Daylight saving time

This weekend we swapped to daylight saving time, or summer time, as we call it. I assumed my new cell phone automatically adjusted the clock, like my old phone did.

I'm using my cell phone as alarm clock, and Monday morning we got up when the alarm went off at 7am. We had breakfast and I sent little boy off to school, before driving to work at 8:15, I thought.

Little boy thought so too. He rang the door bell of the house next door, where one of his friends lives. They walk to school together every morning. He got an early warning when his friend's mom opened the door and said that his friend left an hour ago. He was embarrassed when he came to school and had to tell the teacher that we had messed up the time.

Little boy was annoyed when he called me after school. Sorry about that. My fault.

I told him that it will be less embarrassing in the fall, when we switch the clocks back. Then he will be one hour too early >:D

(I found this picture on the internet. When I was young, I had several Swatch'es, in all kinds of weird patterns and colors. Now it's more than 10 years since I carried a watch. Maybe I should get one?)

Powder to the people

We had a really heavy blizzard this week, lasting for five days.

This weekend was the time to harvest, from the heavy snow fall. We went up to the mountains, and had a great time skiing in all the fresh powder.

The wind calmed down, but the snowfall continued throughout the weekend. I was off-piste skiing in the sparse birch forest with the kids. Today, it was powder all over the place, even on slopes that are normally groomed. Great! The white gold >:)

(I forgot my camera at home. The picture above was taken about a month ago. It's Little Boy skiing in the birch forest. This seemed to be the weekend when we forgot almost everything. When we stopped on a gas station on the way to the mountains, I found that I had forgotten my wallet and my cell phone at home. I asked my old lady to pay, but she had forgotten her wallet too. Fortunately, Little Boy had some cash that he got for his birthday a couple of weeks ago. He was kind enough to let me borrow his money >:D )

Blizzard

I'm working late again tonight.

I took a break at 5pm, and went home to feed the kids (my old lady has been out traveling last 3 days, on a business trip to the south). The kids were hungry, so we made some quick and simple stuff; pizza from the supermarket.

Then I went back to the office, to prepare my lecture for tomorrow morning. The subject this week is simultaneous joint inversion, the Holy Grail of inverse problems. It's about throwing all different kinds of geophysical measurements into a big computer, at the same time. Then, after a while, a unified picture of the earth pops out, we hope. I'm not actually gonna do it. I just teach the theory behind the method. It's like a mathematical concrete mixer.

Teaching is great fun, but the preparations take quite some time, because I always want to be well prepared. I try to imagine that I'm on the students side of the classroom. What kind of lecture would I liked to get? A systematic and comprehensible presentation. That's what I try to make. It's my last week lecturing this semester. Next Thursday I can do something else.

There's a really bad blizzard outside. It's been snowing and blowing like Hell for 3-4 days now. I have to dig the car out of the snow for the 4th time today. If the wind calms down we may get some good powder skiing this weekend.

Now I'm going home, in the white inferno. At least I will try ... >:)

(Sorry, I didn't have a good picture at hand. Above is our weather forecast for the next 24 hours. Doesn't look too good, does it? Maybe it's getting better for the weekend >:) )

The big magnet

I'm working late again tonight, preparing a lecture for Friday morning. Tomorrow night I'm taking Little Boy to skiing practice, so I have to prepare the lecture one day in advance. It doesn't mean I've got better habits, starting early. It's just because I have to.

The subject this week (for the lecture, not the skiing practice) is magnetotellurics. It's a crazy word composed of two parts:
o Magnet; everyone knows what a magnet is.
o Tellus, which is the The Earth.
The Earth (Tellus) acts like a huge magnet. That's why such things as an old-fashioned compass works. The arrow points towards the magnetic north pole of The Earth. The magnetic north pole is different from the geographic North Pole. So if you're very close to the geographic North Pole, your compass would point to some place in Canada rather than towards north (you better use GPS in that case).

Furthermore (and this is where the fun starts), our dear Sun sends out so-called solar winds, continuously. A swarm of electric charges is raining over The Earth, and pushing the magnetic field out of equilibrium.

Just relax. It's not dangerous, and there's no way to stop it. This will go on until the sun stops burning (which will be really dangerous, but it's still some billion years into the future).

When the earth-magnet is disturbed like this (by the solar storms), The Earth sends back an echo which reveals it's inner secrets, not all the details, but more like a rough sketch. If we put down some sensors and measure the echo, we can compute an image of the earth and it's inner structure, many kilometers below the surface.

Cool isn't it? Do you wanna know how to do it? Then you have to come to my lecture on Friday morning. We're starting at 9am, after a cup of hot coffee >:)

(The picture above is an illustration of solar winds distrubing the magnetic field of The Earth. I took it from a report written by a former MSc student of mine. He (the student) probably stole it on the internet. I don't steal stuff; I just borrow it.)

Gone but not forgotten

I apologize for being late. In my place we're already half an hour into the 5th March. The "Gone but not forgotten" blogfest was scheduled for yesterday.

I don't watch many TV shows, nor TV in general. Most TV shows I have watched are gone. There are few I haven't forgotten, and even fewer I miss. Here are five past shows I enjoyed. Not sure if they're completely gone, but they're gone from the TV channels we have.

1. Headbanger’s Ball. An MTV classic. TV is full of crap pop music. More metal, please.

2. Downton Abbey. Great British drama series, watched it very recently (this year) in public broadcasting. Confilct, conflict, conflict.

3. UEFA Champions League. Great football, still on TV, but mostly on pay channels we don't have.

4. Stingers. Cool Australian under cover series. First seasons were best, when Anita Hegh was still in the lineup.

5. M*A*S*H. Just unforgettable.

(Heavy metal is cool on TV but a lot better live. I took the picture above on a concert with Mayhem in May last year)

Swiss chocolate

My mission is completed. I’m going back, from Milano to the far North. I will spend two days in our office beyond the Arctic Circle, before I go home.

It’s a long journey, first over the white peaks of the Alps with Swiss Air. They serve free Swiss chocolate. Very good. I have a connection in Zurich, and then heading Northward.

I’m tired, tried to read a couple of geophysics articles, and prepare some slides for tomorrow. But I'm too tired. I think I rather try to sleep for a while >:)

My old cell phone was almost falling apart. I needed a rubber band around it to keep it together. I got a new one last week, with flight mode. I pulled up my phone and took the picture through the window of the air plane, the Swiss Alps.

City of two teams

I’m visiting this city where I always get lost, the capital of Lombardia, Milano (in Italian), Milan (in English), Mailand (in German).

On my way south, I had a connection at the fucking Frankfurt Airport. Many times I've promised myself to never go there again. But it's one of the major connection points in Europe, and hard to avoid. We came in late, due to capacity problems in Frankfurt, as usual. I ran like Hell to get from Terminal B to Terminal A, down 4 stairs, across a long transport band, and up 4 stairs on the other side. I made it just in time.

The plane to Milano was packed. Lots of Italians of course. Japanese tourists with face masks covering mouth and nose; afraid of being poisoned in Europe? A young girl with bright-blue hair; cute. An orthodox Jew with iPod; I wonder what kind of music he was listening to. I leaned back in my seat with a good read, On Writing by Stephen King.

Milano is completely flat, located on the plains of River Po. There’s no fjord or hill, unlike my hometown, no mountains in the west, unlike Denver. It's just flat, and damn hard to keep track of directions, in particular when the sun is hidden behind the clouds. Thanks to the metro system, I can usually find my way back to the hotel.

This is a city of two teams. If you know anyhing about European football (soccer), you know what that means. Some well known examples are Manchester (City and United), Liverpool (Everton and Liverpool FC), Glasgow (Rangers and Celtic), Madrid (Atletico and Real), and Milano (Inter and AC Milan).

Arriving at the Linate Airport, I passed the aggressive pirate-taxi drivers hanging around the exit, with "special prize for you", and walked over to the line with the reliable White Cabs. When you jump into a taxi, there is never any doubt which team the driver supports, the car always decorated in the colors of his team, black and red (AC Milan) or black and blue (Inter).

I’m here just for a two days, on a business trip. Unfortunately, there is no time to watch AC Milan on San Siro Stadium, nor a Verdi performance on La Scala. I hope I’ll get a tour of downtown Milano, to see the magnificent Duomo, the huge cathedral from the 15th century.

Tonight, I'm going out to get some good Italian food and a beer >:)

(I took the picture above from the roof of the Duomo a couple of years ago. It's a crap picture, taken with my cell-phone camera.)

Watching downhill

It was a beatuiful morning; clear blue sky, but cold and windy. We walked from the car to the lift, carrying our skis on the shoulder. Little Boy lagged behind. I turned around.
“What are you doing?”
“Putting my skis on.”
“Not yet”, I said, “we take the gondola.”
“No, we go by the chair lift. The line for the gondola is too long”, said Little Boy.

We went by the double-quad chair lift, shivering in the cold wind, 10 meters above ground. We looked down on the race course below, where lots of people were working. The course crew mounted double and triple safety nets on both sides. The TV crew rigged camera towers along the course.
“What’s going on?” asked Little Boy
“There’s a World-Cup downhill race next weekend.”
“Can we watch it?”
“No, we’re going home on Thursday. We can watch it on TV.”

I’ve seen pro downhill live only once. It was the World Championship in Beaver Creek, in the famous Birds of Prey course, more than ten years ago, when we lived in Colorado. We were down on the race arena. The racers came down the last hang at 120 km (75miles) per hour before crossing the finish line. It took less than 3 seconds. Then we waited a minute or two for the next one.

“Can’t we just stay a few more days?” asked Little Boy.
“No. I’m teaching Friday morning. Maybe we can watch some of the practise tomorrow”
“I want to see the race.” Little Boy was disappointed.

“Watching downhill live is just boring”, I said, “It’s best on TV” >:)

(When we approached the top lift station, my face felt stiff in the cold wind. I took off my right glove, just for a few seconds. I snatched the camera from my pocket, and was barely able to take the picture above, before my hand froze to ice.)