Sierras, etc.
As ladylita mentioned, we recently went for our first ski trip. My research group normally has an annual ski trip to South Lake Tahoe, but since my advisor was on sabbatical last year, this is the first time I've been able to go. Unfortunately, I don't think we should have started at Heavenly, but all the same, I thought it was pretty fun. By the end of the day, I was sorta starting to get the hang of things. Sorta. If by "get the hang of things," one means that I could make it part way down a slope before spectacularly crashing with poles flying everywhere, of course. Nevertheless, I thought it was fun, and I'd be up for trying it again, particularly on a more beginner-oriented resort. At the bottom are a couple pictures from the house.
Apparently, this year was a light year attendance-wise, so we only ended up with about 12, as opposed to the ~20 that sometimes go. I actually thought this was a good thing, though, because it meant that we could actually do things like eating and talking as a group, rather than splitting up into little parts. It's always amusing when your advisor cracks open the wine as soon as he walks in the door and keeps it flowing until everyone crashes....
In other news, we're on the lookout for our own place. I appreciated having roommates when I first moved out here, but I'm pretty much tired of it now and ready to get a real place. There's a couple of nice neighborhoods a bit farther down into Oakland that we've been looking at, like around Lake Merritt. It'd be nice to find a place close to where sam works, but Rockridge tends to be really expensive and overly filled with kids for my taste. Still, if the right place opened up, it'd be a pretty friendly commute for both of us, at least until her office moves to the still-undetermined future location that might happen eventually. Now the only frustrating thing is that I've been ready to move for a coupl months now, but our lease isn't up until the end of May, so we're just hoping to find something that will at least let us push off our move-in until early May.
Lastly, it's NCAA basketball tournament time again. I decided to go all optimistic and picked a Tennessee - Texas rematch for the championship, with the real UT (you know, the one that was a school back when that other place was still part of Mexico...) winning it all. Of course, it's a long shot, but it's just so nice that it's even a possibility this year that I had to go for it.
Finally, here's a couple of those Sierra pictures that Sam mentioned. This was actually the view from a balcony outside my advisor's room in the house we rented in South Lake Tahoe. Definitely a pretty place, especially with all the snow!
Apparently, this year was a light year attendance-wise, so we only ended up with about 12, as opposed to the ~20 that sometimes go. I actually thought this was a good thing, though, because it meant that we could actually do things like eating and talking as a group, rather than splitting up into little parts. It's always amusing when your advisor cracks open the wine as soon as he walks in the door and keeps it flowing until everyone crashes....
In other news, we're on the lookout for our own place. I appreciated having roommates when I first moved out here, but I'm pretty much tired of it now and ready to get a real place. There's a couple of nice neighborhoods a bit farther down into Oakland that we've been looking at, like around Lake Merritt. It'd be nice to find a place close to where sam works, but Rockridge tends to be really expensive and overly filled with kids for my taste. Still, if the right place opened up, it'd be a pretty friendly commute for both of us, at least until her office moves to the still-undetermined future location that might happen eventually. Now the only frustrating thing is that I've been ready to move for a coupl months now, but our lease isn't up until the end of May, so we're just hoping to find something that will at least let us push off our move-in until early May.
Lastly, it's NCAA basketball tournament time again. I decided to go all optimistic and picked a Tennessee - Texas rematch for the championship, with the real UT (you know, the one that was a school back when that other place was still part of Mexico...) winning it all. Of course, it's a long shot, but it's just so nice that it's even a possibility this year that I had to go for it.
Finally, here's a couple of those Sierra pictures that Sam mentioned. This was actually the view from a balcony outside my advisor's room in the house we rented in South Lake Tahoe. Definitely a pretty place, especially with all the snow!