It’s a Mt. Blanc kinda morning – clear and blue, with an easy (if slightly hazy) view of this daunting mountain in the distance. Nibbling at my pain au chocolate from a local patisserie, sipping my cup of coffee, and surrounded by mountains – it’s Saturday morning in St. Genis.
I had the most surreal experience tonight. I got off the Y bus at Lion and began walking back to the apartment. As I started down the Rue de Bordeau, I started to hear music. At first, it was quiet. I looked around to try to see where it was […]
This is my first night since I traveled to CERN where know I don’t have an early commitment the next day. I am enjoying the evening by sitting near the balcony and watching the Germany v. Greece match in EURO 2012.
The world’s press seems too timid to say it, so I am just going to make this plain and clear. Tonight’s Eurocup match-up between Germany and Greece WILL determine the outcome of the EU. Elections? Pah. Financial legislation? Please. High-level meetings of the G20? It’s a show. Anyone can do […]
After a short rain storm, we were treated to this delightful sight. Unfortunately, the camera on my European mobile phone doesn’t capture the incredible color brilliance of this particular rainbows. The colors were so crisp, and even the blues and purples so vibrant, you could swear they were stained glass […]
I am saddened by the news that South Carolina’s governor has chosen a path of scientific and medical ignorance and vetoed a bill that would have provided young girls free access to the HPV vaccine, which is recommended for girls as young as 12 to head off the possible transmission […]
Today is my last day of Trigger Desk shifts this week. I have one more block of shifts next week. When I went to sign up for shifts 3 months ago, only these two blocks of Trigger shifts were left. In ATLAS, you take what you can get. I hope […]
I’ve been using the WPGPlus plugin for WordPress to cross-post blog entries on Google+. Recently, though, this plugin would post at least five duplicates of my entry. I contacted the author and he quickly narrowed in on the problem. So in this changelog for version 0.8.3 (http://wordpress.org/extend/plugins/wpgplus/changelog/) that “one user” […]
OK, I’ve found my first reason to not like Vidyo: when you join a meeting, the default it to (a) open your mic and (b) open your camera. You then have to scramble in a weird eye-darting frenzy to kill the camera. It’s embarrassing and, worse, it’s a waste of […]
The American Institute of Physics reports in one of its latest FYI bulletins reports on a letter sent by it and five of its member societies to the Senate [1]. I enjoyed one of the quotes from the letter: "Eliminating support for specific disciplines, such as the House did with […]
Since there is no beam right now and there is nothing in the ATLAS Trigger system that requires my attention, I can focus instead on this: thanks to CERN, I saved CHF 3.40 this morning. This summer, a friend of mine is hosting me in a spare room in his […]