An experimental approach to The Year of Happiness...

1.19.13

I thought it would be really interesting to do a little year long experiment during The Year of Happiness.  Specifically, I created a (very) short survey to keep track of people responses to the question 'What makes you happy?'.  At the end of the year, I'm going to try to compile all these answers and do a little analysis.  I promise to report back!

Please participate if you have time, or better yet, go out there ask someone and send me their response!

Click here for a link to the survey!

In other news, I ran 5 miles today.  It was really beautiful out (~46F and sunny) and worth fighting against the little bit of wind.  My legs were only slightly sore at the end of the run with a little twang in my knees, but I felt great nonetheless.  I'm training for a half-marathon (13.1 miles) this coming March in DC.  My first time ever running that much.  I'm not really sure why I decided to do it.  Maybe because I needed a goal or maybe because I just wanted to hang out with Ada, Tom, Ben, and Alex.  Wish me luck!  More on training later. ;)

2013: The Year of...

1.9.13

On the first day of each new year, my good friend Shelley declares a yearly theme for us to wonder about, discuss, and maybe even help to catalyze some personal change in our lives.  Last year's theme was 'The Year of Cups' and I should admit that I didn't really take it to heart.  Mostly, I just thought of cups as a means to get together with people, to stay warm, and to nourish myself.  Maybe Shelley could say more if I interviewed her about it.  She also took many pictures of cups, which I'm sure have sentimental value.  Anyway, enough of 2012.

With some help from her friends, Shelley decided that the theme of 2013 would be 'The Year of Happiness'.  To overcome my lackluster participation in 2012's theme, I'm going to try to think and do a little more to make this yearly theme worthwhile to myself and others.

I met up with a good friend of mine, Ashley, today at the library cafe for lunch.  During our conversation she told me about a saying one of her family members had told her.  Ashley said, 'the key to being happy is having each of the following: something to give you purpose, something to love, and something to hope for'.  Without any one of these you begin to feel out of balance.  I liked this and thought it was definitely appropriate to share.  With Google's help, I found a similar quote by the 18th Century Scottish writer Alexander Chalmers, but it doesn't have the same gusto as Ashley's version.

May your 2013 be filled with happiness!

Getting Back to It

1.5.13

My last post was about two years ago (plus two days) and I think it's about time that I get back to writing my blog.  There are so many things going on these days that it's often difficult for me to find time to write.  However, I think this whole experience is really good for me in terms of helping me reflect, sharing what I'm up to, and brainstorming new ideas.  I'm hoping that 2013 will be full of awesome adventures, new experiences, thinking, obstacles, and enlightenment.

Because I've been so bad at posting, I ought to give a quick whirl-wind recap of all that I've been up to....

I completed my first triathlon, the Cayuga Lake Triathlon!  Friends from college and graduate school joined in for the fun too.  Here are Ada and I sporting out wet-suits just before the start of the race.

I rode 100 miles around Cayuga Lake to raise money for AIDS services in Tompkins County.  Thank you to everyone that helped me reach/exceed my goal of $300!  (Radical Riderz from left to right: Roger, Eric, Elizabeth, me, Tammo)

This past August, Shelley and I went on a best friends trip to Seattle.  It was so great to explore/adventure with her.  Here we are at the farmers market downtown.

This is the biggest piggy bank I've ever seen!  Here I am at the Seattle Farmer's Market.

Shelley and I took a day trip to Mount Rainier, which is about a 2-3 hour drive from Seattle.  It was nice to have a little break from being in the city.  The air was so fresh and smelled like wildflowers.

Here is Mount Rainier with some of her beautiful wildflowers.

Shelley and I did so many things but one of the best was seeing a Seattle Sounders (soccer) game.  The fans are just as amazing as the players.

For Ben's birthday, we took a trip in September to climb in the Adirondaks.  Lots of friends joined in for the fun.  (Left to right: Brenton, Scott H., Andy, Meg, Collin, Scott C., and Johan)

I was so ready to climb!

I did some exploring in Ithaca as well.  You never know what types of wild animals you'll find lerking in the grass outside of Wegmans.

In October, Ben invited me to join him on a climbing trip to the Gunks.  While we were there we visited/climbed with some of his family friends.  Here are Chuck and I at Giannis, a yummy Greek restaurant in New Paltz, NY.

This is Ben's other family friend Preston (and his wife Sheri not pictured).  It was fun climbing with Preston and Chuck because they are so knowledgeable.

Back in Buffalo, I went to check out the farmer's market on Bidwell and Elmwood.  They had so many gourds!

I fit!

On the same trip I took Ben to see Niagara Falls.  Even though I've been there many times, I'm always amazed by the amount of water going over the falls.  It's breathtaking.

Ben looking silly in his free panco.  We still got really wet...

For Halloween we carved a punk pumpkin (punk'in) complete with carrots for spiky hair.

Ben and I dressed up for Halloween as Finn and Jake from the cartoon Adventure Time.

In November, Jayce, Shelley, and Hammy came to visit me in Ithaca.  I had never been to Robert Treeman  (not Harry S. Truman) State Park so I recommended that we go on a hike there.  It was so beautiful, especially Lucifer Falls, pictured above.

The first week of December I attended the American Geophysical Union (AGU) conference in San Francisco, CA.  I presented a poster on water quality data that I had collected at my field site in Bedford, NY.  After an amazing conference, Ben and I hung out in SF.  We went to the National Academy of Sciences and saw some amazing wildlife including these Lion's Mane nudibranch, pictured above.

Speaking of fish, we ate some great sushi in San Francisco too!

After spending the weekend after the conference wandering around San Francisco, Ben and I flew to Palm Springs, CA, rented a car, and drove to Joshua Tree National Park.  We spent the next 5 days climbing everything we saw.  It was my first time in the desert and my first time bouldering outside!  (You can see the Joshua Tree in the background of the photo above)

Here I am all decked out in my climbing gear at Joshua Tree National Park.

After returning home from California, I worked for a bit and then headed to Buffalo for Christmas.  It was great to hang out with my family and friends.  I'm especially greatfull for having the chance to see/hang out with my sister before she moved to Jackson, Wyonming.  I'm so proud that she's taking her own adventure!  More on that later....

Just this past weekend, I went to see a documentary on glaciers called Chasing Ice.  The premise of the film is to provide visual proof on the impacts of climate change.  It definitely convinced me and I would recommend it to anyone.  Even if you're not interested in documentaries, the photos and videos of ice are breathtaking.  I still am amazed at how blue glacier ice can be (because it is so dense and compressed).

Thanks for reading!

P.S.  Today I am 10,000 days old!

Helpful NY Times Articles (on Money and Love)

1.3.11

I found several of the articles in the New York Times series, 'A Sustainable Life' very interesting. I really liked the article that helps readers overcome the inevitable pitfalls of budgeting. Finance reporter Tara Siegal Bernard recommends the free budgeting software on mint.com for those of us that need a little help.

I also enjoyed reading the article 'The Happy Marriage is the "Me" Marriage'. No, I'm not thinking specifically about marriage, but I do believe the principles discussed in this article apply to any valuable relationship. We want to learn from each other, and when this doesn't happen, we no longer feel compelled to contribute. On the surface, yes, it does sound counterintuitive to think 'the best [relationships] are those that bring satisfaction to the individual'. However, evolutionarily speaking, this makes perfect sense. By learning new things (or seeing the world from someone else's perspective), we are better prepared to survive given a diverse set of situations.

Middle Eastern Ensemble Fall Concert

11.21.10

This past September, I was awarded a one year fellowship to study Greek. The fellowship is offered through the US Department of Education and specifically encourages students to learn uncommonly studied foreign languages (e.g. Turkish, Greek, Portuguese, etc.). As stipulated by the fellowship, I will take Greek language classes as well as related culture classes for the Fall 2010 and Spring 2011 semesters. For my culture class this semester, I enrolled in a Mediterranean music ensemble. I had the opportunity to sing in Turkish, Arabic, Greek, and Hebrew. The pictures below were taken at our end of the semester concert.

My fellow choir members: Rebecca, Amy, and Enrika

Practicing before the event starts. (Adem and our conductor Harold).

Adem and Tara

I wasn't expecting such a large crowd to turn up for this event. It made me so happy to see so many of my friends faces in the back of the Carriage House loft. I'm so grateful that you all came!

I really enjoyed singing with this group of talented musicians. I will most likely be continuing with the choir for the Spring 2011 semester and promise to inform you of my next performance.

Buffalo is great!

11.10.10

My neighbor, Margene Weiss, recently sent me a video highlighting the great things about Buffalo. Most people know about Buffalo because of its record snowfalls, but there is so much more to it then this. While the clip focuses mainly on architecture, it does pinpoint other historical and natural aspects of Buffalo. Buffalo was the first city to have electricity. It's about 20 minutes away from one of the oldest state parks in the nation, and besides Central Park in New York City, it has one of the most extensive Frederick Law Olmstead park systems in the nation.

So next time you hear someone say that Buffalo is "lame", you can send them this:

Buffalo, New York: This Place Matters

Poster Presentation for ACSF

10.29.10

Because our research project in Crete was funded in part by Cornell's Atkins Center for Sustainable Futures (ACSF), my group was asked to design a poster highlighting our findings thus far. We knew most of the audience would be administrative staff and alumni so in addition to our poster, we created a game to teach people them about water use in Crete, Greece. Basically, they would roll a die and the number they rolled would determine how much rain fell in a given year. Rain/water was symbolized by little silver buckets. For example, if they rolled a 1, they would get 16 buckets (400 mm of cumulative rainfall in a year), versus if they rolled a 6, they would get 36 buckets (900 mm of cumulative rainfall in a year). They would then allocate these water resources to different uses. Some were mandatory (e.g. domestic use) but most were optional and had a monetary value associated with them. For example, if you decided to plant one hectare of rain-fed olive trees then you would use 4 buckets of water and make $3 million dollars that year. Once they allocated their buckets they would have to roll a pair of dice and rearrange their water resources.

In the end we wanted to show that the crop that was least taxing on water resources was the rain-fed olives. The citrus on the other hand might give more money but they take a considerable amount of water to grow successfully; nearly twice as much was as is required by the rain-fed olive trees. If leaders in the municipality can promote the maintenance of rain-fed olives this would be best for conserving water supply for future generations.

This is the poster I made with the help of Margaret (a student in Natural Resources), Michael (a student in the law school), Gail (the director of the Mediterranean Studies program), and Tammo (my advisor).

This is the poster for our game. The finished product had bright green foam letters spelling out the title: 'Tipping Points: A Race to Sustainable Water Resources'.

All my heard work on the game paid off when we were awarded 3rd place (and an $1000 prize to go towards our research) in the poster competition.

Shellbot and Jack Skellington

10.24.10

With the Guster concert on Monday night, Shelley decided to drive down to Ithaca on Saturday night and stay for the weekend. I showed her all around Ithaca and even roped her into helping me carve my pumpkin.

Shelley and I at Ithaca Falls

The Headless Shelley

There she is!

Toby doesn't look amused.

You can see the world differently when you look at it through the eyes of Jack Skellington.

Thanks to the radical pumpkin carving kit that my mom sent me, it was a lot easier to make Jack Skellington.

Compared to the cartoon version, I think we did a pretty good job.

A Visitor from the ATL

10.6-13.10

Over fall break, Jon Newman flew all the way from Atlanta just to visit me. I picked him up from the airport and helped him get settled in my house. We did a little hiking around my neighborhood, made some dinner, and headed to Cornell's Fuertes Observatory. Every clear Friday night around 9pm the observatory is open to the public. Because it was a clear night, the message on their machine assured me that the observatory was open. While you walked around to look through the telescopes, members of the Cornell Astronomy Club would help explain what constellations you would expect to see. We were able to see Jupiter (as well as the sunspot on its surface), an owl constellation, and a comet. The Astronomy Club members were very friendly, knowledgeable, and welcoming. One of them told us about some of the stories behind the constellations. Jon and I both liked it.

On Saturday Jon, Johan (my climbing friend from Cornell), and I left bright and early for Blue Run Rocks near Gaines, PA. This was my third time climbing outdoors but it was really fun. The most exciting part was learning how to how to lead climb. Because Jon and Johan both have had a lot of experience lead climbing, they were great teachers. To explain, lead climbing is basically a type of sport climbing where you climb above your rope. Usually the first person that ascends a route will lead climb, set up an anchor at the top of the route for the next climber(s), and then be lowered down to the ground. As the climber moves up the wall they use special carabener sets called "quickdraws" to clip into bolts that have been permanently screwed into the rock face. Once the climber comes close to a bolt, they grab the quickdraw from their harness, clip it a portion of it into the bolt, pick up the rope dangling below them, and feed it through the second part of the quickdraw. The hardest part of lead climbing is making sure you clip in as soon as possible. Because you're climbing above your rope you will fall as far as your last clip. This fall can be scary if the bolts on the wall are spread out.

Besides lead climbing there is also top roping. I normally climb using this technique because it is a easier and requires less equipment. In top roping your support rope is above you; the rope has been anchored into the top of the route. Since this was my first time lead climbing, Jon helped me rig up the ropes so I was top roping and lead climbing at the same time. If I fell then I wouldn't fall nearly as far as if I had been lead climbing alone. One step at a time.

Me

Jon

Johan

Pride Rock

This place reminded us of the movie Fern Gully.

Jon is very focused as he belays Johan.

While Jon belayed, I scoped out the surroundings and found this cool cave.

I found some ferns!

I also took pictures of Johan.

Peace (Johan)

Bunny Ears (Jon)

Here I am lead climbing for the first time.

It was getting late and we had to walk back to the car.

Jon and I!

Besides climbing on Saturday, we did a lot of wandering around Ithaca. I took Jon to the farmer's market, to the Cornell plantations, to my favorite restaurant (Sticky Rice), up to campus, and around the Commons. On Tuesday Elliot invited us both to see his PhD defense. I learned a lot about what he studied and was happy to see the finished product of all of his hard work.

I was sad that Jon had to go back to Atlanta but he has 6 more trips to go before I can visit him in Atlanta. That's the rule: 1 Atlanta trip for every 7 Ithaca trips. ;)