suitcase in my hand.

tonight, I leave for a weekend in Florida. Yay for a large network of NASA Ames friends!

last night, while filling out application after application for summer internships/jobs - thanks, thesis project with no real funding - this song popped up on my mix:



my friends don't seem to know me / without my suitcase in my hand. 

though I'm not really a lyrics person (not an auditory learner), the opening line seemed especially appropriate seeing as in the past 13 months, I have been in WA, NY (2x), AZ, CA (3x-ish), GA, MD (2x), TX, NJ, PA, MA and I have driven through or had a layover in IL, NC, CT, CO, OR (and probably a few other east coast states that I slept through).

Wow. So many states and so much time on planes! Ironically, I have yet to get a frequent flyer ticket - but that is what you get when you go for cheap prices over loyalty to one airlines....

is this real life?

I just looked at my calendar - I'm flying on 7 planes between now and Christmas day. 

I'm going to be in Seattle for a grand total of 4 more days before December 25th. 

Tonight, I'm thankful that I'm getting paid to go to graduate school and that my profs don't believe in in-class finals :)

Tomorrow, I head to Albuquerque, Monday I'm giving my 'how to apply for graduate school' presentation to the students at NMSU and speaking on a panel about my NASA internship experiences. Apparently it is going to be cold in Albuquerque....hopefully no snow though!

Tues-Thursday are going to be crazy days. don't expect to hear from me. don't worry, I didn't fall off the face of the earth, I'm just going to be hiding in different spaces cramming everything in for my advisor (final + paper + presentation). 

But then Friday I'm going to NYC! and Boston! To visit these fantastic people:

Yay!

And since my sol-gel class is finishing with a take-home final, a paper, and 'presentation' (but we just send our prof our slides, we don't actually present.....) I'm going to stay in NYC until Thursday!

Everything gets turned in Friday morning and then I'm DONE for the quarter! Hopefully I'm alive enough to go ice skating with my roommates and friends that evening......

And finally, Saturday I'm getting on another plane to Palm Springs with my family + family friends for a whole week of SUN. I am so excited to see the sun. So. Excited. I think I've forgotten what it looks like.....

(solar flares are cool)