Life Update

Work

Work in the lab is continuing fairly standardly on the projects described in the previous edition of this newsletter. I've spent quite a bit of time designing studies for use in classes in the fall and debating all of the different ways that humans mess things up by doing annoying things like learning and having feelings. I don't think that research that runs studies on people is for me, but I do look forward to the statistics that I'm going to get to do afterward.

In the LTL project, the outputs of the LLMs tend to appear almost identical, so I got deep into the history of clarity metrics developed by linguists, as well as ways of measuring the difference in content in two completely differently formatted documents.

The paper that I submitted to MoDRE got accepted; I just cannot seem to leave goal modeling behind. This means that I'm going to Valencia in September to present the paper; I also cannot seem to leave the Iberian Peninsula behind. I really enjoyed attending talks at the last conference I went to so I'm looking forward to that, but the stakes are a bit higher now that I'm supposed to be figuring out what I wanna do with my life and also probably networking.

I've also been giving tours on Saturdays and did a virtual info session. It feels kind of weird to be giving tours since I don't technically go to Smith anymore but I did miss doing it and I suppose I now have a slightly different perspective. I kinda thought I'd heard all the questions by now, but I got one that I hadn't heard before: If Smith was a fruit, what fruit would it be? I had never in fact considered that question and am not sure how much insight my answer provided, but perhaps they just wanted to test whether the liberal arts education actually prepares you for thinking on the fly.

Knick the Knee

June 29th was five months. I saw the surgeon on July 1st. It was mostly a formalism because everything is going fine in general. He told me I could start using the elliptical which is good (my favorite stationary cardio machine) but did explicitly say not to start outdoor biking until six months so I have stopped doing that (whoops) (for the most part; when Katie asked if I wanted to go for a bike ride at five and a half months, I did not in fact say no). The plan is for me to basically keep doing bodyweight stengthening exercises and low impact cardio for another two months, at which point I will go back to PT to start preparation for running around nine months (even though the packet says eight! I have been working under the assumption of eight!).

My current best idea for how to celebrate Cartilage-is-the-Consistency-of-Dough Day in a week and a half is to treat myself to a loaf of bread from Hungry Ghost (though cooked dough definitely has a different consistency), but I am open to better ideas.

The Euros

I cannot put into words how much I love the times of the year when a soccer tournament is happening so you can almost always turn on a game (the others being the World Cup, Olympics, etc.). Unfortunately, the women's Euros don't bring about the same cultural excitement in the US as the other tournaments where it feels like everyone, even those who don't normally follow soccer, know what's going on, but I still love it. I am rooting for England, as I always do when the US is not playing in honor of my time spent there as a youth.

The timing of work is not ideal since the games kickoff at 12pm and 3pm Eastern Time, though this has turned out to be less of an obstacle that I was fearing. I found out that Kika is also an avid women's soccer fan (despite working together for two years, somehow this has never come up but we've really bonded over it) so we've been putting the games on the extra monitors, which has surprisingly even drawn Alicia to come watch with us sometimes.

I'm playing in a fantasy league for the Euros, which is a departure from my usual bracket-predicting in that it's based on the individual players' performances instead of entire teams' advancement. I was doing quite well for a while and am still doing decently. At the end of Matchday 2, I was ranked 147th out of over 80,000 total participants. I have since dropped slightly but remain in the triple digits. Maybe I should start putting actual money on fantasy.

The group stage had a relative lack of upsets, but I did erupt when Switzerland scored in stoppage time to keep their campaign alive in the last group stage game. Kika and I were sufficiently loud for our labmates to come running in from across the hall to find out what had happened. So far, both of the quarterfinals have been extremely epic, including last night's epic England comeback and the worst penalty shootout ever.

Apartment

My frustrating and tedious apartment search ultimately yielded good results. For a while people were not replying, and several places that I toured got snatched up by better qualified applicants (who probably have notable income or are staying longer than a year). I have ended up in a place in Florence that's a little bit more expensive than I wanted but I really like the place and the landlord, which is crucial given that I will be living in their basement (it's on a hill so there are windows fortunately). It's just past beyond downtown Florence in relation to Smith, backs up to the rail trail, and is across the street from the Lilly Library, so I like the location. They also have chickens in the backyard and said I could take eggs whenever I want, and take berries from the garden.

They welcomed me with delicious lemon custard with fresh raspberries for my dad and I while I moved my stuff in. I moved in at the beginning of the month and am unfortunately paying rent on two places for most of July. I managed to obtain enough extra stuff from my parents' basement and my grandparents that the only furniture-ish item I had to purchase was a shower curtain. Some of you may judge the setup of my room (particularly the mattress on the floor, collapsible KwikGoal bench as a couch, and dearth of wall decoration) but I was just glad to find a free solution for all of the normal types of furniture, so I call that a win. However, I don't have wifi and barely have cell reception; only time will tell if I can live this way for a full year or if I will crack and pay for wifi.

The landlord's daughter also just graduated and is really nice and invited me up for a party in celebration of John Quincy Adams's birthday, where people read orations, which ranged from deep and informative to hilarious. Luckily, my invite was last-minute enough that they let me off the hook on delivering an oration. This is the kind of goofy but wholesome antics that I feared I wouldn't be able to find after Smith, so I was very thankful to be invited. We also have gone swimming at Musante Beach and gotten ice cream at Friendly's, so I'm hoping to continue to cultivate a positive relationship with the landlords.

The rail trail runs behind my house and I've been going on (almost) nightly walks after dinner. It's gonna be great when I can run, or even bike. Frequently as I'm walking I think, What would happen if I started running right now? But I haven't tried it, don't worry.

This morning I went to the DMV and registered Joaquin in my name, so tonight I will be mourning the loss of my excellent 899 NNH license plate.

Weekend Trips

In June, Annie and I went to Maine and stayed with my grandparents on Mount Desert Island while hiking in Acadia during the day. The first two days were foggy so our views were a bit limited, but we hiked Jordan Pond, South Bubble, Conners Nubble, Pemetic Mountain, Dorr Mountain, Cadillac Mountain, and the Ocean Path. We also hit the must-see Ben and Bill's Chocolate Emporium for ice cream. The third day was sunny, but extremely crowded, so we did the relatively less popular Gorham Mountain, went to the beach, and then had an excellent yap session on the carriage roads by Witch Hole. I learned a lesson about not wearing a hat when you don't have that much hair, because my ears and scalp got quite sunburned. In the evenings, we devoured my grandmother's delicious whoopie pies and were also treated to chicken pot pie and apple crisp. On the drive back, worlds collided at the Panera Bread in Portsmouth where we met Katherine for a brief catch-up.

My dad's side of the family always goes to Smuggler's Notch in Vermont for the week of the Fourth of July. I was working for most of the week, but I worked remotely on the Thursday and then socialized for dinner, s'mores, and the game Things. On the Fourth, I went lap swimming in the morning with my uncle and cousin, which was quite embarrassing because she swims competitively and I was coughing up water mutliple times per lap. Then my dad, two of my cousins, and I made use of our Wyndham Presidential Reserve perks to go on a llama trek. Our llamas were named Loupy and Indy and it was Indy's birthday. They carried our waters, snacks, and ice cream and then we picnicked by the river. That afternoon, I also did some reading by the pool while my cousins swam, until the pool had to be evacuated due to the presence of a poop on the bottom of the pool, which made me very glad that I had not opted to go in.

I also journeyed to Lambertville to meet up with Annie, Morgan, Anna, and Sky. We played the fabulous card games Incohearant and Exploding Kittens, and got the Lambertville tour, including the splendid Del Vue Arcade (yes, this is an advertisement), South Hunterdon Regional High School, and the canal. On the bridge to New Hope, we admired the turtles paddling around on the Delaware River. Due to my tour guiding commitments on Saturdays, the ratio of driving to actually being there was a bit unfortuate, but I have no regrets. It was lovely to see everyone.