CERN

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j50ZssEojtM

Glasses

I just wanted to say that the Lufthansa flight back had no in-seat screen. I nearly got off the plane!

I got reading glasses, I have an astigmatism in my left eye that is quite bad. Early in the day I can still focus with it but by the end of the day it gives up. Other than that, my eyes are perfect. Here is what a perfect eye looks like:



My eyelids, however, are not perfect. I seem to have bepheritis, causing my eyes to feel like sandpaper most of the time. Sometimes I get stabbing pains in them and have to stop trying to read things. I spend all my time slopping eyedrops in them now.

Glasses are not cheap.

I'm getting a new computer for work.

We have 2 climbers living with us for a while.

The reactor is starting up on Monday and I have lots of plans for the first few experiments, but as everything is new, everytime I do something we haven't done before (which is all of the time) I have to do a whole bunch of things to get ready. Sample cans, sample environment modifications, software modifications, even hardware modifications. Its not stop modification central around here.

I've been running - training for a 9km fun run. For those who know me, I'm a sprinter and continuing to run past the 5 minute mark, actually, past the 1 minute mark, is pain. But I run 16 km a week now and will run 8 km for the first time this evening. Wish me luck.


This is my Nephew who i visited in Singapore, and his mum, Li, who is trying to ignore him.


Cute, no?

Well how about this:



While I was in Berlin i visited Knut the baby polar bear who now looks like this and has a psychological disorder or two I think.

On the way home..

Please, oh please let me have in-seat screen entertainment systems. I am never flying Lufthansa again! I'm at Berlin airport (Tegel) and am flying from Frankfurt to Singapore next, which is only 13 hours, but the most lonely 13 hours in the world without in-seat entertainment units. I know, as I flew here with none. I have my best work shirt on in a pointless attempt to get a free upgrade. Lame, I know, small chance of success, I know, but you HAVE to try. Wish me luck!

The experiment(s) went well, except the reactor went down for two of the days. Oops. I left my sample there in the hope that one of the instrument scientists will take pity on me and run it for me...

Plane food for the next day, but then I'll be back in Singapore with my nephew, the 32 degree C heat, and Singaporean food, which is generally very good and cheap. All this, plus hideous jet-lag. I forgot to mention that.

Pray to the god you don't believe in for:
1. flights to take off and land safely
2. in-seat screens, or better yet,
3. free upgrade to business class.(ha!)

Wannsee

The place I am staying in Berlin is actually in Wannsee, the place that they fist made official "the final solution", for those up on their Nazi history. But the place is really quite pretty and the instrument that I am using turns out to be much better than I had hoped. Furthermore, I now have the cryostat completely under my control and all He forms shall obey me and do my bidding. But enough about exchange gas.

Sausages, potatoes, and cabbage have indeed been the order most of the time, and I am greeted by a nice big plate of meat every morning. Which suits me just fine. Although I did start eating fruit as I got a bit worried about certain things.

I've mostly just been here working, except when I am sleeping or eating. I like the experience of lunchtime at the canteen with the instrument scientists and others from around the traps, its a nice experience. When I forgot to listen to the end of the word, as I so often do in Germany (they tend to go on a bit), I heard the word for potato with my pork and though - why not? Well, the end of the word was actually salad, and potato salad I am extremely picky about, and this was my worst kind. They heaped it on. My local contact, Zunbelts, saved me and gave me hist boiled potatoes. Very nice of him!

Better go, sample change!

Berlin

Berlin is quite far North, which although I knew, didn't quite illustrate the fact that the sun doesn't set until midnight and then gets up again at 4am. I am so glad that I bought by eyeshades with me!

Yesterday i worked in the morning, going through some emails and things that I needed to write, and then I headed into Berlin to see what I could see. There was a big gay pride parade on, and being from Sydney I did not think this was that interesting, and then I went on a walking tour and lean't lots about Nazi history. I knew bits and pieces, but now I know more.

Today I am finishing off an experimental plan and NOT writing a presentation that i really should finish, and of course, missing the premiere of Dr Who season 4, the Christmas special that features Kylie (Minogue) as a guest - the companian of the Doctor for that episode. Real bummer. I have been hanging out for this to come out for almost a year and now I am here and cannot watch it. I tried to find an illegal copy on the web in desperation, to no avail. Anyway - I'm finishing off my experimental plan, and then might be forced to do a bit on the stupid pesentation, or might just go to the Berlin zoo and aquarium.

Toddler Alert!

Today, i am at the Hahn-Meitner Institut in Berlin, preparing for an experiment that starts on Monday.

On the way here I stopped off to visit my nephew, brother, and his wife Li in Singapore where they live. It was great to see them again, Jonathon my nephew is growing up very quickly. He is 23 months old, which makes him very amusing and his favourite words are no and car. He is car obsessed, and I mean, obsessed. Li told me she was in a taxi with him and he said his other favourite sentence "whats that mummy?" pointing to a motorbike, and she said "its a scooter", thinking it was a scooter, and Jonathon YELLED at her VERY LOUDLY "NO MUMMY, NO!" (please note excessive use of favourite word here) "NO ITS NOT MUMMY. ITS A MOTORBIKE". Li said the driver had a laughing fit that nearly caused them all to die.

My brother Richard took the day off from work and we tried to take Jonathon out of rthe day, but he usually naps between 1 and 3pm, so when 12.30 rolled around he started getting CRANKY. Big time. We didn't bring the pram, so he had nowhere to sleep, and he got progressively worse and worse until he started screaming and crying uncontrollably and my brother just picked him up and threw him over his shoulder ala caveman. I suggested we head home so he could have a nap, but he was asleep like so much dead meat before we got there. As soon as we got him into bed he woke up and demanded that we "GO OUT AND RIDE IN A CAR. NOW. NOW DADDY. NOW. I WANT THE CAR> I NEED THE CAR. I NEED IT, DADDY". He eventually went back to sleep. The first words out of his mouth when he awoke, three hours later, were "I NEED THE CAR DADDY. OUT WITH THE CAR".

Jonathon likes to arrange things obsessively to. His cars all have to be in a row, either side by side, but sometimes lengthwise in a row. Don't touch them, they are his. And you don't know how they go. When he drinks some milk before he goes to sleep, he needs:
the green turtle in his left hand which HE will put beside his head. If you do it, this will not be satisfactory. he needs the pencil case with cars on it in his right hand, and he will clutch the bottle in both hands with the pencil case in tow. he likes to have the bottle cap balanced on his right foot, for all this to work. he hasn't worked out he has two hands only, and in order to put the cap on his foot, his shoes need to be off, and the turtle has to already be behind his head. But he wants all of this to happen at once, and he wants to do it himself. So you have to trick him.

I told my brother that I expected an interesting child from his genetic stock.

Last thing - my flight from Singapore to Munich (13 hours) was on a plane with NO INSEAT SCREENS. What the?! Lufthansa. Me cranky! And two toddlers in the aisle next to me, which were no problem at all except for their mum, who was totally annoying the crap out of me. I don't know how they cope!

Wow

Time flies huh!

Since January 26th (the last time I write) I have beasically been working, with a very small amount of climbing thrown in. I went to England for an experiment too, which was intersting, but great as I got to catch up with Vicky who I know from my work at NIST. Vicky works at the ISIS facility now, and is doing very well there. On the same trip I went to Switzerland and spent sometime at a workshop, but managed to go snowboarding - my friend Kat, well, her parent own a chalet near Verbier. It was awesome.





Mikl also had a significant birthday...






The reactor restarted after 10 months offline. So I can stop travelling so much (well, not really, I have an experiment in Berlin in a few weeks and possibly another one in the UK), but am very much looking forward to some Australian neutrons!