Special Delivery!

Life around the Mace household was just not busy or exciting enough so the stork decided to surprise us...

We are in love.  Baby Mace's due date is May 13, 2012...Mother's Day.  

(Although neither one of us thinks it will be born on that day.)

Also Baby Mace has it's mother's dance moves...somewhere between convulsions and Bill Cosby.  I decided this song was what it was dancing to...

Just in case you were wondering... here I am at the end of the first trimester and the beginning of the second.  

Hodgepodge...

This is such a hodgepodge post...  Here goes!

We have a new favorite dessert place!  It is Hawaiian shaved ice and they put Dole Whip in the bottom of the bowl!  

Y-U-M!!!!!!!!!!

On October 21st we went to a LA. Kings vs.  Dallas Stars hockey game.  We had a lot of fun, and I hope to get Greg to go to some more games with me!

On October 27th, Greg passed his Qualification Exam which means that he is in the final count down. In other words he is a PhD candidate!  Pico and I are super proud of him!

The day after Greg passed his exam we decided to take a weekend trip up to Morro Bay.  Here is the sunset at Morro Bay.  Unfortunately this is the only part of Morro Bay that we got to see...

When we got to the hotel we found this waiting for us...Yes, that is a bed bug.  We grabbed our suitcase that we had just wheeled in, and wheeled it right back to the car and made the decision to drive back home rather than risk getting bed bugs.  Oh well.  Better luck next time?

A View From Above The Clouds

by Greg


I spent 3 nights observing the night sky in Hawaii, remotely from Los Angeles. Long nights (3 hour time difference!) and clouds made the time go by slowly.


I found a webcam on one of the telescopes that takes beautiful pictures! The movies are especially entertaining. You can see it here:
http://cfht.hawaii.edu/en/gallery/cloudcams/


Here are a few pictures I saved:

Sunrise to the east of Mauna Kea, clouds below and stars above.

Full moon makes a bright night. Lights of Hilo peak through the clouds.

More bright clouds.

Sunset.  The shadow of the mountain stretches out over the clouds and the ocean.

Sunrise.

Time to say goodbye...

I thought long and hard and came to the decision that in order to try and update this blog more regularly, I am not going to be updating "Side Show Slide Show" anymore.  If there comes a time when I have a ton more pictures I will update it again.  So if this goes according to plan you should be reading a lot more posts on this blog in the future.  Thank you for visiting "Side Show Slide Show!"

Yodelayheehoo

A couple weeks ago we were able to escape from the city and go up to Mineral King at the southern end of Sequoia National Park. We had thought that it would only take 4 hours to get there, but it took 6! Also, we learned that the clutch on the car needed to be replaced by driving steep mountain roads for a few hours.

On the way up the single lane road we crossed a few old bridges.This one crosses the Kaweah River and was built in 1923.

Our campsite was at Cold Springs, an old mining area at ~7000ft. Here is some moss on a tree.

When we arrived at the campground, all the sites were taken, except the walk-in ones.  This means we had to carry our stuff ~1/4 mile, which wasn't fun. 

Right next to our camp was Mosquito Creek.  It was appropriately named and we got many bug bites, despite bug spray and candles.

Greg set off cataloging the plant life. 

And here is some more moss on a tree. Not much of that in AZ.

Here is a pretty flower next to the Upper Kaweah River, next to our camp.  Our tent was on a hill overlooking the confluence of Mosquito Creek and the river.

At the end of the first day we were kind of disappointed in the bugs, the difficulty in setting up camp, and the bad clutch on the car. But it was nice to sleep with the running water and crickets nearby.

The next day we drove around the corner and found a few deer. 

And the vast Mineral King Valley. It was like we were in the Alps, with the peaks at 14000ft.

Walt Disney tried to turn this valley into a world renowned skiing area, but was blocked by environmentalists.  Yay! 

Greg found a moth. 

Janet found a creek. 

We both found some yellow flowers (and then decided we need a book that identifies the plants that we come across).  Mostly because we were sure we had walked through several patches of poison oak.

Finally we looked at some flowers, an old cabin that was built ~100 years ago, and then made the 6 hour drive back. The clutch survived, but we had it replaced right when we got back. It was a long trip for 1 night, and next time we will get there earlier and stay longer...maybe next summer.

Hawaii Revisited by Greg

My work took me back to Hawaii for 2 nights of observing on the Keck II telescope. I was able to confirm a few low-mass brown dwarfs (mass greater than planets, less than stars) and came across a previously unknown galaxy!

The view from my room of the head quarters with the mountain in the background.

Closeup of the mountain. My telescope was the one in the middle.

Right when I landed I went for lunch in Kona and had a calamari sandwich with fries and a Coke.

Then I went to Mau'umae Beach where I swam with a sea turtle.

I visited a number of small historical towns. Here I stopped at Mr. Ed's bakery for a coconut turnover.

I photographed a lot of flowers.

And relaxed at the 420 ft. Akaka Falls.

Explored a state park that was located along the coast, under a highway bridge, where this stream meets the Ocean.

Took in the views at Laupahoehoe Point, where in 1946 a tsunami hit and washed away a school house with 20 children and 4 teachers.

Finally I drove the the view point at Waipio Valley, but didn't make the hike down.

For dinner I had a BBQ chicken sandwich with coleslaw and an onion ring on a hawaiian roll.

On my way back to the airport I visited a coffee plantation, which had great coffee and lots of farm animals.

Cat sleeping in the company store.

Roasted coffee cooling before being bagged.

Palomar Observatory, by Greg

Hello. Time for another fun trip to a telescope with Greg, the astronomer!

There are a few older observatories in California that were built back before the cities sprawled. For this observing run I headed to Palomar Observatory in San Diego County. I used the flagship Hale telescope with a 200-inch Pyrex mirror.

A three hour drive into the mountains took me to Mount Palomar and the living quarters known as "The Monastery." The living quarters were given this name because Palomar was built when few women were involved in astronomy, and in fact were banned from visiting the living quarters.

Now women are welcome at Palomar and astronomy is about 50/50, but the name has stuck.

After I settled in my room I went for a walk to the Hale telescope.

I have been to enough telescopes to know that when you are given a master key, you should use it on every door you can. The dome is 14 stories tall with a catwalk at ~80 feet. The lower half is full of closed doors with the remnants of old instruments and observing tools behind them. The most famous of these are the photographic plates which were once used to take astronomical images.

When the 200-inch was first built images were taken on 18-inch square plates of glass that produced negatives that needed to be developed. These plates were placed at "prime-focus." This means that the observer would climb the ladder up the the top of the telescope were a small room and chair are located. Here they would put the plate in place and then look through a small eyepiece at a bright star. They would then sit in the cold and dark dome for an hour nudging the telescope to keep everything aligned. After an hour, they would do it again with a new plate. An assistant would take the first plate down to the basement for developing. These are the rooms that can be explored if you have the master keys they give to the visiting astronomers.

After exploring the telescope I returned to The Monastery, where a cooked dinner was provided. For the next two nights I sat in front of 4 computer monitors and took images using a digital camera. However, I still had to nudge the stars to keep everything aligned while we observed. Since I was the assistant in this case, I am happy that digital images don't require developing and that I was in a heated room instead of the cold dome.

I am headed back to Hawaii in a couple weeks to observe at the Keck Observatory and to visit tropical waterfalls!!! I will have another blog post when I return!

Our Little Visitor

At the end of June we had a visit from Greg's little sister Anissa.

It started with a quick trip back to Flagstaff to pick her up, which wouldn't be complete without a trip or two to Macys... (maybe it should have been three).

When we got back to Los Angeles we needed a place for Anissa to sleep, you know one where Pico wouldn't lick her at night, and try to share the covers. Greg and I had been toying with the idea of getting some furniture for a while so the next morning we went to Ikea and got a couch, table, and a couple book cases. Out of these three things we knew Anissa could sleep on one of them... I voted book case but Anissa refused.

FYI, Ikea has flat rate delivery! So if you need to buy something there, buy a lot and get them to deliver it for much less then a truck rental would cost! (This friendly advise brought to you by Greg).

Here is Greg, Pico, and Anissa putting together our new table. They had everything assembled in just a few hours. By the way I also helped but there are no pictures to prove it.

Greg had to go into work a couple of times during her visit so Anissa and I ran errands, and had some fun. We went to Color Me Mine, a store where you paint a ceramic thing-a-ma-bob and they fire it for you. Anissa made a coffee mug and I made a spoon rest.

Next, we went out for Chicken and waffles! Yum!

And then we visited the Getty Museum. You are not allowed to photograph the exhibits, but the gardens are just as amazing!

In the middle of the week we took a boat ride out to Santa Cruz Island and had a long hike and a picnic at Smugglers Cove.

The next day we slept in late and then drove to Hollywood to see Shakespeare in the Park at the Old LA Zoo. We were the first audience members of the 2011 season and received a round of applause while we settled in and at another picnic meal.

Finally we went to Angel Stadium in Anaheim to catch the Freeway Series (LA Angeles vs. LA Dodgers). The Dodgers won. After attending 5 different baseball games since moving to LA, our team has yet to win.

After all this excitement we needed a rest. Anissa decided we should spent a few days at home watching some show about mermaids before we headed back to Flagstaff.

For our final dinner we had Sushi. We had to lie to Anissa about what she was eating, but she liked the eel rolls until we told her they contained eel, oh well! Desert was Diddy Riese ice cream sandwiches, if you come to LA and you don't go to Diddy Riese you are seriously missing out on something great!

We drove Miss. Anissa back to Flagstaff and spent a couple more days resting with Family. Then we had to get back to Los Angeles for Greg to work again, and me to read a bunch of really cheesy fiction books.

Hope everyone is having a great Summer!!!!!!

PS: For those of you who are curious here is a before and after of our apartment.

Sorry, this one is a little blurry.