Busy, busy, busy.......

Oh my goodness! Life/work has been absolutely jam-packed with way too much stuff to do this past month. Between birthday parties, thesis deadlines, wedding planning, trip planning, moving home, applying for jobs, etc. we've been swamped and therefore I haven't had much time to blog. Needless to say, I won't have much time to blog between now and my thesis deadline (May 9th) to discuss the mundane goings on my stressful last 3 weeks as a PhD student. But, I did have time a few weeks ago to post the pictures from Joe's Birthday party on Flickr, though they are lacking titles which will probably remain nameless, that is unless I decide to procrastinate writing my thesis (like I'm doing right now by writing this).

I don't have any pictures to show you since Joe's Birthday party, but here's a picture from my thesis... yes, it is a real human brain.

Happy 29th Birthday Joe!!

I don't have time to write anything now... but here are a couple fun things from last night....

-Guinness through a straw

-single patty Greatest burger

-arm wrestling with Sandeep

-dancing with me!

-Happy Birthday cheers to Joe!

beautiful weekend

This weekend was absolutely beautiful and sunny. Joe and I had a lazy day Saturday after having a late dinner at Melody's house Friday night. We went to the market to buy stuff to grill. Nothing like cooking out in March! And then after we finished all of our neighborhood grocery shopping we headed down to the park to get some sun. Joe read while I walked around and took pictures of the spring flowers with the big bad Sony now that I know how to use the manual setting!

- honeybee in a daffodil
-grape hyacinth (these will be in my bouquet)

On Sunday, I stayed home and cleaned the apartment and did laundry like usual. And then I made a new found recipe in one of my Jamie Oliver cookbooks for poussins (small hen chickens) with roasted potatoes and then I also made spinach.

-Mmmm....it was messy to eat but really yummy!

Happy Birthday to me!!

Yeah for 2 days of birthday celebrations! Thank you all for the birthday wishes!!

On my birthday Joe took me out to a nice dinner at Ma Mère M'a Dit (My mother told me) after ballet class. We had a very interesting meal, well Joe did... I had my new favorite, duck. He ordered some veal dish that he'd never heard of before because he's adventurous and thought, 'why not?!' Of course the waiter knew we weren't francophones and proceeded to explain that it's not meat, but organ meat. Now, my french isn't perfect, but I know quite a few vocabulary words for organs that people do regularly eat, like heart, liver, kidneys. But Joe decided that he'd eat it anyway without knowing what 'riz de veau' was. Of course I wasn't about to try it, but Joe said it was okay...tasting like dark turkey meat....hmm..... we found out when we got home that it was 'sweatbread', which is actually pancreas or thymus...... mmmmmmmmm...............gross!

Then last night was my birthday party at Great Escape with my friends. It was a pretty low key evening considering other birthday parties (i.e. Stephan's or Joe's) so in the end I only had, I think, 5 shots....of course they all came in the last hour or so that we were there. I made brownies to fatten everybody up that were yummy.

-my birthday cake. I turned 24...I found out because I counted the candles!!

-reading my card

On our way home, we walked by an upside down car in the middle of the road. Apparently everybody was okay and we got there after everybody was taken to the hospital. I decided to take some pictures because if the swiss police are doing it with the camera phone then so can I!

-how crazy!

More fun photos from my bday party!

Easter Weekend

Nothing like an official 4 day weekend holiday!

Friday I went to work for a few hours to finish something up and then headed to Bern with some friends to go indoor rock climbing. It was massive!!

Saturday Joe and I went shopping at the market and Joe bought me beautiful Easter/Birthday flowers...the 2nd week in a row for flowers. I'm so spoiled!


Sunday we had Easter dinner with Sai and Jen. For dessert, I made some banana bread with gluten free flour for Sai and it turned out alright... not quite the same consistency, but close enough! It was a lot of fun.

Monday we slept in and then I finished doing laundry and wedding stuff. For dinner, Joe and I were too tired to make anything, so we braved the cold wind and constant flurries and went to GE for a burger and salad....yummy! Can't wait til my Bday party there on Thursday!

Camera play time!

So last Friday was absolutely beautiful, especially after a rainy, cloudy week. So as soon as I finished my experiment I took off to get the big bad Sony and wander around Lausanne's cathedral to take some pictures. I decided to head down to Lutry for sunset to see if I could get some nice pictures, but there weren't enough clouds to give me a nice colorful sunset. But I finally figured out how to use the manual setting! Actually, Jay figured it out while we were having a glass of wine at the caveau before heading to dinner in town with a bunch of friends. here are some of my favorites:

-monkey on the cathedral entrance

-shadows on the chateau
-doorway in Old Town
-The Alps & Pont Bessière

Who won a wooly sheep on St Patty's Day? I did! I did!

So we got off to quite a lame start to St. Patty's Day. I was at a thesis defense and apero until 6:30pm and then I met up with Joe, Jen and Stephan at Great Escape. We then headed up to Harper's, the only Irish pub in Lausanne and it was closed!!! We stood there stunned....how can an Irish bar that's closed every Monday not make an exception on St. Partrick's Day?!?! So, we headed back down to GE, but by now it was really crowded and there was nowhere to sit. So we decided to try Captain Cooks, an old haunt from when we first moved here and it was dead, but decorated for St. Patty's Day and there was even an open table! So we snagged the table and had some beers and actually had a lot of fun!!

-Joe and his leprechaunette...hmm...is that a word?

-Jay and my sheep

Check out the rest of the pictures on flickr.

The birthday that Jacqui missed...

So Joe and Jacqui returned from their conference in Ventura, California at noon on Saturday after flying for their entire Friday, which incidentally was Jacqui's birthday. Sai, Adrian and I bought her flowers and put them in her apartment Saturday morning (always convenient to have her spare key). But like always, we went to Great Escape Saturday night to celebrate Jacqui's birthday and try and keep her and Joe awake as long as possible to help them get over the jet lag. It was funny to listen to them talk about Thursday as 'yesterday'. All the pictures are up on flickr, but here are a few funny ones.

-Me and Jacqui

-Jen, Joe and Jacqui enjoying the massive pink drink

-Hi Joe!

What's wrong with a Christmas tree in March?

okay, yes, my Christmas tree is still up, which surprised the girls that came over last night for some wine and cheese. Nathalie and Jyoti from work came, along with Jen, Rikki and Laurence from the CHUV. At first glance they didn't notice and then they all did a double take and asked, 'Why are your Christmas decorations still up?' well, here's the official answer: I need to pack all the ornaments very carefully to transport them back to the States and I haven't had time to spend carefully wrapping all the glass ornaments in bubble wrap. in other words, Joe and I have been too lazy/preoccupied with other things to take time to wrap the ornaments carefully. Really though, I was preoccupied this week and wasn't being lazy. Monday I went climbing; Tuesday I went for Thai with Adrian, Sai, Stephan and Iraklis; Wednesday I had ballet class; Thursday lunch at GE with Adrian and Jen and then Girl's Night. Tonight I'll be cooking Sai and Adrian my world famous lemon rosemary chicken with Hasselback potatoes. It's one of the few dinners I like to make! So there goes one more week and the Christmas tree is still sitting in the living room....maybe we'll take it down on Easter Sunday!

So Joe and Jacqui are on their way back to Switzerland from California right now. Poor Jacqui... it's actually her birthday today, and she's spending the entire day on a plane, then gets back to Lausanne tomorrow morning, missing her entire birthday traveling from California to Switzerland! But we'll go out and celebrate as much as we can...Jacqui may sleep through happy hour, but the rest of us sure won't miss it!

Happy Birthday Jacqui!!

lots of stuff!

Since my last entry, I've kept myself quite busy. I went to the hospital in Geneva and observed an epileptic patient while they determined what part of her brain they need to remove to help curb her seizures. I'll be going back within the next few weeks to observe a surgery... how exciting! Then on Friday, Fabien (a colleague) had his public thesis defense. Joe then left on Saturday morning for a conference in California....so not fair!! But since he left, I had paella at Adrian's Saturday night and then I went hiking with a bunch of people (Adrian, Stephan, Kristen, Rikki, Michael, & Sandeep) near Gruyere. The plan was to take the cablecar halfway up Moléson and hike at 1500 meters around the mountain. The only problem was that when we got there, the entire area was under snow and the path that we were going to take was blocked off with the following sign: Danger of Avalanches. You can actually see the avalanche snow across the path in one of my pictures on flickr.

-me with the sign

So we headed back down the cable car and then Stephan asked the stupid guy that sold us the tickets up the mountain where we could go hiking instead. So we went to a gorge nearby in a town called Broc, where the Cailler chocolate factory is located. Incidentally, Adrian had already hiked the gorge, but it was really pretty yesterday so he didn't mind doing it again. We hiked the gorge and then hiked around a lake. All in all, we hiked for about 4 hours and by the time we were finished, the sun came out and it was beautiful out.

-Moléson behind the lake

Of course I also had to play with the macro on the waterproof camera. It's not as good as the big bad Sony, but I got a few decent photos out of a lot of bad macro photos....next time I'll bring the big bad Sony.

-Cluster of pretty purple flowers

-Water droplet on moss

busy, boring....

Now that I'm as finished with my paper figures as I can possibly be, I'm back to doing experiments to keep me busy at work. I haven't consistently done experiments myself since last April, so it's nice to actually be doing experiments instead of sitting on the computer playing in photoshop or excel or some other computer program analyzing data.

We had amazing weather over the weekend. While Joe was at work Sunday I took the big bad camera out to learn how to use it's manual settings. I went down to the park a few minutes from us and wandered around taking pictures of the flowers that have already bloomed in this spring-like weather. Here are some of my more favorite photos... let me know what you think!

-teeny tiny pinecones

-magenta flower

-buds and translucent leaves

-yellow crocuses

-opening seeds

-pinecone leaf sitting in a branch

-kitty in the grass

Happy Valentine's Day!

Yes, it's that time of year again when the buses and metros alternate their bus route number with "Les Amoureux" and everyone attempts grand gestures of love all thanks to the marketing team of Hallmark. Valentine's Day is a nice day to spoil your loved ones; it can also be stressful to find something perfect to give your loved one... especially when you've contracted your 3rd illness in 5 weeks and can't get off the couch/bed to do anything. Seriously, I've had 2 colds and the stomach flu since we got back from vacation! I'm very mad at my immune system...maybe it's getting back at me for getting a flu shot, who knows. All I know is that I spent all afternoon yesterday sleeping and moping....and admiring the flowers Joe bought me for Valentine's Day! Finally, I had a subject to photograph! The flowers and the sunshine gave me an opportunity to play with my new fancy camera that Joe's mom gave us for Christmas. I'm still not quite sure how to use all the manual settings, but here are a couple pictures I took this morning playing around with the morning light in the kitchen.

-the entire bouquet from Joe (yes, the camera manual is in plain view)

-farting around with the camera's aperture settings


Over the years I've become pretty good at taking pictures of flowers...now I just need to figure out how to expand this to better artistic photos of people and scenery as well!

Stephan's Birthday & I almost won the lottery!

Well, we haven't had a party like this, well, probably since Joe's birthday last spring. I have photographic evidence that Stephan took 14 shots...I'm pretty sure he had more than 14 and he was also drinking beer throughout the evening. Somehow he managed to stick around at the bar until midnight! good job Stephan!

-the disgusting shot with Jaggermeister & tabasco...what was Sai thinking?

-Irish Car Bombs from Jen

More birthday pictures!

After our late morning of sleeping in Saturday, I found out that I had actually won 44 francs in the EuroMillions drawing... too bad I didn't have more numbers!!

24 hours of beards, boars & beach! Part 3: Beach in Barcelona

3:45pm: With about an hour left before we absolutely needed to be on the Aerobus from Place Catalunya to the airport for our 6pm flight, Jen and I decided to head to the beach!

-the video I made while hoofing it through the sand

-I caught Jen screaming as the water crashed into her legs

-Wishing I could do this more often!

Going to the beach was really awesome, especially since the beach was closed last March when Joe, Sai, Adrian and I were in Barcelona for a long weekend. The water was a little chilly and getting my socks and boots on with sand-covered feet was a bit of a challenge, but well worth it!

5:25pm: Jen and I arrive at Terminal A just as our flight starts boarding. We walk straight to security, no line. Jen set off the metal detector, but her wanding is minimal. We head to the gate and directly board the plane to head back... just like Joe's dream trip!

9:35pm: I arrive at home, a little later than expected, because our flight was a bit late. Hang out with Joe for a bit before I go to bed.

More Barcelona pictures.

PS. Happy Birthday Stephan!

24 hours of beards, boars & beach! Part 2: Boars, aka suckling pig in Barcelona

Wednesday, February 6th, 7:42am: It's pouring down rain and miserable in Lausanne. Jen and I board a train from Lausanne to Geneva airport to catch our 20 CHF flight to Barcelona. As some of you know, this trip was supposed to be taken by 8 of us, but 6 people (Jacqui, Joe, Adrian, Sai, Stephan & Kristen) managed to forget about a conference they had to attend at EPFL also occurring on Feb. 6th when we booked the tickets in November. So, in the end, only Jen and I were willing and able to head to Barcelona for lunch for some much loved suckling pig at El Yantar de la Ribera.

-checking in at a self-help kiosk in Geneva airport was a bit against the point of walking directly from train to plane and back, but it did produce this awfully guilt ridden photo-op. As the screen says, 'Any remaining passengers may check in later'

11:05am: Our plane lands in sunny Barcelona where Jen and I disembark to the tarmac like rockstars and realize that we forgot our sunglasses. We decide that it doesn't really matter because it 18 degrees Celsius and there's no need for a jacket!

noon: We arrive at Place Catalunya and head to a local bakery for a snack before lunch. We then take the metro and walk to the restaurant.

1:30pm: Lunch!

-Like always, I'm too embarassed to take pictures with the flash on, so all my pictures of the inside of the oven were coming out blurry. So I had the 'brilliant' idea to take a video of the oven master seasoning the meat and putting it back into the wood stove.

-Jen & I with our meals... Can you tell I'm excited!

3:00pm: Dessert. Jen and I decide to split a pastry and enjoy the basket of liquors... maybe a little too much...and then discussed what we should do in our last hour or so in Barcelona.... to the beach!

24 hours of beards, boars & beach! Part 1: Beards

February 5th 7:30pm: Jacqui, Joe and I scarf-down potato chips watching TV while waiting for Adrian and Stephan to arrive before we order pizza

8:45pm: mmm.... Raclette and Salami Passion Dominators from Domino's

9:15pm: beard activities commence....the before photos

....and then the shaving begins....
9:40pm: half way through shaving....chin hairs are missing...

10pm: I think they escaped from the Village People Summer camp....the construction worker, the leather man, and the police officer

10:10pm: Stephan and Joe....so sexy
10:15pm: the babyfaces have returned

if you want to see more fun photos from the Mega beard shave-off.....click here!