Ching Man's Blog and Travel Garbage

(Frinky)

Sunday, June 18

Woke up at 5AM, took the bus to airport with parents. Dealt with some slack talking, Brooklyn-accented airport staff that talked to me as if I was 10. Flew from LaGuardia to Dallas. The flight took 3 hours, and I sat next to these basketball dads who were loud and asked me about my bulgy-eyed sketches. While being lost in the Dallas airport, Sam found me staring at a screen of flights to Albuquerque. Then we sat around talking about ourselves, when Sam turns around and finds Ryan sitting behind us, and played with a deck of tiny Scooby Doo cards. We boarded the plane, and after taking my seat, Joe finds his seat in front of me. We got to Albuquerque and a lady asked us about out trip, and we found the staff, Gar and Caitlin, then went to get our bags, and I saw all these goofy scouts getting their bags. Amy arrives about an hour later. Jon didn't come yet, so we had lunch in the airport Southwest restaurant. I ordered a kid's meal and ate a piece of chicken, leaving about 3 other items uneaten. (What kind of kid's meal was that???) We started talking as a group, and such. Then the girls and guys split up at the airport, and started wandering around the airport. We ended up at opposite ends of the same lounge. My group starting talking about Jon's bio, smoothies and those little wiener-shaped dogs with short legs.

Fig. 1.1-Fenton Hill Observatory Telescopes.

After Jon came with somebody that was escorting him on the plane, we

went to the car and drove for a long time to Los Alamos. It was really, really, hot. My hair was about to catch on fire after 3 minutes outside in the sun, but New Mexico wasn't all desert like you see on TV. There were lots of brush fir trees, mountains and low buildings. I think this is what the suburban towns must look like, like Springfield. Everyone started to talk to each other, starting with Gar asking about Jon's "bank", and Jon started to blame his Nana. We continued to Fenton Hill.

Fig 1.2 Hanging out in the hotel room playing cards

After a tour, lecture and poking around with the diorama and equipment, we decided to go to the hotel. I really felt like I was going to throw up, so I just slept, and everyone started to talk again. I was still really queasy from the high altitude and strange food, so I went to the hotel room with Caitlin, made a mess and refused pizza. Then Caitlin and I went to Amy and Gar's hotel room and played cards, and goofed off, getting back around midnight to draw, watch Futurama and sleep.

Monday, June 19

Woke feeling less queasy. Went to Los Alamos National Laboratory and got badges only I didn't get one because I forgot my SS number and when I remembered it, the person still couldn't find me on the list. Then we went back to the hotel and I ate a pancake with phony syrup and some juice. After going to the museum for a lecture about history of the Los Alamos National Laboratory, we played around in the Bradbury museum. I wanted to ask a thing or two about the history but I just didn't have a chance. Everyone is so paranoid about security, I noticed right away. The museum was interesting, the most entertaining exhibit was the radiation calculator with Jon. Apparently we were all radioactive, which didn't surprise me after the lecture. The only thing we weren't were glowing squirrels with plutonium laser eyes. After that, we went to the Canyon School to hear for a demo with Don and the CCD camera. We started with a picture of Jon's skull shirt, which scared everyone because we thought it was his face. This was followed by John's asteroid talk, then to the supermarket. Amy and Gar went crazy over cookie dough, followed by everyone else, resulting in a $250 junk food bill for a picnic that night. With all the junk food and Bucky the watermelon, and lunch from an American place, we went back to the hotel playing cards, and I called home. We played Blackjack with the group, where Amy raised the stakes to 50 pushups, I almost ended up doing the pushups, but Amy ended up with the pushups. The look on her face was hilarious, when I flipped over with a 21. We went back to the school and did a telescope demo later, and then we were off to Fenton Hill. After taking pictures of the cloud formations, we were there, and I was only a little queasy. The picnic lasted for hours and we played games and drew everywhere. We set up the telescopes and had a picnic for hours and stepped outside in the moth-infested hill.

I got my first view of the stars in 10 years, but it was getting cloudy. After looking for a long time (1.5-2 hours), spotting stars like Vega, Polaris and other constellations, we headed back to the building where I was laughing over the diorama because a toy man was pinned under a toy car. We looked at the Desktop universe program, chatted for a while, then headed back to the car and drove back to the hotel. Most of the group stayed up until 3 AM watching Cops at Amy and Gar's room, reading comics and commentating on "COPS".

Tuesday, June 20

Fig. 3.1 Tennis ball lesson

I woke up at 11 AM, drawing and whatnot. The group met up at 12:10 where we went to a Chinese restaurant for brunch. I sat with Joe, Jon, Amy, Ryan and Sam, where we talked about Cops, quotes and food. After brunch was a lecture at the school from Frank Timmes about planets and the moon, then the passing around of Earthwatch bottles, patches and $40. Then we did our blogs, followed by a lecture from Patrick about the moon with a tennis ball, and a Q&A session.

After the lecture was dinner at Central Avenue Grill. It was way too fancy for my taste, but at least I didn't make a complete idiot out of myself. Then we were off to the Bradbury museum to hear a lecture about solar winds, auroras and storms from Geoff Reeves. It was already dusk, so we headed up to Fenton Hill, stopping briefly to catch a glimpse of the satellite, International Space Station. We got to Fenton Hill at night, and set up our equipment, this time, just to observe stars and planets. I saw everything but

Pluto, Neptune and Uranus. Jupiter's moons could be seen as well. After 10 PM, we started involving an asteroid, 532 Herculina. We aligned the telescope and drew the star map around the asteroid, which was supposedly the brightest object at that point of the sky. It was freezing at the hill, but we entertained ourselves with the telescope looking at Messier objects and the planets. Gar focused the telescope at the moon, and we all took turns looking at the moon's craters in its crescent phase. That was followed by temporary blindness in our right eyes. We continued our work with the asteroid for a while, stopping at 4AM. After packing up, we saw Venus rising from the horizon. Then we spotted some strange objects in the sky, too fast to be a satellite, but left no streak like a normal meteor. How very odd. When we got back at 5:30 AM, all we could so was sleep.

Wednesday, June 21

Woke up at 11 AM. After drawing for 2 hours, we headed off to a BBQ place, where everything was served in baskets. Lunch was followed by queasiness. We headed to the Canyon school to hear a lecture from Frank about calendars. Then John came up and showed up how to use our data from yesterday's observation. We did lots of calculations and measurements, and during out share, we all rushed outside to see a house on fire. We went back in after the fire died down, and finished the lesson. Then we took a break, worked on blogs. After that, we headed for the skating rink at church where everyone skated like there was no tomorrow. I didn't play a lot of the skating games like limbo, but I did get footage of Jon and falling down and Joe showing off his "moves". Skating was followed by pizza and playing in the children's park outside. We played on the swings, and got into the fire truck for photos. It was a lot less fun getting out of the truck (ask Joe). Then I watched Amy challenge the guys to leg wrestling, which ended up with Jon yell and getting flipped over in the grass like a twig. How's that for losing with class?

After goofing off and getting sand and pine needles everywhere, we headed for Fenton Hill. We set up and aligned the telescopes much easier than yesterday, and were able to find 532 Herculina in about an hour. Joe found a really interesting view of Jupiter. Apparently, Io cast a shadow on the surface of Jupiter's rings and bands. We stayed out until about 1:30 AM, and then it got cold, so I headed inside the main building to hear a discussion about Christianity between Gar and Joe. That went on for a couple of minutes, until the Ryan, Sam, Caitlin, John and Amy come in and join the discussion. After arguing for about a half-hour, Jon came in and tossed himself in, which led Amy to change the topic to cows. We got to the hotel around 4AM, and found Family Guy was on, and went up to Gar and Amy's to watch. Now if only I can find the Simpsons!

After Family Guy, I went to bed and woke up at 11 AM, with the drowsiness only a caffeine overdose could make.

Thursday, June 22

Rushed out of the hotel room and called my sister. Last night's searching for laundry service made me even more tired and slow-witted. My sister was supposed to graduate today, so I was just asking her what she was going to do without a camera. We went to "El Parasol" for lunch, and went to the park to eat that oversized burger I ordered. Everyone played in the park and went to the Black Hole while I went to the Badge Office with Frank to get a photo ID. My photo ended up pretty bad, as usual. Then I followed Frank for errands, ending up at the Theoretical Sciences building to hand back the old ID. Then it was to the mall to buy a can of tennis balls, then to the Canyon School. Frank, John lectured us for a while and we did more calculations with 532 Herculina's radius. Ours was a bit off the real measured value, but it wasn't so off. It was about 10% off. After dinner at a Thai restaurant (They had soy!) we went to a lecture about neutrinos from Todd Haines. After the lecture, we went to the bookstore where I saw a book "How to make an Atomic Bomb." After that, it was a CCD camera tutorial back in Canyon school. After a slight diversion with a verbal IQ test, we tried to focus on the camera again. Then back to the hotel for some sleep. (Wink, wink).

Friday, June 23

Woke up at 7:30 AM today, really, really tired. We planned a geology tour, which starting by driving up the mountains above Los Alamos. We went to see a canyon and the remains of the forest fire first. Then it was to go somewhere near an old volcanic area, which by now was littered with pumice. When Carol told us about the properties of pumice, everyone, especially Ryan, Joe and Jon went crazy and climbed up the slight cliff face to find the biggest piece of pumice. Joe's was the size of a football. After that, we went to a place that used to be a sea. You could tell just from looking at the smooth rocks. Carol showed us some fossils, and for a while, we went through the place, picking up fossils of shells and early organisms. I got a really big bead-like organism and lots of shells. We met and showed off our fossils. Gar found some really small, relatively clean ones, and Jon got the biggest rock ever. After the fossil hunting, we went for lunch at an old cowboy restaurant and saloon. I ordered a small kid's meal and came really close to finishing it. Joe, Caitlin, Gar and I played "20 Questions" during the lunch, until we got into the van. The last stop was to the hot spring, which was obviously the best stop. We got off at the side of the road, and climbed up a slope to get a good view of the 1.6 billion-year-old rock and the hot spring across the street. We went back down and had some time to explore. The climb to the top of the spring looked really hard, so I decided to climb into the spring first. I nearly slipped, but I got up there and felt the inside. It smelled like sulfur, but the rock inside was so smooth and covered with ridges. A person my size could stand up inside without any trouble. Then I went back down, and decided I wanted to climb on top of the spring. I still didn't want to go up the path, so I climbed up the side of the spring. It was really fun, even though it was hard at some near the top where there were less footholds. I managed to get to the top, about 30 feet above ground. Not bad for a city kid like me. I climbed to the top, got some good pictures and climbed back down that path I avoided earlier. Then we climbed up the cliff thingy opposite the spring, and took a group photo sitting on the cave. Climbing down wasn't as much fun, but it was still cool.

If I remember correctly, Jon actually drank water from the spring. Then we headed back to the hotel and the Black Hole, which sold lots of old motors, models and other stuff that looked like it was thrown out from the lab. I bought some uranium marbles, but I wanted a rock. ($50 didn't seem too bad, but how could I get it past the airport?) Then we went to the park to play Frisbee and then went to Quizno's for dinner. The subs aren't much to talk about, then ice cream at Baskin Robbins. We saw some local kids, and I couldn't describe them in a GOOD way, those back-talking, smart-*****. Then played more Frisbee, and then decided to go the movies to see The Fast and the Furious Tokyo Drift. The tickets were so cheap, same with the food. That movie was all right, but it could use more car crashes and less "street girls". After the movie, we went to the park and sat around talking and saw some punks racing the speed limit. Then back to the hotel and watching COPS and Jon trying to fix that motor he got for $50. There were sparks flying out and everything. HA! After that, we went to bed.

Saturday, June 24

We went to a lecture in the morning, analyzing the data from 532 Herculina (which was a lot more accurate than we thought at first, says John O), then another one about atoms and light. After that we did laundry in the afternoon and played a game of Frisbee, which was really hard. My team was losing and didn't even manage to score a point, until we came out again and switched members. After we picked up the laundry, we headed back to the hotel, and I bought some junk food. After that we went to Don's house for a party.

We sat around for a bit just talking, then we ate some grilled food, playing an alphabet memory game. Then after we've given up on eating, we played charades for 2 hours. It was really fun to see the guys try to act out some words. I got some pictures and videos of some, but I'm not planning to show it to the public anytime soon. After that, we watched "Contact" with Jodie Foster. The plot was easy enough to understand, but there were some parts that made you go huh? I had some frogurt during the movie, which was quite good. After the movie, we stood around till midnight to right in Joe's 18^th birthday. Then we went back to the van and went back to the hotel. Amy, Caitlin, Sam, Jon and Ryan went swimming in the pool, while I drew for a bit, then went to check my email. I found Gar and Joe in the lobby, then after emailing, I went to bed at around 2 AM.

Sunday, June 25

Started in the Canyon school to hear a lecture about radio astronomy from Don. Then we ordered stuff from Quizno's and bought a birthday cake for Joe, and ate it right in the classroom. Then it was off to the Bandelier National Monument, and took a walking tour of the ancient Indian communities. We actually climbed into the caves they lived in and took lots of pictures. We walked the path under the wooded area, and saw streams, finally reaching the bottom of a huge cave. We climbed up the ladder and stairs to the top, about 140 ft above the ground. There was a great view up there, and we took lots of pictures of us in a little cave. Then we headed back down and drove back to the hotel after walking through the rain. We had dinner in that first restaurant we went to.

Observing that night was really, really cold. It just rained so it was freezing at the hill, and it did take a while to move around. The group brought several hotel blankets to huddle around in when it was cold, but I just went to the main building instead of staying out, which was fine with me. During our observations, we looked for Messier objects (my group went down the list by setting time, so we saw at least 10 before we decided to leave because it was freezing). We saw M51 and the Cat Eye, to name a few. Those were the most interesting objects we were able to see, the rest were mostly clusters and tiny galaxies. We did manage to find 532 Herculina though, and got some data on it. We left and got back to the hotel at about 2 AM, where I did laundry and such, while everyone else slept early.

Monday, June 26

Went to the Canyon school to hear a lecture from Patrick's wife, Karen give a talk on galaxies. Then we got into the car and drove for an hour to Santa Fe.

We arrived in Santa Fe at about 3:30 PM. We split up to check out the plaza. My half of the group started off looking at the Native American jewelry. I ended up buying something! It was a necklace and bracelet for my sisters. Then I found everyone else at the store looking at souvenirs, then met at the plaza. We hopped back into the van and went to Scott's house. The dogs he had were huge, and jumped at everyone, doing the usual dog things. Before dinner, we played pool downstairs. Then we ate an Italian dinner and went back to playing pool. Joe got beaten by John O in the last game, and then we headed off to the Santa Fe opera. It was pretty cold because it was raining, and it was an outdoor auditorium, so that didn't make it much better. "Carmen" was actually quite good, and not like those operas you see on TV with these huge people singing. The play was in mostly started snoring so loud at the end that I had to wake him up. After the opera was over, we went back to the hotel, and I went to bed.

Tuesday, June 27

Woke up at 8 AM today, really tired. We had a quick breakfast, then hopped into the car and drove for an hour, then stopping at a restaurant in Socorro for lunch with Patrick, Karen, Cass and Don, plus the usual people (except for John O). Then we drove past Albuquerque and after several hours, we arrived to the VLA dishes just like in the movie Contact. We took a tour, and climbed up one of the dishes, as well as going inside to look at all the machinery. It was pretty cool, but very sunny and windy, especially when we were trying to take group photos. Then we went to the gift shop where I bought a lot more tourist things, then back in the van to go to Socorro. We ate at a diner, and once again, I couldn't finish the spaghetti or the soup that came with it, even though it was good. Then we went back to the van and drove for hours back home. We came back at 10:30, and watched Joe crash into the van on the way out, and we went to Amy and Gar's room for some TV. We found COPS, Futurama and Family Guy. After that, we played truth or dare. I dared Ryan to sniff Jon's boots, and that was just hilarious! Then after we couldn't think of any more dares, we decided to just play truth, which was also fun. I got to know more about everyone else, and laugh at (or with) them too. Then the guys left, and only Caitlin, Gar and Amy were left and we started talking amongst ourselves, before calling Jon to come back for his shoes. We got him to stay for a bit to talk, before I went back to sleep at 3:30 AM.

Wednesday, June 28

Woke up at 10 AM and went to the Canyon school to hear a lecture from Cass about gamma ray bursts. Then we got to work on Friday's presentation, and blogs. The presentation planning actually went quite smoothly, because we got our ideas down and everything, and we just went off to do things like preparing the slide or finding images. Then it was another Bradbury lecture on the black hole in the center of the galaxy from Rob Coker, then dinner at this place, Trinity Beverage Company. The food was probably good, but my order didn't come so I didn't pay for it. Whoo! Free $25 steak! Then we went observing, looking for binary stars and tracking Herculina again. It was freezing, even more so than last time. Joe passed out on the floor, and on the car ride to and from the observatory. We got back to the hotel at around 3 AM, where everyone was so tired and just went to bed, but I stayed up till 4 AM eating my free steak and watching Family Guy.

Thursday, June 29

Woke up at around 11 AM and had brunch at Nuke City Foodworks. Then was to Canyon School to continue our PowerPoint and watching Frank chat online with one of Amy's friends, using her AIM account. We spent most of the afternoon working in a meeting room in our hotel on tomorrow's presentation. We did get something done, but we still have lots to do. Then it was time to go back to the school for a run-through. Then it was time for a Bradbury lecture about the Sun's new model with Joyce Guzik. We had dinner at "De Colores" which a mix between a club and a restaurant. They served mostly chili and Mexican food, but I wasn't too happy with the amount of cheese in everything they had. Then we went back to the Canyon School and did our presentation with John O for a while, then back to the hotel to finish the remaining slides and watch Futurama and Family Guy. A lot of people went to bed at 2, but I stayed up till 4 AM with work and some other things.

Friday, June 30

Woke up really tired today at 9 AM. Then it was to breakfast at the hotel, where Jon told us what happened this morning, with details, which I will withhold here. Then we headed off to the Canyon School and continued our work on the presentation later. Then we had lunch at Nuke City Foodworks again, something I was not looking forward to, then back to the school for a rehearsal. After feedback, we went to finish our slides, then blogged. After a short trip to the gas station, we went through another run through where I did a great job of screwing up. Then we went to Bradbury and gave our presentation to a small audience (compared with the full house that we had from the first one with Geoff Reeves to the one with Rob Coker). Frank, John-O and Don all said we did a great job, but I have my doubts. Then we went to the museum gift shop where I bought a bunch of cool rocks (like amethyst and quartz) and went back to the hotel. Later we headed up to a ski lodge for dinner, where everything was double the price 2,000 feet down. I had a rough time with my chicken strips that had the dryness and texture of wood. Bleech! After trying to eat it, it was already around 9:15, so I found everyone else, and I watched Caitlin and Ryan play Foosball against Amy, Sam and Joe. This dude came by and commentated on the game for us. Then we went outside to hear a few minutes of the rock concert outside. It was on a hill, instead of a stadium, and everyone was on the lodge or on blankets. Then we headed back to the van and got back to the hotel sometime past 10. We were undecided about what we were going to do, so we started playing Frisbee in Smith's parking lot, then split up. Gar and Joe stayed near the hotel (in the pool), but the rest of us went for a walk. We went to McDonald's but it was closed, then to Sonic for drinks. Then it was sitting at the park again talking. I sneaked off to go back to the hotel, and found Gar and Joe hanging out in the pool, later joined by Ryan. I left and found everyone else in Amy's room, where I opened my box of pencils (after having it for 30 days) and watched Jon beat Caitlin twice in cards after days of trying, and about 15 games. Then we were so tired all we could do was pass out on the beds and watch David Spade and Dave Chappelle on Comedy Central. I sneaked back to the room when everyone, except Ryan, was snoring or in the bathroom and went to bed.

Saturday, July 1

Woke up tired again but this time we went for Fenton Hill in the morning. We arrived at around 11:30, and listened to Don make broadcasts on ham radio. Don bought some airtime and an ad in an astronomy magazine about our broadcast. We received broadcasts from about 11 different states, like New York, Arkansas and Missouri) but had to quit at around 1 PM because of thunderclouds. Then we went for a picnic lunch at the main building, checked my scores online (NOOOOO!!!) played with Don's Geiger counter and toured the remainder of the observatory area. We went to the pond where they kept those photo tubes that detected neutrinos and the computers for it. Then it was back to the main building and the Geiger counter. We played with the uranium marbles again and I wrapped them in foil to see if it affected the count. It actually helped! First the count was 40 beeps/minute, but with foil it was 24 beeps/minute, with a 20 beep/minute count for background radiation. After seeing the beeps given off, I got more aluminum foil and talked about nuclear physics with Don and John-O. Then it was back to the van. We drove to CB Fox where Jon and Sam, followed by Ryan Amy, Caitlin and Gar sat on the display couches. Gar and Ryan bought some chocolate at the candy shop there. Then it was back to the Canyon school to work on the blogs. Later we're planning to go to White Rock for dinner and doing some Earthwatch stuff. Since we're going to leave Los Alamos tomorrow at 4 AM, we're planning to stay up all night.

End Communication