Best summer ever?

I know, it's been over a year since my last post. But I've been planning this post for awhile now. Labor Day weekend, I would post about all of the awesome things that have happened this summer. And I would talk about how it's been the best summer that I can remember in adulthood (it's hard to eclipse the endless summers of childhood). But then I received the terrible news that my dear friend Anne passed away yesterday. I talked to her husband Rick last weekend and she was supposed to start chemo on Monday (not even a week ago!) and the prognosis was good. And now she's gone. I'm so sad to think that I will never see her again, and my heart aches for Rick who is suffering so much. But I'm going to make this post anyway. It's hard to know where to start.
Work life: I finally got a proposal funded! My proposal to the "Energy for Sustainability" program at NSF was well-reviewed and my collaborators and I have been awarded support for 3 years. This will enable me to hire a new graduate student to start working on this project. The funding wasn't official until this week, but I received the first unofficial notice while visiting my two best friends from high school (more about that later). It was very nice to be able to celebrate with them. And my research group has published several papers this summer as well - including one in a very good journal that we have been endlessly revising since we first submitted it nearly a year ago. Now hopefully we can leverage that into funding for that project.
The house and yard: I've had a lot of fun fixing up the house this spring/summer, will post photos soon. My parents came out for a weekend and helped me put in an awesome flower garden. It's an endless delight. And I had a patio installed, it's a wonderful place to sit and enjoy the flowers and birds. My veggie garden has been plagued with bunnies - 4 nests, meaning about 30 baby bunnies. I complain a lot about these, but in reality the dear little things are delightfully cute. The real problem is that dog likes to catch them and eat them. Fun for dog, painful for me to watch and unimaginably awful for the bunnies. I've installed an owl house and hope to attract one of the local barred owls to move in. Then hopefully mama rabbit won't think my garden is a safe place for her broods.
Other stuff:
(1) Surprisingly, "Lord of the Rings" had one-day re-release in the theatre. My awesome friend DeDe and I caught each showing. Which reminds me of Anne - my then-husband and I met Anne and Rick at a Lord of the Rings fan event. Charlie and I were sitting by ourselves, didn't know anyone. Anne came up to us, introduced herself, and invited us to sit with her, Rick and their friend Becky. That's exactly how she was - always thinking of others and making them feel welcome.
(2) George RR Martin's "Game of Thrones" series finally had a new installment. I had been waiting for nearly 7 years for info on some of my favorite characters, so it's an understatement to say that I devoured that book. And I should add that Anne and Rick were the ones who introduced me to those books. I'm so sorry that I never got to discuss the newest book or the HBO series with her.
(3) *Awesome* Chicago get-together with my two best girls from high school. I finally got to meet Mary Kate's husband and kids, who were even more wonderful than I expected. The last time the three of us had been together was at my wedding nearly 11 years ago. And before *that* we were last together for a brief visit in 1996. That was one year after our high school graduation and to celebrate being back together again, we all got a small tattoo. So *this time* we got tattoos again. Shannon and Mary Kate went small again, but I decided to go all out and get the tattoo that I had really wanted the first time. I got this great red/black/yellow dragon across my upper back. I love it. I should post a photo, but am too lazy. And of course, it reminds me of the pirate ship that Anne and Rick built in their back yard, "The Red Dragon's Revenge" (http://www.reddragonsrevenge.com/).
(4) Family get-together in Gatlinburg. We finally made it back to the Chalet that we had all visited back in '94 and '98. We had a great time and missed those who couldn't be there. We should do it again soon!

Korea trip, addendum

I forgot to mention one of the many things that I liked about Korea. In an elevator, if you pushed the wrong button, you could cancel your choice by pushing the button again. A very simple on/off toggle feature. Why can't we do that in American elevators?

Korea trip

In contrast to my spring trip to the extremely underdeveloped country of Belize, I visited the extremely OVERdeveloped country of Korea in early June. The purpose of the trip was to attend the 8th bi-annual Metabolic Engineering conference. This was an excellent opportunity for me to network with the big names in my research area and get a feel for what other groups are doing. I also had the great fortune of traveling with two of my good friends from graduate school - Katy Kao and Ganesh Sriram, both of whom are also Assistant Professors.We arrived in Seoul 4 days before the conference started, with gracious hosting from three friends from UCLA who are now professors in Korea. This provided us with the opportunity to present brief research seminars at Korea University and Busan University, as well as tour these two cities. These guys were saints to endure the endless questions from three very curious visitors.
I hadn't previously realized that Seoul is the 2nd most densely populated city in the world - 2nd only to Tokyo. But I certainly believe it. It was a very crowded city, but more than anything, it reminded me of Los Angeles, with difficult-to-read signs. I was constantly amused to spot American chain restaurants that aren't available in Ames: TGI Friday's, Outback, and Baskin Robbins, just to name a few. I was also very embarrassed to spot a Hooter's (sigh). Ganesh and I had a fun contest going to see who would we could find first - another blond (like me) or another Indian (like him). Ganesh claimed to see a gaggle of blonds at one of the tourist spots in Seoul, but it was clear that the game was over in Busan, which had a large Indian student population.
One of our hosts had earned his PhD at UCLA, and thus he and his wife lived in Los Angeles for several years. At dinner, I asked her what she missed most about LA, and was astonished when she mentioned a "really great Korean restaurant in Korea town". Seriously? You live in Seoul and the thing you miss most about LA is the good Korean food?
We lucked out in Busan - apparently it is very popular to eat live squid in some places on the coast. They bring a live octopus to your table, cut off a leg and you eat it while it's still squirming. It's even suggested to dip it in sesame oil so that it can't use its suckers to attach to your tongue. I don't like my food to look at me (think of cooked fish served whole), much less for my food to actively WATCH me eat it. Thank goodness we never got into the situation of having to deal with this type of meal.
After having a good time touring Seoul and Busan, we flew to Jeju Island, the site of the conference. Jeju is the Hawaii of Korea, with many people going there for their honeymoon. There is also a volcano in the middle of the island, but it was obscured by clouds during our stay.
The flight from Busan to Jeju was very short, but something quite embarrassing happened. Katy and I were sitting next to each other and talking and laughing. This woman in front of us kept giving us that "look", you know, when you halfway look over your shoulder at people who are annoying you? Everytime she did that, we tried to pipe down, but would inevitably start talking again, but then the woman turned around and said "quiet!". I was so taken aback - it was only an hour long flight and it was 10 in the morning. Other people were talking normally and I don't think we were behaving inappropriately. It was the only time I have been happy to have a crying baby on my flight. She could shush me, but good luck trying to shush the crying baby. Humph. I just wonder if she found us especially annoying because we were speaking English.
The conference was great and I won't go into much detail. On the last evening there was a closing dinner with some excellent performers. It reminded me of the Korean dances that my friend Kristine arranged for a zoo dinner years ago. Here are some videos:




After all of the performances, they had all of us engineers join in for one dance. I was horrified, but grudgingly admit that it was fun. I think it helped that alcohol had been served with dinner.
Perhaps the greatest adventure of all was getting home. I had made a terrible mistake when booking my flights - I was to fly from Jeju Island on the first flight of the morning to Seoul, then after 2-hour layover I was to fly from Seoul to Tokyo then to Detroit, then to Des Moines. The problem was that the 2-hour layover in Seoul involved not just changing planes, but changing AIRPORTS. People who were familiar with both airports agreed that this was feasible, but tight. Once I realized the problem, I tried for several days to find a viable solution. It was possible to fly from Jeju to Tokyo and catch my connecting flight to Detroit, but if I missed my Seoul -> Tokyo flight, Delta was going to charge me $2,000 to rebook the Tokyo -> Detroit -> Des Moines flights. ARGH! So I made a mad dash through two airports with all of my luggage in tow. Finally I made it to my gate, and collapsed in relief in my bulkhead (yeah!) seat, only to see to my growing horror that I was seated next to a young couple that had twin toddlers, one of who was already crying. And she cried and kicked (and kicked me!) for the next two hours, before I finally begged the flight attendant to find me another seat, practically clutching at her sleeve out of desperation. Things got even more interesting in Tokyo, when I bumped into an old college friend that I hadn't seen in at least 10 years. He was on his way home from a trip to Guam. Crazy.
Finally I made it home. Overall the long flights were not nearly as bad as I had anticipated and the jet lag wasn't so bad either. I'm looking forward to more travel experiences in the future. There are pictures from the trip here.

Belize trip, addendum

I forgot to relate two incidents/observations from the Belize trip.
The first night in our lodging at Kings College, I locked myself into my room. I shut to door to change clothes and when I went to re-open the door, the knob came off in my hand. The two students and I had a good laugh as we communicated through the door and I finally found a way to operate the latch mechanism using the handle of a comb.
Kings College had a very regimented schedule for the students. That being said, there wasn't much for the three of us to do after dinner time, as all of the students, teachers and staff had prescribed activities. So we would head back to our cabin, sit in the hard kitchen-style chairs, chat about the day and good-naturedly argue over who could have access to my laptop (with no internet). We didn't even have cell phone service. So I frequently went to bed around 8pm, even though I wasn't tired. This led to a lot of jokes about why people in similar living situations have such large families; come evening, there isn't much left to do, except well, you know.
Similar ideas explored here:
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/world/asia/article6695338.ece

Belize trip

Over spring break I had the excellent opportunity to supervise a trip to Belize by Iowa State's "Engineers without Borders" group. The group included 2 graduate students and 5 undergraduates. A great time was had by all and everyone returned home safe and sound.
The official purpose of the trip was to construct solar fruit dryers for two communities in Belize. The previous summer, a few members of the group had visited Trinidad village with the hopes of finding some common interests/needs for projects. One of the needs was a lack of nutritious snacks at the elementary school. Fresh fruit abounds in bursts, but there are no long-term storage options and thus some fruit goes to waste and there are times that fruit is not available. Given that sunshine is plentiful in Belize, our ISU group proposed the idea of constructing solar fruit dehydrators, and worked on the project in Ames during the fall, even building and testing a few prototype units. The dehydrator design focused on using materials that would be available in Belize, with simple construction plans and safe and simple operating procedures.

With the plans in hand and the necessary approval from EWB and ISU, we set out for a week in Belize. In addition to constructing and testing the dehydrator, we planned to help a boarding school improve their menu and fresh produce options, to build a town sign for our partner village and assess the opportunities for future projects. We had a few small grants to cover supplies and a portion of the travel expenses, but all participants covered the majority of the travel costs out of their own pockets.
Getting there was incredibly easy - we boarded an early morning flight in Chicago and were in Belize City in time for lunch. We had a driver who met us at the airport and spent the whole week with us - he was a great guy and an invaluable resource. I had never been to central america (outside of a brief drive to Tijuana from LA, where we never even got out of the car) and was not sure what to expect. This country is unbelievably under-developed - there is only one movie theatre in the whole country and not even one McDonald's. I kept joking that central america is known for producing sugar, coffee and chocolate and I had a very hard time getting any of those! But, it's not incredibly poor either. Most people are able to meet their basic needs and everyone was very friendly. You couldn't walk down the street without people greeting you and exchanging pleasantries. No one was too busy to stop and talk - in Belize that was wonderful, in Iowa it would drive me nuts.
Our base of operations was Orange Walk Town. It's near the western boarder of Belize and is within driving distance of our partner village of Trinidad. There is a great hotel there - Hotel de la Fuenta, and that is where we stayed. The majority of our group stayed in Orange Walk, in order to build a dehydrator for the elementary school in Trinidad and discuss future projects with the town council there. Myself and two other students headed to a boarding high school (Kings College) in a more isolated part of the country. Students of the school arrive on Monday morning and stay in the dorm all week, then return home on Friday. Teachers live on campus with their families. Due to the long travel time to this school, the three of us stayed overnight at Kings College for several days. One dehydrator was built there, but our major purpose in visiting the school was to help with their menu planning. Since the school is so remote, it is difficult for them to acquire fresh produce. For that reason, the principal was hoping to build a school garden. One of our group members is an agronomy student, so we used her expertise to advise on this project. I was particularly interested in talking with the science teachers, as they need some help developing lab experiments that can be performed with their limited resources; both of these are excellent opportunities for future projects.
Finally, we had a bit of fun on our last day. We took a boat cruise down the river from Orange Walk Town to the Mayan ruins of Lamanai. At the ruins we learned about Mayan culture and even climbed a pyramid or two. We also saw lots of wildlife, both at the site and on the river. We even stopped at one point along the river to visit with a pair of spider monkeys - one boarded the boat and helped herself to some fruit.
Overall it was a great trip. The weather there was wonderful and an excellent contrast to the snow and mess that we left behind in Iowa. The people we met were so friendly and had a lot to offer - I look forward to future interactions on future trips. We are hoping to go back over fall break of this year. There are more pictures here.

new kitty

Shortly after my last post (i.e. more than 6 months ago), I went out and got a new kitty. For years I had planned that my "next" cat would be a yellow male tabby that I could name Tyrion, after a beloved book character. So in early January I headed to the local pet rescue and brought home this sweet guy.
He's very sweet and friendly. I have yet to see him show any aggression to the other cat or towards Sheba, or to even see him hiss at or bite anything. He actually seems to like Sheba, frequently rubbing up against her (the feeling is not mutual as Sheba gets away as soon as she can). He has taken over many of Cassie's old jobs, including meeting me at the door in the evening, letting me know when it's time for cat feeding (starting about an hour before it's ACTUALLY time for cat feeding) and supervising the food prep.
He adapted well to life in this house. The first few days were full of excursions to inappropriate places, such as the top of the stove and behind the washer and dryer. After living in a cage for 6 months, he also seemed to struggle with 3D, as he would frequently, and seemingly randomly, roll right off the bed and sofa. But he does quite well now. The next order of business to for him to learn his name. Judging from my other male cat, this could take years.
He's always game for being held and petted and has a nice loud purr to share. I still miss Cassie and her big personality very much, but am glad to have this sweet guy around. Once again, I can't say enough good thing about animals from the pet rescue. There are more pictures of him here.

Christmases past

20062007
2008
2009

still doing stained glass

As the weather has gotten colder, I've resumed doing the stained glass projects. I've attended two wonderful workshops at the local "Works of Glass" facility where I took classes and bought all of my supplies.
One was for a hanging garden:
and one was for a bay-leaf wreath. The first workshop for this project filled up before I could get my name on the list and I was very disappointed. I was so glad that they opened up another class. I spent a large amount of my "snow day" working on the pieces for this one. It now hangs in my office:
And finally I finished my first completely independent project here at home:
I've spent the past few days cutting the pieces for a new copper-foil project (a yellow bird with red flowers, ISU colors). I still need to foil and solder that project, so it probably won't be finished for at least another week. I *do* need to get back to work soon. And as a mark of a true stained glass enthusiast, I recently bought a piece of glass just because it was pretty. I don't know yet what I will do with it, but I'm sure the appropriate project will come along.

new sofa

Since I moved to Florida in August 2006 I've had a second-hand sofa/loveseat set. White furniture is not a good match with three pets and though I've frequently unstuffed and washed the cushions in order to remove the "Sheba sheen", the arms of the couch were not washable. Therefore I bought a new couch as a self birthday/Christmas present. This is my first piece of brand-new furniture and I love it. It looks gray-ish in this photo, but is actually a dark forest green.
I'm keeping it covered with a sheet, which obscures it's beauty but hopefully will keep it clean. This, my last picture of Cassie, clearly shows her dedication to being my anti-helper.