Spring 2007
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7 May 2007
John's thesis defense was today and it went wonderfully! Congratulations, Dr. Wise!!! :-)
3 May 2007
Tomorrow I fly to California to spend the weekend with John and go to his Ph.D. thesis defense on Monday. Isn't that exciting?! John's gonna be "Dr. Wise" really soon! :-) So that's gonna happen on Monday and then I come back Tuesday night. And you know what I'll be missing on Tuesday? Well, as bizarre as it sounds (or at least it sounded weird to me when I first heard), Queen Elizabeth II and the Duke of Edinburgh are coming to Goddard on Tuesday (May 8). Emails about the visit have been flying all over the place for about a week now. There's gonna be lots of security and a 15-vehicle motorcade, so basically traffic in Goddard is going to be a b*tch, so I'm kinda glad to not be there that day. I still would have liked to see the Queen, but I prefer being with John :-) Goddard is preparing for the Queen's visit in a huge way, not just with the extra security. Only picture-badge employees will be allowed in the campus that day, and only 200 people will be allowed in the formal reception (200 which will be chosen by lottery from almost a thousand requests from employees). The Queen will walk from Bldg. 8 to the Visitor Center and during that time all employees are welcome to stand by (behind the velvet robes, of course) to look at the Queen and say hello (ahh, but it is specified that everyone is to address her as "Your Majesty", and to address the Duke as "Your Highness"). Heh, at least people here are not going too crazy over the Queen's visit, somewhat unlike the other people that she's visiting, who are worrying about whether or not to wear a hat and if it's appropriate for women to wear pants (gasp!) in front of the Queen. The steps at the entrance of Bldg. 8 are getting refurbished, all the road lines are freshly painted, and all the grass is neatly trimmed. Thing is, the nice landscaping is limited only to the main road and the road towards the Visitor Center (where the Queen will be planting a tree or something). Where I work, Bldg 2, is just around the corner from the main road but far away enough to not warrant beautification. The road lines are dull and the grass is so tall that a small dog could hide in it and not be seen. Sigh. I guess a visit from the Queen is so important that all the landscaping people have been assigned to focus exclusively on the areas that the Queen will see. Oh well... In any case, even though I won't be there to see the Queen, I asked Vanessa to take pictures of her if she can, and that way I'll get to see them when I get back ^_^
29 April 2007
Feliz Cumpleaños, Mamá Sofa!
26 April 2007
Feliz Cumpleaños, Wilmaris!
20 April 2007
Happy Birthday, Matt! Feliz Cumpleaños, Yasira!
5 April 2007
Feliz Cumpleaños, Miriam!
28 March 2007
I always knew Saturn was the most interesting planet in the Solar System, and new obesrvations by the Cassini Spacecraft seem to be proving me right. Not only has Cassini observed many of the planet's moons and rings, and given us completely new views of Saturn, but now it shows us that Saturn's poles have two of the most bizarre features in the Solar System. A little while ago there was a press release about a hurricane-like cloud formation that was seen at Saturn's South Pole. The cloud formation is centered on the pole and it has an eyewall, which is something that has never been observed outside of Earth. And, as if that wasn't weird enough, yesterday there was a new press release about Saturn's North Pole. There is a cloud formation centered on the North Pole, much like in the South Pole, but this northern feature is hexagonal. Yes, it is shaped like a hexagon, with straight sides and all, and it rotates in step with the planet's rotation. How the heck did a hexagon form there??? Ahh, Saturn. Always so interesting and mysterious...
26 March 2007
Feliz Cumpleaños, Yessenia!
20 March 2007
Feliz Cumpleaños, Mami! Also, Happy Vernal Equinox!
14 March 2007
Happy Pi Day! Today is also Albert Einstein's birthday, so it's a fun day for mathematicians, physicists and all around nerdy people :-)
12 March 2007
Feliz Cumpleaños, Papi! Feliz Cumpleaños, Tío Luis! And in non-birthday news, I just want to say that I feel smart. S-M-R-T smart (get it? get it? Homer Simpson!), because there are two papers from last week on astro-ph that relate to my research in a somewhat direct way (Cole is co-author in one of them, so yeah, duh), and I understand both papers to a high degree of confidence, to the point that I will lead the discussion about them next week in journal club in Goddard (either in the NumRel journal club, or in the Astrophysics journal club that I'm organizing and wish to kick off next week). It's nice to feel smart ^_^
8 March 2007
Feliz Cumpleaños, Teddy!
7 March 2007
Feliz Aniversario, Mami y Papi!
5 March 2007
I'm in Mars again. Mars, Pennsylvania that is :-P John came over for a few days, and we're staying at his parents' house in Mars (near Pittsburgh), for a couple of days. I have to do a research lunch talk in Penn State tomorrow, so it's best to drive from Mars to State College than from Laurel to State College. The former will be only around 2 hours, while the latter could be possibly over 4 hours due to the horrible morning traffic in the Baltimore area, through which we'd have to drive... For this lunch talk I have had to do the least effort out of all my other lunch talks. I'm basically giving the same talk I gave at the American Museum of Natural History a few weeks ago. The only thing I'll change is the date. Ahh, good times, good times... And and and, in most awesome news, John has decided to accept the postdoc position at NASA/Goddard. So, starting in August of this year, John and I will work in the same place :-) :-) :-) I couldn't be any happier than I already am. Well, actually, I'll be happiest after he's moved out to MD with me and we have a nice little townhouse all to ourselves (and the kitties too).
3 March 2007
Feliz Cumpleaños, Titi Cely!
26 February 2007
Feliz Cumpleaños, Belmarylies!
24 February 2007
Feliz Cumpleaños, Titi Norma!
20 February 2007
Feliz Cumpleaños, Yari!
16 February 2007
My car is covered by 2 inches of solid ice that I can't scrape off. And it's also blocked-in where it's parked because there's a big pile of solid snow behind it, which is too big and hard for me to just drive over it. Grrr... Sigh... I wish I was a firebender to make the stupid ice melt... or at least a waterbender to lift up the ice and take it off my car... Sigh...
14 February 2007
Once again, I'm running behind on stuff to update here. First off, two Feliz Cumpleaños to Edgardo (Feb 4) and Jonathan (Feb 10). Second, Happy Valentines Day! I hadn't even noticed that it's today until I saw today's PhD Comic, hehehe... John and I went to NYC last week, from Wednesday to Sunday, because he was visiting AMNH/Columbia. I gave a talk at AMNH on Thursday morning, about my research, and it went really good. Later in the afternoon we went to Columbia for John to meet with some professors and postdocs, and I also met with some professors. The day went really good, but then the next day wasn't all that good for me because I woke up with a splitting migraine. So, I missed John's talk :-/ but I just couldn't even get out of bed because my head felt like it was going to blow up. The rest of the trip was fine. And then I came back and my apartment still smells like cigarette smoke, even though I've complained and complained and complained about it to the office and they supposedly did something to fix the situation. I am *so* moving out of here when my lease is over... And then yesterday and today there's been a big winter storm, so I decided to work from home to avoid driving in icy conditions... And I finally managed to update my CV! It's not in the website though, so I need to update it really soon. I have no idea when I'll have the time to do that, but I'll do it eventually...
1 February 2007
Greetings from Toronto! This is the first time I've left the US (even though it's not actually that far away), and first time through customs, and first stamp on my passport :-) It's frickin cold here, but I was expecting that, so I packed lots and lots of sweaters to layer-up. Right now I'm sitting in the CITA visitor office, in the 14th floor of the building, while John goes to talk to professors whose research is related to his research. The view from up here is amazing (obviously, since we're so high up). I took a few pictures that will eventually find their way to the website (after I've uploaded about a year's worth of pictures that I still haven't posted). We'll be here until Sunday, so we'll get a chance to go look around the city and do touristy stuff (but not for too long, because my face will surely freeze)... Then on Wednesday of next week, we go to NYC because the AMNH people are also flying John there to visit, and they want me to come along. Actually, they want me to do a talk about my research too. That was very unexpected. I consulted with Cole, to see if he thinks I'm ready to talk about my research at another institution, and he said that I'm ready and that I should do it because giving talks is the best way to get people to know you. So, I'll be doing a talk about my research at AMNH next Thursday. I'll probably just take my thesis meeting presentation, take out the PhD timeline, add some more background, and then present that. Plus, it gives me a chance to use my fancy shiny green laser pointer that John gave me for my birthday (that I've so far used it only once).
30 January 2007
Too much stuff happening in the past few weeks. Some maintenance problems at my apartment -- cigarette smoke from downstairs getting into my apartment and maintenance took almost 3 weeks to fix it, and even now it's not entirely fixed... Some people had birthdays and I didn't have time to say happy birthday here (to Font: feliz cumpleaños; and to newly 30-year-old Miroslav: dude, you're old)... Drove in a freak snow storm on the way up to State College, at night, going up the mountains, in near white-out conditions, so now I know I can handle driving in any kind of snowy weather... First thesis committee meeting was surprisingly painless and my thesis proposal got aproved ("Black Hole Mergers as Probes of Structure Formation" -- my thesis will make me the next Feynman, so watch out for me)... John has gotten tons and tons of postdoc offers (so far Berkeley, Michigan, Goddard, CITA, AMNH, and shortlist at STScI). He's in very high demand. And these places really truly want him. CITA is flying him (and me) to Toronto tomorrow so that he can get a feel for the facilities and the city in general. I'll freeze my ass off in Toronto... My new website design has been sitting in a folder for months now and I haven't had any time to finish it and implement it... My research page is entirely outdated, and so is my CV... I need to get back on track with research, since I've been delayed so much by various circumstances beyond my control... I'm doing a research lunch talk back in Penn State in early March... I have to get back to organizing the gwave astro sources journal club series in Goddard, which I've been meaning to get started up again since last semester... Agh, I have so much stuff going on inside my brain at the same time... I seriously need a breather...
11 January 2007
Happy belated New Year (Jan 1st)! Happy belated Perihelion (Jan 3)! Happy belated Three Kings Day (Jan 6th)! Happy belated Birthday, Kathy (Jan 8th)! As you can see, I'm a little late on these updates. This is because I was on vacation with John, first at his parents' house in Mars, PA (tee-hee, Mars), and then at my parents' house in Puerto Rico. My parents have only dial-up internet, and it was ridiculously slow -- so slow that I could barely check email, let alone update the website... It was a very nice vacation, even though I got sick when I was in Mars and sprained my wrist when I was in PR. I also got some work done for my thesis committee meeting, but not as much as I would have liked. And, I got my parents a pretty nifty present -- a 17-inch, 1.83GHz Apple iMac. They were completely surprised, as they were not expecting it, and really liked it too. It's so pretty and shiny, how could anyone not like an iMac? I wrote them a long list of instructions (in Spanish, of course) on how to use the computer and the various applications and features, and it seems like Mom already figured out how to use Mail (yay!), because she emailed me this morning... John and I came back to Maryland very late on January 8th, and John went back to California on January 9th (*sniff*). I was going to come back to work on January 10th, but decided to take an extra day of vacations because I had a ginormous mountain of mail that I had to take care of, and also putting away the groceries I bought on Tuesday, and cleaning the apartment, and unpacking, and doing laundry. But now I'm back at work, and still working on the paper for my thesis committee meeting.
