Day off

Although it may seem that we are doing more sight seeing than working, the last three days made up for it. Wednesday, I gave a seminar at the Volcani Institute, followed by a 2.5 h drive south to Sede Boker, the site of Daniel's former Kibbutz as well as Ben Gurion University of the Negev. I met a friend of mine there for two days of instrumentation discussion, visiting research sites and an evening walk in the spectacular wadi that forms the back yard of the institute. There is a lot to say, but I want to go to bed.

Last night, we returned to Tel Aviv to spend the weekend with Marcel and Zahava. They have been wonderful. Marcel took us to Masada and the Dead Sea today. Tomorrow it is back to work for me (we had planned to visit Jerusalem) with one of our reps here. Hopefully, we will have some free time later to head there. I will leave you with some pictures of the days. Me swimming in the Dead Sea, the wadi at Sede Boker, Marcel and Kirby in the bath house at Masada, store rooms at Masada (year supply :-)).

Over the Jordan

Funny now that I look at it, most of my pictures were either out of the front or side window of the car. Seems like I remember most of Dad's being the same way, but that may be a false recollection. Today we went north to the Sea of Galilee and the Golan Heights. I seem to remember someone telling me, likely lots of someones, that every notable place in the Holy Land with something to do with the Savior had a church on top. I can verify the voracity of that statement. I don't know what they were trying to do with the church, but I will tell you that it took all the enjoyment out of those places for me. Instead, we were left to look around at the relatively untouched scenery to find a small portion of what it was like when He walked there. The Sea itself was beautiful, although drained considerably from its usual height because of an ongoing drought here. The hills and mountains around it were striking, rising to great heights quickly after leaving the lake shore. It was not hard to imagine the Savior teaching people on the hills or fisherman preparing nets or sailing along the shores. After visiting the sites around the Sea of Galilee, we continued north to the Golan Heights. Daniel told us about his role in the Six Days War, planning how the tanks were supposed to ascend the bolder strewn hillsides. I am not sure how tanks were supposed to move there knowing what a little rock does underneath a track vehicle from my time on the D-6. Somehow they made it, at great personal loss, up through the the steep hills and took the heavily fortified positions of the Syrians.

The pictures, in order, are of the Sea of Galilee, the Sermon on the Mount location , the Jordan river as it flows into the Sea of Galilee, a little warning on the fields of the Golan Heights (we didn't take a walk there), and a beautiful sunset from Daniel's hilltop home, looking over the Mediterranean.

The journey begins

Kirby and I arrived at Tel Aviv airport yesterday morning at 3 am. I am not sure why planes land at 3 in the morning, but apparently it wasn't an uncommon occurrence because there were plenty of people there. Our host for the first part of the trip, Daniel, was waiting there for us at the exit from customs. I feel badly having him come all the way from his home to collect us at that unreasonable hour but we were thankful to have a friend there. The trip to Israel boasted layovers of 6 and 11 hours in Portland and Amsterdam, respectively but was pretty relaxing on the whole as I took the time to read Daniel's book on the Natural History of the Bible. This gave me ample opportunity to read and sleep as needed. Daniel's home is situated on a spur of Mt. Carmel in the north of Israel, not to far south of Haifa. It has a commanding view of the Mediterranean Sea and the skinny coastal plain. Since arriving 24 h ago, we have been the receipient of wonderful hospitality, feasting on grapefruit from Daniel's orchards, eating cheese from Denmark, brought back from his wife Michal's latest trip (an archaeologist at one of the universities here), visiting the ancient site of Ceasaria, complete with lunch at the edge of the small harbor that was constructed there, and dinner at the best Falafel house in the Middle East (at least that is what Daniel thinks). He also treated us with a reading from Isaiah on the besiege of Jerusalem by the Assyrians with commentary from Michal of the history of the people at that time (she specializes in the Bronze age).

Jet lag has not been too bad for me. We slept after arriving hear around 5 am, and also had a nap in the late afternoon. Being out in the sun all day helped too. The weather here is wonderful this time of year, in the low 80s during the day and 60s at night with a low humidity. I have uploaded a few pictures as well. The first shows Kirby and Daniel at 4 am riding the train back to Binyamina, the closest stop to Daniel's home. The other are of the coast at Ceasaria, standing on top of the aqueduct that fed water into the town of Ceasaria, and Kirby and Daniel in his study, figuring out how to get Kirby's email. Today, we plan to see more agriculture and the Sea of Galilee among other things.

End of the semester

The semester ended quietly last week. Usually, the first week of May finds me at my wits end, desperate for some time to myself. This year, it was different. I was glad to get to the end of the semester, but I was not out of gas like I usually am. Which is why I had time to gather energy for my Miles moment, a time named in honor of my second semester physics teacher. Second semester of physics is bad enough without having someone who struggles getting concepts across to the students teaching the class. To make matters worse, and the thing the "moment" is named after, is that he spent hours in front of the class lamenting how dense the students were when they scraped together 47% averages on his tests. After the first test of the semester, I remember at least one student getting into a verbal spar (including obscenities) with him while the rest of us (200 strong) sat in shocked awe. Although it was not what I would have said, the feelings were certainly there. Now, as a professor, I have the same moments. Not in class, but afterwards, talking to Doug about our students. This semester saw some great efforts by students who put everything they had into learning the material, but the general level of the student was not as good as we have had. But, in saying that, I realize I may condemn myself as much as them if I did not teach them well enough. And, since I still had the energy to complain about them, I must have not done my bit.

As long as Nigel brought up the potty training this week, I will jump in with our bit. Michael is finally out of diapers! Okay, he's 3, no real feat to most of you, but this was a real struggle. He has known how to go in the potty for a long time, but just didn't feel like it. Nothing we could do would produce the result. He knew that I was willing to take him for ice cream if he would comply, even telling me so. But, after he told me that he would do better, it was immediately back to his old tricks. I think there is something that changes physiological with kids over 2. Their diapers seems to smell worse and worse with every change. I think it is preprogrammed to help them on their way to "big boys". However, if the kid is resistant, there is little joy on the parent side. But after too many stinkers to count, the change to potty trained for Michael was quite abrupt. One day he was not willing to do anything, the next, he had cast off his diaper, even for naps and night-time. That has not happened since Emily. Funny how much joy we take in these things.

In a couple of weeks I am heading to Israel with Kirby. We are going to do some training with a company who buys our sensors as well as present a paper at a conference, give a seminar at one of the research centers there, and learn more about agriculture in arid regions. It should be a wonderful trip. I wish Kersten was going with me; I think she would enjoy it. But, she was not that excited to leave the children.

All alone

Kersten went to Women's Conference late this week. I expect that most husbands would dread this but I always get excited. I had a fabulous time. I am not sure how the kids liked it, but getting to spend one-on-one time with Sarah and Michael (since they stay home) and a lot of time with the others really brings me joy. We had a great time. Maybe not as much fun as last year when we headed down to Nigel's house and hung out together, but that would be hard to beat. I just loved hanging out with Michael and interacting. He is so fun to talk to and listen to his wants and desires. I had to take them up to work for some of the time so I could work on releasing a sensor that needs a lot of attention. During those times, they developed some new friendships with Lauren and Laura who were long-lost buddies to them. They set them up with juice (Michael, who just got potty trained, went to the bathroom 16 times on Thursday), crayons, giant paper to draw on, movies, and treats. They were in hog heaven. Lauren also took them out to see her dog, Otis, which they both loved. They must think this work thing is the best thing ever.

Friday we augmented work with a trip to Costco with Cecily (fabulous, we should do that more often, it so fun to talk), a birthday dinner of spaghetti and meatballs (the kids were so awesome and helpful getting it on) for Michael Scott...errr...Stuart (Happy Birthday Scott!-sorry I didn't call, things were just too crazy, I love you though), a trip to the track (where the kids are feverishly trying to improve their long jump, triple jump, and 100 m dash, don't know why they love it so much but it is their favorite thing), a movie in the EmRRSaM Theater, and a candled birthday ice cream to top it all off. I went to bed thinking it was the happiest day I have had in a long time. Kersten got home at midnight with great stories of what she had learned and we were glad to have her back.

Well, that is enough for now. I am glad that Kersten goes away now and then so I remember how much I love to spend time with the children but I am glad she is back. One final note: I had to cook up a venison roast for our student party this week that we hold every year at the end of the semester. Without anyone to give me advice, I jumped onto youtube.com to give some advice and ended up cooking up a pretty mean dish (if I do say so myself...okay, it is not hard at all, the youtube video was only 2 minutes long). This cooking thing is pretty liberating. Who knows where I will go next...