Last few weeks

On October 23, I viewed the partial solar eclipse through specially made glasses.  It was awesome -- you could see the giant sunspot in the middle of the sun.  Unfortunately, my cell phone picture doesn't do the view justice:

For the Halloween party at work, I made cookies:

For some reason, I didn't take a picture after they came out of the oven!




Last Friday, Terri, Mike, and I went to the Nuggets-Cavaliers game.

A couple pictures shot with my cell phone of Kevin Love and Lebron James:

We had such good seats, I recorded the game to see if you could see us on tv.  You could!  Here I am in the bottom right of the screen adjusting my glasses:

Then here is Kevin Love, Wilson Chandler, Timofey Mozgov, and me:

Finally, here is one of Lebron James, along with Mike, Terri, and me:

Buena Vista

I took a Columbus Day holiday trip to Buena Vista this past weekend.  This was the view from my hotel's parking lot.

Unfortunately, it rained on Sunday, which was the only full day I was there.  So on that day, I went south to Great Sand Dunes National Park, where it wasn't raining (as much). 

 

  

I decided to climb High Dune.  This was the view from down below.

And this is a panorama from atop High Dune.  

Monday morning, I drove back to Boulder.  I liked this scenic view point showing the railroad through the valley.  

More wildlife at work

It appears the cold weather is driving the critters indoors at work.  Yesterday I was sitting at my computer when I noticed a spider crawling on my lap.  The leg span of the thing was about 2".  I looked down, saw it, then jumped up to brush it off me!

Today I was closing up the lab for the weekend when I saw something on the floor move.  It was a baby snake, which I scared into this resting spot:

I didn't see any rattles, but I still didn't want to get bitten, so I got the broom and swept it outside.  Here it is on the way down the hallway:

And here it is coiled up on the mat by the door before I swept it outside:

From what I can find online, this looks like a gopher snake or a bullsnake.

My new bike

New to me, at least. The frame is as old as I am!

Flooding

Luckily I'm in Houston for work right now, so I'm not impacted very much by the flooding in Colorado. Here are some interesting video captures from this video.

Here's a picture of the Mariana Butte golf course my Dad and I played up up in Loveland before Terri's and Mike's wedding:

This is just upstream of where the wedding took place:

The wedding was about 1/8 mile south of here, right next to the river.

Suzy

My parents had to put their dog, Suzy, to sleep today.  She was just over 17 years old.

I remember playing with her as a puppy.  She liked to play tug of war with her rope while moving back and forth.  If you put your hand on the ground as a tummy-tickling obstacle, she'd jump over your hand while still holding the rope in her mouth! 

Suzy loved people.  I've never met a dog that felt as comfortable sitting with people as she did.  She also trusted she wouldn't be dropped, which allowed me to do Circle of Life jokes with her whenever I saw her!

Here are some of my favorite pictures from over the years:

Suzy in the kitchen (her favorite place!)

Me, Suzy, and Emy

Holding Tasha and Suzy at the dog grooming place

Jackson and Suzy at Christmas

Suzy after waking up from a nap

Suzy and Emy from Christmas 2012

Bye Suz.

Tampa

On Sunday, May 5th, I flew to Tampa to install my instrument on the P-3.

Here's a picture of MacDill AFB flying in.  The NOAA hangar is on the far right -- you can see one of the P-3's parked on the tarmac:

The first thing we did when we got there was go to Clearwater Beach.

The work week went smoothly.  Here is a picture of my instrument after I had installed it.  The complicated-looking inlet belongs to the other instrument in my rack.

This is the P-3 we are going to use:

I'll head back to Tampa the week of Memorial Day for test flights.  We are scheduled to transit to Tennessee on June 3rd.

Colorado Springs

On Saturday, May 4th, I drove down to Colorado Springs to visit Terri and Mike for the day.  We went to the Cave of the Winds, west of the city.

The cave was located up the side of a mountain, which gave us a good view of the town of Manitou Springs:

Nuggets playoff game

Last night I went to game 5 of the Nuggets-Warriors game with Kirk and some of his friends.  I've never sat closer to the action at an NBA game!

The Nuggets won the game, forcing a Game 6 in Oakland.

Here's the player of the game, Ty Lawson leaving the court:

I was able to record the game (using my phone), and I just watched it again tonight.  Here I am on TV wearing a light blue shirt and waving my yellow towel to the left of Wilson Chandler's shoulder (right after Chandler hit an early 3-pointer):

Vienna

I went to Vienna for the European Geosciences Union meeting.  I got there a couple of days early to do some sightseeing.  Unfortunately, it was cool and overcast for the first few days.  The first thing I took a picture of after getting of the train was the hotel I stayed in the last time I was in Vienna!

For the first two nights, I stayed at a hotel situated in an alley, which had a nice European feel.

As nice as the cobblestones look, they are kind of a pain to walk on.

I went to the Albertina museum, which had some drawings by Rubens and Rembrandt.  They also had Albrecht Duerer's Young Hare, as well as some paintings by Picasso.  Unfortunately, I wasn't allowed to take pictures.

I went for a nice long walk on Saturday, much of it along the Donaukanal (the canal that connects old town Vienna to the Danube).

Many of the trees along the canal, like the one on the right bank, had ball-shaped plants living in them.  I'm not sure what they are.

On Sunday, I walked around Prater park, a huge park across the canal from my hotel.

The park is home to the Riesenrad, or giant wheel, a Ferris wheel built in the late 1800s.

According to Wikipedia, it appeared in such movies as The Third Man and The Living Daylights, which I guess is the large Ferris wheel in this movie poster.

At this pond, there was a strong smell of ozone, so I took this picture then promptly left the area.

Note more of those plants in the trees.

Also on Sunday, I moved to a hotel near to the conference site.  I had a nice view of the Kaiserwasser out my window.

Of the nine days I was there, only three or four were sunny. 

At the end of the week, thanks to a birthday present from Sara, I went to the Volksoper to take in the opera, Die Fledermaus.

 

It was the first opera I've seen.  There were subtitles on the screen at the top of the curtain (supratitles?), but they were more of a general paraphrasing of the action, so I missed most of the jokes and subtleties of the dialogue.  

Overall, it was a fun trip.  I never quite got over my jet lag, so hopefully I won't have to readjust too much now that I'm home!

DU hockey game

A week ago Friday, I went to a DU hockey game, which is something I'd been meaning to do since I moved to Colorado.

DU beat the University of North Dakota in an exciting game!

More trivia success

Two more trivia victories, giving us four in a row, and five of the last six! 

Me flashing the secret "E" sign for "Eurolunch":

Trivia success

We've come in first in trivia two of the last three weeks.

I think it has something to do with fewer questions aimed at children of the 1990s.

Emy

I got the sad news over the weekend that my parents had to put their dog, Emy, to sleep.  Emy was so named because they got her when they were visiting Atlanta for my graduation from Emory.  Here are some of my favorite pictures of her:

We went on many long walks with Emy.  She always liked it when I sprinted for home, even though she had no problems keeping up!  She also helped my train for the Bolder Boulder when I ran it a few years ago.  She was diagnosed with cancer last August, but luckily I was able to see her over Thanksgiving and Christmas.  Bye Emser!