Submitted!

I submitted my thesis Monday morning. !!!!  It's been 3 days, and the realisation is just slowly sinking in. I'm enjoying being off and not worrying about the thesis - a very unfamiliar feeling. There is a growing worry about the defense of course, which I probably should start doing something about fairly soon (prep talk, study my large document in which I've collected potential defines questions).

But YEY!!! A strong worry about what to do about the future turned into calm yesterday as well. If the thought of following the path you're supposed to follow after a phd scares me half to death, and the thought of doing things that I would want to do fills me with calm and happy/excited anticipation of the future, there's got to be some kind of hint there telling you which would be the better way to go, right?

Since I moved to Toronto in the beginning of August, I've been working like crazy on the thesis, except for a week when my brother was visiting, and I got some sightseeing in then. On Tuesday, the day after my submission, I went downtown as a reward to myself, visited the Eaton centre, and walked around in the city, while David was doing simulator training (I got to see the simulators - very cool machines!!). Toronto is really great. A downtown where you can walk, enjoy, see the shadow side of nice "old" buildings being lit up by the reflection of the beautiful sunset in the neighbouring high glass buildings, follow the stream of people going home from work to the union station, take the GO train home in just 20 minutes. I love the GO train. It's rather Dutch except for the diesel engine, which is massive and crazy loud (but rather cool). I saw the most beautiful sunset from its second floor as I went home. The sun sets really quickly this far south! Just a matter of seconds! 

Today is remembrance day, and my mother's birthday, and I don't think I've ever experienced such a beautiful 11th of November before. David was off and we took a bike ride up along the little river, through the forest, discovered a new path, and then back again. The last trees are getting coloured leaves now (they seem to take turns here - starting in September - I don't know if it's the norm, but the autumn really was amazing).  The sun still burns my face. In November!!! 

We also changed our number plates on the car today. Funny how such a seemingly insignificant thing makes such a difference in the feeling of where you belong. We need a new Holland sticker though, the old one is fading. The Sweden sticker is fine :) 

Having fun with my wonderful camera. This is one of my favourites!

David's parents visited for a week - during some of the best autumn colours

The birds are preparing to go south

I'm so relieved!!!

First month at the place where the alders grow

I love it here! We live in a part of Toronto called Etobicoke, very close to lake Ontario (300 m). With a beach. With loads of geese (I love geese!) and other birds. The apartment is on the east side of our building, but nevertheless it gets fairly hot on days of 30 degrees and above… It is also very humid here. In other words: I'm loving it!!!!

We have visited one of the 3 (!) ikeas more often than is probably sane (it's 10 minutes away, and they have cheap food…). It takes either 50 minutes or 20 minutes to get downtown depending on choice of transportation (bus+subway or train). My supervisor visited last weekend, and during the day we worked together at the University of Toronto, she showed me around. Before then, I had only seen the Astronomy building (which is wonderful!!! openable windows, an AC you can turn on and off yourself, and are asked not to use unless absolutely necessary, a HUGE lounge, plants en masse, large windows, and view south, with the CN tower in direct view) - and now I got to see a little bit more of campus. What a wonderful campus!!! I need to bring my camera and post some photos! There are lots of old buildings in gothic style. Just a few block south of where I'm located, there is a street (Baldwin) with a plethora of super cute restaurants. We went to one, and the food was just wonderful!

There is obviously an immense amount of things to do here, which I'm saving for when my brother comes over for a visit in September. Because - the thesis has priority #1 for now. But that doesn't stop me from simultaneously enjoying the weather, the location, the apartment, evening walks to the beach, being together again, the rides to uni on the subway, watching people, being in a big city, still having lots of nature nearby, seeing stars and planets over the lake, existing…

The lake in the morning

This little girl had flown all the way from Brampton in 3 days (about 20 km away), and stayed one night with us before I got in touch with her owners who came to pick her up. Just as well, thought my own budgies, who found her a bit bossy... 

The Toronto temple - only 30 minutes away (!!!). I had some fun experimenting with HDR. 

Trip to Toronto

It has almost been a month now since I ended my 6 year long sejour in Winnipeg, and went east. So it's really time for an update on things. All bonds with Winnipeg are not cut yet though - the thesis is yet to be defended. And edited. Of course it would have been amazing to have all that behind me, and that was indeed my plan. On the other hand, it is nice to move in gradual steps.

The trip over was really wonderful - a 3 day camping trip, with husband and birds, trailer and tent, traversing a distance the length of Sweden (2060 km). We had a fair bit of rain the first night, at a camp site called Wolf River, a little bit east of Thunder Bay. But the tent did not leak, and it was ultra cosy to listen to the rain. All three days were rather warm, but our little Golf managed excellently! The second day consisted of lots of ascending and descending major hills bordering lake Huron, and it was pretty - of what we could see, a lot of time we were in thick fog. We camped a little bit east of Sault Ste Marie, in a wonderful spot just on the beach. We got our first swim for the year (about time…) and it was wonderful.

The last day felt never-ending.  We arrived into Toronto just before 3 pm, after an 8 hr drive (instead of the anticipated 6.5 hr), I think on the hottest day of the three days. The traffic was intense, but it was fairly easy to get to our new abode. Some serious unpacking commenced. It took 3 hours in all. It was at least 30 degrees and rather humid - I don't think I've ever sweated that much for such a prolonged time!!

I left winnipeg scrubbing and cleaning, and I started out in Toronto scrubbing and cleaning - the previous tenants had not cleaned out the place. Yeehaa… The caretakers had done a great job cleaning the grossest details - stove, fridge, toilet, so they were in excellent shape (to our great relief!!!), but floors, walls, cupboards, etc, needed a thorough scrub. It was a long day…

T-6 days

T as in Theresa travelling to Toronto (Tenting!). I bought a tent today at Canadian tire. Naturally it has a hole in the floor (and I did not buy the dirt cheap one! Perhaps I should have...). Naturally it's impossible to fit it back into the box in which it came. But! In exactly a week, we'll be camping!!! If the car doesn't break down I guess... The hitch holds. The trailer keeps in one piece. I'm a little worried about the birds too. I wonder how they'll handle 3 days on the road. And will D be able to jump to Winnipeg during the long weekend? Can I include a map here? Nice!



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Oh, what a relief!

So, it seems like my thesis is going to be awesome. And the reason for that is that I'm going to put in an extra half chapter (or whole chapter) that will bind it all together - something I'd totally forgotten about (not the binding it all together part, that was totally on my mind, but the how to accomplish said binding - that was a bit elusive to me as I was finishing my "last" chapter on Tuesday - and it was really so simple, starting to occur to me as I handed over the chapter to my supervisor, and feeling a bit bad about its (the chapter's) inabilities to accomplish the binding on its own.

Lol. In other words, there are some parts missing, that have to be done (and when they are, the thesis will look great!)  Which is ok, I know how, but it'll take somewhat more time than 3 days… In other words, my deadline is going to be moved, and I will work on this for a little bit longer (a bit ~ a month or max two). Am I disappointed? I'm sure my poor supervisor thought I'd be… (she didn't really suggest this to me, we had a great meeting discussing it all, and it felt nice to be able to look at the thing clearly, in perspective). But no! Actually not disappointed at all! I'm just very relieved!! It's been good working 13 hours a day - I've accomplished a lot. But, after 2.5 weeks of this, I'm quite exhausted. Indeed, even this morning, I had a really hard time dragging myself into activity. But my relief is more about knowing that the job will not be mediocre, and that I will be able to continue the way I've started.

These weeks have been very enlightening - I've forced myself to really work in a highly disciplined manner. I've learnt loads, which has felt wonderful. Not only about the topic, but how to fight the anguish, and be structured. That's how I fought it - anguish arrives when seeing too much at once. Then structuring it up, forming a plan, dividing into manageable pieces, and just take one at a time and keep at it, is the way to go. Prayer is an indispensable ingredient in this process...
I am not going to continue on the 13 hr schedule though… I'll aim for 10 hrs/day instead :) 8 - 18 should be good.

There's another benefit with this scenario: I don't have to be working here. I can be somewhere else, say… Toronto?

Happy.

3 weeks

ARGH! GAH!
3 weeks left. And my thesis just keeps getting bigger and bigger (i.e. more and more things added on to it). 2 weeks ago something awesome happened: The last obstacle on my road was flattened, and everything I need to do thereafter, are things I now know how to do (uhm except convert continuum flux to SFR - that obstacle showed up after).  But it all takes such TIME!
I have a plan: These coming 3 weeks I will be working from 8 to 21.

Progress

I finished chapter 2 (data) 3 days ago (YES!). And my supervisor already gave me a pile of comments (things I really should have seen myself, but somehow one grows blind to the writing after a while, making the most obvious things going unnoticed). I've made a list of my remaining analysis, which needs to be written into chapter 6. It looks daunting, but still, on this the day of 50 days left before submission, it might just still be doable. I should leave a fair amount of weeks for chapter 7 (discussion).

I am thinking that going to the shuttle launch is a bit optimistic though. But, oh, I so want to go... There are three launches left, and the next one (after this one) will be just before the defence. And the last one might be popular...

(This is hilarious: I'm trying to "unconnect" my blog from my buzz, using chrome, and it doesn't work. Google, you're awesome, but seriously?)

Thesis, Toronto, climate and luggage

I just can't come up with a catchier title than that...

2 months minus 2 days to submission. Still so much to do that I'm skipping my awesome Halifax conference, and have panic lurking around the corner almost constantly. It's not a bad panic (yet). It's just enough to keep adrenalin levels a little bit above normals. I was hoping that would mean better efficiency working. No, judging from today, it apparently just means an increased anguish about missing something vital and thus reading paper details ad nauseam on stuff that isn't even applicable. !@#$%^.
ugh.

But, I'm not always in front of a computer monitor! This weekend, I visited my cutiepilot who is residing in Toronto since almost 2 weeks ago, which was fun. So that actually meant a flight there and back again, plus a little bit of sightseeing in-between trying to finish my data chapter. Toronto downtown is nice, the lake is nice, and the colour of the lake is great. The transit system seems very efficient, but bus drivers are as friendly as in Gothenburg (i.e. not at all). Outside of downtown, some work could be done for appearances, I think - the Pembina-through-Winnipeg look is just not that attractive. And outside of the city we have yet to explore.

nth trial to get us and skyline into same frame...

Other things… If I had more time I would spend some of it writing about the fascinating and frustrating phenomenon going on in the misreporting, and grave misinterpretation of climate science. Media is largely at fault, for not being able to accurately report actual results of science. And there is a huge gap in-between scientists and the general public in how to interpret results. The general public can't stand uncertainties - they want exact numbers. Well, that's not going to happen. So, what then? Should the general public learn more science, or scientists learn how to better communicate the science? My personal opinion is that media and politicians should learn more science - and better communicate it to the public.
The situation now is quite laughable. The global temperature is increasing, and everything points towards it being due to industrialization. Yet most members of the general public think it is a hoax, because they prefer listening to people without an education in the topic at hand. All one need to do is study up on the actual situation (rather than reading the blogs of the anti-science denialists), and the picture gets clearer and clearer. I am going to link to a good list of references on where we are at today (yes it's a blog entry, but it refers to original articles).

Ah. Nice to get that out of my system a bit!

Now, if only my luggage could be found and returned to me… It was erroneously tagged by an apparently semi-analphabetic Air Canada employee (and for once I didn't check the tag…) who gave it the destination for someone named Williams. Which happened to be Comox, some obscure place on Vancouver Island that I have never heard of before. I wonder if Williams' luggage came to Winnipeg… In any case, it's the first time I managed to lose luggage on a one-leg flight.

T-59 days

Gaaaaaaaah.....

I have two months to finish the remaining analysis and writing. Two months?!?! I mean, what did I accomplish during the last month, even though I worked like a droid on steroids?

<*Somewhere in winnipeg one can hear the echoes of a cry of many sentiments - feelings of anguish, mixed with frustration and resolution, hope and fears, wonderings of if it's even feasible, faith in accomplishment and deepest despair*>

Well at least I feel quite alive with all these feelings. Quite exhausted as well. The feelings cycle between elation and despair with a frequency of about 24 hours. Today was a despair day. I don't like those. But at least tomorrow should be good.
Murgh.
This droid needs a tune-up. A faster processor would be good. More RAM and logical circuits. At least the motivation chip doesn't seem to be able to malfunction anymore.

HA!

I did it. Handed in chapter 3 at 23:40 last night (I even had 20 minutes extra!).
Now for some coding and chapter 2. That should be fairly easy though (just describing the data, shouldn't be too bad, no awesome conclusions to make or anything. Just a pretty chapter). And, after that, I only have 2 chapters left (I don't count the summary)!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Plus editing the rest of course. But I choose not to think of that now. Those two chapters will require brain power though. So it will be tricky.

And, we're moving to Toronto! D first (when he starts his job), myself later, when the thesis is done (but I can see myself going there a few times after he has moved...)

Life is quite exciting! If I just can survive the defence........

4 Mars

Yesterday was my birthday as well as my David-anniversary - it was exactly 4 years ago since we met at St Andrew's airport! I'll never forget that day..! One should not dread turning 30, but instead plan for fun stuff that day (e.g. flying lessons). One never knows what will happen. Since 4 is my favourite number (and comes in yet another time: the name March comes from Roman god of war, Mars (and is called mars in Swedish), but is more importantly the 4th planet from the sun), I decided to just notice this ever-so-quickly in my not so very often updated blog.
This cutiepilot of mine decided to give me a Mac Mini for my birthday. I feel slightly spoilt... :) But I love it and named it Mac Mooi (=beautiful in Dutch).
For some reason I was happy like a kid this birthday, already the day before. That's much better than to most illogically resent "turning" older. As if one could change that anyways.
I also now own my very first orchid. Flower-alms from my mother provided that. It's very beautiful, and I'm very happy about it. It's a great addition to my plant collection.
Another awesomely awesome thing was the sushi place my supervisor took me and David to in the evening - Wasabi on Grant. Not a place for students if you want to be full. But full we became, both of the most magnificent sushi, as well as of the most excellent live jazz music. I'd like to come back for that music, but will have to make sure to be full beforehand, so as to not be tempted to get too much of their fantastic food.
An excellent day, in every way.

Monday is deadline for chapter 3.

More dairy talk...

If I ever get inspiration and time (no, scratch that, I never will, at least not before the summer. I have my allocated amount, and more than all of those hours should go into thesis work), I'd really like to report on the bit of life that was experienced during the Christmas and New year holidays. Fun stuff: Holland, Sweden, Canon EOS 350D for a bargain price, sleeplessness due to Dutch (lack of) heating and insulation, food, sweet food, Amsterdam, airport security of a never-before-observed amount. But for now, I'll report on one of the consequencies of said experience: Successful import of A-fil in two little bottles (small!) in carry-on. Yes. And it works. F-i-n-a-l-ly. Only with 3.25% milk though. 2% doesn't cut it, no matter how much on sale it is.

Also 5 excellent cheeses were imported (2 Dutch, 3 Swedish), as well as a bunch of chocolate (~1 kg fazermint from mum only starts the list). And pinda kaas (peanut butter), so we should be able to survive the rest of the winter. I think my Dutch improved slightly, but it didn't feel like it - all of a sudden people assumed that I understood more than I did, and the result of that was that I didn't understand a thing of the accelerated conversations. Ugh.

Yes. It's afternoon, and I should be working. Tot ziens.