Saturday, October 16, 2010

Physics Pays Off

This weekend was the American Society of Physics, 4 Corners Section conference. It happened to be held at WSU so the HARBOR director pretty much made all of us do presentations of some kind. This is the "poster" I've mentioned before. Murielle and I, the "camera team" submitted a poster for the conference and had some fun making it beautiful and awesome (like science fair for grown-ups, I suppose), but little did we expect in the awards ceremony mine was the first name read off! There were 50 posters and 5 of them won. This apparently was a real kind of contest and so they gave us $100! Who knew?


Our project was using a still camera to verify data taken from other instruments on High Altitude weather-balloon-type flights. We proved that our camera was reliable and then used it to prove the other science-y equipment was reliable. We discovered something we like to call the "crud-o-pause" in the atmosphere and there's still plenty of research to do to understand it more. Science rocks, people! And who knew it would actually pay off so soon? I recommend it to anyone. And not because it pays off, but, in the words of Dr. Palen, "because it is so fantastic!" Happy Day :-)

Thursday, October 14, 2010

all-nighter, etc.

I just got home from institute, it was wonderful! I missed two weeks of class and I was SO glad to get back there today. It really makes a difference in life. There was one quote I copied down: "Every tribulation is 'the shade of His Hand outstretched unceasingly'." It was great.

On Monday I did get a plane ticket for the Philippines in December. Tuesday I finished that poster and then I decided to stay up all night catching up on things. I enjoyed it. I almost got caught up on my sight-reading and transposition, I did an analysis on 2 sonatas, I dusted the piano, I worked on memorizing my pieces, I practiced my accompanying pieces, I found and studied Bach's table of ornamentation, chatted with Sylves, made and ate breakfast, read a bunch of science papers, printed the poster, took two tests, and rode my bike all the way home. The distinction between Tuesday night and Wednesday is completely lost.

On the bike ride home, I remembered my goal of trying to do it in under an hour . . . I kind of cheated to try and do this but it backfired on me. I turned onto Riverdale Road itself to go straight down it instead of in the parking lots--and then every light was red. Well, except for that one. I made it up through the roundabouts without stopping, and then when I got to Main street nearly every light was red for me when I got there, again! Somewhere in Clearfield I gave up on trying to go fast at all anymore because I was too sick of getting up there and then having to stop abruptly. I stopped looking at my watch entirely and I stopped at the import store to get stash food (since I had finished up my stash at breakfast).

And random note, I have a lot of pride. I think sometimes it's okay (like from a performance perspective) but in many ways it's not so good. I just really like to learn and know things and be awesome. If I feel like correcting other people I usually try and do it in a nice way but apparently it doesn't come across like that. I don't know how to fix this problem. I might try some counseling. But I still like to be awesome and yes, I like to brag about it sometimes. Okay, a lot of the time. It has come to my attention yet again and I'm here wondering what the heck I can do about it, and I don't have many ideas. Really. So I'm sorry if I offend people but at this point, that's all I can say.

Good night!

Monday, October 11, 2010

[insert title here]

Events from last week:
-taught boy scouts on Tuesday
-played a concert with my Grandma's choir Wednesday
-taught boy scouts Thursday
-worked on my physics report/poster Friday (and made some sweet scientific discoveries! stay tuned...)
-went to the Symphony Saturday and was most certainly outplayed by that 16 year old kid. Oh well, he'll make a fine living for himself.

Events from today:
-got up at 5:15
-rode the 6am Frontrunner
-went swimming at 7
-"ran" half a mile
-finished my astrophysics take home test
---later: will hopefully finish that physics poster, and buy a plane ticket to the Philippines (lots of exciting things will happen there)