Sunday, July 7, 2024
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In work-related news: I interviewed the authors for the precision gravity measurements on Monday. The interview left me feeling as though I have a good understanding of the research. I continued writing my first draft for the piece on Tuesday and Wednesday. Atomic interferometry takes advantage of the dual wave-particle nature of matter to discern the acceleration due to gravity on atomic wavepackets near a source mass. There are quite a few challenges in doing so, one of them being that Earth’s gravity is 300 million times stronger than the interaction of wavepackets with the source mass, making it very difficult to isolate the acceleration. Research of this type mainly focuses on proving/disproving theories in fundamental physics, but also has repercussions in the study of dark matter/energy and developing new technologies to make such precise measurements. I learned more about “fifth force” dark energy models and scalar fields while looking into this piece! I also finished up my statistics piece for the August edition.
On Tuesday night, I took the metro out to IAD and flew to Seattle to visit my boyfriend for the Fourth of July! We both had a four day weekend, which I believe will not be common in the future, so it was a great time for a visit. I met the perfect kittie upon arriving at my boyfriend’s apartment. This cat is so friendly, soft, and playful, and I am going to miss him so much. After much deliberation, we decided to name him Rocky (short for Ragnarok). His gray fur kind of looks like stone, and he is a ragdoll (hence, rag-narok). I worked from the apartment on Wednesday and got to hang out with Rocky all day. He really likes to tell you when he wants attention– anytime we enter a different room, he will either quickly follow or meow incessantly until he is picked up. I have never met a sweeter cat.
We went to Uwajimaya (a Washington supermarket that sells a huge variety of Asian foods, highly recommend going even if you just want snacks) and got the ingredients for hot pot for the Fourth of July. I had never had hot pot before so I wasn’t sure if I was going to like boiled meat, but hot DANG was it good! The next day, we went to a bakery called Farine and got a cruffin (crème brûlée croissant muffin, very delicious). We decided that we would drive down to Mt. Rainier at some point and go hiking, so we bought some hiking gear. Friday night we went to a revolving sushi bar for the first time! The restaurant has two revolving lines– one has a few of each dish circulating, and the other sends out orders to specific tables/seats. I had so much fun with this experience, and we got a little prize after turning in our plates (tamago sushi keychain). We will absolutely try this again in the future.
We woke up at 3:30 AM on Saturday morning to start the >2 hour drive to Mt. Rainier, when we realized the road to the trail we had chosen was closed. Luckily, we discovered this before driving all the way out there. We promptly went back to sleep and decided to find a different trail to hike on Sunday instead (and honestly we were grateful to get some more sleep). Costco was selling a really nice cat tree that fit with the colors of the apartment, so we bought it and put it together for Rocky. He isn’t quite big enough to get up to the top yet!
Finally, on Sunday we drove to the Sunrise Visitor’s Center at Mt. Rainier and started on the Mt. Fremont Fire Lookout Trail. We got there around 7 AM, so the air was still cool and the sun wasn’t blasting just yet. For the first 15 minutes, I became really afraid that we had made a mistake in choosing this trail because it was full sun and at a steep incline (we powered through and the rest wasn’t as bad). The hike is 5.6 miles round trip along with a 1200 ft increase in elevation, moving us from Seattle’s sea level to 7200 ft. I did not account for this increase in altitude, and got a pretty serious nosebleed halfway to the lookout. Hiking on a skinny trail where some parts only support one-way traffic, and adding some extra dizziness due to blood loss was more sketchy than I had desired. Nonetheless, we completed the hike (and acquired many more mosquito bites along the way). I felt like I was in a movie or video game at the fire lookout, and the surrounding mountains and trees were so surreal. Very early into the hike we saw a mid-sized rodent creature sort of prancing along the mountain. As we learned later, this animal was a marmot! We ended up seeing 10 marmots over the course of the hike. They are very cute and not too skittish so we were able to look at them up close. We also saw mountain goats from a distance! I can’t wait to go back to Mt. Rainier during future visits, hopefully during a time where more roads are open!
I am taking an overnight flight back to DC on Monday night, so I will have to say goodbye to the kittie and my boyfriend. I am rejuvenated and excited to get back to work for the last three weeks of the internship! I also miss hanging out with the other interns!
'Til next time.
Sonja Boettcher