(no subject)

I'm updating my LJ in lab right now because I'm waiting for these video images to be exported as TIFF files so that I can run the analysis code on them. The code is supposed to track individual particles and measure their velocities. I think it also does some FFT (fast Fourier transform) thing on the data.

( The point of all this )

Right now, I'm sick to my stomach. I went to breakfast at the Cottage Bakery near Van Allen Hall, having gone running and just missed breakfast at the Burge Dining Hall. I ordered some coffeecake, on the recommendation of one of the physics students here, and a small muffin. I would not have ordered the muffin had I known that the pieces of coffeecake they served up were the size of pocket dictionaries. I'm not used to eating nearly this large a quantity of rich food for breakfast. It may well take me a few hours to get over this...

(no subject)

I hardly ever update LJ this frequently, but it's just that these video files take FOREVER to be saved, frame-by-frame, as TIFF files, using Adobe Premiere. Each data run takes something like 35 minutes, and then it takes a fairly long time to upload all those humongous files to the UNIX server that has all the analysis code. I want to get all the data files from the last few days of camera testing off the digital VCR and onto the UNIX server. If nothing else, I could do some work on the stuff at home by SSH-ing into the server. But if I'm coming home for a few days to take a break from Iowa, I'm not sure I should be trying to do research at home.

Perhaps I'll go home around dinnertime and get Anna Karenina. At least I'd be able to do some reading while these files save and upload.

( Thoughts on experimental physics... )

Long day...

I think this is probably going to be the latest I've ever been in lab. It's almost 11 pm; I've stayed this late digitizing our fake-particle lattice video data frame by frame and uploading it to the UNIX server. I don't really have to do anything except monitor the computer and start on the next data run when one ends, so it's not as if I've been doing anything really challenging intellectually. It's just "grunt work" on some of the data I took that simply has to be done.

It should finish uploading in a few minutes and then I'll go home. So I've been in from approximately 8:45-5:30, taking roughly an hour for lunch (including walking to and from the dining hall), went to dinner and back to room to get some stuff, returned to lab at 7:00ish, and been there until now.

Worried. Very worried...

I was just walking home from lab. As I approached my dorm, around 11:35, I saw a Greyhound bus approaching. It was labeled "Chicago."

Now, my dorm is on the main route off the interstate into downtown Iowa City. The bus had to have been heading off the highway towards the Greyhound station downtown. But the weeknight bus to Chicago is supposed to depart at 11:15. Given that the bus was still 5 minutes from downtown, and supposing that the bus only takes 5 minutes to load passengers, it wouldn't have gotten on the road before 11:45.

Maybe they're just having a bad night tonight. Maybe the bus can make up some time in the wee hours on the way to Chicago. But I know this: If my Greyhound tomorrow night is much more than 1/2 an hour late to Chicago, I'm in very serious danger of missing my flight.

And suppose the bus loses even more time en route to Chicago? If it's like those long-distance Amtrak trains that arrive hours late, I'm screwed. If it's around 45 minutes late, I'd think about taking a taxi to the airport assuming they're running; it'd be expensive but less so than just losing the flight. Beyond an hour late, I'm done for.