Welcome

The semester started on August 27th with a whirlwind of activity. This semester I am working as an associate instructor for Introduction to Informatics which requires me to be in lecture on Monday's and Wednesdays, hold office hours twice a week for an hour, teach two labs and help teach one. Getting used to that along with my new class schedule has been interesting.

Plus last weekend I met a friend in Fort Wayne at the last minute. It was important that we see each other and this coming weekend was out of the question with grading for two classes due next week and meetings Sunday night.

Fort Wayne was about half way between where we live and that is the only reason it was chosen as a destination. We quickly discovered there is nothing to do in Fort Wayne so we ended up going to Berne, a Mennonite town outside of Fort Wayne. There wasn't much there either since it was a Sunday. We knew that going in but the options in Fort Wayne were non existent on a Sunday too. I was happy to see him again even if only for a brief time. I don't know when we will see each other again but hopefully this won't be the last time.

One of the silly things I wanted to do while in Indiana was see the birthplace of Jim Davis creator of Garfield. I have been a fan of Garfield almost all of my life. We are the same age. :) On my way to Fort Wayne I took a brief detour to Fairmount, Indiana, also the home of James Dean. I got there too late in the day to see the museum but I did take a photo of the Garfield statue out front.

This week was pretty normal. I am starting to see where I have time to work on things and where I will just be rushing to get from one place to the next. Next week I am going to work on using that free time a little better.

I had a lot of fun this summer and was quite busy therefore very limited blog posts.

Here are some photos I posted on facebook. You should be able to access them even without a facebook account. http://indiana.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2279767&l=5d6ff&id=6852332
http://indiana.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2303510&l=e7ca7&id=6852332

After Yosemite Steve and I visited Sonoma where we spent two days going to different wineries in the area. I bought 5 bottles of wine. One I gave to my roommate when I moved out, she was really nice to me. The other Steve and I drank one night and the rest are now in the wine rack of my apartment.

Our next trip was Gilroy Garlic Festival/Carmel and Monterey. The garlic festival was a bit of a let down I was expecting more for $12 per person. We saw it and that is about all we can say about it. Carmel was nice the main attraction was a shopping area. We had a nice lunch at a small Italian bistro. Most of the shops were a little out of our current price range. It was still fun to look at the galleries and shops in the area.

From there we visited the Monterey Bay Aquarium which I thought was pretty fun. We saw all sorts of sea life displayed in a really nice way. That sounds odd to say but zoos and aquariums are all about displaying the animals properly and in an interesting manner. I posted some of the cool jellyfish photos I took at the aquarium.

Our final trip was Las Vegas. We left the day after finishing our internships. We stayed at Treasure Island. It was a nice hotel nothing fancy but also not a crazy place like Circus Circus. We saw a few shows including Penn and Teller and Blue Man Group. We were disappointed with the Blue Man Group show since I had seen essentially the same show in Boston and Steve had seen many of the acts on a dvd.

Besides shows we did a little gambling. I lost two dollars and Steve won over a hundred. We also saw a lot of the hotels on the strip. If I were to go back I would probably stay at Paris. I liked the way the hotel looked. Funny thing about Paris and New York, New York. Both have fake streets inside that are supposed to replicate city streets from their respective cities. In NY,NY the bottom floor is normal scale but the upper floors are squished. You sort of feel off walking through these "streets". Paris has everything on a decent scale where you don't feel weird.

The weekends we were not out of town which were pretty few we spent exploring San Francisco. I feel like I a good feel for the city. I lived in the Marina and spent time in many of the different neighborhoods.

I really loved the city. The only thing I didn't like was how cold it was.

All in all I had a great summer and got to see more of California than most of the other people I know who were out there for the summer.

I started my day today at 3:30 am Eastern in Bloomington and arrived in San Jose around 12:45 pm Pacific. It has been a pretty long day of travel.

The trip was fairly uneventful. I went back through the Dallas airport today where I was just last weekend. I almost felt like I was retracing my steps.

After I got into San Jose I checked in to my temporary apartment. I have two weeks from today to find a more permanent place to live. I am hoping since I am out here I will be able to get something. Apartments out her go so quickly.

My corporate apartment is nice, it is a good sized place right off of the pool. The closest grocery store is a Japanese grocery store. It is about the size of a regular grocery store unlike the Asian grocery stores in Bloomington. They had a few American brands but pretty much everything was not in English. I bought a few things of noodles and some tiny frozen fruit popsicles that are exotic flavors.

The closest American style grocery store is about 8 blocks away so I am going to go there tomorrow to get some things like cereal etc.

The area I am in right now is very car centric. I am hoping to move someplace where there is more stuff within walking distance.

I start work on Monday. I think that is when it will stop feeling like a vacation.

This week has gone by so fast. I leave very early tomorrow morning for San Jose for three months.

It is sort of a strange feeling since I haven't even been in Bloomington a year and now I am taking off again.

I shipped 3 boxes of clothes and kitchen/misc stuff to San Jose this morning and I have two full suitcases and a backpack of my tech gear that I am taking with me on the plane tomorrow. I don't know what I will need for three months since the weather varies. Since I don't know where I am staying I don't know if they will have the knives, pans, measuring cups etc that I need to cook.

Today I was thinking how strange it is going to be adjusting to another new place. Two completely new places in less than one year.

I am also car less from now until I get back. I stored my car at a friends house for the summer. It is going to be strange not to just get in the car and go to the grocery store or Target etc.

I don't have a more permanent place to live yet but I am going into corporate housing tomorrow for two weeks.

I start Monday morning at 9 am and I have to make sure I leave in plenty of time to get on the bus/light rail to get to work.

It is exciting and scary all at the same time. This feels a lot like when I was getting ready to come to Bloomington but there are a few more uncertain factors. The housing thing is a big thing to me since I am not sure where I will be living in two weeks. It has made forwarding mail a huge mess.

I am going to miss my friends but luckily I do have a few friends who are going to be in the San Francisco Bay area this summer. I am sure I will make a bunch of new friends at eBay/PayPal.