Today started bright and later than intended, with me rolling out of bed at 8 am after snoozing through 2 alarms. After quickly changing and getting ready for the day, I headed to the dining hall to get breakfast. Today’s fare was familiar: Eggs, tater tots, and waffles. The scrambled eggs were below their usual standard, but the tater tots made up for it. At 8:47 am, I left the dining hall to head to the morning lecture, which was given by Dr. Robinson. As usual, it was entertaining and engaging, refreshing the familiar topic of E&M at a blistering speed. After the lecture ended, we headed as a group to get lunch. Like always, the majority of Astro 2 sat at the long high table near the back of the hall, and we discussed the contrasting personality traits of our fellow participants over plates of fried chicken. When lunch was over, we headed back to the Bio Annex for our second lecture of the day (after grabbing a cookie on the way out of course). This one was a riveting overview of the stellar life cycle; Dr. Fedderson discussed the main sequence of the HR diagram and its nuances, punctuated by occasional crashes as participants desperately tried to rid the room of the 3 flies buzzing about. After the end of lecture, I went back to the dorms to do my laundry (finally!!!) and call my dad to wish him a happy birthday. After a wholesome conversation and a brief period of relaxation, I left for dinner. Today we switched our table arrangements, meaning that I got to sit with a new set of people. I got to have an interesting conversation with new people about odd foods they’ve eaten and their experiences with them. After dinner I went back to the dorms to retrieve my laundry, before heading to the Bio Annex to process images and write this blog post (which I have only now finished – I love procrastination). I plan on heading back to the dorms soon, and hopefully fitting in a game of cards with my friends before the early curfew hits.
Today was just another typical SSP day, but like every day it was challenging but fulfilling. Each part of it presented difficulty: Staying alert in the 3 hour long lectures, getting through my work, processing my images and getting data from them – all of those things provided me with a special hit of dopamine that I don’t think I would be able to find in any other place, and that is what makes SSP truly special.
– Yuli
