Jodi is currently in La Thuile, a mountain skiing town in northern Italy. She’s not there to ski, though – she’s presenting a comprehensive overview of direct-detection dark matter searches at the “20th Rencontres De Physique De La Vallee D’Aoste: Results And Perspective In Particle Physics”:http://www.pi.infn.it/lathuile/lathuile_2006.html. She’s one of many particle physicists converging on La Thuile right now, and over the next three weeks, for a series of high-profile “winter conferences”, one of two conference seasons that define the focal points of our field.
And thanks to the magic of “Skype”:http://www.skype.org, I can talk to her for free half a world away. I was able to chat with her after she awoke this morning (Italian time, 9 hours ahead). She’s still adjusting to the time change, but she’s already run into friends old and new and is excited about the start of the conference. Meanwhile, I spent the day making last preparations for the trip to Washington.
