I always liked using the Van de Graaff generator with my students and had no idea that they guy was from Alabama. Here we are at his home in Tuscaloosa. We also went to see the grounds of Kentuck, an art fiar, and the ruins of something I can't remember.
We went on a tour of the UA campus today and saw the really cool natural history museum. What a beautiful campus- I had no idea.
To celebrate the end of the fall semester, Dan and I went to a cabin/cottage on a river near Tuscaloosa.
The cabin was quite rustic, but comfy and the view was amazing. It really reminded me of the dream I had a few months ago where I had a choice to jump into the water or not, and if I jumped, I could swim left (upstream) to where it was all happening, or float downstream to a restful redwood deck on the water. The dream meant the decision to retire or not. Well, I made that decision. I'm going downstream. No more upstream.
Today is my big sister's birthday so we are no longer the same age. For three months, we are the same age each year. I got a kit to make your eyelashes curl and be darker. This is the before and after photo.
I made a bunch of ornaments as gifts for my history-of-science students. For several years now, I've given ornaments to my students. These are all based on the characters we learned about in class. Each ornament has the date of when the particular scientist made their discovery.
I gave a talk at the local bookstore about my new book. I brought lots of props and some special folks showed up.
We are on our way home and decided to try the train to get to the airport. It took forever and I was so scared we would be late.
On this day, I sat on the porch outside the condo, and looked at the mountains until they spoke to me. They said that I needed to retire to a more creative life. I had to work a lot on my data analysis today, which I really enjoy doing, but here I am in the Rocky Mountains working at the kitchen table on an Excel spreadsheet.
The main reason I have this blog, and have had it since 2007, is to help me remember my life. Now that I'm in my 60s, it's more important then ever, as I feel my memory diminishing. It's harder and harder to find memories that I know were stored in my head at one time. On this day, we flew to Colorado to go on a mountain vacation with the Js.
Another PhD student of mine defended his dissertation. That makes four! He did a wonderful job and I was so proud. There are three left.... and I wonder if all three will finish. I'm sure two will. Doc students are like children in the family tree of PhDs. I descend from Theodosius Dobzhansky, the evolutionary biologist.
I'm at a conference in Knoxville, TN and we are staying at a really cool hotel, The Collegiate. I'm here with a grad student and we met up with a former student who is also getting her PhD.
In my history of science class, we are studying the work of Fleming and Pasteur, so we decided to replicate some of their experiments by growing mold and bacteria and then trying to kill it with things they tried.
I decided to make a set of paleo Hebrew stamps. There is no definitive source of knowledge here, just lots of interpretations of different writings.
With mixed emotions, I went on a tour of the new COE building today. There were so many rooms just for conversations. The offices were super small. My program only got one hallway. I know I'll only have an office in here for a couple of months, but it still gave me emotions I didn't especially want to have.
Dan and I are at a weekend-long workshop this weekend focused on nature. It's at an ecology preserve that has dorms and rooms for meetings. I took a fish printing class today and it was super fun. I also took a class on how to make mead, and went fossil hunting. Making mead involved squishing grapes by hand, and they started burning my hands like fire ants biting them.
My last fall semester is underway. I'm teaching Methods 2 as well as the new history of science class. BUT... my book came out!!! Makes the business a little more fulfilling.
This is my last year of employment at the university, and my office needs to be cleaned out. Here it is after phase 1 of the clean out. I am not feeling any sentimental emotions doing this. It's cathartic.
I bought a rug for the den but as soon as I put it down, Teensie started clawing it and pulled up all sorts of wool. So I have to return it. But it's such a nice color!!!
It's so nice having JES home. Here we are at my mom's house with Aza and my newphew Sef and some grandkids. Sef is living here now, going to school to studying to be an electrician.
JES and little J2 came to visit for Labor Day. We plan to go up to the lake for the long weekend. We rented a house for everyone.
We went to dinner this evening at the home of our Senegalese son and his family. There I met a man who studied under my late friend, Bob. He had wonderful things to say about him, saying he was "the best economics professor in the whole world."
This is the day I cleaned out my closet. Dan is up north with his family and I'm keeping busy.
