The Big Snow

Over the weekend, much of the East Coast was blanketted in snow. While it is unfortunate that the storm caused a lot of holiday travel difficulties, it was exciting to get some snow that is sticking around for a few days. We were supposed to get a lot of snow on Saturday, but it was still pretty minor on Saturday evening when it was getting dark. Luckily for us, the slow but steady snow continued to fall all through the evening and we woke up to a significant amount of snow. By the time I ventured out Sunday late morning, the roads had been cleared. The main problem people were having was with their cars. Since just about everybody living in this city parks their cars on the street, there was a lot of digging out to be done. The sides of the roads are still a mess today, since there are always one or two cars parked in an area so the plows can't uncover the edges of the roads. Here are a few pictures of the snow on Sunday and out neighbors digging out their cars.

They don't know it yet, but soon the ferrets will be going on a cross-country adventure. For now, they are enjoying their home and hanging out together with each other and with us.

visit to Boston

I spent several days this week in the Boston area. The purpose of this trip was to visit Woods Hole for research, but it was cheaper to go to Boston and then take a seperate trip to Woods Hole than to just go to Woods Hole. There were two reasons for this. First, taking a bus to Boston from New York is relatively inexpensive. Second, I know several people in Boston who would let me stay with them free of charge. I ended up staying with Pam, a fellow FSU anthropology student who is teaching (middle school?) in Boston and recently purchased a condo. She and her cat generously let me stay at their place, which had lots of room, since she hasn't found a roommate for the condo yet.

Pam's cat (Derby-Lynne) came to visit me a lot while I was sleeping, since I was sleeping in her favorite spot. She was a very nice cat, although a loud meower.

Since I was in Boston for a couple evenings, I had a chance to visit with a few Wooster alums, who lived in the same building as Brian and me for all the years we were at school together. Shosh (on left) was in Brian's year and a fellow psychology major. Sarah (on right) was in my year and we were roommates for one semester (the other semester of that year, I was in Greece).

Woods Hole

Earlier this week, I visited the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institute to work on my dissertation research. While the actual town of Woods Hole is cozy and small (kind of like Saugatuck I think, for the Holland folks), the actual research center is quite large, employing more than 800 people. There are also several smaller campuses with different names. I got a little lost on my way there (and went past it), but I asked someone, who directed me back up the road to the right turn off. The area I went was a collection of research buildings that looked rather like large houses or medium-sized inns. Here is a picture:


I had some fruitful discussions with the guy who will be taking my samples through their final step of analysis. Here he is next to the machine he will use. It is a GC (like I have used before), but it is modified into a 2D GC, which will be able to seperate the mutlitide of compounds in the samples so he can get enough space around the compounds to examine the carbon isotopes in a couple specific compounds. The good news is that he thinks there is a good amount of actual residue, so he won't have any problems having too little carbon to work with. The bad news is that the chromatographs are really complex and have a lot of peaks, so he needs to try to increase the seperation to get enough space around the compounds to get a clean read on them. I thought they were really difficult GC results, so it was gratifying to hear the same thing from someone with a lot more experience in the field.

Lastly, here is the view out of the lab's window. Yes, that is the ocean. It is really a beautiful place to work, with plenty of green space and coastal access. I was only visiting for the day, but I do kind of envy those who work here.

First Snow!

Today it snowed for the first time of the season here. It isn't a lot of snow, and I don't think it will stick around, but it is still quite exciting for a couple of northerners who lived in Florida for a while. The first picture is without flash to show how dark it was. The second picture is with flash so you can actually see the snow falling. The flakes were lovely--not little pebbles but large fluffy clumps.

And now for something completely different

Brian is often found sitting at his computer in the evening, either doing work or play. Here Eve has joined him for a bit of a snuggle.

Happy December!

December is here! Our tree is up. We still haven't seen any snow (and it has been in the 40s and above for the most part). I'm sure the real cold is still coming. Anyway, here are a few pictures of our tree to spread some cheer.

Tree with camera flash:

Tree with no flash & no room light:

This fellow should be stopping by our house sometime this weekend. I bought this ornament in Holland last year and I really like it:

Thanksgiving

Ironically, both dad and I had the same ideas about taking a picture of our plates. I posted the picture but thought I'd come back and write something about the day.

Hanneke made a very nice meal (see above) which we are finishing the leftovers of this weekend. It was fun to sit and eat it with her, but I think we both felt like it was a very different Thanksgiving than prior ones. A meal is great and all, but it's not the same as sitting down with a bunch of family. That part of Thanksgiving was very absent for us both this year, and we hope next year that will not be true. We were thinking of you all Thursday.

Happy Thanksgiving!

Winter

Hey everyone. As Hanneke described, things are getting colder here. I have enjoyed wearing my warm socks (thanks Grandma) and having good meals (including nice hamburgers recently, thanks D & R). Hanneke set-up the fountain Mark and Giny sent us before I even got home I think and it looks nice. And I appreciated receiving some birthday and seasonal money to fund our occassional stops at places to eat in NYC.

The semester is about month from ending and I am working on the various projects I have. Still a few papers to write and revise, and one exam to work on. I am also continuing to work on fellowships and other plans for employment next year. I don't expect to know anything about either for quite some time due to their time tables.

We look forward to seeing everyone in December.

November update

Well, we've been keeping busy this month reading and writing and trying to stay motivated. Things are slowly getting written. I am getting restless for winter to arrive: cool, crisp air and snow and holiday cheer. But it will be here before we know it, I'm sure.



I have been entertaining myself by trying many new recipes, many from my Simply in Season cookbook. We have also been enjoying some nice organic beef that David and Rachel sent for Brian's birthday. We ate one of the steaks so far (so tasty) and also one pack of hamburgers. The hamburgers smelled soooo divine cooking, and they tasted very nice as well.



This picture is from yesterday evening. I took it out the window in the front room as the sun was setting. Most of the leaves left on this tree are brown, and I think they will fall soon. I love pictures that silhouette something complex (like a tree) against a beautiful sky.

Cranberry Crumble Bars

It is fall, and we are enjoying the fall foods that appear in the store this time of year. Bags of fresh cranberries recently arrived in our grocery store, so I was looking for cranberry recipes and I found these bars. Both Brian and I think they are really delicious, and they are a good way to enjoy fresh cranberries, so I wanted to share the recipe with you. If you try it, let us know what you think.

Cranberry Crumble Bars (preheat oven to 400)

Filling: 1/2 cup sugar
1/4 cup orange juice
1/4 cup water
2 cups fresh cranberries
1 Tbsp grated orange zest
1/2 tsp ground cinnamon

Crust: 3/4 cup brown sugar
1/2 cup butter, softened
1 1/2 cup oats
1 cup flour
1/4 tsp salt

1) On stovetop, mix sugar, orange juice, and water. Heat to boiling. Remove from heat and add the remaining filling ingredients. Place back on the heat and cook over medium heat for about 10 minutes, stirring occasionally, until thickened.
2) Mix crust ingredients in order given until a crumbly mixture forms. Press half of the mixture into an ungreased pan. Spread the cranberry filling on top. Then, top filling with the remaining crust mixture, pressing down lightly.
3) Bake bars at 400 degrees until light brown.

Notes:
1) The recipe suggests that you use a 9x13 pan and bake for 20 minutes. I thought that would make the bars too thin, so I used a 8x8 and baked for 35 minutes. I think it would work well either way. My bars came out about 1.5 inches tall, so they would be thinner if you used a larger pan.
2) I think the cranberries are the main point of these bars, so I wanted more filling. I made an extra half batch of filling, which is yummy. I would suggest making more filling than the recipe calls for.

the big leak and other stories

Tonight we had a little adventure. I was sitting on the couch in the living room, eating a cranberry crumble bar, and I heard a dripping noise coming from the kitchen. When I went to investigate, I discovered water dripping from the ceiling, from a hole where our main heating pipes come down from the ceiling. I put a container under the leak and started to head out the door to check with our upstairs neighbor, when another (much quicker) dripping started in another part of the kitchen. I ran back to put a big pot under that second leak and then ran upstairs and started knocking insistently on the neighbor's door. It took her a little while to answer, and once she did, I discovered that her son (woh knows English) was not home. I was trying to act out water dripping down from the ceiling, but she had no idea what I was talking about. Finally, I told her I would show her, and we headed back towards the kitchen. When we arrived at the kitchen, we had to literally wade in, since there was at least an inch of water covering the floor. The source of the water was clear, as the washing machine hose was broken and actively spraying water on every surface in the kitchen. We both started muttering to ourselves (me in English and her in Spanish) while trying to turn the water off. She finally got it off, and we started to get all the water off the floor. This took a while (several towels, lots of wringing out, several buckets), and our efforts were partially impeded by Izzy, her small but active dog who was quite excited. Izzy loved to run through the water, attack the towels, and lick at the (really dirty) water pooled all over the floor. I stayed a while to help with the clean up, since our poor upstairs neighbor is quite elderly and was having trouble bending down to reach the floor (she explained to me with sign language--bad knees, bad back). When I got back down to our apartment, the ceiling was still leaking (in a few new places). I called the landlord, but he seemed unconcerned ("it will probably take a while to drain the floor"), so we just left containers out to catch the dripping water and left it. I found a few more small leaks, but overall, it seems like the worst of it is over. The biggest leak is now only an occasional drip.

In other news, I went to Columbia this weekend to read a few books in the library. The regular train was down for repairs (apparently, just for the weekend), so I ended up in the southern part of Harlem, which is northeast of Columbia. This was a bit problematic for me; I was hoping to stay and read for longer, but because of the several block walk through unknown terrain, I left before it got dark to be safe. Still, I got a little reading done.

On the southeast corner of campus is St. John the Divine cathedral, which I think is the largest gothic cathedral in the USA. It is quite a beautiful building. I took this snapshot of it's exterior as I passed it on Saturday (using my phone camera). I stopped by the cathedral many weeks ago to take a look inside and I got a few shots of the interior then. I put those interior shots in this post as well, even though they didn't turn out very well. My phone camera is much better with sunny shots than with building interiors, since there is no flash. Still, you can get the idea.

Update

Things are really getting busy here for Brian. He is writing his first paper for class this week, so he is trying to work extra research and writing hours into his normal homework schedule. Please don't be offended if you don't hear from us a lot in the next couple weeks. There is a lot of research going on, and there isn't a lot of time left over for anything else.

As for me, I have been having some back pain problems. It got so bad this week that I ended up going in to see the doctor today. I have a collection of prescriptions now and I am feeling better.

We have received some much-appreciated letters and packages from family over the last couple weeks. Thank you, everyone. Hearing from you is really encouraging to us both.

SAW XXVII

I'll come back to explain this more, but here's the parody-trailer for Law Revue, a comedic group at Columbia that I'm on the writing team for. This particular video I wrote the script for and edited, but I didn't do the filming itself. It's basically an ad for the show, which consists of full-blown skits and so on, which occurs in a few weeks. Edit: The video is based on the idea that the killer in the SAW movies comes to Columbia Law School (CLS) but instead of his devious, intricate games that his captors play instead he uses everyday, normal law school experiences to torment - because those experiences are bad enough on their own.

You have to have seen some of the SAW movies and/or know the law school environment to get some of the jokes, but maybe it's more widely-appealing than I suspect. In any event, the video is below. Edit: On further thought, this trailer is probably nonsensical to those not in law school. Oh well, I'll leave this post up anyway!

The trailer is not at all R rated, but I wouldn't watch it with little ones around either.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KdVpZ-zbHzg

ferret interlude

There's not a lot to report here, so I thought I'd post a few recent ferret pictures for your viewing pleasure. Brussels was feeling a little sick this weekend, but he seems to be doing better now. The first picture shows Brussels (in a stuffed octopus toy), and the next two show Rex.

October birthday

Well, we are really into fall now. Leaves are changing color and the air is usually crisp and cool. Overall, I think this fall has been enjoyable so far. We had cold rain for a few days last week, which was not very pleasant to walk around in. The air seems so fresh in the fall, and I love that. This is a picture I took this afternoon, showing the trees in front of our place. The leaves on the smaller tree have changed color, but the larger tree to the right is still mostly green. I will try to post another picture when the larger tree's leaves have changed.

Yesterday was Brian's birthday. We celebrated by having our friend Stip over. Stip lives on Long Island, so it was a bit of a drive but not too bad. We hung out, played some games, ate some food, and relaxed. It was a very nice visit.

We also had some cake for Brian's birthday. The cake was decorated beautifully with Halloween-themed colors and a spiderweb design. Unforturnately, I tripped on the way home from the cake shop and the cake fell. It got a little messed up, but it still tasted good. Here is a piece that survived the fall unscathed.

Brian received some very nice cards and packages, which he opened yesterday evening (well, a couple packages were opened on arrival). Thanks to everyone for the thoughts and gifts.

The Sky Calls to Us

Very entertaining. I really, really like this video.

Financial District

On Friday, I took the PATH train to the World Trade Center stop. The stop had been closed for quite a while (since it stops under where the twin towers used to be), but it is open again this year. It was an odd place to be. The stop has signs of continued construction, and the exit to street level is basically at the site of the 9/11 attacks. It is striking to see a whole city block totally leveled in this city, where all around there are tall skyscrapers.

Also on that trip, I got stopped on the street for a few moment. The street was closed for a short time for a film scene. The scene involved racing taxis and motorcycles. :)

Quick picture

This last week, there was an exhibit of pictures of various parts of the universe on display at Columbia, just outside the main administrative building that I walk by each day. I took a moment to look at them on the way home and took this photo of one I like in particular. If you look closely at this photograph, you'll see a white dot at about 10 o'clock in Saturn's rings. That dot is Earth.

Tampa trip

I've been in Tampa the last several days for work. I organized a conference with a few other people on archaeological science. It was a lot of work, but it seemed to go well. I was quite busy for the conference days (Thursday, Friday, Saturday), but on Sunday, I had a few hours to explore before my return flight. I spent that time walking around downtown Tampa a bit (our hotel location was in the heart of downtown). Less than a mile away, at the University of Tampa campus, is a place called the Henry Plant Museum. It is an old hotel with great architecture and many interesting items. Many soliders were stationed close to the hotel during the Spanish-American War, so they had many items from that time, including a series of letters from a soldier stationed there. President Roosevelt was stationed there when he was a cavalry officer, so they had a series of pictures relating to that as well. While the items were interesting, the building itself and all the Victorian architectural details were more interesting to me.

Between the Plant Museum and the main dowtown area, there is a park and a river. Here I am in that park. The pictures that follow show the main area of downtown from the park.

Nice Florida trees:

This palm fell a while ago, and has started the grow up again.

Downtown through the trees at the park:

The main skyline. I know it is hard to see, but there is a river between the trees and the buildings.

This is a picture I took right after my plane took off from the Tampa airport. You can see the same downtown buildings as in the previous picture (they are the tallest ones in almost the center of the pic). This shows you how close the airport is to downtown in Tampa. That was pretty convenient.

The flight back was pretty relaxing, which was nice. There was a small amount of turbulence, but there were also some great clouds to look at.

During the flight, the sun set, and by the time we got to NY, everything was dark.

It was a good trip, but I am happy to be back home again.

Couch construction

A few days ago, I posted pictures of our new loveseat. It is pretty comfortable, covered in nice black leather, comfy padding, etc. But there was one thing I did not tell you in that post: the couch came in many pieces and we constructed it ourselves! This doesn't seem to be uncommon in this area, where living spaces are small, the hallways to access them are even smaller, and many people need to walk up flights of stairs to get to their apartments. Most "regular-sized" pieces of furniture would not fit in our apartment, and I would feel pretty bad for the delivery people too. Anyway, our loveseat came in 2 boxes, each approximately 50 lbs. I manuevered them up the stairs (one at a time), and slided them across the floor into our front room. Here are those boxes:

Once open, the boxes contained several pieces of wood, connectors, padding, and the leather covers. We started construction by making the couch arms. The ferrets watched carefully. Here is one of the arms, mid-construction:

Now both of the arms are together. (See them standing side by side?) Some of the padding is also visible in this photo. Here you can see Brian pounding in some of the connectors, which were used to securely anchor the screws:

So after the arms, we moved on to the seat. Each section of the loveseat was constructed individually (so 2 sections). Here you can see Brian attaching a front panel:

After each seat was made, they needed to be attached together. (They were attached before the actual seat panel was added.)

Once the seats were attached, we started adding the covers and padding. Not all areas of the couch are padded--mainly the parts you touch when sitting (tops of the arms, seat, back). Here Brian has attached the first piece of leather, to cover the very front panel. After covering the arms, we attached them as well. Each cushion got wrapped seperately...

And here is what we ended up with! It took a while, but in general, I like the result. It is nice to sit on--a good, firm bottom cushion, so you won't immediately fall asleep. I like to sit here to watch the ferrets.

Recent work

It is hard to believe that September is now almost over - it has gone by very fast. My classes continue to have heavy reading loads, I spend about 5 hours per class reading, not counting the time I go back and reread the notes I took from reading previously. For the most part I enjoy the readings, though one of my five classes is not at all what I expected - I had hoped for detailed consideration of how the law will handle a category of technology, but instead we have mostly read theory or regular tech, news, or general science articles with no legal element included.

Over the last week I also finished a volunteer study I had signed up for over the summer at a law institute somewhere. For the project, I was assigned 500 documents ranging in length from 1 to a few hundred pages and I had to review them online to determine if they were relevant to a particular legal question. The documents were from the tobacco cases of the 90s, and they were of all sorts. It took a while, but I am done now.

Now that I have that task done and our couch is here and set-up, I'm turning my attention fully to the three articles I must write. I also have to get moving on the fellowships so that I am applying early in their application period, not late.

The weather here has begun to turn cold and it is clear Fall has arrived. It's a little surprising since there was not much Fall to speak of in Florida, but not that much since it did get coldish there.

Columbia Morningside Campus

There was a request for more pictures of Columbia a while back, and I did not forget about it. I have been on campus several times in the last week, and on Friday, I was there again for a few hours working in the lab. I took some pictures in the afternoon after I was finished with my work, before heading for home on the subway. I've attached a map so I can refer to specific locations (and you can get a general idea of the campus layout). I think if you click on the map, you should be able to see a larger image, if you are having trouble reading it.

The main part of campus (and the only part Brian and I have spent any significant time in) is located between 112th and 120th (NS) and between Broadway and Morningside (EW). That is the part of campus in the map below. The law school is on the eastern side of campus, at Amsterdam Ave and 116th. The subway station we use is marked on the map with a red 1. It is at Broadway and 116th. To get to the law school, Brian usually walks along College Walk, which is the part of 116th street that goes through campus (not a street on campus). The pictures that follow will primarily show the Greene Bldg (Law), as well as the above street overpass next to it, St. Paul's, and a few buildings on the central green area. The building I have been working in is the Mudd building (120th & Amsterdam), but I didn't take any pictures of it. All the orange arrows on the map show places that you can enter main campus from the street level. Okay, I think that is all the intro stuff, so on to the pictures.

The pictures start in the main green area. This is a building seen before on this blog, so it may be familiar. It is the old library, now administration building (Low Library on the map). Between this building and College Walk, there are a lot of steps. These steps are a very popular place for students to meet, sit, read, etc. Brian and I have spent some time sitting on these steps, working.

If you look a little further south, you will see College Walk. The main buildings in this picture are Dodge Miller Theatre (R) and the Journalism Bldg (L). College Walk leads between these two buildings, from the subway to the law school.

If we continue to pan south, now you can see across College Walk to the Butler Library, which is the main library on campus. I tried to go into it, but I needed to have a Columbia U ID card. I intend to look at their website to see if there is a way to get permission to go inside without the ID card, since it would be a good place to sit when it gets colder. This picture also shows the main green on campus. (The steps on the left of this picture go to the Kent Bldg.)

Okay, after taking those pics, I walked to the over-the-road campus connector close to the law school. I don't think Brian uses it a lot, but I think it is very cool. It leads from the third floor of the law school across Amsterdam Ave to the main campus. On the map, it shows as a green and cream rectangle over top of Amsterdam Ave. Anyway, from that connector, This picture shows St. Paul's, which I think is a really pretty chapel. It is not the only one on campus (I believe Earl is also a chapel, and there are a couple churches, perhaps one associated with the seminary, I don't know exactly), but it is the main one that I have seen several times.

This picture also shows St. Paul's. In this picture, you can only see the bottom end of the building, because I wanted to show the campus entrance from Amsterdam Ave. This is right by that orange arrow just north of the connector.

Amsterdam Ave, looking north, from the connector. On this connector, I feel like I am floating above the city, which is kind of cool.

This is the exact same view as the previous picture. The main difference is that I backed up to the other side of the connector, so you can see how cool it is. It is mainly a lawn three stories in the air, with several statues.

Now I am standing in the same place, but I am starting to pan right (so away from north to the east). Here you can see the law school. The law school has the vertical stripes. Remember that we are on the third floor, so there are two more floors below this level of law school.

More law school, as I continue to pan east. This crazy-looking statue stands above the connector entrance. Brian and I sat outside in this area to eat lunch on Wednesday.

This shows basically the same view, but I backed up a little. I am standing between Kent and the Philosophy Bldg, shooting across the connector at the law school. See the cylindrical building in the lower right? That is also part of the law school (part of the street level entrance). That is what the last pic of the law school will show.

This is the street entrance to the law school (around the corner) at the corner of Amsterdam Ave and 116th St.

Well, that's it for now. Enjoy!