Archive for May, 2006

Car Shopping

Published
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Nicole
on 5/31/2006
in Journal
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One of the things we did over Memorial Day weekend was start the car shopping process. Because I won’t have all that much money to dedicate to monthly payments on a car, I expected to get a small used car, probably a Honda Civic or a Toyota Corolla because they have good mileage. So we spent Saturday looking around. We looked at Saturns, Pontiacs, Toyotas, Hondas, Dodges, and so forth. The shocker is that both I and my parents had our eyes caught by the Dodge Caliber.

2007 Dodge Caliber

This was unexpected on many fronts. As I said before, I expected to be looking at used vehicles. And, well, at first glance the Caliber doesn’t look like a car I’d be all that interested in. Having moved N-times in small sedans, however, a hatchback was looking nice. So we thought, okay, we’ll give it a try. The first shocker? It’s roomy inside. Or, more exactly, the interior is designed so that passengers are comfortable. My father can sit in the backseat comfortably, which is unheard of in most small vehicles. All the same, it’s not big enough for me to feel uncomfortable in the driver’s seat. I’ve decided that one of the reasons I dislike being forced to drive my parents’ vehicles is that they’re too big and not just in exterior dimensions. As bizarre as it sounds, I feel more comfortable when the driver’s space is a little smaller. It somehow feels more manageable. For example, I felt comfortable sitting in the driver’s seat of a Corolla, but the Camry felt uncomfortably large. You can imagine then how I feel in the Windstar mini-van and why I flat out refuse to drive the F-250 pick-up.

And there are silly little perks, too. Like the Caliber’s auxilliary stereo jack, which lets me plug my Zen Micro mp3 player directly into the stereo. The test drive went well–although I didn’t drive because the model the lot had had a standard transmission and I can’t drive stick :-( But, all in all, I liked it.

So we started looking at whether we could afford to get a stripped down Caliber model with the CVT2 system (like an automatic but cooler in terms of engineering and better in terms of optimizing torque and fuel efficiency). It costs more than we wanted, but given the prices of used vehicles with less than 30K miles on them and the financing we can get, it turns out that I can get lower monthly payments on a new vehicle than on an older used one. Add to that the fact that a new car comes with a warranty and my parents seem to be sold. My father located an automatic Caliber SE down in Lexington and we drove over there tonight to take a look.

This time I did actually test drive the vehicle myself. I’ve been somewhat nervous to do so at the other places because I haven’t driven much recently and I despair of anything going wrong. But this dealership is in Small Town USA. Literally. The sales rep didn’t even ride with us, it was that Small Town. So I felt fine and I did great. I liked the car–which is in Steel Blue, by the way–except for one little niggling thing: it doesn’t have power locks. Now, personally, I find it rather odd that a car has a jack for an mp3 player but it doesn’t have power windows and locks. Oh well, I tell my parents. I can live without that.

But my dad, being, after all, my dad, starts thinking to himself, “But my daughter is going to have to drive through cities to get to Ithaca. She’s going to be far, far away from my protection. And there will be Neighborhoods and when she drives into one of those Neighborhoods I want her to be able to hit a button–click!–and be safe.” (I’m sure anyone who’s driven down Chester or Euclid in Cleveland know what he means by Neighborhoods; the rest of you can just imagine.) So he starts wondering what it’s going to take to get power locks. And, along the way, he starts noticing all these other little things, like the cover that slides over the cargo area to hide what’s under there. We stop by another dealer on the way home and a rep there mentions that on the next model up, the SXT, these power locks and such are standard. So my dad starts looking into that. Nevermind that I don’t know where the extra $1600 is going to come from. As my mother put it, “Justifying it is easy. Paying for it is another thing.”

So where things are headed, I can’t say for certain. It looks like he’s going to see what price we can get on an SXT someplace 40+ miles from here. The other option, of course, is to go with an SE and add some options to it, which means placing a special order. Which means waiting eight weeks. Which, you might guess, I don’t particularly want to do. Not having a car has never bothered me much in the past, but now that my own set of wheels has been dangled in front of me… Oh dear freedom…

We’ll just have to see how this ends.

Commencement

Published
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Nicole
on 5/31/2006
in Journal and memorable
. 4 Comments

Graduation

Now that graduation was ten days ago, it’s really about time for me to say something about it. I’ve got just about all of the photos I have from the weekend uploaded.

The weekend was a complete whirlwind of activity. On Friday night, after my parents and grandparents made it in to town, we went out to dinner at Anatolia Cafe with my advisor, Dr. White. That was a lot of fun. My grandfather could not stop saying how thrilled he was that I’d gotten into Cornell. I think he went into that topic about five times over the course of dinner.

We had rehearsal on Saturday morning, and, in the afternoon, my family and I went to the Honors Awards Ceremony where I received a 2nd place prize in engineering for my poster at the research symposium as well as a departmental award for a student who “shows promise in professional leadership”. That was quite a surprise. The other student who received the prize was a much more obvious choice than I was: he’s been president of the Case student chapter of AIAA and has led the Design, Build, Fly team nearly every year. I, on the other hand, never even joined one of the professional organizations associated with our department. The only excuse I can come up with is that I showed leadership in class and such. Even then, though, I feel like that’s more perceived leadership on the part of other students rather than actual leadership on my part. In any case, I was flattered.

My grandfather, myself, and Prahl

My family had a chance at the rehearsal afterward to meet Dr. Joe Prahl, the head of my department. Prahl is perhaps best described as “a character”. My parents still remember meeting him when I came to visit campus the first time. I think they were a little less freaked out this time around. Maybe.

That evening my family went out with Mark and Jessica’s families at Peking Chinese. As predicted, the puns were rolling. It was another one of those dinners that I honestly didn’t want to come to an end.

As I mentioned the morning of graduation, the day started out rainy. We all got our regalia on and headed down in the rain with umbrellas for the procession. While we were waiting in the line-up, the sky cleared and the sun came out. It turned into a gorgeous day not long before the bagpipes from the law school reached us. For the procession, all of the graduating students (undergrads, graduates, and professional students) start out at their school on campus, fully decked out in ceremonial garb. Different schools fall in together as they make their way in lines across campus. From Adelbert, the platform party, which includes the President, Provost, University Marshall, etc., leads the emeritus faculty and the faculty. These groups, followed by students from the law school, management school, and the school of applied social sciences, processed (also in full regalia) through lines of undergraduates. We had to applaud the entire time they passed, which really does a number on one’s hands. Eventually, we fell into step behind them and all the groups made their way into Veale, parading past rows of parents and family members who were held back by ribbons and volunteers. Having waited four years to participate in one of these procession, I was thrilled and grinning the whole time. Video cameras were strategically placed along the way so that the procession outside could be broadcasted within Veale. All very exciting.

Veale itself was pretty decked out. We made our way through the formalities: the giving of honorary doctorates, the key note speech from Julie Gerberding, and such. Hundert conferred degrees upon each separate batch of students, and we got to cheer a lot. There was a recession where the graduate and professional students left, and soon thereafter the undergraduate diploma ceremony where they actually gave us our degrees began. It was somewhat disappointing that I received my diploma from Dean Savinell rather than from Hundert, but such is life. They also didn’t read my major–it was in the program–but they did note that I graduated magna cum laude, which thrilled my family to no end. I was the only female aerospace engineering graduate, and one of only two aerospace majors to graduate with honors!

They had people stationed at the bottom of the stage’s stairs to catch people in case they tripped. The person waiting on my side happened to be the professor who was my freshman advisor way back when. He’s an accounting professor, so I hadn’t seen him in quite awhile. I had just enough time to tell him that I was glad to see him again and give him a quick hug before dashing back to my seat.

Christian, Me, Jessica, and Mark

After that ceremony–and its haphazard recession–we had a reception in Adelbert, which involved lots and lots of pictures. In fact, most of my Commencement photos are from then. I got to see quite a few people one last time, including Dr. White, Dr. Alexander, Dr. Prahl, Dr. Ritzmann, Chris, Tim, Lisa, Christian, and Michael. Of course, there were also lots of pictures with me with Mark and Jessica and my family. Really, I’m shocked at how many good pictures we got!

The whole weekend was a pretty bizarre experience. We were all quite happy, of course, because we were graduating, but, at the same time, it was terribly depressing because we knew time was running out. My family ended up going back to the Turkish restaurant with Mark’s folks that evening and having our fill of excellent food and company. We got back to the apartment completely stuffed, but nonetheless, we had to pack. I think my family may have been surprised at how quickly I managed to get things packed and ready to stow in the U-Haul they rented. Having done this routine a few times now, it’s getting familiar. They left later, and I got to spend one last night with my suitemates and friends.

I stayed up far, far later than I ought to have, given the early start my family had planned for the next day. But, as I was hanging out with Christian and Brooke and Mark and Jessica for the last time, I couldn’t resist. It was my last night living in a college dorm, and there’s nothing like that atmosphere for making friends and having fun at any hour. I didn’t regret staying up until the wee hours of the morning, even when my cell phone alarm went off the next morning. At that point, I packed the last of my things and stowed them in Mark’s car while he drove me to my parents’ hotel. We both cried.

My family piled into the van and drove off, making it back to North Carolina early in the evening. All of my things got stacked along the walls of the garage, and most of it has remained there. I’ve taken over the guest bedroom and have done a few things to make it my own: putting my own sheets on the bed and hanging my framed degree on the wall, etc. Mark is coming to visit for the weekend and is expected to arrive tomorrow. I’m really looking forward to that. I’ve spoken to Jessica online once or twice. Today she left amusing comments scattered throughout the Commencement gallery. Good times.

All the same, I miss college and my friends and Case. Even though I look at the degree every day, I can’t believe what it says. I’m officially a rocket scientist now.

Musically Speaking

Published
by
Nicole
on 5/25/2006
in Asides
. 3 Comments

One of the things I said I would do this summer is pick up my guitar and see about teaching myself to play some of the songs I love. I think I’ve overdone it for a first day: my fingers are blistered.

Class of 2006

Published
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Nicole
on 5/21/2006
in Journal and memorable
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Today is the big day. In a few minutes I’ll don my cap, gown, and stole, and then it all commences. In a few hours, I will no longer be an engineering student, I will be an engineer. Instead of standing at the sidelines watching others go past in amusing medieval garb, I’ll be processing with them. (It would, therefore, be fantastic, if the rain stops.) It feels, for the moment, like everything is coming to an end, though I know it isn’t. That’s why they call it Commencement.

Myst and Civilization Update

Published
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Nicole
on 5/17/2006
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It seems that I spoke too soon about Myst. It turns out that all I needed were a few little hints to get started, and now, now the puzzles are starting to get addictive. It feels surprisingly like my last graduate homework assignment. It took a little while for me to catch on, but once I did, it was pretty smooth sailing and it didn’t feel much like work. That same impulse to figure things out has hit with the game.

In other news, Mark was awesome enough to get me Civilization III Complete. I’ve resisted the urge to install it so far–I still have a bit more research-related stuff to finish and then there’s that whole packing thing–but I did start reading the manual. And I predict that, not only will I love this game, but I’m certain that my little sister will want to play it, too. She’s too much of a history geek (and possibly a meglomaniac like her sister?) not to love it.

Descent to Titan

Published
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Nicole
on 5/14/2006
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In honor of one of the projects I just completed–the design of an orbiter for a mission to Saturn’s moon Titan–I give you videos of the Huygens probe’s descent through Titan’s atmosphere. First, a small video with narration (10 MB) and, secondly, a higher resolution version (91 MB) without narration. (Via Wohba.)

I find it interesting that Cassini-Huygens appears to have flown directly to Titan rather than doing a fly-by of Saturn first. Granted, this route would probably have been a better one for our mission (PDF file!) to take in terms of fuel consumption, but with the limited tools that we had, I don’t know how well we would have been able to handle a crash course with Titan from that perspective. Still, it makes me wonder how many improvements we could have made…

End of an Era

Published
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Nicole
on 5/14/2006
in Journal and memorable
. 1 Comment

Officially, my undergraduate education is over. Classes are over. Project reports have been handed in. Final grades have been posted. I got all A’s this semester, and am graduating with a 3.79 and magna cum laude status. I must admit that I had wanted to graduate with a 3.8-, but I seem to be the only person who thinks less of myself for having failed to.

My research is not quite where I wanted it to be when I left. I won’t be able to conduct the last experiment, but I’m hoping to have it set up so that the graduate student I’ve worked with is able to run it once he comes back. The next few days, with the exception of Tuesday’s trip to Cedar Point, will be spent in the lab working on that. I feel as though I ought to have been in the lab this weekend, but in talking to others–my advisor included–it seems like they think it best if I take a few days for myself and relax. The rainy weather we’ve been having has only encouraged this lethargic feeling.

A bunch of us went to Borders a few days ago, where I picked up What Do You Care What Other People Think? and The Right Stuff. Both are scientifically-oriented people stories, which says something about the state of my mind, I’m sure. Much of this afternoon has been spent chuckling over WDYCWOPT; Richard Feynman and his stories never cease to amuse me. (As an aside, someone’s uploaded a copy of a documentary with him here, and I recommend it to anyone who has the time to watch.) Another thunderstorm’s come up: perfect weather for curling in bed with a book. Either that or sleeping, another thing which I’ve been doing a fair bit of lately.

Yesterday included a trip to Best Buy, where Mark got to spent the gift card he picked out. Among other things, he got Civilization IV, which I’ve been watching him play. (I, incidentally, got a collection of the first three Myst games, none of which I’ve played before.) I grew up in a household where gaming was not allowed beyond educational games, and I certainly played more than enough of Oregon Trail II and Carmen Sandiego (the third “Where in the world” version for those interested) to justify their prices. But I never got to make the jump from games like those–which were still directly educational–to games like Myst and the Civilization games, which, though educational, were not games purely dedicated to education. This is something I’ve always been a little disappointed about because I simply cannot count the number of times people have told me that I would love those games. And I fear that the time during which I would have enjoyed them–Myst, in particular–may be past. Civilization, on the other hand… well, the meglomaniac in me just refuses to let go of that one. We’ll see what happens when I get my hands on a copy. I’m sure there will be reports on how I’m conquering the world.

All in all, things feel a bit surreal at the moment. I still can’t fathom that in one week I’ll be receiving my diploma, packing my bags, and leaving for good. There’s no way to really express my sorrow yet because it’s just not real. I’m trying instead to focus on enjoying what remains in terms of time with friends, work on research problems, and in simply being here. In some ways, it’s kind of how I felt when my time in Tanzania was coming to an end. I knew that, very soon, I would be leaving a wonderful place (two wonderful places, actually: Tanzania and Germany) and wonderful people for a period of purgatory in a place that was unfamiliar and unexciting before making another move to something to which I actually look forward. The advantages this time are that there’s a good chance that I’ll be able to see my friends again; my place of purgatory is not entirely unfamiliar; I’m only there for a couple of months this time instead of a year; and I already know what I have to look forward to, namely graduate school at Cornell. In fact, as part of my efforts to look brightly forward, I will be wearing the blouse that Bill Nye dubbed “Cornell red” at Commencement next Sunday.

Cooking

Published
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Nicole
on 5/4/2006
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Weeks ago I got an urge to make some chocolate chip cookies but didn’t have enough chocolate chips for them, so I went down to the Village Convenience Store to get some M&Msfor a substitute . I ended up giving the woman working the counter a couple of the cookies when I was done. Today she saw me on my way out of Starbucks (with an espresso brownie!) and had to ask me how I got my cookies all the same size. Apparently she thought my cookies were really good because she said that I should open a bakery. I had to laugh. Mark pointed out that I’ve been wasting my time with this aerospace engineering thing. Obviously I should have gone with the bakery. I pointed out that my baking skills will help ingratiate me with any lab I end up in. Who wouldn’t like the new student who brings cookies?

It’s nice to see that people like my cooking, though. I used to worry about coming from a family with a grandmother and mother who were known for being excellent cooks. I feared I’d never manage to live up to it. But over the past couple years, I think I’ve improved a lot, in confidence as well as ability. Oddly enough, I now cook more than my mom does, and last time I was home, she actually told me that she was impressed at how capable I’ve become in the kitchen. There’s hope for me yet!

Analyzing My Accent

Published
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Nicole
on 5/1/2006
in Journal
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I allowed myself to get thoroughly distracted by Wikipedia today, and it was great fun. Somehow I managed to (eventually) make my way from Guy Fawkes to a discussion of American English at which point I decided to investigate some of what Greg has said in the past about my speech patterns, and I am pleased to report that my accent seems to fit best into the category of General American, which is frequently perceived by Americans as being “accentless”. I can’t say that I understand the phonetic alphabet and all of the terminology used in the article, but there are several things that I do understand.

While there is and can be no single formal definition of General American, various features are considered to be part of it, including rhotic pronunciation, which maintains the coda [r] in words like pearl, car, and court. Unlike RP, General American is characterized by the merger of the vowels of words like father and bother, flapping, and the reduction of vowel contrasts before [?]. General American also generally has yod-dropping after alveolar consonants. Other phonemic mergers, including the cot-caught merger, the pin-pen merger, the Mary-marry-merry merger and the wine-whine merger, may be found optionally at least in informal and semiformal varieties; however, the most formal varieties tend to be more conservative in preserving these phonemic distinctions.

I definitely display rhotic pronunciation (i.e. I pronounce my rs) and flapping (i.e. metal and medal sound very similar when I say them), and father and bother rhyme when I say them. I’m a bit iffy on the cot-caught merger–I seem to waver in whether they sound the same or not. I’m thoroughly off the fence on pin vs. pen–there’s a clear distinction between them in my speech. Mary, marry, and merry all sound the same, and wine and whine tend to, too.

By comparison, I have very little in common with the characteristics of Southern American English although I’m familiar with and can readily imitate many of the pronunciations/tendencies discussed within the article. With few if any exceptions, the pronunciations are things that I’ve heard but never really done myself. I did note one grammatical tendency that I do still use, namely: “The so called inceptive get/got to (indicating that an action is just getting started), as in the phrase “I got to talking to him and we ended up talking all night.” Get to is more frequent in older SAE, and got to in newer SAE.” I do think that I will still use got to on occasion.

Another one that I will admit to is the use of dove as the past tense for dive. I do have to admit, though, that dived sounds absolutely atrocious to my ears. They also mention drug as the past tense for drag, and I’m sad to say that I did use that one at one time. I typically catch that one now. The same can be said for dropping the -ly off of my adverbs.

In terms of Southern word usage, I have used yonder in the past, but it’s not something that comes up frequently, I must admit. I do love the phrase hither, thither, and yon, though. And I must answer a positive both on the roley-poleys instead of woodlouse and crawdad instead of crawfish or crayfish. My cousin and I used to chase those in the creek, which, incidentally, I do not pronounce as crik. I do not, however, call shopping carts buggies or jitnies or trolleys. That would just be silly.

I think that sums up my phonemic discoveries of the day. From there my Wikipedia search derailed into the descriptions of the Ozark Mountains where I grew up. It was interesting to see them refer to the Boston Mountains and Shepherd of the Hills country. Those are certainly terms I don’t hear outside of the Ozarks. One of these days I should really take some time to recount some of my favorite parts of growing up in the Ozarks. For awhile, I was very interested in the history of the area–a situation only amplified while my mother worked at the local historical museum–and I can still tell some ghost stories and tall tales unique to the Ozarks from memory. And the Internet seems to be distinctly free of the story of Mary Calhoun. I wonder if my parents would still have the recording of that story my sister and I made when we were little…

Momentous Occasions

Published
by
Nicole
on 5/1/2006
in Journal
. 2 Comments

I suppose that there are only a couple of exciting things to report from the last few days. On Friday I donated blood for the second time, and it was not nearly so pleasant an experience. The loss of blood volume meant that, after standing outside for the dedication of the Newton tree, I quite nearly passed out while standing in line for a sandwich. I actually had to be helped to a table and ended up going to health services after the incident. This was the second time this semester that I’d nearly passed out–with the same symptoms both times but different triggers. It turns out that I just need to stay aware of my blood pressure. The signs don’t point to this being a problem I’ll have to face frequently (especially with high blood pressure running in my family) but it’s something I should keep in mind when standing in lines, apparently.

As if that excitement weren’t enough, my nurses seem to have been incompetent, leaving me with a triangular red bruise nearly 2 cm a side set against a purplish background. It’s pretty hideous looking, although it doesn’t actually hurt. The interesting thing is that the bruise is nowhere near where they drew the blood. It also looks like I’m developing an allergic reaction there, which worries me…

Today was the big presentation to people from NASA. Everything went pretty smoothly. There were questions we couldn’t answer, but most of those were squarely outside of the scope that we defined for the project, so we were safe. Now I get to dedicate the next two days of my life to making this report as perfect as possible. Because I want that A, dammit.

Today also marked my last day of undergraduate classes. From here, there’s just one final, a couple of project reports, (some more research), and possibly one graduate homework and then my undergraduate career will be over. What a thought. As a kid, you never imagine that you’ll ever get done with these things. Of course, I remember a time when sixth-graders were like unto gods. And, now, I tend to look at college freshmen and think, “Oh, look at the little freshman! I wish they knew how nice they had it!” Goes to show how things change, I guess.