| Thanks to QuantaSham's reminder, I came to realize that I haven't been to Xanga for more than 5 months. Now I am more or less constantly updating my lab log and labbing experience in my own Tiddly about electronics and optics techinique. This update is just some short summary about my life in Boulder recently. I had a lot of doubts about myself and my ability before deciding to go to graduate school, not scared by some comments, just genuinely doubted my capability of continuing onto this track. But I decided to take the risk. I mean, I am only at my early 20's, I can do some experimental trial with my life for one or two years and see whether I love it or I hate it. So, I went to Boulder -- an extremely sporty and outdoorsy place with a 1/3 of residential population having their Ph.D's (or equivalent degrees). After a year, I don't know what else to say except for I ABSOLUTELY LOVE THIS PLACE AND WHAT I AM DOING IN MY LIFE. I can make this bold statement at least about myself, I have never been so happy in my entire life! This is proabably the most insightful decision I have ever made! We have the very best and frontier equipment (as far as I know, we have 3 bath-tub-sized sonic cleaner while MIT only has a small-drawer-sized one!) , supporting staff, collaborative environment, and so much FUN! My schedule is a bit crazy, I usually get in lab at about 8 or 9 am and leave at around 9 or 10 pm, although every Thursday night I play right field in our physics softball team. Debbie Jin and Nobel laureaute Eric Cornell (YES! This one-arm man plays softball VERY VERY WELL!!) play in JILA monster, one of these days, we will beat them! The first two semesters were mainly course taking. Quantum Mechanics I&II, Electrodynamics I&II, Laser Fundamentals and Statistical Mechanics were the 6 courses I chose. I had a blast in my QM I&II. My instructor for the course was Dr. Chris Greene. He is ONE smart guy, doing hardcore AMO theory and has a great sense of humor!! I had a lot of good time asking him questions about 9j-symbol, irreducible tensor, Fermi golden rules, scattering, etc. I became a research assistant officially on the 2nd semester and built two lasers and one avalanche photodetector on my own. Besides study and research in lab, a couple of events were memorable as well, my French maid costume in Haloween party, my trip to Los Angeles to visit Brittney and to Santa Barbara to visit Cherry, my winter vacation, the thanksgiving hot pot party, and so on. The summer has been fabulous! I got my new road bike and all biking gears that I need to train myself for September's buffalo 50miles' race. I have been hiking in Rocky Mountain a lot and I did a hardcore camping at Rooservelt National Forest and looking forward to another one. The trip outside Colorado was so much fun, I ate a lot of seafood and had fun watching dolphins only about 100 yards away at the beach. We also find a great karaokie place for Saturday nights' gathering. There are times I play frisbee golf and go to bar or play guitar heroes with friends after labbing, which was definitely fun. We also got a new griller in the backyard, so we have been doing BBQ's a lot! There is even a park that has batting cage, go-karts, and mini golf there!!!! And Denver has been such a great place for music bands, club dancing. Even movies on air recently are a lot funnier, e.g. the Hangover, Up, Bruno, etc. There are so many plans ahead, go whitewater rafting, go kayaking more with Tory, go paintball fighting, and have more impromptu blast! Hurray! Of course, the most important thing is to go to work, but it's so much fun, I can't believe I am getting paid (and paid well) to do something I would absolutely do just for free. And the summer is closing to an end, but our softball team is moving to the fall league, so we are still in game every Thursday and practicing with JILA monster every Monday practice and the blast won't end. |
