Publishing Research and other stuff

So I know the next installment of Basic Physics is several weeks overdue, but there has been so much going on I haven't had time to do it justice. So here's a post on what's been going on!

Firstly, my first paper got accepted for publication! This is a research project that I had been fighting for well over a year, and the results were/are really cool. It's also my first first author paper, which is a really big deal in the sciences (at least my branch of the sciences). I don't know of an equivalent outside of research circles.

I'm working on new but related research projects, which will hopefully bear fruit soon.

DH got a job in a city that is just far enough away to make commuting 5 days a week untenable, so we are slowly transitioning our lives to an apartment in new city, with me getting the house ready to rent out in our old city. So, ya know, that's a bit time and energy consuming.

I'm teaching half time this semester, which is great, but eats my Thursdays between prep and teaching and seminar and teaching and then eats a couple hours not on Thursdays for grading and getting lesson plans and weekly tests ready for myself and the other two TAs to use.

I have to write and present and get approved a prospectus/research plan by the end of the semester or get kicked out. It is the vaguest most important piece of writing I have to do to date.

I'm also attending the Frontiers in Optics conference in October! Which is going to be fantastic and exhausting and in Arizona! It's also forcing me to actually get some more 'professional' looking clothes, which for me basically means I didn't make them and/or I couldn't rake leaves in them. I am not going to be removing my earrings unless my advisor specifically says otherwise though. They are a part of me, and besides my hair provides decent camouflage.

I also seem to be morphing into a high classical-christianity Anglican instead of a good Calvinist-Presbyterian, and I have to write a separate post on that.

So you can see, there is A LOT going on my life right now, so if the postings are a bit thin on the ground, hopefully you can forgive me.

Cheers!

What 3 years of marriage has taught me

This week my husband and I celebrated our 3rd wedding anniversary. I made a pull-out-all-the-stops dinner, and we drank champagne from our good crystal. And then we happily collapsed in our chairs to watch TV together, because life has presented us with a wonderful opportunity that will mean a good bit of change in our near future, all for the better but nonetheless exhausting.

It also lead to me to reflect on what a strange state marriage is. I would choose to marry my husband over and over again if given the choice, because for all the little ways he can annoy or infuriate me, I can't imagine sharing my life with anyone else. We are two very stubborn, argumentative people. We courted for 4 months by walking around campus and debating everything under the sun. Though I don't believe in soulmates, his existence and the fact that we, improbably, found each other is almost enough to convince me. He's a friend, a partner, a confidant and whetting stone. We've worn down the rough edges on each other, without wearing each other out.

Part of making marriage work , I've realized, is recognizing the importance of the day to day things. He makes sure to call me when he leaves work so I can time dinner correctly. I make sure to do laundry frequently so he is never out of socks. I  keep the kitchen clean and stocked, and he keeps the bathrooms clean and stocked. Grand romantic gestures are nice, but so is not having to do that chore you hate. Waking up on a Saturday morning to the sound of the bathrooms being cleaned is one of the best gifts my husband can give me.

Three years isn't long in the grand scheme of things. But having now spent 12.5% of my life married to the man whom I impressed by arguing him into silence in Philosophy 101, and who impressed me swing dancing, I hope to spend 100% of whatever years remain to me, married to him.

Gardening Success!

It took two good days of two person gardening, but our front yard now officially looks like it belongs to real people. It took 60 bales of pine needles to cover the whole area (and we probably could have used 70, coverage is a little thin in some areas). All the privet hedges got planted, weeds (including two saplings) got pulled, over all a great success.

Don't get me wrong, it still needs work. We need to find something to replace the monkey grass down at the bottom of the hill, where it is not doing so well in 'the swamp'. We're testing out two small 'willow' shrubs to see how they fare in that area. The azaleas are questionable. And I am currently on the war path against inchworms in my shrubs. If they want to eat the trees or the weeds, fine. I'd even be ok with them eating the azaleas. But not my new to-be  hedge. A sparing and localized treatment of pesticide seems to have deterred them for the moment. I don't like using pesticide, but I also don't like watching tiny worms eat a fairly substantial investment in time and money. I'm using it as a stopgap until I can get my hands on some Bt pesticide--kills any insect that eats my leaves, none that don't, harmless to non-bugs and becomes inert after a week of sunshine.

In other news, I've learned that gardening and in general being outside in my yard right now requires some clever use of scarves. Bandanas make for great improvised dust masks when spreading pine needles...

And makes me look like classical music loving old-west bandit

And my old tichels make for great inchworm barriers. There is few things more creepy than an inchworm in my hair.

Tichels--really really big bandanas with prettier patterns

I'm fairly certain I look a bit out of place in my neighborhood with it on, but that's nothing new, and its worth it to know there are no inchworms landing in my hair.

Overall, a successful weekend.

Surpise Gardening

Our front yard is, quite frankly, a disgrace. We bought our house in winter, so we pardoned the yard for looking dreary. We decided to wait and see what bloomed come spring and summer last year, because everything in North Carolina bursts into bloom eventually. 

Nothing bloomed except one staunch stand of  gladiolas. A variety of weeds sprung up. Dirty got washed away and we got to experience the power of erosion. Dear Husband was able to keep most of the grass mostly alive, but the large 'natural areas' that are nominally my arena were  and are terrible. 

That ugly, scraggly azalea is the only thing that should be there.

Of the green things, pretty much none of it is supposed to be there. 

I have bad luck when it comes to most plants. I killed a mint plant once. You can't kill mint with fire, but I did with my amazing plant-killing powers. 

But I thought I might be able to keep shrubs alive. They are already fairly sturdy when you buy them, so as long as I got ones that weren't too condition picky, I should be fine. I bought a few test shrubs a couple of weeks ago and they have been doing fine. Japanese privet is  perfectly happy in my strange clay-and-rotten-mulch soil.

Yes, clay, like the stuff you make pots out of in art class. 

A little cleaning and firing from a pinch pot. 

Dear Husband has deplored this state for some time, but knowing nothing about gardening, felt he couldn't really do anything about it. 

So while he was at a conference last night and today, I made a couple runs to the Home Dopey, as my dad calls it, or the Home Despot, as my husband calls it. The first run I got 6 japanese privet plants, and on the second run I got 6 more, plus a long handled digging spade, because short handled edging spades are not the tool to attack clay or roots with. 

Penny helped keep me company, and dig test holes for roots and rodents.

Yes, her entire head is underground in that photo. 

I planted 10 of the 12 plants (roots + rain stalled the last two). So now our front  yard looks like this

The plan is to have them grow into a nice hedge to line the driveway and help keep the erosion at bay. These will start the process, and if I like how it's going I'll continue it all along the driveway, which will take another 18 plants or so. The next step will be  to cover everything in a layer of pine needle hay, which will hide/kill the weeds and help the privets grow (fingers crossed). 

Dear Husband will be home from his conference soon, and I can't wait to see the look on his face. 

Easter Preparations

Holy Saturday has always been a kind of prep-day for me. Growing up, there was church decorating and food to be made and choir folders to organize. And that hasn't really changed now that I've grown up and married and established a household of my own, minus the church prep and add some house cleaning.

Saturday is our usual house-cleaning day anyway. Things like dishes and laundry get done as needed during the week, besides the obvious post-cooking counter cleaning. But Saturday morning is cleaning time. Dear Husband cleans the bathrooms while I make breakfast. I sweep the floors and clear away any clutter that has accumulated during the week. Any outdoor cleaning that needs to be done gets done then. Vacuuming gets done if the vacuum cleaner cooperates.

Today we did CLEANING. Dust the baseboards, scrub all the floors cleaning. The house smells like lavender and almonds.

And of course I did food preparing for tomorrow. For one, I made sure I had everything. I got a leg of lamb roast to cook for dinner, which requires nothing more than salt, pepper and some rosemary before I throw it in the oven tomorrow. The potatoes and asparagus can't really be prepped today, but they don't take much time anyway. I made deviled eggs, which are a must in my book and my only regret is that I didn't have enough forethought to make them earlier in the week and partially pickled them in pickled beet juice, which turns then a pretty purple-y pink.

The one at 11 o'clock had an abnormally large air pocket.

I even figured out how to do that cool swirly rosette thing with a piping bag!

I also finished the lamb cake. What is a lamb cake, you ask? It is a cake baked in a mold that looks like a lamb. If you are an excellent cake-pan preparer you could probably dust it with powdered sugar and serve right from the pan. But, I am not an excellent cake pan prepper, and my family traditionally has it covered with coconut icing, which is a tradition I am happy to continue.

This cake goaded me last year to learn the art of the 'crumb coat'. Instead of trying to ice it perfectly in one go, you use a thin layer of icing to stick down any crumbs (and hold on any ears that may or may not have been a little stuck to the pan), let that dry for a few minutes, and then finish icing with a thicker layer that gets to be all pretty and even and crumb-free. As a finishing touch, I coated it with coconut using the old press-and-stick method. The eyes, nose and impertinent tongue are jelly beans, and the grass is coconut tossed with some green food coloring. I serve it with strawberries, which is delicious but my sister calls 'macabre'.

Now, other than quiet contemplation, I am ready for Easter.

Have a blessed Paschal Triduum!

Windows, definitions 1 and 2

Last week has somehow ended up focused on two kinds of windows--the kind that let me see the outside world from inside my house and the kind that provides the operating system to my computers at school.

It was discovered a couple of months ago that one of our windows, one in my home office to be specific, was rotting out. Shortly after that I discovered one of our bedroom windows was rotting out. It looked like someone had just painted over existing wood rot instead of replacing the sills, leading the the entire thing rotting. Because both culprits are in bays, we were looking at least 6 windows needing replacement.

So we called the local Anderson windows dealer, who discovered two more heavily rotting windows. These are windows that we never look out of since they just look into our neighbors windows and we can't easily see from the ground, but even we could see (when the blinds were drawn) that they looked like they belonged in a haunted mansion.

Hello custom, rot-proof windows. Goodbye nice vacation.

At school/work, IT is going crazy about replacing XP computers with Windows 7 computers. Yes, they are replacing the incredibly out of date operating system with a slightly less out of date operating system.

For most people, this is good news. Faster computers. New monitors, etc.

This is horrible for any sort of researcher. Custom software. Very expensive proprietary software that only allows one installation and is necessary to run a very expensive piece of equipment. Data that you don't want to run even the slightest chance of losing because that there's 4 years worth of work. For a theoretician, everything applies except the equipment.

Needless to say, most of us were trying hard to hide our computers and ignoring emails and personal inspections by the department IT guy.

I finally had to give in because the XP computers were going to be cut off from internet, and the program I depend on to produce graphs requires an internet connection, the stupid thing. But I'm keeping my old one, off network, lest I lose anything.

I was really excited to have two monitors at last. If only the new one actually worked.

Oh well, maybe I can get graphs in less than 2 hours computation time now.

Trying to Not become my grandmother

I am weird about my kitchen. By weird I mean, weirdly protective of it. By protective I mean possessive. Which is to say, besides myself there are about 4.5 other people on this earth I trust to use my kitchen without my right eye getting twitchy. The half is my husband, who I trust to make tea, coffee and microwave things.


The kitchen is my domain. Nearly every other room in the house includes compromises with someone else. If I am not asleep, that is where you are most likely to find me. It is my artist studio, where I create new food, improve old food.

I also know that kitchens are really common areas and to ban people from using it is weird and awkward. My grandmother never let anyone use her kitchen. Ever. My dad never even learned how to make a pot of coffee while he was growing up, and when we visited as kids we knew that we were not allowed to raid her fridge or even get ourselves a glass of water.

I don't want to be my grandmother is this regard. I really don't. I actively invite people to get themselves drinks, to help themselves to whatever food might be on the counter, and I suppress the urge to do it myself.

But it's hard. It is physically stressful for me to have most people doing  things in my kitchen. Occasionally its because they are doing something bad to my good knives, my good cutting board, or pans. More often it is for little, inconsequential things, like putting the butter in the fridge or putting something away in the wrong drawer. Easily fixable, no big deal things that send my blood pressure skyrocketing.

I know that these things are objectively no big deal. I don't say anything when we have guests over because I know it makes me look ridiculous, and I am trying not to be my grandmother.

But if someone went and rearranged your computer files, or craft box, or your toolkit, wouldn't you get twitchy?

Puzzles are a lot like research

Recently I decided Dear Husband and I should take up jigsaw puzzles. It's a good hobby. It's relatively inexpensive, time consuming, can be done together, and it yields pretty pictures when its all done. Actually, its mostly the latter.

Our house has a lot of big, blank walls painted a cream color. Some have holes from where the previous owner hung pictures. We did not come to the house with a lot of pictures, and we are too frugal to buy real paintings. We could buy reproductions, but even those are somewhat pricey and it feels cheap to us.

 So until we can afford/find/agree on original art, jigsaw puzzles seem to be a good compromise. They are obviously reproductions. They are cheap. And, again, they provide hours of entertainment.

There are many ways of going about completing puzzles with lots of little pieces. There is the "Find all the Edge Pieces" method, which finds the borders and works its way inward. There is the "Hunt and Peck" method, seemingly preferred by my husband which starts with just putting together any pieces that fit. My method could be called "Divide and Conquer" or "Painstaking", which involves dividing up the pieces by come features (color and/or pattern) and focusing on getting all those pieces together. It involves choosing a piece, and trying every other piece to go with that piece until you have built up that entire section.

It is very slow going at first, but as you build up the sections you can begin to eliminate pieces from consideration on the ground of them not being the right shape, being too long, too short. Is it the fastest method? Maybe not. But it involves a lot less trying the same piece in the same spot over and over.

As I went, I realize that this is the same way I attack research (and most of my problems). Slowly and methodically. I think it confuses my PI sometimes why I insist on keeping constants, for example, running around and doing things piece by piece instead of lumping things together cleverly. I don't do clever lumping. My brain doesn't work like that.

It takes me time to get going. I am not fast at the outset. But I get faster and faster as I go because I can see pattern emerge specifically because I didn't lump things at the outset.

It's kind of nice for me to realize that I do have internal consistency in this. And it's nice to see the (more) tangible result of my methods in puzzles, even when the research is slower than molasses in January.

Some days, I love my grocery store.

In general, I am happy with my grocery store. I could wish for a larger selection of meats, and occasionally fresher produce and I can certainly wish they would not store the onions right next to the potatoes. But it provides high quality, low cost store brands that make my grew-up-in-a-high-cost-of-living-area heart sing. Unbleached flour for $1.67?  Sign me up! It's not quite Meijer, where I could get everything and everything for a song, but it's darn close for groceries.

But mostly I love it because they occasionally do ridiculous sales on things I use. Like today's "Buy 2, Get 3 Free" on coffee. Yes, that is not a typo. If you buy 2 pounds of coffee, you can get 3 free. Three! We go through coffee at the rate of a pound or so a week, so this is fantastic. I'm going to measure the space in my pantry and go buy as much as I can store.

Also, Entenmann's! Growing up, their crumb cakes, apple puffs, donuts, danish and eclairs filled a sizable portion of my grandma's deep freeze at any given time, and filled a sizable portion of my stomach whenever I visited. While I have grown up to appreciate that none of these things are high cuisine, I still love them all and buy up their coffee cakes and danish (the only things we get down here) whenever they show up. And when they are 2-for-1, its irresistible.

This is why I love my grocery store.

And why I never end up walking out with just that gallon of milk I went in for.

Becoming Real People: Furniture

When my husband and I got married, money was tight. He had just started grad school, I was looking for a job (eventually joined the PhD program as a job) and while we had significant savings, we weren't really looking to spend it. We got a cheap apartment that was mercifully bug free in a neighborhood that was miraculously low crime. I had inherited a little furniture from relatives (dining room table, a buffet) or from childhood (antique dresser, desk) and Dear Husband's grandparents gave us a bed as a wedding present. But otherwise, it was grad student-newly wed-Ikea chic for us. We cobbled together what we needed from the cheapest things that great Swedish gibberish-labeling superstore had to offer.  As a plus, it was all fairly light when we upgraded to a third floor apartment with no elevator. So our furniture was largely cheap, and there was very little of it, because we are cheap.

Then we bought a house. A wonderful house that satisfies his need for an open floor plan and my need for traditionalism. It has its issues, like the shower, but it's ours and we love it. However, 750 sqft worth of furniture does little to fill a nearly 3000 sqft house. And grad student chic looks a little out of place.

So I am very happy that we finally have upgraded to real furniture for the TV room. By which I mean we each now have a reclining chair, from a real furniture store. They are even power recliners, and Dear Husband's has a back-massage function.

 They don't match, but they match their owners. I like a chair that I can sit cross-legged in and is soft and comfy. He likes a chair with back support and his feet can touch the ground (I have to go antique if I want to touch the ground. Modern chairs are not built for the 5' 1" crowd)

Penny approves of the new addition as well.

As for our old couch, we still have it. It is now the seating area in the previously no-western-style-seating living room.

My old camera isn't really any good any more I guess...

It feels like we are completing the transformation from broke newly-weds to successful married couple. Though we are too careful/cheap to get all good furniture quickly, this seems like we have reached a new stage. And I like it.

Penny vs. Blankets

Changing the bed linens is one of those tasks which is necessary, but is usually boring.

Unless you have a dog like Penny.

Any other time, she seems to understand that blankets are blankets and are there to keep things warm. But when you are changing the sheets, she seems convinced they are now alive and must be fought.

She splays out to control the beast underneath.

She bites it, trying to find its neck

A new layer is  added and she pounces (slightly too fast for my camera phone)

She bites this one, but in a more leisurely fashion.

Then, having killed the beast* she looks at me with the face that says, "I did good, right?"

*While I am ok with her terrier-neck-breaking the $20 target blanket in the first picture, I don't want her to do the same to my beautiful handmade wedding quilt,  so I wait until she is off the bed to smooth it out.

My New Year's Resolution

For the most part, I don't do New Year's Resolutions. If you want to change something, I don't see the point in waiting for January 1st to roll around.

This year though, my desire for change and the New Year coincided. So my resolution is to keep a tidier kitchen. I would eventually like to have an overall tidier house, but one room at a time.

So, I started with my pantry.