Living in a house

Most students at Carleton live in dorms for all four years, or at least the first three. There are some exceptions, such as the town houses on the edge of campus that the college owns. This year I am living in an interest house: C.A.N.O.E. (Carleton Association for Nature and Outdoor Enthusiasts). It is different from C.A.N.O.E. club, although they are closely linked.

I was, at first, nervous about living in a house and between school, soccer, and other extracurriculars, finding time to cook and do other household necessities. But living in a house has been absolutely amazing! Unfortunately (for me), all meals are vegetarian, but there are plenty of opportunities to get meet for ourselves if we try. We cook Sunday-Thursday, so Friday and Saturday are open to go out to dinner, go to the dining halls with other friends, or cook more if one wants. Cooking was a great experience. Thirteen people live in the house, so we usually had two people per night cook. At the beginning of each week we signed up for a night to cook, and the extra three people signed up for bread, yogurt, or granola, which we also made every week. Materials for breakfast, lunch, and snacks also being in supply, along with fruit and anything else we might need, I almost never went to the dining halls. We for the most part cooked rather good food too, and not once reverted to quesadillas and grilled cheese or the like. For shopping, Annie got a lot of the bulk weekly stuff (thanks Annie!) in her car, or if we needed anything else we just rode our bike down to the store with a backpack.

Socially, living in the house was fun too. Mostly we all got along well. Sometimes dishes didn't get done or something was not picked up, but we tried to all chip in when we had time and help people out. I love all the people, and am sad to see some of them leaving for winter term. I really hope they can come back in the spring! We had a lot of fun hanging out when we did though, with lots of cuddling of course, as is necessary with all C.A.N.O.E. associated anything. Occasionally instruments would be brought out, and others would come over to jam and sing, always a nice post-dinner treat. The campus cat, Toff, is also a frequent visitor of our house, a fun break from the no-pets-in-dorms rule. A few times he even curled up with me when I climbed in bed to go to sleep :).

I love my room and the rest of the house! It is an old house with interesting architecture and furnishings. All the doorknobs have intricate patterns on them, and some of the rooms, including mine, has stained glass windows above the regular ones. The regular windows are large and let a lot of natural light in, which I love. High ceilings give a nice spacious feel to the house. It turns out we have a really neat, spacious attic. Right now it is filled with old suitcases, love letters?, and other ancient belongings, but I plan to clean it out and make it into a comfortable room next term to hang out in. A "penthouse executive sweet" to counter Ryan's basement "executive sweet." This term I built a rope swing from one of the trees just outside the house, and I plan to expand this to a tire swing next term. I am someone who spends almost no time in the place I live, so it is saying something when I say I have spent much more time at home this term than in the past.

Boogie Breakfast

I decided I had to write about this because it is one of the coolest ideas I have come upon recently. I am not sure who originally started it, but I was first invited to Boogie Breakfast at the end of last spring (09). Basically, it is exactly what it sounds like: good music, good food, good company, and good or bad dancing! What a fantastic way to start off a weekend day :).

Of Kelp, Cars, and Tents

While at work one morning, I decided getting my advanced SCUBA license would be a fun thing and started looking into it. I was delighted when a few hours later, eating lunch with Tyler in the arboretum, I found out he was SCUBA certified as well and was interested in getting advanced certified with me. Eventually we made the plans official, and while we were at it, made it a camping trip for any friends who were interested. By late afternoon Tyler, Caety, Tina, and I were driving off to Monterey in a car Tyler had rented from UC Davis.

Shortly into our drive, as I was looking back at Tina talking to her, I noticed the occupants of a car behind and to the left of us looking intently into our car. I thought this was a bit odd, but passed it off as them looking back at me, thinking I was looking at them instead of Tina. This assumption proved to be wrong, however, when they appeared on the other side of the car, looking at me and motioning for me to roll my window down. After doing so, the driver of the other car, with a black tooth, asked "Who are you?" Having no idea how to answer this, I sputtered for a few seconds, before he further questioned about our license plate, which we later found out said "For Official Use Only" and "CA Exempt." I responded with something about being from UC Davis. In any case, it was an odd conversation we had, traveling at 70 mph on the freeway, but only a start to our adventures.

A little while later we stopped in San Jose for dinner. I was craving a burger, so I went to In N' Out, but the others went to Subway, where I joined them to eat. I was still hungry after a burger and fries, but did not want a whole sandwich. This is where the semi-interesting part comes in (I know you don't care what I ate). It turns out Subway has a small sandwich that is not on the menu (only shows regular and large) for only $1.07. And it is still like 4" long, what a fantastic deal! So I managed to get a sandwich, burger, fries,and a drink for barely over $5 :). Eventually we got to our campsite just before it closed at 10:00, checked in, set up our tent in a little cave like area made by the trees, and went to sleep. I slept outside, and the others shared the tent.

Getting up around 6:30 the next morning, we planned to eat and leave camp in time to get to the beach by 8:00. This of course, did not go nearly as smoothly as planned. First, as we started to make breakfast, we realized we had forgotten all kinds of eating utensils, and had no way of spreading peanut butter and jelly for sandwiches for lunch, etc. In the end a piece of cardboard, ripped off a saltine box, was used in place of a knife. Then, as we were driving out of our campsite, happy to be relatively on time, we got stuck in a ditch. The car's right side, between the wheels, was up on a hill, making it impossible for Caety to open the door and get out (she was stuck in from the other side by the cooler and food in the middle seat). The front of the car was also stuck on the road, with the wheels down in ditch and spinning, unable to grip the loose dust beneath them. After trying various ways of piling rocks under the wheels, backing up and going forward, pushing and pulling, our neighboring campers saw the pickel we were in and came to the rescue. With their help pushing, the wheel turned in the right way, and rocks piled under the wheels, we finally managed to escape our predicament. From then on whenever we went into or out of our campsite we drove up to the end of the road, turned around, and came back down so we could enter/exit going uphill. Needlessto say, we were late by this point to the beach, where we did our diving.

Diving: I had forgotten we were already certified when we went diving. Our instructor, Damian, basically told us to get our stuff on and go out by ourselves, and he didn't need to be there. That was a rather pleasant realization that I really could do this whenever I wanted, provided equipment and a buddy. Anyway the diving was great, we got to go through the kelp forest and saw hundreds of starfish, a few schools of small (less than four inches) fish, some larger (about a foot long) fish, many hermit crabs, and hundreds of jellyfish of all sizes. Most of this was in and around the kelp forest, which was a fun experience to swim through and practice our buoyancy control as we drifted up and down over obstacles. The highlight of the dives for me was the deep dive we took, down until 65 feet before one of our group members ran out of air and we had to ascend. We had just gotten to this giant white anemone looking thing with translucent tentacles when we started to ascend, and looking up, we found ourselves to be below hundreds of jellyfish, some six feet long and others much smaller. Against the backlit surface it was a gorgeous display, but not the best place to ascend by any means, and our instructor got stung badly on the cheek, the only place that was showing with his drysuit and mask. After some trouble, Tyler and I passed the navigation tests, completing a perfect square. For future reference I do 22 kick cycles/50' (I think).

During our time in Monterey, there was a large car show, so it was fun seeing all the really fancy cars parked all up and down the street. We saw one with a pretty awesome license plate: "Awwsum." Saturday after diving, we went to the famous Monterey Bay Aquarium, which was really cool. We went through almost the entire aquarium, and I especially loved the Sea Dragons (a kind of sea horse). Kim, thanks for the membership card. They gave me slightly a weird look but let me in smoothly :). After the aquarium we ate at a diner Caety and Tina have gone to, and Caety and I had the brilliant idea to split our meals, so we each got half a burger and half a BLT, perfect :).

After dinner, we spent the rest of the night walking down Cannery Row, the main street sort of in Monterey. Visiting lots of shops, we tried some new kinds of candy from a candy shop, found a bakery with delicious cinnamon rolls, etc. Going into those candy shops always makes me feel so good for some reason. It is like a combination of a really olden days style general store and Willy Wonka. Oh, we also found a military base by accident driving around, and a block of "old Monterey."

When we left the campsite early Sunday morning before our neighbors got up, we left them the following note:

Dear Neighbors, Thanks for being such great neighbors! Sorry we didn't see you during the day. Enjoy the rest of your trip! Thanks for helping us out of the ditch! -Your Neighbors

Later, after diving, we had a lovely picnic lunch near the beach where we went diving, walked around some more in downtown Monterey, climbed the rocks by the beach (I am doing the "Where the Hell is Matt" dance in the picture above), got Baskin Robbins (yumm), and tried to go down the 17 mile drive, but it was closed :(. Eventually we had to start heading home, so we crammed ourselves back into the overpacked car and headed home, listening to Spanish music for much of the way, as we did for a great deal of this trip by the way.

Since Tyler had never been on dunes, we stopped at a really nice beach, where we saw a paraglider and taught Tyler how to do a cartwheel. After a pizza stop for dinner, the rest of the drive went smoothly, with some traffic but not terrible. At one point I really had to go pee, so when we exited to find a bathroom we ended up seeing a "Peabody," an "Outback," and one other place that was the best bad pun of all, but I forgot.

Overall a successful trip, I had a lot of fun :).

Observational Astronomy

Last term, Spring 2009, I took a great class called "Observational Astronomy." Essentially a lab, it was held one night a week, from nine to midnight on Mondays. We learned constellations, looked at the stars and planets, mapped the moon, and learned to use telescopes and the CCD cameras used with them (and did some boring computer labs when it was cloudy). Here are some of the photos my partner Jolene and I took through the telescope.

1. Sombrero Galaxy - notice the ring of dust forming part of the outer disk
2. Globular Cluster M13
3. The Whirlpool Galaxy

My fourth 911 call

Last week, after going the farmers market, several of us went to my friend Kim's house, where we picked blackberries to make a pie (but instead ended up eating them with ice cream) and played Karaoke, etc. At about 12:30 a.m. everyone was heading home, and as I still lack a drivers license (soon, I promise!), I was biking home. The bike ride from Kim's house to mine takes about 45 minutes to an hour I would guess, and of course it was dark by that point, so others, as they so often do, started worrying about my safety. After many minutes of assuring people I would be safe and that I had done this many times, I finally agreed to call Kim when I got home. If I was not home by 3 a.m. she would call me. I was stopping by Charlotte's, who had just finished packing and was leaving for Chile in the morning, on the way home to say goodbye, hence the extra time.

After leaving Charlotte's, I was biking past Cactus Corner, an intersection about a mile from my house, when I saw a small red car, completely engulfed in flame so dense I could not see if anyone was inside. Of course I immediately dropped my bike and called 911. The car's horn started honking as I was on the phone, as (I would guess) wires melted and connected, but at the time I didn't know if it was someone in the car signaling for help or not. Parts started exploding, the car jolting this way and that and settling down again as tires blew out from the heat. Eventually I heard sirens and the air horn of the Yolo county volunteer fire department calling people in. A police car pulled up, asking if it was my car and telling me to back off (I was already staying a pretty far distance away because of the explosions, etc.), and then several more police cars and fire trucks. The firemen took their time getting hoses out and putting out the fire, and when I called in this week asking if they had figured out the cause of the fire, they told me the car was too burnt to discern anything. The weirdest thing about it, was that throughout this whole ordeal there was absolutely no one around; just some sheep watching from the far side of their enclosure. Needless to say, I got home slightly later than I had expected, but still long before 3:00, so there was no worry on the other end when I called Kim as promised. It was ironic that all this would happen after so much assurance to everyone that my ride home would be without incident.

My First Half Marathon, San Francisco, 7/26/2009 6:30am

A life goal I think I probably share with many people is running a marathon. Last Sunday I took the first step towards this goal: running the San Francisco Half Marathon. It was a really amazing, fun, and memorable experience, much more so than I thought it would be.

For a while now I have been running, mainly to stay in shape for soccer. I was surprised several years ago, when, after never really enjoying running for the sake of running for so long, I found that it could be extremely enjoyable. Even so, I rarely have run more than eight miles at a time, and a half marathon is 13.1 miles, the full marathon being 26.2 miles (42.2 km). I was not too worried about the extra five miles, however; I was planning to run the half marathon for the fun of it, not to come in first or even get a certain time, although I suppose I was hoping to get under an hour and a half (just under 7 minutes/mile). Heck, I didn't even sign up officially ($100 for a t-shirt, nooo waaay!). I decided to go on a little longer run a few days before the half marathon, and found that I had no problem running 11.5 miles, but SF has hills and it would be mostly on pavement instead of softer ground that I am used to running on.

When the day came, my friend picked me up at 5:30 a.m. from my Grandma's, where my family and I were staying. Driving to the marathon, we were able to easily sneak into the bunch of runners at around 6:30. As soon as we got there I got really excited and pumped up. There were so many people (over 20,000 ran that day), packed into the road and spanning the whole distance of the run. I immediately remarked to my friend Rebecca, with whom I was running, "Wow this is awesome, I am so excited I don't think I will ever run out of energy." And it was! I had an amazing time and felt like grinning and laughing the whole time! It was great to see so many people being so active (too many Americans are too lazy these days :P). People wore attire advertising causes they were supporting or training programs they had gone through to get there. Along the sides there would be people cheering everyone on with cowbells, and occasionally stands with Music, Gu, and Electrolyte drinks in small Dixie cups to down as one ran past. The weather could not have been more perfect...slightly foggy and cool, so that I never got too hot or too cold. The route was gorgeous, along the bay, over the Golden Gate Bridge and back, and through Golden Gate Park.

The Golden Gate Bridge was especially exciting. Three lanes were blocked off to traffic: one each for runners going each way, and another for a buffer zone between the cars and runners. The jam of runners became even more dense, so that it was hard to run fast and pass people, but I actually had fun darting in and out and dodging back and forth between people to pass them. On the way back across, we were able to simply push the rope marking the edge of the runner's lane out into the buffer zone, running around people.

Throughout the course there were several hills we had to run up, although fortunately the route was mostly flat. Of course these parts were a lot harder than the rest, and the general speed of the crowd slowed drastically, but signs with trivia were put up (What is the steepest hill in SF? It has a 31.1% grade. Aren't you glad you are only running this hill instead) that made them bearable, and maybe I have built up stronger calves with the sprinting I do in soccer and hiking, but I didn't think they were too bad at all. It is also interesting, how in experiences such as these, I feel a strong attitude of support and community towards and from everyone. That is such a great feeling.

By the end of the race, I was still so pumped up and full of energy I think I could probably have run the second half and completed the marathon, and probably would have done so if I did not have other plans for the day and had to catch a train. We ended up running it in close to an hour and a half, having passed thousands of people and only getting passed by one near the end. I was proud of everyone who was running that day though, and it was a fantastic and extremely fun start to the day. I plan to do many more of these in the future!

In the beginning...

I have decided that although my life is not always as interesting as I would like it to be, and is probably of little interest to most, life has its interesting moments, and if nothing more than a diary for myself, or a book of notable events in my life, I thought I would start a blog to record these. So here goes, enjoy!