipenes and predict the Pinatubo eruption in 1991? No? Well fine, but I met those guys, including the current director of the National Volcanic Disaster Assistance team. How cool of a job title is that? I think I may have gushed a little bit to this guy though, saying how that sounded a group of super heroes or something, you know, like... Volcano Team! Assemble! ha ha... yeah, that led to an awkward silence.
I also hung out with some Dartmouth people, ate Chipotle for lunch, and presented a poster of my REU research. My poster presentation went well, it wasn't well attended, but I was able to answer the questions a couple people asked me, and no one questioned my intelligence, so I walked away happy. In addition, thanks to the expo of geology related stuff going on during the conference, I now have lots of useless, cool-looking free stuff, including a foam rock I can throw at people.
Finally, I have continued to notice in cities that as bluetooth technology gets better and smaller it gets harder and harder to tell whether the person waving their arms wildly and yelling on a street corner is crazy or a stock broker.
I also hung out with some Dartmouth people, ate Chipotle for lunch, and presented a poster of my REU research. My poster presentation went well, it wasn't well attended, but I was able to answer the questions a couple people asked me, and no one questioned my intelligence, so I walked away happy. In addition, thanks to the expo of geology related stuff going on during the conference, I now have lots of useless, cool-looking free stuff, including a foam rock I can throw at people.
Finally, I have continued to notice in cities that as bluetooth technology gets better and smaller it gets harder and harder to tell whether the person waving their arms wildly and yelling on a street corner is crazy or a stock broker.
Tuesday, December 12, 2006
So about the Black Hole
that was the last 4 months or so with out posts. That would be REU work picking up, a nomadic month of August, and fall term at Dartmouth. All went well.
Speaking of the REU though, I am currently in San Francisco at the Annual Americal Geophysical Union Conference to present my results. This would be a lot more exciting if my results were: "Dominica's gonna explode!" as opposed to "inconclusive", which is the truth. Oh well, my poster is pretty at least. Tomorrow will be my first day to tour the poster sessions and see if I can't introduce myself to any potential grad school advisors. More on how that goes in the next couple of days.
So, a couple highlights from today:
-Emily having to drive 3 loops around the Logan Airport departure terminals because America West wasn't a listed airline and we had to keep asking where it was
-Me failing at gambling in the Las Vegas airport because even the nickle slots didn't accept coins. Who lays down even a buck to play nickle slots when you're on an hour layover?
-Me, in the thralls of starvation, buying a $12 sandwich in the San Fran airport as I was walking to get my bags.
As for the future of this blog, I hope to update every week or so, now more with rants and random things that happen as opposed to what I'm up to, since most of the people who might read this will likely be seeing me regularilly and therefore will know what I'm up to. So, look forward to such things as: the hotornot.com experiement write-up, me bitching about the club sports system at Dartmouth, me skiing Tahoe, a rant on injuries in ultimate, and other random stuff likely related to ultimate or skiing.
Speaking of the REU though, I am currently in San Francisco at the Annual Americal Geophysical Union Conference to present my results. This would be a lot more exciting if my results were: "Dominica's gonna explode!" as opposed to "inconclusive", which is the truth. Oh well, my poster is pretty at least. Tomorrow will be my first day to tour the poster sessions and see if I can't introduce myself to any potential grad school advisors. More on how that goes in the next couple of days.
So, a couple highlights from today:
-Emily having to drive 3 loops around the Logan Airport departure terminals because America West wasn't a listed airline and we had to keep asking where it was
-Me failing at gambling in the Las Vegas airport because even the nickle slots didn't accept coins. Who lays down even a buck to play nickle slots when you're on an hour layover?
-Me, in the thralls of starvation, buying a $12 sandwich in the San Fran airport as I was walking to get my bags.
As for the future of this blog, I hope to update every week or so, now more with rants and random things that happen as opposed to what I'm up to, since most of the people who might read this will likely be seeing me regularilly and therefore will know what I'm up to. So, look forward to such things as: the hotornot.com experiement write-up, me bitching about the club sports system at Dartmouth, me skiing Tahoe, a rant on injuries in ultimate, and other random stuff likely related to ultimate or skiing.
Wednesday, July 12, 2006
and you thought your night was bad...
Time: 1:20am
Place: Northwest Quad Dorm
WTF!: Fire alarm
Right as I was about to turn off my computer and go to sleep the fire alarm goes off. Then it stopped, and then it went off again. I exchanged a few confused looks with other people in the hallway before we decided we should go outside. I threw on some clothes and proceeded to stand outside for 15 minutes or so before we were given the all clear to return to our rooms. The fire alarm had simply malfunctioned.
Time: 1:45am
Place: Northwest Quad Dorm
WTF!: Fire alarm %$!!!$#%*$# again!
This time it sounded more serious and didn't shut off. Figuring we'd be told immeditated to return to our rooms, I left the building wearing only shorts. Once we had gathered outside, we were told the fire alarm was broken, that a mechanic was on the way to fix it, and that we would have to stay outside until it was fixed. At least it was a warm night.
Time: 2:45am
Place: Northwest Quad Lawn
WTF!: Thunderstorm
I had been outside an hour, laying on the grass and intermittently talking and sitting in enraged silence with the other geology REU students. This entire time I had been watching lighting and darker sky move slowly towards it. At this time, with maybe 200 people outside, the storm hit with pouring rain and winds that pushed it horizontal under the overhanging roof we were hinding under.
Time: 3:15
Place: Northwest Quad Dorm Lounge
WTF!: Hard as concrete carpeted floor
Clay, Shannon, and I had gone into another dorm around 3am and were attempting to sleep on the floor in a bightly lit room when we got the call finally that we were allowed back into our rooms 90 minutes after being evacuated. They hadn't fixed the fire alarm though, but rather had decided that someone at the front desk had to push the reset button on the alarm system every 10 minutes to keep the alarm from continuously going off.
Time: 3:30
Place: Northwest Quad Dorm
I finally drifted off to sleep for a nice 5 hour respite before waking up to go to work.
Place: Northwest Quad Dorm
WTF!: Fire alarm
Right as I was about to turn off my computer and go to sleep the fire alarm goes off. Then it stopped, and then it went off again. I exchanged a few confused looks with other people in the hallway before we decided we should go outside. I threw on some clothes and proceeded to stand outside for 15 minutes or so before we were given the all clear to return to our rooms. The fire alarm had simply malfunctioned.
Time: 1:45am
Place: Northwest Quad Dorm
WTF!: Fire alarm %$!!!$#%*$# again!
This time it sounded more serious and didn't shut off. Figuring we'd be told immeditated to return to our rooms, I left the building wearing only shorts. Once we had gathered outside, we were told the fire alarm was broken, that a mechanic was on the way to fix it, and that we would have to stay outside until it was fixed. At least it was a warm night.
Time: 2:45am
Place: Northwest Quad Lawn
WTF!: Thunderstorm
I had been outside an hour, laying on the grass and intermittently talking and sitting in enraged silence with the other geology REU students. This entire time I had been watching lighting and darker sky move slowly towards it. At this time, with maybe 200 people outside, the storm hit with pouring rain and winds that pushed it horizontal under the overhanging roof we were hinding under.
Time: 3:15
Place: Northwest Quad Dorm Lounge
WTF!: Hard as concrete carpeted floor
Clay, Shannon, and I had gone into another dorm around 3am and were attempting to sleep on the floor in a bightly lit room when we got the call finally that we were allowed back into our rooms 90 minutes after being evacuated. They hadn't fixed the fire alarm though, but rather had decided that someone at the front desk had to push the reset button on the alarm system every 10 minutes to keep the alarm from continuously going off.
Time: 3:30
Place: Northwest Quad Dorm
I finally drifted off to sleep for a nice 5 hour respite before waking up to go to work.
Tuesday, July 11, 2006
Fayetteville Summer League
After the pretty good competition at pick up and the tournament over the weekend, I have to admit I came away from my first summer league games a bit frustrated. There were a lot of people new to playing organized ultimate, so actually playing an offensive set was not really possible. I am also probably the most solid handler on the team. I say solid as opposed to best, because there are people who make better dump cuts, or have better throws, but I think I have the best combo of throws, cuts, knowledge, and a holster on hucks. Our team also has 12 guys and we were playing 4/3 coed at times tonight, so playing time was sparse. In our 11-9 second game win, I think I played maybe 6 points. My highlights included a sweet 50 yard backhand huck for a score and a sky catch for a score. Lowlights included some pretty lazy defense and a couple rather sloppy low release backhands that I made very hard for the receiver to catch (one was caught, the other was dropped).
So, the question is what can I get out of this? Since our team is full of cutters, I have resigned myself to handling for the team, so I'll be working on that, noteably trying to make the offense run through me and then having consistent throws, smart successful hucks, and no turnovers. Handling was even frustrating tonight though as the inexperience players would make horizontal cuts in front of the disc and then clear out right next to the handlers, so at times we had five people behind the disc, making it kind of hard to get open for dumps. Hopefully that'll improve as our team learns the game more. As for now I still have pick up on Thursday and Sunday and practice with an open team on Wednesday to work on my cutting.
So, the question is what can I get out of this? Since our team is full of cutters, I have resigned myself to handling for the team, so I'll be working on that, noteably trying to make the offense run through me and then having consistent throws, smart successful hucks, and no turnovers. Handling was even frustrating tonight though as the inexperience players would make horizontal cuts in front of the disc and then clear out right next to the handlers, so at times we had five people behind the disc, making it kind of hard to get open for dumps. Hopefully that'll improve as our team learns the game more. As for now I still have pick up on Thursday and Sunday and practice with an open team on Wednesday to work on my cutting.
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