Day Twelve Summer 2010 - It's a small world afterall

My lab team - what are the odds that 33 people can number to eleven and team seven all have Js for the first name?

On the austere Amherst campus I enjoyed to very modern integrated science building with lots of glass and metal work and wood.
The hands on activities and the lectures that I could download online and follow along and make notes on the slides as they went was very cool. And matter of factly in his summer lecture shorts, Mark, showed a slide where he was testifying before Congress on the impact of Nanotechnology for the future and importance of supporting research.

Mark and Buzz, my new physics teacher buddy, from Uttica, NY, who GPS-ed us on his Garmin to our first gathering

And young PhD Jonathan lectured and got queried by me about a diagram with a QCM (Quartz Crystal Monitor) - it vibrates at a certain frequency when the vapors hit it and let the lab technicians know when enough mass is coated on the surface (by the way his doctorate is from MIT).

All of that was cool and being the lone person below Kentucky was fun. I am the token Southerner. The farthest south anyone was from beside me was Michael from Cincinnati, Ohio - who shared his analysis of why it was not a great city yet - too many provincial factions of very small neighborhoods that claimed their identity and did not cross over or collaborate much.

But the coolest thing was getting in the elevator after a long run and after a refreshing shower and donning my last clean shirt that had Velma Jackson on it (I went to Target and bought a few more so I would not have to do laundry). The young African American coed asked if Velma Jackson was in Mississippi. Yes. I asked her where she lived and she said Jackson which is where I live. How wild is that? She graduated from Lanier High School and Jackson State University. (I told her to give me some dap and how I was so tired of these d--- yankees (not really) and she affirmed, "tell me about it.") It gets more interesting. In texting with one of my young Jackson friends later, she inquired about what was her name. When I said Darla, she knew her right way and texted that is Darla K--- who is super smart.

It is a small world after all - how appropriate in a workshop where I am studying things very small at a billionth of a meter (a billionth of the diameter of the earth would be the diameter of a nickel).

Day Eleven Summer 2010 - First Day at College

Day Ten Summer 2010 - Simplify, Simplify, Simplify

Day Nine Summer 2010 - Drive On

Day Eight Summer 2010 - Perception and Reality

Day Seven Summer 2010 - Stand up if you are a runner

My friend, Joe, spared making me swim with him before the run at 9:30 though he provoked me til the end. After his three quarter mile swim, I decided to give a run a chance after a six month plus layoff. He said I needed a hat for sun protection - don't argue with Joe. He gave me the one that he received at a gathering where they asked everyone to stand if they had served in the military. See me sport it.



I finished 21 minutes before a warm-up and 21.5 after at a very slow pace but it felt good to be back into running again.

The rest of the day was very relaxing.

Day Six Summer 2010 - As easy as falling off a bike (and loosing glasses)

Joe and Heather Biola

And another great day rushed into since I slept til 7 and Joe wanted to ride at 8. I barely got my morning stuff done and no blogging. And a quick yogurt for breakfast and some almonds and quickly stuck my glasses and snacks in the bag and off.

I clipped in and off we went and I fell off at the first stop since I could not get out of them quick enough. This was a sign of things to come unfortunately. We stopped early for spring water that trickled down the mountain and would not have been noticed except by someone who had been this way a hundred times before.



I went down at least three or four more times and Joe got a huge kick out of that and when Heather was talking about the historic battle at Rich Mountain Joe talked about making a reenactment film with me falling off my bike. The worst fall was when I was going up an steep uphill that I could not pull and tried to dismount but got thrown to the side of the road and got the knee and elbow digs and the palm of the hand plug and (later when we got to the turnaround point realized that is where my glasses were probably thrown off the bike too). Oh well another pair – on one of my trips after a long ride through the rain on Blue1 across the state of Tennessee I stopped at Wal-mart and left my glasses on the shelf above the sink in the bathroom for about five minutes until I realized I had left them and came back and they were stolen, and on a series of physics competitions with students in 2001 I went through three pairs of glasses in the month of February. I am hard on glasses.

The last fall was when I had finally gotten back on my recumbent after having an awful time and realizing it was in a big gear, I got to the top of the hill and started down Joe said stop a minute I want you to see my gear. Down for the last time. No more clips for this ride. At the turnaround point I duct taped the bottom of my shoes and the pedals so it would not happen again (though my left foot seemed to find a way to lock in anyway – but I was spared further humiliation).

On the way back we took a brief ride on 219 and it was unsettling to say the least with no bike lanes and going over a curvy bridge with a dump truck roaring by two inches from my elbow. We did make it to Beverly where the covered bridge was whose beams are in the Joe and Heather’s house where she grew up. It is also the place where the first telegraphs were used to send battle news to Washington.

Along the way there were beautiful postcard views across the sprawling mountains and valleys and along the river and indigo buntings in flight and on the road to fly no more. Heather said you can go back and say you are at the Headwater. This river runs into another that runs into another that runs into the Ohio that runs into the Mississippi. “My grandfather says the higher up the river you go the better the people, and we are at the Headwater.”

On the way back I got way ahead and made a wrong turn less than two miles from home and took a two mile detour until I realized it was not familiar and stopped a man on the road to get directions. Then another woman at a stop sign and she said turn right here and it will take you into town. Joe and Heather were having lunch when I arrived and I joined them.

My 38-mile trip ended up being 41. Later it was fiddlers in the park on Wednesday and I heard some classic West Virginia tunes from a group circled in the park two autoharps, two dulcimers and two guitars. And then we took another trip to the El Gran Sabor to hear a not so good young guitarist after supper at a place that served Grand Lake Elliot Ness and home.

We are running in the morning for a change. He wants me to swim before hand but he does not always get what he wants which is unusual for Joe the ex Marine and Progressive insurance exec and ironically liberal Democrat and one of the most generous people I know but don't tell him he already thinks he is in the fourth stage of manhood - wisdom.

Enjoy the ride.