Florida!

Here’s the belated account of Florida, land of palm trees and beaches. This is a tag team entry!

Jac was in Florida attending back-to-back conferences and I was tagging along which is why it’s my job to write this one up! We flew direct from San Antonio into Tampa international, which is a surprisingly handsome airport. We were headed to St Pete Beach, which is on the other side of Tampa facing into the Gulf of Mexico. We stayed at the trashy Trade winds Resort, which boasted it’s own private strip of beach, complete with beach cabanas and a huge inflatable waterslide, which was a handy landmark when walking down the beach.




The high points were having a number of lovely pools to swim in, and a man-made lagoon/waterway running through the resort that you could navigate in a paddleboat. We had a couple of boating adventures and Jac navigated both times, which was probably a good thing. The worst bit was sailing under “The Flying Bridge” which was the bar built over the lagoon looking down on the pool.



We only ate at “The Flying Bridge” once, and swore never to do it again! However, we did sip cocktails there one night and they were a much better standard, although as Jac points out, it’s hard to make a bad bloody mary.
Each day Jac went off to her morning session and I would pack my bag and head for the beach. My favourite thing to do was to walk up to the non-tourist end. It was much quieter with only a few condos, most of which were empty, and instead of people there were masses of seabirds! Gulls, Pelicans, and Herons diving for fish. One day I saw a dolphin rise up out of the water not ten meters away from me.


Ok, it’s Jac here now… Jo appears to be having trouble remembering just how ‘fake plastic’ the whole resort experience really was. Poor thing must have been more jet lagged and confused than I thought! The resort was one of the nicer ones on St Petes Beach, which somehow allowed it to be even more tragically daggy, with towering fake palms inside the atrium and piped steel drum music throughout every inch of the place, including all outdoor areas. There was one tune that got stuck in my head for a full week after we got home. I needed steelpan detox. I’m sure it was only some local council rule that saved us from having the same aural nightmare follow us onto the beach.

We had one of the bigger rooms that looked out onto the ‘lagoon’…a disneyland style snake of water that circled most of the complex, fully equipped with paddleboats, koi, and a pair of indifferent swans. The highlight of the lagoon was watching a small but fierce bird (perhaps a heron) break the core rule ‘never eat anything bigger than your head’ as he spent a full 10 minutes swallowing a massive fish he’d pulled out of the water. The whole ‘fish still flipping while sliding down the tiny neck’ was a little much for the two ladies behind us, but we were loving it and have most of the carnage on film.


The room came fully equipped with big but saggy beds decked out in the brightest coloured linen I’ve ever seen (think children’s wards in the 80s). However, it did have a wide selection of cable (we overdosed on the food channel) and a kitchenette, which allowed us to stock up on real food type supplies from the supermarket down the road.

The best part of the resort, aside from the amazing diving pelicans and sea birds helpfully supplied by one end of the beach, was the deep, blue and heated swimming pool. There were multiple pools but that one was my favourite, partly because it was so deep and partly because it was totally neglected by almost everyone else. The temperature for most of the time we were there was lovely. 30-35 days, dropping to quite cool in the late afternoon-evenings. One day even hit 40, and luckily it was also the slowest day of the conference, so I got to bake myself a little (Jo on the other hand was well and truly lobster girl at this point and had to go buy some special blue burn gel).


On the second last night we were there a huge electrical storm hit just after we got back from dinner. We sat on the beach watching the lightning for a while and then had the sense to go back in before the rain hit, and hit it did! The storm turned out to be huge!! Heaps of rain, wind and lightning, with the most incredible thunder. Sadly that was the same set of storms that sent the tornados up through the Carolinas :( We were also under a tornado watch, but we didn’t know it at that point, probably for the best. The next morning the entire strip of resorts had no water! Kind of weird in a hotel. Jo discovered the weather channel and was instantly hooked.

We also got to catch up with friends of ours (Chris' relatives) and that was just wonderful, like hanging out with family again ^_^

All in all, it was a fun trip :)

Newsflash!

Jo has asked me to post a newsflash to let you know that SHE HAS NEW SHOES!

I take NO responsibility for them...



Also, we're heading to Portland for a week on Monday and it's really cold there! We're working on a Florida post as well as an update on Thanksgiving! Stay tuned...

Backdated...Halloween!

I know it has been an insanely long time since I last posted. Jo has been giving me a hard time about letting my loyal blog devotees down. However, in my defence, I have written this Halloween entry THREE times now and each time blogger has wiped it. NOT HAPPY JAN!

Anyhow, it's been pretty busy here the last few weeks and there will be more entries soon. No sooner had Jo arrived and de-jetlagged than we headed to Florida for a week for back to back statistical genetics conferences. More on that one soon, for now I owe you this Halloween entry.

I had never had a Halloween before, so I had little idea of what to expect aside from what I'd seen in films and stuff. The lead up was great. All the stores were decked out in orange and black with lots of ghosts and jack-o-lanterns and such. The usually brilliant single candy isle at the supermarket expanded to a whopping 3 isles! All the candy makers here produce special Halloween fun-size versions of their products, sold in bags bigger than your head. And it's not only the packaging that changes, m&ms are orange and black, hubba-bubba pieces are shaped like pumpkins and you can find all kinds of bleeding body parts made out of gummy jelly (and for some, like the ear I ate, the texture is far too real!)

The other thing that there's suddenly a whole lot of is pumpkins! Up until that point I had only seen uninspiring looking 'acorn squash' and a few rogue butternuts. Suddenly there appeared piles of pumpkins in all different shapes and sizes. Huge ones for carving, smaller ones for putting at your doorstep to look all rustic and Fallie and tiny table decorating pumpkins. Americans seem to love decorating their tables...

I missed out on carving one this year but I'm looking forward to giving it a go next year.

On the Saturday before Halloween I went out to dinner with some friends and at the last minute we decided to go to the fancy dress Halloween party hosted by some of the waitresses at our local pub (the Saucer). Since we were completely lacking costumes and it was 11pm, we raided the kiddy dress up isle of the local supermarket! As a result I went as batman, with a pretty cool mask, and Matt went as Darth Vader with a mask that didn't quite manage to cover his head (so he looked like Darth with an afro!) The party was fun and there were some great costumes, but by far the scariest were the three blokes who dressed up as Saucer waitresses, complete with tiny tartan skirts, long stripey socks and tank tops. eek!

Andrea invited me to go trick or treating with her and the boys on the actual night of Halloween. They live in an 'edward scissorhands' suburb that's very safe and quiet, and the houses were all covered in spooky decorations, so it seemed like a great place to go. I was then informed that this outing required full spooky attire! I used the tricks I'd learnt on Saturday night and headed back to the kiddy costumes, but this time I found a great vampire costume that included a set of wings (I have a thing for wings...) A little alteration with the kitchen scissors and I managed to fit into most of it. The end result was fairly lame, but what do you expect for less than $10!

It's ok, I do know quite how daggy these photos and are I can't believe I posted them!

Anyhow, we had fun. The houses that were 'participating' left their outside lights on, and any that were dark meant you didn't trick or treat there. There was also no tricking, and no real intention of it. I'm not sure how it goes for the bigger kids (who start their rounds around 9pm, after the littlies are worn out, and pick up all the left-overs). Lots of places had really well decorated doorsteps, with lots of carved pumpkins, ghosts, cobwebs, lights and even the odd hay bail (?!) The most full on thing I saw all night, however, was the people who were driving from door to door. No joke!

The loot level was beyond even this candy addicts wildest dreams, and even though we only visited about 10 or so houses we came home with bulging bucket. Or we would have if the buckets could bulge.

In transit

Jo is on her way! I spent the night/morning tracking the flight using a google earth mod. Very cool, just like being on the plane and watching that map that changes, like, every hour. Delays on either end of the LA flight so I think it turned into quite a long trip. Here's hoping the San Antonio legs is ok (less than 3 hours direct from LA). The weather here is clear, the big storms passed through last night.

Off to do some more tidying... A cover for nervous excitement :) Thanks for all the lovely emails!!

PS. I have some halloween pics that I'll backdate soon...

Lethargy

I have a cup of tea and a york pattie to kick me through the afternoon, but I'm slowing down. So sleepy! I finished writing a grant application a little while ago and all remaining enthusiasm fled as soon as I hit send. The stupid thing about the grant is that it's going to take me twice as long to fill in all the paperwork as it did to write it!!

A bunch of us went out to Sushi Zushi for dinner on Saturday night, then randomly decided to go to a Halloween party. Luckily the supermarkets are well stocked, costume wise! I ended up wearing some batman number build for a 6 year old. Seriously uncomfortable but a lot of fun. I was hoping to get some pumpkin carving lessons from someone but I think I've missed my window. Oh well, next year!

On the weekend I also went to a few of the Asian grocers, and stocked up on some weird and wonderful items. One of the places (my favorite one) had peking duck halves for $6. That's just insane! So anyhow, point of the story is that I'm heading home soon to make duck soup :) And the thought of that should get me through the rest of the afternoon. I miss you all!

Snow?

Um, so here's me complaining that we had a few days of cold in San Antonio, and I log into the Hobart webcams and see snow!? I forgot Hobart sometimes does that odd October cold snap thing. Icky.

I was wandering around Ship of Fools during lunch the other day and came across the following little gem in the 'blunders' section. For those of you who don't remember, ship of fools is subtitled 'the magazine of Christian unrest' and it's written by Christians with a sense of humor and a whole lot of salt. However, if you're the stiff upper lip type and have easily offended sensibilities, don't bother following the links. There, end warning rant. Anyhow, this particular section kept me entertained for a good 10 minutes!

Hello Pastor... >_<

The rest of the site is worth checking too, especially the biblical curse generator and Gadgets for God.

Anyhow, nothing to report. I'm off to a gallery opening tonight but I know nothing about it so I'll have to tell you later! It's insanely windy here today, but bright, gorgeous sun. I'm having fun watching the flocks of birds get tosses around in the sky. Persistent little buggers though!

Here comes the sun

Well, somehow I managed to miss the end of summer. I'm not sure how and when that happened but it is definitely gone. The last week, however, was a serious shock to the system. Not only did it rain, lots, but it also got cold! I couldn't believe it. Last Saturday the temperature dropped to 20 degrees (C) and I was thinking about testing out the heating in my apartment! Yesterday it rained heavily all day and many of the roads flooded (because drainage is NOT a priority for the road builders here). However, I can write about this because today is sunny and warm. Yay! We're back up to 30 degrees and climbing. Actually, it feels even hotter today because it's so muggy after the rain. Don't get me wrong, the cold and wet was deliciously enjoyable in it's own way, but I was hoping Jo would at least get a little bit of warm weather! Now at least that's looking a little more likely.

And because I'm in a very random mood...

Yesterday I bought a packet of Fusen gum, which is really good Japanese bubble gum. It was one of those mixed packs where you get to try all the different flavors (orange is still best). However, I'm now left wondering if the pack I bought was made specifically for the American market, because when I took all the mini packs out of the box I discovered a piece of foam inside that is used to hold the smaller pieces in place, and printed on the foam block...

>_<

I am Wonko the Sane

On a lighter note...

While traveling last week I received a packet of salted peanuts on the aeroplane. Very old school, especially given the rate of dangerous peanut allergies. This in itself surprised me, however, when reading the fine print on the packet (as I'm want to do) I came accross the line:

Warning: This product has been produced at a facility that processes peanuts

"Oh I'm sorry mr flight attendant, I can't eat these peanuts. You see, I'm allergic to peanuts and these may contain traces of, well, peanuts" Gah!!!

Outside of the "isle of denial"

So, I promised a second New Orleans post but I've been putting it off because I don't know really how to say it. I'm not an expert on the politics. I'm not a local. Yada yada...

However, what needs to be said is that outside of the French Quarter and the CBD, New Orleans in a mess. Worse than a mess...Utterly destroyed comes to mind. However, there is a strong spirit of hope, courage and fierce determination that is holding the remains together. All I can say is that from the little I saw, I was horrified. I had no idea of how widespread the destruction was, and still is, nearly a year later. And I only saw the edges on some off the less damaged places.

There's an article in the Houston Chronicle that's worth reading. Tells the story much better than I could, although I'm sure it's biased in it's own way. The whole thing is soo caught up in politics now as well, just to add to the complications. The feeling I get here is that people don't want to know. they're sure the government is dealing with it so it's all good.

Anyhow, this post was prompted by two things I saw on the tour that were a bit of a reality check. The first was the watermark on some of the places we drove through. The sides of bridges, halfway up houses...this kind of slimy line. That wasn't so bad, but it was the realisation that the line wasn't where the water got to, but where it stayed that really floored me.

The second were these painted markings on all the houses (outside of the FQ and CBD etc). Painted Xs with notation in each quadrant. The similarities to passover were somewhat sobering. None of my photos worked because they were taken from moving cars, so I borrowed one from here.


I later learnt that these are search markings, where different volunteer teams like the chicago police etc (urban search and rescue) would go out and check for people in the houses. This house has been searched twice, the first time in orange. The date is at the top, the team ID in the left, any hazards etc in the right and the number of bodies or survivors at the bottom. The first marking has NE in the right quadrant, which means there was no entry (water too high, toxic... ). The second marking is from two days later, no hazards, no people. The number of these markings that we passed was, like almost everything else, overwhelming... If I had a hat, I'd take it off to the courage of all those people who were part of those teams.

And then there's the story of the missing killer dolphins... Although that may be a hoax.

^_^

New Orleans - Epic post

So much for my hope of being able to post while I was away. I did have a sporadic net connection. What I didn't have was time! So much to tell you, but first things first...

I'm home now. I was in New Orleans from Monday (9th) to Saturday (14th) at the big American Society of Human Genetics (ASHG) meeting. The conference was pretty good, but smaller than usual and I hope that's because genetics is having a quiet year, although I fear it was because people didn't want to go to New Orleans, even though it's one of the best ways to help some parts of the city recover! Anyhow, I spoke on Wednesday. On Tuesday I made the mistake of going in and checking out the room I'd be speaking in...BAD PLAN! It was huge! OK, so 'ballroom' should have given it away but I was not prepared for the sheer number of chairs. I nearly wet myself on the spot. John also changed the entire structure of my talk on Tuesday afternoon so I was pretty much peaking out. But all that aside my talk actually went really well! It seemed to be well received and I got a tonne of questions, even though my session had been very quiet till then. The audio setup was terrible for the stage though. The questions were audible to the crowd but not to us on the podium, so I had to guess most of the questions from the few keywords I picked up. All good though. I had a lot of comments afterwards as well. Our group had about 6 people at the conference, three speaking, so it was great to be part of such an active group rather than wandering round as a lost an lonely PhD student, which has been my experience in the past. The only problem with 'the group' was it meant there was a LOT of socialising!

So, on to New Orleans. We were staying at the hilton on the river, near the convention center, on the corner of the French Quarter. That whole area was not really flooded by Katrina, although it did suffer wind damage and huge economic loss that comes from 80% of your population having to go elsewhere! Most of that side of town is up and running now, trying to get the tourist trade back. However, even from that relatively untouched part of town you can still sense the huge scarring. There's a major labor shortage in the places that are up and running. There are a lot of places in the French Quarter that weren't necessarily damaged, but they're closed for economic reasons. But all of that aside we had a fabulous time!

This is the view from my hotel window. I was up high enough that I got no noise, but it was lovely to watch the sluggish barges on the Mississippi!

It was gorgeous weather for nearly the entire trip, sunny and warm but not hot. Good for walking! On Monday evening, after we arrived and got settled in, we headed straight for the French Quarter. First place we hit was the Acme oyster bar. Classic Southern style...black and while tiles, red and green neon lighting and a menu consisting of 98% fried stuff and plenty o booze. We circumnavigated the fried options and had fresh oysters, which were good and made even better by the horseradish laced tomato sauce, but nowhere near tassie standard. They were too clean, to the point of being tasteless. I had an oyster shooter and that seemed the best way to enjoy them! After that we headed up to Bourbon St, which is truly it's own unique experience. No idea what it was like pre-katrina but it was rowdy, loud and a lot of fun! Drinking on the streets seemed to be not only condoned, but celebrated, and the majority of bars were 'to-go' meaning take away, no seating room at all.

The sign says it all really!

I discovered the joys of the mint julep! Apparently another southern tradition. Massive amounts of fresh mint, crushed with sugar (think Moroccan mint tea) then smothered in bourbon and a hint of soda or 7-up, not sure which. Pretty darn good though! I also tasted a hurricane, and unfortunate local specialty, but it was nasty! So glad I didn't order one of those. After some good live tunes at the 'Famous Door' we went in search of dinner, and ended up at Brennan's, one of the well known and well respected local restaurants. Even more well respected now for keeping their staff on the payroll during the down time! They run several of the top local eateries, but the one we went to is the birthplace of 'bananas foster', a local dessert that involved caramelising a banana in brown sugar, rum, cinnamon and lots of flamage! Tastes pretty good even to the girl who doesn't like bananas! Dinner was gorgeous, and between three of us we had frogs legs, escargots, soft shelled crab and numerous other yummies. Dessert was, of course, bananas foster. The service was excellent and the wine list was pretty good, even though they were recovering from losing 35,000 bottles in the storm!

Random parts of the French Quarter - before my camera failed on me

OK, so perhaps they're not so random. They were actually the least smelly/rowdy parts. The Quarter sure has it's own, distinct fragrance >_<

Tuesday was mostly spent stressing about my talk, having it completely rewritten, then getting it loaded (since my talk was first thing Wed morning). However, I did go on the dinner cruise put on by the company we use for all our gene expression/genotyping work (Illumina). I was kind of stressed and quiet but it was lovely just to glide up and down the river and see a little bit more of the environs.

Wednesday, post-talk, was pretty cruisy. I managed to fit in a nap and catch up on some of the sleep deprivation. That night we hit the parties run by the different universities. They were all in different conference rooms at our hotel so we spent most of the night party hopping. There were some pretty good ones, with a range of food and drinks. The ones that started later even had desserts instead of dinner snacks!

Thursday was an early start for the last of our cohorts talks, followed by a good look at the posters (2000 of them!) and freebie collection at the exhibitors section. Basically all the different companies lure you towards their product by giving away a range of great free stuff. I scored an umbrella, insulated lunch bag, pens, pads, clips and numerous other glowing things, a great coffee mug that changed colour with heat, t-shirts and a bunch of other stuff. I'm a bit of a freebiephile...

Thursday night we were meeting a bunch of friends and collaborators for dinner. The plan was to meet at Acme and go from there but there was a huge queue to get in! (it wasn't that good!) Anyhow, we found a great looking wine bar (La Louisiane) across the road and hung out there. This place was not only accommodating of our huge groups barging in for drinks and snacks, but they also made a bloody mary that included blue cheese stuffed olives! Heaven on a cocktail stick. After the pre-dinner drinkies we headed to a place called NOLA, set up by well known US chef Emeril. While Brennan's had great public support for the way they treated their staff during after Katrina, Emeril copped a fair amount of local flack for staying closed for so long, but they're back up now and the place is definitely worth checking out. We had 10 people, yet the meal was incredibly good all round and hiccup-free! I had mussels followed by crab cakes and a fennel&white bean salad with lump crab meat. I also got to try the lovely Chicory Coffee Crème Brûlée and a glass of ice wine...mmm

Friday was relatively quiet. The conference was all but over. The hotel breakfast was a great buffet that included a station with a lady who made you an omelet topped with your choice of a range of toppings. Brilliant! We ended up having brunch then heading off on a 4 hour mini-bus tour of the city. Tour options includeded swamp, city and disaster and so we decided to do the city tour. It wasn't intended to be disaster focused, but as the guide pointed out, Katrina is now such a major part of their history that you can't ignore it completely. We just didn't want to go around only to look at damage, since the city has so much other history and life as well.

The tour was pretty good, aside from being cramped into a tiny bus with a very loud guide! I certainly learnt a lot about New Orleans in general, but also about the impact of Katrina and the on going ramifications. We went through the garden district which was just gorgeous. Some amazing houses out there. We also went to one of the cemeteries and our guide explained all about the mechanics of above ground burial and it's utility in flood threatened areas. Some of the family tombs were enourmous and soo extravagant. The walls of the cemetery contain mini tombs that are for more general public use, if your family can't afford their own dedicated tomb. Some of the larger ones were set up by clubs, guilds and societies for their members. The deal is that the coffins sit in the tomb for at least a year and a day, sealed behind bricks and mortar, and if there's another burial after this time the remains are emptied into the tomb then pushed to the back where they fall down to the bottom level. Pretty amazing stuff. Almost no cremation and what they do have is only in very recent history! These massive above ground cemeteries are knows the "the cities of the dead".

These are the public and/or cheaper tombs that make up the cemetary wall.

A private tomb. Some of them are enormous!

Ok, so this has turned into a post of EPIC proportions so I will sign off and finish the rest tomorrow. I guess the message is that New Orleans as it is now is definitely worth the visit.

^_^

New Orleans

(pre-script...I wrote this yesterday morning and didn't get time to post it

Hi guys,

I'm just about to jump on the plane to New Orleans to go to the big genetics conference. I'm hoping I'll have net access so I can send you lots of pics. I've never been before and I know it's not what it was, but it's still great to go and I'm sure it'll be a lot of fun. We're staying near the conference centre, at the edge of the French Quarter, which wasn't hit very badly by Katrina. This conference is the biggest general genetics conference there is, so I'm pleased they went through with hosting it there. The conference website has been running a lot of good info about where the city is now and why it's vital to get tourists back. I guess that's one of the best way people can help get the city back on it's feet. I'm looking forward to it! OK, aside from the speaking part. My talk is first thing Wednesday morning so I'll be much more relaxed after that. We get home on Saturday, no doubt exhausted!!

On Saturday I went out to Gruene, on of the little towns just outside San Antonio, with a couple of the girls from work. There was a Texas winetasting fundraiser that we wanted to go to. Texas wine usually means blergh, but there were a couple of ok moscatos. I bought a jar of this amazing burnt orange jelly that has serrano pepper in it... sounds odd but it's this fantastic hot, sweet and slightly savory jam that would be lovely with chicken or cheese or just off the spoon!!


This watertower is in the centre of town. .. I'm rather fond of it!

After the wine tasting we went to a place called the Gruene River Grill. It was pretty good! I don't think we got to see them at their best because they were so busy, but worth a second visit at some point. They had great outdoor furniture to loaf around on while you waited for your table... huge plastic armchairs! They were incredible. Not particularly comfy but they sure looked cool.

After dinner we went to the Gruene Hall (the oldest dancehall in Texas apparently) to see Leon Russell. Aged 70s rocker but he still has a lot of energy and charisma, and you should hear him play the piano! Amazing. The dance hall and and the people were an experience in themselves. I wish there was some way I should have photographed some of the characters in the crowd. The hall is like a barn with a bar, but it had it's own, old-school Texas style. Lots of fun.

>.<

It's 1am and I've just finished making sushi 'because I had leftover tuna'...?!

Off to bed now.

Supermarket of bliss

I just went outside because I had to run some paperwork around the foundation and it is a gorgeous day! It's sunny but not too hot and the trees are totally full of birds. It's almost deafening! The weather has cooled down recently and not we're sitting at about 32 degrees each day dropping too about 20 at night. Just gorgeous. It's perfect for eating outside at night now (although I did get eaten by mozzies on the weekend doing just that)

I've been a touch depressed lately...not sad depressed, just apathetic, flat. Sorry about the lack of posts. I think it's just from being sick and stressed all at the same time. Work is really busy with HUGE grants all due in at the same time and I'm also really stressing about this platform presentation that I'm doing in New Orleans next week...argh!! But I'm getting over it.

I went to one of the best supermarkets in San Antonio on the weekend. I love supermarkets so that was instrumental in me getting out of my black hole. It's called Central Market and it's on the edge of downtown, so a little bit of a stressful drive, but so, so worth it! They have the best fruit and veg section. I found 13 different typed of mushrooms, including these very cool looking blue foot or blewitt mushrooms that really did have blue stems, and bright orange lobster mushrooms, both of which cost about the same as a lobster($50/lb)! But I did find some gorgeous looking oyster and shitakes so looks like it's risotto tomorrow :) This place also has a great fresh fish/meat section and they just happened to have wild caught tuna steak of sale. They were the darkest red! I'm going to have half of it raw for dinner tonight, if I can come up with something cool to do with it. Last time I made soy/ginger/wasabi marinade for the tuna and had it with salad. yummo.

Central Market also has a wonderful and incredibly dangerous cheese section. They even had some King Island Roaring 40's blue!! No bright orange cheddar or monterrey jack to be seen :)

Surprisingly, I didn't go too overboard (I made myself eat before I went there because shopping while hungry is a very bad idea). I picked up some fresh local apple juice that is pretty darn good, a small piece of gorgeous looking Stilton, some yummy bread and a few other bits and pieces. I completely avoided the wine section because I know it'd be as good as everything else there and I don't need any!

So anyhow, I'd better get back to work. I have a week to get my talk organised for the ASHG meeting in New Orleans (panic!) but at the same time I'm looking forward to the trip. We leave next Monday and I think we're on the water, at the corner of the French Quarter (in the convention center area). I'll keep you posted on that one for sure!

^_^

The dreaded lurgie

It's been a week between posts! argh.

I did some kid sitting on the weekend and it seems that I don't have babysitter immunity yet because I picked up the nasty chest bug that they had. Going swimming with 2 sick kids probably didn't help, but it sure helped the whole tired, bed time thing. It was lots of fun to hand out with kids again and I watched Nanny McFee which made me cry! Lucky I was watching the end after they'd gone to sleep ^_^

Back there this weekend for a 'six year old pool party'...12= kids, one pool, major chaos. But it should be lots of fun too. We're having an adult de-stress later that evening.

There's nothing like a raging head cold in the morning to make you want to go and buy drugs, and by drugs I of course mean legal medication, pharmaceuticals and the like. But since I have to go to a drug store to do that... Anyhow, I now have red pills for the day, blue pills for the night, yellow pills to suck and make my throat go numb (and my mouth taste terrible for hours - an unfortunate side effect) and white pills if none of the above seem to be working. Needless to say I still feel like crud. Yay for science. However, copious amounts of vitamin enriched pink grapefruit juice seems to be helping ^_^

Work has been busy, nay, hectic in recent days with a few late nights in the office. It all seems to be under control for the moment though. We have a bunch of major grants due soon, and I've been preparing abstracts and submissions for conferences and well and working on lots of small but urgent projects. I like it :)

And finally, in news that isn't about Jac, my dear friends Kath and Andrew had a little boy the other day, Angus. He's lovely!

Tiny Size!

Wandering through Target on the weekend I stumbled across these miniature gems! Aren't they wonderful? I've never seen camping gear displayed like this. Imagine being the person whose job it is to miniaturise all the tents into display form. I wanted to get one as a house for Purry but they only sell the big ones :( I was also very tempted to raid the toy isle and tuck a whole bunch of bears into the mini sleeping bags, but I restrained myself.





All is well here. It's clear and sunny again but the few days of rain we had have dome wonders for old San Antonio. The temperature has dropped to a simply delicious 35 degrees C and everything looks so greens. It's given a whole new lease of life to all the poor plants, as though they've been waiting for months to have one huge growth spurt, and now everything is just covered in green. I don't think I've ever seen such growth and so quickly!

(PS. Tiny Size! is a bit of an in joke but it's a brand of mexican gum - Kath and Andrew used to send it to Jo and I when they were in the states and "Tiny Size!" kind of entered our vernacular. Got to love bad translations!)

Hansoi

Unless you're an avid ego-surfer you'll probably never read this, but I want to say a huge thank you to the mystery person who runs the "hansoi" shoutcast online radiostation. You keep me sane at work when my head is full of numbers. Whenever I think that we have similar tastes in music you add yet another CD that I adore! Please, keep the music coming ^_^

Floods, explosions and an overactive imagination

Ok, so I'm getting my wrists slapped for falling behind with posts, and rightly so I guess!

Yesterday was pretty amazing, it rained ALL DAY! I haven't seen so much rain since I've been here. It started just as I pulled into the carpark in the morning and only got heavier as I waited in the car for it to ease up so I could make the mad dash to the office. Needless to say I was literally dripping by the time I got inside! While we desperately need the rain, the downside is that San Antonio is not a city that was build to cope with the rain, even a little rain... there's no curbside drainage, the roads aren't rounded and water pools on the highways in no time. The urban planers here should definitely win the Atlantis Award for drainage. It only takes about an hour of heavy rain for us to have widespread flash floods, but do you think the crazy drivers slow down? At all? Nope, if anything they're worse! I left work late last night waiting for both the rain and the traffic to calm down as much as possible.

We had a little excitement outside my office on Friday. I was writing an email when I looked out my window to see one of the workmen (just finishing the renovations and finally packing up) knock a hole in the top of a huge gas tank! The huge stream of white vapour not 20m from my office caught my eye! I then watched as the workman kind of pretended nothing had happened, then slunk back a few paces, then thought better of it and wandered off to tell someone there was a problem, then more workmen congregated (meanwhile the tank is still spewing gas like there's no tomorrow). I became somewhat concerned when the laid back workmen started moving back and standing behind trees, then more so when the fire brigade turned up and got them all back behind our building... Meanwhile I'm still sitting 20m away from the thing separated by a window and wondering if I'd have time to dive under my desk if it exploded (cold war style). Anyhow, it all turned out fine, of course! They basically waited for it to empty itself then took at away. Kept me entertained before pub time though ^_^

I kid you not, the weather forecast for San Antonio today is "Isolated Sprinkles"... Choc chips or 100s and 1000s?

Sleep Deprived!

Well, last night I had the worst sleep EVER! I went to bed a little earlier than usual with the hope of catching up some...Ha! I was having trouble getting to sleep anyway, it was really muggy last night because there was a storm approaching, so I was either hot and sweaty, or cold and sweaty with the A/C on. Ick. Anyhow, after an hour or so of tossing and turning the smoke detector in my bedroom starts doing the flat battery beep, stupidly loudly! After attempting to sleep through it I finally spat it and climbed up on my (rickety) stool to take the $*#& thing down, only to discover it's hard wired in and taking out the battery just makes it beep more! Anyhow, at my wits end (and about 2am) I finally spac it, make a pile on the lounge floor out of my 2 doonas and the cushion from my chair and attempt to sleep on that. Even with all the doors to the bedroom closed I could still hear the beeping thing (ha!) Needless to say, I didn't sleep much.

On the up side, soon after that at started raining! Sweet, glorious and soaking rain that lasted half the day. It was wonderful and the temperature dropped to 20ish C, delicious!

Invaders

I got inspired yesterday and went to the craft shop to buy some painting gear! My walls have been horribly bare so I though I might try to come up with something! It's been a very long time since I painted though so I started off VERY easy! Kate send me a coolhunter link that inspired the bedroom invaders. They still need to be sealed but they were good practice, although my hands cramped so badly I nearly couldn't finish them! I'm working on something a little more Jac now ^_^

Holidays

Just a quicky to say Happy Father's Day to all those dads out there...including the somewhat terrified dad's to be :) I'm thinking of you all.

Well, call me slow but I have just worked out the Monday is a holiday here (Labor day) so YAY for a long weekend! It was that day, four years ago (2002) that this whole adventure started, when I was accepted into a statistical geneitics course in LA. Little did I know the doors that would be opened in that week!

(told you it would be a quicky!)

Thank you

I just wanted to say a HUGE thank you to everyone who helped us with the visa. I should have said it yesterday but I was a little overwhelmed with relief. There was a LOT of paperwork to collect and most of that was from trying to second guess what they might ask for (the website is not up there on the clarity scale). Thanks so much to everyone who wrote letters, provided shoulders to stress on and all those other things that made the process that little bit easier ^_^

I'm off to a BBQ tonight with the aussie contingent from work (and a few honoraries). It's at the house I was sitting with the pool, so I'm looking forward to a swim. Nothing hugely exciting planned for the weekend. I think we're all at the point where we're over the heat and just waiting for it to break. We've even cancelled friday night drinkies lately and that's almost unheard of!!

Oh, and if anyone can work out how to get me one of these you'll be on my lost of world's coolest people FOREVER!

Yay!!

Well, some of you already know the good news... Jo's visa was approved yesterday! Talk about major sighs of relief!

I don't really know the details but the interview went well. She now has a 5 year visa (longer than mine...go figure!!). The odd thing is that point of entry [immigration in LA airport] decide on the duration of stay, which may be 6 or 12 months, then you reapply for an extension internally (yay for not having to border hop to do paperwork) and that process can continue for up to 5 years. I might remind you that 5 years is definitely NOT on the cards ^_^

So anyhow, I'm stoked and Jo seems stoked too, although the reality of coming the the US is probably kicking in about now and that can be nastier than a bucket of moonshine. But no matter how far removed from the happy mateship of old oz, I have no doubt that being here will be a great experience for both of us, and fun too!

*happy dance*

Best quote I heard today "Silence is golden, duct tape is silver"

It rained last night. Not a lot (you could see the real storm off in the distance) but it took me a good minute to remember how to work my wipers!

I've had insane heartburn and anxiety all day. Must be the visa... I can't imagine how Jo must be feeling but I hope she's sleeping right now!

Visa stress and general news

Greetings all. It's been a busy week already and it's only Tuesday!

As some of you know, Jo is about to have her visa interview. The weeks leading up to this point have been extremely stressful. Much more so for her than me, but it's a horrible feeling being here and not being able to do much (anything) to help. I think we've done everything we can do, in terms of getting the volumes of paperwork together, now it's all down to the person on the day of the interview. It's such a full-on thing to have a government department decide if you can be in the same physical location as your partner, especially a government department from another country! Please keep us in your prayers.

As far as other news goes...Dinner at my place went well on Thursday night. We had a big roast chicken (free range) and lots of vegies, although I overcooked some of them (not used to the mega oven yet). There was still plenty of good stuff left so no dramas. Much wine was consumed by all - Tom and I stuck to the aussie reds again. Joanne made a fab lemon meringue pie that topped off the dining experience perfectly ^_^

The weekend was pretty quiet. I went shopping on Saturday morning at my favorite outdoor mall. It was fun to just wander though different places and look at stuff. Got a bit hot though! Speaking of hot, people are saying that this is the hottest summer on record for San Antonio, but I haven't been able to verify that yet. Even if that's not entirely true, it's still jolly hot! The max temps aren't getting hotter but it's just not cooling down at night now. Unrelenting! I got excited yesterday because they were tracking rain for the first time in over a month, but it didn't reach us :( Apparent;y we're in a cold front today though, which means the max temp is below 100 for once! (ok, so it's 99 but it's still below the magic number) The chance of rain has dropped to 20% for tonight, so it's not looking likely.

But enough boring weather talk. I'm off to the supermarket tonight. Simple things make me happy ^_^

New look...

...is not much different to the old one!

So, the migration to the new blogger let me make a few changes, but it's made other stuff messier, like the profile text that no longer takes code! So now you get a wall of text rather than my categories :(

Again, please, if you have any issues seeing anything on here let me know. It all looks fine on my screen, but I don't need to see it!

Going home now, it's late!!

More nonsense

I just did a very scary thing and migrated my blog across to the new version of blogger! It probably doesn't look any different but for a while there it was just GONE! eek. All seems to be working fine, but let me know if anything looks a bit off now, especially you *cough* mac users.

As for news and such, I've been working pretty hard the last few weeks so not a whole lot to report. Work is going really well though and my current analyses are finally coming together! I just have so much data to work with. As Vince says, it's an embarrassment of riches, and he's so right.

Having a few people over for dinner tomorrow night which should be fun. Yesterday morning I made a wish (while showering...) that the WoW servers would go down so I could clean my house, and they did! That's got to be the first time I've ever been pleased about extended maintenance. My house is now close to spotless which is making me feel much better about life. I just need to mop the floors tonight and it's all good. One of tomorrow's diners in a fussy eater, so looks like the menu will be simple roast chicken and a range of vegies, grab what you like style. I'm out of chicken stock at the moment so it's perfect timing. I also have lots of tarragon growing on my deck, so there's another reason to go with chicken! I'm surprised my herbs have survived this long; not only do they need about 2Ls of water per day to survive this heat but my squirrel has taken to digging in the pot(grapes don't store well...) It's only a small pot!

One last thing (just to keep the food theme going) I've discovered the most wonderful chocolate! Now, I'm a big time dark chocolate fan. I like the sweet and bitter combination AND the fact that it seems to be good for your health (in moderation) and a better cough suppressant than codeine. I usually get the Lindt 70% cocoa but I don't really like the slightly dry texture it has and it's a little too sour. Anyhow, the other day I discovered Lindt "swiss bittersweet" dark chocolate! I can't tell you what the cocoa content is here because FDA allows some very weird labelling... For example, the second ingredient is chocolate! It's still got the bitterness of the 70%, but it's a little smoother and softer (hmm...guessing more fat?) and a tiny bit sweeter and it's totally wonderful!!! I'm no chocoholic, so one or two squares is enough for me for the whole day, which is why I'm not phased if it is higher fat. Anyhow, if you can find this stuff in Oz and you like dark chocolate, try it, it's good!!

Some random pics

At the moment I'm making a batch of meat sauce (for work lunches) so I thought I'd put some photos on the blog while it simmers. I've been a bit slack with pictures, mostly because I update the blog on my work computer, but the camera only talks to the laptop at home.

Anyhow, here they are ^_^

For all you mosaic buffs out there, this as a HUGE mosaic on the wall of the hospital in town. It's even more impressive when you're standing at the base of it.


One of my little friends who hangs out near my office window.


This is an old shopfront I found on the edge of the city during my travels with Tom. I just love all the textures ^_^


Great place to make a nest!


This is one of the rock trains that goes past my place. The driver thought it was a great idea just to sit on the horn while I was trying to take the photo. Nearly burst my eardrums!!


And finally, the absolutely delicious chocolate tart that I had a La Frite. mmmm


Till next time...

Electronic art

I took this post down because the vids were slowing down the blog too much. Different story had they been mine, but there were just random stuff!

Now while Government announces Australian History Prize is something to be pleased about, somehow, some small but highly cynical part of me knows that it'll end up going to a windschuttle clone *sigh*

Dinner went well last night. We had salmon, mussels, clams and prawns in a spicy, garlicky white wine/tomato soup with a tonne of fresh herbs. Hot, crust bread to mop up the slops. Oh, and a couple of bottles of good aussie red :) It was wonderful to be able to cook for other people again! Everyone is back from the Australian conference now so while I no longer have cats, cable, a washing machine or a pool, I do have friends again ^_^

More food!

Hi All,

Struggling today. I've been sleeping really badly lately and it's starting to kick in. Think I'm going to have to dump the doona and get some kind of ultra light blanket. I have the AC on but not too cold because then I hide under the doona and then I overheat! Not sure if it's the heat or if I'm just having a rough patch but I hope it passes soon!

Work has been happily busy today. I've been switching from the Sun to the PC all day, which is fine except for the enthusiastic moment where I swung around and banged my knee on the sun box! Doh!

Tom and Matt are coming over for dinner tomorrow night so that's a good excuse to cook my bouillabaisse variant. It's a variant because it's easy! There is wonderful and fresh seafood available here at the moment, so I'd better live it up before Jo arrives. The local figs are just so gorgeous at the moment so that justified buying little blue cheese to share, doesn't it? There's also a wonderful soft cheese that I can find once in a blue moon. It's a little like the King Island Scrubbed Brie (one of my all time favorites) but not as soft, but it does have a similar yellowish mold on the outside. It's called saint something... I'll have to pay more attention next time I find it, but trust me, it's wonderful!

On Friday night I went out to a place called the Scenic Loop Cafe to celebrate one of my co-worker's birthday. This place is known for it's outdoor dining and live music, and there was a fab bluegrass band playing while we were there. The menu looked good, too many potential options for once, but I went with the Jackson salad (because Elan used to call me Jackson). I've learnt that salads here are usually HUGE, and more than enough to feed me, plus this one had artichokes, palm hearts, bacon and gorgonzola, as well as grilled chicken. It was yummy. The side of steamed asparagus was a let down, but it stopped me from ordering the fried okra so it's all good. The wine of choice was a pretty decent Australian red called Nine Stones (shiraz). Australian wine is very popular here, although my rule of thumb* is to avoid anything with a brightly coloured and stylised aboriginal drawing on the label. The drive to get there was a little nerve-wracking, not only because I didn't really know where to go (and it's easy to get lost around here) but also because I was on one of the rare 2 directional access roads that run along side the highway. Not only did I have multiple people drive straight towards me because they forgot or didn't know it was two way, but having oncoming traffic to my right (on the highway) was making me flashback to driving in Australia for the first time since driving here, and I had to keep telling myself out loud what to do and which side to stay on. Eek! Driving home was better because the highway traffic and I were going in the same direction, although working out how to get onto it before I hit the big crossroads that I knew were coming up was a little tricky! Being here has made me realise just how good our roads and road markings are in Australia!

*I heard today that "rule of thumb" is derived from an old English law that you couldn't beat your wife with anything thicker than your thumb! I'm hoping its not true and is just one of those things that goes round the 'interweb' but I'm not sure...

Back in black

Hi all,

I'm back, and so is my little lappy :) Mostly fixed and raring to go. I say mostly because it's still turning itself off, but after another fruitless interaction with tech support I've given all hope of SONY fixing it and I'm doing what I can instead. I'll spare you the details, but new bios and graphics settings will hopefully help! I'm also thinking of getting one of those fan pads to sit it on. They circulate cold air under the laptop. It seems the vaios are notorious for getting too hot, but I'm not surprised given the specs of the thing!

Anyhow, all is well. I had a good weekend of shopping, cleaning and gaming. On Sunday Tom called and invited me on a tour of the West Side of San Antonio, so that was a lot of fun. Aside form the fact that it was, of course, stupidly hot which restricted us to short hops out of the car to take snaps instead of really being able to wander around. We briefly retired to La Tuna for an intermediate beverage, and later hit the saucer for another beverage and some food. I tried their bratwurst platter (excellent - included a mustardy potato salad and a tonne of sauerkraut) and Tom had their chili which was also delicious and stuffed inside a cobb loaf. I'm having wing withdrawals though since it's been about a month since I last had any!

Last night Tom and I went to dinner at a little Belgian place that we'd heard good things about and had driven past on our Sunday tour. It's called La Friet and it felt a little like somewhere small on Lygon St, Melb. Of course we both had a huge bowl of mussels and fries, and the food was wonderful! The broth for the mussels was perfect. From the options of curry, tomato and "normal" we chose normal, which was white wine and cream with lots of garlic, shallots and herbs. Delicious. Even the fries were good and tasted like they were hand made from real potatoes. We had a half decent French red to go with it and topped the whole thing off with an incredible chocolate tart that was bittersweet and smooth and simply wonderful. Go San Antonio!

On the other side of life here... Within hours (or less) of the latest terrorist threat that saw the orange globe get replaced by a red one we were issues a travel safety notice for work that states:

NO LIQUIDS OR GELS OF ANY KIND WILL BE PERMITTED IN CARRY ON BAGGAGE. SUCH ITEMS MUST BE IN CHECKED BAGGAGE. This includes all beverages, shampoo, sun tan lotion, creams, tooth paste, hair gel, and other items of similar consistency.
Exception: Baby formula, breast milk, or juice if a baby or small child is traveling; prescription medicine with a name that matches the passenger'’s ticket; and insulin and essential other non-prescription medicines, which all must be presented for inspection at the checkpoint

One thing that has always surprised me is the sheer volume of baggage that you are allowed to take as carry on on US flights. One of those big roller cases and a smaller (slightly) duffelbag. No wonder it takes an hour or more to get through the screening at the airport here! Oh well, at least I won't have the problem of my moisturiser leaking all through my bag and laptop again, but no toothpaste? No waterbottle? It goes on to say that drinks purchased in the airport have to be consumed before getting onto the plane, but does this throw a spanner in the duty free market? I guess we stay tuned. But I'm so glad I'm not traveling today.

Miss you all ^_^

Oh yeah, I also have photos from our Sunday tour...watch this space.

The Graduate

My bestest girl is graduating today! I'm stoked and sad, all at the same time. Messy! One of the worst things about being here is missing those important milestones in life, and having important moments that aren't shared memories. I'm also miffed that I'll miss friends and family all frocked up for procession!! Not many people get multiple academics processing for them out of more than a sense of duty! Anyhow, needless to say I wish I could be there, but I can't be so I have high expectations of many photos filling my inbox from multiple sources...

So, Dr Richardson the Third, I'll be there in thought and spirit. I hope you have a truly wonderful day. Lap it up, you deserve it ^_-

Room with a view

Amazing things I've seen out my office window today:
- A skinny, hyperactive squirrel
- A mother bird feeding worms to a big, demanding baby bird
- Multiple butterflies, including a yellow one, a white one, a brown one and an orange and black one
- A mini-twister that looked like a column of sand but taller than a house, and a startled workman with his earmuffs on standing right next to it!
- A rabbit with an incredibly varied nutmeg coloured coat
- A plane the size of an apartment block that reminded me of the line from the Hitchhiker's Guide describing the Vogon fleet "the ships hung in the sky in much the same way that bricks don't"

(Note: My window looks out onto 3m2 of grass and a construction site, so any one of these is an amazing occurrence, but so many in one day?? Why am I spending so much time looking out the window today? Because it's 30+ degrees in my office!)

It seems that Mr New Office PC doesn't want to talk to Mr Camera, so unless I find some common ground, or a card reader, I'm photo-less till I get my laptop back. Sorry about that guys, but I'll continue to snap and see if I can collect some interesting pics for y'all soon.

This weekend is a 'tax holiday' which means (I think) that we're exempt from sales tax for a few days. Sounds tempting since sales tax is 8.5%, but I don't know how widely it applies and I'm sure there will be crowds of shoppers out and about which probably means attempting to even leave the house just isn't worth it. The tax break seems to be targeted at the 'back to school' shoppers so maybe only some stores apply it, but there sure are a lot of sales on this weekend. I wonder if it applies at the supermarket? I'll keep you posted.

I'm reconnecting with my Playstation now that I don't have the laptop, and playing Kingdom Hearts II, but it's a little lame. I'll give it some more time thought because I'm still in the early stages and Square do make excellent games, but I'm just not a big Disney fan and I don't think having random disney characters appearing in my manga world is helping me suspend my disbelief. Oh World of Warcraft, how I miss thee! Pathetic I know, but I never pretended not to be a geek.

This little geek should get back to her geeky work ^_^

I'm melting...

No wicked witch story here, the AC in my office is broken and the temperature is gradually climbing from uncomfortable to horrid to I might just pass out on the floor. However, I feel more sorry for the maintenance guy who is now up in the roof trying to work out what the problem is. I bet it's a whole lot warmer up there!

Jamie said he's watched a news story that was saying we were having a heat wave. But how would you tell? I don't think it's been below 98 for months! Whit is it about us humans that we insist being able to live anywhere and bending the climate to our will?

The increased frequency of the number of cars flying small American flags from their aerials tells me Bush is in the state... Oh, and the news that is.

Bad start to the day...

Gashed my hand on my newly sharpened kitchen knife that was sitting in the drying rack, dizzy swoon minor shock and nausea, cleaned up, went to post office early to send parcel, signed wrong customs form, back to the end of the queue, get to counter, no wallet, go home, no wallet, paid by cheque, got to work late, wallet on desk!

I need a coffee and a nap. Or a hug.

Slack Jac...

Hello dear friends, hopefully I haven't lost you all during my virtual leave of absence. It's been fairly hectic here every since I returned from Boston and I've let a lot of things slide, including the blog, housework, showering... ok, not showering, it's still 100 degrees so that'd just be gross!

I've had to send my laptop away to Sony after another failed onsite repair, this time the technician not only managed to avoid fixing the original problem, he also permanently disconnect the trackpad and mouse with an enthusiastic lack of remorse, before closing the job and calling it a day. Needless to say I was furious, since I was heading to Boston the next day! I called support again and quietly bit my tongue as they calmly told me the three strikes and I'm out rule which meant sending it to California for repairs that may take two weeks, maybe more. Seems somehow it was my fault it was broken! Anyhow, I still took it to Boston (with clunky Mr External Mouse) because I needed to keep working, but yesterday I packed it up in it's little FedEx bed and posted it off to CA :( So now I have no internet at home. It's weird how much lonelier that makes the place feel. The hours that I'm online at work are almost exactly when most decent Aussies are happily sleeping. And the hardest part is going cold turkey on WoW! I was about a day away from level 40 which means not only being able to wear mail armour, but also being able to get myself a huge cat to ride! Oh well, something to look forward to :)

Work is busy and quiet all at the same time. Busy because I have a lot to do, which is great, but quiet because not many people are here and those who are seem to be hibernating in their offices! Guess everyone who is here is just as busy as me. It's hard knowing that some many of our group are going to the conference in Brisbane, but I think if I was to go home now I might not come back again!

I found out the other day that I've been assigned a platform (talk) at ASHG, the big genetics conference here. Scary! But much better than being assigned a poster I guess. The conference is in New Orleans in early October, and I think perhaps the location may reduce the numbers a little compared with previous years, but we'll see!

I had a horribly sad experience driving to work this morning. Something was flashing up on the huge overhead traffic warning screens on the freeway, and it took me a while to realise it was the description and rego of a car involved in a kidnapping :( I hope they found them and all is well now... I've been up close and personal with a high speed chase here, where I had to get the car off the road and out of the way very quickly! I've also watched a few of the really big ones on live tv. Luckily the ones I've see have all worked out fine. As awful as they are, there's also something horribly fascinating about watching them, more so knowing it's live. You just can't look away - and they way they're broadcast here is almost like a national sport. I guess making that kind of news such a big deal keeps the public eye nice and close to home and not wondering what's going on elsewhere... For those who know there is an elsewhere that is!

That said, watching the world news at the moment just makes me want to cry. I'm not going to go on a rant about internal politics and public opinion here. I got sucked into that at the pub a few weeks ago and it was a truly depressing and draining experience. In response I went shopping and bought myself a bright green 'practice nonviolence' t-shirt to wear to work.

I should wrap up this eclectic post and get back to work. Matt had a spare 5.1 surround system that I've just hooked up to my office PC, so I'm now wired for sound ^_^

It is no coincidence that Texas is shaped like a t-bone steak.

Skyline

Boston - Part 1

I've been in Boston for a few days now and there's so much to tell, which means I'll forget most of it! Anyhow, it's Tuesday evening here, and my birthday! I'm planning to take myself out for a quiet dinner soon then have an early night. I must be getting old! There's an added level of loneliness to walking around a strange town full of strange people on your birthday because not only do you want someone to say hi or to have a coffee with, but you want it more because it's your birthday and, damn it, someone should be making a fuss. Maybe that's just me... Anyhow, thanks for all the lovely messages and emails from home. I really appreciate them all :) Especially W&I who sent me a veritable theatre production of photos celebrating ,y birthday, including banners, costume changes AND a decorated cake! I'm a lucky Jac. So no moping about being miserable! (although I may have a nap)

Boston is a pretty cool city so far. I arrived late Sunday afternoon. I didn't have that immediate connection that I felt with Portland, but I still really like it. Clearly I'm here at the best time of year, since I'm not knee deep in snow, but even though they say it is warn I've been freezing my butt off ever since I arrived. My hotel AC seems to be in Kelvin, and has no off switch, and the conference facilities are like a meat storage facility! (in temperature only) I spend the last session yesterday with my teeth chattering, and trying to wrap my knees up in the tablecloth! I was even wearing jeans and a jumper!

It took 6 hours to fly from San Antonio, with a brief stopover in Houston. Houston airport was pretty schmick but I have to say the Boston airport smelt like p**p. not so good when you've just hopped off the plane. But after the scary mad rush through fluoro lighted tunnels in the taxi we were flying through the tiny, windy Boston streets and I was getting into the groove. Taxi triple parked and dropped me at my hotel, where I spent a full 2 minutes before heading BACK out the door and straight into the heart of Chinatown :) I'm staying in the theatre district which is right on the edge of Chinatown....couldn't have picked a better spot.

Chinatown here spans about 4 small blocks, rather than one street, and is (of course) full of great looking places to eat, and wonderful supermarkets. I just wandered for ages, reading menus and buying packets of tea, until I came across a Japanese place that looked good and had some of my favorite dishes on the menu. So, I bit the bullet and decided to do the full dining alone thing. I guess I could have gone to one of the packed Vietnamese places where no one would really have noticed me eating alone, but I took the near empty Japanese place instead. It was fine though because while I was there several other people also came in to eat alone. Maybe because it is dark and quiet. I'm not sure, but I enjoyed it. I ordered Agedashi-tofu (fried soft tofu squares in a light broth with ginger) as an entree then had the Yosenobe (thrown-together pot) for main. Both were excellent and the yosenobe was full of all sorts of beautiful seafood, tofu and vegetables as well as deliciously chewy udon. The octopus was exceptional, and everything was well prepared and organised perfectly in the dish, not chaotic, but so that you could gradually move through the different tastes and textures. Similarly, the tofu was gorgeous and crispy on the outside (but not to greasy) and meltingly soft in the middle. Now, it wasn't Earnest Bean tassie made tofu, so it'll never come close to Mitsuno's food, but it was a good second. I have temporarily forgotten the name of the place but I'm thinking of going again tonight to try something else, so I'll blog it later.

The meeting was good. A little scarier than the big conferences in terms of meeting people, partly because it was a small group (50-100) but also because there were mostly commercial groups represented, rather than academic facilities, which meant lots of suits! But I did managed to meet a lovely lass within the first hour. She's German but doing a postdoc in Sydney! Typical. But we hit it off and spent the rest of the meeting hanging out, which made it much more enjoyable. I'm impressed that an Australian group sent someone all the way here just for a user's group meeting!

The 'cocktail party' of the meeting was last night. When did "cocktail" come to mean beer and wine? I haven't been to a real conference cocktail mixer since 2000! Aussie/German girl and I made friends with another boy from Canada (us postdocs got to stick together) and convinced him to join us for dinner since he was also there on his own. We found a little (italian? fusion? confused?) place that turned out not to be too great, but it was still fun and their bread was delicious! I had garlic clam pasta which was pretty good.

And now, after all this talk of food, I've worked up quite an appetite so I think I'll head back into Chinatown and see what I can find. I haven't had a glass of champagne since I arrived in the US so I'll have to see if I can find one! I'll post part two of my Boston Adventures soon!

(PS. Blogger doesn't want to play the photo game at the moment, so pics coming soon)

Eve of anticipation

It's Saturday night and I'm trying to get organised to head to Boston early tomorrow morning. We had some rain the afternoon which was delicious, and now it is still and heavy outside, the sky is pink, and the insects are having a lovely time!

I head to Boston tomorrow and come home again Wednesday afternoon. I'm nervous about the meeting in terms of the demographic and dress code, neither of which I have any clues about. Also about not knowing anyone, but that should be ok.

I spend the last few days at work moving offices. The new space is larger and has a window. It also has a soothing green feature wall that I respond well to. I'll be sharing it with another aussie lass who will arrive in September, but she's been working in the US for a few years. It's a bit sad to leave Vince behind because I really liked sharing an office with the Guamaniac, but I'm so glad to have a little more desk space! Here are some pics for you :)





Once I finish my packing I'm going to have a little early birthday celebration. I got a few packages in the mail today that I haven't opened yet, but I feel a little like a kid at christmas having them sitting there! I have to finish getting the house tidy first because the apartment complex are running their annual inspections while I'm away.

But anyhow, that's about all from me for the moment. I'll try to update the blog from Boston, if I can get the net working! Until then...

Petey Problems

I hate getting cars fixed. With a passion.

I took the car in to be checked out and to deal with the 'squealing belt on acceleration' problem. Belt was fixed fine and everything else apparently looked fine... Aside from a small note on the receipt saying 'check engine light - CMP sensor'. No dialogue, $200. Now at this point I am totally stoked to have Mr squealy Belt vanquished. Not so happy on the weekend when the car consistently takes several attempts to start, the check engine light stays on and running a diagnostic gives me P0340 - No camshaft position sensor detected. Argh. Filled car up with fuel and hoped it would go away (ostrich style). It didn't. I got fed up with it today and called the mechanic again. $75 for new cam sensor plus at least 3 hours labour and it may not even be the sensor itself... Spat it and rang the nearest official Chrysler dealer. Now, even more than getting the car fixed, I hate dealing with the 'official dealers' BUT they do know the car and if this is a common PT problem then they may know how to fix it without too much messing about. They quoted me $82 for full diagnostics (better be more that what I did - get code, google it) but only $14 for the part and $40 to install it. Needless to say Petey is off to visit the dealer tomorrow. Fingers crossed that this doesn't turn onto another 'why not just give us your wallet, phone, watch, first born child, soul..'

In other news our dinner at Saltgrass was excellent. I had the same thing I always order a 12oz ribeye (rare) and a baked potato (NO toppings). All good. I also had lunch today with Rev. Rita at my favorite yup cha place. It was fun! She's good value, and it was so good to be hanging out with someone outside of the work crowd, even though I really like the work croud.

Tonight looks like a good night for a swim! Any takers? ^_^

Carnivorous

We're going out tonight to celebrate my birthday (a little early but I'll be away - and when I return everyone else will be in Australia!) and the PhD and whatever else we can come up with at the time. Going to one of my favorite steakhouses, Saltgrass (a Texan institution). I can't believe I have a favorite steakhouse, let alone several! These guys make a good bloody mary and their steak is excellent and cooked just the way you ask. They may not be as classy as the Little Rhine (on the riverwalk, Downtown) which is my other favorite, but they're not as pricy either! Last time we went to little rhine we not only had steak, but escagots, grilled asparagus, lobster... mmm

And while I'm updating, here's a screen shot of Bravenstar at level 33 and my new pet. He's a unique beast in WoW (Humar Pridelord) and it took me all night of sitting in a tree waiting for him to turn up so I could tame him! I've renamed him Ravage, and the (pop) cultured kids of my era will of course realise that he's named after the famous transformer. You missed my daggy hat phase though - for a while there I was running about with what everyone called 'my russian hat'. I now wish I'd taken a shot of that, but this one is much better ^_^

Cafe crud and butterflies

Howdy y'all,

I know it's been a while between updates so I'm working on being a bit more on the ball this week. Actually, things are pretty much the same as usual. It's still stupidly hot and there's been no storm activity since Independence Day. I say we arrange some kind of firework display in an attempt to taunt the weather!

There's some species of small brown butterfly that must hatch (emerge? what is the right word) during a very small time window here because there are literally thousands of them in the trees outside my apartment. One day there were none, the next the trees are full of them! Driving down my street is like that scene in Excalibur with the cherry blossoms, except the blossoms are brown... It's almost like driving through falling leaves, only they move in stilted slow motion. I've also seen some huge black and yellow butterflies - I should know what they are because Kath and I saw them in the butterfly house on our Hill Country tour, but I forget. They're gorgeous. There's a lot of Lantana here which is in bloom at the moment, and aside from the fact that I appear to be allergic to it (determined by the red rash on my ankles after walking through a small patch) the butterflies seem to love it. It's mostly yellow, not like the variable pink ones that I like so much in Oz, but still pretty (and they probably have all the other sorts too, I just haven't noticed yet!). Sunflowers seem to grow wild here too, although why they'd choose to bloom with such gusto in this heat I'm not sure!

This next part has been posted by Jac the Coffee Snob. She been repressed for quite a while now but occasionally makes an unpleasant appearance. Feel free to ignore her.... (hey, I heard that!)

I bought myself one of those little Italian stovetop espresso makes to try and vanquish the evil that is coffee in America and get my caffeine levels back up to normal. I've even found multiple fair trade coffee options in the supermarket, so I can stop buying the starbucks one. Even if it is fair trade, I still don't want to support the machine. I can't remember if I told you my dreadful coffee ordering experience in Portland where I ordered a macchiato from a man who ran a small coffee stand. He had a decent looking machine so I figured he knew what he was doing. Wrong! Initially I was seriously berated for ordering a macchiato "we don't make those starbucks style coffees here - we only make real coffee" said loudly and with much pretension. When I politely explained that macchiato means 'stained' (or a derivation thereof) in Italian and describes a coffee consisting of a shot of espresso 'stained' with a little milk or milk froth, the 'friendly barista' (neither word applies) continued with his tirade of how I was actually describing something called a cafe creme and why hadn't I ordered that in the first place and macchiatos were invented by starbucks... then he proceeded to make me something that vaguely resembled a latte made out of cream. Needless to say, I didn't go back. I'm guessing that cafe creme means coffee with cream so he may have been on the right track with something. Anyhow, my new coffee maker is great so no need to forage in the streets.

(sorry about the lack of accents on the text... I could get blogger to do it but it's the end of a long day and I can't really be bothered)

Pretty in pink

I'm taking Petey in for a service and check up tomorrow so fingers crossed that it won't be too expensive. Or if it is, that my warranty will cover it!

No other major news at the moment. I'm off for a swim soon, it's a scorcher today!

I've found a remedy to the Jac doesn't like drinking water but it's hot and she has to problem. It has also fixed my coke (cola) habit. Soda water. In a can! Simple, yet brilliant. It's cold, sugar free and it satisfied the need for fizz. Why did I not think of this earlier? I've been drinking the coke C2 rubbish...not sure if it's in Oz yet but it's 50:50 coke/diet coke and has the worst features of each of them (sugar AND the nasty artificial sweetener taste). And did I warn y'all to stay clear of the Coke Blak (blerk). Who mixes fizzy coke and weak coffee? It's all kinds of nasty! Pepsi trialed the same sort of thing in the mid 90's with Pepsi Kona, a screaming flop. As someone in a forum somewhere said (of coke blak) "what soft drink can survive when half its name is made up of the sound you make as you spit it out".

And finally, this little gem. Thanks Booey for the heads up on the amazing sunrise this morning. I hope some of you saw it! This is the tail end of it, I missed the rest.

Reasons to love Hobart

From the Rose Bay High webcam this morning.

Random stuff of the moment

I just had a delicious swim in the pool that I'm 'pool-sitting'. The water temperature was 29 degrees C!

On the weekend I watched the tragedy that is Iron Chef America. A complete reproduction of the original, done remarkably badly. The highlight was tarragon salt which sounds like a great idea to me. Fresh tarragon + sea salt + coffee grinder. However, I also watch the challenger make tilapia noodles by turning the fish into a paste, adding some kind of cross linking enzyme that had a name like DR-DETH-54, and squirting the final mixture into a tank of hot water. Fish paste noodles...gross. I don't even think tarragon salt could save them.

I went back to the United Church on Sunday and this time I made much more of an effort not to be a shy turtle and it was great. I finally got to meet Pastor Rita (who was in Europe on my first visit) and she was lovely. I was even brave enough to stay for orange sherbert icecream afterwards. Who could resist??

The 'cook-out' on Saturday was fun. I took some lamb chops to put on the grill and had to fight to keep them!! Apparently they looked tasty, and they were! The butcher here cuts them so they're about an inch thick, as opposed to about 1cm in Australia, which means that for thems of us who likes out meats rare...read me (still making up for years of being stupidly vego) you can cook then to caramelised perfection on the outside and still have them deliciously rare in the middle. Alan, I know you're probably not reading this but it works a treat!

Apparently chuck a wobbly is another Australianism unheard in Texas. Can someone please explain where that one came from? I used it by accident today and a few heads turned in confusion. I didn't realise I had so many of these things in my vocab!

Thanks for all the comments, I love reading them ^_^

Boston Baked Birthday

It's official - I'll be in Boston, Massachusetts for my birthday. I'm of to a "User's Group" meeting for a new software package that we're trialing. It's pretty neat stuff. Not sure if I've rambled on about it before but it allows you to build network of gene interactions then overlay functional pathways and disease processes(like signaling or immune response components) or drug targets onto the network. We're hoping it will be useful for interpreting lists of interesting genes that are coming out of the expression work. I've been doing a lot of the trailing so I'm going to this meeting to see what other people are doing with it and get an idea of weather it is flexible enough for what we need. Should be good. I've never been to Boston so I'm hoping I'll get a little time to poke around. There's supposed to be a big Chinatown which I'm hoping isn't too far away from my hotel. Not sure what else is nearby, I'll have to get online and do some hunting. If anyone knows Boston and has some ideas, let me know! I get in on the afternoon of the 23rd (Sunday) and leave the morning of the 26th. There's a cocktail reception on the first night of the meeting which sounds a little scary, but I may have to go in my day gear since my hotel is a half hour walk away. Anyway, it should be fun!

In other news, it's all pretty quiet at the moment with everyone away. I'm going to a real American BBQ (cookout?) on Saturday evening to say goodbye to one of the girls here who is leaving to take up an Assistant Professorship in Anthropology. I keep thinking it'll be similar to BBQs in Australia, the someone says 'grill pit' and I'm just not sure... It's byo meat and grog so I'm thinking lamb chops...mmm I'll have to be brave though because most of the people I usually hang out with are away, but lucky I have Tom :) I'm a bit whussy (how do you spell that??) when it comes to these social things.

4th of July was great, even with the rain. I stood out on the deck watching firework displays in all directions and in the middle was the leftovers of the electrical storm. Very cool. Then, when I jumped on WoW for a quick virtual run around, they had fireworks every hour as well, so I really was surrounded by them! WoW also had mugs of ale to celebrate so Bravenstar got a little tipsy, which is hard to watch because the screen blurs and goes all swimmy and you can't walk in a straight line if you try. Trying to speak is great, the program slurs your words and inserts hiccups! I did get some kind of bonus (charisma perhaps) for kissing one of the festival celebrants though Don't worry, it was a NPC (non-playing character).

That's all from Bravenstar and I for now. Methinks the Saucer is a no go tonight since I'd probably be the only one there, but perhaps I'll cook something yummy for dinner instead. I've been meaning to make a crawfish tail pasta with a creamy sauce and lots of chili and garlic...

Independence Day

Looks like nature is going to put on her own 4th of July fireworks tonight! There's a huge electrical storm just on the horizon looking out from my balcony and it's fantastic!

And here's my blog entry from earlier today. I didn't get to post in because the laptop crashed :)

...

I'm not feeling particularly star spangled yet, bit it's not even midday and I've yet to venture out into the world of July 4 fever. The television keeps telling me to 'be thankful for my freedoms, liberties and other flag waving buzzwords' and it seems that I should do that by going out and buying a Texas Edition truck or a side by side fridge-freezer! I've just realised that I have forgotten to wear the red, white and blue underpants that I bought especially to celebrate Independence Day! (and also because my washing bags were full and I'd run out of clothes) Oh well.

I'm about to head out to the airport to drop John and Jo off, as part of the mass exodus of friends. Luckily for me Mr Squiggle hasn't been eaten by coyotes and is looking as plump and happy as ever, so I can at least hang out with him, even if we are separated by glass walls. I think I may have turned him into a bit of a princess though... I was watching him peel grapes before eating them yesterday!

I got up this morning hoping to spend some of my day off playing WoW, only to discover that they're running maintenance and ALL the servers are down! They have 6 million players, more than half of whom are probably american, and they schedule maintenance on the one day people are not working and able to play??? Anyhow, I cooked myself a fry up and read the Current instead ^_^

Rainy days and Mondays

It's been raining on and off all weekend which has just been magnificent! Looks like it'll continue for another few days as well. The rain is so lovely I just want to stand out in it and jump about :) It's deceptive though because it's grey outside and looks like it'll be cool (I'm busting to wear long pants or a jumper) but it's still over 30 degrees, just stickier now. However, the breeze picked up on the weekend and it just felt like all the stale, bad air was being swept away. It was exactly what I needed. I was having a bit of a black few days earlier in the week, but I'm feeling better now. I guess I'm going to have to get used to it coming in waves like that. The next two months will be hard as well as most of the people I usually hang out with here are going away! As I mentioned earlier the plus is that I get two housesit a place with a pool and a place with cats and cable, but that doesn't quite make up for human contact. All will be well though, and there's always the virtual me (aka Bravenstar) who can hang out online with all kinds of weird and wonderful people, Andrew being a prime example. World of Warcraft is keeping me sane and expanding my bladder holding capacity ^_^

I had a huge weekend and I'm utterly exhausted now! Luckily it's Independence Day tomorrow (July 4) so I'm looking forward to sleeping in and fireworks! I was told on no uncertain terms that this is the "Most important holiday in America" so I went and bought myself some red, white and blue knickers to celebrate. But that was a sidetrack... This weekend we went apartment hunting with another Aussie lass who works in Florida. We're trying to poach her to came and work here (we need lab postdocs) so Joanne and I spent the entire weekend driving her to all the nearby apartment complexes looking a floorplans and demo homes etc. That stuff is really tiring! I think perhaps we went to the best one first, but perhaps that's because they made us pancakes for breakfast while showing us around! The great thing about looking through 30 other apartment complexes is that it made me realise that I really like my place. I had no real moment of going "gee, I wish I lived here" which was great because I didn't look at that many to start with. It was also interesting to see how people could be looking for two completely different things out of a living space Subtle aren't I? Anyhow, she was cool and hopefully she'll take the job. She's from the same lab as all the other Aussies here, which makes me the odd sheep again, but they're all Queenslanders so I don't mind so much :)

We also went to dinner at my favourite Japanese restaurant on Saturday night (sushi zushi - dumb name but great food) which meant soft shelled crab and the house seafood udon bowl for me. Mmmm. The secondhand CD store is next door so we digested by wandering the isles in there for a while. I picked up the second season of Six Feet Under so I'm looking forward to getting into that.

We also managed to fit in a little shopping on Sunday at my favourite mall here, La Cantera (it's open air and kinda glam). I spotted this t-shirt and it spoke to me: