Neskowin

We couldn't remember the last time we went to the coast, so it's definitely been several months. And since there was sunshine with cold and crispy air today, we decided to drive to Neskowin to enjoy some quality time at the beach.

And as always, we had a blast. Pepper and I ran for quite a while; he thoroughly enjoyed being off-leash. And since he was a good dog and came every time I called him, we extended that off leash period for a good chunk of the walk (only leashing him up when there were other dogs or people).

There must have been quite a storm recently. Big parts of the dunes had been washed away as you can see here, with Jan and Pepper for reference. In the past that part would gently slope upward.

Sherwood Ice Rink

For the first time in a long time we decided to go ice skating again. We couldn't remember, although I am sure we have photos of the last time somewhere here on this blog, but since we moved to Oregon in 2008 we've only been once. So... it wasn't too surprising that our skates had felt a bit neglected and had a few spots of rust on them. First order of business - directly after finding a parking spot and standing in line for quite a while (that place was PACKED!) - get the skates sharpened. The guy did it for $10 for both pairs, which I thought was a really good price (they had a sign saying that it would be between $20 and $30 per pair).
Here's us, waiting for the skates to be done.


And on the ice we went. It was pretty slippery at first, but we got used to it, at least somewhat, pretty quickly. Because it was so crowded I spent a lot of time just looking left and right, trying to avoid collisions with others who were not watching where they were going, or who were fighting to stay up and losing. So many folks just dropped down right in front of me. Besides that it was a lot of fun.

At 3 they told everyone to get off the ice to redo the surface. Jan and I had a coffee while we watched them make the ice all nice and shiny again. (We did leave the ice a bit earlier, not knowing that they'd have a break at 3, which made the line to the coffee place significantly shorter for us!)

It was a lot of fun skating on the fresh ice. No bumps, and not as many people back from their break yet. Even though, I didn't last long. My muscles were absolutely fine, but my feet were killing me. Have they grown over the last years??? Or have the skates been this small ever since I bought them?

Oh, and have a look at this ad that was placed prominently above the rink:

Christmas 2015 - II

Forgot to add these! Just as last year we went to the race way in Portland for our (now!) annual Christmas lights ooh-ing and aaaah-ing, followed by a nice dinner together. Some of the photos Jan took turned out really well!

  

And because it's so much fun - here's our resident Swagway expert!

Christmas 2015

Christmas this year was very low key and calm with just the two of us (plus pets, of course). Jan did some last minute shopping in the morning, had a nice walk (mostly dry, even!), and then prepped dinner. Meat fondue, as always, but this year also with some bison. Yummy.

After dinner we could *finally* open the presents. They had been taunting me for WEEKS by now!!! Here's the moment when I unwrapped my brand-new shiny Surface Book (and when I said to Jan "You're crazy!" because it's so pricey!). LOVE it. In fact, I am writing this update on it. The keyboard is fantastic, very responsive and I like the clicking sound it makes (funny, I know).

I had a little scare when I started it up and it wouldn't let me log in with my Microsoft account. But after updating everything and restarting all was good. Phew! Abby was a big helper, of course!

Just in time, we received a package from Helga and Wolfgang. The bow from one of the presents was a perfect fit for our pooch, and look at him pose!

I am also excited about the pizza cutter and server. Time to make some again!
UPDATE:  Here's the pizza cutter in action. Nevermind the thick dough, we had some issues. BUT, the cutter works beautifully!

That green thing in the photo is Jan's present: A Swagway X1, one of those hoverboards that people go nuts about. It took a few minutes to get used to it, but look at my hubby ride it in confidence! (Also note Abby sitting on the counter top - probably a very sensible decisions :)).

We took it for a spin in the evening, and while there were a few uh-oh moments, Jan's incredible sense of balance helped him out and he didn't fall. Encouraged by that success we took it on our long morning walk on the 25th.

No falling, but for some reason the red light indicating that the board is unbalanced kept coming on, which made for brief bursts of riding followed by switching on and off and even resetting it. Hm... It's possible that Jan is unbalanced himself since he's just learning how to do it. Let's hope it's not something more serious! I sent an email to the company to see if that's something they've seen before. In the mean time, we read up on how to properly reset it (which seemed to help), and Jan just finished opening it up and checking all the connections (some may have been a bit loose, we'll see). Fingers crossed! (Update from tonight: That really seems to solve the issue. We can get a lot more distance out of it, and it gets worse and worse the longer we go. So clearly there is some loose connection. Jan's been trying to fix it with electrical tape. It's better, but not there yet. We'll keep you posted!)

Earlier today I rode it inside as well (outside is still a very different matter!). FUN!

'Tis the season...

... when even the cats love to spend time with one another!

Christmas cookies - part 2

And here are the remaining ones. From left to right:



Chocolate-sugar roll (to be honest, this is just from the chocolate and sugar cookie dough leftovers :D)
triple chocolate heart (chocolate dough with chocolate chips and chocolate topping)
cinnamon star (with lemon glaze)
sugar cookies with sprinkles

Christmas cookies!

Here's the first batch of this year's Christmas cookies. From left to right:



Soft orange bar with lemon glaze.
Vanillekipferl.
Orange bar with chocolate drizzle.

More to come tomorrow, stay tuned!

Utah, part 2

I was back in Utah this past week to continue working on what we had started two weeks ago. The main focus this week was to build a permanent magnet Zeeman slower (similar to the one I'm using in my lab).


When I left on Friday we saw first indication that it's working a little (that's expected - now it needs to be tweaked to make it really nice and capture a lot of atoms). For comparison, here's another photo of the Yb MOT. Significantly bigger already!


When I left Portland it was raining (and Jan told me that it only got worse from there!).


Monday morning in Provo had a light dusting of snow on the ground,


and the snow kept coming.

After a week it was bye-bye Utah again (until next summer).




















While it was a fun experience, I am very glad to be home again with Jan and the beasties :).

Some more catching up to do

As every year, Billie and Rod invited us for Thanksgiving dinner. And it was fabulous!

Also as every year, I organized the Dog Days at Willamette again. Huge success! This year we even got a big poster announcing our event!

Utah trip

I recently received an NSF sub-award which allows me to travel to Utah several times over the next three years to work in a colleague's lab. I took my first trip in early December and will head out again today for another week. So far it has been a very fruitful collaboration!

Bye-bye Portland!

When I arrived in Salt Lake City it was close to 8 pm, which means pitch-black outside. So the drive to Provo was pretty unspectacular. So imagine my surprise when I woke up the next morning and the mountains were RIGHT THERE!

My morning walk to campus was about 45 minutes or so. 

 

The week was very productive. We successfully trapped calcium 

and all even isotopes (as well as one odd!) of ytterbium

And after a week, it was bye-bye Utah, and back to Portland. Glad to be home again :)