A good week

I finally had a really good week at work! It was pretty busy, I'm working on 3 or 4 different tasks right now. So sometimes I felt kind of like a chicken with my head cut off, but it's much better than feeling like I'm getting nothing accomplished. A big help to my productivity was a phone call I got from my advisor on Wed. He said he wants me to go to a conference in Brazil this summer, and he's made a request for me to get funding from NASA to go! Me going is dependent on getting that funding, and I find out Apr 4 (next Friday). Yes!!! I was trying to continue a civilized conversation with him but really wanted to jump up and down and yell, I was so excited. If I get to go, I have to submit an abstract by April 17. I really need to have my thesis done before the conference, because I want to have the best possible results to present. So I was very motivated to work after that conversation.

It's really nice to enjoy what I'm doing. The science side of my research is really kind of fun - it's just the computer science part that often makes me want to jump off a building.

Other than that, Chris and I (and Rachel) went to a talk at our church on Wed. night by the guy who discovered pediatric AIDS, and is the president of a non-profit called Global Strategies for HIV Prevention. It was really interesting. He talked a good bit about the science behind the disease, but also talked about how to address HIV/AIDS in Africa (and other developing countries where it's a big problem). Here's one other thing that I liked about his talk ... Dr Ammann is obviously very intelligent and also very well-respected in the medical community, and yet he hasn't shied away from using his faith as an impetus to take action when needed. It's always encouraging to me to see examples of people who are successful scientists but also have a faith in God. I firmly believe the two are not mutually exclusive, and they can even be complementary. Also, even if people who listened to his talk aren't about to go to Africa to personally address AIDS, I realized there are probably a lot of people who just don't know that much about AIDS. There are stigmas attached to it here as well as in Africa, so I think it's important to be informed.

Thursday night I went to an orientation for mentoring at the Matthews House. I learned a lot in the 3-1/2 hours I was there, and also gained a lot of respect for what they are doing.

Today Rachel and I swam for 2 hours (that's a long time!). I swam 5500 yards - that's 3.125 miles! Woohoo! I swam 3000 in the first hour. To reward ourselves, we went to Lucilles afterwards. I had a cappuccino that came in a cup as big as my face that required two hands to drink out of. We also ate beignets, a burrito, and a buttermilk biscuit. Good stuff! Now Chris and I are relaxing. We're taking today off from any kind of work, but will both try to get stuff done tomorrow. I think we'll go see a movie later to complete the vegetation. :) Thanks for reading, have a good weekend!