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Have any of you ever wondered what I might look like as a character on the Simpsons? I has. But this morning, instead of getting to work early, I decided to visit www.simpsonsmovie.com and create my Simpsons avatar. Behold!

P.S. In case you are wondering, I may be suspect of the upcoming movie, but I'm terribly excited about it!

Google has 2 o's only

Does anyone else hate Google Images? I find it extremely obnoxious. When I am searching for a picture, I don't want to go to the web page the picture can be found on. I want to see only the picture. But Google has that stupid 2 inch bar that shows up at the top of the page. And then if you actually want to see a decent size shot, you either have to scroll through the website below or you have to click again on the thumbnail. Stupid. Just stupid.

I guess there's nothing left to do but provide you all with a picture or two...

TinRoof and I with The Expert and his wife in Chi-town at a Sox game.

Me and Seinfeld's puffy shirt. It's in the freaking Smithsonian.

P.S. I bought the newest Kurt Elling CD this weekend. It is absolutely ridiculous. If you like jazz - go buy it right now.

Picture Time

This week I have had problems getting out of bed and out of the house on time. Each day a new distraction has presented itself to keep me from getting to work at a decent hour. Could it be because my advisor is out of town? Possibly. The point being - today I finally got a peek at the pictures from the Zero G flights a couple weeks ago. I couldn't wait to download them to my computer and post a few for you all. (NU boys - you'll have to tarry for my MLB picks. But rest assured, I plan to stick up for my boys despite their manhandling by the Mets.) Click on the pictures to see larger versions.

Charlie and I working on the experimental rig during our first flight.

Arthur, Charlie, and I watching as Charlie fires the laser.

Riding that great Space Pony in the sky.... or something like that.

Taking a break to float a little during runs of the experiment. Check out the dame on the right. Who the heck is she? I have no clue.

This may prove to be one of my favorite pictures. I love the fact that I'm completely sideways in the shot.

Arthur filming the cameraman is apparently driving me up a wall.

Chuck is working hard as Arthur and I goof off.

By our fourth day of flying, zero g was a very zen experience.

The Arch

Over the New Years weekend when TinRoof came to StL to meet the parents we visited, among other places, the Arch. I hadn't been up in it since I first visited St. Louis in the third grade or so. It ended up being a lot of fun. It was a beautiful day and we had fantastic views of the city. Most noteably... the new Busch...

As an "engineer" it was pretty amazing to hear about the Arch's construction. Did you know their margin or error for merging the two legs at the top was 1/64th of an inch?

The other great thing about the Arch is the Lewis & Clark museum at its base. I find history more interesting when ginormous, life sized pictures are involved. Oh, and stuffed buffaloes... even if Tin Roof snuck up behind me and scared the bejesus out of me. Also, as UVA students, we couldn't pass up a chance to get our picture taken with TJ.

Addendum: These pictures were taken by mi hermana, whose nickname shall now be Hermana (unless she would prefer Arbusto). She is awesome.