If you haven't noticed

I am getting bored with this blog.

But, by way of update, I must say that the trip to Wittenberg last week was very fun. I got to sit in on two informal q&a sessions with Dudley Herschbach, as well as hear his two lectures. He was great fun to listen to. He knows so many people... and all their stories too. I was particularly interested in the history of the development of NMR, which I studied at Penn State, and the different perspectives that physicists and chemists had on the same problems. Fascinating.

The only thing that would have made that aspect of the trip better would have been if the lady who kept interrupting his technical talk had not attended. She actually interrupted him THREE TIMES. Once, she even said "If I may illuminate your point," and then went on to make a total idiot of herself, obviously knowing nothing about what he was saying. Seriously, a Nobel prize winner in chemistry having his point illuminated by someone who knew nothing about chemistry. I was embarrassed for her, but mostly I just wanted her to shut up.

Got to have lunch with Drs. Finster and Cline. Got to see (from a few rows back at the lecture) my old p-chem prof. He is still wearing the same hat! And, we got to experience Dr. Sartoris's "1-iodoisopropyl people ether" joke again. Ate at Young's and Mike and Rosie's. Lovely.

Last but not least, Jenny came with me... great fun. We chatted til one in the morning about just about everything. It was interesting to learn about stuff that happened 10 years ago that I never knew was going on. And it was fantastic to have someone to talk about chemistry with again... even though neither of us could remember half of what was being taught in the classes we attended. Oh well, at least Dr. Cline said "dropknocker."

Good stuff.