Buenos Aires! Part 1

We had a great trip to Argentina (albeit it was a brief trip).  Our flight from Houston to BA was cancelled on Thursday (after a 2 hour delay, and 2 hours sitting on the plane at the gate).  We had to deplane and wait in a line for an hour to get our hotel, taxi, food vouchers, then wait in a line for a taxi at 2:30 am.  We got to our hotel and got a few hours of sleep and then went back to the airport to get on a 2pm flight which got us into BA at 2am Saturday.  Long story short-we lost a day.

The flight was long but uneventful.  When we arrived at 2 am in a country where we don't speak their language, we weren't sure what we were going to do/how we were going to get to the hotel.  Luckily, just outside of customs and still inside the airport was a registered taxi stand where we could get a safe ride to the city.  We fell asleep very easily and woke up a few hours later to an amazing breakfast at the hotel.  Next, we met up with Mike's colleagues and took a taxi to a giant park on the northern side of the city.  The weather was perfect, about 60 degrees, and we explored a rose garden, walked past the polo fields and found our way to a Japanese garden.  It was very cool to just be walking around experiencing the city like someone who lived there.  Lots of people out running, walking, roller blading.  Also lot of dogs!  Everywhere!  but not wild dogs-these were well-loved members of the family playing fetch or doing agility trials or just out for a stroll.

After 3 hours of walking around we found an italian restaurant for lunch.  I had a great empanada and pizza and of course we had Argentinian wine!  I found out that there are a lot of people of Italian decent  in BA which made a lot of sense as we ended up eating at a lot of really good Italian restaurants.

Rose Garden

Rose Garden

Some large statue in the middle of the street.

In the Japanese Garden

More Japanese garden

Statue of Eva Peron

Hilton Head, SC

We had a great time at Hilton Head last week.  Mike and I stayed at the Marriott Resort and Spa and were upgraded to a top floor ocean front room. It was so nice to wake up in the front, open the sliding door and sit on our patio, drinking coffee, and watching the ocean.

We were pretty lazy (which was awesome) and spent most of our mornings/early afternoon on the beach and then had lunch at the poolside restaurant. Afterwards we took a nap and then spent another 2 hours at the beach before heading to dinner.

There were a few exceptions.  One day we rented bikes and biked 8 miles to the other side of the island and had lunch, then biked home (and took a nap).  Another day we went to the outlets in the afternoon (no nap!) and two mornings we went kayaking for 2 hours.

Unfortunately we didn't take many pictures-but here are a few. It sure was nice to have Mike all to myself for 7 whole days!

Summer is almost over already!

First day back at work is September 8th with classes starting September 14th.  Only 4 weeks left of summer :(

I spent way to much time at work this summer, usually being there from 9 am-4-4:30pm with a few Fridays off.  My measly stipend for doing research with students just doesn't cut it.  But no point dwelling on that.  I'm focusing on the next 4 weeks when I have no students and no classes to prep.

First order of business: Get paper back to PostDoc Advisor for look through before resubmission. (and a few western blots to run too).

Second: Vacation with Mike.  7 days, no work, just the two of us!  Can't wait!

Third: finish house projects, including scheduling a tree trimmer and driveway seal coater and painting the porch railings.

Fourth: Quality time with Cali because soon my MWF are going to be ridiculously long.

I hope you all enjoyed your summer!

Summer 2015 Home Improvements-updated

Besides trying to re grow our backyard grass, this summer we are tackling the family room windows.  This house has/had brown trim and brown windows and we hate it.  Last summer we replace the trim on the main level (here and here) and painted the trim on the lower level (here).  I also painted the windows on the main level (here).  Over the past week we have (almost) finished the windows on the lower level .  One more coat is needed and I'll take pictures once it is finished and update this blog post.  For now-Here is the before.

The After!!!

It's summer time!

Finals are graded, grades are submitted.  I am officially on summer vacation!!!

Well, kind of.  Summer research starts on Monday and I will have two undergraduates with me 30 hours a week for the next 8 weeks.  It is a lot of fun but also a lot of work.  I am looking forward to it but also to August 7th when it's over.

Mike and I will be heading to Hilton Head, SC in August for a much deserved vacation together!  And we might be taking another trip too but we haven't solidified the details so I'll wait on telling you about that one.

I celebrated being finished with some white wine sangria that I made and Cali enjoyed a dip in the pool.  I made time for a summer hair cut too! Even though I'm still working-it is much nicer pace and I am looking forward to relaxing some.  You will probably see picture of painting projects again this summer!

Happy Spring!

Where has the time gone?

Wow, it's been a while since I last posted anything.  I don't actually know if anyone reads this anymore.  I feel like blogs are kind of 2005 not 2015 but I don't tweet or have instagram so I guess I'll just stay in my archaic medium.

Life here in IL is good.  Mike is still loving his job although it takes him away from home a lot.  His position allows him to constantly learn new things and that is definitely the type of job that he likes.  One of his main problems with grad school was after a while, he was using the same techniques to answer new questions but the daily grind became repetitive. Now, everyday he gets new questions from his reps or is learning how a different scope system works.

My job is also going well.  I also love my job but there are aspects that I don't love (like working every night and weekend).  I know my teacher friends know what I am talking about.  Whether you are teaching K-12 or college, every one has class prep, grading, and then extra "situations" with students (both good and bad).  I'm about to start my spring term (which means 11 weeks until summer).  Summer can't come soon enough.  I love it when I can come home from doing research and have my nights to myself.

Cali is starting to show her age but is otherwise healthy.  For those of you who knew her when we got her 6 years ago, I could take her to the dog park for hours every day. We forgo the dog park nowadays because her shoulder and rear leg joints don't do well with the jumping and tearing after tennis balls.  I can't control how people at the park throw the ball for her (i.e. up in the air thus making her jump) so we don't go.  We do go for a ton of walks (even though it is friggin' cold here) so she gets her exercise.  She self limits her exercise.  One day last week the temp was in the high 60s so I took her for a 1.25 mile walk when I got home from work.  A few hours later, at dusk, it was still that warm so I wanted to take her out again to enjoy the sunset.  We only made it .25 miles from home when she sat down and wouldn't go any further.  So we turned around and went home-what dog doesn't want to go for 2 walks?? Mine.

Here is a picture of the sunset that night.  Enjoy.