disappeared from blogging but wishing I could disapear from life for a while

Wow, the last few weeks have been absolutely torturous. I've really struggled with a sense of alienation lately. Most of the alienation stems from my self-imposed exile from life outside of the research lab. Since I am a rather social person and quantum chemical calculations are not social, I have become rather depressed and lonely. But let me back track...Why did I exile myself from life outside of the lab?

One: I take my oral exam for my Phd on Dec. 10th. The oral exam is meant to test your ability to defend and describe your research. But in order to defend and describe your research, you must know and love it. I can do neither, which has lead to many thoughts about the meaning of life and why I really want a PhD, which of course spirals down into an empty abyss of self-loathing and hopelessness.

By placing myself into exile, I decided to let research consume my being. Anything that was not research related was considered frivolous and must be disposed of. Gone are the big and small joys of my life.

Graditeam list - replaced by the Gaussian03 Users Manual
Dinners with friends - replaced by dinners in front of the terminal screen
Phone calls- screened and returned only in the case of emergency
Church - attended when necessary
Family - see phone calls
sleep - replaced by caffeine and papers
Boyfriend - seen 1-2 times a week for moral support (you can guess that this causes a slight strain on the relationship)
Instant Messenger - turned off

I even went so far to turn off my gmail news feed so I won't get distracted by inane newstories or advertisements for quantum chemistry packages.

So my life has been stripped down to my computer, papers, food prepared one week in advance, and meetings with my advisor.....and occasionally an hour or two with the boyfriend.

The problem with this life...it stinks.

I don't love my research. I can barely tolerate it at times. Being absorbed into my research may be the source of the mysterious twitching that has developed recently. But the thing is....if I want to pass this prelim...I have to learn to love my research. So I figure the best way to do that is to continue to spend inordinate amounts of time on it until I get to know it in a personal way. Love will stem from a mutual sense of hatred into a beautiful flower of brilliant research.

I must now disappear into research world again.

Continuing the Tour

Hi, I'm back...

After a one month hiatus I decided to continue the blog. My European travels may be over (for the time being) but my adventures continue. So if you don't mind, I'm going to continue to post to my blog. Hopefully people still read it. :-)

In the last month I moved, visited family in KY, finished a portion of a project, helped with Teaching Assistant Training, started my own course, and finished a huge fellowship application. Now that my 800 students have checked into lab and my room is mostly completed, I believe my life can continue on.

I miss Europe. I miss the sense of adventure I felt every weekend as I explored a new place and I missed trying new things everyday. But I've learned to appreciate the things I love about home. I love the Champaign bus service and the fact that I am walking distance from my boyfriends apartment (2.3 miles is walking distance if you give yourself 40 minutes to walk it). I also love visiting my favorite organic food store (Strawberry Fields) after I make my Saturday morning farmer's market run. I love the ability to use my cell phone to call home as much as I want without paying ridiculous roaming fees.

But I think the thing I love most is knowing that I know my country. I may not understand why we have 20 different types of yogurt, but I know which kind I want. I love not having to ask someone how to operate the vending machine or what type of food I'm ordering off the menu. I also know how to navigate cell phone customer service. I guess I just like things to be normal, so I don't have to ask for help every time I want to try something new. But at the same time, I know that after a few months of normal, I'm going to start begging for travel experiences soon.

Just as a precaution for boring days ahead, anyone want me to visit?

Dream experience?

So I'm safe in the US now, back in the same house I've lived in for 4 years. Walking to front door, my hands began shaking, not because I was nervous about how things had changed since I left, but because so little has changed that I'm afraid the past 2 months will turn out to be a dream. I walked into my apartment, turned the key the wrong way like I always have, opened the door, and smelled the mustiness that I've grown accustomed to in the last year. My bathroom towel still hung in the same place I left it 10 weeks ago.

As I walked through the door, scenes from the summer flashed through my mind. Watching the Hungarian symphony in a a gilded opera house, watching the alps zoom past the train window in the superfast train, walking through the streets of Goslar with my long lost German sister. I have to wonder, did all of this really happen? Did I really spend 10 amazing weeks roaming the streets of 7 European countries? Did I really meet people from 30 different countries? Well, this blog, unless I can write blog entries in my sleep, proves that I did in fact do all these amazing things, and much more.

I still have so much to write about. So much happened on this trip that the blog hasn't even begun to explain all the memories in my mind. Hopefully I can catch up on some of the amazing experiences later this week as I wake up 2-3 hours before everyone else (I made it to 5:30am this morning. But until I can write again, I leave you with the last picture I took in Marbug, which really makes me think that this trip was a dream.

MIA for a while

Just so you know, I will probably be MIA for the next few days as I travel from Marburg to Frankfurt to Geneva to Amsterdam to Chicago and finally Champaign. Pray that no air traffic controllers strike in Switzerland, the Netherlands, or Chicago and that I make all my trains (I have 4 tomorrow alone) :-/

As much as Reuti wants me to have an eventful trip...I hope its plain boring.

Tata for now!

Caught unawares....but at least I had my towel

I leave for the US on Wednesday but I had to check out of my dorm today. However, I didn't know that I had to check out of my dorm today. I got up around 8:45...headed to the shower. I share a shower with 15 other people...which you might think is gross, but people keep the shower clean so its really not that bad. But I have to walk down the hall to use the shower.

Anyways, I'm down the hall, taking a shower, shampooing my hair, when someone bangs really loud on the door. I wonder if the door is going to crash in. Then I hear a female voice yelling "drei hundert neunzehn"....which is my room number. I turn off the shower, get soap in my eyes and yell back. "Ya, drei hundert neunzehn" . She then bangs on the door again and yells something in German...I have no idea what she said....I listen...I pause...and I reply "Ich verstehe nicht"....(I don't understand) to which she says another 30 words in German of which the only part I understand is "aus".....which ussually comes paired with questions that ask about travel. I then realize that someone was coming to see me....and apparantly they wanted to know when I'm leaving. I reply...with my very limited German "Dienstag!" (Tuesday)....she then says .aa/s.mdf/.amdsf;lasjksdf;ljsa or something....I have no idea....and walks away. Thinking that the exchange was over...I finish my shower....get the soap out of my eyes...and wrap up in a towel for the 5 meter walk back to my room.

I step into the hallway, wearing just a towel (I time my escape so no one sees me) and rush to my door...only to be blocked by a large woman dressed in white with hair the color of a coke bottle. She clutched what looked to be 2 folders, one with my name emblazoned across the top. Before letting me into my room, she proceeds to pester me with questions in very fast german....questions that I only catch one or two words of before becoming completely lost. I listen and listen..and eventually figure out that she wanted to know when I was leaving and if I paid my deposit. I say yes, and then say that I'm going to pay my rent that very day. During this time she grabs a tall Arabic guy and asks him to translate for us....even though I'm standing in the hallway wearing nothing but a towel!!!!

We then finish our conversation outside, after which she explains that she needs to see my room, but she doesn't give me the option to dress beforehand. So I open the door to my room, dreading her expression. I had just started packing and entire closet now lay between my floor and bed...sorted into piles that only I understood. I had not cleaned the sink (a task I saved for tonight) and my desk was covered in piles of dead moths (another task for this evening). She quickly walked through the room, with me hurriedly throwing things into a suitcase with one hand and grasping my towel with the other. She then told me that I would be charged a cleaning fee....(not surprised considering the state of my room). And then she left, leaving the door open so everyone could see me in my towel. :-/

I closed the door, quickly dressed, and then began cleaning the room. However, damage had been done, I would now be charged a cleaning fee, all because I had no idea that I had to check out one day before I left. :-/

Thus ends my story.

The Moral: Never leave without your towel.

Success!!!`

As the title suggests...I achieved success today as the 11th person in Marburg to obtain a copy of Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows. The evening started around 10pm when Amir and I walked to the city center (busses stopped running so we had to walk.


After wandering around for a bit, we finally found the bookstore that sold the book at this hour.

Around 12:30, a line began to form, so we decided to get in line.

By 1am, the line stretched around the block.

But at 1:01, the doors opened and we all walked in to obtain our copy of the book, which was even gift wrapped for us. :-)


So here I am with the bag...and the book...



I'm happy to report that the ending is...........

addendum to Harry Potter post

I should also add that I was able to watch the fourth movie in Germany this week...in English even. I'm beginning to wonder why I need to go back to the states...I can get all the books and watch all the movies I want.