Kendall Giles

If you want a fun day trip, don't mind being overwhelmed by cute, and want to get up close and personal with a camel or perhaps an ostrich, then you should consider a visit to the Virginia Safari Park, located off Interstate 81, just south of Lexington and northwest of Lynchburg --- right beside Natural Bridge.

They have a variety of land mammals and birds, such as llamas, giraffes, pot-bellied pigs, bison, emus, elk, zebras, camels, and some endangered African animals.

You can either drive through the three-mile trail or you can ride in a wagon, pulled by a tractor. As you drive along, the animals will come up to the car and you can feed them special food from plastic buckets. We bought four buckets of food for $10, and that was about the right amount for the three-mile trip.

Some of the critters will be happy to relieve you of your bucket if you aren't careful:

You also have to be careful that you don't get an additional passenger in your car:

In addition to the safari trail, they also have a giraffe feeding station, a kangaroo walk-about, a lorikeet landing, primates, tigers, warthogs, an aviary, and a petting area.

So it was a nice day trip up in the beautiful Virginia mountains, where the buffalo do roam and the antelope do play. Camels too.

If you've ever wanted to combine staying healthy with literature, then you might want to consider walking, biking, swimming, or rowing to Rivendell.

Here's the idea: Karen Fonstad (sadly, when writing up this post, I saw that Karen died in 2005 due to complications from breast cancer) reverse-engineered the route Frodo and Company took on their way to Rivendell in her book The Atlas of Middle-Earth. For example: leaving Bag End, heading west through the gate into a lane, following the lane for a bit, then following the hedgerows south is about a 3 mile trip.

In her Rivendell mileage chart, Karen notes the cumulative miles, miles between each milepost, and the description of each milepost location. So if you are just starting out and log 3 miles on today's run, then you would make a note in your notebook your mileage run for the day and the cumulative miles you have run. That way you can compare your progress against the progress of the Company as they (and you) head to Rivendell.

All this may sound a bit geeky, but it does work---I have started the journey, though extensive, non-fitness travel has kept me away from too much "Hobbit-walking", as my wife calls it. Nevertheless, yesterday I jogged 2.25 miles, which brings my cumulative total to 36.84 miles. On the Rivendell journey, this puts me just beyond that incident with the Black Rider, but before they meet up with the Elves on the Road.

As a final note: in case you are not familiar with Rivendell, Hobbits, or J.R.R. Tolkien, get thee to Amazon and buy the books, or at least the movies. Getting back into shape can wait until you finish - one has to have priorities.

Last week I attended Interface 2008, which was the 40th symposium of a conference celebrating the interface between computing science and statistics. It was held at the Durham Marriott, in Durham, North Carolina. The Interface series of conferences is sponsored by the Interface Foundation, and this year's conference was hosted by the National Institute of Statistical Sciences.

I particularly enjoyed the sessions on data analysis and knowledge extraction - finding patterns and knowledge in large, complex, high-dimensional datasets. Along these lines, I gave a talk titled "Interactive Text Analysis with Iterative Denoising".

Durham, a former tobacco town, is home to Duke University and serves as one vertex of Research Triangle Park. One restaurant I particularly enjoyed was Toast, a small but good paninoteca, which was within walking distance of the hotel.

I've "known" Michael Yon for years now. And I put "known" in quotes because, though I've not yet had the privilege of meeting him in person, I've talked to him by phone and we've traded emails over the years---mostly him sending me pictures and details of his latest adventures. (It's a bit one-sided, because, whereas he's been off to foreign countries, getting shot at, have dinner with cannibals, etc., I've just been driving around the Washington D.C. beltway from Richmond to Baltimore for the past five years.)

For the last several years he has been embedded with the U.S. and international troops in Iraq, detailing the tremendous changes occurring in that country, considering not only the perspective of our and allied troops trying to restore order, but also the perspective of the everyday Iraqis, whose country and lives were tossed into the air like so many pick-up sticks.

While some of you may be familiar with Michael's first book, Danger Close, which details his experiences becoming a Green Beret, Michael has chronicled his experiences in Iraq in a new book, called Moment of Truth in Iraq: How a New 'Greatest Generation' of American Soldiers is Turning Defeat and Disaster into Victory and Hope. From what I have seen, Michael tells it like it is, much to the dismay of the military brass.

Special signed editions of his book are available here.

You can read the first chapter of the book here.

Get it while you can---Michael is heading back to Iraq, already having logged more time in combat situations than any other reporter. I think he has a unique perspective on the situations on the ground there, and I believe his voice is an important one.

With the summer travel season nigh, here are a few travel tips, especially for those who are more technologically inclined and security conscious.

For general technology travel tips, from wired.com:

Pick up some CD-Rs for backing up your images. If you don't have a laptop with you, make your backups at an internet cafe. Not only do CD backups let you clear out your memory card, they also aren't affected by x-rays at the airport. X-ray machines around the world are often much stronger than those in U.S. terminals. Memory card don't get scrambled often, but it does happen, and optical media has definite advantage.

For tips on making your laptop safe for from customs officials, from news.com:

Turning off your computer is especially important for OS X users, at least until Apple patches a security glitch that keeps account passwords in RAM. In the default configuration, the account password is the keychain password and yields passwords to wireless networks, Web sites, accounts accessed via SSH, network-mounted volumes, etc.

Finally, here are some more security-related technology tips, from the EFF's Jennifer Granick:

Another option is to bring a clean laptop and get the information you need over the internet once you arrive at your destination, send your work product back, and then delete the data before returning to the United States. Historically, the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) generally prohibited warrantless interception of this information exchange. However, the Protect America Act amended FISA so that surveillance of people reasonably believed to be located outside the United States no longer requires a warrant. Your email or telnet session can now be intercepted without a warrant. If all you are concerned about is keeping border agents from rummaging through your revealing vacation photos, you may not care. If you are dealing with trade secrets or confidential client data, an encrypted VPN is a better solution.

Travel safely, and securely!

I've been on walkabout since June, and have finally returned. Now I know a little what Bilbo & c. felt like after finally coming back to the Shire. And just in time too, for the trees are turning their fall colors -- here's looking down my driveway:

Technorati Tags: living, travel, virginia

Some friends took me to visit The Arboretum, in Arcadia, California. Located on 127 acres, The Arboretum is a tranquil botanical garden and historical site.

We saw lots of birds there too, including geese, ducks, and peacocks. This one bird was perched on a branch above the water and sat there for minutes with its wings spread out, looking at you with one eye - kind of creepy. An informed source tells me that this was a double-crested cormorant. Here's a pic of him (the bird, not the informed source):

While the many plant varieties are winding paths are reason enough to visit, movie-hounds may find it interesting to investigate where some of the many movies and tv shows were filmed on the grounds.

Johnny Weissmuller swam in Baldwin Lake for decades as Tarzan:

A local news story reported that he, in fact, set an unrecorded Olympic swim record when a cage of crocodiles was accidentally opened during filming (Weissmuller beat the crocs to the lake shore).

Bob Hope, Bing Crosby, and Dorothy Lamour were here for the Road to Singapore in 1939. Douglas Fairbanks was here for Safari also in 1939.

Perhaps most interesting is that the long-running tv show Fantasy Island was filmed here in the 1970s, and the Queen Anne Cottage, built in 1885, served as the tv show's manor house. In fact, you can see the spire of the cottage just over the shoulder of Herve Villechaize in the First Season DVD cover.

Here is a picture of the same spire that I took today:

Alas, I looked for de plane, de plane, but couldn't find it.

Technorati Tags: travel

Here is a picture from the Tahoe National Forest, which is in Northern California (thankfully not on fire) about an hour north-east of Sacramento.

You can click on the image to get a larger view.

Technorati Tags: travel

No doubt, by now you have heard about the fires ravaging Southern California at the moment -- having consumed an estimated hundred thousand acres so far. By Monday, hundreds of thousands of half a million people had fled or been ordered to evacuate their homes [this is now the largest internal evacuation since hurricane Katrina].

In September I drove through Malibu, admiring the homes there. One home in particular was built like a castle. Today, that castle home is ashes. Many of the movie stars live in Malibu, and so folks like singer/actress Olivia Newton-John and director James Cameron have had to evacuate.

The satellite image above is from NASA and shows how quickly the fires grew yesterday, October 21, 2007.

Planes flying into L.A. from Sacramento had to pass through a massive layer of dark smoke. The captain of the aircraft warned passengers that the smoke they smell is outside the plane and that their plane was not actually on fire.

And though the media is fixated on Malibu, with all the Hollywood stars, San Diego is thought to be in much worse shape.

Below is a map someone created showing the current fires. I am in Los Angeles, the spot in the ring of fire.

More up-to-date information on the fires can be found here http://calfire.blogspot.com/.

From BoingBoing: San Diego Union Tribune fire blog, KPBS on twitter, Red Cross "Safe and Well" list.

Technorati Tags: living, travel

Before you get too excited, no, it is not a museum of hammers. When I first saw the museum in Los Angeles' Westwood area, I thought how great to have a museum on hammers - battle hammers or maybe even Thor's Hammers!

Alas, that was not the case, but you should visit it anyway if you are in the area. The Hammer Museum houses some of the art collected by the late Armand Hammer, who was an American industrialist (no, Armand Hammer did not create the Arm and Hammer baking soda). He collected art his entire life, and amassed a very large collection. This museum displays some works from his collection and rotates through other exhibitions. On Thursdays there is free admission, so this is a prime time to visit.

From Hammer's private collection, we saw paintings by French 19th century masters, other European master paintings, and 18th-20th century American artists. There were van Goghs, Monets, a Rubens, and very nice Rembrandts, including Rembrandt's Juno and Portrait of a Man Holding a Black Hat.

There was also an exhibition of 17th-19th century advertisements called broadsides that depicted showings like Toby the sapient pig, a dulcimer player with no arms, the real-life Tom Thumb, and fortune telling ponies.

There was also a modern art media exhibition showing, for example, a guy pushing a block of ice through a city until it melted.

There are many events held at the museum throughout the year, and the museum itself is managed by UCLA.

Technorati Tags: academia, culture, living, travel

Just look at the labels or the bottled water ads: deep, pristine pools of spring water; majestic alpine peaks; healthy, active people gulping down icy bottled water between biking in the park and a trip to the yoga studio.

While the shiny labels on bottled water make us think we are doing the right thing by buying and drinking it, this story lists 5 reasons not to drink bottled water:

• Bottled water costs more than gasoline
• Is regulated by the FDA less than tap water
• The containers are plastic: 80% are thrown away each year, entering oceans and filling garbage dumps
• More bottled water means less improvement to the public water supply
• Fosters the corporatization of the water supply

Also, many investigations have shown that expensive bottled water is often little more than regular tap water with a fancy label.

While it is unfortunate that probably most people think bottled water is somehow better for them than plain tap water, as a valid reason for drinking bottled water I can see that bottled water might be useful when traveling to different towns, since you would not be accustomed to the bacteria strains present in the local tap water systems. Some also like bottled water when exercising.

As a resolution to the dilemma, I have found that buying a reusable bottle, such as the Colored Lexan Wide Mouth Bottle (32 oz.) - Nalgene Water Bottle, and re-filling it with filtered water or tap water, seems to be a reasonable compromise between not being wasteful with all the plastic throw-away yet having water convenient when exercising or traveling.

The bottles pictured above have a wide-mouth, making it easy to add sports-powders or ice cubes to the bottle, and the lexan material means that the bottle will last for many years of rugged use. Note that the bottles comes in a variety of colors, and there are also narrow-mouth versions.

Technorati Tags: living, science, technology, travel

I have been asked to give two tutorial lectures at this fall's Mathematics of Knowledge and Search Engines workshop series at the Institute for Pure and Applied Mathematics, which is a part of UCLA.

I just found out about this (me presenting), so it looks like I'll be busy preparing the talks from now until then. When I find out more information I will post it here.

Here is an overview of the workshop series:

The rise of the search engine as a major tool for searches on the internet has spawned a large and growing industry that has changed modern commerce, education, and the study of scientific, financial, and social data bases. The underpinnings of these search engines are mathematical algorithms which are well adapted to large and rapid computations, mainly from linear algebra. While the impact of this industry has been enormous, there is a parallel development in the applications of these methods to other related problems concerning the extraction of knowledge from large databases. This long program at IPAM will be devoted to new mathematics and methodologies of knowledge engines: the mathematical procedures used to extract knowledge from large databases. While this includes topics related to search engines it is mainly devoted to the more general problem of finding features in a database or using defined features to search within a database. It is expected that this program will be of interest to a large number of scientific fields, including pure and applied mathematics, statistics, bioinformatics, and engineering.

In addition to the tutorial sessions, the rest of the workshops are as follows:

• Dynamic Searches and Knowledge Building
• Numerical Tools and Fast Algorithms for Massive Data Mining, Search Engines and Applications
• Social Data Mining and Knowledge Building
• Search and Knowledge Building for Biological Datasets

Technorati Tags: academia, income, job, science, technology, travel, work

I mentioned here earlier about how a reconstructed Viking ship was going to trace historic routes in order to test theories on Viking navigation. Nearly 1,000 years after the original sank of the coast of Denmark, and after a trip of about 1,000 miles, the Sea Stallion pulled into Dublin.

From the Reuters news article on the arrival of the Viking ship in Dublin:

"You have come here on a voyage of discovery," said Dublin's Lord Mayor Paddy Bourke as the vessel and its volunteer crew of men and women docked.

Crafted from the wood of 300 oak trees, the 30-metre (100-foot) long, 4-metre wide Sea Stallion is the world's largest reconstructed Viking vessel, its builders say.

Technorati Tags: culture, travel

At the moment, the biggest star in Los Angeles is David Beckham.

Technorati Tags: culture, travel

If you are filled with the D.C. Beltway Blues, or are tired of all the big-city grime, crime, and lack-of-time, then a trip to the Marriott Ranch might be just the escape you need.

About 45 miles outside the beltway, Marriott Ranch is a working cattle ranch in the foothills of the Blue Ridge Mountains, in Hume, Virginia. The ranch has about 4,200 acres, and, in addition to cattle, has a bed and breakfast called the Inn at Fairfield Farm. You can also go horseback riding, hiking, off-road jeeping, and fishing. In addition to people wanting to get back to nature, the site is also a popular destination for company retreats and weddings. Around the ranch there are vineyards and wineries, fishing, rafting, canoeing, Civil War Trails, the Shenandoah National Park, and the Skyline Drive.

We went on a guided trail ride and had a great time. We have been to other destinations for trail rides, but this one was much better---the horses were healthy and well-kept, and the trail ride was more relaxed and natural than some other rides I have been on.

My horse was not too thrilled with having his picture taken.

Saddle-up!

Here's one happy camper.

Here we are, heading out.

This is an active cattle ranch, so sometimes you see some of the other residents.

Great scenery too!

And an old timey saloon is a great place for a picnic after a hard day's ride.

They also offer other rides in addition to the basic trail ride: you can go on overnight rides, mountain rides, cattle drives, and even learn how to be a cowpoke.

Technorati Tags: culture, living, review, travel, virginia

I guess now I have had the official California experience---last night we had a small earthquake:

The 4.5 preliminary magnitude quake was centered 4.1 miles north-northwest of the suburb of Chatsworth, according to the U.S. Geological Survey. It was extremely shallow, at only 3 miles deep.

It happened a little before 1AM, and woke me up---the bed was shaking and at first I thought someone was in the room moving the bed around.

It is very disorienting to wake up to an earthquake.

Technorati Tags: living, travel

Officially called Mount San Antonio, but known as Mount Baldy because of the absence of trees at the summit, this mountain has the highest peak in the San Gabriel mountain range. This mountain range is located in northern Los Angeles County and western San Bernardino County, California. If you are on the Los Angeles side of the mountain, on the other side is the Mojave Desert.

There is plenty of hiking available, which affords wonderful views.

Supposedly, from this view above, you can see the ocean, which is about 50-60 miles away. However, when I was there it was too hazy. But there is actually a house for sale on the mountain that actually advertises "Ocean View" in the listing, because on the one or two days a year when it is not too hazy, you can actually catch a glimpse of the ocean while in your mountain home 5,000 feet up and 60 miles away.

Many of the tops of the large cone bristle pine trees were sheared off---the wood of this type of tree is very brittle, and the tops get sheared off from the howling winds.

We hiked up to a small waterfall, at about 6,300 feet elevation.

What struck me most, besides the views, was the extreme dryness. The waterfall was a trickle compared to its normal flow, and some of the housing developments have their water shut off every night in order for their tanks to refill. It is easy to see why the area catches fire, since a careless tourist can easily catch the mountain on fire.

Besides the noisy Harleys that constantly thunder up and down the mountain on weekends, visiting the lodge and bar there, the locals also complain of bears. With the extreme lack of water, and therefore food, the bears have learned that, since Thursday is garbage day, the humans who live in the mountain village put their garbage out Wednesday night. And food thrown away by humans is tasty to starving bears.

There is a nice ski resort that becomes active in the winter. The resort is the largest and steepest in Southern California, offering 26 runs spanning 3 mountains and 2,100 vertical feet. However, given the desert-like atmosphere during the summer, it is hard to imagine the mountains having any snow. But, an old postcard helps explain why the ski resort is still in business.

We also saw the house where some scenes from Commando were filmed.

I guess now I have to rewatch that movie!

Technorati Tags: culture, travel

On the southeast corner of the UCLA campus lies the Mildred E. Mathias Botanical Garden. On seven acres, this oasis contains tropical and sub-tropical plants from all over the world.

I took a pleasant walk through the garden over the weekend, and plan to return, since it is a restive spot that calls for quiet meditation and attention to nature amid the city jungle of Los Angeles.

Technorati Tags: living, travel

The Vikings were some of the best sailors, ship-builders, and explorers the world has known.

The remains of a Viking warship was found in 1962, and has been rebuilt using traditional Viking tools and building methods by a dedicated team.

From the BBC news article, The return of the Viking warship:

More than 7,000 iron rivets, 2,000m of rope and 300 ancient Danish oaks were used in the reconstruction. After four years of painstaking work, the Sea Stallion from Glendalough was launched on 4 September 2004.

Now, the team behind the project wants to know whether the reconstruction is capable of making the kind of journeys the Vikings once undertook. To find out, the ship is being taken over 1,000 miles (1,600km) across the North Sea to Orkney and on to Dublin.

UPDATE: You can follow a diary of the voyage at the BBC site.

Here is probably the best way to hide your iPod or iPhone from theft---disguise it as a Microsoft Zune:

Ever wanted to watch a book being made? Here is a link to a short movie of a paperback book being printed and bound.

And just because this is where you go a lot when in Los Angeles:

Technorati Tags: book, culture, living, travel

If you are in need of a technical book or magazine, or several, you can probably do no better than to visit Opamp Technical Books, near Hollywood Boulevard in Los Angeles.

Inside are a number of aisles stacked floor to ceiling with used and new scientific and technical books of all topics, including software development, security, electronics, building codes, medicine, operating systems, CAM, writing, leadership, programming, business, and a whole lot more.

During a visit, prepare to spend an hour or more in browsing pleasure.

Technorati Tags: book, science, technology, travel

When I found out I was going to Los Angeles for a trip, I started to despair. Not because I didn't want to go to L.A. (the stories can't all be true, right?)---rather, I wanted to be able to take a lot of pictures while I was there, and I didn't have a suitable camera.

I do have some cameras, but they were either too big and bulky, made it too difficult to get the images onto my computer, or took poor pictures. Obviously, during an extended trip, I needed something highly portable that had an easy and fast way to download the images and that took great pictures.

My problem was resolved with the Canon PowerShot SD1000 digital camera. Since I have been using it almost daily here in Los Angeles, I have found it to be one of the best cameras I have ever used.

First, the camera has a convenient and functional shape that is easily portable. Basically the camera is like the shape of a small deck of cards. The lense extends when in use, but otherwise sits protected within the camera case. Some of the other cameras I saw had strange curves or awkward protrusions that would only cause trouble when on travel.

Second, loading pictures onto my computer is trivial---I just attach the cable from the camera to my laptop and with one button press all of the new images are transferred over.

Third, the camera takes great pictures. In fact, all of the pictures taken of Los Angeles in the various blog postings on this website were taken with this camera. For example, here are some pictures I took on a recent trip to the Getty Museum.

And note --- I have no photography experience, so these pictures were me just pointing and clicking. For the experienced photographer, there are many, many features in this camera to allow almost complete customization of the picture taking process. With me, for now, just pointing and clicking works well.

For some of the technical specifications, it has a 7.1 megapixel CCD that captures enough detail for photo-quality 15x20" prints. You can use the view-finder or the 2.5" LCD to compose your shots. It also has something like 17 shooting modes, face detection, high ISO settings, 8 special scene modes, red-eye correction, 3x optical zoom, and a number of other features.

After adding a 4GB SD card, I've been completely happy with this camera.

If you thought this article was interesting or useful, please help it be more visible to others by clicking on "digg it" below:

Technorati Tags: review, technology, travel

Without a doubt, the Getty Museum is one of the places every visitor to Los Angeles should see.

Jean Paul Getty (1892 - 1976) was an American who made his money by founding the Getty Oil Company. A collector of art and other antiquities, when he died his money went into the J. Paul Getty Trust, which funds and operates the Getty Museum. The museum is a part of the larger Getty Center, which operates a research institute, conservation institute, grant program, and leadership institute.

The museum contains classical:

manuscripts

furniture

art

in addition to being flanked by a 134,000 sq. ft. garden

There are many more sights to see there, but you know they did things right when half your pictures turn out to be just of the building itself.

Oh, and best of all, entrance to the museum is free -- you only have to pay for parking.

Technorati Tags: academia, culture, travel

It's tough being a bag in Los Angeles. Or at least my backpack thinks so.

Every day that I have been in Los Angeles so far I have been out walking or riding my bike. Usually I have my backpack with me, to hold my laptop, some books, and other items. My backpack is one of those padded computer backpacks---in specific, the Dell C8882 Inspiron 17" Laptop Backpack. I don't have a Dell computer though---I use the backpack to carry my Apple Powerbook 17" laptop.

For a while the backpack worked well, as it had lots of padding, held the laptop plus lots of books, had numerous pockets to hold odds and ends, and was comfortable to wear. But under extended use, especially since I have been out in Los Angeles, the backpack has not aged well. In specific, the padding in the shoulder straps has started to slide around, all the seams started looking fuzzy, like the material was wearing out, and a seam on one of the straps actually split open. So rather than be caught off-guard by a total backpack malfunction one day, far from home, I decided to look for a replacement.

My criteria: I wanted a bag that could hold my laptop, several books, and a few extra odds and ends; was waterproof (the backpack was not); and that would be comfortable and secure while walking or riding a bike. More subjective criteria included having a smaller form factor than the backpack and being more stylish. When loaded, the Dell backpack could easily knock someone over standing next to me if I turned around suddenly, and it also had a major Forrest Gump vibe going---something that doesn't compute in style-sensitive L.A.

And my wife imposed the criteria that the bag had to be less than $100.

So I headed to a large mall on Santa Monica and stopped into the Tumi store. Their T-Tech Pulse Eldridge Computer Messenger Bag seemed really nice, except that it was not waterproof (the sales lady said it is not waterproof, but that it resists water). As nice as the bag seemed, I couldn't see spending $195 for a bag that could not keep my computer dry. Plus, it was about twice my budget.

The sales lady suggested I check out the Louis Vuitton store. They had Very Nice Things, but their $1,300 messenger bags would not fit my laptop. I am also not convinced that their bags would feel comfortable or be appropriate when riding a bike. As for being waterproof, I never got around to asking that question about these bags. I mean, I guess what I am trying to say is that someone in the market for a Louis Vuitton messenger bag would have a different set of criteria than the ones I listed above.

So, just about to give up on my quest, I happened to stop into my local bike shop and they had exactly what I was looking for.

The bag that fit all my requirements turned out to be the Timbuk2 Commute Messenger Bag:

For many years Timbuk2 has made quality messenger bags, and the Commute was designed for the professional who wants something different than the traditional boxy briefcase, and who needs a rugged and travel-friendly bag that can hold a laptop.

This bag has a ballistic nylon exterior and a molded padded back panel (shown above). The bottom is double-padded and has an extra rubberized bottom layer (not shown).

The inside has a padded compartment for the laptop (the X-Large Commute bag fits the 17" Apple Powerbook) and the bag itself is waterproof. It has a handle for convenient hand-carry and comes with a second strap to secure around the waist for when riding a bike (or running to catch a taxi).

And, though the bag retails for $120, you can likely find it for less (I did, and it met my authorized budget).

All in all, the Timbuk2 Commute is a quality bag that seems to be very durable, to be useful and stylish, and to have enough features to make the price seem more than reasonable.

Technorati Tags: academia, bike, book, review, travel

So today I decided to make a tour around the UCLA campus.

The University of California, Los Angeles, or UCLA, has the largest enrollment of any university in the state and consistently ranks as one of the top universities in the world.

The campus is large (about 419 acres) and the buildings have a detailed, solid architectural style (Romanesque Revival?). As an example, the building below is the Powell Libary, which is the main undergraduate library. Interestingly, it was one of the original four buildings on campus.

In 1995, according to wikipedia, of the 36 PhD programs that were examined by the National Research Council, 11 departments made the top ten list.

Also, since 1998, no American university has had more applicants -- out of 50,732 applicants for fall 2007, 11,860 (23.38%) were admitted.

The building below is the IPAM building, or the Institute for Pure and Applied Mathematics. The mission of IPAM is to serve as a collaboration center for mathematicians, engineers, and scientists to work on a wide variety of interdisciplinary problems. For example, during the summer IPAM organizes RIPS, which is a research program for talented undergraduates to solve a variety of problems for a variety of companies, such as Symantec, Pixar, and some of the national labs (LANL, LLNL, JPL).

The IPAM building, though a break from the main architectural style of the campus, was designed by noted architect Frank Gehry in the mid-1970s. Inside there is an open design with large windows that provides a lot of light and helps foster collaboration spaces for visiting researchers.

Another building that moves to the minimalist end of design is the Ronald Reagan Medical Center, below.

Finally, on my way back to my room after touring around the campus, I stopped by a small cafe for some food. Of course, I was riding my folding bike, so when I went in to order my food I naturally carried it with me.

While I was waiting for my food, this man and woman had pulled up on a large BMW motorcycle. The lady rider, in leather jacket and helmet, came into the cafe through the door as I was exiting through the door, still carrying my little folding bike. She saw it and gave me an "All right!". So either she really approved of me and my bike, or she was greatly amused -- I am not quite sure which.

Technorati Tags: academia, culture, living, science, travel

I took my first real ride on my Downtube Mini folding bike over the weekend. I mentioned earlier that I had brought the folding bike with me to Los Angeles, since I wouldn't have a car while I was here.

Someone at work had mentioned that San Vincente Boulevard was a nice road to take to the beach, so I thought that would be a nice way to test out the new bike and to see some of the sights. The route I ended up taking is highlighted in purple (UCLA is in the upper right corner; Santa Monica pier is in the lower left corner).

The first task was to find San Vincente Boulevard. So I started at UCLA, headed South on Westwood Boulevard, and followed the Bike Path signs west on Wilshire Boulevard. The first ten minutes of my trip went fine.

However, my first mistake was to ride in traffic along Wilshire Boulevard. I am not a bike rider, but I knew that it is best to ride in the right-most lane. And after all, I was following the Bike Route signs. So all was fine, until I discovered suddenly that my lane, and the one to my left, turn into feeder lanes for the 405 San Diego Freeway.

Luckily, the Downtube Mini has a sharp turning radius, and after a bit of dodge and weave, I managed to get out of that situation.

Once I got west of the 405, I turned right onto San Vincente Boulevard. This was a much nicer road -- with a real bike lane, lots of nice houses, and being generally a pleasant place to ride a bike, as the following pictures show.

My second mistake was to not apply sunscreen. There is quite a bit of sun in L.A., especially at the beach. So about six miles into the trip, which put me near where San Vincente hits Ocean Avenue, I was starting to feel the heat. However, all discomfort was forgotten once I saw the view:

Note that in the second beach picture, the pier in the distance is Santa Monica Pier.

Also note that these pictures were taken from Ocean Avenue, which is on top of a small cliff, above the Pacific Coast Highway and above the beach.

However, when you have a folding bike (which weighs 24.5 pounds), cliffs are not a problem. No, I did not fall off the cliff, for once, but I did find some stairs going down the cliff. This picture is looking back after I carried my bike down the stairs and crossed the bridge over the Pacific Coast Highway:

However, by this time I realized my third mistake. On my next trip I will leave my backpack containing my laptop computer and some textbooks in my room. Evidently these sorts of things aren't really needed at the beach.

The fourth mistake dawned soon after -- riding a bike a long distance in the sun makes one thirsty and hungry.

Nevertheless, I rode my bike along the beach until I got to the Santa Monica Pier. There were the usual things one finds on a pier -- people fishing, people walking, people selling trinkets, people playing musical instruments -- though this was the first time I have seen a 9-story ferris wheel on a pier before:

My return trip was similar to my outbound trip, except that I rode back to San Vincente along Ocean Avenue instead of along the beach, so that I would not have to carry my bike, backpack, laptop, and books back up those stairs.

The round-trip was about 15 miles.

Technorati Tags: bike, culture, fitness, living, travel

Well, at least using my experience with one trip, it works.

In my previous post, "In theory: how to survive when on travel without a car - the folding bike", I discussed this idea for staying in a city without a car. I showed a picture of the bike and a picture of the bike folded in a suitcase.

Here is a photo of the bike, unpacked from the suitcase, after a trip of 2,329 miles via airplane:

Technorati Tags: culture, living, travel

So for a period of time in the near future I will be working and doing research in a place where I will not have a car. This might not be so bad if it were not for the commute back and forth to the office.

So my solution, perhaps with my engineering background showing a bit too much, was to buy a folding bike.

The bike I chose: a Downtube Mini.

In theory:

wake up --> ride folding bike to office --> fold bike and carry into office --> work --> ride folding bike back to where I am staying --> fold bike and carry inside.

This way, I have convenient transportation, the bike won't be stolen by leaving it outside chained to some bike-rack, and, perhaps best/worst of all, I will be able to carry my bike with me on the airplane!

So here is the bike:

And here is the bike in my suitcase:

But, airports being what they are these days, hopefully I will not suffer the same fate as Stephen Orsak who, upon riding his bike from the Minneapolis St Paul International Airport, enjoined discussions with the police that did not end in his favor:

As I lay still on the pavement, Officer Wingate walked over to my glasses and smashed them into the ground with his boot. I was handcuffed, body searched and baggage searched. Reinforcements were called in, a total of (4) squad cars and a paramedic unit.

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Technorati Tags: academia, culture, job, living, travel, work

I'm out in Los Angeles at UCLA for a math workshop. Here's a picture of the dorm where I am staying:

Technorati Tags: academia, travel

Just got back from a trip to Toronto where I delivered a security talk at a statistics conference, JSM 2004. The conference was nice and I was amazed that so many people showed up to hear my talk, considering that it was the last session of the conference!

Toronto had lots of nice restaurants, but I found the air a little more polluted than what I was used to - had a headache the entire time I was there: it didn't clear up until I landed in D.C. By the way, have fun getting _back into_ the country!

Here are some touristy shots.

First, they have creative advertising:

Second, the needle:

Third, a nice view from Castle Loma:

Fourth, Castle Loma itself:

Technorati Tags: travel

Here's a really cool underwater dragon-type creature I spotted, just before he spotted me and dove under a rock.

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Here's a pic from the East side of Oahu, looking out onto Rabbit Island.

For those who've had high-school biology, you can guess what happened to the rabbits humans put on an island with lots of food and no predators.

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While in Hawaii I went to Hana Lima 'Ia, which is a wonderful store in Honolulu where they teach you how to build your own ukulele. I would have loved to have taken the class, but it lasts for 10 weeks and I was only in town for 4 nights.

But I did buy one of their Mahogany and Rosewood kits. I also got a brief overview of how to make it from Asa Chock, though I have to admit I am really looking forward to their book (hopefully coming out this fall).

Technorati Tags: travel

Just got back from a trip to Hawaii: 4 nights on Oahu in Waikiki. Lest you think it was all fun-in-the-sun, I went there to present a paper at the Hawaii International Conference on Mathematics and Statistics.

I did manage to slip away for a quick round of sightseeing, and I'll post a few pics shortly.

Technorati Tags: travel