Sunday, July 27, 2014
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Monday, we got to spend the day exploring the Federal government. First thing in the morning, we went on a tour of the Pentagon. After that, Ben took us on a very detailed tour of the Capitol Building, and Ashley showed us around the House Committee on Science, Space, and Technology chambers and offices. We met with some PhDs working on Capitol Hill in science policy.
As I prepared my presentation, I discovered that when I replaced my hard drive earlier this summer, I lost my Microsoft Office license and no longer have it running. I'm sure the product key is somewhere in my 'files' at home, but that's almost 500 miles away. Now it's time to innovate. The result was that I wrote the presentation in Latex. I was thoroughly impressed with myself. As is the case with all presentations, it was subject to scrutiny for content and time, so I kept updating my code and tweaking my slides. Thursday was spent partially at AIP practicing presentations and watching the other interns' approaches. Thursday night, everyone was talking about presentation attire, and that's when I got nervous. When I'd packed for this summer, I included the typical undergrad conference business casual wardrobe for the final presentation and decided that what I had wouldn't quite be enough. Ashley graciously lent me her assistance in emergency suit shopping before the stores closed. I walked away very content with my newest wardrobe investment.
Friday was a very long day. I woke up early to make sure I had everything in order before we headed to AIP for the presentations. Everyone's went very well and we all looked quite dapper. After lunch I headed over to Goddard for a meeting about CLASS development with my lab and others involved with the project. Still in my suit and heels, I took the metro to the airport to catch a flight. I spent the weekend with my family (ALL of it) in Sacramento for my cousin's wedding. It felt very short, mostly because the flights were 6+ hours each way, but also because we had lots of things to do and people to see in a very brief period.
Kirsten Randle