http://blog.lotten.net The weblog of Lars Otten Tue, 18 Aug 2009 18:23:31 +0000 http://backend.userland.com/rss092 en As the interested reader might have noticed, my summer is quite uneventful and calm this year. If you recall, last year I was all over the place with conferences etc. This time around there was only one conference to attend in July in Pasedena, CA. That is about an hour ... http://blog.lotten.net/2009/08/17/summer/ Last week was spring break here at UCI, which three friends and I took as an opportunity to get away for a few days. So on Monday Dave, Kenny, Matt and I loaded our backpacks in the car and headed to the Grand Canyon, leaving civilization behind us! ;) After a ... http://blog.lotten.net/2009/04/02/grand-canyon-backpacking/ Like every year, some friends and I signed up for the intramural basketball league in the winter quarter. Also like every year, we competed in five group games and then proceeded to the playoff stage. And like every year, this implies everyone on the team is growing a playoff beard! ... http://blog.lotten.net/2009/02/23/playoff-season/ This past December, after winter break started at school, Teiko and I went on a 2 night trip to New York City, which I had arranged as a surprise. We flew out of Los Angeles very early on Monday and returned late on Wednesday. The trip itself was rather packed ... http://blog.lotten.net/2009/01/03/big-apple-and-big-news/ As I wrote earlier, I spent three weeks in Israel this summer. My visit was part of a research cooperation that we at UCI have with a group at the Technion University in Haifa. My Israeli hosts arranged for a nice room on campus for me and I spent most ... http://blog.lotten.net/2008/09/27/visit-to-the-holy-land/ After three weeks in Israel, I returned to California in early September for five busy days (hence no new entry on this page), where I had to prepare for this summer's final trip: I was to present a poster at a conference in Sydney, Australia, for which I left on ... http://blog.lotten.net/2008/09/19/gday-mate/ I just returned from a great weekend visit to Jerusalem, a truly fascinating city. I will have some more details (and pictures) later, but first I feel I should catch up with my trip to Finland and Germany earlier this summer. As you might remember, I traveled to Finland to attend ... http://blog.lotten.net/2008/08/24/long-overdue/ Since Wednesday I am now in Haifa, Israel. I will be here for almost three weeks, working with some people at the Technion University on a joint project. If time and money allows, I will take one or the other 'touristy' trip around here, so stay tuned. :) http://blog.lotten.net/2008/08/15/and-gone-again/ After a long day of traveling with a fair amount of delays, I arrived back in Irvine yesterday night. In spite of the ongoing strike at Lufthansa, I flew from Dusseldorf to Chicago -- with a 2 hour delay due to the strike (it seems I was still lucky, Lufthansa ... http://blog.lotten.net/2008/07/30/home-sweet-home-other-side-of-the-atlantic/ I write this from my parents' house, were I arrived late yesterday night, after flying in from Helsinki. The conference was over on Saturday, so I had most of Sunday to explore Helsinki as a tourist. I walked and saw a lot, it's a really pretty city, reminding me of ... http://blog.lotten.net/2008/07/14/home-sweet-home/