delayed onset jet lag

I should be running off to the first talk of the day, but I find myself dragging. On Monday and Tuesday, I ran around like crazy, trying to fit in as my things as I could, meeting up with my two local friends, and being so excited to be here in Hong Kong that I only felt tired when I sat down in my hotel room. Yesterday (Wednesday), the conference started. As you may know, conferences involve a lot of sitting in one place, and listening to people talk. Suddenly, the tiredness kicked in. After about 8 talks (which, admittedly, sounds like a lot) I realized that I was falling asleep on my feet (because many of the rooms don’t have enough chairs). I headed back to my hotel room for a nap. Today is not off to a promising start, as I woke up at 5 am, for no good reason, and could not get back to sleep.

In spite of the tiredness, I am still having a fantastic time. I have been doing quite well with achieving my pre-trip goals, with several items already completed or in progress, and a couple more scheduled. I hope to have a chance to write more about my packed first 2 days, and share more photos. But I think it will have to wait.

I’ve landed

I’m in Hong Kong now. Woohoo! But I need to try to get some sleep so I can start exploring for real tomorrow. Meanwhile, here are a couple of photos.

A view from the plane. The pilot was considerate enough to approach not only from an angle that gave my seat a good view, but also one that I can easily match up with the maps I’ve been looking at. We’ve got the Wan Chai district running along the top of the lower landmass, and Kowloon across the water. I am staying in Wan Chai, just a bit left of center, apparently quite near that fairly tall building with a spire.


A view from my 20th floor window. (See the spiky building?)

packing my bags

In just 6 days, I’m going to be on a flight to Hong Kong.

Yup. I said Hong Kong.

I can’t even express how excited I am about this trip.

John, wonderful partner that he is, will be single parenting while I am away. I’ll be attending a conference in Hong Kong, and will be staying for 8 days. However, seeing as travel to and from takes such a long time, I will be gone largely for 11 days. In case you are unable to do the math in your head, 11 days with 2 small children and only 1 parent equals a really freakin’ long time. But John was willing and remarkably supportive, if not necessarily eager to be rid of me, and I couldn’t pass up the opportunity. (It also would have been unreasonably expensive for all of us to go.) I wanted to try to minimize my away time, but seeing as I will be travelling to the other side of the planet, I decided not to skimp too much on my end. Hence the 11-day absence.

The conference is 5 days long, which leaves only 3 days of being a tourist, at least some chunk of which is likely to be eaten up by jetlag. (It looks like I’ll be cheating a bit, though, and ducking out of the conference one of the 5 days.)

I have yet to work out the specifics of my plans for my non-conference time. Among my goals for my stay are:

  • A trip to Macau, the nearby former Portuguese colony that is a UNESCO World Heritage Site
  • Seeing a Hong Kong action movie in Hong Kong
  • Eating obscene amounts of delicious food that I can’t easily find at home
  • Taking obscene amounts of photos that I definitely can’t take at home
  • Going on some sort of hike or excursion to a green space (YTSL of Webs of Significance has been taunting me for years with gorgeous photos of her hikes around Hong Kong. You might be amazed at the lush nature that can be found there!)

I am very excited that I’ll be getting to meet up with YTSL herself. (She’s one of my earliest blogging friends. We coincidentally started our blogs on the same day almost 5 years ago, and “met” only a month later through our mutual love of movies with kick-ass women characters.) I’m also happy that I will get to see a friend from highschool who now lives in Hong Kong.

I am very much looking forward to the conference itself, too. It is the International Congress of Phonetic Sciences, known informally as ICPhS (or “ick-fiss”). It takes place only every 4 years. I went to the last one, in 2007, which was how I ended up in Saarbrücken, Germany. It was a fantastic conference, and I’ve been wanting/hoping/dreaming about going to the one in Hong Kong ever since.

As you might expect, I have a huge number of things to go before my trip. For a start, I have a lot of work to do on the presentation my research group will be giving at the conference. (I won’t be the one speaking, but I tend to be the one who does graphics for our presentations.) I also have a variety of home and trip-prep things to do. Unfortunately, the timing of my big trip coincides inconveniently with our daycare provider’s own vacation schedule. She’ll be closed this Wednesday through next Tuesday. This means that I will have Theo on my hands for the 3 days before my trip, and also Phoebe on one of those days. This leaves 2 full working days, one of which I have committed to meeting with my advisor to discuss my own research “progress.” (Though likely we will also talk about the Hong Kong presentation, as my advisor will be the one presenting.)

I’ve been wanting to write about how much I love travel, and was thinking that it would be one my “40 things I like” posts, but I don’t see myself having the time to invest in that right now. I have too many things to pack in during my next few days.

Did I mention that I’m going to Hong Kong?

Project 365: a few of my favorite photos (part 2)

Here is the next big batch of my favorite photos that I took during my year of daily photo-taking. These are from the second 6 months, listed by month, along with the theme I chose for that month. (Favorites from the first 6 months can be found here.)

Month 7: color

190:365 After an icestorm


199:365 Snow cone


206:365 Hydrant

Month 8: shape(s)

235:365 The mega moon

month 9: texture

249:365 Fountain of Youth. (Title credit goes to my mother. Photo taken at my cousin’s wedding reception.)


253:365 Chain link curtain


254:365 Tissue rose


262:365 Dandelion macro


272:365 Flower in a mandarin orange

month 10: perspective

282:365 Phoebe among the dandelions


303:365 Stack of fruit

month 11: people

312:365 Confrontation in blue (aka “Donkey Darko”)


321:365 Washing hands at a farm


337:365 A flower for you

month 12: tired of themes

342:365 Cars on the driveway


343:365 Stairwell at MIT. (Taken with my iPod, and largely unedited.)


349:365 taken with my iPod, and filtered in Instagram


354:365 Theo telling Grampa about the fireflies


355:365 Picnic at the rest area


358:365 Peacock, up close

last night I dreamt of Hogwarts

I can’t remember exactly what I dreamt last night, but it had something to do with Harry Potter. As the alarm went off, beep-beeping along with the radio, my confused brain was convinced that the annoying DJs were talking about Hermione. It must have been a portent of the arrival of this:

I am now the proud owner of this very cool shirt designed by artist Karen Hallion. I won a drawing on Emily’s blog a couple of weeks ago, and had my choice of two Harry Potter-related designs. I chose “I open at the close,” which boasts a cool stylized image of a snitch in black. And what’s also cool is that through the site that distributes the shirts, I was able to choose what color shirt I wanted. And they had a dark gray. I think the black design looks quite striking on the dark gray. (And you know I love me some charcoal gray and black together..)

I think this will be one of my favorite t-shirts, and there’s a good chance I will have to order some more Karen Hallion creations. Phoebe may just have to have the Streetfighter Hello Kitty, and Theo may well need the Droid Army Where’s Waldo one. Perhaps John will need one of the various Firefly ones (especially one that features Calvin & Hobbes. Shiny.) If you appreciate some geekery on your t-shirtage, you should totally check out her work.

what I’ve been doing the last 4 days

The daycare where Theo goes (and where Phoebe goes 2 days a week) was closed this past Friday, and also today, as the provider was taking some vacation time. What this meant was that I was not going to be getting a lot of work done for a few days. It also meant something exceedingly rare: a 4-day stretch with Theo at home. Not in daycare, not travelling. And not sick, either. A combination of factors that may not have been experienced since he started full-time daycare over a year ago. I realized, with a combination of dread and resolve, that the time had come for…potty training.

(Don’t worry, I’m not going to go into details. At least not many.)

Our main motivating tool for this endeavor is a progress chart, linked to the promise of a bigger prize. Each successful potty usage gets a sticker on the chart, and a full chart gets a trip to a store pick out a toy.

On Friday morning, I printed out a new chart for Theo. (Actually, the same chart we used for Phoebe¹, courtesy of my digital hoarding tendencies.)

Phoebe got mopey when I made out a chart for Theo, as she realized that she wouldn’t be having a chart, and thus Theo was in position to be gaining a toy when she wasn’t. Seeing as I have been struggling to get Phoebe to practice violin, I thought maybe this was an opportunity:

Phoebe was quite pleased that she was on her way to a prize. She practiced enthusiastically that very morning, and again the next day.

Theo, it turns out, was good and ready to be using the potty. He earned many, many stickers on his first day. And by the end of his second day, he was well on his way to have a filled chart. This is, of course, fantastic.

Unless you are Phoebe.

If you happen to be Phoebe, this is a near tragedy. Because while Theo’s chart had 20-odd stickers, Phoebe’s had only 2. All Theo had to do for his stickers was pee in a pot, an achievement that he quickly learned to achieve quickly. Phoebe had to do somewhat more than this. It was not likely that she would be practicing her violin 10 times a day.

Phoebe does not like to be the one left behind.

Sensing that Phoebe was ready to give up on her chart and her new-found enthusiasm for practicing violin, I had a flash of inspiration:

Phoebe, observant girl that she is, realized that I would not likely outpace her with my chart. If she couldn’t be at the front of the race, at least she wouldn’t be bringing up the rear.

As you can see, I have yet to put any stickers on my chart. I made mine on Saturday, and it was a long and harrowing weekend of exaggerated cheerfulness and frequent handwashing. Then, as I mentioned, there was no daycare today. I do hope to start adding stickers. I think I’m going to have the requirement that I work on my own research for at least a solid hour to earn a sticker. Failing that, I may just have to reward myself for peeing in the potty.

I can’t say how well this will all go in the weeks to come. Theo heads back to daycare tomorrow, which may be great for my own chart, but likely to be a big setback for his. (We achieved success by having Theo not wear a diaper at all, but that won’t fly at daycare.) In the meantime, check out this measure of success:

Here is the toy Theo picked out for his first filled chart:


Molly, a yellow engine from Thomas & Friends. Our first train with a face.

I’m also very happy to say that Phoebe’s flurry of practice sessions also paid off, if not yet with a toy. Our violin teacher was pleased enough with her progress to say it was time for us to get Phoebe her first violin book. Phoebe was thrilled. She may even have described herself as “ecstatic.”

Moral of the story: peeing is not the only route to success.

¹ I’m still very entertained by my post “Standoff at the P. P. Corral,” which I wrote almost 3 years ago. I crack myself up.

Project 365: a few of my favorite photos (part 1)

I wrapped up Project 365 a few days ago, and have a really long, rambling summary post in the works. (I bet you can’t wait!) However, seeing as it was a photography project, I thought I should post “a few” of my favorite photos from the year. And seeing as I had trouble picking, “a few” apparently means “a number so large that I should probably not try to squeeze them all into one post.” So, I’ve split them. Here are some from the first 6 months, listed by month. I’ve even listed my monthly themes, which I haven’t really shared before.¹

Month 1: reflections

011:365 New York City building reflections


019:365 Inside and outside, at my in-laws’


028:365 Rain drops on the train window

Month 2: shadows

043:365 Shadow of a lightbulb


045:365 Floating bike rack


062:365 Menacing bunny slipper

Month 3: Text

072:365 Up


090:365 Wood, stone


091:365 No trespassing

Month 4: motion blur

107:365 flashing light ring in motion


110:365 My Docs


111:365 Comparing apples to oranges

Month 5: light(s)

126:365 Silhouette


132:365 Compact fluorescent


138:365 tail lights through rainy windshield


139:365 Burnt out

Month 6: patterns

154:365 Milk crates in snow


170:335 Orange cones at the SFO airport Bart station

—
¹I wondered if people would be able to guess…

364 down, 1 to go


364:365 A ridiculous still life, with everything but the kitchen sink.

Unbelievably, I have just about made it through Project 365. 364 days in, I have managed to take (at least) a photo a day to share online. Admittedly, there were 2 or 3 times when I didn’t quite manage to take a photo before midnight, plus some other times when time zone mismatches made it look like I’d missed a day, but I always remembered to take some sort of photo by the time I went to bed. In this year of chaos and of feeling stuck, this project has felt like an accomplishment.

For my penultimate shot of the project, I decided to get all wacky and revisit some props and repeat subjects from my year of photos. (It’s sort of a pictographic summary.) In this photo can be found at least 20 things that have either been the subjects of my photos more than once, or that represent things (or categories of things) that have recurred in my project photos. (I’m sorry to say that even though it appeared in at least 4 of my photos, the kitchen sink is not included in this still life.)

How many can you find?

If you are curious, but haven’t looked at many of my photos, you can peek the thumbnails in batches on my flickr account:

And here’s another game for you, if you want to play. Each month, I chose a theme (or some sort of visual motif) to work with. Can you identify them? (Okay, it was not actually all 12 months.)

If you want to play, leave a comment with:

    1) one thing from the still life photo above that has either appeared in some of my Project 365 photos, or that might represent things from those photos
                    ~ or ~
    2) a theme identified from one of my monthly sets
                    ~ or ~
    3) the number of things from the photo you have been able to identify
                    ~ or ~
    4) any months for which you have been unable to identify a theme

If you don’t want to play, leave a comment telling me:

    1) how cool I am for doing this project and for achieving awesome levels of awesomeness
                    ~ or ~
    2) what a dork I am for making up this game and for achieving dorky levels of dorkiness
                    ~ or ~
    3) the number of times you rolled your eyes while reading this post
                    ~ or ~
    4) any moths for which you have been unable to identify a thorax

If you don’t want to play or leave a comment, click here.