Visiting friends

Dan and I drove across part of New Jersey last night to visit an old friend who is back visiting her family in New Jersey. The drive was great - although the roads are rather poorly designed (designed to go around farms, not to get you to a specific location!) the scenery is great. The continued rain (have you heard about the terrible floods in south Jersey?) is keeping the state green and we understand the nickname, "Garden State." We're also understanding the down side of such an abundance of growth. Trees, vines, and bushes frequently grow over road signs, making it rather tough for the uninitiated to navigate through the state.

Dan and I still enjoy the "Tractor Crossing" signs on roads. While driving across the country on our move, we took pictures of the various cow signs, mainly in areas of Nevada and Utah with free range for cattle, and tractor crossing signs. Our friend's house is down the street from such a sign.

Jonathan and Sharon's baby came this week. After four beautiful blondes, their fifth has wonderful red hair!

Dan submitted a paper for publication. Now comes the waiting and referee process as it is peer-reviewed. This will be our first time to go through this; this is Dan's first paper submission. The strange thing is that he'll be going through the process on his own because he is the sole author of the paper, something somewhat strange in his field due to the frequent and large collaborations necessary for the big projects done in Astronomy/Astrophysics.

Blogging?

I haven't updated my website since I had mono. Maybe this will work better because I don't have to deal with HTML or archiving?

This is the month for babies! First, Jane and Ari had Petra. Then, Bill and Stephanie had Daphne. Finally, Jonathan and Sharon are due to have Matthew arrive on Monday. Whee! While these babies are the first for the first two couples, Matthew is Jonathan and Sharon's fifth. Their first three are girls followed by an adorable, fire-man loving little boy, Seth. Seth is very excited for Matthew's arrival and has been patting on his Mom's tummy and telling the tummy, "Matthew, come out now!" He's excited to have a brother!

I am no longer the newest employee at my job!!! I now feel like I know the ropes and am basically a part of the company. I am incredibly thankful for my job. Typically, I go project to project every three to eight weeks. On the last few projects I didn't, I was very frustrated due to lack of technical interaction. Basically, I was given an assignment, a few weeks to do it, and then spent the next weeks working at a computer by myself. This project, however, involves writing code to integrate with a larger program. So, now, I have time every day talking with the project manager and with the other coder. I am now very happy at work.

Dan and I are nearly moved into our new apartment. Unfortunately, we have found a few key quirks in the building:
1) If you press the call elevator button while it is still moving between floors, the elevator stops working until a repairman comes and resets the system. (Someone did that yesterday and my legs are sore from the hikes up and down the six floors - maybe I should do that more often!)
2) Our A/C only comes on if the current room temperature is *below* the threshold temperature. So, if the temp is 86 degrees and "cool" is set to 78, it stays off. If we set "cool" to 87, though, it comes on.
3) Our phone isn't working. Hopefully, the repair person will come on Monday to make it work.