Ink's New Trick

So Ink has a new trick. I'm pretty sure she got it from her Uncle Frances. At first it was just drinking out of the faucet if I left it dripping. Now it is sitting in the faucet, letting it drip all over her, and drinking at her leisure. It took a really long time to get a decent video of it, as she is camera shy, but I think it was worth the effort. How many cats do you know that willing let water drip all over them, or sit in a sink slowly filling up with water around them? I always knew she was a weird cat.

Craziness at a Party

So this is some of the craziness we get up to at ward parties. My friend Emily (the one in the yellow) is going home in preparation for her mission so we had a going away party. This apparently meant seeing just how many people can fit on a two seater couch. Ethan thought it was funnier when he was lying on top of all of us.

The best part was the gift that Emily got. Lisa Wiltbank (not my roommate... other Lisa) made a custom game of guess who with some of the ward members. It is pretty much the best game I've ever seen.

Lisa

So Nicole pointed out to me the other day that she didn't think she had ever seen a picture of my roommate. So here is the best picture I have of Lisa and I. Unfortunately, we are dealing here with two people who don't like having their picture taken. But beggars can't be choosers.

Finally...

Yes, I am finally updating my blog. But really folks, my life is so much less interesting then yours. Plus I don't have cute kids to put pictures of up. That and I really don't do much interesting around here. I go to school, and then come home and crash because I am so tired. But several interesting things are going to be happening soon.

I think I finally found a solution to my advisor problem. I am going to ask Andrei Caldararu, an algebraic geometer in the department, to be my advisor. But I am going to ask for something a little unique. I actually am interested in a field between algebraic geometry and algebraic number theory, so I have decided to try and see if both Andrei and Jordan (the one I wanted to be my advisor originally) will do a dual advisorship. This way I can have access to both fields, and not put too much of a strain on either of their excessively busy schedules. I really hope this works.

Also, I found a way for the department to buy me a plane ticket for a conference in November. A conference in Salt Lake City. So I will be there for about five days and get to see both Grandpa and my friend Michelle. I am very much looking forward to this. One should never turn down a free plane ticket, after all.

So that will be my life for the next few weeks. Nothing too terribly exciting. (At least nothing that can come even close to the excitement of a temple coming in Rome. I literally shouted in the middle of Conference when President Monson announced it this weekend. How serious are you all on the thought of going for a visit?) But I figured if I didn't update my blog soon Mom at least was going to get very angry at me. (Actually, I'm pretty sure she already is about this...)

FIREWORKS!

I don't know how many of you know this, but I absolutely love the 4th of July! I love the patriotism and the colors and the fireworks and the music. So I was way excited to finally get to go to a Madison celebration of it. They put on a spectacular fireworks display with choreographed music and it was fabulous. This year we watched from across the lake, so it was pretty cool to see the fireworks exploding over the lake. Next year I am definitely going to have to go to the actual park where they set them off from. They even had a blackhawk and F16 flyover. It was spectacular. Anyways, the pictures are a little blurry, but they are still pretty cool. And hopefully the video shows you how fun it was. If you look close enough you'll see that in one of the pictures I was able to catch the smiley face fireworks. Pretty awesome, huh?

Celloing

Yesterday, for the first time in over six months I was able to play the cello. It still hurt, and I wasn't able to play at the level I am used to, but it is just so exciting to actually be able to play again. That's all I wanted to say for now...

Sailing and Whaling

By far the coolest activity we did was go sailing on Saturday. I think we gave the poor crew a lot of trouble. They seemed to be a relatively new crew, and not many of them had much experience, and here we come with twice as many kids as adults, most of which were under the age of 8. But we had no accidents. We were trying to spot the hump-backed whale, so Mom spent a lot of the trip perched out on the bow with two cameras strapped around her neck. I wasn't brave enough to climb up to the crow's nest (My excuse being that climbing a rope ladder with nothing but water underneath you is relatively hard with only one working hand), but I did spend the last bit of the trip out on the bow. It was fantastic. Katie even got over her fear of water enough to enjoy herself. I am so glad Jenny was able to give us this amazing opportunity.