Watch this space!

In two days' time Raewyn and I will be walking a marathon in Brisbane. Last year we completed it in 9 hrs 10 minutes; the aim this year is to do it in under 9 hrs - and have fewer blisters.
So far we have already raised about $5000 which is fantastic, especially given how difficult we have found it to fundraise this year. Both of us encountered frustration at work, as there were many days we didn't sell all of our home baking. Then when we came to organising our two major events, a family Wii games tournament and a quiz, we had all sorts of hurdles to overcome with venues, costs, and lack of interest. Despite all this the events were lots of fun and, as I said, we've already raised more than last year.

Our team page is here:
www.thebridge.net.au/mybridge/keepcalmandkiwion/

You can track our progress on Saturday here:

www.thebridge.net.au/eventw/tb_event.html

Modelling our team T-shirts

Earthquake...

Well I suppose it was only a matter of time. Magnitude 6.5 just after 5 pm, centred only about 80 km away from here. This was after a couple of decent shakes earlier in the day, and a decent one on Friday which were bad enough. This was easily the biggest earthquake I have been in and while it freaked me out (as earthquakes tend to do; ever since I went on the Universal Studios tour aged 9), physically I am ok. A couple of things fell off the shelf but nothing more than that as far as I know.

Certainly other people have it worse than me. Here's hoping things settle down...

June update

It's a busy time at the moment, what with the restructuring at work (about which we are still getting told nothing), badminton club, interclub, rep training and trips, and church activities. This would all be plenty but for some reason I'm also piling up my plate with fundraising and marathon walk training for the Bridge of Hope walk on the first weekend in August.

Last Saturday we held our first of two major fundraising events: a family Wii tournament at church. It went really smoothly (especially compared to last time), although we were a bit disappointed that there weren't more people. Anyway most people had fun and with the money raised from the day and people donating at church on Sunday we raised nearly $400. You can follow our fundraising progress (and sponsor us!) here.

Our second event will be a quiz on 27 July. In the meantime we are both baking twice a week and selling goodies at work. I think we're both finding it harder going than last year; not sure why. Maybe the novelty has worn off for people, or they're just feeling less generous. Or maybe last year was easy for some reason and this is what it's supposed to be like? Anyway the fundraising is a bit of a roller-coaster, varying from the depressing to the exhilirating often in the space of a week. I think we'll be glad when it's over and normal service can resume!

When a milk experiment turns to custard

I'm in Melbourne at the moment with two back-to-back synchrotron experiments. I'm currently sitting at the soft X-ray spectroscopy beamline, measuring spectra of the aluminium dopant atoms in zinc oxide thin films. Thrilling stuff I tell you. (Perhaps if I explain that these materials could be used as electrically conductive, transparent coatings, does that sound more impressive? Imagine having windows in your house that double as solar cells. Obviously we're a long way from that, but it's one possible future application... at least that's what we tell the funding agencies.)

We had a little drama this morning changing samples. I was about to say to my colleague, 'At least we haven't had any sample changeover problems this time' when the sample got a little bit stuck and was in danger of falling off. After a bit of panicked yelling to move things around, we managed to rescue the situation and continue as normal. Phew!

The reason I'm writing this - and yes, it has no relation so far to the title of this post, but just hold your horses - is because to fix this you would usually call the beamline scientist. The problem with that is it was 5:30 in the morning. And although I've managed to pick things up fairly quickly on how to use the vacuum system and operate the various detectors, I'm a long way from being an expert on this particular beamline.

= = = = =

Flash back to last week, when I was working with some other colleagues on the small angle X-ray scattering (SAXS) beamline, looking at milk. On our last day of beamtime, at about 2:00 in the morning, I managed to break a very thin silicon nitride window that was keeping the detector chamber under vacuum.

The frame on this window is 10 x 10 mm, the window is about 1000 nm thick (0.001 mm) and 5 x 5 mm square. The one I broke was about half the size of this (and therefore costs about twice as much).

As we had been told to do if this sort of thing happened at 2:00 am, we called the control room to help change to a new window for us. Fortunately (?) a window had broken earlier in the experiment, and the beamline scientist fixed it, briefly telling me what he was doing along the way. So when it came to turning the vacuum pump back on, I was able to show the control room people which pump it was. But after that it was all up to me to get things back to how they were.

One thing that is important is to make sure that all of the beam is going through the window. I took a few scans and realised that the window was not centred. The day before, the beamline scientist had pointed out what to look for in the video camera image when centering the window, but when I had to do it by myself I had no idea what I was looking at. After moving it by brute force and getting nowhere (apart from quite frustrated), I resorted to a more systematic approach of turning each dial separately, half a turn at a time, and taking another scan (meaning having to activate the 'hutch close procedure' each time). In one direction moving the window, I think I had about ten scans before things started to improve. By this stage it was 3:00 and I was getting really irritable. In fact at one point when I went into the hutch to do another half-turn of the dial, I must admit that I had a bit of a cry. At this point I had had a total of about 9 hrs sleep in the preceding 69 hours. My colleagues were playing music that was annoying me, and sitting around chatting. I was annoyed at them for not helping, which was completely irrational because they weren't able to do anything at this point. I couldn't delegate this frustrating job to anyone - if we wanted to collect data, I had to fix it. And at that moment, I almost wished that I didn't know what I know about beamlines and synchrotron stuff, because without that knowledge we could all go to bed, lose a few hours of beamtime, and that would be it until the beamline scientist came in and fixed it - and that was probably what any other user group would have done.

Thankfully a few half-turns later, then a few in the perpendicular direction, the window was in the right place and we were able to carry on with the experiments (and I was able to go to bed). But I don't think I've ever been that frustrated, while being that tired, with something before. (Although maybe after the Oxfam trailwalker, when they wanted us to walk up steps onto a platform to receive our medals after we crossed the finish line. I refused.)

In the end the milk experiments worked really well. We got through everything we wanted to and should get a few papers out of it, and a few ticks in various administrative boxes for our funding arrangements. The ZnO experiments have thrown us a bit of a curve ball, but we should still be able to get something useful out of them.


[Translations for any of my American readers:
"turns to custard" = goes wrong, goes bad.
"hold your horses" = wait a minute.


The SAXS beamline

Race day

It might surprise you (then again, it might not) to learn that I signed up for the Screaming-O mountain bike race which was on today. The course covers 28 km of single track, four-wheel-drive track and road (5 km, 14 km and 9 km respectively) over terrain which is only accessible to mountain bikes on one day each year. The 5 km single-track is a very popular walk in the Catchpool stream region of the Rimutaka Forest Park - and as you might expect, is completely different when it comes to biking it.

Anyhow I convinced Stuart to sign up as well (just for the ride really, as the times for placings in the open men's division are in the sub 1:20). I don't know about him, but I quite enjoyed it, apart from getting a puncture which cost me about 20 mins. Not that it took me that long to change the tyre, but after changing it I discovered it needed changing again as there was a very small leak in a previous patch-up that only manifested itself once the tyre was fully pumped up. Anyway it gave us a bit of a break and after that the objective was more about finishing than beating other people. However it gives me great pleasure to say that neither of us came last!



That's my bib, and a bronze medal for coming 3rd in the open women's category (in a time of 2:28). (I also received a box of scorched almonds but dropped those round at Mum and Dad's)

= = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = =

In other news:

Work has been crazy lately. I've been involved with bidding for research funding and have put together a first round Marsden proposal and a MBIE Smart Ideas proposal. On top of this I have taken up the offer of becoming chair of the SAXS PAC (have to be careful how I pronounce that) for the Australian Synchrotron (SAXS PAC = small-angle X-ray scattering (beamline) proposal advisory committee), and we had a 4 hour teleconference yesterday to rank proposals for the upcoming 4-month cycle. Add to this all the changes going on with IRL having been absorbed into Callaghan Innovation on 1 February, and another trip to Melbourne next week for experiments; I think it's fair to say that a lot has been going on.

Church has been going well. Music practices are now every fortnight and we spend the time going through the songs for the coming two Sundays, and any new songs to be introduced. I still haven't quite managed to get across to people what I mean when I say I play by ear and therefore don't need music... Also Raewyn and I have been playing a few songs at the Tuesday night women's Bible study, which has been really good. We are studying 1 Samuel at the moment (although lately I have been having trouble finding/making the time to work through it). The Sunday morning youth group I am running is also going well and we are having some really good discussions.

Badminton season has started so I have that 3 nights a week: club on Wednesday, interclub Thursday, rep training Sunday. Tomorrow and next Sunday we have singles grading for the teams. I have been struggling a bit with my shoulder in the last few seasons, so here's hoping that it will sort itself out for this year. I'm not able to make the first or last ties (which are both local) but am able to make the two that are out of town - Hamilton and Auckland.

Queen Charlotte 2013

A couple of years ago I did two-thirds of the Queen Charlotte track with a group of 16 people from work. Ever since, I've wanted to go back and do the whole thing - do it again properly, as it were.

Now I have a walking partner, such things are becoming possible. Add to that the water taxi operators who will take your bags from one accommodation to the next, and it makes for a three-day walk that is accessible to anyone who can walk 20 km in a day.

Meet Raewyn...

... and Jen.


Day One

The morning dawned cloudy but no rain. We took the 10 am water taxi out to Ship Cove and started walking about 11:20.

A couple of hills to start with, then pretty flat around Endeavour Inlet to our first pit stop: Punga Cove resort (backpacker units, of course - but we did get to use the spa!). Distance for day 1: 27 km, 7 hrs


Day Two

A sunny day, not much wind. This was the view from our rooms!

Fantastic views from the ridgeline.

Have a break, have a photo opportunity!

Jen feeding a weka

Admiring the view.

Pit stop for night 2: Portage (backpacker rooms again). Distance for day 2: 24 km, 7 hrs (51 km total)


Day Three

For something a little bit different, we had planned to break up the three days of walking with a day trip kayaking on the Kenepuru Sound.

Later in the afternoon the wind picked up so my camera had to be put away.


Day Four

Another fantastic day for the weather, but it was just as well we started early as the open sections of track got very hot later on. Still, we had great views!

Along the way there were markers telling us how far still to go - starting with '71 km'. They came approximately every 10-15 km, but towards the end we saw '11 km', then '6' km, then a most welcome '1 km'. Distance for day 4: 20 km, 6.5 hrs (71 km total)

I'll finish off there with one of my favourite shots from the walk: coming down the switchbacks towards Te Mahia saddle (Mistletoe Bay).

Next year... Abel Tasman perhaps?

Merry Christmas!

If you can't say it in person, or with a card, or with flowers... say it with a bus.

Australia: conference time

So I am acutely aware that I haven't posted anything for a month or so, mainly because I've been away, and was waiting until I got back so I could write all about it. Then of course things were just as busy when I got home. And deciding which picture(s) of real-life koalas to put on the blog led to procrastination, but more about those later.

Sydney

My first stop was in Sydney, for the SAS 2012 conference, where I was giving a talk about the work that we have done since we created the cool wall of SAXS: watching nickel nanoparticles grow in real time.

Fireworks at Darling Harbour on the night I arrived. They weren't for me though.


You know how when you're about to embark on a trip, it doesn't matter how organised you are or how much time you give yourself to pack, when you're driving to the airport your mind is racing trying to think what you've forgotten? Since I travel so much, I have this feeling frequently, but so seldom is it ever justified that I have (for the most part) trained myself to ignore it. So there I was, sitting in the departure lounge at Wellington airport, 5 minutes before boarding the plane for Sydney, watching other people walking around, when I realised - heck - I've forgotten to pack my conference shoes. And the dumb thing was, that I had deliberately made a list and written on it, 'conference clothes, shoes, socks' and distinctly remember crossing out 'clothes' and 'socks' as I put those things in the bag, and thinking, 'must remember the shoes'. Anyway that meant that instead of having virtually all of Sunday to wander around Sydney and see the sights, I was wandering around the shoe shops in Sydney trying to find something (a) suitable, (b) in black, and (c) reasonably priced. Sigh.

Finally getting to see the sights of Sydney!


Anyway the conference was really good. I learnt a lot and made some good contacts with several people, which is what going to conferences is all about. This particular conference is held every three years and the next one is in Germany... I'd like to go but obviously we'll have to see.


Melbourne

Week two was in Melbourne. I stayed with Paul and Marge for the weekend, which was great to catch up with them. One day consisted of putting together a kitset greenhouse from instructions written in Engrish. The next day involved sitting, talking, barbequing, and eating. Bliss! After that it was off to the synchrotron for a two-day software analysis workshop, then the annual facility user meeting. This time I was giving a 30-minute invited talk about the work we've been doing on the carbon dioxide corrosion of steel.

In between I had a free day, so since the forecast was for 29 degrees instead of 38 on the following day, I decided to go for a bush walk in the Dandenongs.

Adelaide

After Melbourne came Adelaide, and the joint Asian Crystallographic Society / Society of Crystallographers in Australia and New Zealand conference. I was presenting a 15-minute version of the talk I gave at the user meeting. Apart from that I didn't get much out of this conference - and not because I was getting weary from the travel and the talks (because oddly I was feeling quite coherent), but because I guess I'm not really a crystallographer. Which is good to know.

Anyway I had a few free days in Adelaide as well, including one afternoon during the conference where the only things on the programme were lunch for an hour, 3 hrs of committee meetings (which didn't concern me), and the final plenary session on some macromolecular crystallography probably-chuck-some-bio-nano in there talk, which I was pretty sure I wouldn't understand.

So I went for another bush walk instead, up Waterfall Gully to Mt Lofty.

Lookout at Mt Lofty


Which brings me to the koalas. I've never seen one in the wild before, only in zoos and wildlife parks. But after having seen several road signs while walking from the bus stop to the start of the Mt Lofty track, I was reasonably hopeful.


I saw my first 'real' koala!

Then I saw my second and third 'real' koalas!

Then another one...

... so close to the path that I could actually get a decent shot of myself with it

Finally, koala number 11 (I think - kind of lost count) was hanging on a branch with one arm, reaching out for the fresh leaves, a good 4-5 metres above the path I was walking down - with a joey clinging to her tummy.

Overall the trip was great; it is good to be back home though!

Stress

Last week I was on beamtime, which I think I mentioned in the previous post. We had 24 hours of SAXS (well, actually, WAXS - wide-angle X-ray scattering as opposed to small-angle X-ray scattering) to look at structural changes in polymer samples as you heat and cool them. We observed changes; now we just have to figure out what it all means.

This beamtime will also be remembered as the first time I've ever played cards with my colleagues in the middle of it - usually things are too busy to do such things.

(Side note: I did get quite frustrated when it seemed every game we played, everyone had different rules. For example, we play that in 500 if someone calls misere, (a) it prevents any further bidding, and (b) that person leads every trick. We play that in Liverpool Rummy you can only put down however many sets or runs are said i.e. 3+3 = 2 sets and only 2 sets, you can't put down any extra sets but can only get rid of your cards by building on other players' cards that have been put down. Rickety Kate (MS Hearts) the queen of spades is worth 13 points and each heart 1 point (not face value). Funny 500 the score for each trick in each round increases as the number of cards decreases (10 cards = 10 points per trick, 9 cards = 20 points per trick, etc. if you win the number of tricks that you nominate). I wonder if, if we had played Snap, someone would have complained about the rules. I would be interested to know what versions of the above rules other people play... comments welcome!)

Upon arriving back at work on Monday this week, I've been swept up in a mass panic about the funding situation for the main project that I'm working on. We are scheduled to be reviewed by MBIE (formerly MSI, formerly FRST) in December, and I'm the most senior person on the project who is regularly at IRL. Cue a meeting with my boss and someone from the Industry Engagement team on Tues, a trip to Palmerston North to chat with my colleagues there on Weds, a meeting with the Industry Engagement person, our group administrator, my boss, and my boss's boss on Thurs. Oh and today I had a 4-hour teleconference with Australia for the SAXS PAC (proposal advisory committee) where we had 46 proposals to review for the next cycle.
Next week I'm participating in a mini-conference that we have every year, somewhere up near Kaitaia which means flying to Auckland then driving north for about 4 hrs. Then I have one more week at IRL before heading to Australia for 3 conferences in a row. Good news regarding those is that I have been allocated oral presentations at all of them; in fact for one I have been upgraded to being an invited speaker, and for another I have also been asked to chair a session. Unfortunately the MBIE review happens while I am away in Adelaide, but I might see if I can join via videoconference...

In other news Raewyn and her friend Jen and I have started making bookings to walk the Queen Charlotte track over Wellington Anniversary weekend next January. Should be fun :)

Birthday season

Once again I am sorry for not having updated this blog in a couple of months. The last thing I wrote about was the marathon walk that Raewyn and I did. We've both recovered; in fact we even went for a walk last Saturday up to Boulder Hill (Belmont Regional Park), training for Queen Charlotte / Milford track / the next marathon walk... I think she's hooked now :) Anyway it was a gorgeous day to be out and about.

September is birthday month for our family. It was Mum's 60th on the 25th, and Al's 29th on the 30th. So we had a surprise in store for Mum a couple of weeks ago - dinner at a restaurant in town, followed by cake and presents and games at my house. We invited Uncle Derek and co as well and it was a really enjoyable evening (although I think Mum was a little worried at times about what we had planned next!).

August and September were pretty slow and steady work-wise; no trips away, which is good for actually settling in and getting things done. There are a number of papers which I've started working on and not finished, so now is the time to make some progress on those. The first half of October is the same; after Labour Day (22 Oct) I have a trip to Melbourne for 24 hrs of experiments, then in November I'm off for a conference circuit of Sydney-Melbourne-Adelaide for 3 weeks.

About two weeks ago we had badminton club champs. My first game was the open ladies' singles final. It went to three sets and was probably one of the best singles games I've played in. Eventually I lost (20-22, 21-9, 15-21), or you could look at it as coming runner-up and winning the plate! My second game was the open ladies' doubles final, where I was teamed up with the girl I played against in the singles. We won that one reasonably easily. After that it was open mixed doubles, where there were four pairings and again my partner and I came runners-up.