Sunday, June 9, 2024
By:
Lessons of the week: STScI is way more important than I gave it credit for, I wish I had a boat, and networking is way easier when you run it as squads.
The week started off slow with a work from home day, an afternoon laying by the pool, and a game night with the other interns. I don’t know what the name of the game Charles brought was, but it had waaaay too many werewolves.
Tuesday Charles and I went into the ACP office, got some good work done, and met a few members of the APS and AIP staff. After work I again laid by the pool for a bit (my efforts to get a tan going have been futile so far). Movie night afterwards saw a continuation of our Indiana Jones streak with The Last Crusade. Reviews are in and the consensus is it was far better than Temple of Doom (if you’ve seen it you know), but not as good as Raiders of the Lost Ark.
Middle of the week meant an early morning, an Amtrak delay, and a 2 hour commute to go up to STScI in Baltimore. Upon my arrival, I met with Dr. Kumari, my advisor, who showed me to a spot in the library that I could do my work. As it turns out, the JWST control room is supposedly located in the same building, so I’m definitely hoping for a tour in the coming weeks. I ate lunch with Katarina, one of Dr. Kumari’s grad students who is doing some very cool work on dwarf galaxies. After lunch I met Chris Evans (not the Captain America one), the Baltimore head of the European Space Agency (ESA). I met with Dr. Kumari, where we went over the preliminary work I’d been doing compiling a comprehensive list of all the JWST programs targeting Lyman-alpha emitters. I’m now working on a piece of code that will give suggestions on Hubble and James Webb instruments and wavelength filters based off the redshift and emission line you want to look at. I got to attend a talk on active galactic nuclei (AGNs), which went so far over my head it might as well have been its own far off galaxy.
I then hurried to get back to DC for the Trimble Lecture featuring Dr. John Mather (Nobel Prize winner) and Dr. Mark Clampin (Astrophysics Division Director for NASA). This meant yet another Amtrak delay, but I managed to pass the time talking with a random 92 year old woman named Jules, who gave me some life advice, a shockingly firm handshake, and some snacks. The lecture itself was fascinating and I got to talk to both Dr. Mather and Dr. Clampin afterwards (promptly sent some LinkedIn requests, which they actually accepted!). I was exhausted and feeling introverted, but the post-lecture networking was so much easier once Charles and others broached conversations and I could just tag along. I spoke with Dr. Robert Petre (Director of Astrophysics at NASA Goddard) and Dr. Chris Stark (NASA Goddard astronomer) as casually as I could without making a fool of myself. We must be good at networking or something because they gave us their personal contact info, and invited the entire intern cohort up to NASA Goddard for a visit and tour.
Thursday I went into ACP again and worked on my code for a while, to mixed success (my programming chops are gonna need a lot of work). After work was the SPS Dinner Cruise on the Potomac River. Dress code? Fitted to a T. Menu? Braised pork, and I don’t even remember cause I scarfed it down so quick. Dessert? Decadent. Views? Aplenty. Did I do the Titanic pose with Amanda? Uh huh. DJ? You know it (pretty sure he played Cha Cha slide 3 times though). Vibes? Classy as hell. Needless to say it was a phenomenal experience. I imagine that’s how rich people network, and now I understand why. Later in the evening, a few of us went out to a club to celebrate a week of successful networking.
The work week ended with another day at ACP, though less productive than previously because Muji and Johnny were leaving for more than a week each, so everyone was a little restless. After work Charlotte, Jenna, Charles, and I went to Jazz in the Garden, which are weekly live jazz concerts in the Smithsonian Sculpture Garden. Tickets are highly coveted, and we only had one between the four of us. It took some skilled deception and several tries on the part of Charles and I in order to get in (they’ve got that place on lockdown, our next plan was to scale the fence), but eventually we all made it in. The evening wound down with another movie night, where we watched Indiana Jones: The Crystal Skull and Shrek.
The weekend started with a morning game of Bananagrams against Charlotte (I’ve never seen someone play a game so ruthlessly), a trip to the Natural History Museum with Charles and Charlotte, and the DC Pride Parade with Brynn, Kai, and Amanda. Later in the evening, a group of us went out to a few places in Adams Morgan.
Sunday I slept till like 3pm and didn’t leave my room until 5pm (clearly I’m not a morning person). I did bike up to Safeway though to acquire some hotdogs, which I then grilled and enjoyed with a bunch of interns. Reidyn kindly ordered some donuts, and we had a group over for game night, where we played Uno. I’d never realized that Uno rules were subjective and/or regional, but some of the outrageous plays last night cemented for me that I’m the only one who knows how to play correctly. What do you mean you can stack skips??
Hoping this week’s STScI round trip total can stay under 4 hours (impossible) and that its just as busy as the last. In closing, I’ll leave you with a few words Jules told me on a random bench in Baltimore: “Everyone always says ‘people these days are the worst!’, but I’m 92 damn years old and people are just as good as they’ve always been! If you’re good honey, people will be good to you, always remember that. Just don’t be a sh**head”.
Jaden Sicotte