Day 24 - And the winner is...

Woke up early again today (but not as early as yesterday) to get to the lab and grab my samples before meeting Talmon for a TEM session at 9 am. We worked until 1 pm and I got some great data, but we only looked at 3 samples! Not only did we get a lot of images which are perfect for my processing, but we found some really cool-looking nanotubes, one of which can be found at the end of this post.

Anyways, I had missed lunch again, but Anna had texted me during my TEM session about grabbing some food, so I called her on my way back to the lab. She said she'd grab a cab to the front gate, so I dropped my stuff off and went to meet her. She was literally stepping out of the cab as I got there, which was great timing. We walked about two blocks down so I could get some delicious falafel, and since Anna had been sort of snacking all morning, she just grabbed some sorbet. We chatted about a whole range of things, including how when people (/boyfriends) reliably go the extra mile, it's hard not to get frustrated (although it's totally unfounded) when they fail you that one time (in this case, not putting a lactaid pill in Anna's wallet for her because she always forgets), roommates and messiness, and other random topics.

We re-entered campus through Clore house, and as we approached my building ran into Doron wearing a sort of cowboy hat. We chatted for a few minutes, but it was too hot for more, so I went to work, Doron continued towards the cafeteria for his late lunch, and Anna went in search of internet so she could practice chess openings on her laptop. Hopefully we'll get together again before she leaves on Tuesday!

I began processing the new TEM images in the afternoon, and left around 5:30. I changed into climbing stuff and blogged/etc in the Clore lobby until it was almost time to go climbing. I had organized a train trip to the bouldering place in Tel Aviv, and ended up accompanied by Tanmay, Tamara, Michael, another guy from soccer, Jordan, and Jordan's friend. We left at 7 but missed the 7:16 train by about 30 seconds, so we hung out to wait for the 7:38 one. From the Tel Aviv Hahagana stop, we walked the 10-15 minutes and arrived at Performance Rock. It's not a huge place, and Dave, Nina, and her two friends from Germany were there waiting for us, so Weizmann people might possibly have outnumbered all others.

I showed everyone the beginner routes and gave some tips to those new to climbing, and eventually started working on some new stuff with Tamara, which was really fun. Towards the end of the night we made up a really interesting traverse route, the last move of which neither of us could manage. It was a successful trip. We left a bit late to catch the 10:12 train, and the next one was at 11, so we went straight to the central bus station and practically filled a shuttle back to Rehovot. Some interesting religious discussions occurred during the ride back, which will be discussed another time, and I tried to listen to both simultaneously.

When we got back, those of us who hadn't eaten yet grabbed some pizza and then returned to Clore. There was a group of people chatting in the lobby, which was fun but which eventually turned into a smaller, summer-student version of the gathering relocated in the kitchen. Stephen, Joel, Ari, Jordan, and even Jonathan brought their laptops out, and we had an amusing time. Highlights included showing Jonathan his first ever complete episode of The Office ("Diversity Day," for those interested), and a major overhaul of my blog tagging system to correct the many omissions of Joel tags, one of Jonathan's, and the revision to organize the "Labels" sidebar by label frequency (not in alphabetical order), to facilitate competition among my friends here for "most tagged." It was very dramatic but now that it's easier to see who's winning, I feel sure people will hang out with me more just to be mentioned here and then consequently labeled.

Work pictures today...an unusual coil-shaped nanotube!
"DANGER: Laser Radiation" (edit)