Not so smart

So last week was crazy. I had my first near all nighter up til 5, up at 7. To be honest I felt pretty good about it because a lot of my friends seem far busier than me and I was starting to get a little concerned that I was missing something. For the 2.75 Precision Design class we had a lab assignment and would you believe it, I found myself in the workshop. We had to make something which demonstrated the principle of kinematic coupling. There are 2 main types of kinematic coupling, the 3 V-groove coupling and the Kelvin coupling, so named because it was favoured by Lord Kelvin. Now, I know you're thinking what I'm thinking. Lord Kelvin is only Glasgow's greatest scientisit! So it was clear I was going to have to make that one. Only down-side was it was way more tricky so it took a long time and I had to get someone to program the CNC mill for me.

tada! It's only a set of stackable coasters. So 3 hemispheres on one locate to 3 grooves on the other, in this case one being tetrahedral, the other a v and the other a flat plate. This exactly constrains 6 degrees of freedom and provides a precise and repeatable locating mechanism. How about that. Whilst I wanted to keep this blog for all the fun things I'm doing in the US of A I thought I should give some impression that my lack of communication is because I'm hard at work during the week! On that note lets skip to the weekend.

So with lab report handed in and Dad's Christmas present in the bag, we had a pizza party at the end of class. On Friday I volunteered at Beyond Cause Marketing an event running at MIT. I thought something which combined good causes and marketing would be right up my street and I also had a free Friday so there you go. It was pretty interesting, I met the lady who organises the X-Prize and told her I'd heard about it when I did my lasers report on the space elevator. A lot of other interesting people were there. I had my first experience of people probably listening to you way more because of the intial, oh this girl must be really smart thing. So that was nice.

Afterwards I met Alison and tagged along to a trip to the Institute of Contemporary Art organised by people at her graduate halls. It was really great, the building is awesome, particularly the media room and the exhibitions were contemporary in a good way rather than when you're just presented with a lot of disturbing/weird stuff. Saying that there were a lot of little jugs carved out of human bone.

My favourite exhibit was the stuff by Evelyn Rydz who does these very detailed drawings in coloured pencil on overlayed tracing paper that creates this kind of subtle glow. I mainly liked it because whilst I try to embrace the letrasets I do still love my colouring pencils.

After the ICA we went to Legal Seafoods. The graduate halls were subsidizing the trip because they like to encourage social outings. Alison and a couple of others went grand and got lobster. I was a bit scared to get one having never tried any before and also there was this awkward thing where I didn't know if my meal was subsidized because I was the only one who didn't actually live in their halls. Tried a little bit of Alison's and I think I can handle it so definitely going to take Sam out for lobstah when he gets here. I hear Maine's the place to go though. The whole process was pretty entertaining.

So that evening it was my friend Jack's birthday. I was really excited to go out and wanted to make a fuss over it because I thought it must be a bit weird having a birthday and you've got none of your good friends from home about. I hadn't yet been home since getting up at 7am so I thought I should go and drop off my schoolbag. I got back and realised I had lost my keys. I also realised the house I live in has no doorbell! All the lights were off, and Lisa and Ben wouldn't hear even if I knocked as they live on the third floor. I went round the back and see no lights on, pluss at 10pm on a Friday night it was likely nobody was in.

I cracked open my laptop on the porch and emailed everyone whilst looking for phone numbers. After 20 minutes or so Lisa got the email and came down to let me in. Phil's friend had the spare key and I still really wanted to make Jack's birthday. I remembered getting 3 keys when I moved in and reasoned that one was for the back door, and the other the shed so I went to find it and try it out. Dumped all my stuff and went out to try the back door key only to find the back door locked automatically and the key was poorly cut and didn't work. I was then stuck outside with no phone, laptop, money or coat so my options were pretty slim. Lisa seemed to have gone back up to bed and now that she thought I was inside I didn't think she'd come to check. So, I thought I'd leave a note and head to the bar my friends were at. I ran to Starbucks just before they shut and they leant me a receipt to write a note on so I left a message at the front and back door. I was about to leave when I realised I didn't have my passport so I wouldn't get into the bar, and I didn't have any money so I'd have to walk for 40 minutes.

I figured I would have to bite the bullet and wake up a neighbour. I went next door where the lights were on and ended up in the home of a Warren Goldfarb, a Harvard professor. He had a Charles Rennie Mackintosh poster on the wall so we found some common ground. Fortunately he knew Lisa and Ben so after tracking down the house phone number all was well. I finally got into my room and decided to just stay put that night.

The next day I set about getting some keys cut! I did a bunch of other errands thanks to having no hangover to navigate and so got my shoes in for repair at a place on the corner. I also managed to get a nice Chinese lady to agree to fix the dress I bought last time I was in Boston with the broken beading so I'm pretty excited to get that back! If she's done a good job I might keep her in business with the various holes and loose buttons I've got going on.

I continued to explore my neighbourhood and headed along to Cambridge Used Bikes on a recommendation from my friend Chris. It was in the basement of an amazing antiques market. I was very close to buying an old cook book when a member of staff asked if he could help and reminded me that I could get a lot of recipes on the internet these days. Downstairs I admitted cluelessness as to what to look for and the guy gave me a couple of 21" frame options. I quickly blew my cover by admitting that I absolutely loved the canary yellow cruiser and was very soon giving it a test ride round the car park. I also tried a more sensible and slightly cheaper mountain bike but seeing as you're only in America once I thought it was a time for bold decisions. The bike was $225 and once I'd bought all the extra safety gear it had fair totted up. However, this new mobility allowed me to go to a better supermarket which is about a mile and a half away. I was however 2 eggs down by the time I got home! So the guy checked the serial number and informed me this bike was made in Chicago in 1973. Someone made the comment that this bike was made for me and I found a surprising coincidence in the name of the new version!

Having bought my bike I headed to Whole Foods to buy some decent ingredients in preparation for Canadian Thanksgiving on Sunday! I had said I was going to bake something and thought it'd be wrong not to attempt a pumpkin pie, although I bought stuff for apple pie as well for back up. I told Lisa what I was up to and she kindly looked out all the necessary equipment. Turns out making pumpkin pie from scratch is a total nightmare! After boiling, scooping, puréeing and seiving the pumpkin I had enough orange gloop to get started. Lisa informed me she normally just buys a can. Woops! I also decided to make the pie dish from scratch. So by 2pm I was basically at square one if I hadn't been stubborn about doing it all myself.

Took a break and headed out to the Sowa Open Market which describes itself as Boston's original outdoor art and indie design market. Sounded pretty perfect and it really was. I loved all the stuff! They had some very cool vintage stalls, I spent a lot of time mulling over a ramshackle leather bag with a motif of the pyramids on it when the lady came in and said I could have it for $5 because the zip was bust. A "weekend project" she said. Fortunately I remembered the fact I'm at MIT and should be working my butt off on bigger challenges than fixing a zip and so I left it there. Obviously I shall return in a few weeks and if it's still there I might buy it and take it to my new friend the Chinese seamstress! There were some nice leather goods, and funky jewellery and loads of cool illustrative tees. Basically you're all getting your Christmas presents from there! There was even a nice lampwork glass beads stall for Mum. I duly took a photo and picked up a business card. Check out the website and if you want me to do a little bead traficking I will see if Liliana and I can come to some kind of arrangement.

Obviously I couldn't bring myself to leave, and I had met Jack so wanted to hang out with him a bit seeing as I'd missed his special day. We got coffee at the cafe down there. Definitely going to go back for the next Sunday market. Returned home to finish what I had started, apple pie now completely off my radar. I was already pretty late and having realised the pie filling was basically liquid I had to get it cooked at mine before transportation. After cooking it had not set but I was already late so had to do parcel it up and get to the halls where the meal was being held. The thing did not travel well!

Anyway, Canadian Thanksgiving dinner was wonderful. We had chicken and rice dishes and wine, and vegetables and a ton of yummy things. 50% Canadian turnout too so pretty authentic. I took a bit of stick for my unfinished dish but mostly for the fact I brought maple syrup to go with it (thanks recipe!) which is apparently a total no no. We ate and drank then went down to the games room where they've only got air hockey! My embarrasingly competitive side came out, obviously I whooped Jack. Then it was time for some rock band which obviously I loved as well. The drum kit is pretty sweet but the cymbal didn't work so you could never get above around 60% which was pretty sad.

Monday was Columbus day so we had a holiday. The sliver of pie I had took home had been transformed by a night in the fridge making me appreciate that pumpkin pie needs to cool to set! I'll have it sussed by American thanksgiving hopefully. I spent the morning buying a glucometer to test for precision design and then had a five hour ideation session for my development ventures class. Anyway... and that's when things start to get boring again.

I have made a bit of progress this week having expressed an interest in medical devices. I just need to spend time finding the right project and potential funding before that's a goer. This weekend is dominated by my big entrance into the world of amateur ballroom dancing! I am competing in the Harvard Beginner's competition and dancing swing and rhumba with another rookie called Jason, then doing hustle as a "rookie - veteran" couple with a guy called Vik who I met tonight. I need to buy shoes and something to wear and all that in the next few days. Pretty scared about it but new experiences etc! I think JFK would approve.

Wrap it all up with a nice photo I took today showing why people are always banging on about New England in the fall. I'm really not used to clear skies in the -ber months.