A brief warm-up...

Hey, I'm blogging from my hotel room in Helena, Montana. The past week has been a busy vacation of sorts: on some days were driving, and on other days we're digging. With shovels. The nature of the research we're doing out here can be summed up as such: We're measuring how fast water seeps into the ground. Of course there are other ingredients such as geomembranes and landfills and two stage boreholes and whatnot, bit it's all a bit complicated and I'm not sure I understand all of it myself. It's all about the water moving into the ground. But the best part of the trip is that I get to hang out with and talk to engineers. I get to talk shop and ask questions and absorb a heck of alot of knowledge and wisdom from people who know what they're doing. And none of them are jerks, which is a relief, since I'll be interacting with alot of them for the foreseeable future. I guess my confidence level is running pretty high right now. Classes start on Tuesday, so I'll be sure to let you know how that goes. Otherwise: I'd recommend a trip to Montana. Today we drove through Glacier National Park, and I've discovered that I enjoy National Parks waaaaay more that I though I would. The mountains here have to be seen to be believed. Should you ever plan to motor west: count me in for a Montana Road Trip.

Out the starting gate...

I hit Madison this past Saturday with all my worldly goods in tow. After a brief hiccup in Chicago to finalize things, I spent my first night in the new apartment Monday. I slept well. Tuesday I got up and found a decent coffee shop with good music and internet access. And coffee. Those of you from Urbana will appreciate the "Paradiso" vibe of the place. After that I ate at a Jamaican restaurant and checked out the local food co-op. I might add that his all occurred within a 10 minute walk of my new digs: Thank you Jenn Lassa for insight into Madison neighborhood selection. My next project was to figure out how long a bike ride it was to campus. I left my apartment at 3:22pm and arrived in front of Engineering Hall at 3:38pm. (16 minutes for you non-math majors.) Then groceries, then rooting for the Women's Olympic Gymnastics Team. Silver medal: Damn balance beam! At 7pm I got an email from the University looking for field trip volunteers. Now it looks like I'll be in Montana all next week collecting soil samples. (Sorry Alex!) So yeah, I guess things are working out pretty well here so far...