Trekkies

I went to a Star Trek convention in Baltimore this weekend, with Andrew and the friend who went with us to the Vegas convention last year. It was great fun and a lot less tiring that the four-day marathon that was Vegas. The highlight for me was Nichelle Nichols (whom you may know as Lieutenant Uhura): she told lots of stories evoking the era when starlets would jetset around Europe, as well as explaining the work she did to encourage NASA to add gender and racial diversity to their astronaut pool. (When they originally asked for her help, they said it would be best if she could find an African-American woman, because then they could check off all the diversity boxes at once.)

Now, laugh as you may about Star Trek conventions, one thing that is really cool about them is the variety of people you see there. I'm not just talking about seeing grandmas, or people with different colored skin. I'm talking about people who don't know what hairstyle has been in fashion ever. People who were several standard deviations away from even the geeks in high school - these were the people who sat alone at lunch. But at Star Trek conventions we're all friends. We all share a passion for this crazy thing, and we're all having a blast. And that's pretty cool.

Partying hearty in the Buckeye state

I'm back! The vacation was great, which maybe you could tell, because I was too relaxed to care that I hadn't posted in over a week. Life at the new house, situated in the middle of nowhere as it is, is quite easy-going. It's not much of a stretch to say that we sat around and watched the corn grow. There was great excitement during one supper when it started pouring rain through a mainly sunny sky and we spotted a double rainbow. And I spent lot of time watching the hummingbirds that buzzed around the back porch while I'd sit out there reading.

The party was a great success. I think about 30 or 40 people showed up, and everyone feasted on Mexican food that my mother had spent days and days preparing. I hadn't realized the similarities between Mexican and Indian preparation techniques: every sauce that I helped her prepare began by roasting flavorings (in this case mainly garlic and various peppers) then pureeing them into a paste that formed the basis of the sauce.

I forgot to take pictures at the party, although I snagged a few of the cutest party attendees. Here's Andrew with Molly, the cat who adopted my parents and shows her gratitude for being allowed to sleep in the shop by bringing freshly-killed birds and mice to my clearly hungry parents.




And here's Kyla, clutching her toy of choice, an empty soda bottle. I can't imagine why she's looking so surprised - maybe she's astounded that my parents run a household with just one cat, instead of the four they have at her house?

Cornish Pasties

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Renee Michelle divulges the secrets to making authentic high quality Cornish pasties.  

Disclaimer: Beware, this video contains explicit meat images and references. 

The life of a writing woman

I've been writing, writing, writing the past few weeks. Sometimes I write about students, and then for a break, I write about teachers. Since writing is a big part of research (what's the point of having all these brilliant ideas if you don't tell anybody about them?), I'm lucky I don't dislike writing as much as some grad students I know. But I have to admit that I like having the finished project a bit more than the actual writing.

This week I've been creating presentations and posters, which is just a different kind of writing, as far as I'm concerned. (For those of not in academia, when you attend a conference, two of the most common ways to present new findings are either with talks, accompanied by Powerpoint slides, of course, or on a poster, a great vinyl sheet on which you print all your deep thoughts, then stand in front of it at prescribed times. You accost anyone foolish enough to wander by while looking vaguely interested. It's like a science fair without judges and afterwards you go out for beer instead of ice cream. )

Tomorrow night I leave for a week's vacation in tropical Ohio. I know that's not everybody's idea of paradise, but I'm hoping for lots of garage saleing combined with a week's respite from washing dishes (my mother spoils me). Bliss!

Garage Saling

There comes a point each day when I want to cut off my own hands in frustration, because they just can't get the words that I want to say up on the screen. There is some progress it my battle with the Dvorak keyboard - I'm very fast at typing 'the' and my name. But I continue to mix up the positions of the 'c' and 'r' keys. (They are right next to each other.) And I'm rather dismayed at how often I need either 'c' or 'r'.

My town (which is really just a big neighborhood) had it's annual town-wide garage sale last Saturday. Andrew and I snagged some great deals: a still-in-its-original-packaging split keyboard for my new computer at school ($3), a single-speed bicycle ($6!) that I'm going to try riding to school, and some decorations for my dad's upcoming birthday party. I look forward to this sale every year because it's rare; it seems that fewer people have garage sales in the DC area compared to Ohio. It's a good chance to get out and meet the neighbors, too, and it reminds me again why I'm glad I live in a neighborhood full of families instead of an apartment full of undergraduates.

The struggle with my fingers continues

Five days of typing on Dvorak and I'm up to 8 words per minute. Don't expect any chatty posts until I can raise that painful number a bit. For now it's, "Just the facts, ma'am, just the facts."

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