Hmm, I reread my entry from yesterday and it sounds way more upbeat about my classes than I remember feeling. However, I definately am more in tune with it today, now that I decided to drop the class with the half a book to read. I found out that another class I had been interested does not conflict with one of my other classes and that it had just been an error in the course catalog, so gone is the five credit class that I'm sure would have been interesting, but also driven me to a shallow grave.
So, unless something major changes, I'll be taking Hydrodynamics, Rivers, Channels and Streams (a fancy, more attractive name for Open Channel Flow), Privitization of Water Supply and Sanitation, Physical Hydrogeology, and Sailing. So I'll still get a policy class in, as well as a geology.
I'm still a bit lost in Hydrodynamics, so if anyone understands Einstein's Summation Convention, I'd love to hear about it, but so is everyone else, and the TA is going to help us, so I think by next week I'll probably be on better ground.
And I went to my first swim practice with the Masters team here on campus. They seem nice, but let me tell you, swimming in an outdoors pool when its a windy 60 degrees is not that fun. But at least the pool seems really warm.
California misconception #1: The weather's great because its been 70-80 degrees and sunny every day. WRONG! It may reach 80 every day, but the mornings and evenings are in the 50s, and it doesn't get sunny until the middle of the day, so you need to dress for 80, when its boiling, with layers for the 50s, since its around that when I leave for class. Not quite what I had expected.
Someday, when my bike arrives, I'll be able to appreciate having the nice big campus to roam around. But until then, I'm not so silently cursing that my classes are over a 20 minute walk from my apartment, which wouldn't be so bad if I didn't have a big blister on my foot.
Otherwise, my first day of classes was pretty good. I definately realized exactly how little I remember of math from the undergrad years, and am glad that I brought along my Calculus and Differential Equantions texts for some review. However, I haven't had a chance to look at them yet since I've been busy trying to read half a book for tomorrow for one of my policy classes, a really interesting sounding class on the environment and development in third world countries. The class will definately kick my ass, but I think its probably worth it.
I did take a break from my reading last night to be social, though, and met a whole bunch of grad students at some social events. And discovered yet another Tufts grad who's here, which makes two Tufts grads and two people from high school that are here. I'm sure there are many more, but those are just the ones I've run into in my first week here.
OK, back to reading....
Click for the full tour
I didn't realize that although my site looks perfect in Firefox, things are all sorts of screwed up in IE. So everyone should switch to Firefox because tabbed browsing is where it's at, but I'm going to do my best today to figure out what's wrong.
Also on the list of tasks today is to get around to sorting through the Seattle photos and posting them, finding some interesting goings on to write about for SFist, make some phone calls and emails to friends now that I'm settled and have an address and stuff.
And of course, hang out with the bro, since he stopped in here last night on his way to Tahoe, where he's heading tomorrow to begin his life as a ski bum. I'm jealous.
So if anyone can figure out why my pages aren't looking right, please let me know. The help would be much appreciated.
The past few days have been really hectic, but it seems like I'm almost set in my apartment, and have a clue what classes I'm going to take on Monday.
First crisis in the new apartment was that my cell phone doesn't really work in my room. And by really I mean not at all. Sometimes I get one bar if I'm lucky. Obviously, this isn't ideal, but while I was at orientation today, Sam got a landline set up for me, and confirmed that I can set up call forwarding from my cell to my land line, so that should be fine for now.
Second crisis was that my packages didn't come from Fed Ex on Wednesday as expected, and I didn't have the tracking number because the receipt was among the stolen items, and no one at Fed Ex seemed to have a clue what happened to my boxes. Added to the confusion was I wasn't sure if they'd be able to find my apartment, and since my phone wasn't really working....but yesterday they called, apparently unaware that they should have delivered it the day before, and all my boxes made it.
Yesterday I made my first meal in our gloriously large kitchen and took advatage of having a freezer again to buy some ice cream. Oh, how I've missed being able to buy ice cream.
And today, after spending the morning meeting everyone in my program (there are a whopping 10 of us), and figuring our my schedule with my advisor, I made a trip to Ikea to buy a futon and some other household items. I made it a whole three days in a twin bed. And yes, sharing a twin bed was as bad as I had expected. Thankfully, the twin bed also fits perfectly in the storage closet in our apartment.
Sadly, Sam leaves tomorrow, but at least I start classes on Monday so I'll be able to distract myself.
And no, I haven't forgotten about the last of my photos, I've just been too busy to sift through them.
Since we last talked, Sam and I had a great time in Seattle with my college friend Liz, fit in a visit with my aunt and cousins on Bainbridge Island, and then drove straight south to Stanford, making a detour to see Mount St. Helens and stopping in Medford, OR overnight.
Checking in here was easy and I met two of my three roommates so far (where the third is, we have no idea). And after finally unpacking the car, walking around campus, attending a "dorm" BBQ, and making a trip to Bed Bath and Beyond and Target, I'm wiped. Photos will have to wait.
Ahh, the glory of free wireless internet in the wonderful La Qunita Inn & Suites in Coeur D'Alene, Idaho.
And without further ado, the photos:
Badlands National Park. Click for more Badlands photos
Mount Rushmore. Click for more Black Hills photos
Devil's Tower National Monument. Click on the photo for more.
Yellowstone National Park. Click for more.
Just finished a few days in the wilderness, aka South Dakota and Wyoming. We spent time in the Badlands, the Black Hills, saw Devils Tower, drove through the Big Horn National Forrest, substituted a day in the Shoshone National Forrest for the Grand Tetons, due to some road closures, and froze our fannies off in Yellowstone today.
Pictures will have to wait for a faster internet connection, but they're worth waiting for.
Next couple days are driving days - we're in Bozeman, MT now, and are planning on heading to Coeur D'Alene, Idaho, tomorrow, and ending up in Seattle by Friday.
Greetings from Souix Falls, SD.
Been doing a lot of driving the past couple days. We went from Milwaukee, where we saw the amazing Calatrava addition to the Milwaukee Art Museum, to middle of no where Wisconsin (Spring Green) to see The House on the Rock, to St. Paul, Minnesota in time for dinner with Sam's mom. Yesterday, we packed in Sam's grandma and his dad in the afternoon, followed by a tour of downtown Minneapolis with Sam's friend TJ.
And of course, we squeezed in breakfast with Sam's brother and sister-in-law this morning before hitting the road again.
Tomorrow, off to the Badlands.
The Milwaukee Art Museum. Click on the photo to see the rest.
We tried to not let the time in Chicago get ruined by the break in, and still managed to fit in a ton. We went down to the Loop and wandered around Millennium Park, walked up Michigan Ave, ate some Chicago style hot dogs, saw a show at The Second City, and still fit in a visit to Oak Park.
Oh, and I just realized that the theives took my big back pack, complete with most of my shoes for the trip and pretty much all the T-shirts I own. These guys suck!
Our drive to Chicago was uneventful, though we had to skip Fallingwater because the tours were already booked up, and we made great time. Found Stephen's house without too much trouble, and had a yummy deep dish pizza dinner at Baccino's of Lincoln Park, followed by a party for one of Stephen's friends.
However, when I woke up this morning, I found out that my car was broken in to and they had stolen, among other things, my external hard drive with all my photos from the past year, one of my huge case logic binders with half my cd's (N-Z and all soundtracks), and my credit card statements. The Chicago Police were really nice and came out to see if they could get prints from the car, but it rained in between (luckily didn't start raining until we had already taped up the window with a plastic bag), so no luck.
Oh, and the took the box with all my toilettries, because everyone wants a box of hair gel, don't they?
Last night, around midnight when I had a minor meltdown realizing there was still more cleaning up to do in my apartment before we could take off, we kissed our original plan of driving to Chicago on day one goodbye.
So here we are in Pittsburgh, at my aunt and uncle's house. Much better - we left at noon, got here around dinner time, saw my cousin and his wife as well, and we'll get to Chicago tomorrow afternoon or evening, depending on whether we end up making a detour to see Fallingwater or not.
Other highlights of the day:
- filling up my car for the first time - around 360 miles on 9.7 gallons!
- taking some minor detours due to some technical difficulties with the GPS system (i.e. our errors in using it)
- seeing some Amish in horse and buggies on one of the detours