Adventures in Hooterville

Testing, test test, one, two...

noreply@blogger.com (Amber) — Thu, 12 Nov 2009 17:00:00 +0000

Well, the formatting default seems to suck pretty bad. At least it did the work of linking to the article I wanted to share, even if it didn't preserve the youtube video embedding. You can't have it all.

Anyone else impressed by Carl Sagan's new single? Love it :)

Reader

noreply@blogger.com (Amber) — Thu, 12 Nov 2009 16:46:00 +0000

Does anyone know how to grab links from google reader? I think I've got a good thing going on over there... at least I find my shared items entertaining. I'd like to share (at least some of) them here, but I'm not sure how to do that without creating a new blog post each time. Hrm...

Update: Here is something that might make reposting easier. Not quite the quick fix, but seems like it will minimize the number of clicks required, at least. I'm gonna give it a shot, but if y'all (all three of you) find something easier lemme know.

Travel bug

noreply@blogger.com (Amber) — Sat, 24 Oct 2009 14:47:00 +0000

I'm getting pretty good at this travelling thing. My most recent adventure was prompted by the Society for Neuroscience annual conference, i.e. the biggest conference ever as far as a neuro-geek like me is concerned. My lab goes every year, because my advisor is wonderfully generous with travel funds. So, off to Chicago we went.

Unfortunately, after a science-packed first two days, I came down with a nasty head cold. So I didn't get to see much, if any, of the Chicago night life but I appreciated the city from afar, let's say. That turned out to be, though not ideal, alright with me because I got to spend some quality time in our incredible accommodations. We rented a pair of condos, both right downtown. Condo #1, where I was staying, was right on a park in an brand-new high-rise complex. We were on the 7th floor, not too high (thankfully) but high enough to have a really nice view out of the floor-to-ceiling windows. Add to that some ample floorspace, king beds, giant flatscreens, wifi, washer/dryer, full kitchen… TWO bathrooms!... and you have a recipe for a very comfortable week-long stay. Condo #2, on the other hand, was really lame. I can't believe I didn't get more complaints from my labbies who were, unfortunately, staying there instead. This place was on the 57th (!) floor of the Hancock building. The view was.. well… take a look:

(click to embiggen)

Not much to say about that, but you wouldn't know it from the way my co-workers went on and on ;)

I also felt like this was the most productive year, for me, when it came to making contacts and learning about interesting science. Considering I was sick for more than half of the conference, maybe the lesson here is that less is more? Maybe, or it could be that the timing was excellent: I'm in the market for the next step in my thesis project, so collaboration ideas and possible new directions are a welcome distraction. Either way, I'll take it.

PS- To the guy I sneezed on during my poster session, I'm really very sorry. I hope you have a killer immune system and an abundant supply of vitamin C. Though I didn't get your name, if you care to identify yourself, I would be more than happy to send you a care-package of noodle soup and lemon tea? Thank you so much for your interest and your gentlemanly demeanor.

noreply@blogger.com (Amber) — Thu, 24 Sep 2009 13:39:00 +0000

Thank you Natalie Dee!

Cooking: domesticate thyself.

noreply@blogger.com (Amber) — Fri, 07 Aug 2009 01:03:00 +0000

I've been a bit preoccupied by food and where it comes from since I turned 13 and decided I was going to vote with my diet. As the story goes, I read an article in one of my teeny-bopper magazines about vegetarianism and the myriad of reasons people choose to eat that way, and declared that I, too, would be a vegetarian. What made such an impression on me, besides the sheer number of valid reasons to eat vegetables, was that vegetarianism is one way to protest the cruel and unhealthy conditions in factory farms. (MRSA, anyone? Shudder...)

Because of my choice of a (mostly) vegetarian lifestyle and my tendency toward excessive research, I've read a lot about food. I've seen my share of propaganda on both sides of the argument. Last year, I read The Omnivore's Dilemma by Michael Pollan and I was impressed. Strangely, he was using a lot of vegetarian-propaganda stand-bys (in my case, preaching to the choir) but for an entirely different purpose: he's not a vegetarian. He is just a dude who thinks the American food culture is broken.

In addition to being a regular "Joe Omnivore", he's logical, reasonable and a terrific writer. The combination of these attributes make him someone that people will actually listen to, which gives me all sorts of butterflies in my stomach. A figurehead for reform in American agriculture? Hot damn, I've been waiting for this guy to show up for awhile now*.

So I recently read his second book, In Defense of Food, and I liked it. He trash-talks scientists in the first part of the book, and that is a little weird because he uses a fair amount of science to back up his arguments in subsequent chapters. Besides that minor offense, he makes some good points. Let me sum it up thusly:

Book #1: By following 4 meals from the soil to the table, demonstrate that the American agricultural system is... not ideal.

Book #2: By examining the American eater, compared to eaters of traditional cultures (primarily Europeans - French, Italian, etc), demonstrate that the American food culture is unhealthy. Then give some recommendations on how to fix it.

and then there is "Book" #3, which I stumbled upon a couple days ago. It's his most recent article in the New York Times, where he's a contributing writer. Believe it or not this entire rambling love-fest was intended to properly introduce this article... ha... Anyway, this article describes another part of the American food culture that seems to be broken: cooking. Americans don't cook the way other cultures do. We reheat, we take-out, we snack-pack and (maybe) assemble. Read the article! It's interesting! I won't be able to do it justice.

So, in an effort to get off the couch and into the kitchen, and to open a dialogue about how to cook food (versus how to order food... read the article!), this is what I cooked tonight:

Curried Kale and Apples

2 Tbs olive oil

1 onion

1 apple

1 bunch kale

1 Tbs curry powder (give or take)

a small amount of water

salt, to taste

Chunk onion and apples, 1-inch pieces work well but don't worry about uniformity. Wash and strip kale greens from tough stems.

Saute onions in oil in a large skillet, until they look delicious. Add apples and curry powder and saute for another minute. Add kale greens and a bit of water for steaming. Stir briefly, and cover. Cook for 3 or 4 minutes (I'm guessing here) stirring once or twice. It's done when the greens are tender.

Yum :)

That's chipotle baked tofu in the background, if you're wondering. Tonight was the first time I had tried this tofu recipe and the chipotle marinade, big surprise, totally overwhelmed the curry. But, that's okay, the sweetness of the apples/onions came through and that was a good contrast for both types of spice.

* To be fair, the meat-eating Eric Schlosser wrote Fast Food Nation in 2000-ish, and I was (and am) a big fan. But for some reason I can never get my omnivore friends to read this book. It might have something to do with the Sinclair-esque detail with which he describes industrial agriculture...

Berlin

noreply@blogger.com (Amber) — Sun, 02 Aug 2009 20:38:00 +0000

... is a fantastic city. I didn't really know what to expect, but turns out I love this city. It's got a really laid-back feel to it, and after Paris I was definitely in the mood for laid-back. I also loved the fashion in Berlin, but when you have maybe 5 outfits for 2.5 weeks (all using the same pair of pants), I think you will like the fashion anywhere...

Since most of my time in Berlin was conference-going*, I'm not going to do a day-by-day account. Instead, I will list some highlights.

Highlight #1: The conference.

Haha okay so maybe I just put that here to make fun of myself and my nerdiness. But in truth the conference was fun and my work was well recieved. The comp neuro community is pretty chummy because they, as a general rule, get a lot of flak from biologists. So they are supportive of eachother which makes for a productive, laid-back, collaborative atmosphere. Yay, science! Here is a picture of my coworker Tomasz presenting at one of the workshops:

Yes, that is an actual slide in his presentation and that is an actual serious 'thinking' face on Tomasz. This is during the Q&A after his presentation. Which means that someone actually asked a serious question pertaining to this slide. I love my job.

#2: Beer.

The beer gardens were a lot of fun. Does anyone know why beer plus manicured landscaping does not equal good times in the states? It seems like someone could make some money off of this obvious oversight.

The above pictured beer garden had some live jazz while we were there. I got a crepe here with orange liquor as the filling. I don't think I'll be making that at home, but it was interesting.

#3: Mosaics.

So there are statues and public art all over Berlin, and they are all very impressive. However, I think my favorite works were all mosaics. I was really, very impressed by the quality of the colors, contrast, etc that can be achieved by glass and stone. I think I embarrassed my fellow travelers when we got to the top of the Victory Column and instead of looking at the view of the city like a normal person, I just gawked at the mosaic on the building itself. They had to tear me away. Some examples shots:

Amazing.

#4: Shopping.

Okay so maybe this wasn't so much the city as it was the fact that Nick and I no longer had to carry all our belongings on our backs, but I was nevertheless entertained by the shopping districts. We stopped by KaDeWe, a department store of second-largest-in-Europe fame, and were awed at their rediculous assortment of... everything. On the top (7th) floor they have an impressive food court. We didn't really eat there. No, I was impressed by appearances alone. Behold:

Notice that this fanciful display is mostly mushrooms (a large variety of mushrooms, but still). There were displays like this for all sorts of fresh foodstuffs: fruit, veggies, legumes, you name it. And it was all worked in seamlessly with the wares.

I swear their decoration budget has to be more than the kitchen budget. Well, maybe I am being naive. Do they use the veggies that the tourists have gawked at, sneezed on and fondled? (the other tourists... I only gawked...)

to be continued...

*and eating - the falafel was amazing and I actually found a roadside currywurst stand that had some fish sausage!!

Photos!

noreply@blogger.com (Amber) — Sat, 25 Jul 2009 17:53:00 +0000

EuroTrip - selected photos

A few highlights will be posted here shortly, but in the meantime Picasa has the 300-picture version of our trip (in actuality, we took 850 or so...). This album has comments and is linked to a map, where I linked pictures to where they were taken. This allows you to see our basic hiking route, etc.

I also plan to update soon with stories from week two, but right now, it's just good to be home. Hello, lazy weekend!!

Day by day

noreply@blogger.com (Amber) — Sat, 18 Jul 2009 09:25:00 +0000

I am writing this during our 9-hour first-class train ride from Interlaken, Switzerland to Berlin, Germany. By some miracle, we don’t have any transfers on this trip (yay!) so I have lots of time for writing (double yay!).

Before I start, I have to admit that I’m not a huge fan of day-by-day travelogues, but there’s just so much to talk about that I gave in and succumbed to order. Not much to be done, there.

Day 0, Pardon my French

The day before we left, I called into Paris to make a dinner reservation. I was really, really proud of my solid 30 seconds of talking in French, until the guy on the other end started talking a little too fast (presumably to confirm the reservation?). Who knows. After a minute or two of dead silence (ummmmmm, desole!) they found someone to assure me that I had in fact just made a reservation. Le sigh.

Day 1, A 7-hour plane ride and the City of Lights

We had a red-eye flight that left Atlanta at 11pm and got into Paris at about 1pm. After a bit of a delay at the airport due to some unattended baggage (we heard they blow them up wherever they are found, can this be true?), we hopped the metro to our “bed and breakfast” which was really “the spare bedroom in someone’s apartment”. This turned out to be the best thing ever, because our hosts, Marie and Jean, were incredibly helpful and welcoming. After settling in, we were off to dinner at “A la Biche au Bois” or “A doe in the woods”. This was our most formal eating while in France, the whole nine-yards with 4 courses (5 if you count the appertifs) and traditional French food. Wow, so much butter! I was most impressed by the cheese course – big surprise there – wherein our waiter brought out the cheese plate and we naively asked “how many?” and he waved his hand over the entire plate. Well, okay then, if you insist!!!

From dinner, we walked. And walked. And lost track of time and walked some more. We took some goofy pictures of the Seine, Notre Dame, the Bastille, and some dimly-lit streets that had all sorts of charm. It was a lot of fun and by the end we were crazy tired, so we tried to catch the metro back… oops, ferme. Closed. So there was a long tired walk at the end of the night (2am local? Damn how did it get so late?) but we got there!

Day #2, Perfume and pipi

After a fantastic and simple French breakfast, we started our day close to home base on the recommendation of Marie, at the Père Lachaise cemetery. We took too many pictures and stopped by Jim Morrison’s grave before heading to Sacre Coeur, not so much for the church itself as for the fantastic view of the city. Next we stopped at a brasserie on Rue Lepic for lunch, another recommendation from our wonderful hostess. Nick’s crepes were way better than my (rather odd) salad, but I had the distinct pleasure of sitting next to a drunk, chain-smoking, bar-song-singing local (probably in his 60s). When Nick ordered an appertif and I requested water, he laughed a big belly laugh and exclaimed “Ohhh, le bebe!” before going back to his singing. It was awesome.

After lunch we hit the Arc de Triomphe and Le Tour Eiffel, before trying and failing to do a picnic at Jardin du Luxembourg. We had meant to go to a bunch of famous little shops, one for bread, one for cheese, etc that Nick had done some research on. But everything was closed. Instead, we stopped at the one place that was open (famous for its butter, but also a street cafe) and got some delicious but overpriced nouveau cuisine. The butter was ok, maybe they didn’t give us stupide americains the good stuff?

We routed our after-dinner stroll through the Louvre’s courtyard and admired all of the crazy, and intricate, sculpture adorning the building. Closer to the B&B, I witnessed something that explained a lot about this city: it was a local, peeing in the streets. That, and well I can only assume that “fresh lemony clean” doesn’t have a French translation…

Day 3, Tah-may-toh… Ta-mah-toh…

After breakfast, it hit us that we didn’t have any travel or lodging plans for the next week, and due to the upcoming Bastille Day (French day of Independence), it was going to be a busy travel week. So we meandered down to the train station to assure (at least) that we would be in Berlin in time for my conference. We also booked a trip from Paris to Chamonix (south of France, see day 4).

From the station we walked to and along the Viaduct de Arts, a collection of artist studios/galleries built into an old railway. On top is a beautiful park, lots of gardens etc that we were able to walk through and admire. After a morning of walking, we walked some more, this time implementing the plan of day 2: rounding up goodies for a picnic in Jardin du Luxembourg. At one of our many stops, I had an encounter with the stereotyped French/American friction, and the shopkeep refused to sell me a tomato. (I may have deserved that, but I swear I meant to say “Bonjour, Monsieur”… ).

After lunch we went for more sightseeing. This time we actually went inside the building we were looking at (gasp). Le Sainte-Chapelle was tres joli. Nick had thoughtfully brought along a walking-tour-on-tape that included this chapel, and the history was as interesting as the stained glass was impressive. We sat, we stared, and we eventually moved on, because, we were tired. Especially me. I was really, very tired. So we went back to the B&B and I was going to take a nap but Marie and Jean offered us some wine… and well, can you say no to French wine? We were recounting our day and my frustration with all the meat and delight at all the cheese on French menus when Marie exclaimed that she had just the souvenir for me: cheese plates. Hand-painted, darling little things that had (apparently) been sitting in her cupboard for 20 years. I will post pictures soon, but needless to say I went to bed happy.

Day 4, Nick gets déjà vu

We meant to wake up early and sneak out without a fuss, but Marie was one step ahead of us and made breakfast against our protests. In her words, “Sorry there isn’t any French bread, but the bakery isn’t open yet, you know.” So we sat and ate and enjoyed it too much because we missed our bus and had to power-walk to the train station, where we jumped on our train last-minute, like something out of a movie from the 60s. It was a relatively short train ride, but I loved every minute of it. Chamonix ended up being too touristy for Nick “It reminds me of Vail” but we were able to get a campsite far enough out of town that the beautiful mountains weren’t spoiled by, well, anything. As a bonus, Nick’s sister’s boyfriend, Paul, was in Chamonix by some crazy coincidence, and we got to meet up with him for an hour or two.

Day 5, 98% water

This was a hiking day. We hiked from Chamonix, in France, to a little town called Le Peuty, in Switzerland. Everything in between was amazing. I’ll have to let the photos do the talking for me, because I can’t do them justice. I will say that it was a strenuous hike. After about 15 minutes of walking (barely even uphill) I had to dump out all my water to lighten up my pack. But I manned up and we made our goal of reaching Le Peuty in good time, even if my hip bones looked like someone had punched them repeatedly (I guess backcountry packs aren’t made for skinny nerdy types). My favorite part of our trip so far was going to sleep that night. Totally exhausted, gazing at the mountains and the sky while being serenaded by the jingling cowbells from the pasture next to the campsite. It was surreal.

Day 6, I find a little piece of home in Switzerland

We woke up to cowbells and I had a really hard time convincing myself to leave (as many of you know, I’ve been a fan of cows since I was a kid). The day was a little muggy and our hike to Martigny (nearest train station) wasn’t nearly as pretty as the one of the day before. But we made it even though the trail signs disappeared halfway there and we had to catch a ride into town. Our original plan was to continue on to Zermatt that day, but plans change and we stayed in Martigny. The town has a few Roman ruins that were interesting but not so impressive. For example, the amphitheater has been turned into an outdoor movie theater. Nothing says ancient and awe-inspiring like plastic theater seating and projector equipment. I called this town the Kent,WA of Switzerland. Needless to say we didn’t stay more than one night.

Day 7, Bernese bears and more happy Swiss cows

We hopped a train early for Lauterbrunnen, which is in the Berner Oberland, a region of the Swiss Alps a little south of Interlaken. To get there, we took the “Golden Pass” train, which is a scenic route. Again, words won’t do this justice. So many adorable little farms with flowers in the windows and happy cows wearing bells. The mountains towering over them were unspeakably beautiful. On our way, we stopped briefly in Montreux (loved this city!) to see a castle (one of my check-list items for this trip: see some old stuff) called the Chateau de Chillon. The history is worth another 4 pages but I’ll spare you (for now, mwahaha) but to get an idea, the first written account of the castle was in the 11th century, and it’s been maintained ever since (never plundered or damaged in an attack). So, it was really fun to explore the dungeons, banquet halls and chapels etc, though we were halfway through the tour before someone told us that we could check our packs at the door (doh!).

Sore backs aside, this was a fantastic day and we got to Lauterbrunnen early enough to snag one of the best campsites ever.

Day 8, The price of beauty

Lauterbrunnen is in a deep valley with mountains on 3 sides. The two side walls are just that – walls of rock, steep cliffs with waterfalls everywhere. Our campsite was situated just out of town, with a fantastic up close view of the biggest waterfall. We’re going to guess between 1K-1.5K ft tall, but I’m not 100% on that. Anyway it was really a trip to wake up and have that staring you in the face. After much grumbling on my part (“buuut it’s so pretty here and my feet are tiiiired…”) Nick convinced me that we came here for a reason and we put our hiking boots back on. Holy happy cows, am I glad for that. We took a train up the left wall, which revealed more mountains on top of mountains, and caught a gondola when the train couldn’t take us further, to our final destination of Mannlichen. Here we had a 360 degree view of snow-capped peaks, rocky cliffs, rolling hills and I swear I heard a cowbell or two from the valleys below. We started our slow hike down the mountain by passing in front of the Eiger north face, which I hear is pretty famous. I can see why! It was incredible. We had a nice picnic lunch staring at it and a few other notable peaks (jungfrou, etc). I would recommend this hike to everyone I know, that is, if you can afford the ridiculous touristy train/gondola prices. I’d say it was worth every penny.

Day 9, and that brings us to…

Today! It has been the perfect day for traveling because we woke up to thunderstorms and it’s been raining ever since – thankfully, this is the first bad weather we have encountered all week. I have to say though, the thunder this morning was pretty fantastic due to the acoustics of the Lauterbrunnen valley, so awesome. Luckily, our neighbors in the campground (a lovely older couple from Belfast with endlessly entertaining accents and Irish slang) offered us a ride into town so we avoided the long walk in the rain. I have sore feet and a full belly and I am looking forward to more adventures in Berlin.

I like dirt.

noreply@blogger.com (Amber) — Fri, 03 Jul 2009 00:46:00 +0000

Last night, Nick and I went to a birthday party in Little 5. It was here that I discovered that Nick's co-worker Scott had been offering him tomato plants for several weeks, and Nick had failed to mention said offer. Whaaaat? Of course this could not stand. We drove straight from the party to pick up the plant at 11pm last night. After work today, I went straight to the garden to give the new addition a proper burial. Or, no... um, new home? I don't know what the terminology is, but there is a live tomato plant in the garden now.

I used the occasion to take a few photos of my favorite plants at the moment. We had more lettuce (red, green leaf, and romaine) than we could eat last month but it's looking pretty sad now due to the heat, so there aren't any pictures of that. Ditto on the fennel and dill. The basil, thyme, oregano and mystery plants are doing great, though! Mystery plants are probably pumpkin, but that's another story.

The link above also directs to pictures of our latest camping/hiking adventure and some other domestic stuff I was pleased enough with to take pictures of. Namely a key lime pie (my first!) and a t-shirt "refashion" that was actually successful.

Anyway, I have way too much work to do so I'm going to keep this short. I probably won't post much before or during my trip, but the trip should be good blogging fodder. Take note Blogger, and be sure to beef up your servers before August 1...

Mr. President

noreply@blogger.com (Amber) — Sun, 21 Jun 2009 20:16:00 +0000

Apparently, the White House has an official photostream on flickr. They're fun to flip through and an excellent example of how tech-savvy this administration is. I mean, is there a networking site they haven't infiltrated?

Regardless, I like the caption posted with this photo:

"At center-right is the hieroglyphic that the President comment on saying it looked like him."

Gramatically incorrect, but amazing nonetheless.

Thanks to Kate for the heads up.

Reese Brink: wedding and more

noreply@blogger.com (Amber) — Sat, 06 Jun 2009 16:30:00 +0000

Picasa to the rescue! This should work as a temporary work-around to Blogger's crotchety mood this morning...

This is the bridal party from Lauren's wedding. No, we are not huffing fumes from the bouquet, we are taking sips from our cocktails. Lauren was the mastermind behind this fantastic "Boozy Bouquet" idea. Basically, the base of the bouquet is a margarita glass, and the flowers were arranged (by us!) on top of a lid for the glass. We fitted the lids with some straws and the rest is history. Genius, eh?

Myself and the beautiful bride:

The happy couple:

Ok, so there are lots of better pictures of them, but I can't get over the jump-shots. Awesome, right?

Speaking of better pictures, I can't help but brag a little about the bachelorette party... Of course, there were the usual things: wedding/marriage-themed games, gratuitous penis*, lots of good food, a bar-centered scavenger hunt, etc. BUT. My favorite part of this party was the theme. Yes, there is always a theme with me, haha. This one was executed pretty well, though. Behold:

The "Ugly Bridesmaid Dress" theme. The girls were instructed to procure a dress from their local thrift store, or use one they had lying around. As such, we got a spectrum of "ugly" but hot damn if we didn't stand out in a crowd! It made the scavenger hunt a lot more interesting.

Ok, I think that's enough of embarrassing my friends for one day. Until next time...

*Cartoon penis. Just trying to get some more hits on the ol' webpage ;)

Business Time

noreply@blogger.com (Amber) — Sat, 06 Jun 2009 15:19:00 +0000

Well, it has been an exceptionally busy blogging hiatus. Starting in mid-March, my weekends have been completely stacked. This looked something like (in order of appearance): a ski trip to Utah, a bridal shower for Shosh, Matt and Dayna's visit!!! and Noelle's wedding!!! (here in Altanta), Adam's wedding in New Orleans (and the resulting brush with swine flu, yuck), a surprise party for Nick's birthday AND Lauren's bachelorette party in one weekend (both of which I had a hand in planning), Mom's visit!!!, and finally, Lauren's wedding in SC, in which I was a bridesmaid/ baker/ lighting engineer/ decorator/ giddy friend :)

Holy potatoes, that's a lot of social crap. There was not one dry weekend from mid-March to late-May. It was tons of fun, and I'm so glad it's over!

Now, I can focus on my work, my (much improved!) garden, and lazily making plans for my upcoming trip to Europe.

Trip what-where?!

I am going to France, Switzerland and Germany next month!!! As my first official trip off of this continent, I am SO incredibly excited! The impetus came when my abstract was accepted for presentation at Computational Neuroscience, a conference which is in Berlin this year. That means, this is technically a business trip which ensures that the July 18th-24th portion is paid for. Lucky thing too, because my dollars are not liking the look of the exchange rate lately...

Well, there is much planning to be done, and I should get to it. I am hoping to write more here this month, but blogger seems to be hating my photos at the moment so we will see how this goes down. Until then, bon weekend!

Postscript

noreply@blogger.com (Amber) — Sat, 21 Mar 2009 22:27:00 +0000

I want to make one of these... too bad I don't have a fireplace. Desk clock maybe?

Spring is in the air

noreply@blogger.com (Amber) — Sat, 21 Mar 2009 20:35:00 +0000

Did some weeding in the sun this afternoon. What's left is last years fennel and scallions... and the rest of the garden to weed. I'm really looking forward to planting some fresh basil, maybe some cilantro, definately oregano... hooray for the long, beautiful growing season in GA.

Edit: Apparently blogging straight from the phone works better in theory. This is my second try, the first time there were password issues and it didn't post anything. That now fixed, This entry got through but the picture only uploaded halfway. Sigh. Fixed now.

So.

noreply@blogger.com (Amber) — Mon, 23 Feb 2009 02:08:00 +0000

It's been awhile.

I got a bike!

It's been a couple of weeks now, and I'm happy to report that I'm riding it quite a bit: to work, the farmer's market, for fun, etc. It's not the cushiest ride (read: I'm not used to riding regularly and will probably get over it) but it's super, super light and zippy. Of course, this is my first road bike and the only one I've ever owned that is the correct size, so take my recommendation as that of a biker noob. A very, very happy biker noob!

In other news, work has been keeping me pretty busy, and I am actually very pleased with this situation. I am slowly learning to recognize that not having enough to do makes me antsy, and I am more productive on each task when I have several things going at once. Boredom is not my friend. This is good news for my current situation. I am: teaching (lab TA), writing (draft #2 of the same paper I've been working on for.ev.er), experimenting (proof-of-concept type stuff, gearing up for real experiments), and doing lots of background research to help with experiment planning. I'm in a nice place in my studies right now where I'm finally feeling confident and knowledgeable enough to use the freedom my NSF fellowship grants me. I'm starting to ask my own research questions, and design experiments around them. It's been fun... hopefully something comes of it :) I'll keep you posted.

I've also been loving the cold (all relative) weather for knitting. I FINALLY finished this hat after working on it for what seems like months and days and years and decades. It was a really fun project, my first using the doubleknit technique, but daaaaamn small needles will suck up your life. Soon after putting that down, I started my first-ever sweater and I am so happy to report that it's coming along nicely. The yarn I picked out is probably the best thing ever, so you should be really, really jealous.

Speaking of unbridled jealousy, you're also envious of all the amazing food I made this weekend. I started the week with almond cupcakes with chocolate mousse frosting, which meant by Friday the cupcakes were gone and I now had an abundance of mousse. Knowing no other way out, I baked cookies. Now, I have mousse-filled peanut butter oatmeal choc chip cookie sammiches. Yeah. And dinner tonight! Nick helped me with this amazing recipe from my new favorite cookbook, Veganomicon. Skip the bad photography and go straight to the recipe. Or, if you don't believe me, take this freakishly accurate description of the mole sauce from the blogger cited above:

"But let me just tell you: it's totally worth tracking down the cookbook just for this recipe. Holy motha. And I didn't even use the GOOD shit when it came to the a) chocolate and b) chili powder. I used Trader Joe's semi-sweet chocolate chips and shitty 99-cent chili powder. And yet, AND YET, I wanted to fill my bathtub up with this and roll around in it buck-nekkid except for maybe a small hat made out of tortillas. I can only imagine what would've happened if I had splurged and bought some fancy chocolate and some good chipotle chili powder. My nipples probably would've caught fire."

Yeah.

Aw, Republicans. Look what you made me do.

noreply@blogger.com (Amber) — Wed, 10 Dec 2008 19:20:00 +0000

Last night's The Daily Show has inspired me to post a political opinion. I'm not prone to this, but hey, I guess you have to start somewhere.

Jon Stewart's interview of Gov. Mike Huckabee can be seen here. It's most of the episode. The part that was so inspirational to me is the last segment, seen here. Jon Stewart brings up gay marriage. Huckabee does a piss-poor job of defending the social-conservative bigoted stance, which is understandable. What is really upsetting, however, is that Jon Stewart seemed to be validating Huckabee's religious undertones by arguing the biblical slant. Yes, he had some good points (polygamy anyone?), but I think using these arguments will hurt the cause in the long run.

Ahem. Our wonderful, long-surviving government claims to rely on a separation of church and state. Unfortunately, marriage is a religious institution that has been written into government policy, tax code, etc. This is causing a good deal of confusion.

Get. It. Outta There!

If Mike Huckabee wants to keep the word "marriage" then fine, you religious nut you, have it. Take it to your churches where marriage ceremonies are performed. But in this United States, ALL law-abiding citizens need to have the same rights. PERIOD. Of course, here I am referring to those rights of civil union, including tax benefits and adoption rights. It's as simple as separating "ordained by god" (which of course, isn't a right) from "accepted by law" (which of course, shouldn't be religiously biased).

This, to me, seems like a pretty obvious course of action. I would expect that there is nothing in the bible about hospital visiting rights or tax benes, and there is no special diction here for Huckabee to defend. So end of discussion, everybody is happy.

Okay maybe not everybody. I can see that raising kids/adoption is probably the root of all this hubub. Many people are dedicated to the traditional family structure and see the current legal definition of marriage as protecting that and the proverbial children. Well, nuts to you guys, your argument stinks. Traditional family structure sure doesn't guarantee a happy childhood, nor does non-traditional family structure guarantee a miserable one. Let me quote an amateur op ed I stumbled across:

"Adoption is not simply a smart alternative to parenting without stretch marks. It can take years and costs thousands of dollars to adopt a child, and the emotional price is often greater than the monetary one. People adopt because they love children, and because there are no shortage of children who are in need of a better life. No one fills out all that paperwork to undermine society, and yet some feel that’s exactly what will happen if we allow homosexuals to raise kids.

Parenting, whether it’s by adoption, foster care or nine months of pregnancy, follows a single goal: to raise good children and help give them a bright future. It has nothing to do with sexual orientation, and there is no evidence to suggest gay parents will raise an army of gay children. Straight parents seem to raise plenty of homosexual kids as it is, yet no one is condemning Dick Cheney’s fatherhood. These are not issues of family or children; these are issues of civil rights and fear, and they’re issues many thought ended in the 1960s."

In this regard I think Jon did a good job. There really is no counter-point for "a loving gay family with a financially secure background beats the hell out of Britney Spears and Kevin Federline any day of the week". Priceless.

Well, that's my ferocious 2 cents. I hope you enjoyed it.

In other news, the big presentation went surprisingly well and I am happily contemplating my next course of action. Watch out crabbies, I have experiments in mind...

White beaches are hard to photograph.

noreply@blogger.com (Amber) — Tue, 14 Oct 2008 00:08:00 +0000

Not a lot to say. For now, I'm enjoying this photograph, and that's enough.

We will miss you, so very much.

noreply@blogger.com (Amber) — Sun, 12 Oct 2008 23:06:00 +0000

"But Margaret, perhaps more than any other person I’ve ever met, she just rubs off on people. You look at her, you admire her, you absorb a bit of her attitude, find it good and true and useful, and carry that bit of her off with you. I plan on seeing her regularly, living inside everybody who ever loved her. That’s not just a comfort. It’s a promise."

Happy Birthday to me!

noreply@blogger.com (Amber) — Sat, 04 Oct 2008 03:06:00 +0000

Today I was the lucky recipient of a brand new camera, because my dad spoils me. I won't pretend to know all the nerdy specs, but I will say that so far, I've been really impressed with the zoom and the industrial strength flash. The image stabilization also rocks my socks, but I don't have any example shots of that. I didn't get the battery charged until after dark, so all the photos I've taken have been indoors with fairly low light. Which, actually, is why I wanted the camera. I've had such a hard time getting decent photos of friends - seems the nerds only come out at night. Now, they have nowhere to hide...

hehe. So shout out to Papfoo, thank you for the top-notch birthday present. I'm looking forward to taking lots of pictures.

Pictures, ahoy!

noreply@blogger.com (Amber) — Wed, 10 Sep 2008 20:56:00 +0000

Mom requested photos for her birthday, so I posted house pictures and long-lost Bahamas pictures to my Picasa account last night. Both albums are large and far from complete, but there are a couple interesting tidbits. Feel free to make fun of my cheesy captions (Bahamas captions to come, various stressors are interfering at the moment).

Anyway, my main reason for posting is that I was tickled by an email I just got. Nick and I are having a housewarming / birthday party on the 19th, which by no coincidence is also International Talk Like a Pirate Day... so pirate themed it be, yarr! I recently decided to buy some decor - pirate flag, inflatable treasure chest cooler, etc - to go with our theme. I got the following from the online retailer I decided to go with:

We would like to notify you that your order has been shipped from our warehouse.

Should you happen to face any problem (e.g. item not arrived, item damaged or in bad condition, wrong item received etc.) or just have any questions regarding your order/product please feel free to get in touch with us. We would be more than happy to assist you as we would do anything to make you a satisfied customer.

Hehehe. Maybe I should suggest they come to my party, dressed in their fine pirate merch, to lead the group in some pirate drinking songs? No? Okay, well, a girl can dream.

The way of the Goob

noreply@blogger.com (Amber) — Sat, 23 Aug 2008 13:46:00 +0000

This new habit of K's amuses me greatly. It's as if she's too lazy to lift her head to look out the window. She even keeps her head propped like this as she swivels to look from one side of the yard to another. It's adorable.

In other news, Lauren gave a shout out to me / knitting night in her blog, and featured a photo of my latest WIP. I'm not sure I would call myself an advanced knitter, but... sweet! I'll take it :) The project is this purse, which looks great on paper. I'm hoping that it will test my sewing (for the lining) as well as knitting skillz, and result in something useful if not beautiful. Honestly I'm regretting my choice to add the red. I think I would have liked it better in a solid dark grey to show off the cables properly. Maybe I'll start over, but that's always a bummer. Choices, choices...

On the work front, I'm getting bogged down in some statistics, which is so incredibly frustrating. I took two stats classes in college, which might suggest that I know something, but no. I think this stuff is just out of the undergrad-stats league, which really means that I'm frustrated that Emory/Tech doesn't have stats consultation services for labs. Seriously people, back me up here.

Regardless, I survived technical presentation #1 last week, so I'm looking forward to the potential of another one in November in DC. We'll see, but I'm optimistic.

Oh, and this week I made an amazing soup and some carrot-raisin-pecan cupcakes (from VCTOtW, of course). Yum! You're jealous.

Home sweet.

noreply@blogger.com (Amber) — Wed, 09 Jul 2008 23:34:00 +0000

The last several days have taught me, once and for all, that my cell phone camera is terrible. I need to bust out my old-school digital rebel for this job, but I'm too damn lazy. I'll get around to it, promise.

Until then, be satisfied with this shot of our sun room. I've spent most of this week sitting in that amazingly comfortable chair, working from home because I'm gearing up to write a paper and what does that mean? Lots and lots of reading. But hey, on the bright side, it's allowed me to do lots and lots of cooking (hello, crock pot!) and that's been fun (and cheap).

Otherwise, thunder and lightning are plentiful, Kaisa is dealing with an abundance of mosquito bites (I'm sorry Goober!) and I finally finished my Heroes binge. Season 1 was really good. Season 2 was a complete nutter soap opera in that deliciously cheesy, circular storyline sort of way. Yum. Now on to 30 Rock. Thank you, Netflix, for your instant-watch goodness.

Does anyone have any good zucchini recipes?

(vegan) Cupcakes are wonderful

noreply@blogger.com (Amber) — Tue, 24 Jun 2008 17:43:00 +0000

I mentioned in a previous post that I am a big fan of the book Vegan Cupcakes Take Over the World. Let me reiterate: best cookbook ever.

To be fair, I never thought I would say that. As desserts go, I've always been more of an ice-cream-cake sort of girl. In fact, I hate most frosting. The sugar content makes the roof of my mouth feel funny, and leaves a sour taste in my mouth. (What? No, you're weird.)

Oh, but this cookbook. Incredible. Until last night, I was particularly fond of the peanut-butter cupcakes and the cashew-butter cardamom cupcakes. But last night, I decided to try the basic chocolate cupcakes topped with a chocolate mousse (linked picture is from the blog of the author).

Holy crap.

This is what cupcakes are supposed to taste like. Basically, you've never had a cupcake before. Trust me.

Annnnnyway, in other news.... :)

We're finally starting to feel settled in the new place, but we don't have internet as-of-yet. I'm writing at work right now (waiting for some code to finish running) and of course I forgot the cable for my phone so I don't have any pictures to share. They will be up soon.

My last little nugget for you today involves a website I'm currently obsessed with: muxtapes. Playlists have time limits again! It's fun, so if you're as music-obsessed as I am, I recommend it. You can search for a list you might like via muxtapestumbler or you can just go straight to mine. Enjoy!

Transitions

noreply@blogger.com (Amber) — Thu, 12 Jun 2008 19:15:00 +0000

We move this weekend! I'm really excited about this. You should be too. Do you know why? Because as soon as I move, this space will be inhabited with excessive house pictures in lieu of excessive puppy pictures. See? Aren't you excited?

But as long as we're on the topic of the pup... We went to a coffee shop / dog park for knitting this week. Yes, that's right. It's half coffee shop and half dog park. It's decently close to the new digs, so I have a feeling I will be going back frequently. Rachel and Emma (Rachel's adorable new pup) got there a few minutes after us, and Kaisa actually jumped on Rachel when she walked in. This is a HUGE recent development for my usually-shy girl. It made for an awkward moment when I wanted to squeal with joy, but felt it necessary to apologise instead. But Rachel was nice about it, and Kaisa was as happy as ever, and it ended up being a lovely evening. Hooray for Kaisa, the social butterfly in training...

Fetch!

noreply@blogger.com (Amber) — Sun, 08 Jun 2008 15:18:00 +0000

More hiking pictures!!! Hooray!

These are from last weekend at Red Top Mountain. Of course, being GA, the mountain is more of a hill, but it's next to a lake. So the draw for me is that it's one of the few places around here where K can swim, which is always really fun for all involved*

*really!! It's hilarious to watch, and she loves it. So much so, she actually barked at Nick when he was taking a break (she appeared to be worn out, but I guess not). It scared him half to death, which was really funny because he jumped and yelled back at her. It was so uncharacteristic of both of them, it really made me laugh.