Road trip - Day 3 KS to CO

After weathering another pretty good storm in the hotel for the second night, we started out early (after eating at IHOP). Heading west on 70 was all we had to do for most of the day. We decided that once we got near Denver we would decide what to do from there, since at this point we hadn't picked which route to take once we got there.

Central and western KS were beautiful. See for your self:










We saw our first pronghorn antelope as we pulled into a rest stop east of Denver to eat our lunch. With the rockies in sight, we were excited to get closer and see some of the mountains especially after 3 days of flat driving.

As we drove into Denver, we decided to go up through Boulder and into Rocky Mountain National Park, see some sights, and come back out a different route to catch up with I25 that would take us north to I80. Here are some of the pictures from this part:














After making our way out of the part and the mountains, we found a very nice hotel right next to the interstate in Loveland CO. Our room had a great view of the rockies, the service was great, the food was really good, and it was a great price! Here's the view:

Road trip Day 2 - June 20 2009

Dad and I got a good nights rest while a bad thunderstorm went through over night. We awoke to clear skies and got an early start. The directions for the day were simple: get on I70 west bound and get off when tired, hungry or when nature calls.

We made in through Indiana pretty quickly. It is a nice state with a little more to see than Ohio, but still not much. I did most of the driving in the morning until about lunch time.

Next state: Illinois. Not much to say about this drive either. It finished up nicely with a drive through St. Louis. Technically, East St. Louis since the city is in Missouri. We stopped to see the Mississippi River and the Gateway Arch. The arch is amazing! I did not know that you can actually go up into the top. Of course there was quite a line when we got there on a Saturday, so we did not partake but we did get some nice pictures.






We found a rest stop and ate lunch west of St. Louis. I guess I should mention that we carried a cooler with lunch meat, bread, cheese, mayo and the like; filling up the ice and making lunch for the next day at the hotels we stayed at. I think this was a nice way to do things. It allowed us to avoid lunch time traffic at fast food stops and kept us close to the highway so we could keep on keepin on.

After lunch we powered on through, passing Kansas City and Topeka. We chose to stop in a small town called Salina KS. Dad picked a Days Inn, which to me was a little sketchy at first, but turned out to be ok. We ate dinner at an IHOP and had crepes, so I was happy.

On this day, KS lived up to my expectations. Not 40 miles south of us, a tornado was spotted along with strong rains and hail! We saw the warnings in our hotel room as we were settling in for the night. I went outside and sat in the truck, listening to a radio call in program that was dedicated to tracking the storm. It was pretty exciting, but I'm glad it remained far away. I did get a blurry picture of the radar map from the tv. We were at the intersection of roads, just north of the red:


Everything was fine and we got a good rest. Day three was coming up, with more of I70 to see....

Ok.... sorry. I have no excuse....

Well, I know you all have been expecting a post from me since, well, I can't remember when. So, I'm just going to start again with no excuses LOL.

Fast forward to June 2009. Dad and I completed a cross country drive in my S10. Yes, the S10 made it! Part of the exhaust few off in Nevada but other than that everything was fine. The entire trip was about 3100 miles, due to the couple detours that we took.


The first day started around 8:45 am. We would have left a bit earlier, but the windows hadn't been washed in my truck for a long time and Dad thought it would be a good idea to do that. We drove toward Maryland to get onto I70/68. From there we drove west and remained on I68 into West Virginia. Immediately into WV, we hit some rain. Not bad, but spots were a bit heavy. At Morgantown, we drove north on I79 towards Washington PA. The weird thing was, that once we left WV it cleared up again.

At Washington PA, we caught I70 again and drove west toward Ohio. This may sound like backtracking, but if you look at starting from Waynesboro it makes sense (it also avoids tolls). So, after passing through WV and Wheeling we were into boring Ohio.

The drivers in Ohio are much nicer than PA/MD/DC and pretty much the east coast for that matter. But, there is not much to see in Ohio so we didn't get many pictures. We took a lunch break somewhere west of Columbus I think.




After trucking through Ohio, we made it in to Indiana. Mind you, we are still on I70 and will be for another two days. We drove around Indianapolis in the early evening, so luckily we missed much of the city traffic. It looked like a pretty nice city, but we weren't compelled to stop. About 15 miles west of the city we found a hotel and checked in for the night.

That was day one of the trip. I'll break it up a little and do each day as a separate post, until I am up to date. That way, you can stop where you like while getting caught up on the stuff I should have posted a long time ago. :)

My goal is to post at least once a week, maybe on Sundays. Hopefully I can keep up with this habit, although don't hold your breath. You know how it has been in the past.

Another grad school update

I've got some more good news from Stanford!

University of Chicago - waiting
UCLA - visiting/interviewing Feb 20 - 22
Duke University - waiting
Harvard/MIT - waiting
University of Wisconsin - ACCEPTED visiting March 13 - 14
Stanford University - ACCEPTED visiting March 31
University of Pennsylvania - ACCEPTED

UCLA weekend - Saturday

Our morning began around 9:30 when the candidates and two grad reps met outside the hotel. Then our bus rolled up. Yes, we had an entire bus!

This is the Graduate Student housing. It was our first stop, and we got to look at three different options that are currently occupied by students in the program.

Santa Monica Peir

J. Paul Getty Art Museum

UCLA weekend - Friday

On Friday we woke up early and were met by our grad student reps in the lobby of the hotel. My roommate and I must have been a little late, because when we got off the elevator everyone was standing there, some in suits, looking to see who was coming. Apparently we were two of the four that hadn't come downstairs yet. It was a little intimidating having 20 people, all dressed up, staring at you as step off the elevator.

We then went to the Medical School, which we were told has a building footprint only second to the Pentagon. It soon became obvious of this as we weaved through hallways to finally make it to the BMP Office. There we had some breakfast, met the administrators and began our tours.

The first stop was the NEW Ronald Regan UCLA Medical Center. It is an amazing place. Designed by architect I. M. Pei, the light that enters the main entrance can make it's way to every room (so they said). We got to see a few of the imaging rooms. Next we got a brief campus tour where we got to see the Bruin, which is their mascot, the gym (very important) and other parts of campus. Unfortunately I didn't have my camera on Friday, so not pictures of campus. Sorry :(.

Next we had our interviews. My first one was tough. The guy grilled me pretty hard, but I think I came out OK in the end. The second interview was really laid back. The guy was a Penn State Alum who was originally from Lancaster, so I think that helped my chances a bit. On that note, the Head of the Department was a professor at Penn State Altoona for a while so that is good for me too :).

Then we had a nice lunch in the J.D. Morgan Athletic Hall of Fame, which is huge by the way. UCLA is WAY into sports, duh, and they are proud of it. I mean they have there own sports museum on campus, dedicated to there years of success in almost every sport.

Our day continued with lab tours. We hear talks and saw the research labs from the four different degree options. After all of this, everyone was getting pretty tired. We had about a half hour to take a break and change clothes before going out to dinner. We ate at the Westwood Brewing Company, which doesn't brew beer anymore, but has really good food.

Adam, one of our grad reps, offered to take people out on the town after the dinner. Most people were pretty tired, but a few of us figured that we don't get many opportunities to go out to bars in LA so..... Off we went. Six of us went to a local place that was pretty happening since the Lakers were playing and were on EVERY TV in the bar. Everyone was pretty upbeat, especially when the Lakers won. A couple people from our little group split, and then we went to another bar in Santa Monica called South. It was a pretty cool place. Lots of people, loud music, cool lounge areas, and pool tables. We shot some pool, had a couple drinks and then we back to the hotel. Saturday was another full schedule for us so getting some sleep was on all of our minds, especially those of us from the East coast. :)

A post.... with the correct time

Since I began my blogging when I was in Palo Alto last summer, the time on all of my posts is defaulted to PST. I can change it when I post, but I never remember. So when you see those 6:30AM posts, the time is a lie. :)

Well, this time it IS true, because I am back on PST. Although, I am totally jet lagged and it does feel like 2:00 AM. I just finished getting settled into the Hilgard House Hotel in Westwood, very near the UCLA campus. I found a Subway for a bite to eat before I fall asleep.

The trip was really good. My flight out of State College was a little worrisome when the snow squals were blowing in and you couldn't see the other side of the runway. We had to de-ice, which made us a little late getting into Philly. It worked out, for me at least, because my connecting flight was delayed about the same amount of time.

The only snag was that my shuttle driver heard what he wanted to here when I told him where I was going. I said "Hilgard House Hotel" and he said "Guest House?" and I said "Hilgard" and he said "I know Guest". So I figured it was the same placed, just called Guest House for slang or something. Well, I knew something was up when we passed Hilgard House and kept driving for a few blocks. When we got to the guest house I again tried to convince him that this was not the right place. He did not believe me until I showed him my letter from UCLA with the name and address of Hilgard House. After appologizing, he said he would take me there and all was good.

So for now, I will sign off. Expect an update soon... I've got wireless :D.

Getting ready......

Well tomorrow I fly from State College to Philly, then on to sunny California. It will be in the 70's and sunny in LA and I doubt that I will miss the sleet and rain we had today :). I'll be attending candidates weekend at UCLA. Things will begin Thursday night (unofficially) when I will meet some of the current students and other candidates. We will be hanging out at someones condo I think.

Friday will be the big day. Tours of the Hospital and labs, interviews, lunch, more tours, dinner, and maybe some nightlife (woohoo). Saturday, we will get to see some sites in West LA, have a meal with a faculty member in their "plush" condo in Pacific Palisades, and then some bowling in Santa Monica. Then I've got an early flight on Sunday morning.

I'll have my laptop and camera with me, so HOPEFULLY I will get a chance to update my blog while I'm there. But, please don't hold me to that! I will definitely have an update with pictures coming up soon.

Wish me luck!

Update on grad school

Here's a quick update on my applications to grad school:

University of Chicago - waiting
UCLA - visiting/interviewing Feb 20 - 22
Duke University - waiting
Harvard/MIT - waiting
University of Wisconsin - ACCEPTED visiting March 13 - 14
Stanford University - waiting
University of Pennsylvania - ACCEPTED

In a couple weeks I hope to hear from some of the other schools. I think I will have to make a decision by the end of March or early April. I still don't know which one yet :).

Routines

It is a good one though.... I think I'll try and get at least one entry in a week now to start. I don't want to over do it, you know. So, not a whole lot happening right now. Just settling into my courses and my daily/weekly routines.

This past Saturday, I helped some folks from my old job do some work at the Boy Scout Camp I used to go to as a kid. Camp Sinoquipe looks a bit smaller now, but still brought back tons of good memories. They are building a new dining hall and we worked on putting in an overhead paging system in the building. It was good to see everyone from ICS and to visit this wonderful camp for a day.

This week looks to be more eventful. I may go skiing tomorrow night. If not, maybe later in the week. Tuesday night we (the Society of Physics Students) are rock climbing at the local YMCA. The father of our club president is a climbing instructor there, so we get the whole wall to ourselves. I'll definitely put some pictures up afterwards.

Until then.... Stay warm everyone :).

Wow, it's been a while

Ok.... so one of my New Years resolutions was to update my blog at least once a week.... starting now :).

Well, I had a very nice winter break. I spent a lot of time with family and friends, while "recharging my batteries" after a VERY busy fall semester. Dad's cooking was probably the highlight of the vacation, which included homemade lasagna and pizza. Not to mention the 20+ dozen Christmas cookies he made. I loved all of the great food and company. Thanks Mom and Dad!

I'm back at school now and have finished the first week of the spring semester. This one looks to be much better than last, as far as being less busy. It will be a good way to finish out my degree at Penn State, since I will be graduating in May. I'll actually have some time to relax and have fun. My roommates ski and snowboard, so I've dusted off my equipment and will probably head to Tussey Mountain with them a few times this year. They have good deals for students and the mountain is less than 10 min from State College.

This spring I will also be anxiously waiting to hear replies from the graduate schools I applied to. This is another reason to keep my blog updated :D. Here is the list of schools and programs that I have applied to:

University of Chicago - Medical Physics PhD.
UCLA - Biomedical Physics PhD.
Duke University - Medical Physics PhD.
Harvard/MIT - Radiological Sciences Joint Program PhD.
University of Wisconsin - Medical Physics PhD.
Stanford University - Applied Physics MS
University of Pennsylvania - Medical Physics MS

I've already been invited to visit UCLA for their candidates day at the end of February. This is a good sign, since they must have liked my application. I will get to meet with people from the department, have an interview or two, tour the campus, and learn about the program. The trip will also be on their tab! Free trip to California... Wooohooo!

I really don't have a top pick yet. It is something I'm constantly thinking about, since there are a lot of variables to consider and it is a pretty big decision. However, by the end March most programs want to have a decision sent to them so I will have until then. Any thoughts? Please let me know :).