Mid-conference update

I am having a good trip so far and had a great day at the conference yesterday. It's a small conference, and pretty much ALL of the research being presented is interesting to me. My poster session was last night (combined with a cash bar social) and I was able to talk with quite a few people about my research. When I go the larger conferences, I don't usually have so much interaction, so that was really nice. Today and tomorrow there are more sessions, plus a field trip this afternoon (led by someone I went to grad school with). The weather is cooperating, although it is a bit cooler than I expect for SoCal. I am staying with a friend, so I get to get away from the conference in the evenings- which is nice. It's also nice because the friend I am visiting is one who I don't get to see very often. The only downside so far is that I have been fighting a cold since the weekend and all the talking (and shouting over the noise) at the poster session last night has stolen my voice. I don't think I have laryngitis, but my voice is sounding pretty bad! Plus- I keep waking up at 5:30 every day because of the time change!

Have a great rest of the week!

Another trip

leave for conference tomorrow night...

exhausted from cleaning house (I HAVE to before leaving town) & cooking for husband & daughter (some meals while I'm gone)

must sleep...

About Friday...

Despite my previous post, I was feeling pretty evil on Friday- or at least like a negligent mother! But, first let me tell you about my day before that... I went to the office again, since I was supposed to meet my advisee, have lunch with my friend, and go to a faculty meeting. Between those things, I needed to finalize and print (at least a first draft) my poster for next week's conference.

I am cutting this short, because it is now SUNDAY and I haven't managed to post the update yet! I basically had some mishaps with our plotter being out of paper (I had to print my poster at the library and pick it up yesterday- DONE), my network access in my office was screwed up again (apparently something had "fallen out of the plug" somewhere- NOT in my office- NOW FIXED), and we had a miscommunication with my daughter (she thought she supposed to go home with a friend- which is happening one day next week- and then when I was late picking her up she thought she had been abandoned at school).

Coincidentally, I am feeling evil right at this very moment, because my daughter just came into the office carrying a pair of sharp grown-up scissors (she was carrying them carefully- I'll give her that much) and asking me to cut something out for her (I think her own scissors are covered in glue or something). I yelled at her for even handling the adult scissors, so she has now retreated to her room to throw herself onto her bed and do some dramatic crying. She let out an intentionally audible groan, so I told her to shut her door. Maybe I sound VERY evil right now, but I KNOW she is only going for dramatic effect. I wonder where she gets that from? Must be from Disney movies... Is it time for my husband to wake up yet???

sigh

Silly blog thing...

Seeking Solace had a link to this quiz on her blog, and since it's Friday and I had a rather weird day (see next post later), I thought I would take it:

You are 20% Evil

You are good. So good, that you make evil people squirm. Just remember, you may need to turn to the dark side to get what you want!

How Evil Are You?

I guess I am not too evil, then! I'll post about my strange day later!

"N" is for no network

Since I am not teaching this semester, I have been working at home most days. Today, I decided to work in the office, since I hadn't even been in there since before the conference and Mexico trip. I stopped at Starbucks on the way in and happily arrived at my office with my decaf grande soy latte (my favorite!). I logged into Novell (if your company/university doesn't use this- just ask me later) and it took a long time to respond- this usually means that it isn't finding the network or it's having trouble connecting to some network drives. It finally gave me the "tree could not be found- would you like to log in to windows anyway" error, so I did the "workstation only" option and logged into Windows. I opened Firefox to discover that I was also unable to access the internet. After a few minutes on the phone with IT and reconnecting cables and hubs, disabling and enabling my LAN, they concluded that I needed some hardware assistance- "there must be a problem with the network jack in your office". Apparently there was a power outage last week, which may or may not have affected the network. Now, the work I needed to do today does not require the network (just my external hard drive, excel, stats package, word, & powerpoint). I stayed to work without network access and just went down the hall to the public lab occasionally to check mail. It was a short day, since I told my husband I would pick up the little pumpkin at school today- and it was early dismissal, but I managed to organize my correlation results into a summary table to go into my poster. I also went back to the poster I used the last time presented work related to this and modified it to use for this conference. After lunch, the network people came and saved me from my cyberspace banishment- unfortunately, not in time for me to listen to Al Franken while I ate my lunch. So, the network problem was hardware related- they said it's an 'age' issue- not even related to the power outage. I'm hoping that I won't go in next time and find the same problem! Bottom line: I got some things done today, despite the technical glitch. I hope I can print the poster on Friday and then it will be DONE for the trip! Have a good evening everyone.

Snow day

My daughter stayed home today, because our local district decided school should be cancelled. They were forecasting as much as 6" of snow by tonight (which is a lot for SW Ohio). It didn't snow as much as they had predicted, so I think they could have just done a 2-hour delay, but oh well. The snow day meant I had to reschedule a doctor's appointment and I wasn't as productive as I might have been (I can blame it on my daughter's presence, but she actually kept herself pretty busy). I leave in one week for the next conference and am scrambling to get ready for it. I am looking forward to the trip, because I am staying with a good friend and have gotten in touch with several other friends from grad school (the conference is in the city where I did my MA). It should be fun to see everyone there.

So anyway- today I did some exciting statistical analysis and need to look over the results in more detail tomorrow, so that I can get my poster together (no talk this time). The research I am presenting started as a follow-up to my dissertation- I presented some of it at a conference two years ago, then put it away (for far too long). I want to do some more analysis and write it into a paper this semester, so I planned to use the conference to get me going on it. It will still need more work when I get back, but hopefully I will get some insightful feedback from others at the conference- the BEST thing about poster sessions is the feedback and discussion.

I think I'll go watch TV with my husband and sleep early- I'm still on a weird schedule since the Mexico City trip. I've been staying up too late and barely getting up in time to get my daughter ready for school! Maybe I'll get up earlier tomorrow...

Back to work... tomorrow

Sorry for the lack of postings, but I've been ON VACATION!! We had a relaxing trip to Mexico City to visit friends for Spring Break, BUT tomorrow is back to reality. We came home from the Chicago conference late Friday night, then left Monday for this trip. It was my third trip to Mexico City, but first trip for my husband and daughter. We visited different parts of the city and also saw the pyramids at Teotihuacan. It was pretty hot down there, so we got to wear our summer clothes for a few days before returning to late winter in the Midwest. Right now, we're under a winter storm watch for tomorrow night! What a great welcome for the "first day of spring".

Pyramid of the Moon

Looking down Calle de los Muertos from the Pyramid of the Moon

Mural at the National Palace, Mexico City (Diego Rivera)

We had some interesting travel experiences this trip. We flew Continental through Houston. Both flights down were on Embraer regional jets (only three seats across). I was surprised that a plane that small could fly into Mexico City, but we did. Both flights were OK, but on the one from IAH to MEX, the flight attendant seemed particularly clueless on several fronts. She handed out customs and immigration forms right after take-off, including giving people the wrong type and wrong number of forms. During the flight, I informed her that there was no toilet paper left in the bathroom and she discovered that they were out! Isn't that lovely?? On the way home, we were on a 737 from MEX to IAH. I was looking forward to the roomier plane, but they did a bunch of seat rearranging. We had reserved seats, so when we checked in, I didn't even look at the boarding passes. When we boarded, I noticed that they had split us up- including my 6-year-old daughter. Now, I know that the flight attendants did not personally switch our seats around, but you'd think they might be a little more helpful about trying to resolve the issue. Apparently, they had done the same thing to several other families, so there were many of us trying to sort out seats right before departure. One flight attendant kept telling us to just sit in our assigned seats and we'd figure it out after take off. I'm sorry, but I was not about to make my daughter sit between two strangers! We finally got it sorted out and some people were nice enough to switch seats to accommodate everyone. It sounded like some others had even more problems coming from Acapulco and connecting through MEX. Our last flight was another regional jet and that was also fine.

I have another conference coming up, so this week will be spent getting ready for that one. I'm flying non-stop on that trip, so that will be nice. Once that trip is over, I can finally get back to finishing up some papers and sending them for publication before the semester is over. I planned to do extra traveling this semester to take advantage of the time off from teaching, but I have to say that it has been a bit hectic!

Conference done!

Whew! That's the feeling I always have after giving a conference presentation. I feel like it went well this time and I got some good questions and feedback, as well. I was first speaker in my session, which I love, because then I feel completely relaxed for the rest of the speakers.

The conference was in Chicago and I wish we had had more time to spend there, because it seems like a fun city. The only sight-seeing we did was to visit the Field Museum for a couple of hours. I did get to eat some deep dish pizza and good Thai food, too.

My favorite thing about conferences is getting to see friends from grad school that I never see any more. We've all gone off to different parts of the country and barely have time to stay in touch, but when it's conference time, everyone comes to the same city and it's a great chance to catch up with everyone. I also see former advisors and professors from grad school. I especially appreciate it when they come to hear my talks- it's been 10 years since I finished my MA, but two faculty from that department were at my talk this year.

I've got another conference in a couple weeks, but I'll be taking a break first!

Conference-ready!

I've been reading some other blogs lately and have decided that mine will be more entertaining to read once I start teaching again! There are so many great things to talk about when you interact with students every day- sometimes funny, sometimes annoying, sometimes just interesting. I have a committee meeting today- the only reason I have to go into campus. It will be a real delight trying to park on a Tuesday afternoon, too. Although, I'm sure some students have started their spring break a week early! I'm SOOO glad I won't be here for Green Beer Day. It's really best to avoid that whole scene. I want to clean house this morning, practice my talk some more (it's a bit short right now- so that's good), clean out the car for the trip, etc. So instead, I am blogging away! Alright- enough procrastinating for now.

Making some progress

Yesterday was somewhat productive. I finished some analysis on the computer (which I will be presenting at the conference next week), attended our grad students' practice presentations, and met with my advisee to help him revise his presentation (which I saw for the first time at the practice session). This morning I started searching for literature related to what I have been working on. I don't need too much for the conference talk, but will need to do some background writing for the paper I want to write later on. I also have a committee meeting on Tuesday and have to review some proposals before then (and send my ratings to the chair of the committee). Oh yeah- I still need to prepare my presentation! It should be a fun weekend/week...

March came in like a lamb

March seems to sneak up on me every year, since February is so short- I guess. I'm feeling great to have those proposals finished (now, if they could only be funded!). I have two conferences this month, which I am preparing for right now (or not right now, because I decided to update my blog before waking everyone else this morning--> I am the household alarm clock). My plan is to write both presentations into papers before the semester is over. I also have that other paper that got left behind during the proposal frenzy of January and February. I will have April and May to accomplish these things (after the conferences are over). Let's hope I can do it, so that there is no danger of me NOT getting tenure.

I took this photo at a conference in Baltimore last year. Conferences can be pretty fun, since it is a chance to see friends from grad school that I never get to see any more. Sometimes they are also in really fun places. The Baltimore conference last year wasn't bad, except that it was REALLY cold (below 20°F) and windy the whole time I was there. I will tell you about this year's conferences after I get back. Of course, if I was good at schmoozing, then conferences would be a great chance to network. Unfortunately, that has never been one of my strong suits! I meet some new people, but I'm not very good at those sorts of interactions (I'll tell you about an unfortunate incident at a conference in 2003 some other time).

OK- time to wake the family. I'll post again soon!