Actually Playing with Dirt

That's right. I'm actually playing with dirt. Apparently this blog is aptly named after all.

As the title of this post might suggest, I've started my lab work. F'real. I spent last week mixing batches of clay and cleaning/organizing my lab area. It took a couple attempts, but I finally managed a procedure to create samples with unit weights within 0.7% of each other (this is mission critical). Needless to say, a happy dance ensued. No, really, I started dancing around the lab. It could have been really embarrassing if someone had walked in. I also did a couple practice runs for my tests. After all, I'd rather know if something isn't going to work before I start processing samples en masse.

So welcome to my lab.

It's all clean and stuff! And the wires are actually organised, labeled, and go somewhere. I really should have taken a 'before' picture...

Of course, stuff takes time, and, while I was hoping to start real testing this week, I'm still waiting for the laptop to get setup. It's currently with the tech guys, so hopefully later today (or tomorrow morning) I'll have everything I need to get this show on the road. The apparatus and area is clean, I'm mixing a giant batch of clay and cutting samples tomorrow morning and, hopefully, will get my first set of big boy tests started tomorrow. I even have a triaxial test going. And it appears to be going well. This is exciting stuff, I promise.

I'm an eternal optimist. (Hah!)

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Of course, all this lab productivity comes at a cost. In this case, it was an absolute failure to study for yesterday's exam. Luckily, it was open book and I managed to get a couple hours of cramming done in the two days leading up to it. I'm not sure it went well, but I'm pretty sure I passed. I'm gonna be super burnt if I didn't. Now I'm down to two oral exams, one of which is next week. I have to finish the assignment before I can take the oral exam for the other class. That's going to be a February thing, methinks.

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The Netherlands has decided to have an actual 'winter' this year. It's been hanging out around freezing, resulting in a light frost and thin layer of ice on the canals. We had almost a week of barely-freezing temperatures and clear skies. And then, of course, it rained. Not one of those typical sporadic Dutch drizzles, but real, god awful, 1 degree Celsius rain. Last night was not one of my best rides home, especially since it was the only freaking day I didn't have a rain jacket with me. I was soaked. Ev and I had been talking about swimming, but by the time I got home I felt (and looked) like I had already been.

Go weather.

This morning I was thinking about cycling in. And then I walked outside. And fell on my ass. The magical downpour last night turned into a nice, thick layer of ice.

I took the train in.

And did a successful triaxial test on my clay (that's right, bitches, that means results I can use!).

And managed to get home at 19:20 so I can actually spend awake time with my boyfriend, who apparently still exists.

So Happy Thursday, everyone. Hope it's a good one.

2016: let's hang out in a lab

Happy 2016.

Ev and I spent it hanging out on our balcony watching the fireworks light up the skyline. We really do have an excellent view for that. We can see the light shows in Rotterdam and Delft, not to mention the thousands that are lit off in the neighbourhoods around (and far away) from us. The annual fireworks spectacular is one of the only parts of living in a city I think we'll miss.

So we rang in the new year the same way we have for the past 4 years: nice bottle of wine (or champagne) and a cigar.

Left to right: Peru (2011/2012), Rotterdam with Ev's folks (yay) (2014/2015), (2015/2016). There's definitely a version of this pic from 2013/2014 from Dillingham, but I have no idea where it's at. 2012/2013 is a blur... I know there were scotch and cigars, but not much else.

Ok, I have to confess something: this year's picture took two takes. The first one looked more like this:

I wasn't prepared for the camera flash. It hurt.

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And so we kicked off the new year with minimal fuss and I promptly went back to the whole schooling thing.

I'm (supposed) to start my lab work tomorrow. This is kind of terrifying, since I was busy with some coursework and haven't acquired the insulation and heat transfer gel I need to actually run my tests. So that's a tomorrow morning mission: go to the hardware store near campus and buy stuff. Then cut to size, make sure the apparatus actually works, make 3 to 5 batches of test soil and make sure my procedure is actually ok, and hope to hell nothing goes catastrophically wrong.

Mostly the last bit.

A couple weeks ago I made a fancy schedule of my tests, since there are some serious time limitations to be negotiated. Namely, I can only break one sample per day (but I can have 6 tests going at a time). Given the different test scenarios, this makes things... complicated.

Want to know the scariest part? As soon as I have my first round of test results, this entire thing will have to be adjusted, since the cycle times will change.

I'm afraid.

I am very, very afraid.

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In other news, I may have made a questionable life choice yesterday: Ev and I booked tickets to go to Bonaire with his dad and stepmom at the end of March. According to that terrifying schedule, this should allow me 2 weeks of buffer time, and I can do extra short tests when I'm back and doing data analysis, but... needless to say, the thesis is coming on vacation with us. 

Still, I'm trying to keep myself from feeling guilty. I have only left the Netherlands twice since the school year started, and that is pretty damn abysmal. And, thanks to the time-sensitive nature of my lab work, I have a minimum of 46 consecutive days in the lab, which means no sneaking off for magical weekend adventures or going anywhere for spring break (which we learned last year is actually 'ski break', since it's the first week of February).

We'll see if I manage to stay semi-sane for the next three months.