Yesterday, I drove up to Washington & Lee University on my own initiative. I've applied to be a computer science professor there, so I was curious about the place. I also wanted to connect with Rick Peterson, the CTO of the university and an old friend of my advisor's.

W&L is in Lexington, VA, about 3 1/2 hours from Chicopee. I left the house at 6 am, before the crack of dawn. The drive up was pretty throughout, and stunningly beautiful in places. Lexington is in a valley between the Blue Ridge mountains and another Appalachian range. I was seriously in awe of the scenic beauty, both on the way there and the way back (for which I took a different route).

I arrived at W&L for a campus tour at 10. It didn't take long--the campus isn't very big. There are only about 1700 students there (all undergrads), not including ~500 law students. The campus is very pretty, and I think either the campus as a whole or else several buildings are listed in the national historic register. The campus was spared the torch during the civil war because the main building had a statue of George Washington on it. In fact, the Lee Chapel has the original copy of the first portrait of Washington on display. Robert E. Lee, who was the university's president for a few years after the Civil War, is buried there, in Lee Chapel, along with his family and his horse Traveler.

The culture is really awesome. People are really friendly. There's a rule that you look people in the eyes and greet them when you run into them on campus. Also, people really abide by a strong honor code. Lying, cheating, or stealing will get you expelled (for serious). Two great implications of this: students choose when they take their final exams (during the final week, that is), and people leave their laptops and stuff lying around wherever, because nobody will take it. Dr. Lambert, the head of the CS department, said that he accidentally left his bike parked in front of the library, with no chain or anything, and it was still there when he went looking for it a month later.

I met up with Rick at noon, and we had lunch at the cafeteria on campus, which was actually pretty good. He was so helpful to talk to. He also introduced me to several of the CS faculty. (Also, I met the technical support dude for the department, who has climbed 7 of the world's 9 tallest peaks, including Everest.) I'm hoping that getting to meet them (and actually spending a fair amount of time talking with Dr. Lambert) will help my chances there. I would really love to work there...

ETA: apparently they weren't impressed, because they did not invite me back for an interview. Ah well. Best of luck to 'em. I'm sure they'll do well.

Last weekend, I flew home to spend Thanksgiving with my family and my dear friends the Remer family. It was a great time, and a really refreshing break. Highlights include:

• Reading all of The Last Lecture by Randy Pausch and most of Zanna's Gift by Orson Scott card (who I'm starting to think is an egomaniac) on the flight home Thursday morning. Mom let me borrow both of these, and they were both really good.
• Meeting up with the entire Remer clan at the airport (all 11 of 'em, including 6 kids, 2 in-laws, and a grandkidlet/cutie pie), and grabbing some lunch at a nearby McDonald's that I think wasn't entirely thrilled about serving us on Thanksgiving Day.
• Enjoying a delicious Thanksgiving meal with Mom, Dad, Krissie, and Richard, courtesy of Cracker Barrel's cooks and Mom's wallet.
• A good conversation with Scott (the oldest son) about life, God, girls, etc, before falling asleep Thursday.
• Going to Wal-Mart to get a football, then tossing it around at the Lock & Dam park with Peter and Scott. Chinese fire drill on the way home!
• Meeting up with my old friend Alan, who is leaving with his wife pretty soon to be missionaries to Turkey.
• A YUMMY meal of pot roast, mmmm! Thanks Mom!
• Going to church with everybody, and seeing a lot of old friends there. Whatta-burger (a Russellville tradition)--thanks Dad!
• Another yummy meal of stew--thanks again Mom!
• Meeting Warren and Daniel in Conway for lunch, then walking around the UCA campus.
• Wonderful, heart-felt conversations with wise people: Dad, Mom, Miss Gina.
• Reading most of State of Fear by Michael Crichton on the flight home. This book pretty much single-handedly convinced me of the fallacy of a global warming crisis. VERY interesting read, and a tight story, too.

Alright. I'm gonna try to keep my LJ more up-to-date. Starting now.

Last weekend, five friends (Daniel, Darnell, Rachel, Faye, Tiffany) and I went to Boone. Last year, some of us went up there, stayed at Rachel's mom's house high in the mountains above Boone, and hiked Grandfather Mountain. It was such an amazing time, so we decided to do it again.

Four of the group carpooled out there, but Tiffany and I had work and couldn't leave when they did, so the two of us rode out to Boone together in her car, rocking out and talking the whole way. She was thinking she probably wouldn't go, because hiking isn't exactly a fun time when you've got a broken foot. But I twisted her arm, telling her that we would split off from the main group and have a blast in Asheville. :-)

We eventually hacked our way through the fog, missing one turn by about 10 miles, and made it to Rachel's mom's (Lisa's) house. Lisa is awesome. She's an amazing hostess, and had prepared two big pans of delicious pasta. We ate, played Uno and Jenga, the guys (& Tiffany) did pushups, and we all had a good time just staying up 'til 2am and talking together. Oh, and Lisa brought some fake mustaches for us to wear and take pictures of.

Saturday, I got up around 8:50, got a shower, and woke Tiffany up around 9:30. The other group slept in later, enjoying a leisurely breakfast of French toast (courtesy of Darnell), and they didn't leave until after noon. Tiffany and I left at 10, grabbing some breakfast in town before hitting up the Blue Ridge Parkway.

The Blue Ridge Parkway is gorgeous! That was so worthwhile! Tiffany let me drive her new Mazda 3 (woohoo!). We frequently pulled off the road to enjoy the beautiful scenery. It was a little late in the year to get the full color experience, but there were still some smatterings of bright yellow (Maple?) in places. We got to Mount Mitchell, where the road closed for repairs, but thankfully we didn't have to backtrack too far before hitting Highway 8, which took us to I-40 and then to Asheville. It really worked out well, for not having any map whatsoever. :-)

In Asheville, we arrived at Wall St around 2 and had lunch at the Laughing Seed Café, a creative vegetarian place. Surprised that I ate vegetarian? Well, I'll have you know that I actually enjoy vegetarian--of the Indian variety. :-) We then shopped at a very creative bead store (Krissie, you would have loved it!), walked around downtown (Tiffany with her boot), and perused a happenin' bookstore and coffee shop called Malaprop's, before needing to leave to meet up with the other group. My one regret is that we didn't have time to take a rikshaw ride through downtown.

We originally planned on meeting up with the other group at a Cuban restaurant in Boone, but a combination of fog/bad weather and a football game prompted them to head out early. I figured we wouldn't be able to meet them for dinner, but it actually worked out well, and we ended up in Winston-Salem at the same time, where we ate at Applebee's. After we got home, Tiffany and I watched Napoleon Dynamite at her place. Why? Because we felt like it, gosh! :-)

Last weekend, several dozen young adults from GNet, Grace's young adult ministry, went on a retreat to Ocean Isle beach at the southern point of NC. Some highlights and photos:

( below the fold... )

Last weekend, the junior high youth group went on a year-end retreat to Washington DC. Here are some highlights, in order:

• eating at Sonic on the way up there
• riding up with Kyle (a 14-year-old) in the passenger's seat, chillin, talkin, and listening to Pink Floyd and Coldplay
• the Holocaust Museum (heavy, but amazing)
• barely beating Kyle at a Rubik's cube competition (he's good!)
• the broken-firmament-style downpour on Saturday. Thankfully, we were underground when it opened up, so we just went to Union Station and had lunch at the food court.
• tentatively venturing out when the rain subsided, setting out for the Lincoln Memorial (which is at least a mile from the nearest metro stop), being caught out when the rain resumed, stopping at Starbuck's to ask for some trash bags, wearing trash bags, and the boys jumping to shake rain-logged limbs over the girls.
• the Lincoln Memorial (my favorite DC attraction)
• the incredible meal at Chili's. We were famished, and the company was great. Donald in particular told stories that had us pretty much constantly laughing.
• fearlessly leading the caravan to the zoo on Sunday, intrepid navigator Bernie (Ben's dad) at my side. (I think we only missed one turn.)
• going to the zoo, but being too worn out to see much. Instead, the dudes lounged around on a lawn near the entrance. We caught a second wind, I broke out my frisbee, and we played some hot-box.
• leading the way out of the zoo, and accidentally turning the wrong way down a one-way street. In my defense, I was following a fire-truck!
• riding home with Bernie, Ben, and Kyle; having a good conversation with Bernie; worshipping together; stopping at Subway and getting caught in another torrential downpour; transmission warnings (though we got home fine)

All in all, an awesome trip! I love these kids...

Last Wednesday afternoon, I flew to Little Rock to meet up with my old friend Mike (affectionately spelled "Miek"). Miek's stuff was mostly packed, but we hung out a few blocks away at Clay and Patria's house. Miek, something of a chef (and beer brewer), had marinated some pork in a scrumptious-smelling sweet cinnamon sauce. The plan was to take the meat to our favorite local pizza place, Damgoode Pies. They will actually cook custom meats into a pizza pie for you. But, they weren't feeling it that night--I guess they were busy--and they basically asked us to take our business elsewhere. So, we went to the supermarket, bought some ingredients, and made our own pizza pie. Heh, we made it in a casserole dish. It was fantastic! That meat was crazy good, too.

Thursday, after grabbing lunch and running a few errands with Miek, Miek, Clay, me, and an extra passenger hit the road for northwest Arkansas. We stopped by Russellville (my home town) on the way, grabbing a tasty burger. My mom met us there, so I got to say hi. I also grabbed a couple of long-sleeved shirts from her, which she happened to have in her trunk, ready for Goodwill. I had dumbly neglected to pack anything remotely warm, and we were going to Colorado. That's not the first packing mistake I've made. Ask me about packing shoes sometime... :-)

We got to NW Arkansas around 8, I think. We picked up Otto and Dan (Miek's bro), bringing the head count to 5. We stopped at Wal-mart on the way out of town to grab a tarp and some cables. That way, we could strap our luggage to the roof of Miek's parents' Expedition and use the back of the S.U.V. as a sleeping area. The tarp, unfortunately, was very annoying, flapping loudly in the wind. For the first hour or two, the navigator frequently opened the sunroof to check on everything.
( At this rate, this is going to be a long post... :-) (pics inside) )

After finishing up the semester, I hung around town for a few days, staying to run some errands that I had been putting off and also going to Courtney's birthday celebration. The celebration included kickball, Courtneyball (a variant of Calvinball), and 4-square (or boxball as Courtney called it), as well as grilled cheese and tomato soup on a cold, cold day. Beautiful.

Then I hit the road, making my annual trip home for the holidays. This time, I didn't want to spend the money on a big long audiobook, so I did some research online and found Librivox.org, which has free MP3 downloads of audio recordings of public domain classics. I listened to "Dracula" by Bram Stoker, which was pretty good.

I stopped in Little Rock, about an hour short of home, to visit my old high school and college buddy, Mike. The next day, I got to see my wonderful family. Well, Mom and Krissie anyway--Dad was still at work until Friday. Friday during the day, I saw Aaron and his new (and first) baby, Emma. She is a total sweetheart--she obviously takes after her mother more than her father! :-)

Saturday, we drove to Amarillo to see our relatives. That was quite a journey. It started snowing pretty hard just before Oklahoma City, and it got pretty dangerous for a while. I-40 slowed down to 20-30 mph for long stretches. My car was acting up--one of the cylinders was misfiring--so I was in the lead, with my parents behind me. (Krissie had to stay home and work.) At one point, as we're crossing a bridge, I looked back and saw my parents passing a big truck, going maybe 40-50 mph, and they start fishtailing. They went back and forth, pretty crazy, for about 5-6 times, but my dad finally got it under control. Scary stuff. Apparently, the same storm tore through Amarillo, caused a 60-70 car pileup, and stopped traffic on I-40 eastbound for several hours. Yikes.

I was a little worried about my car. It was misfiring pretty bad by the time we arrived. I really, really wanted to get to Kansas City on the 28th for a conference. I was worried because we arrived Saturday night, Monday was Christmas Eve, Tuesday was Christmas, and I had to leave for KC on Thursday, leaving only one day to get my car fixed. But, my dad and grandpa and uncles and cousins all pitched in, as did AutoZone's car computer code reader, and we got it fixed Sunday afternoon for only $55 or so. Very cool.

I did end up leaving Texas on Thursday, intending to sleep in Northwest Arkansas at my dad's work-week apartment and go on to KC on Friday. (The conference started Friday afternoon.) I met my other grandparents at a Braum's in Oklahoma City for lunch. They said a storm was coming through that was supposed to dump 6-8 inches in some places in Oklahoma. It felt like forces were conspiring to keep me from getting to KC (the car, then this), so I skipped out on Arkansas and drove directly to KC.

The conference was incredible, and it deserves its own post. It was over at midnight of the new year, so I headed back to Arkansas on the 1st. I managed to stop by and see the Hotzes as I drove back to Russellville. It is always good to catch up with them. Tobit and Brogan were their usual rambunctious selves, and Cassidy is about to pop with boy #3. She certainly has her hands full!

Let's see...I went back home, my family celebrated my birthday with a delicious meal of spaghetti and garlic bread and honey-bun cake. Yummy. :-)

I drove back to NC on the 3rd, a Thursday. I left kinda late from Mike's place in Little Rock, and I also stopped to lunch with a friend in Memphis, so I was not going to get home until pretty late. Not far from Memphis, digestion started in and I pulled over to a rest stop for a 2 hour nap. Much later, in NC, I pulled in to another rest stop and had another nap. It was so cold! I woke up, hit the road in the wee hours, and got home just after sunrise on my birthday. It was a really great, restful, wonderful vacation, but it's good be home and off the road. :-)

(Note: I'm about 2 months behind on my posting. I'm trying to catch up. We'll see how it goes.)

Last weekend, 7 (incl. Fuller, Rachel, Justin, Tiffany, Aisha, Genevieve) of us went to the Blue Ridge mountains in NC. We left late morning on Friday, lunched at a mall in Greensboro (where there was a Sonic! Yes, I planned that out in advance.), had some great conversations on the way, and arrived in Boone by dusk-ish, after doing a bit of hiking in Linville Gorge. We stayed at Rachel's mom's (incredible!) house in Boone, NC. Rachel's mom, Lisa, made chili for all of us, and it was extremely tasty. She lives sort of up in the woods and mountains, and later we started up a campfire out back.

We talked about a variety of things. But, being around a campfire, the conversation naturally turned to scary stories. But, it wasn't just "scary stories". See, all of us believe in demons, and discussing demonic run-ins, in the woods, on a cold, dark night was, frankly, kinda scary. After one story, we kinda spontaneously decided to start praying. So we prayed. And prayed. And, some two hours later, we were reveling in the glory of God, who delights in his children crying out to him.

Sigh...it's hard to convey what that was like. There were so many things that happened that night. So many wonderful, spiritual things. I really believe the whole night was some awesome spiritual warfare. Anyway, I'll stop talking about that now because you probably already think I'm nuts. :-) Of course, if you want the full story, ask.

The next morning, we went to eat in downtown Boone. It was a cold morning, and we sat outside to eat because the restaurant was full. We got to Grandfather Mountain by sometime around 11am, I think, and paid $12 each to get in. (She gave us a deal; it should have been $14.) We hung out on the mile-high bridge for a while, then set off for some serious hiking. We got to the crazy cliff-face ladder system and the girls, minus Genevieve, turned back. We hiked on, and pretty much hiked our butts off. It was wonderful. It was also super windy. Like, dangerously windy. Especially on top of rocky peaks, with neither trees nor earth to stop the wind. I'm guessing that gusts got up to about 50 mph. It's probably a good thing those girls didn't follow us--they would have blown away! I still didn't get to hike the whole trail, though. I guess I'll have to go back again someday.

We left around 6pm and drove home, enjoying more good conversation. What a great group.

Last weekend I flew to Chapel Hill for Claire (ktria) and Ed's wedding. Claire matriculated at UNC with me but left with her master's.

I left San Diego Friday night around 11pm, taking the red-eye to NC. I'd never taken a red-eye before. I got my boarding pass and saw that I had seat 47D. I happily assumed that meant I'd either have a window seat (if there were 2 seats per side) or an aisle seat (if 3 per side). Either way, I wouldn't be stuck in the middle, right? Wrong. The plane was huge--by far the largest I've ever flown on--and it was one of those with 2 seats on either side and 3 in the middle. So, seat D is basically the only seat in any row that is a middle seat. Also, row 47? Very last one in the entire plane. So I pretty much had the worst seat (in terms of layout, anyway) in the whole plane. I didn't mind, though--it was kinda fun to be so distinguished. :-)
( In which I recount the sundry adventures and misadventures of your intrepid hero. Or something. )
It was such a fun visit! It really made me realize how much Chapel Hill has become home for me.

Sunday I flew to San Diego for a workshop. The workshop is now over and I'm still hanging out in the area with my friend Matt from Arkansas, but I figured I'd post about Sunday.

Russ drove me to the airport. I got there around 12:15. My flight was at 1:25. Everything was pretty routine despite the Orange Alert, until I got to the security check. I took my shoes off and emptied my pockets and whatnot, and got through the metal detector fine. My tray, however, didn't make it through. The dude stopped me, held up my keys, and said "Are these yours, young man?" Whoops. I forgot to take my 4" knife off of my keychain. I'm pretty sure I could've gotten in big trouble over that, but thankfully, I just gave up the knife and that was that. Yeesh. (I also found out I was supposed to have taken my laptop out of my carryon bag for the check. Duly noted.)

The first of two flights was to Atlanta. I sat by Luther, a young professional-looking dude, who was going to Atlanta to recruit teachers to the Wake County school system. On my other side (the aisle side) was Laurie (I think), a 40ish mom of two. She was flying to Florence, and was going to meet up with her friend 3 days into a 10 day tour of Italy. She had quite a tale to explain why she was running late!
( Laurie's Tale )
I got off the plane in Atlanta and hurried to the nearest sports bar to watch the last few minutes of the ACC championship. Our pilot, knowing that the game concerned many of those on a flight from the Triangle area (Carolina was playing NC State), informed us at halftime that Carolina led by 8. I found a bar with 7:20 left in the 2nd half. State was closing the gap, but we held them off to become the 2007 ACC Champions. Woohoo!

The next flight went straight to San Diego. To the aisle side sat Mason (or Davis, maybe?), who was in the Army Reserves. He was flying back from Panama. I don't remember what project he was working on, but it was basically a goodwill project to help out the Panamanians, so that was cool. The weather was just barely good enough in Panama for him to catch his helicopter to the airport. If he had missed it, he would have had to go home after his orders expired, which means he would have had to pay for his own flight.

To the window side sat Sam, a 9-year-old. I don't really consider myself good with kids, but Sam and I had some fun. We talked (well, he talked, mostly...he was a chatterbox!), we played rock-paper-scissors, he listened to my iPod, and he watched the movie for about 5 minutes. At one point, the lady in front of us turned around, smiling, and made a "Mr. Chatterbox" motion with her hands where only I could see. Of course, the flight was like 4 hours long, and that's a long time to sit still if you're a 9-year-old. I think another couple hours and I would have gotten pretty tired of entertaining him, but it was OK as it was. Mason also helped entertain Sam. Heh, Mason asked him if he liked football, and Sam said he did. Mason said "I bet you're a Raider's fan, huh?" Sam, of course, was a Charger's fan. You should have seen his face, all pinched up in disgust. ;-)

We landed and went our separate ways. I caught a shuttle to the Radisson La Jolla, talking with the driver, a Brazilian named Felipe, on the way. I got to my room and met my roommate, Alessio, an Italian going to school in Napoli. He was busy working on a paper, so I left him behind and went out for a walk. There was a shopping area very near the hotel, so I thoroughly checked that out.

Across I-5 there was a beautiful, shining structure of some sort. I walked a while and found a gate, but it was locked. A motion-sensing camera clicked at me. I retreated a bit, found a good vantage point, and just stared at it for a while. I was just captivated. It was so beautiful. (Here is a picture.) It turns out it is a Mormon temple, and apparently only Mormons are allowed inside.

I eventually left there, grabbed a gyro at a place called Daphne's, and got back to the hotel around 10:30. I fell asleep quickly and slept well. I fell asleep on Eastern Time, and awoke on Pacific Time, so I was quite well-rested for the workshop.

Last weekend, Sarah organized a trip to Asheville. It was a package deal, including 2 nights at a hotel, a day of skiing/snowboarding, a "brews cruise", and a bluegrass CD. I almost didn't go because it was expensive (~$130, which is actually cheap for all that we did), but eventually I rationalized and banked on a decent tax rebate. What an awesome trip it was!

We got to Asheville Friday night. I rode with Jason, Sarah, and Nico. keith_lee, Xiaoxiao, and Li rode in Keith's car. Our car stopped in Hickory for some amazing Jamaican food. Oh, man, was that jerk chicken good!
( Continue reading... )
All in all, it was an absolutely amazing weekend! Serious props & thanks to Sarah for organizing everything!

Last Saturday, Jason S. and I ventured to Marin County, which is on the north side of the Golden Gate Bridge. He took the CalTrain up from Santa Clara to meet me in San Francisco around 9:30. I picked him up, and we headed north. Crossing the Golden Gate was a disappointment because it was so foggy.

We soon got off the freeway and began driving along a 2-lane highway, through some really beautiful countryside. The goal was to get to a beach during low tide, which was at 11:16am that morning. We didn't make it to McClure's Beach in time, but the tide was still low enough when we got there to walk through a ravine to the "secret" beach nearby. This beach disappears during high tide. Though it was too foggy to get any breathtaking views, it was still pretty awesome. We saw live mollusks on a rock! The tide started coming in, though, and we had to leave.

We left there, went to Kehoe Beach for a little while, then drove east towards Novato. We stopped at a funky-looking restaurant named Peppers, which was tasty enough (especially since we were starving), but wasn't as wacky as it looked from the outside. A short drive later, and we arrived at the Stafford Lake disc golf course. That was pretty fun, though it was pretty hot outside. We didn't know the course, and I'm pretty sure it was more common for us to throw at the wrong basket than otherwise. It was a really pretty course, and pretty much unpopulated (thanks in part to the $8/car park entrance fee, I'm sure). We saw ground squirrels, rabbits, ducks and geese, and even several deer. We each found a disk while searching for ones we had thrown in the tall weeds, but I lost my new disc in some cattails by the lake.

By the time we got done, we were so thirsty! We even skipped ~6 of the last 8 holes to finish quickly. Jason was frothing at the mouth he was so thirsty! ;-) We stopped at a gas station to drink up, then started driving back to the city. We ate some not-too-tasty burritos on Mission St, and then Jason caught a train home, and I drove back across the bay. Good times!

I visited the only monosyllabic state in the union last week to see Jason and Sarah get hitched. What a fantastic vacation it was! Here's the full recap.

( Read on if you dare. Be warned, though: it's long! )

Wow, what a trip!