MOONFEST! and the Semi-end of Procrastination

If you didn't know, today is the 40th anniversary of the Apollo 11 landing, when Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin first stepped foot on our lovely moon. Significant lunar activity = lots of things to do at Ames! We had a special speaker two weeks ago, a gentlemen who has speialized in writing about the Apollo missions, and yesterday was MOONFEST! (And yes, it has to be in all caps, that's just the way it is.) 

MOONFEST is a day full of lunar activities for the young and old. The picture on the right shows just part of the crowd that showed up to Ames on Sunday; the organizers expected 8,000 people. I am not sure how many actually showed up, but there was a traffic jam all the way down Moffett Boulevard, and it backed up into Hwy 101. That never happens on a normal day. I decided to voluenteer for this event (I got a free t-shirt!) and I worked the Speaker's Tent. For part of the day, my friend Hannah and I guarded the door behind the speaker's platform from people who might ignore the 'KEEP OUT' signs and try to slip in. We also acted as direction and general information givers, as our bright blue shirt labeled us as people who know something about the event. 

For the other part of the day, I got to sit in on the speaker's talks and then pass the microphone around during the Q&A afterwards. My, but I didn't know how pushy people were about getting their questions heard and how challenging it is to coordinate mics! However, I did enjoy listing to Dr. Wooden, who I had met at lunch one day, speak about future NASA missions to the moon. She was engaging and had great videos and visuals on her powerpoint. She also has an asteroid named after her. And then, at the end of the day, an astronaut named Dr. Donald Pettit, who has a doctorate in ChemE from Oregon State, and has flow into space twice, and invented a zero-gravity coffee cup that he uses on the International Space Station. He talked about what he learned in space, about how things like iPod cords and heavy equipment behave in ways previously unimagined, and how ever since NASA invented a zero-gravity printer, they've had to constantly be doing paperwork (It is the government....) He has also been to Antarctica, studying meteor rocks, but that wasn't nearly as interesting then the ISS information. He was actually on the last mission that came down, STS-126 (STS-127 is up on the ISS now, after a month and a half of launch delays), which also installed the waste-water recycling set up that a gentleman who works in my building designed and built. I heard a talk on it a couple of weeks ago, it is very interesting how they are making drinking water. 

Today, I decided to leave Ames a bit early and just find a place off base where I could work. I would get distracted in the lab and at Sayre's, so I found a Peet's Coffee and Tea to do some work. I really wanted to find a place like the TeaCup in Seattle, but apparently all they really have is Starbucks around here. Starbucks doesn't serve great tea, but I remembered my friend Sarah said she enjoyed Peet's when she went there, so I decided to give it a try. It was surprisingly good, even though it lacked the teapot and cup service, and the friendly people of the Teacup. I got my work done that I needed to for today (abstract and poster draft) and will probably continue procrastinating on the rest of it (poster final version is due next Monday and the final paper is due in three Fridays). Thus, this is only the semi-end of my procrastination. 

Next time, I want to try this place in the picture, Le Boulanger, which sounds like they might have good French bread!!

Also, you all should google (which is a verb now, according to Dr. Reinsma) the Hubble telescope pictures, they are amazing! I used one for my poster background and placed one on my computer desktop, even going so far as to clear all my icons off so I could see all of the picture. 

And tomorrow, you all should go to Starbucks and get a free pastry!! Click here for the coupon! You should try the Chonga bagel (toasted) or the Traditional Coffee Cake, they are both delicious!

96.34 Hours

The number in the title of this post? That is the number of hours I spent at NASA Ames Research Park over the course of the last two weeks. Not only was I there every weekday, but I went in for a bit last Sunday, today (Saturday) and will go in tomorrow. I am doing my best to get as much experimental data in before I have to write up my abstract, poster, and paper, of which, the first two are due on Monday (the 20th!) by midnight...

And of course, I don't really want to write the abstract or finish my poster, so this post is one glorious form of procrastination. I have been majorly procrastinating on this project, partially because it feels to much like school (a 10 page research paper?!) and I don't feel like I have enough data to draw conclusions. What do they expect, I've only been here for 6 weeks! 

So, I decided to tell you about non-NASA stuff, to take a break for a moment. When my parents were visiting, on morning on my way to work, what did my and dad and I see? ....an older couple walking their goose! Yes, I am telling the truth, they were walking with what looked to be a Canadian goose in between them, prodding it along with a stick. It was quite funny and pretty much made my day that Tuesday. 

Another interesting observation about this area (and also tells you how much I have adapted to Seattle): There are so many SUVs and big trucks around here. Now, I'm used to them in Ellensburg, because they usually serve a purpose as a farm truck or for hauling things, but I was very surprised to find so many in a state that is striving to be green and save energy. (On another note, there are these really cool stickers that let single-passenger cars use the diamond lane if they are hybrid cars that pass a clean air emissions test. There are so many days when I wished I had a Prius) The following are a few pics from my phone that I couldn't resist snapping when I saw these trucks. These are both trucks that have been jacked up and ride real high off the ground. In Ellensburg, we'd call them red-neck trucks, but I'm not sure what you'd call them here....

Something fun Alina and I did today was travel to the Willow Glen farmers market. I was kind of expecting a market like Fremont's in Seattle, but this was surprisingly like the one in Ellensburg. There were local, fresh-picked fruit and veggies, flowers, handmade jewelry, a guy singing classics with his guitar, a local bakery and a local jam/jelly maker. 

It was pleasantly uncrowded, and we purchased some delicious fruit. 

Here is a picture of part of the market, this was only about 2/3 of the booths. I forgot to bring my camera, so this is a shot from my phone. 

Well, I'm going to leave procrastination station now, eat some ice cream and get back to work. Before bed I am determined to have a 250 word abstract written and emailed to my mentor!

Also, funniest thing I've seen at NASA, this is a sign in the bathroom in the cafeteria area. Jesus reminding people to wash well with his "Repent! Wash your germs away!" sign.

Wow. Two Weeks

It has been two weeks since I have last posted, sorry for the long delay :) I will however, not aim to post all of what has occurred in that time in one post, but will tell my tales over the course of a few. My family and my chemicals have been keeping me from writing lately. That, and I lost my camera for a time and thus was unable to take or post pictures. I found it in a bag of yarn in my room, of all places!

Well, for the whole week leading up to the fourth of July, I did nothing but sit in a chair and read scientific literature the whole week. However, that has paid off, as now I am prepared to do more and have a better grasp of the reactions I am running. That thought doesn't, however, make those 40 hours I spent staring at my computer any easier in my memory....

Also during that time, my family came into to town from the great state of Washington! I was really excited to see them, and it has seemed to break up the time I am here into nice chunks. I have now been in Cali for exactly 5 weeks and have less than 5 weeks to go. Eek! So much to do! I was nice to hang out with the have have a mini-vacation of sorts: we traveled down to Bakersfield, CA for the fourth. Now what is in Bakersfield, you ask, that would induce a normal person to visit such a hot, smelly land? Well, I have relatives down there that we like to visit about every other year (or so it has been for the last few). They actually have air conditioning, which is great, seeing as it was nearing 100 degrees F before nine o'clock in the morning. They also have a rather large pool, which my family availed themselves of constantly. The picture above is from the 4th, the girls sat and watched while guys lit off the fireworks, which consisted of mostly fountains that sparkled. And then we watch the show from the country club over the hill, where there were bigger and better fireworks, and they were free!

Also, the other best part of visiting Bakersfield - the meat. My great-uncle cooks really good meat. We had delicious chicken the first night, pork the second, and some beautiful beef the last evening. Of course there were other things along with it, but I have not had good meat for a while now, probably since my birthday, when I was home in E-burg. 

While I was there I was able to really relax. With no agenda, a pair of knitting needles, new yarn and a new pattern, coupled with a little second-cousin (I think that how we are related anyway...) who loves to watch the Disney channel. And deep down, I really enjoy that channel too, especially when I find Scooby Doo on...I love Scooby Doo and could watch it all day...but please, don't tell anyone ;) Though I seem to do nothing but relax when I am at the Sayres, home from work (I am not taking French classes this summer and no one I know lives close enough for me to visit) but at my relatives I got to stay up til midnight and still get 8+ hours of sleep! 

This is what what the nightstand next to my bed looks like. And yes, it does get cold enough here in the evenings to merit a nice hot cup of tea. Tonight, I believe it was mint.

I have, this summer, read many books. It has been almost 2 years since I got to properly read a novel for pure pleasure, and I have been taking every advantage of my lazy summer days. This is the reason I will not come back from Cali with a tan, as I spend much of my time inside, reading my books. I do however, have a slight Tom's tan line, which I will sport with pride when I meet up with my friends from the south US. (aka Kali and Charis). 

And with that, my friends, bon nuit! for I am heading to bed. 

It's Finally Friday!

So today was probably the slowest day of my entire 3-week career as a NASA intern. I sat in the library for 8 hours and researched articles on the internet. Story of my life lately. On the up-side, I did get to sit in the library for those hours, instead of the lab, so I had more comfortable chairs, better table heights and much less noise. :)

Back to what happened over the last week. On Sunday, I went to church again at Campbell Church of Christ, sans the Sayre family, and it was an interesting sermon on the fire of God, and how Christians can re-light that fire as it is quenched just by living the human life. A couple of the hymns struck me regarding their theological information, especially coming off a quarter of Christian doctrine with Dr. Steele at SPU. In particular, we discussed in class how the body has often been regulated as not-redeemable, or that there is body/soul spilt, stemming somewhat from the influence of Plato and often read into Paul's writings. However, (and I am not looking at my notes here, so forgive me if I get this wrong) from what I remember, Paul was using language that did not denote the separation of the body from the soul in the Greek language, and thus there is no room for a doctrine of the 'immortality of the soul,' where the soul will go to heaven after death, but the body will stay behind. From this erroneous view often comes the idea that the body is somehow a cage for the soul, that the soul is 'good' and the body is 'bad' (again, reflecting Plato), and thus when we are redeemed, our soul's are saved, but we must fight against the sins of the body. However, and this is what we discussed in class, it seems to be Biblically supported that the whole person, body and soul, is redeemed through Christ. Christ's whole body and soul died and rose, not just his soul. There was no body in the grave. So, I guess what stuck me with the hymns was the references to the body as halting the refiners fire from glowing, and how we had to move past the sins body to re-light the fire inside. While I think that many sins do seem to stem from the body vs. the soul, I think that we sin with our whole selves and are redeemed with our whole selves. If that light 'goes out' then I think that we can't hold up what we consider our soul as untouched, but that the relighting has to involve both all the person. I don't really know where I am going with this, just that I wanted to share with you all some of what I am learning and processing right now on my walk with God. 

After church on Sunday, I took a trip out to the Computer History Museum. It was very interesting to see how the laptop I am writing on evolved. I saw some huge machines and some early computers, and want to go through it with my dad or someone who grew up during all the revolutions in technology to truly get a feel for what it must have been like to see that much technical innovation in the span of ~40 years. I saw card punch systems, walls of wires from MIT, some guys doctorate project, really BIG hard drives, old-school arcade games, and the teapot that launched the 3D graphics revolution. There was so much history there, so many machines that were saved (it kind of looked liked an organized garage) - it was nerdy and it was great! Also, there was an exhibit on computer chess, and I saw an old game, "Chessmaster" that I used to play on our old PC. Also, bit of Olivia trivia for you - I really learned to play chess on our computer with a version of Star-Wars chess. Mind you, I hadn't (and still haven't) seen the the episodes to which the game was referring, but it was still fun. It took me forever to figure out how rooks moved and did the switch-aroo thing with the Queen, or is it the king? I still don't know it, apparently.  They also had this huge machine designed by an Englishman in the 1800's that calculated polynomials. It looked so complicated to design and use that I was amazed and became very grateful that I had a TI-83 to do all that math for me. 

Here is a picture of the wall of PC's, starting with an Apple I.

Which reminds me, I also had a conversation this Monday with an astronomer who works at NASA over lunch, and she suggested that become proficient in a programing language before heading to grad school, as that would be a valuable skill. While the last time I ever attempted programing was in 7th grade on an old Compaq laptop (with an external floppy disk drive, mind you, that's how old it is) in MS-DOS. Now, while I did make fun game programs and password protected them, as well as make pictures, I didn't remember a thing on Tuesday when I decided to start learning. I chose to learn Python, because it looked relatively intuitive, yet could do some powerful stuff, but after conversing with my CS major friends, I might switch to C++, though I think that would be more challenging to learn on my own. I am kind of following a MIT course entitled, 'A gentle introduction to programing' through their open courseware project, coupled with an online book called "How to think like a computer scientist," both of which teach Python. All I have done so far is learned some basic commands, as well as read almost 4 chapters of the book, and made two little programs. The highlight so far has been creating a program that will do all the math to tell me how many grams of a reagent I need to add to a solvent to make a certain concentration. I really just didn't want to crunch the numbers any more, so I am making my computer do it! It was quite fun and it works. We'll see what else comes from this dabble in programing. 

On another note, I also saw this at the Computer History museum, and I laughed. I had one of these at my grandma's house growing up, but did it help me learn to spell? Nope. I am still a terrible speller, but I enjoyed the device. :)

A Few Thoughts

I know, I know, it has been a week or so since I lasted posted. But because my 15 minute nap this evening lasted 1.5 hours, I have to go to bed for real very soon. Today was long day, very long - I left the house at 6:45, got to work at 7:15am and didn't leave until 6:01pm and finally arrived home at 6:50 pm. This is not my normal day length, but today I wanted to use a machine called a Scanning Electron Microscope (or SEM for short) and it was booked by other people from 8 am to 6pm. Not thinking that I would be around past 5, I aimed for the morning. Well...I didn't actually write my name on the sheet because no one gets here earlier than 8am, and only before 10am if their young and you get lucky. Much to my surprise, however, the person was already on the machine! So here I was, at work ridiculously early, with practically nothing to do. Oh well, c'est la vive, n'est pas? 

Days are also kind of slow right now because I am in a transition part of the project, which requires new chemicals, and thus wait time. It means I am back in the literature, researching and reading things that often go over my head. But, I did recently discover that Ames has a few libraries on base, and the one in my building is great! It is a much better place to read my literature than either my lab or my semi-desk space 5 minutes away. And almost no one uses it, so it is quiet...and warm...and comfortable. And the old guy who walks by my lab all the time is pretty much the only other person in there, and he sits and responds to emails for hours. Literally. I watched him type emails from 1-4 today, and he was still there when I left. I snuck a picture of him with my Photobooth and built in computer camera, but all I got was a back shot. I also found out his name is Joseph. Soon, I might even try striking up a conversation with him...

I really was holding off posting another blog entry because I was marathoning through both my TV show seasons that I missed this last year and through the finishing steps of a sweater I am knitting. I didn't really stop to do much else this last weekend and really wanted to post pictures of the final project. But, alas, doing things the right way takes more time than I thought, I will not be finished for a while yet. (Also, the needles I need to completely finish it are currently in use with another project that I started without thinking that I might need the needles for the sweater). This particular sweater was started during Christmas break of my freshman year, in 2007. Don't think I am a slow knitter though, I just could not justify taking the time to knit this school year because of the amount of homework I had, as much as I wanted to do nothing more than sit, chat, sip some tea and knit my sweater. 

Fun new thing coming up: my family is coming down on Sunday and will be here for about a week!! We are going to go to Bakersfield, CA, for the 4th (don't worry, if you don't know where that is or are wondering why I am going to that part of Cali, I understand). Bakersfield is where my great-Aunt and Uncle live, and we have gone down there a few times during the summer breaks. Alas, we generally go during the hottest week of the year, where I distinctly remember reading '117 degrees F' on the thermometer for a few days.... I am so much more a winter weather kind of girl... But, it will be fun to see my family and relatives, as I will have a grand total of 8 days in WA before heading back to school. However, once there, Elizabeth my sister will be joining me, so that will be fun to have her at school with me. We've gone to the same schools since preschool. I think she will like SPU, it definitely was her first choice for college. 

I hate to always sign off with this, but it is past my bedtime now (it is 10:42 pm) and I have to get up so early to go to work. I'll post pictures tomorrow. Bon nuit!

3, 2, 1, LIFT OFF!!!!

Today, the LCROSS project blasted off the earth and hurtled itself towards the moon. in percisily 111 days, this project will crash itself into the moon and move no longer. LCROSS stands for 'Lunar CRater Observation and Sensing Satellite' (apparently they could not just call it LCOSS...). The purpose of this craft is to hit a part of the moon that has never seen the sun. This permanently shadowed spot is in a crater at one of the two poles of the moon. The theory is that if a spot has never seen the sun, if there is any water (in the form of ice) on the moon, then it would be frozen in a spot that has never seen sunlight and thus has never had a chance to evaporate. According to NASA's website, "the identification of water is very important to the future of human activities on the Moon" (a.k.a for deciding whether or not we'll create a lunar habitat). Beyond just sensing for water-ice, the LCROSS will also look for hydrocarbons and hydrated materials.

Another speical aspect about this project, is that it was spearheaded by a group here at Ames, where I work, so it was quite exciting to watch it launch today. To be more specific, our website says that Ames will be "managing the mission, conducting mission operations, and has developed the payload instruments" in partnership with Northrop Grumman, who built the actual spacecraft. Another cool thing about this craft can be found in the design, because it uses existing NASA technologies as well as off-the-shelf parts. Thus, this is a low-cost, quick project. It only took 3 years from proposal to launch. For those not familiar with the NASA time line, that is fast!

You should check out the video on this page: http://lcross.arc.nasa.gov/ to learn more about the project.

In other news, another boy, Joe, a senior in high school, semi-joined our lab group yesterday. He will be working on a totally different project, but will be sharing the space with Kunal and me. This is his third summer here and he knows lots of people, which is great!

And...we passed our lab safety inspection today after 3 hours of frantic cleanup. Yay!

Misadventures and Oddities

I have found the best spot to sit outside at the Sayre's house: on the back porch, there is a bench swing, and with the warm temperatures outside, it is a fantastic place to be!

This post is all about my misadventures so far, because nothing new or exciting is happening at work - my reactions continue to not work and the LCROSS launch was pushed back to Thursday.





Misadventure #1: The Freeway system.

I know I have complianed about this before (see previous post) but the freeway system is pretty hard to follow down here. The North/South on-ramps are so close together that I have often taken the right numbered freeway, but gone the wrong direction. Also, They don't have good exit signs, so I sometimes miss my exits when I try to get off the freeway! My GPS sometimes compounds the problem, as it is often just a hair off in tracking where I am, so sometimes it will say, "Take the right hand on-ramp now" when I should be taking it in another 150 ft.

Example A: First day driving to work alone: I took the exit right before my actual exit for Moffett field, and it took me 30min to get back to where I needed to be. I could not get back on the freeway because of 8ft tall brick walls lining the road, and so I went through downtown Mountain View. I was still on time to work, though!

Example B: On my way to pick people up from their hotels for the trip to the zoo, I took the I-85N when I needed to take I-85S, and thus ended up 15min late to picking everyone up and delaying the group's departure from Ames.

Example C: On Sunday, I got to church fine, but on the way back, I took the wrong Expressway on-ramp, N instead of S, and went in a big loop to find the right one. That's another thing different about this area: Expressways. They are not quite freeways because they have stoplights and cross streets, but they aren't quite roads because they have three+ lanes and go 45mph (radar enforced as every single sign says....) Apparently they also have N/S directions.

Example D: On Sunday night, I had a huge hankering for some ice cream. I had passed it up the night before in SF, but I really wanted some this night. So, I remembered that their was a Safeway nearby, programed my GPS and off I went. It really was about five blocks away, and after successfully purchasing some Cookies and Cream ice cream, I was on my merry way back. However, what I didn't know about these expressways, is that generally, unless you are at a light, you can only turn right. And I wanted to go left. Okay, I said to myself, my GPS looks like it has a plan, I'll just follow it. It had the right way to go, however I missed the street sign I was supposed to turn onto. Again, no big deal, I thought, I'll just go around and come back. But, when I got to the light, I chickened out about doing a U-turn, legal though it may be, and I just turned left. Bad decision. I had to wait half-mile to a mile before I could turn around, and even then I didn't pull a U-turn, but slowly made my way back to the house. All for a bit of delicious ice cream (and rainbow chip frosting with cinnamon gramcrackers!!!)

Misadventure #2: The Dog

First day dog sitting, and guess what happens. I must have not shut the garage door tight enough, because when I got home, Tessy was happily in the house. While this is not a major problem, as she is often in the house, it is always when someone else is home.

Misadventure #3: The House Key.

As a rule, I lock all the doors leading into the house because I am staying alone, even the door from the garage into the house, which doesn't lead directly to the outside. When I went to let the dog outside right before leaving for church on Sunday, what did I do? Yep, you guessed it - locked myself out. There was no spare key around the outside that I could think of, and no one was going to be home for a while (they are in Minnesota). Fortunately, I remembered that Mrs. Sayre had mentioned that the neighbor who house sits sometimes had a spare key. I had just been introduced to them two days before, but I had no idea if they were home or not. Again, fortunately, someone was home, and I was able to get back in the house, on the road, and only be 5 minutes late for church.


I also want to recount some oddities that I have encountered so far during my short 1.5 wks in Cali: (mainly just at Ames)

My lab goggles: Yes, I look like I never left the 80's, though I was only in that decade for 6 months and 5 days. These glasses kind of remind me of some that my dad had back then... These apparently are the only goggles my lab purchases, though I have seen other labs with nicer glasses. They do beat having those great chemical splash goggles I wear at SPU, as I don't have to have them wearing permanent bruise lines into my face. I do wear my goggles almost all day, (and sometimes forget them on my head and bring them home...) as I am in the lab all day. I do now have a desk, but it is a 5+ minute walk to another building, so I might as well just stay in the lab space.

The guy in the top hat: I could not get a good picture, as he and I were walking in different directions when I tried to snap this subtly, but this guy was dressed up in nice black pants, shoes, vest, blue shirt, tie and a TOP HAT!!! Not a "normal" smallish one either - this black top had rivaled the size of the Mad-Hatter's from Alice in Wonderland! I tried later to take a better picture, but I think he saw me pause walking with my cellphone in the air, so I had to scurry off. :(

The old man in my lab building: There is this really old man, probably my grandpa's age, who walks by my lab all the time. I haven't yet caught his name or snapped a picture of him, but he is so fun to watch. I just see him constantly move down and up the hallway, usually toting a paper Trader Joe's bag behind him. He is kind of hunched over, and often wears a yellow shirt and kaki pants, but is always smiling. He also had a gauze bandage on his forehead for a few days, so I wonder what he might have done to himself. I would love to know where he works exactly and what he does, as I imagine him as this super smart scientist who just loves his job and work too much to call it quits and retire to a life of golfing. (Though, perhaps, maybe he does golf, as we have a course on our base...with the 'Tee-1 Cafe'...)

The squirrels here: We have some funny squirrels at SPU, who run everywhere and dig in our garbage, but her in Cali they have black squirrels. It is kind of weird. I don't know if I have ever seen a black squirrel before coming here. Maybe it's a product of all the smog emissions....

Business Hours at Ames: If you want to catch anyone, don't look before 11am or after 3pm. Or during 12-1, lunch hour, unless you search the cafeteria. No one is here. It is kind of strange to me, how flexible everyone is with their hours and how eveyone tends to come in late in the morning. Apparently, people also stay late, like past 6 pm, but I have yet to see it. I told someone today that I come in at 7:30 or 8 am, depending on whether I carpool or not, and he looked shocked. I, for one, prefer to have my afternoons/evenings rather than sleep in during the morning hours and stay til sundown. Besides, traffic is lighter earlier in the mornings. (See a connection?)

P.S. This is Tessy, the Sayre's dog.