Back to rainy NH

I'm back in New Hampster, and it's pretty rainy and cold. Oh well, it is supposed to be sunny this week. Here's one of my pictures from last week. Just click on it to see more on my Picasa page. It was a great trip. Thanks John!!

**note to John: these pictures are for you! I know you're the one who put a comment up about the lack of photos recently - you can't fool me by calling yourself anonymous! ;)

Goodbye, California

This week went by incredibly fast, as you might imagine. I spent every single day doing basically nothing. I brought along a few 'academic papers' and some half constructed matlab code with high hopes of accomplishing something (anything) while on my quasi-vacation, but alas it was not meant to be. 'Reading academic papers' turned into 'taking pictures of myself beside california-looking things', and 'writing code' turned into 'trying to get a tan so people believe I actually went to California'. So the week was spent mainly relaxing and watching other people (John and Chris) do work like lugging car batteries and GPS equipment around.

Well, my slacking days are over (for the time being). I'm in a hotel in Sacramento and am being picked up by the Super Shuttle at 3:45am. My flight leaves at 6am, I'll fly to Denver, then to Laguardia, then arriving in Boston at 10pm. The C&J trailways bus will take me to Portsmouth, and I'll take a taxi from the station to home sweet home. I should arrive sometime near 1am. The next day I will meet Gretchen and her family at 7:00am in preparation for the graduation day ceremony. After the ceremony we're going for lunch and celebratory drinks at Kennebunk with Gretchen's family and friends. Much coffee will be consumed between now and Saturday night.

PS: for anyone who is not sure, this is not my graduation. It is Gretchen's. And many others. And believe it or not, Bill Clinton and George Bush Sr. are speaking at the graduation ceremony. I'm not joking

No single-beaming yet

I'm still at Lake Berryessa, enjoying the sun and the views. Unfortunately, I forgot to bring my download cable, so I can't share the photos yet. I thought I'd be spending my days here on the little ski boat helping John do a little single beam survey on the east side of the lake. But the boat has been out of commission since I arrived. They thought it was the starter, then thought it was the solenoid, then the mechanic decided it was something more serious and needed to take it out of the water and have a look at it at his shop. So I'm just hanging out and following John and Chris around (to Napa, to the other side of the lake, to the marina office, etc.). It's nice to be on a job, but not actually have to do anything. I got John to take a picture of me by the RTK base station. It kind of looks like I'm working.

Sunny California

I said a while back that I was going to try to get myself out to California. I didn't think it was really going to happen, but here I am. We're waiting on the shore of Lake Berryessa for a starter for the boat. John and I tried to get it started earlier, but no luck. So while the mechanic is locating the part, John has moved on to another task - fixing the broken pinball machine.