Another sunset
« December 2002 | Main | February 2003 »
January 31, 2003
January 28, 2003
La rentrée
Otherwise known as the return to school.
Last Monday I woke up at 3 am Eastern (midnight Pacific), flew across the country, got into Oakland around 11 am, cooked dinner for the house between 1 and 6, painted my room (with lots of help) from 7-11, hot tubbed until 1, then went to bed. Classes began the next day. I kind of like that kind of chaos.
So, classes. The oddest thing in my schedule this semester is EE129, which was listed as "Neural and Nonlinear Information Processing", and the list of topics covered looked so cool I had to see what it was about.
The first class, I find out that it's actually a "self-contained" course, because "all of this material is new" and invented by the professor himself. He and a group from Budapest have been working on a chip that implements analog neural networks much faster than any software can, so he decided to teach an undergraduate class on it. "You know that thousand-page book by Stephen Wolfram that came out last year?" the professor asked, "Well, that's only a subset of what we're covering in this class." From everything I've heard about the book, it also suffers from the "I did it all myself" and "I'm re-inventing the universe" syndrome. What is it with these cellular automata people?
And French, "Women in French Literature". All right. We have a book chapter to read for tomorrow (in English), entitled "The 'Risk' of Essence". Representative quote: "If essentialism is more entrenched in constructionist logic than we previously acknowledged, if indeed there is no sure way to bracket off and to contain essentialist maneuvers in anti-essentialist arguments, then we must also simultaneously acknowledge that there is no essence to essentialism, that essance as irreducible has been constructed to be irreducible."
January 20, 2003
New York - The Weekend
Why did I go to New York for a weekend? Well, really, it was kind of a random last-minute decision. But it was awesome. Christophe just moved to the east coast, and one day when he (probably facetiously) suggested I come visit for a weekend, I looked at plane tickets online, found the price to be reasonable, and went.
The City
Technically I stayed in New Jersey, but there's not a heck of a lot there. Mostly wandered around New York City. So, pictures.
First, the city has a lot of buildings in it.
Ground zero is, well, one of the biggest tourist draws at the moment. Maybe it's tasteless, but I guess that's the way things are. I'd never been to the city before, so I don't have anything to compare to, but the space did feel empty. Also, the streets around were lined with people selling twin towers memorabilia. I wondered how long after the disaster they'd waited to set up shop.
Christophe mentioned that before the towers fell they were *the* thing to see in New York for people outside the US. I'd never really considered them much before - they weren't a very big part of the west coast image of New York that I'd gathered. I hadn't realized that they would be a more important symbol to people across the world than to people merely across the country.
Also in lower Manhattan is Wall St. It was a weekend, so empty. And dark. All those tall buildings just cut out all the light. The sign was also kind of fitting.
There was a statue of a bull in the street. I think it belonged to some big financial company. I liked this angle:
Continuing on in that direction, you get to the touristy area where all the ferries go off to visit Ellis Island and the Statue of Liberty. It was a bit late for that, so I just took a picture of the water. You can see the statue. There were a lot of tourists standing around and taking pictures of each other.
Later we went to Times Square, which is about as bright and garish as I'd expected. The Toys R Us store was pretty darn cool, though. In the center divider of the street, there were literally hundreds of tourists waiting to buy last-minute tickets for Broadway shows. Waiting around in that cold shows some real dedication.
Around sunset on my second day, we finally made it to Central Park. Everything was frozen over, but the sunset was nice.
We also went to the top of the Empire State Building and took pictures of the buildings below. Lots of waiting in line with other tourists.
One mystery remains: how can such a rich city have such horrible roads?
The Weather
It was cold. So cold that one morning my hair froze between the apartment and the car while I was braiding it, and even my upper lip chapped, and I was still a bit chilly in about 5 layers. Brr. I'm reconsidering ever living on the east coast now. (Besides other cultural defects the region may have.)
Back in France
The whole weekend was in French. I had a moment of doubt after Christophe greeted me at the airport with a torrent of high-speed French and it was all I could do to stumble through a few awkward americanized syllables in response, but within hours, I was back up to speed. It felt good.
And plus, it's really fun to be a foreign tourist. Gabriel pulled that one on me when we were visiting Paris together -- one day he just decided that we were going to speak English, because he thought it'd be fun to pretend to be a silly British or American tourist. I protested because I've been an American tourist enough in France (and everyone at least understands some English anyways), but he was happier. But in New York, even though everything was in my own language, it was fun to kind of float around in a little French (or at least franglais) world. Waiters would kind of look bewildered waiting for us to decide things in not-English, people kept asking where "we" were from, and someone on the subway even said "excusez-moi, monsieur".
It was a strange kind of deja vu to be transplanted from the end of summer in the south of France to the middle of winter in New York.
January 17, 2003
Hello from New Jersey!
This is all very exciting. It's *damn* cold here. I am now rethinking any possible plans I had about living anywhere on the east coast. But this looks to be un voyage super-fun. Pictures when I get back.
January 16, 2003
January 15, 2003
A year ago...
... I was on a plane bound for France. How odd.
January 14, 2003
Oh California (the trip)
Featuring:
tall mountains * snowstorms * parched deserts * oceans of sage * steaming hot springs * one-lane roads * white buttocks glowing in the moonlight * two dozen strapping young men and assorted staff * rolling green hills * smog clouds of death * misty cliffs * roaring seas * majestic redwoods * the San Francisco skyline
This is quite long and contains many pictures. You've been warned.
To start off, we drove up 80 towards Tahoe and crossed the mountains, dipped through a corner of Nevada (which I'd never been in), then back into California to follow the eastern side of the Sierras south to Bishop. While we were driving through Tahoe it began snowing, but none of the passes were chain-controlling... yet. The day after, highway signs in Bishop warned that chains were required to drive north. What luck.
We stopped for pizza in south Lake Tahoe, and that was about the most interesting thing that happened on the drive. I took a lot of nice and slightly blurry pictures of snowy countryside from the road.
There's not much to do around Bishop. We got a cheap motel room at Big Pine (pop. 1500) at the Bristlecone Motel, had dinner at a taqueria in Bishop, then wandered along dirt roads through miles of sagebrush looking for the Keough hot springs. A couple links here and here about the hot springs.
There's actually a resort built on the hotsprings themselves, but the runoff creek that rambles through the desert forms several pools. We soaked in one that was rather wide and shallow and looked at the patches of clear sky with stars showing through the clouds. It was there that I saw for the first time the full arc of stars that form Orion's bow.
The next morning Hunter wanted to run a few errands in Bishop, including stopping at the optician because he swears it's the only place unfashionable enough to have glasses he'll like, and a swing by the DMV purely to show me a DMV office with no lines in it. Then we made the drive to Deep Springs. It was about a 45 minute drive across a mountain range from almost the middle of nowhere to truly the middle of nowhere. At the top of the pass there was a turnoff to the bristlecone pine forest, but the road was snowed over and impassable until spring. We got out and played in the snow a bit, and I took some pictures of the snowy desert.
Deep Springs is all by itself in its valley. The two-lane highway from Big Pine continues on from there into Nevada. I now know what driving over a cattle guard in the road sounds like. It's all kind of a blur, but on the first day I read a lot of Deep Springs propaganda, met the dairy cows and a new calf named Persephone, and got the general tour.
The calf thought Hunter's hand was an udder to suck on:
A panoramic of the valley and college (picture links to bigger image); the main college buildings are in the lower right.
Friday night while all the students were having their weekly meeting, Hunter and I drove a little into Nevada to visit the Fish Lake hot springs, a mossy rectangular pool in the desert. It was nicely built, and the water was a good temperature.
The next day, a crowd of people left on an all-day trip to lead the cattle to new pastures. We tagged along on part of the (animal) feed run back at the farm with a friend of Hunter's. The farm truck is this ancient blue Ford whose passenger door doesn't open from the inside and whose seatbelts haven't been used in ages, with a flat bed for carrying around hay bales. I was pretty clueless, but I did get to collect chicken eggs (this was exciting for me, but the kind of thing I got laughed at for being excited about). They had one chicken that lays pastel green eggs.
Then we helped cook dinner for a few hours. The kitchen was, well, industrial style like Ridge House, only everything was nicer and better maintained. I made a huge vat of pasta salad and a dessert custard (Julia Child style, no less) with fresh farm eggs and milk. Probably the first time in my life that I've had unpasteurized whole milk. I also learned that there are special kinds of cows for producing cream. The students were planning to make ice cream in a few days with the vats of fresh cream they had stored up.
After cooking, Hunter and I drove to Eureka Valley to visit the sand dunes. Apparently the boys of Deep Springs have built up an elaborate fantasy (joke) about a mythical Eureka Valley Girls' School in tunnels in the mountains separating the Deep Springs and Eureka Valleys. For reference, Eureka Valley is part of the Death Valley National Park, and there is no water at all in the entire valley. The drive is a long and twisty trek from Deep Springs to Owens to Eureka Valley on a road that twists and winds past rocky cliffs that threaten to fall on you, through the Joshua tree forsts, and finally shrivels into a lonely rippled dirt highway stretching absolutely straight into the distance as far as the eye can see. Unfortunately, the ripples in the dirt were rather severe, and after only a couple of miles of this when the dunes were in view off in the distance, Hunter wanted to turn back so as to not destroy the rental car. Next time we're getting a truck.
On the subject of the sand dunes, later on a student told a story in my presence about overhearing another student who'd giving an interview with Rolling Stone Magazine about the Deep Springs Experience. When he walked into the room, the guy giving the interview was describing the best part about going to the sand dunes as the boys' naked buttocks glistening in the moonlight as they slid down the mountain and the low humming sound of the sand when you slide, and judging from the quote that the magazine published, the interviewer didn't really understand.
I enjoyed my visit to Deep Springs, but I was glad that it lasted only two days. People did not address themselves to me, only to Hunter, and if they needed to refer to me, I was "Hunter's girlfriend". I spent significant amounts of time remaining silent in the company of people who never looked at me, even through extended conversations with everyone else around me, Hunter included. It was not a cold environment, and certainly several people did talk to me, but after a while I started to realize the weirdness was grating on my nerves.
On Sunday morning we got up while it was still dark outside to get an early start. A good number of the boys were already awake by then, and there really was something to seeing one make long strides in the pre-dawn light across the lawn to the boarding house where the cooks were already at work on brunch. We left just as the sun was rising against the hills.
The descent over the mountains was one of those "oh my god" moments the first time I saw it, with the snow-covered Sierras just appearing. I can't describe it. It was overcast the first day we drove through the Owens valley, so nothing prepared me for the view that presented itself once the clouds lifted. Pictures do not do it justice.
Later I took a panoramic (links to larger picture):
We drove through the desert to the south, dropping in altitude until we reached Mojave.
Then we turned towards Bakersfield, and the environment got quite a bit greener and more friendly. We drove through some pleasant grassy hills, and then as we descended into the valley, a thick black cloud of smog swallowed us up. I've never seen air pollution this defined.
Luckily, the worst of the it disappeared as we exited the string of towns around Bakersfield into serious farmland. Here's a view of the smog looking back once we'd left it (that would be the thick dark band at the horizon):
We passed some amazing vinyards that stretched on for miles (and a few signs advertising rather un-prestigious wine brands), and orchards of oranges and almonds. Then we neared the coast (it was only early afternoon by this point) and it grew overcast and very green. For a while we were going through these gorgeous rippling green hills where streams and rivers had cut deep paths through what looked like sandstone.
We hit highway 1 just below San Simeon and Hearst Castle, actually, and saw it on the hill as we drove by, but didn't want to stop because we wanted to get as far up the coast as we could before nightfall.
The coastline is just amazing. Hunter remarked on how curious it was that someone had bothered to build a road there at all. But what a drive.
In a curious bit of serendipity, on a beach not too far from Cambria, I believe, we saw a beach parking lot that was full of cars and dozens of people looking out into the water, so we decided to stop and see what everyone was looking at. It turned out to be hundreds upon hundreds of elephant seals who had come ashore to this one beach, apparently one of a select few beaches that they frequent, for a month in the winter to have babies and mate. We did indeed see some black seal pups, and we stood for a few minutes watching the seals sleeping there on the sand, whacking sand onto themselves and snoring, entirely oblivious to the crowds of humans watching them.
We spent the night in Santa Cruz, where Douglas was nice enough to put us up at the Wood Duck Inn (which is no longer a bed and breakfast but is still as charming as ever). The hot tub is in a fairy circle of redwoods, and all night we heard the babble of water in the creek just outside.
The next morning we toured around Santa Cruz a bit, through the UCSC campus, up through Bonny Doon (where the mist in the redwoods was beautiful)...
...and then down back along the coast, stopping at Natural Bridges to watch the ocean...
... and then stopping at the empty Boardwalk (which I swear is way different from when I was a kid, fixed up since then I believe)...
...and then in the downtown area for lunch.
The rest of the drive was uneventful, and a rather interesting re-introduction to densely populated areas. Highlights included a very Oakland pho dinner and Hunter rocking out to Bruce Springsteen.
The bay bridge experience:
It's good to be home.
January 08, 2003
Hello Desert
Here:
Mapquest made it for me. Isn't that neat? I had to put in some extra "destinations" (the numbered locations) to get it to trace out a semi-correct path, but there you go. Only inaccuracy is that we're planning to drive up highway 1 all the way along the coast on the way back, not 101/880 the way it shows there.
We'll be spending most of our time at location #2, around Bishop/Big Pine/Deep Springs. Total mileage according to mapquest is 1020 mi. That's a big chunk of California.
January 06, 2003
Travel plans
Jan 9-14: Owens Valley road trip, probably in a big circle through Bakersfield and Tahoe
Jan 17-20: Weekend in New York/New Jersey
Just so you know. Pictures to come after trips. Suggestions of cool things to see along the way welcome.
January 03, 2003
21+
For the first time ever today, I wished I were already 21.
You see, I needed some brandy for a recipe, and brandy was not to be found. The corner store was closed, the other corner store only sold beer and wine coolers, and major supermarkets tend to card. Eventually I acquired some because Scott was kind enough to trek back to Safeway with us, but sheesh. Less than a month left.
Oh, and Andronico's sucks for only selling really really expensive dried fruit.
My cake turned out nicely though, except for the falling apart bit. I'd post a picture, but it's not very photogenic.
Instead, I decided to share the picture at left. I snapped it Dec. 30 in the late afternoon, facing almost directly south.
January 02, 2003
Dinner and conversation
Last night, six of us who were bumming around the house decided to pool our food resources and make dinner together. It was a hodgepodge meal, but I think we still eat well for college students: caprese salad with fresh basil from the backyard, a romaine salad with feta and walnuts, chile rellenos, shells 'n' cheese, a cantaloupe that was in the back of the vegetable fridge, and chocolate-covered dried cranberries.
At one point in the conversation while we were eating, we started talking about when we'll all be grown-ups with kids, and how if we all lived close-by we could raise them together. Even better would be to get a gigantic communal house, but I think we all know that that'll never happen, despite how well it might work.
It seems to be a rather universal progression that as you get older, you need your own space more and more, until this desire finally culminates in the purchase of a single-family home in a new development in Pleasanton with your wife and 2.5 darling little kids. Communes were the domain of the inexperienced young.
But it is not so much harder to cook for eight or ten or twenty than it is to cook for two, and certainly more rewarding. Cleaning certainly goes a lot better when done in a group. Decisions are slower and more cumbersome, and privacy is less easy to come by, but, well, I guess that matters less when you're young. It's also hard to live with people who are changing, but we've managed so far. If only housing in this area were easier to come by...
Scarier is the imminent reality of friends actually getting married and having children. A significant portion of my good friends have formed stable long-term pairings, and graduation is fast approaching to force an exit into the real world and the heavy decisions it brings. Ack! I said I was getting old.
January 01, 2003
Happy New Year
Another year already. Both my roommates are still asleep at 2 in the afternoon, so it must have been a good evening.
I decided to abandon waltzing to spend the night with friends, and like all good coop parties, we started out by cleaning - this time it was the layer of drywall dust that coated the living room.
After that, we set out some good food:
... and started a "roaring" fire. This would be the starter block slightly charring the big log we had:
We all wrote our new year's resolutions and "best of" and "worst of" the year on the wall. A lot of things made both lists.
The Codeglias came and showed some movies old and new. They don't have a website made yet, but we need to convince them to make their old movies available. I don't have a picture of the movies, so here they are being cute:
When midnight approached, we all scrambled through the 4th floor window onto the roof...
... to mill around and drink our requisite glass of champagne.
At midnight, the campanile played Auld Lang Syne and we watched the fireworks being set off across the bay in San Francisco. It's hard to take a non-blurry photo while shivering.
