Month: October 2006

In other news

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I wanted to go shop today. Turns out, Long Beach is crap for shopping. The “shopping plaza” consists of a Wall-Mart and a few low-budget stores. Cambridge high street has more charm and selection. Feh.

What annoys the hell out of me is that I wanted to get my grubby little paws on a Sony reader. It's only available in the US currently and there are no plans to release it in Canada, let alone the UK. The nearest Sony store is in west LA, which is a 65$ cab ride in one direction. I tried to order one online. They said that it might probably ship around the 21st of November, but there was no guarantee.

No e-book reader for me then.

This makes me sad.

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If I wasn't scheduled to speak in this session, I wouldn't be here right now

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Those were the first words of the first speaker of the moonlight session I was attending tonight. They perfectly reflect my frame of mind. You see, I was scheduled to give a presentation tonight, in the main ballroom of a conference where abour 3000 people are registered.

Unfortunately, or fortunately (depending on how you want to think of it), I was scheduled to talk at 9:40pm tonight. Yes, that's not a typo. The program organizers have been cruel and sadistic this year. The keynote sessions start at 8am and the final talk ends at 10pm. There were 20 people in the audience when I gave my talk. I work with 4 of those, and 5 others were the other speakers in the session. Still, more than 10 people stayed up to hear my talk. Freaks. I was stressing about it the whole day but it went well. In fact, it went really ok. I'd prepped some handwritten notes for my various slides, but I ended up not even needing them. No hangups, no real hesitations.

Apparently, it's always the case when I give a talk. I come across as a calm and composed speaker even though I'm shaking like a leaf inside. I got kudoses from my coworkers and from my big boss, which is always a good thing. They liked my slides and the content came across as slick and well presented. Me happy. I had a been with a random stranger who was interested in the project and now I'm adrenalined-out and I shall go crash forthwith and sleep the sleep of the righteous, for I have given my talk and not passed out. All is well.

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Are we there yet?

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My day started very early and ended very, very late. My cab picked me up at 8am and that's where the travel hassles started. We had to go pick up a colleague 40 minutes away, but he didn't have either of us down as going to Heathrow, so that got sorted out and we were on our way.

The real fun started at Heathrow, where our direct flight to LAX had been cancelled because of mechanical failure of the plane so we were rerouted via Chicago with a 3 hour lay-over. That flight was 2 hours late taking off and was 30 minutes late arriving. I got selected for an enhanced security screen, which meant going through all my carry-on luggage and getting my boots and laptop wiped down and screened.

The flight itself was generally ok. I was able to watch 2 movies (Cars and X-Men 3) and a documentary about crossword puzzles. I'd made myself some grilled turkey breast wraps for lunch and dinner and I had a ton of junk food, so I had enough grub for all the flights (and as a side note, I found out there's a deli and grocery shop close to our hotel, so I should be ok for the flight back, yay!)

At Chicago, we had to pick up all our luggage from O'Hare arrivals and lug it across to the domestic departure terminal where we checked everything back in and went through yet another security check. I have to say, airport security is a big fucking joke. They're just going through the motions to make the sheep feel safer and in the process, waste everybody's time. When I arrived at O'Hare, there were signs everywhere that the department of homeland security would fingerprint and photograph everybody who comes from Europe. Apparently, that doesn't include me (probably because I have a canuck passport) cause they just grunted me through the checkpoint.

That flight was also one and a half hour late getting off the ground. I paid for a seat upgrade to premium economy cause at that point, my back was starting to kill me and those extra 4 inches make the world of difference. It was only 20 quid, so I didn't feel bad doing it..

A sign of the times: the seat I was in had been previously used by somebody that was so fat as to require a seatbelt extension. I'm not a small person by any measure, but with most airline seatbelts, I have about a foot or so belt that is still available to use. That person required a whole extra bit of belt…

When we landed at LAX, we picked up our bags (again). The poster tube I was carrying got broken (they didn't screw the cap back on when they opened it to inspect it so it got lost) and my coworker's bag got inspected by homeland security (they left a note saying they'd done it as a random spot check).

Getting to Long Beach was… interesting. I strongly believe our cab driver was hopped up on coke, weaving through 4 lanes of traffic in the freeway like a fucking maniac while trying to light his cigarette and playing bongo drums on his steering wheel to the beat of the (actually quite good but too loud) cubano jazz that was playing on the radio. When he got to Long Beach, he didn't know where the hotel was so he was driving around like he was using the force.

At one point, he asked another cabby for directions. The dialogue went something like this (and I am NOT exaggerating):

cab1: Hey, son of a gun! Where's the courtyard marriot?
cab2: fuck you!
cab1: fuck you too! courtyard marriot?
cab2: fuck you!
cab1: fuck you too! haha! courtyard marriot?
cab2: fuck you!

And it went like that until the light changed, where the other cab just peeled off and our cab driver starting complaining that nobody liked him in Long Beach.

By pure stupid luck, we found the hotel and checked in. Of course, something went wrong. The room was supposed to be pre-paid with the EBI credit card. Of course, no mention of that is on file. We'll figure that out in the next few days.

By that point, it was 11pm local time, 7am UK time. I'd been on the move for 23 hours and I was braindead. I gave Katy a quick skype call and went to bed.

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HUPO day 1

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My body is screaming for sleep, fluids and advil right now.

I had a good breakfast at the hotel (the breakfast buffet was a make-your-own waffle iron, how cool is that?)

The hotel is clean and comfy, but for unknown reasons, call it a gut feeling, I don't feel good about leaving Parsley in the hotel room so he's going to have an education in proteomics from my laptop bag.

I've registered at the conference venue and I'm going to sit in to a few talks this morning but the rest of the pre-meeting stuff this weekend doesn't really inspire me so I might play hookie and go back to the hotel. We'll see how things go. I have to say that I'm less than impressed with the session I'm in right now. The session chair and keynote speaker didn't bother to show up – always a good sign. The next speaker's hard drive crashed, the microphone isn't loud enough and the laser pointer doesn't work. All sorts of nice…

I need tea.

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[Recipe] Lasagna Soup

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1 pound sausage meat
2 cups diced onions
1 cup diced carrots
1/2 teaspoon dried basil
1/2 teaspoon dried oregano
1/4 teaspoon red pepper flakes
1/8 teaspoon salt
1/8 teaspoon pepper
4 cups chicken broth
1 large tin crushed tomatoes
1 large tin tomato sauce
1 cup dry large-shaped pasta
2 cups chopped fresh spinach
4 ounces diced provolone cheese
1 ounce fresh grated Parmesan cheese

In a dutch oven over medium-high, add sausage and cook until browned – crumble the sausage as you go with a wooden spoon. Add the onions and carrots – cook 3 minutes. Mix in the basil, oregano, red pepper flakes, salt and pepper – cook 1 minute. Pour in the broth, crushed tomatoes and tomato sauce. Bring to a boil and add in the pasta. Simmer soup until the pasta has cooked. Mix in the fresh spinach and cook until wilted – about 1 to 2 minutes. Remove from the heat.

To serve – place 1 ounce of diced provolone in the bottom of 4 bowls. Evenly divide the soup between the 4 bowls. Sprinkle each serving with Parmesan and basil.

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