Perhaps the dorkiest costume of all time

I really can't (or won't) claim that too much thought went into it, beyond finding my old graduation cap and gown in a trunk and thinking that was too boring to wear alone and pondering how I could spruce it up a bit for a few minutes.  I'll let those of you who don't already know what I was guess in the comments.  Keep in mind I'm married to a science teacher...

Kate went as an astronaut, and even Banjo got a last minute cape to transform him into Underdog!

Did anyone else have a good costume?

Beach Birthdays

We're a little behind the times on the blogging - oh well.  But we have had some fun times recently!  Two weekends ago we took a trip up to Dillon Beach, north of San Francisco on Tomales Bay, with our good friends Dustin and Cara to celebrate Dustin's 30th birthday (and mine too, coming up).  Cara has relative who let us stay in his house right on the beach (read: rocky cliff) there, which was really quite nice.  We had a relaxing weekend of walking on the beach, cooking and eating delicious food (Kate and I made Coq au Vin for the first time ever, Cara and Dustin made German Chocolate cake), playing games, and hiking along the rugged coast while soaking in the scenic surroundings all the while.  Here's a few pictures of the weekend, which you may have already seen on Picasa:

Look who's turning 3 - 0!

Tom n' Kate

The view from our temporary residence - amazing!

Kate is king of the mountain so ppbbbblttttphff!

Looking back towards Dillon Beach and Tomales Bay

It was fun to take a trip to the coast, as we often end up heading East into the mountains for our CA vacations.  The weather sure agreed with us, and a weekend spent with friends in a beautiful setting like this was a welcome escape from our busy lives.  Happy Birthday, Dustin!

Glacier Point Hike

Last weekend I went up to Yosemite with an assortment of work friends (Kate was busy and sadly couldn't join us), and since we've all done Half Dome more than necessary, we opted to hike up to Glacier Point and continue down to the valley via the Panorama trail, mostly to do something different.

After arriving and spending Friday night in a crowded but still spacious Upper Pines campground, we set out on the Four Mile Trail up to Glacier Point, which was surprisingly consistently graded despite the numerous switchbacks and 3,500 feet of elevation gained in 4 miles or so. Here's some pictures of this part of the hike - the trail offered great views of the valley and distant domes throughout the hike.

Dave, Mikey, and Cathy heading up the Four Mile Trail


Looking West back out the valley towards El Cap


Climbing the valley walls


Almost to Glacier Point (it's the outcrop at the right)


Half Dome vista from Glacier Point, with the recent rockslides (whitish patch) visible

After lunch on top with a couple hundred of our closest friends, we continued on the Panorama Trail, which offered amazing views of Half Dome, Tenaya Canyon, the Panorama Cliff, and the almost-dry Nevada and Vernal Falls. One particularly neat aspect of this hike was how the trail provided nearly continuous, but still always changing, views of some of Yosemite's more prominent features. For example, we got to see Half Dome from so many angles, I almost think you see it better on this hike than you do when actually scaling the giant dome itself.

Heading down the scenic Panorama Trail


Half Dome - dead-on


Panorama Trail view


On the JMT above Nevada Falls


Nevada Falls, a little drier than last time we discussed it...


Mmmm... dinner.

HSB9, continued

As promised, I have some additional videos and pictures from this year's Hardly Strictly Bluegrass festival in SF. Enjoy! Who wants to come out for it next year?

Workers Comp

It turns out being a Physics teacher is not safe.

Today I dropped a 2 kg mass on my middle finger from about 3 feet up trying to demonstrate potential energy. It worked - my jumping and hollering definitely convinced my students that the mass had gained some energy. I also accidentally hit a kid in the face with a (flat) basketball and got a rubberband lodged in the ceiling.

So, although this isn't quite as painful as the time I ripped my lips off with duct tape last year, and it didn't leave as much of a mark as stabbing myself with a fork earlier this year, it is going to be a challenge learning how to type with nine fingers.

Tomorrow is the famous "bowling ball pendulum" day, so keep your fingers crossed that I don't have any major mishaps...

Teaching Milestone

A big moment in my life as a teacher today - I have been teaching for an entire year (counting my student teaching). This is a BIG DEAL because I am now getting to teach lessons for the second time around. I'm proud that I have managed to force myself to keep digital lesson plans this whole time - often the last thing I wanted to do was type up the material I taught after a long day. But now I'm getting to reap the rewards - I just opened up a file and had Monday's lesson basically all planned out for me, which was a great feeling!

So now, it is mostly a matter of making changes and edits to improve myself and my lessons, but that should be a lot less time consuming than generating the first drafts has been. Yay!

Hardly Strictly Bluegrass 2009

I'll have some more photos and a recap up soon, but here's two videos I took of Natalie MacMaster and husband Donnell Leahy fiddling up a storm on the Porch Stage Saturday. Her performance was my highlight of the weekend, although there were lots of other great acts too.

This was their opening number:


And this was their closer, a rousing fiddle and dance extravaganza.


This song really captured the relaxed and fun-filled atmosphere of their performance. You could really tell that they were genuinely having a grand old time up there on stage. The crowd really enjoyed the girl (just an anonymous concert-goer) that was invited to dance a bit on stage (2:10) after doing her thing in front of the stage. Neat moment among many at HSB 9. Can't wait for next year!

More to come when I have a little more time...

YTVotD

It's been a while since we had one, and I thought this was pretty cool. If you thought the Beijing Olympics opening ceremonies were well-choreographed, check this out:



Sure beats the "Wave," homer hankies, or the Tomahawk Chop, huh? I still like the SJ Sharks chompchomp move though.

There's another less professional video here that shows some of the same cool moves.

Also, Happy Birthday Mom, and cousin Margaret! (And Bailey and Jones!)

Phun Physics

Thought I'd share some highlights from my new life as a teacher. I'm still amazingly busy but really enjoying myself and my kids!

My top 10 best stories / anecdotes so far

• Using Physics as an excuse to watch roadrunner cartoons and the Simpsons in class.
• Surprising and startling them with demos like "pound your hand with a hammer". I couldn't find a good video of this but the idea is that you put a large mass on your hand/arm (I used an 18 lb block of aluminum) and hit it with a hammer as hard as you can. It won't hurt... I promise!
• A student showing up for class wearing these. (Make sure you scroll down far enough to see the picture. Creepy, eh?)
• Physics aerobics! Try to stand with your heels against the wall and touch your toes without bending your knees. One of my students can... but it turns out he's a hyper-flexible waterpolo player. Can you?
• Outtakes from our water rocket launching project. Most launches went fine, but 3 rockets did explode on the launch pad and one took off sideways across the campus quad... right at the principal. No injuries, though!
• Stabbing myself with a fork attempting to do this demo.
• Walking around the room while they're problem solving and feeling like almost everyone is getting it!
• Playing with super-sensitive motion sensors. The kids really got a kick out of seeing a graph of their movements on a computer screen. We also talked about how motion sensors worked and I showed an incredible video about a blind boy from Sacramento who can actually echolocate! He's good enough at it to be able to skateboard, ride a bike, and walk without a cane... and he literally has no eyes. If you want to check out the video it is in six parts on youtube here. It's worth watching if you've got an hour (or even 10-20 minutes for the first parts).
• Students giving me links to weird websites/videos, like this one. I'm not sure why they thought I needed to see that, but it looks a lot like Banjo getting a belly rub...
• Lots of kids telling me that they like / love Physics!

Biking to the Beach

Over Labor Day weekend we didn't have any big travel-related plans, but we did head over to a beach near Santa Cruz for an afternoon of fun in the sun and hanging out on the beach. Alex and I decided to take advantage of the free ride home and bike one-way out to meet our friends on the beach. I've been wanting to bike from home to the coast for a while and this was a great day for it! Here's the route we took, which took us up on Route 9 above Saratoga and down the other side through beautiful and redwood-filled Big Basin State Park as well as the lush canyon of Henry Cowell Redwoods State Park before we got to Santa Cruz.


Here's a couple pictures from our ride that Alex took. Our favorite part was the windy downhill into Big Basin where the road alternated between open views of the forest-covered hills and nice banked turns snaking through giant redwood groves before bottom out at the park headquarters, where we had a nice snack break.


Fortunately there were friends with a car, grill, burgers, and frosty beverages waiting for us there! Hope you all were able to celebrate the "end" of summer in good fashion as well, although it still feels like summer out here in CA.

P.S. - If you're not easily nauseated and don't mind intense biker-style rock music soundtracks, there are some YouTube videos of motorcyclists riding some of this route. This one is going uphill from Saratoga to the high point at Skyline Blvd (passing lots of tired bikers), this one is cruising through the woods on the western side of Skyline, and this one is good if you like Journey and bad video quality. Maybe I need some speakers on my bike so I can rock some Journey too while pedaling through the hills...