This week consisted of... well basically homework everyday. I had a math homework set due on Wednesday and a 3 hw sets due from my other classes on Friday. Not my favorite experience. I'll just provide a recap of what I've been up to:
Last weekend: I went to a musical last Saturday with a few of my friends. We saw Into the Woods, based off Grimm's Fairy Tales, and it was really good. It was put on by a group on campus, and student tickets were only $10, so it was pretty cheap too. On Sunday, I started writing the exams for the Science Olympiad tournament events that I'm supervising. There were five of us working on it, so we planned a brunch and had cinnamon rolls, metal muffins, banana bread, fresh fruit, and omelettes. We're planning the same thing for tomorrow, so I'm pretty excited about that. Sunday night I had hockey games again, and we won our first men's game, but lost in the co-rec league. Maybe tomorrow will be our day!
Wednesday was my friend Nikhil's birthday so a few of our friends organized a surprise birthday party for him on Tuesday night. I had to keep him distracted until 8:30 and then bring him back to his apartment. We watched an Indian movie, but I don't remember the name of it. I ended up getting back home at 1:30 am and was up til 3 finishing my math hw which was due the next morning.
In terms of research, I started doing mechanical measurements on my polymers this week! I like to think of my experiments as controlled poking, because that's essentially what I'm doing. Poking stuff. Preliminary results indicate that the double network polymer systems have increased strength over the single network systems, which is what we anticipated, so I should be able to move forward with my polymer gel experiments. Good news...
That's about it for now I guess. Not a whole lot of excitement around here. Just the humdrum of classwork. That's what I get for taking an extra course this quarter. Though if I do an extra course the next quarter and in the fall, I'll be finished with classes forever in December, a quarter ahead of schedule. More to come on that later. I'm off to bed. Good night everyone!
Sunday, January 28, 2007
Tuesday, January 16, 2007
Quick update
I've been busy this week working on homework so I haven't had time to post. Here's a quick synopsis.
I've starting doing intramural hockey now. Our first games were on Sunday- I'm in both the men's league and the corec league, and both of my teams lost our first games. The corec team's game was against another MatSci team, who just happens to be the returning champions from last year, so we got obliterated. In the men's league we didn't do so badly, but we just didn't get a lot of shots off. A lot of us are new to the sport, and I personally haven't played since middle school. Oh, and it's floor hockey, so we just run around in our shoes, not roller blades, which is kind of disappointing, but I won't complain.
I also went curling this past Sunday, but I think it will be my last time until hockey is over. Both are on Sunday, and I can't waste my entire Sunday just playing sports. Plus it's tiring. Anyway, we had a mini-curling match, and my team beat the other team 7-0. I had some particularly good placements that were pivotal in our win, so I was pretty excited about that. In our last round, the other team had like 4 stones in the 'house' and we only had one, which they had just knocked out. I was trying to take out their closest stone to keep them from winning 4 points, but instead, I messed up the shot, knocked out their second closest stone, and ricocheted off it to put my stone smack dab in the center. The beauty of it was that this was blocked in front by about 3 other stones, so the other team even with two more stones left, was unable to take out my stone so we got the point instead of them getting 3 or 4. I was quite proud of my mistake.
Also on Sunday (I know, busy day) I met with the regional science olympiad director, and she gave me the rules for the events I will be supervising. I have a group of 4 friends who said they'd be willing to help me out with writing the exams, so we're having brunch on Sunday at my apartment and doing some brainstorming. The two events I will be doing are Five Star Science and Forensics. The Five-Star Science event is a pentathlon of Chemistry, Biology, Physics, Earth Science/Astronomy, and Data Analysis, while the Forensics is like a crime-solving event where I get to devise a made-up crime with suspects and the students have to solve the crime using fingerprint analysis, chromatography, identification of white powders and polymers, etc. It should be a lot of fun, and I'm really looking forward to this weekend (gotta get past the homework this week though!).
In lab, I was able to successfully polymerize poly(n-butyl acrylate) as an elastomer and then polymerize the same thing in the presence of a triblock copolymer. The idea is that we will compare the two polymers to see whether the triblock copolymer strengthens the poly(n-butyl acrylate) network, and then proceed to the hydrogel systems if it looks promising. I'm presenting at lab meeting this week, but once again, there are like 4 of us presenting so I want to keep it at about a 5 minute presentation with room for questions. Next week I'll actually be doing the mechanical measurements to see if the one polymer is stronger than the other. I would have done it last week, but I had some issues with my polymerizations shooting into the water bath and then bubbles forming during polymerization, which I have since corrected.
I guess that's about it for now. Thankfully my homework this semester is only worth about 10-15% in most of my classes so I don't need to worry about it so much. However, I'm doing an extra class this semester so that probably makes up for it. But, if I take 4 classes this quarter and next quarter, I'll only have 4 left until I'm done with classes forever! That means I could potentially be done with classes in December, but my guess is that I'll just end up taking like 1 or 2 at a time instead because of when courses are offered that I want to take.
Anyway, I need to get back to work or go to sleep. Sleep sounds better. Hope everybody is doing well. For your viewing pleasure, I'm attaching a picture of a group of us doing homework in my apartment with the "wall of laptops". I'm not in it, as I'm taking the picture. The guy on the couch is Nikhil, the girl standing up is Louise, and the guy in the background is Andres.
I've starting doing intramural hockey now. Our first games were on Sunday- I'm in both the men's league and the corec league, and both of my teams lost our first games. The corec team's game was against another MatSci team, who just happens to be the returning champions from last year, so we got obliterated. In the men's league we didn't do so badly, but we just didn't get a lot of shots off. A lot of us are new to the sport, and I personally haven't played since middle school. Oh, and it's floor hockey, so we just run around in our shoes, not roller blades, which is kind of disappointing, but I won't complain.
I also went curling this past Sunday, but I think it will be my last time until hockey is over. Both are on Sunday, and I can't waste my entire Sunday just playing sports. Plus it's tiring. Anyway, we had a mini-curling match, and my team beat the other team 7-0. I had some particularly good placements that were pivotal in our win, so I was pretty excited about that. In our last round, the other team had like 4 stones in the 'house' and we only had one, which they had just knocked out. I was trying to take out their closest stone to keep them from winning 4 points, but instead, I messed up the shot, knocked out their second closest stone, and ricocheted off it to put my stone smack dab in the center. The beauty of it was that this was blocked in front by about 3 other stones, so the other team even with two more stones left, was unable to take out my stone so we got the point instead of them getting 3 or 4. I was quite proud of my mistake.
Also on Sunday (I know, busy day) I met with the regional science olympiad director, and she gave me the rules for the events I will be supervising. I have a group of 4 friends who said they'd be willing to help me out with writing the exams, so we're having brunch on Sunday at my apartment and doing some brainstorming. The two events I will be doing are Five Star Science and Forensics. The Five-Star Science event is a pentathlon of Chemistry, Biology, Physics, Earth Science/Astronomy, and Data Analysis, while the Forensics is like a crime-solving event where I get to devise a made-up crime with suspects and the students have to solve the crime using fingerprint analysis, chromatography, identification of white powders and polymers, etc. It should be a lot of fun, and I'm really looking forward to this weekend (gotta get past the homework this week though!).
In lab, I was able to successfully polymerize poly(n-butyl acrylate) as an elastomer and then polymerize the same thing in the presence of a triblock copolymer. The idea is that we will compare the two polymers to see whether the triblock copolymer strengthens the poly(n-butyl acrylate) network, and then proceed to the hydrogel systems if it looks promising. I'm presenting at lab meeting this week, but once again, there are like 4 of us presenting so I want to keep it at about a 5 minute presentation with room for questions. Next week I'll actually be doing the mechanical measurements to see if the one polymer is stronger than the other. I would have done it last week, but I had some issues with my polymerizations shooting into the water bath and then bubbles forming during polymerization, which I have since corrected.
I guess that's about it for now. Thankfully my homework this semester is only worth about 10-15% in most of my classes so I don't need to worry about it so much. However, I'm doing an extra class this semester so that probably makes up for it. But, if I take 4 classes this quarter and next quarter, I'll only have 4 left until I'm done with classes forever! That means I could potentially be done with classes in December, but my guess is that I'll just end up taking like 1 or 2 at a time instead because of when courses are offered that I want to take.
Anyway, I need to get back to work or go to sleep. Sleep sounds better. Hope everybody is doing well. For your viewing pleasure, I'm attaching a picture of a group of us doing homework in my apartment with the "wall of laptops". I'm not in it, as I'm taking the picture. The guy on the couch is Nikhil, the girl standing up is Louise, and the guy in the background is Andres.
Sunday, January 07, 2007
Doritos Commercial
Courtesy of Kristin, I would like everybody to look at the following link and vote on this commercial to win a Doritos Superbowl contest. It's actually really funny, and two of the people making it went to my high school.
http://www.wral.com/news/local/story/1128505/
That's the link for the story.
http://www.jumpcut.com/view?id=F0CBEA0C841311DBA3823EF340157CF2&b_id=1FE7BE2457D211DB9D601EE329CBD869
That's a link for the commercial.
http://www.wral.com/news/local/story/1128505/
That's the link for the story.
http://www.jumpcut.com/view?id=F0CBEA0C841311DBA3823EF340157CF2&b_id=1FE7BE2457D211DB9D601EE329CBD869
That's a link for the commercial.
First Week of Classes
Now I'm back in lab and starting courses all over again. The first day of the quarter was Wednesday, and lucky me woke up having a bit of a cold (or something respiratory). Anyway, I was pretty miserable for the first day, as my nose was running everywhere and I didn't have any Actifed or Sudafed to put a stop to the torrential downpour. On Thursday I felt pretty much the same, but I suffered through it so I could go to lab for 8 hours to set up and carry out my first polymerization for my research! I made a small 3 milliliter sample of poly(n-butyl acrylate) and was quite excited to see a gelatinous product stuck in the reaction vessel, which was what I was going for. Thursday was also the first day of hockey practice for the intramural league, so I went and played floor hockey at the gym for 2 hours despite my fever and impaired ability to breathe. I actually scored 2 goals within like 5 minutes of playing, but I quickly died out and I think scored only one other time in the ensuing 2 hours.
Yesterday, I went with Joe, Andres, and Nikhil to check out an open house of a 4 bedroom house about 5 minutes from here. We're checking out places for next year. Ideally, we'd like to find a big, cheap 6 bedroom a little further south that we can all live in along with Eddie and Nikhil's roomate. We've found a couple 3000 square foot houses for ~$1350-$1700/month with heat, but the problem is that mostly all the ones we're looking at will be gone by the fall. Blast! Then later in the day I played squash for the first time against Andres and Nikhil, and topped off the night by watching Children of Men. I think it was a good movie, but I felt like it could have been awesome if it were more believable. Anyway, it was a good day.
Today, I think I'll be doing my homework for the week so I can get ahead. It's always a good feeling. Until next time...
Yesterday, I went with Joe, Andres, and Nikhil to check out an open house of a 4 bedroom house about 5 minutes from here. We're checking out places for next year. Ideally, we'd like to find a big, cheap 6 bedroom a little further south that we can all live in along with Eddie and Nikhil's roomate. We've found a couple 3000 square foot houses for ~$1350-$1700/month with heat, but the problem is that mostly all the ones we're looking at will be gone by the fall. Blast! Then later in the day I played squash for the first time against Andres and Nikhil, and topped off the night by watching Children of Men. I think it was a good movie, but I felt like it could have been awesome if it were more believable. Anyway, it was a good day.
Today, I think I'll be doing my homework for the week so I can get ahead. It's always a good feeling. Until next time...
Monday, January 01, 2007
Christmas and New Years
Since I was subjected to dial-up internet while at my grandparents, I haven't posted anything in the past week or so since I was there. I'll give a brief run-down of what Christmas and New Years was like:
This year, we opted to have the Henderson Christmas a bit earlier than normal. We randomly decided on Friday night (Dec. 22) that we would open up presents to avoid the hassle on Christmas eve. I was a bit unprepared, not having wrapped any of my gifts, so all of my gifts were given out in plastic bags. Aside from Katie, Kristin, and Brian buying a few of the same gifts for people, I think everybody was happy with what they got and it was good to have the whole family together again. Also, that morning we took our family pictures. I'll post a few of them for those of you who haven't had the privilege to see our beautiful faces in a while:
I've got to say, the second one is my personal favorite. Just to keep the rest short and simple, on Sunday, we had Christmas with my dad's side of the family and attended the Christmas eve service that night, and on Christmas day we had a gift exchange with my mom's side of the family. I headed out on Tuesday night with Kristin back to Evanston as she wanted to come see where I lived and hang out in Chicago for a day.
Some highlights from Christmas: Rachel and I winning Trivial Pursuit at Grandma and Grandpa Sollars's house, participating in a huge round robin tournament of gin (and practically breaking even), watching like 6 DVDs with the family, going to Fazoli's twice, seeing Kendall's huge belt buckle, and of course getting to see everybody after a my absence last Christmas.
On Wednesday, Kristin and I headed to Chicago around 9:30 am (and missed the express train by about 5 seconds, but that's another story). I took her out to lunch, then to the Sear's Tower and Merchandise Mart, and then we stopped by both B. Dalton's and a used book store. We also just strolled around the city for a little bit, and I bought her dinner to take on the train with her before she left. We had a good time, but she had to leave by about 3 pm, so next time she visits, we should plan on more time so we can go see some sketch comedy or something.
For New Year's Eve, I just took it easy. I didn't really feel like going to any parties and watching people drink their lives away, so I hung out with Andres and his friend Naomi and went to see fireworks on the lake. It was basically just what I wanted to do, though I've got to say it didn't really feel like New Year's. Maybe next year I should go into Chicago or something. We'll see...
Tomorrow I've got to get back to work, and Wedneday my classes start. Then I'm pretty much booked until June.
I hope everyone's holidays went well, and I wish you all a happy New Year!
This year, we opted to have the Henderson Christmas a bit earlier than normal. We randomly decided on Friday night (Dec. 22) that we would open up presents to avoid the hassle on Christmas eve. I was a bit unprepared, not having wrapped any of my gifts, so all of my gifts were given out in plastic bags. Aside from Katie, Kristin, and Brian buying a few of the same gifts for people, I think everybody was happy with what they got and it was good to have the whole family together again. Also, that morning we took our family pictures. I'll post a few of them for those of you who haven't had the privilege to see our beautiful faces in a while:
I've got to say, the second one is my personal favorite. Just to keep the rest short and simple, on Sunday, we had Christmas with my dad's side of the family and attended the Christmas eve service that night, and on Christmas day we had a gift exchange with my mom's side of the family. I headed out on Tuesday night with Kristin back to Evanston as she wanted to come see where I lived and hang out in Chicago for a day.Some highlights from Christmas: Rachel and I winning Trivial Pursuit at Grandma and Grandpa Sollars's house, participating in a huge round robin tournament of gin (and practically breaking even), watching like 6 DVDs with the family, going to Fazoli's twice, seeing Kendall's huge belt buckle, and of course getting to see everybody after a my absence last Christmas.
On Wednesday, Kristin and I headed to Chicago around 9:30 am (and missed the express train by about 5 seconds, but that's another story). I took her out to lunch, then to the Sear's Tower and Merchandise Mart, and then we stopped by both B. Dalton's and a used book store. We also just strolled around the city for a little bit, and I bought her dinner to take on the train with her before she left. We had a good time, but she had to leave by about 3 pm, so next time she visits, we should plan on more time so we can go see some sketch comedy or something.
For New Year's Eve, I just took it easy. I didn't really feel like going to any parties and watching people drink their lives away, so I hung out with Andres and his friend Naomi and went to see fireworks on the lake. It was basically just what I wanted to do, though I've got to say it didn't really feel like New Year's. Maybe next year I should go into Chicago or something. We'll see...
Tomorrow I've got to get back to work, and Wedneday my classes start. Then I'm pretty much booked until June.
I hope everyone's holidays went well, and I wish you all a happy New Year!
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