There's No Place Like Home, There's No Place Like Home...

My current vacation in the States has been designed to be a bit of a whirlwind tour of my life. Today is my sixth -- and final -- day in Illinois. Tomorrow, I go to spend two days in Arizona, the previous State that I lived in. Then I will be in New York, where I lived before AZ, on Friday... before finishing up with two days in Massachusetts. Each of the four states that I have lived in gets a bit of my time on this trip.

The first, and longest, leg of the tour goes to Illinois because it is where I call home and it is where I seem to have put down the deepest roots. As that leg begins to draw to a close, here is a report on what I have been up to this week:

Thursday: Landed at O'Hare around 10am. After gyades picked me up, we went for lunch. Then I spent a fair bit of the day running errands... the sort that I could not do from thousands of miles away. I also dropped by the lab to see some of my old colleagues in the Particle Astrophysics Center. That was nice. On my way home, I stopped by the comic book store and picked up the past three months worth of books. polymorphism made dinner for us at the Event Horizon. Finally, I read myself to sleep with the last three issues of DC's Infinite Crisis and the first two issues of Marvel's Civil War. I thought the Crisis story was okay, but I was extremely impressed with Civil War... quite in spite of myself! I have made a hobby of being a Marvel cynic for the past decade or so... primarily out of bitterness for the sharp decline in the quality of their books. So I find myself impressed at how good this particular cross-over story is starting off!

Friday: I spent the day with iamthesphinx. This may be, so far, the only time that I have been more nervous approaching a second date than I was on the first date. Since the weather was quite hot, we decided to postpone the Botanical Gardens, which are outdoors, in favour of the Garfield Park Conservatory, which is indoors. I am not sure how we decided that a greenhouse on a hot day would be a smart idea, from a temperature perspective. However, the conservatory itself was lovely and made for a very good visit. Then we went out for Mexican food -- which there is a definite lack of in England. After a quick stop at her apartment, where I got to meet her two adorable kitties, we spent the evening at two karaoke bars. The first one, Hidden Cove, was new to me; then we ended up at our regular spot... Sidekick's. Throughout the course of the day, we had one long conversation that organically shifted in topic to cover an enormous range of subjects. Which was fantastic!

Saturday: Party Day! As usual, everyone at the Event Horizon spent the first few hours of the day getting things set up for the party. Then, around 1pm, we could relax as friends began arriving. The party ended up being a bit smaller than usual -- thirteen people total, where most recent parties have numbered in the twenties. I mainly attribute this to AnthroCon, which a number of regular attendees were at. Ah, well. Those who could not show were missed, but I was quite happy to catch up with all the friends who could be there. So long as there is an interest, I will probably continue hosting these parties each time I come back to the States.

Over the course of the day, I played a fair number of games. First was Apples to Apples, which iamthesphinx won quite handedly. Although I enjoy the game, I never do very well at it. Indeed, this time I did not score a single point! Then I played Wise & Otherwise, in the backyard, beating polymorphism for the first time ever!! (Or at least for the first time when she was not sleeping during the game...) We took advantage of the good weather to play a small game of Four Square. When it ended, I was in the lead spot, for whatever that is worth. At least I did not get bonked on the head for it this time, as I did back in March! Before pizza arrived, I was part of an aborted game of Carcasonne and after dinner I played a truncated Lord of the Fries, which madandrew won.

In between pizza and Lord of the Fries, there was a group discussion of physics, with most people at the party. It started when somebody asked me about what I am working on now. I did my best to give a lay explanation, though I am still new enough to the world of dark matter detection to have perfected my routine yet. Hopefully I did a good enough job; I take the business of explaining science to non-scientists quite seriously. When I worked on solar and supernova neutrinos at Super-Kamiokande, I had perfected a standard explanation within one year. During that year, it was improved from questions that people asked me. Though, after reaching perfection, I gave the explanation so often that I began to grow bored with it, despite how well it was received. I am still working on a standard explanation for dark matter detection.

Around 11pm, most people had left and only gyades, polymorphism, iamthesphinx, and I remained. gyades built up a fire in the backyard -- no small feat given that it had rained earlier in the evening. Then we all gathered around the fire and talked for several hours. This made for some of the more relaxing time that I have spent in quite a while.

Sunday: My time in Illinois branched out from Chicagoland. After sleeping in, I woke up and drove to Urbana to see cassiopia for the first time since her trip to England last month. We finished the masks that we had begun making late last year and worked on periodically since then. We went out for dinner -- Mexican food once again -- and then got ice cream for dessert. Back at her place, the House of Slack, we watched Tristan and Isolde as we ate the ice cream. Then we talked for a good long while, catching up on various things. Overall, a mellow but good day. And now I have a completed mask!

Monday: I completed the rounds of other places in Illinois that are significant to me. After sleeping in again, I left the House of Slack and drove from Urbana-Champaign to Bloomington-Normal to see the Kiddo. Now that he is off for the summer -- after a 4.0 first year in grad school -- he seems to be doing quite alright. We hung out and caught each other up for a bit. We got lunch and then his girlfriend came over so that I could meet her. The three of us strolled around the two ponds at his apartment complex, then met up with his girlfriend's friend to play mini-golf. The friend arrived after us, so we filled the interim time by playing in the arcade and tossing about the high-bounce balls that I had won. cheshcat and I used to play mini-golf regularly when we lived in Long Island and Arizona but, before yesterday, I had not picked up a club in quite some time. It showed: The Kiddo beat us all, with me trailing in second place by eight strokes. Next time! (I wonder if they have mini-golf in England...) After the game, the Kiddo and I went back to his apartment and played a game of Jenga. Our final height -- thirty-two completed levels -- was respectable, but nowhere near our best score of 39 2/3 levels, from many years ago. Finally, as the day got late, I drove back North to the Event Horizon and spent some time talking with both housemates, gyades and polymorphism, before going to bed.

Tuesday: Today I woke up early to bring Foxy to the vet. It seems that she is doing very well. She has put on weight and is maintaining it. The swelling in her lymph node has gone down. All good signs. We will soon be taking her off of antibiotics, then weaning her off of the steroids. It looks like our little girl is very likely to be okay now. What a relief!!!

Later today, I hope to take a walk at the Morton Arboretum. It will be the last walk that I take before my membership expires in August. I was planning to go there before writing this entry; however, a drizzle had begun, so I took to the computer while waiting for the rain to subside. If it does stop, then I will bring some comic books with me so that I can walk as well as read in a beautiful space. Tonight, I am planning to play gyades in GO, with the usual outcome -- he kicks my arse -- expected. And then, tomorrow morning, I am off on a plane to Phoenix, where I will be reunited with cheshcat once again!

Right now, I feel a little bit like I have been on a foreign tour of duty and am getting a bit of welcome shore leave in before returning to my station. I love it over in England, but I have missed being here, too. That's the trouble with having only one body; I need clones.

More about the upcoming legs of this trip as they actually happen...

There's No Place Like Home, There's No Place Like Home...

My current vacation in the States has been designed to be a bit of a whirlwind tour of my life. Today is my sixth -- and final -- day in Illinois. Tomorrow, I go to spend two days in Arizona, the previous State that I lived in. Then I will be in New York, where I lived before AZ, on Friday... before finishing up with two days in Massachusetts. Each of the four states that I have lived in gets a bit of my time on this trip.

The first, and longest, leg of the tour goes to Illinois because it is where I call home and it is where I seem to have put down the deepest roots. As that leg begins to draw to a close, here is a report on what I have been up to this week:

Thursday: Landed at O'Hare around 10am. After gyades picked me up, we went for lunch. Then I spent a fair bit of the day running errands... the sort that I could not do from thousands of miles away. I also dropped by the lab to see some of my old colleagues in the Particle Astrophysics Center. That was nice. On my way home, I stopped by the comic book store and picked up the past three months worth of books. polymorphism made dinner for us at the Event Horizon. Finally, I read myself to sleep with the last three issues of DC's Infinite Crisis and the first two issues of Marvel's Civil War. I thought the Crisis story was okay, but I was extremely impressed with Civil War... quite in spite of myself! I have made a hobby of being a Marvel cynic for the past decade or so... primarily out of bitterness for the sharp decline in the quality of their books. So I find myself impressed at how good this particular cross-over story is starting off!

Friday: I spent the day with iamthesphinx. This may be, so far, the only time that I have been more nervous approaching a second date than I was on the first date. Since the weather was quite hot, we decided to postpone the Botanical Gardens, which are outdoors, in favour of the Garfield Park Conservatory, which is indoors. I am not sure how we decided that a greenhouse on a hot day would be a smart idea, from a temperature perspective. However, the conservatory itself was lovely and made for a very good visit. Then we went out for Mexican food -- which there is a definite lack of in England. After a quick stop at her apartment, where I got to meet her two adorable kitties, we spent the evening at two karaoke bars. The first one, Hidden Cove, was new to me; then we ended up at our regular spot... Sidekick's. Throughout the course of the day, we had one long conversation that organically shifted in topic to cover an enormous range of subjects. Which was fantastic!

Saturday: Party Day! As usual, everyone at the Event Horizon spent the first few hours of the day getting things set up for the party. Then, around 1pm, we could relax as friends began arriving. The party ended up being a bit smaller than usual -- thirteen people total, where most recent parties have numbered in the twenties. I mainly attribute this to AnthroCon, which a number of regular attendees were at. Ah, well. Those who could not show were missed, but I was quite happy to catch up with all the friends who could be there. So long as there is an interest, I will probably continue hosting these parties each time I come back to the States.

Over the course of the day, I played a fair number of games. First was Apples to Apples, which iamthesphinx won quite handedly. Although I enjoy the game, I never do very well at it. Indeed, this time I did not score a single point! Then I played Wise & Otherwise, in the backyard, beating polymorphism for the first time ever!! (Or at least for the first time when she was not sleeping during the game...) We took advantage of the good weather to play a small game of Four Square. When it ended, I was in the lead spot, for whatever that is worth. At least I did not get bonked on the head for it this time, as I did back in March! Before pizza arrived, I was part of an aborted game of Carcasonne and after dinner I played a truncated Lord of the Fries, which madandrew won.

In between pizza and Lord of the Fries, there was a group discussion of physics, with most people at the party. It started when somebody asked me about what I am working on now. I did my best to give a lay explanation, though I am still new enough to the world of dark matter detection to have perfected my routine yet. Hopefully I did a good enough job; I take the business of explaining science to non-scientists quite seriously. When I worked on solar and supernova neutrinos at Super-Kamiokande, I had perfected a standard explanation within one year. During that year, it was improved from questions that people asked me. Though, after reaching perfection, I gave the explanation so often that I began to grow bored with it, despite how well it was received. I am still working on a standard explanation for dark matter detection.

Around 11pm, most people had left and only gyades, polymorphism, iamthesphinx, and I remained. gyades built up a fire in the backyard -- no small feat given that it had rained earlier in the evening. Then we all gathered around the fire and talked for several hours. This made for some of the more relaxing time that I have spent in quite a while.

Sunday: My time in Illinois branched out from Chicagoland. After sleeping in, I woke up and drove to Urbana to see cassiopia for the first time since her trip to England last month. We finished the masks that we had begun making late last year and worked on periodically since then. We went out for dinner -- Mexican food once again -- and then got ice cream for dessert. Back at her place, the House of Slack, we watched Tristan and Isolde as we ate the ice cream. Then we talked for a good long while, catching up on various things. Overall, a mellow but good day. And now I have a completed mask!

Monday: I completed the rounds of other places in Illinois that are significant to me. After sleeping in again, I left the House of Slack and drove from Urbana-Champaign to Bloomington-Normal to see the Kiddo. Now that he is off for the summer -- after a 4.0 first year in grad school -- he seems to be doing quite alright. We hung out and caught each other up for a bit. We got lunch and then his girlfriend came over so that I could meet her. The three of us strolled around the two ponds at his apartment complex, then met up with his girlfriend's friend to play mini-golf. The friend arrived after us, so we filled the interim time by playing in the arcade and tossing about the high-bounce balls that I had won. cheshcat and I used to play mini-golf regularly when we lived in Long Island and Arizona but, before yesterday, I had not picked up a club in quite some time. It showed: The Kiddo beat us all, with me trailing in second place by eight strokes. Next time! (I wonder if they have mini-golf in England...) After the game, the Kiddo and I went back to his apartment and played a game of Jenga. Our final height -- thirty-two completed levels -- was respectable, but nowhere near our best score of 39 2/3 levels, from many years ago. Finally, as the day got late, I drove back North to the Event Horizon and spent some time talking with both housemates, gyades and polymorphism, before going to bed.

Tuesday: Today I woke up early to bring Foxy to the vet. It seems that she is doing very well. She has put on weight and is maintaining it. The swelling in her lymph node has gone down. All good signs. We will soon be taking her off of antibiotics, then weaning her off of the steroids. It looks like our little girl is very likely to be okay now. What a relief!!!

Later today, I hope to take a walk at the Morton Arboretum. It will be the last walk that I take before my membership expires in August. I was planning to go there before writing this entry; however, a drizzle had begun, so I took to the computer while waiting for the rain to subside. If it does stop, then I will bring some comic books with me so that I can walk as well as read in a beautiful space. Tonight, I am planning to play gyades in GO, with the usual outcome -- he kicks my arse -- expected. And then, tomorrow morning, I am off on a plane to Phoenix, where I will be reunited with cheshcat once again!

Right now, I feel a little bit like I have been on a foreign tour of duty and am getting a bit of welcome shore leave in before returning to my station. I love it over in England, but I have missed being here, too. That's the trouble with having only one body; I need clones.

More about the upcoming legs of this trip as they actually happen...