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This entry is, in effect, an ode to the wonders of modern technology.
I write this entry sitting on the floor of the study at the new flat. The desk is not yet rebuilt so I have nowhere else to sit. There is a phone line at the flat, but we will not have our broadband set up for another two our three weeks.
Meanwhile, I am online via my laptop and my mobile broadband modem, surfing along the 3G network. Armed with only these two devices, I am not only able to post this entry... I am also participating in an international video conference with some of my collaborators in London, the United States, Canada, and Japan!
Isn't the digital revolution incredible??
As an interesting side note, I can see a couple of places I recognize on my screen. One is the conference room at the TRIUMF laboratory in Vancouver -- I was there in Dec 2005 when I interviewed for a job. Indeed, they offered me the job to work on the T2K experiment... but I turned it down to go to Oxford. Nearly three years later, here I am on T2K and watching them on the video conference.[*]
The other place that I recognise is the conference room at the Kenkyutou[**] in Mozumi -- a small village in Japan that is very close to the Super-Kamiokande experiment. The Kenkyutou is where the central offices for SK are, and where I worked during the two years that I lived in Japan[***]. While seeing the room in Vancouver is cute, seeing the Kenkyutou again is a major blast from the past, bringing lots of nostalgia with it! I have been in that room so very many times, for so very many meetings. I have wandered into it at virtually every hour of the day. Indeed, I even watched the Twin Towers fall from the television in that room, back in 2001.
Ah, I miss Japan. It has been more than five years, after all! Very glad that I will be going back there in January. Meanwhile, I suppose that it would behoove me to post this and go back to paying attention to my meeting!
[*] Not the first time that something like this has happened. When I arrived at Fermilab in September 2003, I was able to choose what experiment I wanted to work on. I chose the Pierre Auger Cosmic Ray Observatory... but my second choice was the Cryogenic Dark Matter Search (CDMS) experiment. Three years later, I end up in Oxford working on CRESST, which is a direct competitor to CDMS.
[**] Japanese for "research building".
[***] Unless I was a couple of miles away, in the mine -- working on or in the actual experiment.
I write this entry sitting on the floor of the study at the new flat. The desk is not yet rebuilt so I have nowhere else to sit. There is a phone line at the flat, but we will not have our broadband set up for another two our three weeks.
Meanwhile, I am online via my laptop and my mobile broadband modem, surfing along the 3G network. Armed with only these two devices, I am not only able to post this entry... I am also participating in an international video conference with some of my collaborators in London, the United States, Canada, and Japan!
Isn't the digital revolution incredible??
As an interesting side note, I can see a couple of places I recognize on my screen. One is the conference room at the TRIUMF laboratory in Vancouver -- I was there in Dec 2005 when I interviewed for a job. Indeed, they offered me the job to work on the T2K experiment... but I turned it down to go to Oxford. Nearly three years later, here I am on T2K and watching them on the video conference.[*]
The other place that I recognise is the conference room at the Kenkyutou[**] in Mozumi -- a small village in Japan that is very close to the Super-Kamiokande experiment. The Kenkyutou is where the central offices for SK are, and where I worked during the two years that I lived in Japan[***]. While seeing the room in Vancouver is cute, seeing the Kenkyutou again is a major blast from the past, bringing lots of nostalgia with it! I have been in that room so very many times, for so very many meetings. I have wandered into it at virtually every hour of the day. Indeed, I even watched the Twin Towers fall from the television in that room, back in 2001.
Ah, I miss Japan. It has been more than five years, after all! Very glad that I will be going back there in January. Meanwhile, I suppose that it would behoove me to post this and go back to paying attention to my meeting!
[*] Not the first time that something like this has happened. When I arrived at Fermilab in September 2003, I was able to choose what experiment I wanted to work on. I chose the Pierre Auger Cosmic Ray Observatory... but my second choice was the Cryogenic Dark Matter Search (CDMS) experiment. Three years later, I end up in Oxford working on CRESST, which is a direct competitor to CDMS.
[**] Japanese for "research building".
[***] Unless I was a couple of miles away, in the mine -- working on or in the actual experiment.
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From:
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How long do you get to go back to Japan for, in January?
From:
no subject
When I go back to Japan in January, it is for a meeting that is only a few days long... and taking place in a completely different location from where I used to live. Depending on what else is going on at the time, I may try to get back to the Kamioka area where I was based. Even if it doesn't happen on that trip, though, I am sure it will soon now that I am in a job that requires regular travel to Japan once again.
(Can you tell that I may be just a wee bit excited about this??)
From:
no subject
I can understand being excited about this! It sounds very exciting indeed. It's too bad your first trip isn't longer, though.