Notes of the Day

Some days like today, I'll just jot down a few thoughts that I have at the moment:

• Such miserable weather outside - cold, steady rain/drizzle makes for an ugly day outside; on top of that, there is a Maryland football game against surprisingly 3-0 Towson Tigers of Division I-AA (my mom's alma mater)
• Going back to that point, I saw a group of guys and gals heading to the football game decked in paint - have fun!
• On the other hand, it's great to receive a compliment this morning on my musical tastes: During an emergency shift I had to cover around 10ish, I was playing a Maroon 5 song on Pandora. A resident walked by and said I had great musical taste! :)
• I just ordered a 36x24 bulletin board for my World Map poster through Amazon (yay for free shipping!), so I can place thumbtacks/push-pins on locations that I have been to globally - problem is it won't arrive until LATE this month/early November! :(
• I had a great day at the annual Maryland All-Nighter yesterday - listened to two acapella groups strut their stuff - an all-guys group (Generics) and an all-girls group (Treblemakers); got a free shirt that's 10X better than last year (AND IT'S PINK!!!) and saw a Cirque-de-Solei-like group perform in the food court
• Thank goodness that my next exam is on a Thursday; originally, I was going to have five straight weeks of Tuesday exams :(
• Then again, I'm more fortunate than others; one of my colleagues has two exams PLUS a ton of homework AND a quiz this week

Funny Photo of the Day

I took this picture last Thursday on the campus grounds of Howard University. Isn't it "pun"ny?

I'm on TV!

When the Howard University Weather Camp went to WJLA-7 this past Tuesday, we met meteorologist Adam Caskey, and he graciously gave us a tour of the facility. In addition, he gave the program a shout-out on the 5 AM and 6 AM news shows on Wednesday. take a look:



The director/teacher of the program, Mr. Mike Mogil, was overjoyed that Adam would go out of his way to endorse this camp, let us tour the facility, show us the ABC-7 news at noon in the control room in real-time AND let the students play with the green-screen. 

But I'm excited that I was on TV for the FIRST TIME!

I am currently watching the Oscars/Academy Awards while I am studying for tomorrow's exam, and, surprisingly, both are a snoozefest, for the most part. However, there were three moments that shocked and awed me in the 2011 Academy Awards. The opening skit was cute - how actress Anne Hathaway and actor James Franco incorporated themselves in several 2010 movies - and another famous actress uttered the F-bomb (uncensored) on national television. And, last but not least, the autotune was awesome.

First, here's the skit:

Then, there's the F-bomb by Melissa Leo. She was a supporting actress that won an Oscar for her role in "The Fighter", and was using the word in a positive manner:

Here's the autotune, the second-best moment of the Oscars (just behind the Opening Skit):

And the Tweet of the Day goes to Michael Gluckstadt. Actor Jeff Bridges announced all ten nominees for Best Female Actress in a Motion Picture, and Michael said (or should I say, 'tweet'):

And, how many dresses did Anne Hathaway wear to the Oscars? I think, at my last count, she was wearing her eighth dress during the nominees for Best Picture for a Motion Picture. 

As for the studying, the terms for tomorrow's exam are pretty straight-forward, but there are a lot of definitions, such as: the importance of greenhouse gases; how the air moves in the atmosphere, based on the PGF and Coriolis forces; and the difference among transpiration, evaporation and evapotranspiration. To me, these questions are easy - for your information, the class is AOSC123: Causes and Implications of Global Change.

70 Degrees in February?

Yes, you heard that right. Today's weather brought about an abundance of shorts and t-shirts and clear skies:

Students walking through Hornbake Plaza in gorgeous weather

Compare this day to this time last year. In February 18, 2010, we went through two REALLY severe snowstorms that made Maryland and College Park look like a winter wonderland:

Back in February 2010, our utopia would be a day like today. Nice, balmy, sunny weather with an ever-so-slight breeze in the 70's.

Don't you just love days like these?