Yum!

From my book-a-day calender entry on Anthony Bourdain’s book A Cook’s Tour: In Search of the Perfect Meal:

To get a little excitement back in his life, he went on a globe-trotting expedition with a camera crew from the Food Network, recording his experiences as he consumed some of the world’s most peculiar meals: a cobra heart washed down by cobra bile in Vietnam, a deep-fried Mars bar in Scotland, sheep’s testicles in Morocco, roasted bone marrow in England, poisonous blowfish in Japan.

In what universe is a deep-fried Mars bar in the same category as a cobra heart and sheep’s testicles? I would be more than happy to try a deep-fried Mars bar, but even before I went vegetarian I would not have tried anything else on that list.

ASCA data

To track whether or not the effect I’ve been seeing with MCG -6-30-15 is real, my advisors suggested that I delve into ASCA data. The hope was that I could use data directly from the Tartarus Database of AGN observations from ASCA. However, I’m looking at the data in different energy bands — in theory, I could use the extracted spectra from Tartarus, but it would be using the data in a different way that I’ve been using it with the XTE data.

The upshot is that yesterday and today I’ve been delving into the ASCA data iteself. I needed to reinstall HEASoft software package to deal with a bug in XSelect — a tool I need in order to extract spectra and light curves from the ASCA data. In addition, I needed to find a version of SAOimage to run on Mac 0SX (fortunately HEASARC had one I could just download in pop into the appropriate directory).

I haven’t dealt with many data sources other than those from XTE. ASCA is an imaging telescope, unlike XTE, so it’s a bit different to work with. Rather than just using the raw data files and scripts, I need to go into the extracted images and tell the scripts where in the image I want the lightcurves and spectra extracted from. Honestly, it’s a lot easier than the XTE data, at least so far, presuming that I’m doing it right.

Two Dreams

I’ve been remembering bits of more dreams that usual lately — I have yet to figure out what any of them mean, though. Here’s a couple from last night:

The scene is fairy-tale-esque, with castles on every hillside and princes and princesses running around. One princess, though, starts taking out the other princesses, until every kingdom but one is without their princess.

She stops in my kingdom (I’m not a princess…not sure what I’m doing there, but I’m probably just some peasant). She talks into a walkie-talkie, telling the people “downtown” that she’s on her way. No one is happy that she’s here, and there is a groan from the other end of the walkie-talkie.

I throw something to her (not at her, but to her), but she misses it, and it clocks her in the head. She drops, unconscious. Then I rifle through her bag to find the walkie-talkie, and radio to the people downtown that she’s out, and they should come restrain her before she comes around.

I’m in my car, driving on I-66 toward DC to get to Alexandria to check out the hotel we’ve arranged for our wedding guests. I get a little nervous because my car clock says “9:29”, but I know that the HOV restrictions on I-66 (all lanes inside the Beltway) are in effect until 9:30, so I wonder if some cop is going to be a total prick and pull me over.

I don’t get pulled over, but just a bit inside the beltway, where traffic from the inner loop joins I-66, there is a terrible back-up. My lane is fine for a while, so I continue on at 70 mph, but soon my lane slows, too. Suddenly I see the cause of the back-up in the lane in front of me. There is a car, on its side and smooshed, like if you put the car in a vise with the two sides with doors against the vise itself and squeezed. It was the weirdest thing.

I dodged out of my lane, and saw the drivers in the grassy median yelling at each other. I overheard another driver (not one involved in the accident) say that the parties couldn’t work out the details of the accident. A few hundred feet ahead, I came to another car, smooshed in the same way as the other one, and also on its side. I wonder why traffic in my lane comes to a stop, when I realize that I’m the one who has stopped, right in front of the smooshed car. Traffic hasn’t started honking at me, and I wonder why not — I could get around the car, but I just am not moving. I can tell traffic is thinking about honking, but they just aren’t.

Stop calling me!

Ack! What recourse does a person have against calls from a fax machine? Every once in a while I’ll come home to find five messages one the machine that consist of “beep….beep…beep…” Now, the past couple weeks that I’ve worked from home, I’ve been getting calls from a fax machine.

Normally I would just not answer the phone, and then if it happened to be a “real person” I’d call them right back. Today, though, I’m waiting for a couple wedding-related calls from people who aren’t necessarily in their offices much, so I’m left answering the phone. One set started around noon, with a call every ten minutes for a total of about three calls. Now I just had another one.

I’ve *69ed the calls to get a phone number, but of course a reverse look-up comes up empty…oh, and the calls today are from a different number than the ones last week. Sigh. Off to answer the phone again.

Great Outdoors puzzle

Another puzzle finished. This was one of those where all the pieces are shaped the same (except the edge pieces, but all the edge pieces were shaped the same), and there’s no picture on the cover of the puzzle box. You have to assemble 60 mini-scenes using 9 pieces each, and then figure out how they go together using clues in the scenes. It was actually quite fun.

Wedding Dream

This wasn’t my first wedding dream, but it was the most vivid, though the details are already fading…

The ceremony has just ended, and Andrew and I are walking out of the planetarium. About that time I realize that the lights had not been dimmed — the stars had not been up for the whole ceremony. So, I wonder why we bothered with the planetarium in the first place.

When we get out, we are called back so that our guests can do three special things for us. We walk back into the planetarium, which has turned into a large amphitheater, and the audience has grown. When we walk in, we get a toast by one of my cousins — that was apparently the first of the three things. Sadly I don’t remember the second, but the third was a video of me and Andrew. Andrew and I settled ourselves in on a grassy area on the side of the amphitheater in front of one of the large-screen TVs playing the video.

As we’re laying there, snuggled up, I realize that this would be a good picture, and I wonder why I haven’t seen the photographer snapping pictures. I un-snuggle myself, and leave Andrew watching the video as I go in search of the photographer or wedding coordinator. Neither one is there…neither one has shown up.

I run back to find my phone numbers for them, and find Dad on the way. I give him the numbers, and ask if he can call and light a fire under our coordinator’s butt. He says no. “What’s wrong with you?” I scream at him. “Grandma just died, ” he answered.

Now, I think about it, and realize that Grandma had been in the hospital in Minnesota while the wedding was going on, but that everyone, all of my aunts and uncles, were with us at the wedding. I have a moment of remorse about her dying alone, and give Dad a big hug.

Then I call the coordinator and start to yell, asking her where she is and where the photographer is. They got lost, is the answer, but should be there in just a little bit. I tell them it’s too late, and they should just meet us at the reception.

The part about Grandma being in the hospital came from finding out that she was hospitalized yesterday. She had gotten very dehydrated, had low potassium and low sodium in her system, so will be in for a day or two while they get her levels back up. She’s going to be just fine, but she keeps saying things like, “If I’m still around for the wedding,” to family memebers, so that’s probably where her dying came from.

Can’t I just be married now?

A few wedding notes

Bailey Banks and Biddle called Tuesday to let me know that the pendant I ordered last week is done, so I drove up yesterday morning to pick it up. It’s gorgeous, but I can’t get a good picture of it, so you’ll just have to wait for the wedding to see it.

Also, Andrew called a few hotels near the Stardust Restaurant (where the reception will be held), to see if we could get a group rate. We haven’t signed anything yet, but will probably go with the Sheraton Old Town.

Finally, I also posted my wedding pages today. There is information on how Andrew and I met, how he proposed, where the wedding and reception are, where to stay in the area, and things to do in DC. I still need to add a couple pages on things to do in Baltimore.

Quit yer whining!

Whoever decided that this was newsworthy needs to quit their whining.

That’s so bad that NBC is betting that its May sweeps week disaster mini-series “10.5” starting Sunday for two nights will prove fatal to the competition despite a groundswell of grumbles from critics who say they haven’t seen and heard so many cliches assembled under one roof in years.

And scientists are also not happy: they call the whole thing blarney from beginning to end.

So? It’s not like 10.5 is the first movie with lots of bad science. And it won’t be the last.

Shall we list a few of the worst offenders from the past few years? Let’s see…
The Core, Volcano, Deep Impact, Armageddon, Asteroid, Twister, Meteorites!….need I go on?

Even movies that proudly announced that they consulted NASA scientists had blatant science mistakes. Take, for example the opening scene of Deep Impact. We open with a group of amateur astronomers observing the night sky. They are using flash lights to consult their charts. White flash lights. Astronomers never use white light during nighttime observations — it kills the night vision. If you’re going to tout your film as being as scientificly accurate as possible, I strongly suggest you don’t open the film with a very bad mistake.

I’m not saying I don’t watch these movies — I just know that I need to expect bad science, so I turn that part of my brain off.

Check out Phil Plait’s Bad Astronomy for more bad science in the movies and media.

Hmmm…

Just heard a large boom somewhere relatively nearby. It’s been followed by sirens. Wonder what’s up. It doesn’t sound like it’s on campus, but the sound might have been decieving…

Update 9:05AM: When I went out to Building 6, there was a FOX5 helicopter perched in the general direction I thought I’d heard the boom from. But then, it might just have been looking at traffic on the BW parkway.

Update 10:08AM: The Washington Post traffic site is showing that Cipriano Street (just outside the Goddard campus) is blocked due to a fire at the VFW. That might be it.

Name issue resolved

I think I’ve resolved the name-change issue. I’ve been fretting over it for the past several months.

On the one hand, I want to change my name. I like the idea of being part of a couple, and being identified with Andrew. (Not the barbaric, he-owns-me kind of identification, but the we’ve-pledged-our-lives-to-one-another kind of identification.)

On the other hand, I have two referred publications under my maiden name in The Astrophysical Journal (one of those as first author). I will have at least one more (albeit as one of 80 authors) by the time of the wedding, possibly a fourth (depending on the results of my current thesis investigation). I’ve also had this name for my entire life — 32 years. I’m not ready to just give it up.

So, I think I’ve decided on the compromise I like best:
Barbara Jo Mattson Kuchling

Two middle names. I really like ‘Jo’, so I’m not willing to get rid of it. But this way I can continue publishing scientifically under B. J. Mattson, but also get Christmas cards addressed to Mr. & Mrs. Kuchling (eventually Mr. & Dr. Kuchling!). I realize that I could continue publishing as B. J. Mattson, but it seems like it would be easier if the ‘Mattson’ is still part of my legal name.

I’m happy with this compromise, but need to see how the decision feels in a couple weeks or months. I still have time.