Sometimes being a graduate student is hard.
Actually, lots of the time being a graduate student is hard.
There is no instruction manual.
There is no task list.
There is no known protocol, no timesheets.
There are no known answers.
Someone hasn't already solved the problem, you can't check the solution sheet.
Heck, sometimes there aren't even questions.
For probably the first time in your life, you are left nearly completely without direction, with only a vague research question to answer... and most of the time, you also have to develop that on your own.
So what do you do?
It is, unfortunately, a question without a good answer. If I could sit here and tell you how to succeed in grad school, I would. If I could even give you a hint as to how approach one day, I would gladly pass that on. But, my friend, I am as clueless as you.
There are a few things I've learned so far, and I'm sure I'll learn more. But for you, dear friend, who are just starting out... I want to hint at what you will learn, will have to learn on your own. So maybe this isn't going to be helpful at all. But if I can give you fair warning, maybe hearing it here one of the seven times you need to hear it before learning it... will help.
Grad school is hard. Even though from the outside it looks easy, it is hard. We are entering academia. There is a ridiculous amount of work involved in that. Do not disregard the importance and value of your work.
You will run into a lot of dead ends. You will come up with a lot of ideas you aren't proud of. You will look idiotic in front of your adviser at least once a week. You will seriously, seriously doubt if you are qualified to do the work you're doing. You will stand speechless in front of the leader of your field, trying to remember your name for an introduction.
You will spend entire days writing code, testing hypotheses, running experiments and simulations, that will end up being useless. There will be days when you actually just can't do anything.
There will be lots of time you feel like an idiot, or that your project is horrible or useless. But you are not an idiot, and there will be some good that comes out of it.
I know, this sounds really depressing. And sometimes it is! But take heart in the fact that one day, you will make a difference through your work. In the meantime, think about this: what else would you be doing? They say that those in a PhD program not only belong in a PhD program, but that we have no other choice: we learn and continue to learn because we must. As Ranier Maria Rilke describes for writers in his Letters to a Young Poet,
“Find out the reason that commands you to write; see whether it has spread its roots into the very depth of your heart; confess to yourself you would have to die if you were forbidden to write.”
And remember that you are not alone. There are lots of people in your situation, and a lot of Nobel Laureates were just as confused as you feel right now, in the same place as you.
Try not to get frustrated. Keep the big picture in your mind. Wear sunscreen.
The best thing is to know when you've reached a limit. When you're at capacity, and being in the lab will do no more good... don't stare at your computer screen any longer. Go outside, breathe some air. Do something that is fulfilling to you- read a book, play the guitar, call a family member. Learn to recognize when you are not being useful... and use that time to relax a little, and enjoy yourself. You will be far more energized to get back to work and make up that time (no one cares which days of the week you work!).
And remember, the most important scientific discoveries have come about by mistake. And stupidity is important.
Friday, September 23, 2011
Tuesday, September 20, 2011
Everyday Hope
A few days ago, I wrote about the importance of hope, for a country, for a group of people.
Since that time I've had a chance to discuss this with several people, and I have realized my emphasis was all wrong.
What I meant to display is the importance of hope in the lives of every one of us. There are many kinds of hope- and one way to think about it is through three important groups, great, middling, and everyday hopes.
Many people have what we might call a "great hope". Often this is a hope for their life, the overall impact they will have on the world, or for the world in general. Some of these hopes are selfish, some are incredibly selfless, and some are nonsensical. These great hopes tend to give their hope-ers a sense of purpose in their lives. They tend to pop up in every huge decision, every relationship, every career choice that their hope-er makes in their life.
For some, this is a religious principle; a deeply held belief about their purpose; a recognition of their talent and place in the world; an insatiable need to be in the public eye, or make lots of money, or find the gold at the end of the rainbow of life. One might also call these "life-hopes". These tend to last a lifetime, but are found at any point within that- some not until a hope-er is on his or her deathbed does the meaning of their life and the choices they made become clear.
Then there are "middling hopes". These tend to influence a hope-er's behaviour for a long time, and are often big goals for careers, lifestyle, home life, relationships, et cetera. They seem to affect most decisions in a certain area of life- how one acts in the workplace, how one pursues love, how one raises children, how one spends free time for some period. These are the "directors" of life. Nearly every person has these hopes and dreams and goals, whether they last a career or just help get you through university.
These are incredibly important in a person's life, and yet many of these hopes are formed around fleeting passions that occur due to one experience, one influence, or one fear. They are often not divinely or conscientiously inspired, they do not reflect the basic human needs of the hope-er or others around them, and yet they are very powerful. Inflexibility turns these hopes into goals, tangible aspirations, and can lead a person down an ill-advised path.
And finally, we have everyday hopes. Everyday hopes get us from point A to point B. They can be a hope that at the end of the day you'll get to see your lover. That it will stop raining by sundown so you can get to the baseball game, or the market will have those fresh figs you want for dessert. That you'll make it through the next two weeks of work until you have a vacation. That you'll be able to get up in the morning and start another day, the world will not have crumbled to dust as you sleep, and your mistakes will not follow you from day to day.
At some point, we all get stuck in everyday hopes; they are the only thing that keep us alive- the hope that one foot will end up in front of the other, that tomorrow might be better than today was.
Some people live entirely on everyday hope. There is much debate on whether it is a shame that everyone doesn't have a "great hope", and the responsibility of those who do have a great hope to help others find their own meaning of life. Some argue that the world needs the "accountants and secretaries" (a-la HHGTTG) to make it run smoothly, so that those who will have an impact will be able to do so, and the everybody doesn't end up trying to out-do each other in pursuing their great hopes to make the planet a better place. But then the question is, who should get to have a great hope, and who should not? Is there some kind of meritocracy of hope?
Somehow the world seems to figure this out for us. Some people do choose to live on everyday hope. But it is incredibly difficult to watch those you know well, who have great potential to have a wonderful impact on the entire planet through success in a field of science or public speaking or planning or resources management or psychology or faith, give in to the easy choice of living on everyday hope.
Perhaps the only thing that is worse... is to see them not live at all.
We all need all kinds of hope, in different dosages, to get through our lives. The more hope, the better; the happier humankind, the more success and the more we are able to work together; the more potential is realized, and the more impact we have on each other. Humans are social animals. We need societal hope, as well. I wish only to bemoan the loss of societal hope, and seemingly along with it the loss of deeply personal hopes that form each life.
It would be grand if we could all realize our potential to do good things for this world, for those we love, and for those we don't even know. But sometimes we have to live with everyday hopes. In a bastardized form of ee cummings' poem, let us continue to hope, and if you pray:
i thank you, God, for most this amazing day...
and the possibility that tomorrow might be an even better one.
Since that time I've had a chance to discuss this with several people, and I have realized my emphasis was all wrong.
What I meant to display is the importance of hope in the lives of every one of us. There are many kinds of hope- and one way to think about it is through three important groups, great, middling, and everyday hopes.
Many people have what we might call a "great hope". Often this is a hope for their life, the overall impact they will have on the world, or for the world in general. Some of these hopes are selfish, some are incredibly selfless, and some are nonsensical. These great hopes tend to give their hope-ers a sense of purpose in their lives. They tend to pop up in every huge decision, every relationship, every career choice that their hope-er makes in their life.
For some, this is a religious principle; a deeply held belief about their purpose; a recognition of their talent and place in the world; an insatiable need to be in the public eye, or make lots of money, or find the gold at the end of the rainbow of life. One might also call these "life-hopes". These tend to last a lifetime, but are found at any point within that- some not until a hope-er is on his or her deathbed does the meaning of their life and the choices they made become clear.
Then there are "middling hopes". These tend to influence a hope-er's behaviour for a long time, and are often big goals for careers, lifestyle, home life, relationships, et cetera. They seem to affect most decisions in a certain area of life- how one acts in the workplace, how one pursues love, how one raises children, how one spends free time for some period. These are the "directors" of life. Nearly every person has these hopes and dreams and goals, whether they last a career or just help get you through university.
These are incredibly important in a person's life, and yet many of these hopes are formed around fleeting passions that occur due to one experience, one influence, or one fear. They are often not divinely or conscientiously inspired, they do not reflect the basic human needs of the hope-er or others around them, and yet they are very powerful. Inflexibility turns these hopes into goals, tangible aspirations, and can lead a person down an ill-advised path.
And finally, we have everyday hopes. Everyday hopes get us from point A to point B. They can be a hope that at the end of the day you'll get to see your lover. That it will stop raining by sundown so you can get to the baseball game, or the market will have those fresh figs you want for dessert. That you'll make it through the next two weeks of work until you have a vacation. That you'll be able to get up in the morning and start another day, the world will not have crumbled to dust as you sleep, and your mistakes will not follow you from day to day.
At some point, we all get stuck in everyday hopes; they are the only thing that keep us alive- the hope that one foot will end up in front of the other, that tomorrow might be better than today was.
Some people live entirely on everyday hope. There is much debate on whether it is a shame that everyone doesn't have a "great hope", and the responsibility of those who do have a great hope to help others find their own meaning of life. Some argue that the world needs the "accountants and secretaries" (a-la HHGTTG) to make it run smoothly, so that those who will have an impact will be able to do so, and the everybody doesn't end up trying to out-do each other in pursuing their great hopes to make the planet a better place. But then the question is, who should get to have a great hope, and who should not? Is there some kind of meritocracy of hope?
Somehow the world seems to figure this out for us. Some people do choose to live on everyday hope. But it is incredibly difficult to watch those you know well, who have great potential to have a wonderful impact on the entire planet through success in a field of science or public speaking or planning or resources management or psychology or faith, give in to the easy choice of living on everyday hope.
Perhaps the only thing that is worse... is to see them not live at all.
We all need all kinds of hope, in different dosages, to get through our lives. The more hope, the better; the happier humankind, the more success and the more we are able to work together; the more potential is realized, and the more impact we have on each other. Humans are social animals. We need societal hope, as well. I wish only to bemoan the loss of societal hope, and seemingly along with it the loss of deeply personal hopes that form each life.
It would be grand if we could all realize our potential to do good things for this world, for those we love, and for those we don't even know. But sometimes we have to live with everyday hopes. In a bastardized form of ee cummings' poem, let us continue to hope, and if you pray:
i thank you, God, for most this amazing day...
and the possibility that tomorrow might be an even better one.
Tuesday, September 13, 2011
A whiff of Montreal
Second head cook shift at HiP successfully completed. I'm finally sitting down after ~5hrs of ridiculousness, full and happy and tired. My hands carry a light scent of garlic and homemade Montreal steak rub, which they haven't done for a good five or six years. It was glorious to feel up that massive pork loin, chop it into roasts, season the heck out of it and smell it waft through the kitchen as we cooked the rest of dinner. There is something incredibly satisfying about roasting a beautiful cut of meat, preparing it so that it will remain moist, packing it with flavor, and watching the delighted faces as it is consumed. Nothing like it in the world. Tofu will never be as satisfying, even if someone manages to figure out how to make it taste like something (I have yet to find the answer).
Because themed dinners are always the best kind of dinner, I chose "food my mother loves to make for my brother". First off, a Montreal-steak-rubbed pork loin, roasted slowly in the oven, as you may have guessed. I brined a whole loin roast (must have been about seven pounds and a good two feet long), overnight in a cup-salt-to-gallon-water mixture. The pallid colour of the roast is at the end of a day of brining (for this size, a couple of days would have been better, but alas, I didn't think of it on Sunday) is no indicator of the deliciousness imparted by the extra moisture the meat has absorbed (it may actually just be additional locking-in-juices, I haven't really thought about the science of this). When dried off, drizzled with olive oil, and coated in an approximation to McCormick's Montreal steak seasoning, there is nothing better. Since y'all are probably wondering what this stuff is, it's amazing, delicious, and if you eat meat, I recommend trying it on everything. Pork is nice because it doesn't have a strong flavor of its own. Serving it with dijon mustard is always a winner.
Since I didn't have any of the authentic stuff, I found an approximation on the internet, which I added to and will share below.
Next, my brother is hilariously in love with my mum's scalloped potatoes (oh wait, is that me? well, both of us). They're pretty ridiculous. Otherwise known as potatoes au gratin, these guys are cheesy creamy wonderful. Potatoes, onions, flour, milk, salt and pepper, and sharp sharp cheddar (or any other nice strong cheese, tonight I used a large block of Swiss). That's it. Heavenly. This one you'll have to email me for if you want the recipe, I'm not sharing it with the entire internet.
And then broccoli, because my mum always has to have a green vegetable at dinner. I've gotten in that habit too, as I've learned the nutritional value of lots of "vegetables" (ie potatoes are not a vegetable, they are a starch; zucchini and summer squash have almost no nutrients; corn is mostly sugar, not much good there; et cetera). Tonight I decided to make the vegans happy and make a stir-fry of wax beans (yellow green beans), broccoli, and mushrooms. Unfortunately, I gave over watching the vegetables par-boil to one of my assistant cooks, so the broccoli ended up mushy, but the effect was nice all the same. Note to the wise, which I didn't realize everyone doesn't know: if you are going to saute mushrooms (or, really, cook them at all), be sure to start with a little medium-hot oil in your pan; add dry mushrooms (mushrooms should NEVER be washed with water, or else their pores close up and you can't caramelize them because they leach out their water); and mix only occasionally. If possible, flip them only once or twice as they cook, using a quick wrist motion while holding the pan. Do not stir them constantly. If you must stir because you can't do that nifty flip of the wrist thing I'm talking about (you know you've seen someone do it), again, only do so once or twice. Otherwise you'll end up with chewy mushroom goo. Nice sauce though.
The first time I cooked at HiP, I co-headed the kitchen with Megan. We had a pretty successful night, and I received wonderful feedback (along the lines of make this again!!!!) on a variation of a recipe I learned during one of my last practical classes in culinary school. There we made our "Tuscan bread pudding" by grilling bread, cutting it into spears, fitting it into molds, and filling it the molds with a bread/tomato mixture. I knew we had a ton of stale-ish bread sitting in the pantry (since I helped unpack it Saturday), so I made another version tonight, which turned out very well (that is, after Megan was a life-saver and did some dishes so we would have pans to cook it in... one of the downfalls of cooking in a co-op, someone will inevitably blow their dishes shift the night before you cook). This guy is super easy and doesn't really require a recipe; all you need to do is get some stale baguettes (or similar) and an equal amount of tomatoes by volume, an onion or two, a handful of chopped fresh basil, some garlic, olive oil, salt and pepper. If you happen to have an oven that broils, drizzle a bit of olive oil over the bread (chunked) and broil about 4 mins either side, to crisp it up a bit. Chop up your tomatoes in bread-hunk-size pieces, saute your onions and a bit of fresh garlic til soft, and mix all the ingredients together in a pan greased with olive oil, and pat it down a little. The tomatoes and bread will sort of meld together, but you'll get bits of each. As Dave would say, nom nom nooomm.
To appease the vegans (there are lots) and vegetarians who require protein, I forged new personal territory and cooked tofu (this may have actually been the first time I've done this, at least in recent memory). [Aside: I hate tofu. It has the texture of eggs, which I can't eat because the texture literally induces an involuntary gag reflex. I'm an unhealthy vegetarian.] Not having any clue what to do, I turned to my trusty Moosewood for directions. There's an incredibly simple recipe to make "crispy baked tofu" in one of them (perhaps more), which I stumbled upon last night. It essentially said to throw some soy sauce and sesame oil in a bowl, lay out your tofu on a baking dish, drizzle this stuff over, and bake at 400degF for an hour, flipping over once. Well, that's exactly what I did. I threw a couple of squirts of soy sauce in a bowl with a bit of sesame oil, some random spices I pulled off the wall (red pepper flakes, mustard, garlic, onion powder, ginger, and I think turmeric, though that didn't do much in such company), and poured it over my tofu and a couple of onions I chopped up. One of the assistant cooks asked when we were eating how I had made it, even though he was there the entire time- must have been un-noticeably easy! To serve, I sauteed a few more mushrooms and threw them in the mix, because no one in their right mind would choose to eat tofu on its own.
So... I forgot to tell the assistant cook who was cutting up bread when to stop. We ended up with a large bread bag (these are actually 50-lb flour bags that Acme gives us bread in) full of 1-inch chunks! I had planned on the Tuscan bread pudding, and this gave me an opportunity to try a sweet vegan bread pudding I had been considering for a while. When I brought this up in the office today, Lauren suggested we look up recipes to figure out how they dealt with the lack-of-egg thing. It looks like arrowroot is the answer, but I just ended up throwing together a bunch of soymilk, some sugar, a bunch of spices (we were all out of cinnamon!!!?!) vanilla, and a tiny bit of cornstarch, which I poured over the bread, along with some raisins, apple slices (not actually a good plan for the pudding, but it kept one of my assistants busy for a while), cashews, and cranberries. This went in the oven at 375degF for a while (time didn't matter since there wasn't anything raw in it).
We had more bread yet, so I threw together yet another bread pudding, this one more traditional. It had eggs, milk, and the like. I'm not entirely sure how, but it ended up kind of salty (?). Maybe I accidentally put some in while trying to cook the other billion things I had going at the time. Meh, one failure isn't too bad for a night.
And then, to finish off, I made a chocolate trifle. I asked Adam, the kitchen manager, to get some heavy cream for me... to make whipped cream. It is hilarious how shocked people are when they see how easy making your own whipped cream is! It's simpler than opening that ridiculous spray can it comes in, seriously... and especially if you have a massive Hobart to help you out. So I made a chocolate sponge cake, layered it with whipped cream and ganache (cream and chocolate), and the HiPsters were happy.
And so was everyone's tummy :)
Because themed dinners are always the best kind of dinner, I chose "food my mother loves to make for my brother". First off, a Montreal-steak-rubbed pork loin, roasted slowly in the oven, as you may have guessed. I brined a whole loin roast (must have been about seven pounds and a good two feet long), overnight in a cup-salt-to-gallon-water mixture. The pallid colour of the roast is at the end of a day of brining (for this size, a couple of days would have been better, but alas, I didn't think of it on Sunday) is no indicator of the deliciousness imparted by the extra moisture the meat has absorbed (it may actually just be additional locking-in-juices, I haven't really thought about the science of this). When dried off, drizzled with olive oil, and coated in an approximation to McCormick's Montreal steak seasoning, there is nothing better. Since y'all are probably wondering what this stuff is, it's amazing, delicious, and if you eat meat, I recommend trying it on everything. Pork is nice because it doesn't have a strong flavor of its own. Serving it with dijon mustard is always a winner.
Since I didn't have any of the authentic stuff, I found an approximation on the internet, which I added to and will share below.
Next, my brother is hilariously in love with my mum's scalloped potatoes (oh wait, is that me? well, both of us). They're pretty ridiculous. Otherwise known as potatoes au gratin, these guys are cheesy creamy wonderful. Potatoes, onions, flour, milk, salt and pepper, and sharp sharp cheddar (or any other nice strong cheese, tonight I used a large block of Swiss). That's it. Heavenly. This one you'll have to email me for if you want the recipe, I'm not sharing it with the entire internet.
And then broccoli, because my mum always has to have a green vegetable at dinner. I've gotten in that habit too, as I've learned the nutritional value of lots of "vegetables" (ie potatoes are not a vegetable, they are a starch; zucchini and summer squash have almost no nutrients; corn is mostly sugar, not much good there; et cetera). Tonight I decided to make the vegans happy and make a stir-fry of wax beans (yellow green beans), broccoli, and mushrooms. Unfortunately, I gave over watching the vegetables par-boil to one of my assistant cooks, so the broccoli ended up mushy, but the effect was nice all the same. Note to the wise, which I didn't realize everyone doesn't know: if you are going to saute mushrooms (or, really, cook them at all), be sure to start with a little medium-hot oil in your pan; add dry mushrooms (mushrooms should NEVER be washed with water, or else their pores close up and you can't caramelize them because they leach out their water); and mix only occasionally. If possible, flip them only once or twice as they cook, using a quick wrist motion while holding the pan. Do not stir them constantly. If you must stir because you can't do that nifty flip of the wrist thing I'm talking about (you know you've seen someone do it), again, only do so once or twice. Otherwise you'll end up with chewy mushroom goo. Nice sauce though.
The first time I cooked at HiP, I co-headed the kitchen with Megan. We had a pretty successful night, and I received wonderful feedback (along the lines of make this again!!!!) on a variation of a recipe I learned during one of my last practical classes in culinary school. There we made our "Tuscan bread pudding" by grilling bread, cutting it into spears, fitting it into molds, and filling it the molds with a bread/tomato mixture. I knew we had a ton of stale-ish bread sitting in the pantry (since I helped unpack it Saturday), so I made another version tonight, which turned out very well (that is, after Megan was a life-saver and did some dishes so we would have pans to cook it in... one of the downfalls of cooking in a co-op, someone will inevitably blow their dishes shift the night before you cook). This guy is super easy and doesn't really require a recipe; all you need to do is get some stale baguettes (or similar) and an equal amount of tomatoes by volume, an onion or two, a handful of chopped fresh basil, some garlic, olive oil, salt and pepper. If you happen to have an oven that broils, drizzle a bit of olive oil over the bread (chunked) and broil about 4 mins either side, to crisp it up a bit. Chop up your tomatoes in bread-hunk-size pieces, saute your onions and a bit of fresh garlic til soft, and mix all the ingredients together in a pan greased with olive oil, and pat it down a little. The tomatoes and bread will sort of meld together, but you'll get bits of each. As Dave would say, nom nom nooomm.
To appease the vegans (there are lots) and vegetarians who require protein, I forged new personal territory and cooked tofu (this may have actually been the first time I've done this, at least in recent memory). [Aside: I hate tofu. It has the texture of eggs, which I can't eat because the texture literally induces an involuntary gag reflex. I'm an unhealthy vegetarian.] Not having any clue what to do, I turned to my trusty Moosewood for directions. There's an incredibly simple recipe to make "crispy baked tofu" in one of them (perhaps more), which I stumbled upon last night. It essentially said to throw some soy sauce and sesame oil in a bowl, lay out your tofu on a baking dish, drizzle this stuff over, and bake at 400degF for an hour, flipping over once. Well, that's exactly what I did. I threw a couple of squirts of soy sauce in a bowl with a bit of sesame oil, some random spices I pulled off the wall (red pepper flakes, mustard, garlic, onion powder, ginger, and I think turmeric, though that didn't do much in such company), and poured it over my tofu and a couple of onions I chopped up. One of the assistant cooks asked when we were eating how I had made it, even though he was there the entire time- must have been un-noticeably easy! To serve, I sauteed a few more mushrooms and threw them in the mix, because no one in their right mind would choose to eat tofu on its own.
So... I forgot to tell the assistant cook who was cutting up bread when to stop. We ended up with a large bread bag (these are actually 50-lb flour bags that Acme gives us bread in) full of 1-inch chunks! I had planned on the Tuscan bread pudding, and this gave me an opportunity to try a sweet vegan bread pudding I had been considering for a while. When I brought this up in the office today, Lauren suggested we look up recipes to figure out how they dealt with the lack-of-egg thing. It looks like arrowroot is the answer, but I just ended up throwing together a bunch of soymilk, some sugar, a bunch of spices (we were all out of cinnamon!!!?!) vanilla, and a tiny bit of cornstarch, which I poured over the bread, along with some raisins, apple slices (not actually a good plan for the pudding, but it kept one of my assistants busy for a while), cashews, and cranberries. This went in the oven at 375degF for a while (time didn't matter since there wasn't anything raw in it).
We had more bread yet, so I threw together yet another bread pudding, this one more traditional. It had eggs, milk, and the like. I'm not entirely sure how, but it ended up kind of salty (?). Maybe I accidentally put some in while trying to cook the other billion things I had going at the time. Meh, one failure isn't too bad for a night.
And then, to finish off, I made a chocolate trifle. I asked Adam, the kitchen manager, to get some heavy cream for me... to make whipped cream. It is hilarious how shocked people are when they see how easy making your own whipped cream is! It's simpler than opening that ridiculous spray can it comes in, seriously... and especially if you have a massive Hobart to help you out. So I made a chocolate sponge cake, layered it with whipped cream and ganache (cream and chocolate), and the HiPsters were happy.
And so was everyone's tummy :)
Recipe #1
Montreal Steak Seasoning (after McCormick)
1/2 tbl garlic powder
1/2 tbl crushed red pepper flakes
1/2 tbl thyme
1/2 tbl rosemary
1/2 tbl fennel seed
4 tbl kosher salt
1 tbl black peppercorns
1 tbl onion powder1/2 tbl garlic powder
1/2 tbl crushed red pepper flakes
1/2 tbl thyme
1/2 tbl rosemary
1/2 tbl fennel seed
1/2 tbl coriander seed
1/2 tbl spicy paprika
1/2 tbl caraway seeds
Grind these ingredients a bit in a mortar or, if you don't have one, a metal bowl, using a glass jar as a pestle. You just want to get the big pieces crushed. If you don't have these ingredients whole, using ground is fine, you'll just end up with a bit different flavor. Use with steaks, roasts, chops, and in braises, stews, etc.
Monday, September 12, 2011
Anniversary, Part II
Today has finally occurred, this day of remembrance.
And I am surprised at my own blase treatment of the whole thing in last night's post. This anniversary is not a time to bemoan the horrible things that have happened, the unfortunate events and choices that have been made.
It is a time to be grateful for the past ten years. I was allowed a little bit of reflection this morning while making granola and listening to the 9am service/discussion between Dr. Rahim Nobahar and Sam Keen through the doors of the kitchen.
Ten years ago, I was sitting in Dr. Zilian's Ancient and Medieval History class, learning about the Spartans. And then the first plane hit, and then the second, and we were called in to assembly. The feeling of intense joy that hit me after finding out my dad was not in the city that day was unbelievable. And since then, much much much has happened to be grateful for, even in my one little life.
The past ten years have included my entire high school career, and all that went with it, good teachers, horrible teachers, fighting The Man, finding that I could have niches, learning to tell people I could be good at math and science even though I was a girl. Discovering the words of philosophers, and the concept of Utopia. Learning to love throwing and basketball and running (sort of), and then being told I could never play again, dislocating my shoulder (and later surgery). Learning to love, and learning to live through pain and the loss of a good friend (and a couple years later, another good friend). Being almost adopted by a friend's family. Living in New Zealand at 17 and traveling alone around the country; graduating from culinary school with distinction and winning silver medals in two competitions. Going to Mudd, learning ridiculous things about special relativity and then idolizing Feynman. Leaving Mudd, co-coordinating a fashion show, finding a home in sculpture, learning how to love and support a young mother. Learning the importance of understanding how people think. Transferring to Swarthmore, becoming an engineer finally, exploring combinatorics and the cloudy ideas of complex algebra. Learning about food, food processing systems, food politics, agriculture, becoming addicted to sustainability, co-founding the Good Food Project. My first stint directing a student ministry. Throwing for a collegiate track team. Making concrete over and over again. Building steel bridges. My first research. Writing a model for runoff from suburban watersheds from scratch. Teaching younger students. Deciding I want to be a professor. Getting into grad school; receiving the NSF GRFP. Moving to Berkeley. Moving to Berkeley. Finishing an MS. Starting a cafe ministry. Working on an unbelievably interesting project, and learning the awesome field of fluid mechanics. Presenting my first scientific paper.
And along with all of this, learning every kind of love available. My heart breaking several times, for different reasons. Learning that the deep connections are the only ones worth making; that pain is part of life, and I will lose people throughout my life, but there will always be someone else who could benefit from being loved by me, or I by them. Learning that there are people in every place who are worth getting to know, though they may not fit the profile of whom you'd expect to become your friends. Learning to treat each day as a precious gift, since we never know when it's going to end, and learning to hope that each day will be better than the last, trusting that that is the only way it could be.
My brother explained an interesting metaphor today about those who die young. He just lost another friend (this makes four? five?) two weeks ago (don't become friends with us, unless you want to die young), and the young man's mentee was distraught, so Patrick went to comfort him.
Why did Matt have to die so young? Well, perhaps each person has a life-tank. At the beginning, everyone's life-tank is full up. But we all drive different cars of life. Maybe the 90-year-old man down the street has been driving a Neon. Your mother is at least driving a Corolla. Patrick's maybe driving a sedan (what does this say about when he's going to die??). But Matt was driving a Ferrari, at full tilt. They say only the good die young because the burn through their life-tank quickly. And by doing so, they live every single moment to the fullest, meet every person they can, take every opportunity to spread branches in this world and do something good. So yeah, they're good, and their time comes for them early on.
We talked even more in depth on the need for the end of one life to not be the end of another. The death of a young person does not need to mean the essential death of a friend or family member. Besides what would be desired by the deceased, we all must move on with our lives after mourning a loss. We are human, and we understand death, perhaps in a unique way among animals. But we also have coping mechanisms, and we should use them. We are made to get up and keep going with life, but too many people become married to the idea of a lost loved one. That keeps them from moving forward, ties them inextricably to the past, and makes them less productive members of society. This is not a good thing. Mourn your losses, certainly. But know that wallowing is not a good idea.
In a way, I feel like the American people are stuck in that mourning mode, as I said earlier. We are mourning in particular the events of September 11, 2001, the loss of our friends and families, and the devastation caused by Hurricane Katrina in 2005. Yes, we MUST NOT FORGET. But there is a difference between forgetting and forgiving, forgetting and moving on with life, taking our pain and turning it into strength.
Ten years later, it is a time to look forward with hope, and most importantly, love. Pat de Jong spoke today (updated on Tuesday) of the multi-faith vigil service held in Berkeley on the evening of 9/11/01. She talked of the love and prayer that emanated from the crowd of believers in... something... and the forms of plea and prayer and remembrance that were brought by leaders of all faiths in the area. The collective grief. But also the collective hope that, if somehow these cultures and beliefs and faiths could convene here in Berkeley, there might be some hope that they might be able to do the same around the world, some day. That is a tall order, but I believe it could happen. Maybe we all just need to stop saying we, and only we, are right.
And I am surprised at my own blase treatment of the whole thing in last night's post. This anniversary is not a time to bemoan the horrible things that have happened, the unfortunate events and choices that have been made.
It is a time to be grateful for the past ten years. I was allowed a little bit of reflection this morning while making granola and listening to the 9am service/discussion between Dr. Rahim Nobahar and Sam Keen through the doors of the kitchen.
Ten years ago, I was sitting in Dr. Zilian's Ancient and Medieval History class, learning about the Spartans. And then the first plane hit, and then the second, and we were called in to assembly. The feeling of intense joy that hit me after finding out my dad was not in the city that day was unbelievable. And since then, much much much has happened to be grateful for, even in my one little life.
The past ten years have included my entire high school career, and all that went with it, good teachers, horrible teachers, fighting The Man, finding that I could have niches, learning to tell people I could be good at math and science even though I was a girl. Discovering the words of philosophers, and the concept of Utopia. Learning to love throwing and basketball and running (sort of), and then being told I could never play again, dislocating my shoulder (and later surgery). Learning to love, and learning to live through pain and the loss of a good friend (and a couple years later, another good friend). Being almost adopted by a friend's family. Living in New Zealand at 17 and traveling alone around the country; graduating from culinary school with distinction and winning silver medals in two competitions. Going to Mudd, learning ridiculous things about special relativity and then idolizing Feynman. Leaving Mudd, co-coordinating a fashion show, finding a home in sculpture, learning how to love and support a young mother. Learning the importance of understanding how people think. Transferring to Swarthmore, becoming an engineer finally, exploring combinatorics and the cloudy ideas of complex algebra. Learning about food, food processing systems, food politics, agriculture, becoming addicted to sustainability, co-founding the Good Food Project. My first stint directing a student ministry. Throwing for a collegiate track team. Making concrete over and over again. Building steel bridges. My first research. Writing a model for runoff from suburban watersheds from scratch. Teaching younger students. Deciding I want to be a professor. Getting into grad school; receiving the NSF GRFP. Moving to Berkeley. Moving to Berkeley. Finishing an MS. Starting a cafe ministry. Working on an unbelievably interesting project, and learning the awesome field of fluid mechanics. Presenting my first scientific paper.
And along with all of this, learning every kind of love available. My heart breaking several times, for different reasons. Learning that the deep connections are the only ones worth making; that pain is part of life, and I will lose people throughout my life, but there will always be someone else who could benefit from being loved by me, or I by them. Learning that there are people in every place who are worth getting to know, though they may not fit the profile of whom you'd expect to become your friends. Learning to treat each day as a precious gift, since we never know when it's going to end, and learning to hope that each day will be better than the last, trusting that that is the only way it could be.
My brother explained an interesting metaphor today about those who die young. He just lost another friend (this makes four? five?) two weeks ago (don't become friends with us, unless you want to die young), and the young man's mentee was distraught, so Patrick went to comfort him.
Why did Matt have to die so young? Well, perhaps each person has a life-tank. At the beginning, everyone's life-tank is full up. But we all drive different cars of life. Maybe the 90-year-old man down the street has been driving a Neon. Your mother is at least driving a Corolla. Patrick's maybe driving a sedan (what does this say about when he's going to die??). But Matt was driving a Ferrari, at full tilt. They say only the good die young because the burn through their life-tank quickly. And by doing so, they live every single moment to the fullest, meet every person they can, take every opportunity to spread branches in this world and do something good. So yeah, they're good, and their time comes for them early on.
We talked even more in depth on the need for the end of one life to not be the end of another. The death of a young person does not need to mean the essential death of a friend or family member. Besides what would be desired by the deceased, we all must move on with our lives after mourning a loss. We are human, and we understand death, perhaps in a unique way among animals. But we also have coping mechanisms, and we should use them. We are made to get up and keep going with life, but too many people become married to the idea of a lost loved one. That keeps them from moving forward, ties them inextricably to the past, and makes them less productive members of society. This is not a good thing. Mourn your losses, certainly. But know that wallowing is not a good idea.
In a way, I feel like the American people are stuck in that mourning mode, as I said earlier. We are mourning in particular the events of September 11, 2001, the loss of our friends and families, and the devastation caused by Hurricane Katrina in 2005. Yes, we MUST NOT FORGET. But there is a difference between forgetting and forgiving, forgetting and moving on with life, taking our pain and turning it into strength.
Ten years later, it is a time to look forward with hope, and most importantly, love. Pat de Jong spoke today (updated on Tuesday) of the multi-faith vigil service held in Berkeley on the evening of 9/11/01. She talked of the love and prayer that emanated from the crowd of believers in... something... and the forms of plea and prayer and remembrance that were brought by leaders of all faiths in the area. The collective grief. But also the collective hope that, if somehow these cultures and beliefs and faiths could convene here in Berkeley, there might be some hope that they might be able to do the same around the world, some day. That is a tall order, but I believe it could happen. Maybe we all just need to stop saying we, and only we, are right.
Saturday, September 10, 2011
Anniversary
Tomorrow is the tenth anniversary of September 11, 2001. About eight hours from now, ten years ago, the first plane struck the first of the World Trade Center towers.
What has the past ten years taught us? Or, more importantly, what have we learned? What have we, as a nation and people and world learned about the dangers of hate, and the virtue of love?
We have seen a number of wars, or one big war, depending on your outlook. We have seen famine, draught, floods; earthquakes, tsunami, climate change, oil spills; political unrest, protests, killings, and (often hidden) ethnic cleansing and human trafficking; economic failure, bankruptcy, crumbling infrastructure... the list goes on.
What have we learned in the past ten years? Can we say that we have learned to love our enemy, forgive our foe? Have we gotten even the tiniest inch closer to putting aside cultural differences and realizing we all want and need the same things? Is the ever-popular beauty pageant wish- world peace- any closer at all?
The United States has seen some hard times these past ten years. Some have been related to the events of 9/11/01. Most have not, though there have been politicians, business-people, even religious leaders coming at it from every angle, milking the pain the country felt. Exposing those poor few thousand families who lost a loved one, and using their loss as fuel for war, military spending, political dominance.
Can anyone say that is right and good? To tear open a wound over and over again, to make the pain felt every day, to keep true healing at bay? We ought to perhaps doubly pity those who lost a loved one on 9/11. They haven't been able to be alone and get on with their lives, as is natural and necessary by human nature.
Three years ago our country decided to have hope. (Whatever that means to you, I do not intend to be political). But the dominant image I saw, for a good year or so, was the word "HOPE". It seemed we wanted to move on with our lives, and I breathed a sigh of relief. Perhaps we would be able to do just that, with our new-found hope in the way things could be, the way we could be in the world.
But it turns out the American public has the patience of a toddler who has missed his nap, unfortunately. As complete miracles have not been delivered on a daily basis for the past three years, those same posters of HOPE have been replaced with the disheartening word 'nope'. We don't really want to work to have hope. We've lost it in along the way, watching our sitcoms and eating our increasingly-artisan ice cream.
So here's hoping the American public learns once again to have hope that this world isn't the hostile thing we think it is, to be feared and beaten down with a stick, to be conquered. Let us hope that we learn to think of our brothers and sisters in the world as just that- siblings on this earth, worthy of love and, the very least, basic consideration. And most of all, let us hope that we learn to let pain and loss be exactly that-pain and loss- and let us not use ours as justification for causing more.
What has the past ten years taught us? Or, more importantly, what have we learned? What have we, as a nation and people and world learned about the dangers of hate, and the virtue of love?
We have seen a number of wars, or one big war, depending on your outlook. We have seen famine, draught, floods; earthquakes, tsunami, climate change, oil spills; political unrest, protests, killings, and (often hidden) ethnic cleansing and human trafficking; economic failure, bankruptcy, crumbling infrastructure... the list goes on.
What have we learned in the past ten years? Can we say that we have learned to love our enemy, forgive our foe? Have we gotten even the tiniest inch closer to putting aside cultural differences and realizing we all want and need the same things? Is the ever-popular beauty pageant wish- world peace- any closer at all?
The United States has seen some hard times these past ten years. Some have been related to the events of 9/11/01. Most have not, though there have been politicians, business-people, even religious leaders coming at it from every angle, milking the pain the country felt. Exposing those poor few thousand families who lost a loved one, and using their loss as fuel for war, military spending, political dominance.
Can anyone say that is right and good? To tear open a wound over and over again, to make the pain felt every day, to keep true healing at bay? We ought to perhaps doubly pity those who lost a loved one on 9/11. They haven't been able to be alone and get on with their lives, as is natural and necessary by human nature.
Three years ago our country decided to have hope. (Whatever that means to you, I do not intend to be political). But the dominant image I saw, for a good year or so, was the word "HOPE". It seemed we wanted to move on with our lives, and I breathed a sigh of relief. Perhaps we would be able to do just that, with our new-found hope in the way things could be, the way we could be in the world.
But it turns out the American public has the patience of a toddler who has missed his nap, unfortunately. As complete miracles have not been delivered on a daily basis for the past three years, those same posters of HOPE have been replaced with the disheartening word 'nope'. We don't really want to work to have hope. We've lost it in along the way, watching our sitcoms and eating our increasingly-artisan ice cream.
So here's hoping the American public learns once again to have hope that this world isn't the hostile thing we think it is, to be feared and beaten down with a stick, to be conquered. Let us hope that we learn to think of our brothers and sisters in the world as just that- siblings on this earth, worthy of love and, the very least, basic consideration. And most of all, let us hope that we learn to let pain and loss be exactly that-pain and loss- and let us not use ours as justification for causing more.
Friday, September 9, 2011
Good-Riddances
Good-byes are, by their very nature, some of the worst things in life.
Seriously think for a minute. Even those good-byes that seemed like good-riddances, those that just needed to happen for the health or happiness of both parties involved, those where your heart is broken and/or you are breaking someone else's. If you are saying good-bye to someone, even someone who has hurt you deeply, the mere fact that you are taking the time and energy to say those words means they affected your life in some significant way. Even those good-riddances; good-byes to a nemesis, an especially obnoxious relative, or an opponent.
When I was fourteen, I heard the words "love thine enemy" in an inexplicably strong way. To this end, I wrote a letter to my long time nemesis, Allie. We had competed for the same position on our travel basketball team for four years, and were exact opposites in the hallways of our middle school. Allie wanted desperately to be one of the popular girls; I didn't really care that much (I had been given an opportunity to hang out with them at one point, and they spent an entire afternoon talking about their boyfriends... they were eleven.). I was the quintessential nerd; Allie looked at me every day with a slight sneer. I spent far too much time thinking and worrying about the pain she caused me (you can't ignore a sneer). There was also a rumor we had a crush on the same boy.
So when I knew I was going to be going to high school in a different state, I wrote her a letter, saying that I held no grudge and I hoped she would flourish (or the fourteen-year-old equivalent). I wrote out my good-bye, and put her to rest in my mind. I never heard back from her, of course. But even that good-bye, one of the most good-riddance-ish imaginable, acknowledged the relationship that we had, even if it was one based entirely on animosity.
Animosity is a certain kind of love, and can be as all-consuming as the most passionate romance or deepest friendship. So what does this tell us? The only good-byes that don't affect us are the ones that don't matter to us. The ones we actually don't make the effort to say, the mediocre band director, the friend-we-hung-out-with-for-the-last-few-years-but-not-that-much, the cat lady down the street who used to stare at us as we walked by.
And we all know the agony of a farewell said to someone we love or have loved, whether it be for a long time, a not-so-long time, or forever. It's those forevers that are the worst. Though I'll leave it up for debate which is worse: the goodbyes you know are forever, or those you don't know are forever, but turn out to be that way as the person is yanked from you. I've had more of the latter than the former in my life, but both are excruciating.
So every good-bye is hard. But does that mean we shouldn't say them? Does that mean we should let life go by without making the connections that lead to hard good-byes? To avoid that pain of separation? CERTAINLY NOT, LADIES AND GENTLEMEN.
As my friend, who will likely never read this blog (or so I hope), quotes Henry Rollins:
I think if you're alive and you wanna be into something, you should be on it like... you should be nuts about it, or be nuts about something else, but don't be halfway about anything, cause life is too short. If you're gonna love someone, LOVE 'em, if you're gonna hate 'em , HATE 'em, but don't be like, "Oh, I don't know how I feel about it." Have an opinion about something, otherwise don't show up at MY dinner table, cause it's gonna be boring conversation.
Well, actually, DO show up at my dinner table. I'd love to have you.
Seriously think for a minute. Even those good-byes that seemed like good-riddances, those that just needed to happen for the health or happiness of both parties involved, those where your heart is broken and/or you are breaking someone else's. If you are saying good-bye to someone, even someone who has hurt you deeply, the mere fact that you are taking the time and energy to say those words means they affected your life in some significant way. Even those good-riddances; good-byes to a nemesis, an especially obnoxious relative, or an opponent.
When I was fourteen, I heard the words "love thine enemy" in an inexplicably strong way. To this end, I wrote a letter to my long time nemesis, Allie. We had competed for the same position on our travel basketball team for four years, and were exact opposites in the hallways of our middle school. Allie wanted desperately to be one of the popular girls; I didn't really care that much (I had been given an opportunity to hang out with them at one point, and they spent an entire afternoon talking about their boyfriends... they were eleven.). I was the quintessential nerd; Allie looked at me every day with a slight sneer. I spent far too much time thinking and worrying about the pain she caused me (you can't ignore a sneer). There was also a rumor we had a crush on the same boy.
So when I knew I was going to be going to high school in a different state, I wrote her a letter, saying that I held no grudge and I hoped she would flourish (or the fourteen-year-old equivalent). I wrote out my good-bye, and put her to rest in my mind. I never heard back from her, of course. But even that good-bye, one of the most good-riddance-ish imaginable, acknowledged the relationship that we had, even if it was one based entirely on animosity.
Animosity is a certain kind of love, and can be as all-consuming as the most passionate romance or deepest friendship. So what does this tell us? The only good-byes that don't affect us are the ones that don't matter to us. The ones we actually don't make the effort to say, the mediocre band director, the friend-we-hung-out-with-for-the-last-few-years-but-not-that-much, the cat lady down the street who used to stare at us as we walked by.
And we all know the agony of a farewell said to someone we love or have loved, whether it be for a long time, a not-so-long time, or forever. It's those forevers that are the worst. Though I'll leave it up for debate which is worse: the goodbyes you know are forever, or those you don't know are forever, but turn out to be that way as the person is yanked from you. I've had more of the latter than the former in my life, but both are excruciating.
So every good-bye is hard. But does that mean we shouldn't say them? Does that mean we should let life go by without making the connections that lead to hard good-byes? To avoid that pain of separation? CERTAINLY NOT, LADIES AND GENTLEMEN.
As my friend, who will likely never read this blog (or so I hope), quotes Henry Rollins:
I think if you're alive and you wanna be into something, you should be on it like... you should be nuts about it, or be nuts about something else, but don't be halfway about anything, cause life is too short. If you're gonna love someone, LOVE 'em, if you're gonna hate 'em , HATE 'em, but don't be like, "Oh, I don't know how I feel about it." Have an opinion about something, otherwise don't show up at MY dinner table, cause it's gonna be boring conversation.
Well, actually, DO show up at my dinner table. I'd love to have you.
Sunday, September 4, 2011
They know who you really are.
Mum is here.
Right now, she's asleep, 'doing my old mother thing', as she says. I just smile and nod when she does. But I don't believe her. The woman might be sixty, but there is no way she's old. And sure, she's a mother, but she's so much more than that.
Do you know those two, maybe three people in your life with whom you don't even need words to have a conversation most of the time? Maybe an old old friend, a lover, a brother. Someone with whom you can spend many comfortable silences, who knows all of your quirks and little biases and what REALLY MATTERS TO YOU SO MUCH YOU WOULD KILL FOR IT even if you pretend it doesn't matter at all. When you see this person, you pick up just like you've never left each other's company.
To whom you can say, "that pear is really green", and they'll know you were comparing it to a pear you had discussed three years earlier at a farmer's market on the other side of the country, and will answer, "but I bet it won't fit in your sock", in reference to the pair of socks your favorite writer had published an expository essay on (and they had read and then sent to you for that reason alone) six months later. With whom your conversations can be completely nonsensical, or at least appear that way to the public at large.
These people, and I sincerely hope you have some, are the cornerstones of your life. They remind you of who you are at your most basic level, what you love and care about and the way you want to live in the world. They help you get through the tough times in life, and often will arrive at your doorstep just in the nick of time, seemingly without cause. You will think of each other simultaneously when you're a thousand miles away, and one will call the other because one of you needs a reminder of your fundamental self.
Yep, you got it. I know it's cliche to say your mother knows you better than anyone, and that you're good friends (or maybe just pity-inducing). But I'm going to throw it out there in a completely contrarian way... too bad, world, this ain't your normal. I'm pretty gall darn lucky to have a friend in Ms. Becky.
So maybe she's finally asleep. But the poor woman, she just got in from the East Coast yesterday, where it's three hours later; last night we stayed up talking; and this morning I made her get up at 6:30am to help me set up, cook for, and direct the FCCB cafe (for six hours nonetheless). She gladly rose early and met a million people, made her famous coffee cake, had rather philosophical discussions with three parishioners, attended the 11am service with me, went to lunch with Margaret and I, toured the co-op, and went girly dress shopping at Jeremy's all before sitting down once. And then dinner at HiP, talking with four new grad students in fields varying from biomechanics to Russian literature to displaced tribes in Jamaica. Finally home. Not your average sixty-year-old. Not your average lady. I am impressed.
Right now, she's asleep, 'doing my old mother thing', as she says. I just smile and nod when she does. But I don't believe her. The woman might be sixty, but there is no way she's old. And sure, she's a mother, but she's so much more than that.
Do you know those two, maybe three people in your life with whom you don't even need words to have a conversation most of the time? Maybe an old old friend, a lover, a brother. Someone with whom you can spend many comfortable silences, who knows all of your quirks and little biases and what REALLY MATTERS TO YOU SO MUCH YOU WOULD KILL FOR IT even if you pretend it doesn't matter at all. When you see this person, you pick up just like you've never left each other's company.
To whom you can say, "that pear is really green", and they'll know you were comparing it to a pear you had discussed three years earlier at a farmer's market on the other side of the country, and will answer, "but I bet it won't fit in your sock", in reference to the pair of socks your favorite writer had published an expository essay on (and they had read and then sent to you for that reason alone) six months later. With whom your conversations can be completely nonsensical, or at least appear that way to the public at large.
These people, and I sincerely hope you have some, are the cornerstones of your life. They remind you of who you are at your most basic level, what you love and care about and the way you want to live in the world. They help you get through the tough times in life, and often will arrive at your doorstep just in the nick of time, seemingly without cause. You will think of each other simultaneously when you're a thousand miles away, and one will call the other because one of you needs a reminder of your fundamental self.
Yep, you got it. I know it's cliche to say your mother knows you better than anyone, and that you're good friends (or maybe just pity-inducing). But I'm going to throw it out there in a completely contrarian way... too bad, world, this ain't your normal. I'm pretty gall darn lucky to have a friend in Ms. Becky.
So maybe she's finally asleep. But the poor woman, she just got in from the East Coast yesterday, where it's three hours later; last night we stayed up talking; and this morning I made her get up at 6:30am to help me set up, cook for, and direct the FCCB cafe (for six hours nonetheless). She gladly rose early and met a million people, made her famous coffee cake, had rather philosophical discussions with three parishioners, attended the 11am service with me, went to lunch with Margaret and I, toured the co-op, and went girly dress shopping at Jeremy's all before sitting down once. And then dinner at HiP, talking with four new grad students in fields varying from biomechanics to Russian literature to displaced tribes in Jamaica. Finally home. Not your average sixty-year-old. Not your average lady. I am impressed.
Saturday, September 3, 2011
Welcome Sunday at the FCCB Cafe
I found out about a week ago that the FCCB Cafe was meant to be open, and free, this coming Sunday, while the person who had been organizing cooks and servers was in the middle of a move to Palo Alto.
So I'm taking this thing OVER!
There's a huge difference, once again, between cooking in a kitchen for a-la-carte meals and cooking a bunch at once while organizing and directing a bunch of volunteers to make an open, welcoming cafe.
This is going to be fun, especially as... who will be showing up tomorrow morning but Becky, mum extraordinaire?! At least she's willing to help out (she's always up for community-building)!
So I'm going to go into the ideas behind the cafe in a later post (it is pretty much completely what I use as my life philosophy), but right now I'm focused on trying to assemble enough foodstuffs to feed a bunch of hungry people who will arrive on Sunday expecting a complete, free cafe (usually we charge enough to cover the cost of ingredients).
Usual fare at the cafe on a Sunday morning might be 1-2 types of muffins (36 total); a coffee cake (or two) of some sort; granola and organic yogurt; one type of scone or savory bun (about 20); and two large frittatas (serving about 24). This tends to sell out (it's not a huge ordeal on a normal week), so we've been able to keep it regular.
And yet, this week it will all be free, so naturally we'll get a bunch more people. So what to make?
So far, we have in the plans:
four large frittatas
two loaves of bread (for what I'm not quite sure, something about toast was thrown around, but I'm not sure how we could get that working)
some cupcakes(? I'm sure they'll go easily enough even at 8am)
On Sunday I'll be making strawberry cream scones (ergh not the best choice of berry, but it wasn't mine to make). They tend to be a hit, and when the ingredients consist of flour, sugar, baking powder, berries, and heavy cream, it can't really be any simpler to throw together in a massive batch. Looks like I'll need to get some more cream, though. One pint will make approximately twelve large scones.
And tonight I threw together a variation on my favorite, easiest-in-the-world-and-always-delicious lemon cake. It's the same recipe I made for my sister Kristen's wedding cake, and can work with any kind of citrus fruit (needed for the acid and the delightful flavor to complement the dense-ish texture). Tonight I found I didn't have any lemons, only limes... and a blood orange... so I went with an Orange and Montmorency cherry variation. I'll throw together an orange glaze on Sunday morning and serve it up in little slices (I made a triple recipe, so it should feed quite a few, though a triple recipe went into each layer of Kristen's cake...). Fortunately this cake gets better and better for the first few days after it's made (the gluten relaxes and the moisture in the cake condenses and settles), so by Sunday morning it should be pretty good.
Well, wish me luck! And if you have suggestions for other easy recipes to throw together on Sunday morning, please let me know...
So I'm taking this thing OVER!
There's a huge difference, once again, between cooking in a kitchen for a-la-carte meals and cooking a bunch at once while organizing and directing a bunch of volunteers to make an open, welcoming cafe.
This is going to be fun, especially as... who will be showing up tomorrow morning but Becky, mum extraordinaire?! At least she's willing to help out (she's always up for community-building)!
So I'm going to go into the ideas behind the cafe in a later post (it is pretty much completely what I use as my life philosophy), but right now I'm focused on trying to assemble enough foodstuffs to feed a bunch of hungry people who will arrive on Sunday expecting a complete, free cafe (usually we charge enough to cover the cost of ingredients).
Usual fare at the cafe on a Sunday morning might be 1-2 types of muffins (36 total); a coffee cake (or two) of some sort; granola and organic yogurt; one type of scone or savory bun (about 20); and two large frittatas (serving about 24). This tends to sell out (it's not a huge ordeal on a normal week), so we've been able to keep it regular.
And yet, this week it will all be free, so naturally we'll get a bunch more people. So what to make?
So far, we have in the plans:
four large frittatas
two loaves of bread (for what I'm not quite sure, something about toast was thrown around, but I'm not sure how we could get that working)
some cupcakes(? I'm sure they'll go easily enough even at 8am)
On Sunday I'll be making strawberry cream scones (ergh not the best choice of berry, but it wasn't mine to make). They tend to be a hit, and when the ingredients consist of flour, sugar, baking powder, berries, and heavy cream, it can't really be any simpler to throw together in a massive batch. Looks like I'll need to get some more cream, though. One pint will make approximately twelve large scones.
And tonight I threw together a variation on my favorite, easiest-in-the-world-and-always-delicious lemon cake. It's the same recipe I made for my sister Kristen's wedding cake, and can work with any kind of citrus fruit (needed for the acid and the delightful flavor to complement the dense-ish texture). Tonight I found I didn't have any lemons, only limes... and a blood orange... so I went with an Orange and Montmorency cherry variation. I'll throw together an orange glaze on Sunday morning and serve it up in little slices (I made a triple recipe, so it should feed quite a few, though a triple recipe went into each layer of Kristen's cake...). Fortunately this cake gets better and better for the first few days after it's made (the gluten relaxes and the moisture in the cake condenses and settles), so by Sunday morning it should be pretty good.
Well, wish me luck! And if you have suggestions for other easy recipes to throw together on Sunday morning, please let me know...
Thursday, September 1, 2011
HiP Italian
Here we are back in the States, and if the beginning of school and all the other craziness that is my life right now isn't enough, today brought about my first workshift as head cook at the graduate co-op, Hillegass Parker (as mentioned before, HiP).
Now, here's the challenge:
Three cooks (one head cook, two assistants who may or may not know anything about food)
Three hours
An unreliably stocked kitchen
A full meal for ~60 people
...GO!
Menu planning must happen far in advance, or at least, far enough in advance that the kitchen manager has time to order anything not a staple in the kitchen. Produce is delivered Friday. Unfortunately, with Thursday as my assigned cooking night, it looks like I'm going to be doing a lot of last-minute adjustment to my menus as the walk-in fridge is depleted throughout the week.
Now, a little background on the co-op so you know what all is going down.
HiP houses ~60 graduate students in three neighboring domiciles just south of campus. About ten people "board" at HiP as well, either ex-inmates (har har), friends of the co-op, or people who live down the street. Or me, who lives several miles away and up about 1000ft elevation [some may say I'm crazy for doing this. I am inclined to agree]. We boarders eat some number of meals at the co-op every week, and in return pay for our meals and are assigned several hours of workshift every week. I'm on the 5-meal, 2-hour plan.
And by "meals", we are referring primarily to dinners. Dinner is a big deal at HiP. The aforementioned three people bravely take on the task of creating a culinary wonderland for all members of the co-op. Generally there are between five and ten dishes served up promptly (well, within ten minutes or so) at 7pm each night Sunday through Thursday. Co-op-ers line up in the dining room in Main House (also where the big kitchen is, it used to be a boarding house years ago) at 7pm, forks and knives in hand, ready to demolish what tends to be a delightful meal. There are always vegetarian, vegan, and gluten-free dishes available, the primary goal being to provide a complete meal for each of these groups, in addition to the omnivores who are so easy to cook for. Each night a new set of cooks try their hand, though there are weekly (in my case, bi-weekly) shifts assigned.
So. Among the ridiculousness of life right now, I planned a meal for sixty to commence preparation at 4pm this afternoon (yes, I left work extremely early, and earlier yet in order to ride the bus up the hill to get my car so I could get home at the end of it all).
To illustrate the interesting task of end-of-the-week cooking at the coop:
Intended menu:
pasta; pomodoro sauce made entirely of fresh tomatoes; chicken marsala with cream; garlic olive bread; tiramisu; balsamic green beans; gluten-free pasta; zucchini "pasta"; sicilian red lentil pasta sauce/stew
Final menu:
pasta; pomodoro sauce made of almost-ripe tomatoes stripped from the garden and canned tomato puree; chicken marsala (without cream); garlic bread (someone had eaten all six loaves of the olive bread!?); tiramisu-like cake trifle (no whipped cream); orange-fennel salad over mixed greens; oregano-spiked summer squash; tempeh "arrabiata" (aka kinda spicy with a couple of tomatoes, lots of onion, and summer squash)
All in all, it actually worked out surprisingly well. We were only about ten minutes late, which included making up "late plates" for absent co-op-ers (amusingly, Megan was one of these, though she had gone to dinner for Rudi's birthday instead, just wanted to be sure she got some after she wandered into the kitchen this afternoon). Roasted garlic was a huge hit on the crispy bits of garlic bread. The tiramisu trifle went over incredibly well, considering I had forgotten to pour over the coffee/marsala wine mixture on the top layer. And the mere fact that the pomodoro sauce was uber-local made Adam, the kitchen manager, so happy he loudly declared that fact to the entire room.
But lesson learned: as far as co-op-ers are concerned, anything with chocolate chips is far superior to anything without.
One of the greatest (and potentially aggravating) parts of being head cook is that every week a new set of assistant cooks are assigned to your shift. Today James and Margaret were to be assistants, but Margaret found herself four hours of workshift "up" (meaning she had done more than necessary), and with a problem set due tomorrow, "sold" her shift to Nina. So, Nina, James, and I made an (inevitably) complete mess of the HiP kitchen in our attempt to satisfy the hungry graduate students.
I must say, it's been a while since I directed others in cooking. Most of my culinary training was in taking orders, not giving them. I'm pretty good at getting all of my stuff done in order and on time; this was part of what earned me highest honors in the City and Guilds program. But telling others what to do, and being completely dependent on them because there's no way to do it all in that period of time on my own? Unfamiliar experience for me. Especially the part that makes me responsible for the outcome of our team's work. I never liked that part of teamwork, if there was a situation where I absolutely had to trust my teammates to do their work well. I'm far more likely to try to do it myself. I'm a horrible team player. I know it. But there's nothing saying I can't learn to either:
1) not worry about it not being perfect, since it never will be, or
2) absolutely trust that someone else is equally competent and will do a good job without my involvement.
Actually, I think the first will be more of a problem.
Regardless, getting to know Nina and James was great. Turns out Nina's on what they call a "grace period" (even though she's not a student, she can live in the co-op for one more semester beyond finishing her degree), and James is the one other person I've met from Rhode Island (East Greenwich!). Nina did an incredible job with the chicken marsala, and pretty much deconstructed three whole chickens on her own after I showed her the general procedure. And poor James got all the boring jobs, slicing about 2 gallons of mushrooms, fifty mixed summer squash, twelve oranges, seven fennel bulbs, and five heads of garlic. The dude was ridiculously upbeat about it. I promised him next time he'd get to do all the fun stuff (whatever that is).
And the adrenaline rush after realizing half my proposed dinner (and vegan protein) was nonexistent (no red lentils, or a proper substitute, anywhere in sight) was invigorating. Sleep deprivation is not a good thing in such situations... I ended up spending ten minutes in the walk-in, trying to find something to make, and walked out shivering. Thank heavens for my SusieCakes chef's jacket! Another use beyond protecting me from flying spurts of hot oil and providing a reminder of M1N (swatties!!!!!): it can be used as blustery-weather gear. woot!
So somehow I'm supposed to get four workshift hours for this ridiculousness. Fortunately I love it, otherwise there's no way it'd be worth it. But this is most of the reason I joined the co-op (besides meeting non-engineers, trying something new, and getting to hang out with two of my favorite people in the world). It's great to be back cooking for people, and seeing their faces as they enjoy it.
Now, here's the challenge:
Three cooks (one head cook, two assistants who may or may not know anything about food)
Three hours
An unreliably stocked kitchen
A full meal for ~60 people
...GO!
Menu planning must happen far in advance, or at least, far enough in advance that the kitchen manager has time to order anything not a staple in the kitchen. Produce is delivered Friday. Unfortunately, with Thursday as my assigned cooking night, it looks like I'm going to be doing a lot of last-minute adjustment to my menus as the walk-in fridge is depleted throughout the week.
Now, a little background on the co-op so you know what all is going down.
HiP houses ~60 graduate students in three neighboring domiciles just south of campus. About ten people "board" at HiP as well, either ex-inmates (har har), friends of the co-op, or people who live down the street. Or me, who lives several miles away and up about 1000ft elevation [some may say I'm crazy for doing this. I am inclined to agree]. We boarders eat some number of meals at the co-op every week, and in return pay for our meals and are assigned several hours of workshift every week. I'm on the 5-meal, 2-hour plan.
And by "meals", we are referring primarily to dinners. Dinner is a big deal at HiP. The aforementioned three people bravely take on the task of creating a culinary wonderland for all members of the co-op. Generally there are between five and ten dishes served up promptly (well, within ten minutes or so) at 7pm each night Sunday through Thursday. Co-op-ers line up in the dining room in Main House (also where the big kitchen is, it used to be a boarding house years ago) at 7pm, forks and knives in hand, ready to demolish what tends to be a delightful meal. There are always vegetarian, vegan, and gluten-free dishes available, the primary goal being to provide a complete meal for each of these groups, in addition to the omnivores who are so easy to cook for. Each night a new set of cooks try their hand, though there are weekly (in my case, bi-weekly) shifts assigned.
So. Among the ridiculousness of life right now, I planned a meal for sixty to commence preparation at 4pm this afternoon (yes, I left work extremely early, and earlier yet in order to ride the bus up the hill to get my car so I could get home at the end of it all).
To illustrate the interesting task of end-of-the-week cooking at the coop:
Intended menu:
pasta; pomodoro sauce made entirely of fresh tomatoes; chicken marsala with cream; garlic olive bread; tiramisu; balsamic green beans; gluten-free pasta; zucchini "pasta"; sicilian red lentil pasta sauce/stew
Final menu:
pasta; pomodoro sauce made of almost-ripe tomatoes stripped from the garden and canned tomato puree; chicken marsala (without cream); garlic bread (someone had eaten all six loaves of the olive bread!?); tiramisu-like cake trifle (no whipped cream); orange-fennel salad over mixed greens; oregano-spiked summer squash; tempeh "arrabiata" (aka kinda spicy with a couple of tomatoes, lots of onion, and summer squash)
All in all, it actually worked out surprisingly well. We were only about ten minutes late, which included making up "late plates" for absent co-op-ers (amusingly, Megan was one of these, though she had gone to dinner for Rudi's birthday instead, just wanted to be sure she got some after she wandered into the kitchen this afternoon). Roasted garlic was a huge hit on the crispy bits of garlic bread. The tiramisu trifle went over incredibly well, considering I had forgotten to pour over the coffee/marsala wine mixture on the top layer. And the mere fact that the pomodoro sauce was uber-local made Adam, the kitchen manager, so happy he loudly declared that fact to the entire room.
But lesson learned: as far as co-op-ers are concerned, anything with chocolate chips is far superior to anything without.
One of the greatest (and potentially aggravating) parts of being head cook is that every week a new set of assistant cooks are assigned to your shift. Today James and Margaret were to be assistants, but Margaret found herself four hours of workshift "up" (meaning she had done more than necessary), and with a problem set due tomorrow, "sold" her shift to Nina. So, Nina, James, and I made an (inevitably) complete mess of the HiP kitchen in our attempt to satisfy the hungry graduate students.
I must say, it's been a while since I directed others in cooking. Most of my culinary training was in taking orders, not giving them. I'm pretty good at getting all of my stuff done in order and on time; this was part of what earned me highest honors in the City and Guilds program. But telling others what to do, and being completely dependent on them because there's no way to do it all in that period of time on my own? Unfamiliar experience for me. Especially the part that makes me responsible for the outcome of our team's work. I never liked that part of teamwork, if there was a situation where I absolutely had to trust my teammates to do their work well. I'm far more likely to try to do it myself. I'm a horrible team player. I know it. But there's nothing saying I can't learn to either:
1) not worry about it not being perfect, since it never will be, or
2) absolutely trust that someone else is equally competent and will do a good job without my involvement.
Actually, I think the first will be more of a problem.
Regardless, getting to know Nina and James was great. Turns out Nina's on what they call a "grace period" (even though she's not a student, she can live in the co-op for one more semester beyond finishing her degree), and James is the one other person I've met from Rhode Island (East Greenwich!). Nina did an incredible job with the chicken marsala, and pretty much deconstructed three whole chickens on her own after I showed her the general procedure. And poor James got all the boring jobs, slicing about 2 gallons of mushrooms, fifty mixed summer squash, twelve oranges, seven fennel bulbs, and five heads of garlic. The dude was ridiculously upbeat about it. I promised him next time he'd get to do all the fun stuff (whatever that is).
And the adrenaline rush after realizing half my proposed dinner (and vegan protein) was nonexistent (no red lentils, or a proper substitute, anywhere in sight) was invigorating. Sleep deprivation is not a good thing in such situations... I ended up spending ten minutes in the walk-in, trying to find something to make, and walked out shivering. Thank heavens for my SusieCakes chef's jacket! Another use beyond protecting me from flying spurts of hot oil and providing a reminder of M1N (swatties!!!!!): it can be used as blustery-weather gear. woot!
So somehow I'm supposed to get four workshift hours for this ridiculousness. Fortunately I love it, otherwise there's no way it'd be worth it. But this is most of the reason I joined the co-op (besides meeting non-engineers, trying something new, and getting to hang out with two of my favorite people in the world). It's great to be back cooking for people, and seeing their faces as they enjoy it.
Commenting
A couple of people have asked me how they can comment on a post (or mentioned that they had something to answer with, but were to lazy to figure out how). Well, sorry lazy people, you have no excuse now.
Easy instructions:
In the upper right hand corner click on 'sign in'.
If you have a google account, gmail or otherwise, use that, you already have an account. LUCKY YOU.
If not, make one really quickly, it'll take O(2min). You can create a google account using an email address you already have.
Then you can click on the 'comment' button at the bottom of each post, and talk to me.
YAY.
kthanksbye.
this was a public interest message in addition to regular programming, brought to you by the letters K, M, and the number 16. Additional support provided by the korporation for public broadkasting and the karnegie foundation.
Easy instructions:
In the upper right hand corner click on 'sign in'.
If you have a google account, gmail or otherwise, use that, you already have an account. LUCKY YOU.
If not, make one really quickly, it'll take O(2min). You can create a google account using an email address you already have.
Then you can click on the 'comment' button at the bottom of each post, and talk to me.
YAY.
kthanksbye.
this was a public interest message in addition to regular programming, brought to you by the letters K, M, and the number 16. Additional support provided by the korporation for public broadkasting and the karnegie foundation.
Wednesday, August 31, 2011
A question for scientists
Have you ever tried to convince yourself of something, even though you know it's wrong?
For example, that tomatoes really should go with peanut butter (why? because they're two of my favorite things!) but no, tomatoes and peanut butter don't like each other (except, actually, in the rare Thai dish, crap, bad example).
Well anyway. How do you possibly know how to describe why you know something? Are feelings and convictions even describable? If we can't use logic to defend a feeling or conviction, where does that leave us?
Being an engineer, my default is to look for logical support before drawing conclusions about anything. But that doesn't actually work for every situation.
For example: 68-88% of the world's population (and ~80% of the American population) adheres to some sort of religion. However, many logical arguments could be (and have been) made to "disprove" the existence of a higher God of some sort; that is, if each person has not had a record-able, unquestionable religious encounter, it is difficult to logically prove the logical truth of the belief system.
And yet, people believe nonetheless. Many logical scientists are believers, as well. Why do we take this one exception to our "logic rule"? When we spend so much time insisting that only tangible proof, and sometimes fourfold tangible proof, is sufficient in our scientific pursuits, why do we turn to something else to prove this?
And is this the only time when such an intangible proof is sufficient? If we can use a basic "gut feeling" or "just knowing" for trusting a higher being with control of the world, however that is, can we trust that same feeling sense for other decisions? And if we can, do we need more proof? Does it make sense to ask for more when the only proof we have is that knowledge that something just is a certain way?
I leave this question for you, scientists. Do we have a way to use that gut feeling (and it is surprisingly useful in directing our research)? Can it be enough proof on its own? If it is the basis of a decision, can it by definition logically need any more proof? If the basis is not logical, can we adhere the rules of logic to it?
Maybe I should return to my small bookshelf of philosophers for this one. Unfortunately, it seems most of them were Christian... or at least the ones I have (thanks Catholic school). hmm.
For example, that tomatoes really should go with peanut butter (why? because they're two of my favorite things!) but no, tomatoes and peanut butter don't like each other (except, actually, in the rare Thai dish, crap, bad example).
Well anyway. How do you possibly know how to describe why you know something? Are feelings and convictions even describable? If we can't use logic to defend a feeling or conviction, where does that leave us?
Being an engineer, my default is to look for logical support before drawing conclusions about anything. But that doesn't actually work for every situation.
For example: 68-88% of the world's population (and ~80% of the American population) adheres to some sort of religion. However, many logical arguments could be (and have been) made to "disprove" the existence of a higher God of some sort; that is, if each person has not had a record-able, unquestionable religious encounter, it is difficult to logically prove the logical truth of the belief system.
And yet, people believe nonetheless. Many logical scientists are believers, as well. Why do we take this one exception to our "logic rule"? When we spend so much time insisting that only tangible proof, and sometimes fourfold tangible proof, is sufficient in our scientific pursuits, why do we turn to something else to prove this?
And is this the only time when such an intangible proof is sufficient? If we can use a basic "gut feeling" or "just knowing" for trusting a higher being with control of the world, however that is, can we trust that same feeling sense for other decisions? And if we can, do we need more proof? Does it make sense to ask for more when the only proof we have is that knowledge that something just is a certain way?
I leave this question for you, scientists. Do we have a way to use that gut feeling (and it is surprisingly useful in directing our research)? Can it be enough proof on its own? If it is the basis of a decision, can it by definition logically need any more proof? If the basis is not logical, can we adhere the rules of logic to it?
Maybe I should return to my small bookshelf of philosophers for this one. Unfortunately, it seems most of them were Christian... or at least the ones I have (thanks Catholic school). hmm.
Tuesday, August 30, 2011
Serendipity
28 August 2011 01:20AM
Have you ever seen that movie? It's extremely cheesy and full of John Cusack's floppy hair, and I have no idea why, but for some reason that popped into my head tonight. Well, I suppose I was thinking about the word, but the movie? Not so appropriate. Thanks, brain.
Have you ever seen that movie? It's extremely cheesy and full of John Cusack's floppy hair, and I have no idea why, but for some reason that popped into my head tonight. Well, I suppose I was thinking about the word, but the movie? Not so appropriate. Thanks, brain.
So why was that in my brain?
Well.
I just enjoyed a lovely 28-hour trip home from Rome (it's 1am now, Berkeley time, Saturday night). I got to the Termini station in Roma at 6am Saturday morning, arriving at the international terminal at FCO at 8am, a full two and a half hours before my flight took off. I suppose there's something to be said for getting there early, but something tells me the 3-hr-beforehand limit isn't expected abroad like it is in the US. But no matter. I had my last Italian cappuccino (actually my first, as well, I realized- I've been drinking espresso), did some yoga, and read Belong to Me (I highly recommend this book) as my fellow passengers trickled in. After spending a week meeting random people, all I wanted to do was sit in my little bubble for a while and watch them all wander past, taking care of the little things they all cared about, the little rituals before flights. I took a heavy grip on my oh-so-sexy neck pillow and prepared myself for an 11-hour flight to Atlanta.
The flight was not interesting. I sat next to a kid from Penn who had spent the last month on an archaeological dig in Tuscany (poor guy) and, when we touched down in Atlanta, learned that his flight to Philly was canceled due to Irene (double poor guy). At the baggage claim, I conversed with a guy from Mississippi who, upon learning I was from Berkeley, sneered "Oh that's like the really liberal place. That's like your fight song, right? Are you a liberal?" my answer was insufficient, to say the least. Yes, dude, I think people should be able to live their lives in a way they choose and that we shouldn't be able to pass judgement on the choices they make. Thanks for making it sound like I'm killing puppies.
No, the insane thing that forced serendipity to arrive in my brain like flashing lights on Broadway was what happened in the Atlanta airport, 45min before my flight to SFO was to depart. I was headed toward the gate after a nice dinner of frozen yogurt (if you can't eat crap while traveling, when can you?), when a flash of orange appeared in my left peripheral.
I overcame my lack of ability to turn left to find Brian stopping next to me in his Philadelphia Runner shirt.
[In my mind: duhhhhh WHAT JUST HAPPENED?????]
Exactly one week (almost to the hour... 8pm local time...) after we met on the Piazza di Santa Maria Maggiore, our paths crossed again, randomly, in an airport on a different continent.
He was on a trip to South America for work, and rather than heading to the international terminal, was sitting in the domestic terminal with some people he had met on his previous flight, having a few beers during the long layover they all had. I happened to walk by as he looked up. What kind of strange coincidence is that?
All in all, it was pretty amusing. I went to join them for a little while before getting on my flight, and we all exchanged contact info, and decided that Brian and the other guy needed to come out to Northern California to join Windee and myself (she's from Sonoma) and do a wine tour. Because heaven knows we'll all run into each other again, in some random airport, at some point. Why not make it on purpose?
I have no idea who or what controls the universe and things that seem to be extremely strange coincidences. But I'm grateful for this serendipity (now it feels like a 6th grade vocabulary word). For better or worse, it gives me a little more confidence that life isn't completely a waste of time, with no rhyme or reason. Or maybe it is. Who knows for sure?
The cantering horses of Leonardo da Vinci
27Aug2011, 01:43am
Well, a 3am bed-time after wandering around with the oceanographers meant a late beginning to my last day in Rome, 9:30am. I caught Audric on his way out to wander the city, and wished him and Julia a good trip to France. And then exploration began. I decided to not have a plan for the day, but to wander and meet people and talk to them. A random selection of the interesting people I met:
An old man, who owned a tiny leather goods shop, and whose family had run it for two generations. He was childless, and regretted not marrying for many reasons, not the least of which was to let the shop continue on after his death.
- A newlywed couple from Pittsburgh on their one-year-delayed honeymoon. Their favorite part of Rome was the Spanish Steps; they had been there every day on their 4-days-so-far trip.
- Seventeen thousand people (or so it seemed) at the Trevi fountain, milling around, wishing they could clamber into the fountain because it was about 98degF, but knowing they can’t (which makes it so much worse and so much more tempting)
- Clint Winant, whom I met out on the street as I was wandering in the evening; we had a lovely discussion about the need for a place to work away from the office; apparently he occasionally finds himself wandering outside and wondering why he wasn’t working.
- A young man from Canada, who was kind enough to take a picture of me outside THE BEST gelato place EVER (l’Alberto del Cacao). I had a bit of chocolate smeared on my upper lip and was completely oblivious, so it took me a while to figure out why he was laughing the entire time… there are a couple of times it would be nice to have someone along to point things out and keep me from wandering around Rome looking like an idiot (fortunately I had a look at the picture immediately). Though truthfully, by definition I will always wander around looking like an idiot. Just gotta laugh at yourself, right?
- A German family of three, with a young boy about eight years old, who was obsessively turning the crank on one of da Vinci’s flying machines. His parents just rolled their eyes at me and said, “he will not stop. We try to stop him, but he will not stop.” Fortunately, these magical contraptions were made for young girls and boys (and older ones too!) to try out. We spoke for several minutes about the nature of children, regardless of where they are or where they were raised, and how we all could learn a thing or two about creativity. Da Vinci was quite a genius, it’s true- I wish we could have made his utopian city, it was beautifully laid out. He did, in fact, invent something to walk on water (a la Ever After, for all of you girly movie fans out there), but it was more along the line of skis than the boat-shoes you might think of.
And those were just the people I interacted with directly. Most of the day was spent attempting to blend into the landscape. You can always tell if that goal is successful by the reaction of tourists, and locals, to your presence. If both groups steer clear of you, they know you have somewhere to go, and aren’t aimlessly wandering like a tourist.
It’s an interesting feeling, realizing that you can be absorbed so easily into another country, another place. I thirst for it. I so dearly want to return- or even just try out another new place. This has made me think I might just get up and go somewhere- even if it’s just another city in the US. Make no plans but a place to stay. Go out and meet people. Watch, listen, learn, and see. Maybe tomorrow. Or maybe in a year. That would be a most fulfilling hobby.
Monday, August 29, 2011
The Swedes
August 26 2011, 22:15.
Sitting alone in a restaurant in Rome can be a very awkward thing.
I'm writing now in my notebook as the servers stare, and every other person at a table speaks with their party. I have been oddly placed directly in the middle of the walkway into the garden dining room, so there's no avoiding sticking out: tall blonde american alone = obvious freak show.
I ended up here, wherever here is, by chance; I had a list of six restaurants I wanted to try before leaving, and not one of them was open. So here I am, in a random little restaurant in the middle of nowhere. But as those tend to be the most interesting places, I'm actually not at all concerned.
I'm sitting at a table adjacent to a group of six older Swedish gentlemen and ladies.
[and how do I know this about them? when the server took their plates: "He say, 'you finish?', No, we Swedish". har har har har]
It turns out they're all neighbors in a small city in Southern Sweden, and they travel various places together. That sounds so lovely. This year is Roma, Madagascar, and Tunisia; next year will be California and Vegas.
We have had a very interesting conversation over the past couple of hours, a few plates of spaghetti pomodoro, and several glasses of vino tinto. Rather than describe everything about these guys, let me just state the particular things I learned from them:
Not bad for two hours of discussion. And what life lessons I received in return for a little time and a map of Rome, directions, and a pen!
I again wonder at the fact that we are communicating in English. This city is such a strange collection of people from so many places, and yet, everyone knows some little bit of english, no matter where they hail from. So in this city in Italy, in the middle of Europe, with tourists out the wazoo, here we are, all trying to speak slightly different versions of English to understand each other.
I've known that was the case, but it never really hit home til today, when I was in the garden Quirinale. An old Italian man sat down next to me on a bench. I was sketching the statue in the middle of the garden, of a famous dude on a horse, with the late afternoon sun coming across. When I finished, he asked in broken English if I was an art student, and then whether I was English or American. I decided to go out on a limb because I didn't understand him well, and, as opposed to what I did all week, pretend I was German.
We proceeded to have a broken conversation in English, in which I almost copied his accent, thinking which words would be basic and building blocks for an ESL-speaker, which would allow us to communicate without one of us having "superior" grammar- that is always my least favorite part of speaking with a nonnative speaker, when one of the two has an upper hand by the mere fact that they spoke the language well. It's a strange power struggle, and seldomly does the nonnative speaker come out on top. But when neither knows it well, there is no such struggle, and all that is important is understanding and using body language (the most beautiful and expressive form of communication, in my opinion). I feel rather bad about pretending to be something I wasn't in my discussion with this guy, but to be fair, he was rather creepy in the way he approached me and decided to sit very close on the bench with me. It was half self-defense to avoid sharing too much information. But that's just an excuse. I was scared, a bit, and it also sounded interesting to try.
Net in net: try it. Put yourself in someone else's shoes sometimes. It's amazing what you'll learn. Especially if you have nothing to lose, and you can pretend without it hurting anyone.
Sitting alone in a restaurant in Rome can be a very awkward thing.
I'm writing now in my notebook as the servers stare, and every other person at a table speaks with their party. I have been oddly placed directly in the middle of the walkway into the garden dining room, so there's no avoiding sticking out: tall blonde american alone = obvious freak show.
I ended up here, wherever here is, by chance; I had a list of six restaurants I wanted to try before leaving, and not one of them was open. So here I am, in a random little restaurant in the middle of nowhere. But as those tend to be the most interesting places, I'm actually not at all concerned.
I'm sitting at a table adjacent to a group of six older Swedish gentlemen and ladies.
[and how do I know this about them? when the server took their plates: "He say, 'you finish?', No, we Swedish". har har har har]
It turns out they're all neighbors in a small city in Southern Sweden, and they travel various places together. That sounds so lovely. This year is Roma, Madagascar, and Tunisia; next year will be California and Vegas.
We have had a very interesting conversation over the past couple of hours, a few plates of spaghetti pomodoro, and several glasses of vino tinto. Rather than describe everything about these guys, let me just state the particular things I learned from them:
- Northern Sweden is very desolate. Never visit there.
- Europeans are still very grateful for the American sacrifices in WWII, for "the sacrifice of young men, or else we would all be German or Italian".... so they don't harbor any hatred toward Americans, regardless of politics, for that reason alone.
- There is always a war going on somewhere. Someone's fighting. Just right now America's involved and it's close to home [for you]. [You] are involved but that doesn't mean anything. Thus there's no reason for bad feelings.
- There is no reason to hate anyone. At all.
Not bad for two hours of discussion. And what life lessons I received in return for a little time and a map of Rome, directions, and a pen!
I again wonder at the fact that we are communicating in English. This city is such a strange collection of people from so many places, and yet, everyone knows some little bit of english, no matter where they hail from. So in this city in Italy, in the middle of Europe, with tourists out the wazoo, here we are, all trying to speak slightly different versions of English to understand each other.
I've known that was the case, but it never really hit home til today, when I was in the garden Quirinale. An old Italian man sat down next to me on a bench. I was sketching the statue in the middle of the garden, of a famous dude on a horse, with the late afternoon sun coming across. When I finished, he asked in broken English if I was an art student, and then whether I was English or American. I decided to go out on a limb because I didn't understand him well, and, as opposed to what I did all week, pretend I was German.
We proceeded to have a broken conversation in English, in which I almost copied his accent, thinking which words would be basic and building blocks for an ESL-speaker, which would allow us to communicate without one of us having "superior" grammar- that is always my least favorite part of speaking with a nonnative speaker, when one of the two has an upper hand by the mere fact that they spoke the language well. It's a strange power struggle, and seldomly does the nonnative speaker come out on top. But when neither knows it well, there is no such struggle, and all that is important is understanding and using body language (the most beautiful and expressive form of communication, in my opinion). I feel rather bad about pretending to be something I wasn't in my discussion with this guy, but to be fair, he was rather creepy in the way he approached me and decided to sit very close on the bench with me. It was half self-defense to avoid sharing too much information. But that's just an excuse. I was scared, a bit, and it also sounded interesting to try.
Net in net: try it. Put yourself in someone else's shoes sometimes. It's amazing what you'll learn. Especially if you have nothing to lose, and you can pretend without it hurting anyone.
Sunday, August 28, 2011
Party like it's 753 BC!
So I said I was going to the “social dinner” last night.
Well, go I certainly did. I arrived at the Hydrology garden (wish we had one of those! Next to the Colosseum!) and ran into one of Mark’s contemporaries, who, surprisingly, somehow knew who I was. We had a chat for a while; he is now a professor at Iowa (doing more hydraulics than EFM, apparently they’re ridiculously good at that, who would have thought?). But knowing me, I have completely forgotten his name.
Regardless, after a ten-minute conversation about how I was going to tell Mark I saw him but not that he says hello because he was pretending to be miffed that Mark didn’t show up, we went our separate ways, him to join a group of older gentlemen, and me to join a couple of PhD students. As previously mentioned, I am ridiculously bad at remembering names, particularly those of whom it will be crucial to know their names at a later time (ie, five years down the road at the next ISSF). Alas, I do not have their names, but let’s call them Jean and Rolph. Jean was from France and Rolph from Germany but studying in the Netherlands (or something like that)… within the next fifteen minutes, we were joined by a guy from Germany studying in Canada, a guy from Korea studying in the UK, the two girls from Jeff’s lab at Stanford, and one or two others. All in all, we had a very interesting discussion of how German would soon be the language everyone in the world was studying (as opposed to now- everyone must learn English! This hit me in a particular way last night… a large group of people from all over trying to convey important information in our different broken bits of English, the only language overlap we all have).
They announced dinner, so being grad students we rushed up to the buffet and filled our plates with fresh ricotta, pancetta, bruschetta, little puffs of fried vegetable dough, eggplant, hunks of parmesan from a wheel, and slices of fresh braided mozzarella. And then we went back for seconds, because it was 1) ridiculously good 2) not all that filling because the plates were small and 3) free.
On top of that, they had plopped a bottle of white wine on our table to begin, and came around filling up champagne glasses (we had a debate on which of the glasses was for wine, which for champagne, since none were quite right). In the following hour or so, our table probably went through about five or six bottles. And then dinner arrived, in multiple courses, much to our surprise: cannelloni filled with some sort of fish, followed by swordfish, and ladyfingers soaked in marsala wine with custard and fresh fruit. With every intervening course, the general surprise of the group was vivid; we had spent a week in Italy, but we weren’t familiar with the way a dinner like this would work; and none of us ever ordered beyond the primi on the menus at the restaurants, being cheap grad students who could easily deal with pasta for dinner, again.
I apologize for the description of dinner; I’m being long-winded.
At one point in the night, all of the senior research scientists, organizing and scientific committees gathered around one table; these people are the pillars of stratified fluid mechanics. I joined in and took a picture. How could you not? Okay, so maybe it was a little awkward. But I mean really.
 |
| The fathers (and mothers) of today's stratified fluid mechanics, aka scientific committee 2011. |
After the main courses were finished, I was extremely amused to hear intense joy and perhaps drunkenness coming from the next table over, where J. Nash, Amy Waterhouse, some scared-looking Germans, an elderly Pole, and a couple of other Scripps scientists were. I decided they were having a lot of fun, so I picked up my chair and went over to join in. It was hilarious; we ended up moving our massive formal dining tables together, and generally being stupid and nerds of all ages, cracking jokes about (what else?) fluids.
Then they called for after-dinner drinks, and we all had to try limoncello (like a lemon drop, only alcoholic). Wandering around with Amy, the C. Winants, along with the other Scripps guys, we talked to most everyone (they know EVERYONE!). Larry Armi came back to say goodbye to Clint, and I just felt I couldn’t let him leave without introducing myself. And his reply “oh yes, I know your name, I was at your presentation, very nice! Good luck with your work.” WHA???? Really? He knows my name? This random old guy father-of-fluid-mechanics?
And then we decided to go dancing on the Island (in the middle of the Tiber). I ended up wandering around with the Scripps girls, a selection of European guys, and Jon through Rome to Trastavere, etc., until about 3AM. What an epic epic night. These scientists are people too.
It was amazing to be in… my own shoes… this week. I’m not sure anyone else would feel quite the same shock and gratitude for this particular company and becoming part of it, but I awoke every morning (admittedly tired) with the knowledge that I was going to be learning and doing something important and meeting important and interesting people. How unbelievable and how fortunate I have been.
Friday, August 26, 2011
conclusione del congresso
okay, so I fudged this title too, thanks to the sign I saw outside the cloister today. BUT IT'S OVER!!!!
YAY.
I never thought I'd be so happy to see this wonderful thing end. But the truth is, I'm tired of thinking about 500,000 different kinds of stratified flows, and remembering everything I've ever tried to learn about the differences between the turbulent, gradient, flux, and stratification Richardson numbers, the convergence of vortices, and the appropriate Reynolds number at the transition from 2D to quasi-3D turbulence for Kelvin-Helmholtz billows. I'm over discussing SCAMP processing with every other person who has ever used one. I'm done with trying to sketch out code for derivation of vertical dissipation rate of TKE from ADCP measurements with Joe Schmo, and then realizing Joe wrote the definitive paper on internal wave steepening over continental shelves, so there is no reason to argue with him. Enough, enough, enough. phew.
Oh, and I'm ready to be done with the 100degF conference rooms and lack of oxygen... talk about feeling lightheaded. phew. If I haven't said it before, don't visit Rome in August, unless you have a portable ice box.
Cool thing I learned today: Chloe Winant and her dad, Clint, are in the same field (fluids). COOL. they're both at the conference. I guess fluids runs in families.
So. One more day in Rome. I'm not sure what I'm going to do. I've been invited on a biking trip with a couple of grad students and post-docs from Scripps, and a tour with a couple of people around the city. I think I might just head out on my own, though, even if it would be a great idea to "network". I have an intense desire to wander the city alone, though I'm not sure why. Maybe I'll find some more random people to talk to, maybe I'll be spat upon by another crazy lady, maybe I'll stumble upon the most beautiful little place in the city, or walk along the Tiber, or head out to the beach.
I don't care about the tourist places. Rome is lovely, but I think it's more lovely for the city it is now than the city it once was, 2000 years ago. History is wonderful, and I love how it is integrated into the very fabric of this place, every old building still lived in, frescoes randomly scattered among the posters for 'NUOVO CELLULARI' and 'Rent Scooter'. But the ruins... they're ruins. I'm glad they're preserved and still around for the world to appreciate, but what makes a city isn't its tourist destinations.
What makes a city, and what makes each city different from others, is the unique ways its citizens make it their own. No one ever thinks they can own a city. But everyone lays claim to a corner of it, from sheer familiarity if nothing else. And those people change the place while they're there, they change the feel and the use of the space, the decoration and the purpose and the reason it exists.
Even those who visit change a place. I've become familiar with this corner of Via Cavour in the last week, as it has become familiar with me. No longer do I have to think before choosing which side of the street I'll walk on. No longer do the cafe owners offer me 'ice cleam' and 'gelatopizzaflenchaflies' as I walk by. They know I'm not a first time tourist, they recognize me. The guy at the cafe downstairs who cat-called me the first night I was here now nods and smiles respectfully. It's amazing the change a single week can make.
But I won't have a lasting impact on this city. Only those who can claim it as home really will. There seems to be some sort of threshold of involvement, time spent in a place, signing a lease, or something... that decides if you will change it. I don't know what that threshold is. And I think it changes from city to city. But all I can do is sit and appreciate the people who make this city their own, who love the buildings as home, who take every day here as part of their lives, dealing with tourists and making it work.
YAY.
I never thought I'd be so happy to see this wonderful thing end. But the truth is, I'm tired of thinking about 500,000 different kinds of stratified flows, and remembering everything I've ever tried to learn about the differences between the turbulent, gradient, flux, and stratification Richardson numbers, the convergence of vortices, and the appropriate Reynolds number at the transition from 2D to quasi-3D turbulence for Kelvin-Helmholtz billows. I'm over discussing SCAMP processing with every other person who has ever used one. I'm done with trying to sketch out code for derivation of vertical dissipation rate of TKE from ADCP measurements with Joe Schmo, and then realizing Joe wrote the definitive paper on internal wave steepening over continental shelves, so there is no reason to argue with him. Enough, enough, enough. phew.
Oh, and I'm ready to be done with the 100degF conference rooms and lack of oxygen... talk about feeling lightheaded. phew. If I haven't said it before, don't visit Rome in August, unless you have a portable ice box.
Cool thing I learned today: Chloe Winant and her dad, Clint, are in the same field (fluids). COOL. they're both at the conference. I guess fluids runs in families.
So. One more day in Rome. I'm not sure what I'm going to do. I've been invited on a biking trip with a couple of grad students and post-docs from Scripps, and a tour with a couple of people around the city. I think I might just head out on my own, though, even if it would be a great idea to "network". I have an intense desire to wander the city alone, though I'm not sure why. Maybe I'll find some more random people to talk to, maybe I'll be spat upon by another crazy lady, maybe I'll stumble upon the most beautiful little place in the city, or walk along the Tiber, or head out to the beach.
I don't care about the tourist places. Rome is lovely, but I think it's more lovely for the city it is now than the city it once was, 2000 years ago. History is wonderful, and I love how it is integrated into the very fabric of this place, every old building still lived in, frescoes randomly scattered among the posters for 'NUOVO CELLULARI' and 'Rent Scooter'. But the ruins... they're ruins. I'm glad they're preserved and still around for the world to appreciate, but what makes a city isn't its tourist destinations.
What makes a city, and what makes each city different from others, is the unique ways its citizens make it their own. No one ever thinks they can own a city. But everyone lays claim to a corner of it, from sheer familiarity if nothing else. And those people change the place while they're there, they change the feel and the use of the space, the decoration and the purpose and the reason it exists.
Even those who visit change a place. I've become familiar with this corner of Via Cavour in the last week, as it has become familiar with me. No longer do I have to think before choosing which side of the street I'll walk on. No longer do the cafe owners offer me 'ice cleam' and 'gelatopizzaflenchaflies' as I walk by. They know I'm not a first time tourist, they recognize me. The guy at the cafe downstairs who cat-called me the first night I was here now nods and smiles respectfully. It's amazing the change a single week can make.
But I won't have a lasting impact on this city. Only those who can claim it as home really will. There seems to be some sort of threshold of involvement, time spent in a place, signing a lease, or something... that decides if you will change it. I don't know what that threshold is. And I think it changes from city to city. But all I can do is sit and appreciate the people who make this city their own, who love the buildings as home, who take every day here as part of their lives, dealing with tourists and making it work.
Wednesday, August 24, 2011
In Honor of Fred Browand, who is Actually Still Alive and in the Front Row.
well, then.
Day 3 of conference: complete.
Since I've unfortunately been getting very little sleep while staying up writing these blog posts, I'm going to keep today's short and sweet in the hopes I sleep more than 6 hours (I'm all screwed up with jet lag still anyway, so it might not make a difference).
Today was LONG, though they actually managed to get the air conditioning working, which was SWEET. It's ridiculously hot here in the middle of the day. We have lunch out in the courtyard of the cloister, meaning we're in about 95degrees. Fortunately, though, they understand that and feed us random cold things (it's also a great way to keep people from eating very much and thus saving on catering, cha-ching!).
Highlights of today:
Overall, though, I'd say today was a success, despite my wallet being $70 lighter. :)
And the best part of the day: walking by a restaurant late tonight and seeing this beautiful tomato art:
Day 3 of conference: complete.
Since I've unfortunately been getting very little sleep while staying up writing these blog posts, I'm going to keep today's short and sweet in the hopes I sleep more than 6 hours (I'm all screwed up with jet lag still anyway, so it might not make a difference).
Today was LONG, though they actually managed to get the air conditioning working, which was SWEET. It's ridiculously hot here in the middle of the day. We have lunch out in the courtyard of the cloister, meaning we're in about 95degrees. Fortunately, though, they understand that and feed us random cold things (it's also a great way to keep people from eating very much and thus saving on catering, cha-ching!).
Highlights of today:
- morning coffee break was spent with Lynn Gelhar in front of my poster, discussing AUVs and potential methods of calculating dispersal (turns out that was his niche of hydrology)
- played Set during one of the lectures with a random guy I never learned the name of
- managed to catch Jon Nash and pick his brain for twenty minutes about how to identify internal wave packets in my data
- learned that my data might be crap, or that our IW calcs might be advected fluid instead of mixing...
- Larry Armi gave a ridiculously good lecture on the "touching case" of exchange flows
 |
| Larry Armi giving a lecture on the "touching case" of stratified exchange flows *BRAIN CRUSH* |
- one of the Canadian professors dressed up as Jorgen Holmboe in honor of Fred Browand, who has heralded the importance of Holmboe instabilities since the 70s (part of a set of two lecture blocks in his honor, Audric thought the guy was dead until "Jorgen" walked in and started addressing a guy in the front row)
 |
| One of the Italian professors (bottom left) as Jorgen Holmboe, the colors didn't turn out, sorry. |
- visited St Peter's again, arriving 20min before closing, found that the cathedrals of California had sponsored a plate in the floor of the basilica (WHAT DOES THIS MEAN??), and saw the creche where Pope John Paul II is buried (is he a saint yet? I though I heard something about that)
 |
| inside St Peter's looking west. basilica panorama forthcoming. |
- had a delightful Neapolitan style pizza at the first restaurant we've actually found open that was mentioned in my Rough Guide
 |
| Recafe ovoline pizza nom nom nom |
- walked up the Spanish Steps (nothing next to Berkeley Hills!) and tried to convince one of the guys selling laser pointer things that we'd buy one only if he could catch the top of St Peter's from there with it (it was dark)
- walked past the crazy stores on the upper part of Via del Corso, and learned that you can spend >900eu on a down jacket in the middle of 95degree heat, and that Hermes scarves will run you in the several hundred euro range (what?????)
- walked along the Tiber and oggled the ridiculous summer restaurants on the banks (which must smell nasty, there's so much gunk and marsh), listening to a band pretend to be Simon and Garfunkel
- got kicked off the bus and a 50euro ticket for not having stamped my bus ticket correctly
Overall, though, I'd say today was a success, despite my wallet being $70 lighter. :)
And the best part of the day: walking by a restaurant late tonight and seeing this beautiful tomato art:
 |
| yes, please. all you ever need on one plate. |
Tuesday, August 23, 2011
liquidi stratificati meravigliosi
okay, yeah, I used babelfish for that one. Sorry. I wasn't about to try to find the word "stratified" in my Just Enough Italian: How to Get By and Be Understood. Not that I think it'd be in there, unless the reference was to a vinaigrette or something (nerd overload, I know, sorry).
Well, today started in an interesting manner, as I was awoken by a knock on my door that made me literally jump out of my bed. Fortunately, I did not hit anything on my way to answering it (not sure how I managed to find my keys to unlock it either, but apparently I was startled into a sixth sense... I can't usually even find them when I have my contacts in, for that matter). There was a shape leaned over in a hunchback-like manner, mumbling to me in broken it-english. I had no idea what it said until later, but nodded, hoping it would leave me alone to find my eyeballs. And the figure scurried off after five seconds of this, and I was left to slow my heartbeat and splash water on my face to wake up (as it was already about 85degF at 7:30am, I was ready to go jump in the Trevi Fountain NOW PLEASE). When I woke up enough to reprocess what the guy said, it occurred to me that he was the dude on duty at the front desk. I asked yesterday if I could borrow an alarm clock since my phone doesn't know what time it is (Verizon apparently doesn't travel to Europe, only to NZ). Unfortunately, no, they said, but we can call you in the morning to wake you up (my room has a TV and phone line and sink, but no clock or toilet or shower). But apparently the phone line in my room is broken (as is the mini-fridge), so he had to come knock on my door to wake me up. Phew. That gave me a fright.
Beyond that, it was the second day of the conference. Audric and I listened to a bunch of interesting presentations, a bunch of boring-as presentations, and a bunch of poor PhD students you just have feel extreme pity for because you can tell they've never given a presentation before. Jon Nash gave a wonderful keynote lecture about the unpredictability of internal wave behavior in the presence of inhomogeneous topography, essentially telling me that my PhD is going to be ridiculous and I won't be able to draw any real conclusions given the data I have, and then failed to answer my question regarding wave packet identification by telling me that they were identified by changes in the vertical velocity (no duh, but that doesn't define packets, just IWs). On the bright side, this prompted Sonya Legg one of the three or so female senior researchers in the conference, to introduce herself to me. That was nice. And I had lunch with Lynn Gelhar again, along with a discussion of the pros and cons of presentations and posters. I think he was just trying to make me feel better.
The poster session went well enough, though unfortunately Rocky Geyer didn't show up, though I really wished he had (he was signed up for a poster... and I wanted to plant a seed in his brain that I would love to do a postdoc with him in three years or so at Woods Hole). Actually, of about thirty posters, only about ten of us showed up. And only about five of us actually were with our posters during the session time (which happened to correspond with coffee hour in the afternoon). I was hoping that Larry Armi would come over, but he just stopped by and moved on. Christine (a Stanford student who had also made her poster the wrong way) and I stole one of the Nortek dude's easel boards to put up our posters, and it was a madhouse trying to keep them up. Unfortunately, not very productive... the most productive comments/questions came from Audric, though I did get a chance to talk to several other SCAMP users and find that my swinging velocity isn't abnormal... it appeared off the coast of France, as well.
It turns out there are some people from NZ here, so I'm going to try to get a chance to meet them tomorrow. The scene in the keynote lectures is hilarious: in the first row near the door sit about seven old men with white hair and beards. They are rowdy and talk over each other, even during the lecture, and you'd think they were graduate students. But if you were to read their nametags, you would find yourself in the presence of many of the fathers of modern fluid mechanics and oceanography, from Scripps to MIT to Woods Hole to Oregon State to Cambridge to U. Western Australia. It's a ridiculous bunch, but knowing there are such great minds in the room simply enthralls me.
After sweating through the poster session (both literally and figuratively, as the posters were outside), there were more lectures (including Audric's) and I finally had a chance to sketch a little more. The cloister the conference is being held in (the Faculty of Engineering) is ridiculously gorgeous. I wish O'Brien were this nice!
Well, today started in an interesting manner, as I was awoken by a knock on my door that made me literally jump out of my bed. Fortunately, I did not hit anything on my way to answering it (not sure how I managed to find my keys to unlock it either, but apparently I was startled into a sixth sense... I can't usually even find them when I have my contacts in, for that matter). There was a shape leaned over in a hunchback-like manner, mumbling to me in broken it-english. I had no idea what it said until later, but nodded, hoping it would leave me alone to find my eyeballs. And the figure scurried off after five seconds of this, and I was left to slow my heartbeat and splash water on my face to wake up (as it was already about 85degF at 7:30am, I was ready to go jump in the Trevi Fountain NOW PLEASE). When I woke up enough to reprocess what the guy said, it occurred to me that he was the dude on duty at the front desk. I asked yesterday if I could borrow an alarm clock since my phone doesn't know what time it is (Verizon apparently doesn't travel to Europe, only to NZ). Unfortunately, no, they said, but we can call you in the morning to wake you up (my room has a TV and phone line and sink, but no clock or toilet or shower). But apparently the phone line in my room is broken (as is the mini-fridge), so he had to come knock on my door to wake me up. Phew. That gave me a fright.
Beyond that, it was the second day of the conference. Audric and I listened to a bunch of interesting presentations, a bunch of boring-as presentations, and a bunch of poor PhD students you just have feel extreme pity for because you can tell they've never given a presentation before. Jon Nash gave a wonderful keynote lecture about the unpredictability of internal wave behavior in the presence of inhomogeneous topography, essentially telling me that my PhD is going to be ridiculous and I won't be able to draw any real conclusions given the data I have, and then failed to answer my question regarding wave packet identification by telling me that they were identified by changes in the vertical velocity (no duh, but that doesn't define packets, just IWs). On the bright side, this prompted Sonya Legg one of the three or so female senior researchers in the conference, to introduce herself to me. That was nice. And I had lunch with Lynn Gelhar again, along with a discussion of the pros and cons of presentations and posters. I think he was just trying to make me feel better.
The poster session went well enough, though unfortunately Rocky Geyer didn't show up, though I really wished he had (he was signed up for a poster... and I wanted to plant a seed in his brain that I would love to do a postdoc with him in three years or so at Woods Hole). Actually, of about thirty posters, only about ten of us showed up. And only about five of us actually were with our posters during the session time (which happened to correspond with coffee hour in the afternoon). I was hoping that Larry Armi would come over, but he just stopped by and moved on. Christine (a Stanford student who had also made her poster the wrong way) and I stole one of the Nortek dude's easel boards to put up our posters, and it was a madhouse trying to keep them up. Unfortunately, not very productive... the most productive comments/questions came from Audric, though I did get a chance to talk to several other SCAMP users and find that my swinging velocity isn't abnormal... it appeared off the coast of France, as well.
It turns out there are some people from NZ here, so I'm going to try to get a chance to meet them tomorrow. The scene in the keynote lectures is hilarious: in the first row near the door sit about seven old men with white hair and beards. They are rowdy and talk over each other, even during the lecture, and you'd think they were graduate students. But if you were to read their nametags, you would find yourself in the presence of many of the fathers of modern fluid mechanics and oceanography, from Scripps to MIT to Woods Hole to Oregon State to Cambridge to U. Western Australia. It's a ridiculous bunch, but knowing there are such great minds in the room simply enthralls me.
After sweating through the poster session (both literally and figuratively, as the posters were outside), there were more lectures (including Audric's) and I finally had a chance to sketch a little more. The cloister the conference is being held in (the Faculty of Engineering) is ridiculously gorgeous. I wish O'Brien were this nice!
Sangallo Cloister, Universita di Roma la Sapienza
But I guess that's what you get for being around since the 12th century.
At 7:30pm, Julia, Audric and I headed out to roam and have dinner in the Trastevere neighborhood, across the Tiber from where we're staying (and a bit). It's supposed to be the best place for nightlife, and if the packed cafes were any indication, they were right.
Via Della Scala, 8:45pm
We ended up finding the place we wanted to go for dinner was closed (not surprising, really, as this is the time of year when lots of restaurants have vacations). We ended up somewhere that ended up being pretty dang good, even without knowing anything about it and despite the high tourist population. So now commenceth food blog: we shared mozzarella di bufala with shaved black truffles:
and then for dinner, risotto with porcini, sausage and ricotta salata (yes! meat! though now my stomach isn't happy):
AND a bottle of Montepulciano d'Abruzzo (nom nom), called "Ilius". Amazing.
And as we were walking back to the hotel (gotta love those nighttime city streets), there was a place selling ricotta granita. If you're familiar with granita, you will understand that is rather strange, as the creaminess isn't associated with granita much. It wasn't the best thing I've ever had, but hey, when in Rome, right?
What a day.
Monday, August 22, 2011
en Roma, Senatus Populusque Romanus
Thus commenceth ISSF2011, or, the 7th International Symposium on Stratified Flows. We have ridiculous backpacks (Audric managed to escape that fate) and four days of lectures to look forward to. Today was the 'master classes', meaning they broke up the grad students according to research topic (kinda) and had us present our work to each other. The main issue being, there was no real organization, so nobody really knew what to present. I threw together something last night, primarily from the presentation I gave to EFM in April (and heaven knows how things have progressed since then). By a horrible twist of fate, my presentation was eaten by PPT2003, and in a rush I had to convert it to a pdf (bye bye effects, hello confusing images). And about ten extra slides that I had hidden from the original presentation about Batchelor theory. gah. what a nightmare.
So something I learned today: when Larry Armi is going to be in the crowd, DON'T MESS UP. [dang.] That man doesn't like to listen to things he is bored by.. and he was bored by a lot of the presentations, and asked me to cross off which ones had been given already (he came in late). Fortunately, though, Clint Winant came over and introduced himself afterward, and said he liked my presentation (ha! yeah right). That was nice, at least.
I must say, I love the Italian way of doing things... rather slow, methodical... with lots of coffee breaks (though the accent isn't the same, I hear Andreas in my head every single time one of the organizers announces it). In the States it'd be.. well actually, it would probably be similar, except every coffee break would be accompanied by five-day-old pastries. At least here it's espresso and cookies.
So random list of memorable things that happened today: found a real Salumeria (this one); was spat upon by a signora pezzasca (crazy lady) in the Piazza Navona, who a minute later proceeded to start yelling across the square; had pizza bianca from Forno for lunch, on the east bank of the Tiber; was complimented in Italian on my tiny sketch of gothic windows, and tried (but failed) to have a conversation with him; realized that not only is my poster the wrong size, it is the wrong direction (is hamburger, not hot dog orientation), and found a solution (one of the Stanford students did the same thing, so we'll put them together on two boards); met Lynn Gelhar over pizza; wandered around the city for the night and watched traffic, and buses, go by the piazza.
I don't know why, but I've always loved cities at night. I'm not sure what it is about them, but somehow they feel more alive than during the day. All of the ugly bits become fuzzy, all of the stark sadness goes away. There is a special kind of energy, particularly on summer nights, particularly in cities where people stay out until all hours... eating at cafes on the street, wandering around with a gelato, or just wandering in general. You can feel the city's heartbeat in the background, thump-thump-thumping to an unknown band, a set of accordionists playing over each other to form a beautiful inharmonious symphony.
And a guy playing the accordion is sitting below my window right now, at the restaurant that closes at 1am. (he just struck up 'when the saints go marching in') Via Cavour is still busy, even now. But the shutters on my windows open up onto the corner, and all is well with the world.
To appease those not on facebook, here is one picture to go by so far:
yeah, Coloseo.
So something I learned today: when Larry Armi is going to be in the crowd, DON'T MESS UP. [dang.] That man doesn't like to listen to things he is bored by.. and he was bored by a lot of the presentations, and asked me to cross off which ones had been given already (he came in late). Fortunately, though, Clint Winant came over and introduced himself afterward, and said he liked my presentation (ha! yeah right). That was nice, at least.
I must say, I love the Italian way of doing things... rather slow, methodical... with lots of coffee breaks (though the accent isn't the same, I hear Andreas in my head every single time one of the organizers announces it). In the States it'd be.. well actually, it would probably be similar, except every coffee break would be accompanied by five-day-old pastries. At least here it's espresso and cookies.
So random list of memorable things that happened today: found a real Salumeria (this one); was spat upon by a signora pezzasca (crazy lady) in the Piazza Navona, who a minute later proceeded to start yelling across the square; had pizza bianca from Forno for lunch, on the east bank of the Tiber; was complimented in Italian on my tiny sketch of gothic windows, and tried (but failed) to have a conversation with him; realized that not only is my poster the wrong size, it is the wrong direction (is hamburger, not hot dog orientation), and found a solution (one of the Stanford students did the same thing, so we'll put them together on two boards); met Lynn Gelhar over pizza; wandered around the city for the night and watched traffic, and buses, go by the piazza.
I don't know why, but I've always loved cities at night. I'm not sure what it is about them, but somehow they feel more alive than during the day. All of the ugly bits become fuzzy, all of the stark sadness goes away. There is a special kind of energy, particularly on summer nights, particularly in cities where people stay out until all hours... eating at cafes on the street, wandering around with a gelato, or just wandering in general. You can feel the city's heartbeat in the background, thump-thump-thumping to an unknown band, a set of accordionists playing over each other to form a beautiful inharmonious symphony.
And a guy playing the accordion is sitting below my window right now, at the restaurant that closes at 1am. (he just struck up 'when the saints go marching in') Via Cavour is still busy, even now. But the shutters on my windows open up onto the corner, and all is well with the world.
To appease those not on facebook, here is one picture to go by so far:
Sunday, August 21, 2011
Roma walkabout
After sleeping for 11 hours last night (with the time difference and -52hrs, I was zonked), I awoke to Julia knocking on my door. Surprise, surprise! Audric had told me she'd be arriving in the morning... I suppose I just didn't expect to get up so late. But Rome is an easy place to be lazy, especially when it's 90degF out and 80% humidity. That's why August is not a popular month to visit, and why my hotel room only cost 290Eu for seven nights (besides the fact that it's the exact shape and size of a closet).
Julia and I had a lovely time being mostly asleep, wandering around the city. It was hilarious, she kept mentioning that it all felt surreal, like she was in a dream. I had felt the same the day before, so I wasn't as comatose, though there were several times when I thought I'd lost her.
After lunch at a wee cafe, we sort of went searching for a skirt for me. Unfortunately, all I packed was business casual, so I've been panting like a dog for the past two days... hence skirt search-age. But alas, to no avail... it's hard to remember that I am simply freakishly huge, and the idea of a "tall" doesn't exist in Italy. Most of the sundresses wouldn't cover my derriere significantly. Such is life.
We found a couple of nice little back streets, as you are wont to do while roaming in Rome, and purposely avoided the most touristy places. And we fell in love with the misters- lots of outdoor cafes have fans that simultaneously blow and mist their customers under umbrellas. And as most cafes have outdoor seating in the street, it's easy enough to continue walking along the sidewalk to catch the edge of the mist plume.
After a nap, Audric arrived in town, and we headed out to dinner, via the Colosseum. The light was perfect for photos, so we had a good time with that... and then wandered around trying to find a place to have dinner. On the way we found one of Rome's famous public fountains- drinking fountains everywhere! with delicious cold water running! (this part scares me, env engr that I am). And beyond the typical fountain, this one had THREE spouts, so we all filled up simultaneously. It was hilarious, and I wish I had gotten a picture. And here we were, worrying about drinking tap water in Rome.
None of the places recommended in my Rough Guide were open, so we ended up at a little place called Restaurant Tempio di Mecenate, near the Vittorio Emanuele. The food was decent, prices about normal, though they had a heavy hand with the salt. Not too bad for walking in off the street. Dinner was followed by gelato at one of the oldest gelaterias in the city- Giovanni Fassi. It was actually a MASSIVE place, and filled with people (primarily tourists). But the gelato lived up to its name, so that's fortunate at least.
What a day. what a day.
Julia and I had a lovely time being mostly asleep, wandering around the city. It was hilarious, she kept mentioning that it all felt surreal, like she was in a dream. I had felt the same the day before, so I wasn't as comatose, though there were several times when I thought I'd lost her.
After lunch at a wee cafe, we sort of went searching for a skirt for me. Unfortunately, all I packed was business casual, so I've been panting like a dog for the past two days... hence skirt search-age. But alas, to no avail... it's hard to remember that I am simply freakishly huge, and the idea of a "tall" doesn't exist in Italy. Most of the sundresses wouldn't cover my derriere significantly. Such is life.
We found a couple of nice little back streets, as you are wont to do while roaming in Rome, and purposely avoided the most touristy places. And we fell in love with the misters- lots of outdoor cafes have fans that simultaneously blow and mist their customers under umbrellas. And as most cafes have outdoor seating in the street, it's easy enough to continue walking along the sidewalk to catch the edge of the mist plume.
After a nap, Audric arrived in town, and we headed out to dinner, via the Colosseum. The light was perfect for photos, so we had a good time with that... and then wandered around trying to find a place to have dinner. On the way we found one of Rome's famous public fountains- drinking fountains everywhere! with delicious cold water running! (this part scares me, env engr that I am). And beyond the typical fountain, this one had THREE spouts, so we all filled up simultaneously. It was hilarious, and I wish I had gotten a picture. And here we were, worrying about drinking tap water in Rome.
None of the places recommended in my Rough Guide were open, so we ended up at a little place called Restaurant Tempio di Mecenate, near the Vittorio Emanuele. The food was decent, prices about normal, though they had a heavy hand with the salt. Not too bad for walking in off the street. Dinner was followed by gelato at one of the oldest gelaterias in the city- Giovanni Fassi. It was actually a MASSIVE place, and filled with people (primarily tourists). But the gelato lived up to its name, so that's fortunate at least.
What a day. what a day.
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