Winter Festivities

I had a lovely holiday. By the time I flew out to go home to Utah, the snow at the airport was sufficiently cleaned up and I breezed through. And my flight was even direct!

I spent a week at home with the family, and had a nice Christmas. I got some good stuff, including a food processor. I've been dying for a food processor for quite some time now. So excited! I've already made carrot apple salad (requires grated carrots and apples), AND munched up bread crumbs for an impromptu chicken recipe I made up for a dinner party Sunday night. Perfect! (Speaking of that dinner party, I also made the best homemade garlic rolls EVER! So yummy.)

I returned to Baltimore the Tuesday after Christmas with moderate hassle (involving delayed flights and missed connections), and got to work on final preparations for a conference I was attending. I was presenting a poster of my own research from here at STScI, and was heavily involved in getting data together for another poster. There were a lot of all nighters involved that week. Truth be told, it wasn't fun.

Saturday night I went down to my church's temple just outside Washington, D.C. During the Christmas season, they have lights up on the grounds as well as concerts at the visitors center. Here are some pictures. It was beautiful! But, so, so, so cold.




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The next week (this being last week now) I attended the annual winter meeting of the American Astronomical Society. The meeting was astronomical in itself, as the largest astronomy meeting ever with over 3000 participants. I had fun catching up with people and going to some interesting talks. I presented a poster on Monday. Here's a picture of my poster, and one with me by my poster.


I took the commuter train everyday between Baltimore and DC. (The ride between Baltimore Penn Station and Union Station in DC is about an hour; plus about 20 minutes on the metro in DC.) It was exhausting, but nice to sleep in my own bed at night.

I also got new glasses. My old ones were about four years old, and not strong enough. I like them.

And I bought a new chair for my room! I'm WAY excited about this purchase. It's an overstuffed armchair. There is a store near my house that sells used hotel furniture, and I got this great chair for $50. (Plus the cost of a fleece blanket from Target to throw over it to make it cozy, and hide the crazy pattern of the chair.) Here's a picture of my awesome chair.

You might wonder where I have room in my bedroom to put it. I wondered the same thing, and after several attempts at rearranging, I figured it out. I'm happy because I FINALLY have my bedroom arrangement figured out, and the current arrangement really opens things up and makes it feel a lot bigger. Picture:

And now it's back to real life (I guess). Half my roommates are back (yay!) and preparing for their semesters to start. And I'm trying to be productive at work, as I have at least three papers on the docket to get out this semester (yes, I still think in semesters). They are in varying stages from very close to being ready to submit to still need to recheck the data. Onward and upward!