July 21, 2010

Yesterday was the second meeting for Science Club for Girls. For those of you who don't know, I lead the 1st grade club at a chinese school in downtown Boston. Yesterday our lesson plan was centered on bubbles! We learned about the colors in bubbles, the shape of bubbles, the differences between big and little bubbles and the elasticity of bubbles. The girls had a lot of fun!

I had less fun. The club was bookended by two difficult events. The first was the late arrival of one little girls who was in tears! She was inconsolable for the first few minutes following her arrival. Luckily, you may not be surprised to learn, bubbles go a long way in consoling a six year old girl! The second memorable event launched when one of the girls wet her pants, leaving a large puddle of pee on the classroom floor. I had the honor of taking her to the bathroom to help her clean up. I think I handled it fairly well considering I was trying not to gag while cleaning up her pee...ugh. I washed my hands a lot!

Here are some pictures of us playing with bubbles!

July 12, 2010 part b

Last night I dreamt that I moved back to California to work at JPL. The lab had the same layout, but all the equipment had been updated. Also, Governor Schwarzenegger was there to welcome me back (we were pals, apparently). Everyone else was there, too! Adam, Liana, Margie, George, Amy! Ken!

I also dreamt that I had really dry skin. To combat this, I used butter as a moisturizer. Go figure.

july 12, 2010

I am a jealous person, maybe I should use the word envious...does that sound better?

Currently, I am envious of people who blog regularly and whose blogs are interesting enough that they have followers; well, followers that are unknown to me.

I am envious of people who play games well. I play WoW (among other things), and I do alright, but I know other people who are phenomenal at games! I look up to these people, in a sad, pathetic sort of way.

I am envious of people who have swimming pools. I don't swim a lot, but I do like to lay by the pool and get a tan. It's no fun to lay out in the sun without a significant (read "pool sized or larger") body of water near by.

I am envious of people who have 9-5 jobs. This is not to say that I work longer hours, just that i know that i ought to. I would like to keep my same schedule without feeling so guilty about it.

I get really jealous (this word works here) of guest stars on the Supernumberone podcast! I wanna do it!

There're a lot of other things. These are the things I am thinking of now.

kisses!

May 17, 2010

In last night's dream I was in an old house with my co-workers Ashleigh and Heather. The house had recently been flooded and we were trying to assess the damage to figure out if we could use the space for a lab. As we were walking up the stairs from the basement, and alligator came out of nowhere and began attacking Ashleigh (she complained that "it tickled")! I used something sharp to cut off the gator's tail, which startled it enough that the three of us were able to make it to the top of the stairs where we quickly shut the door. The gator was small, though, and managed to wriggle under the door. I opened the door and kicked it back down the stairs and stuffed some jeans in the gap, hoping that would keep the gator contained. Nope, the alligator chewed through the jeans and started coming under the door, again! I had to kick it and fight with it. The gator's blood was bright orange with black specks (like pepper) in it...it was gross; it made me vomit...my vomit was bright pink like Pepto Bismol.

We won the fight, but what the heck?

I also dreamt that Steven came home in the middle of the night with a new picnic table, which I had to go back to the store to pay for the next day.

April 23, 2010

The other day I had a weird dream about taking a standardized text. It wasn't a normal test like the SAT or GRE, the questions were a bit more abstract. For example, I remember the first question was about an ancient Greek goddess:


The Goddess of Justice is perpetually plagued with the thought that her punishments are, in fact, unjust. She is currently waging an underwater battle with an unjust god. In light of the goddess's fears, which of the following scenarios would be the most ironic:


I then had four scenarios to choose from. I was not prepared to do well on this test.

March 17, 2010

Happy St. Patrick's Day

I am about to go to a group meeting. Given by a woman who has ~60 slides. Kill me!

March 3, 2010

Tonight is WoW night. Tonight is the night I play WoW. If it is ever a Wednesday night and you are thinking to yourself, "what is April doing," I am probably playing WoW.

WoW = World of Warcraft. I have been playing regularly since December 2008. Wednesday's I play with Kevin and Andrew. Join us on Thunderlord if you subscribe...Wednesday nights at 8pm eastern, 7pm central (5pm pacific? if you are home from work?).

February 26, 2010

My co-worker Heather and I entered the National Science Foundation's "International Science and Engineering Visualization Challenge" last fall. We were informed in November that we were finalists, but, sadly, did not end up winning. However, I want to share a link to the website that showcases the winners (we entered the Photography challenge), because I think it really demonstrates how beautiful science can be.

http://www.sciencemag.org/special/vis2009/show/

Some of the photographs would appear quite mundane in real life. It took the creative minds of researchers to take the usual and make it beautiful, meaningful and accessible.

Below is the image we submitted and it's would be caption. It's called "Icy Slopes". I admit, it's not as beautiful as the winners, but I liked it.

The image was obtained using a scanning tunneling microscope. The unique capabilities of this instrument allowed for molecular resolution of dibutylselenide (DBSe) molecules adsorbed on a Au (111) surface. The herringbone reconstruction of the Au (111) surface acts as a template for patterning the DBSe. DBSe preferentially adsorbs in the wider region of the herringbone as evidenced by the dense packing of molecules in those areas of the surface.

The DBSe molecules look like individual snow-capped peaks leading off into the distance. Each of these "molecular mountains" is in reality less than one trillionth the size of Mt. Everest. These molecules align along their central selenium atoms with their alkyl tails parallel to one another. The molecules will line up either along or against the herringbone directions, depending on how much space is available, to maximize the number of molecules that can fit within a given area. Self-assembly allows the individual DBSe molecules to be the building blocks for patterning areas on much larger size scales.

February 24, 2010

Yes I am blogging from work, so what?

One year ago today (a.k.a. February 24, 2009) I went on a first date with a dashing gentleman. We hit it off, and tonight we will celebrate our anniversary. We will revisit the site of our first date, where we haven't been since our one month celebration last March. I am looking forward to some delicious sushi at Harvard Square's Takemura. If we still have room after dinner we plan on getting dessert at Finale just around the corner.

On another note it's been raining here for ~24 hours, and all weather reports indicate that it will continue to rain until Saturday. That's, like, a billion days of rain! That's too much rain, if you ask me.

February 22, 2010

Well, it's been almost a year since I posted anything. It's hard for me to stay in the habit of writing, but I hope no one has been too disappointed.

This past weekend we (Steve and I) went to a "Breakfast for Dinner" party at my friend Jenny's place. Jenny and I met a couple of years ago through a mutual friend, and we've stayed in contact on and off since then. We don't see each other often, but we follow each other on Twitter, and that's almost like having a conversation. Break-ner was delicious (please to be telling me where to find that waffle mix!) and we met some good people. Didn't get any contact info, but good people nonetheless.

On Sunday I hosted a Mark. party. My friend Cristy is a Mark. cosmetics representative (it's an Avon brand...cheaper than Avon products), and I volunteered to be a hostess. The perks of hosting include (1) discount for hosting, (2) discount for every dollar spent and (3) not having to leave my home. She demonstrated a "dramatic/evening look" on me; everyone said it was hot, but I thought it was...let's say "dramatic" (to use her words). Nevertheless, I bought some products and a package of makeup removing wipes. I look forward to what other looks I can come up with on my own.

ttyl!

march 18, 2009

being a graduate student isn't as glamorous as it sounds. i am sure some of you imagine me sitting at my desk or in the lab coming up with and carrying out amazing experiments that will change the world as we know it.

not the case. today is a prime example:

for the past few days i have noticed that our rotary pump smelled funky and was leaking a bit. i decided to change the oil and investigate the leak. i spent the last two hours dealing with the stinkiest pump oil ever created. think of rotten eggs mixed with the stench of death. it was gross. i still have no idea where the leak is coming from, but the pump and it's oil are now clean and back in use.

march 11, 2009

remember back in september when i wrote about that dude i met at a party? the one with the conveniently not mentioned girlfriend? we've seen each other a few times since then at other parties. i've even met his girlfriend (she's annoying). each time, we have a very similar interaction in which he flirts a little and buys me a beer or something, and i go home annoyed.

i went bowling with the prospective students at last weekend's open house. i was putting away my stuff when i heard someone say "hey april!" it was the dude. he was bowling with a couple of people in the lane next to ours. we chatted a bit while we were bowling, but for the most part kept to our respective groups. i am happy to say that i didn't get the least bit annoyed. i must have moved on...what's that about?

march 9, 2009

it's snowing this morning, after a beautiful weekend of 60 degree weather. i don't think i'll get used to this manic climate.

i had a fantastic weekend. our department had an open house for prospective graduate students, and i got to meet a lot of new people and eat a lot of free food on saturday.

speaking of new people, i had a date on sunday. this was our fourth. i'm terribly smitten, and he brought flowers, to boot!

march 3, 2009

I love this song.

Many Shades of Black by The Racontuers

Go ahead, go ahead,
And smash it on the floor
Take whatever's left
And take it with you out the door...

See if I cry,
see if I shed a single sorry tear
I can't say that it's been that great
No, in fact it's been a wasted-free year

Everybody sees
And everyone agrees
That you and I are wrong
And it's been that way too long

Take it as it comes
and be thankful when it's done
There's so many ways to act
and there's many shades of black
There's so many shades of black
There's so many shades of black

Let it out (let it all out) let it all out
Say what's on your mind
You can kick and scream
and shout and say things
That are so unkind.

Yeah,
See if I care
And see if I stand firm or if I fall
Cause in the back of my mind,
and on the tip of my tongue
is the answer to it all...

And everybody sees
And everyone agrees
That you and I are wrong
And it's been that way too long

Take it as it comes
and be thankful when it's done
There's so many ways to act
and there's many shades of black,
There's so many shades of black,
Yeah, there's many shades of black

Yeah...
Everybody sees
And everyone agrees
That you and I are wrong
And it's been that way too long

So take it as it comes
and be thankful when it's done
There's so many ways to act
and you cannot take it back
no you cannot take it back
there's so many shades of black,
There's so many shades of black,
Yeah, there's many shades of black
there's so many shades of black
there's so many shades of black
Yeah, there's many shades of black
there's so many shades of black
Yeah, there's many shades of black
there's so many shades of black

march 2, 2009

i've gotten into a groove of not having lots of work to do in the evenings since i'm not taking/teaching classes this semester. it's super nice.

as i write this, i have the cutest little kitty (bean) sitting next to me wondering why she doesn't have a spot in my lap. i think she's more than a tad jealous.

call me!

january 24, 2009

What do a bunch of graduate students who have spent the day on the mountain and all their money on lift tickets, ski gear, hotel rooms and beer do for fun on a Saturday night? Jenga! This is a video clip of my turn. We were sure it was going to fall (I think you can hear ashleigh say, "it's gonna go right now" at some point). The game continued for about an hour after this. We were masters for a night. PS - I had no idea she was taking a video.

january 19, 2009

that's a lot of snow. do i sound like a broken record?

january 12, 2009

mother nature is pummeling this area

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Now playing: The Flaming Lips - In The Morning Of The Magicians
via FoxyTunes with snow. this is not exactly what i signed up for.

january 7, 2009

The New Year - Death Cab for Cutie

so this is the new year.
and i don't feel any different.
the clanking of crystal
explosions off in the distance (in the distance).

so this is the new year
and I have no resolutions
for self assigned penance
for problems with easy solutions

so everybody put your best suit or dress on
let's make believe that we are wealthy for just this once
lighting firecrackers off on the front lawn
as thirty dialogues bleed into one

i wish the world was flat like the old days
then i could travel just by folding a map
no more airplanes, or speedtrains, or freeways
there'd be no distance that can hold us back.

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Now playing: Death Cab For Cutie - The New Year
via FoxyTunes

december 20, 2008

I, April, the laziest woman you know (or so you thought) got out early today, my day off, to shovel snow off of the sidewalk. This was no small task, as it snowed almost a foot yesterday!

Now, I am back bed putting off the inevitable (laundry and packing!)