My grandparents...

So, this past weekend Oscar and I went skiing in Austria. It was a lot of fun and I was really relieved because my brand new skis are quite nice in the snow! :) We went with our friends Joerg and Manual. Joerg is a skiguide and he told us about his tour group who were having an opening season ski tour weekend. It was so much more fun than I had imagined a tour would be. I really enjoyed it for lots of reasons, but one was that I heard German being spoken most of the weekend and I felt like I could learn a lot of words. Also, I felt like I understood a good number of the conversations and now I am more excited than ever to learn German.

I will post some photos tonight of Oscar and I skiing this past weekend- but I wanted to post a link to Nanny and Pop Pop's website. Specifically, I'd like to point out the one that Pop Pop made for me! :) It still makes me feel really special that he did this for me. Here is their webpage: http://www.hometown.aol.com/nanandpop1/raynhelenworkman.html and the one Pop Pop made for me is here: http://www.hometown.aol.com/nanandpop1/bettymohler.html.

I have always had a hard time in life remembering that people love me, and when people do things like this it makes it easier and easier for me to remember over the years that I am loved. I know that sounds silly- but when living so far away from all your family and many of your friends- it is nice to have them be so sweet to you! :)
Another great example is that my sister, Deb, sent me a birthday package today. I am going to wait until saturday to open it! :) She is super sweet and her two little girls, Kira and Jena, even colored some pictures for me! :) Hopefully I can get oscar to take a photograph of me and I can post it on this blog so they can see that I am posting their artwork on my wall in my office here in Germany!!

Happy Thanksgiving...

So, today is thanksgiving in the states. I'm working and so is Oscar. However, tonight we leave for Austria to go skiing. Last night we made a "thanksgiving dinner" for a lot of our friends. It was a lot of fun. We made burritos- which is maybe one of the only things I can imagine making for 11 people! :) Everyone seemed to think it was fun and we stayed out until 11:30 having a good time. Today, I'm playing around with my avatar and also working on our linear treadmill. I'll post more photos later today, if I find the time.

Ha ha, I found a logo for a burrito place in Colorado that is called "Burrito's Betty". ;) I sure wish I was with family watching football- like we were last year! :) Actually, last year I learned how to knit and we watched a game. I'm still not very patient when it comes to knitting- but I at least know how to knit now and I think it is fun.

Here is a photograph of our linear treadmill, and my PhD advisor Bill Thompson walking on it. ;) He was here a few months ago and it was really great to see him.

And one final photograph of me on a work outing with the Reinhard from work. He is a very cool german! :)

Real-time avatars are cool

Today I had a great day at work. I've been working on something for a long time with a colleague and it finally looks cool! :) I'll have some real pictures by next week because we will be demoing it to our group! :)

Since I've gotten here to MPI, the coolest programming project I could think of was to get a real-time human-like graphical representation of oneself within the virtual environment. Finally, today we did it! :) I've spoken with several people about this topic and I'm so excited that it is now realized. Tomorrow I have to work on programming in the legs and feet. Then I will add in the ability for two virtual avatars to be represented in real-time motion at the same time.

What these means for those of you who don't know anything about virtual environments, is that now I could ask you to put on an outfit that would allow you to visually become part of the virtual environment. Currently, my avatar looks like a robot. In fact, it was a robot that I programmed in my first year of graduate school! :) The people at work that have helped me get excited about this project and have influenced what we've done are, Martin, Michael, Naima and Stephan. I'm also quite excited to tell my graduate advisors that it is finished-- since now I can use it to evaluate the effects of an avatar on the persons perception of the space and lots of other effects that are not reliant on low latency. ;)

Lets see if I can find a picture of a typical avatar body that we will use for this project! :) Oh, right. There is a photograph of one of the graduate students at Utah that I used to work with. This is a perfect example of an avatar, for those of you who have no idea! :)

Sleeping in on Sundays, skiing Oscar, and Surfing Betty

We have had a pretty good weekend so far. Although today I slept in really late. I was up coughing a lot last night, because some stupid cold has gotten in my system and hasn't gotten the hint that I want it to leave!!! Oscar and I looked at an apartment yesterday and it was beautiful- but we didn't get it. Friday night we watched a nice movie called, "An Unfinished Life". It was sad, but happy as well and everyone that joined us (5 people or so from work) seemed to like it. It had "Bart the Bear" in it- so who wouldn't like it. Well- maybe Stephan Colbert wouldn't like it.. that is who. Oscar thinks it is hilarious that Stephan Colbert's #1 on his threat-down count is bears!

Anyway, then yesterday Oscar went for a long run. I went shopping for christmas gifts since I still am not feeling up to running and then we met up down town and eventually went to our favorite restaurant to celebrate Jenny's birthday. We had a great time talking with Joerg, Jenny, Brian, Daniel, and Joerg's roommate Manual (from Spain). Manual and Joerg are both going skiing next weekend with us. It is great-- it will be our thanksgiving celebration, although I'm sure I will call my family to ask them to describe thanksgiving dinner for me.

I miss my parents this weekend a lot. I saw a guy last night that reminded me of dad quite a bit. He was a silly man selling sling-shots! :) Now, doesn't that sound a bit like dad! :) He spoke German, but he was trying to convince us that these sling-shots were traditional Tuebingen weapons. This also made me think of dad and how silly he is. Okay, well lets see what photos there are on Oscar's computer that I can post today. Also, wish me luck that on future sundays I will be as fortunate as I was today and can sleep in until Oscar makes me soup, cheese and bread! :) Yummy and happy me.

Also, just so none of you get confused about what can be done in Germany and what we have been up to lately-- the skiing and surfing photograph are from British Columbia, Canada! :) It would be super cool if we could go surfing behind a boat here- but as of yet we don't have a boat or a really nice friend with a boat! :) I wonder if anyone surfs like that on the bodensee (Lake Constance). That would be cool if they do!

Friends in Germany

I have some news! Laura's IEEE-VR paper got accepted and I'm working on organizing a panel discussion for that conference. It should be good, I hope. Also, it is really exciting that Laura's paper got accepted because I think it was some good work and she will have fun presenting that research to her peers. It will be a good learning experience for her and me- I will be nervous for her!

Today I decided to put a photograph of me and my friend Mirko up on my blog. He is one of my favorite German people. I think this is because he talks quickly, he is sincere, and many times he is funny without being distasteful! :) ha ha.

My brother Robert and sister-in-law Jen met Mirko when they were here and I think they agreed he is a good guy. ;)

Anyway, he is one of my bestest-friends here in Germany and has been doing a good job looking out for me when I have been sick and helping me call places where I'm afraid because I speak so little german. He is from west-berlin (NOT EAST!) and he always has a nickname for everyone. I think his nickname for me is probably "Team America", but I'm not sure if he has any other ones. I hope you enjoy the photograph! :) I am at least smiling a lot in this one. My nickname for him is t-shirt king, because he always has a funny t-shirt on and I think he must make them himself because otherwise I'm not sure how he can afford all of them!

Soon, as promised, I will post a blog with details on Laura's IEEE-VR submission. :) and maybe announce the upcoming panel that I will organize at this conference. :) Also, in other exciting news it snowed here last night and Oscar and I are going on a ski trip next weekend to Austria! :) Super-cool! :)

Busy week

This week has definately been a busy one. We had nothing really exciting going on monday night, but then last night we went to Joerg's for dinner and to talk about skiing. We planned two ski trips before we leave home for Christmas. :) So that is great. It makes me really happy for Oscar to know that he will have company to go skiing with here in Germany.

I've been feeling pretty sick and even a bit down lately. I'm not sure what is up, but I'm working on going to the eye-doctor and also my regular doctor again to have them check up on me. Hopefully they will find something that will help me feel a bit better. However, mostly I just have a sore throat and it makes everything sort of a bit miserable.

I'm still enjoying my work though and I also really like my labmates. One of my labmates here in Germany is turning 30 on friday! :) So exciting. Her name is Jenny and she is having a few of us over tonight for dinner.

:) I'll post a photograph of her on here today. ;) The one of her is when we are giving her her PhD Hat (this is a german tradition! and one we enjoyed doing for her as well). The other person in the photograph is our friend, Joerg. The other photograph I decided to include today is of Oscar when we went to Nuermberg. Jenny was just mentioning that she might want to go there for the Christmas market this year. I think that would be a great idea and I hope we can find the time to tag along with her and her husband Brian! :)

A great weekend and a photo

Friday night of this weekend we went to a friend of ours, Lili's, place for dinner. She is a post-doc visiting Max Planck Institute from University College of London. She is really a great addition to the cyberneum group. Her research interests are very much in line with what Jenny, Tobi and I are interested in, but more importantly she is really nice, into the outdoors and an all around good person. She invited, Jenny, Brian, Oscar and I over for dinner on friday and cooked us chinese food. She also cooked fish and it was really yummy. Then she showed us her photographs from her recent honeymoon to Bhutan (near Nepal and in the heart of the biggest mountains in the world!). Her photographs were fantastic and it was great to hear about her trip.

Then last night the Buelthoff's invited us over for dinner (again Jenny, Brian (jenny's husband), Oscar and I). Prof Buelthoff is my boss and his wife also has her PhD and is really great. She is from Switzerland and she made us fondue, using Oscar and my favorite cheese: Greyer. :) They have two kids and their younger child (19 or so) joined us a for a bit of the time. Oscar and I both had a fantastic time. Now today we are just doing laundry, listening to the rain hit our window, calling family, and I am working on faculty applications (fortunately, only that last one on the list involves any kind of stress!). That is my idea of a really nice sunday! :)

I've been meaning to post this photograph Oscar took the other night when we went for a bike ride. This is my new bike- which I call "Sharpy". ;) It is a good bike- and yes, I know in this photograph I have a lot of style with my pink striped shirt, orange vest and multi-colored red hat. The german's don't know what to think when they see me biking by! :)

Thinking of family visiting me here in Germany

I am so excited that I finally have my christmas arrangements scheduled. It will be so great to see so many people in PA and really get to have two whole weeks to be with all of my family , and it will be great to see Oscar's family more and spend a holiday with them. They are such nice people and I'm also really looking forward to seeing Oscar's sister, Suz. I have only met her briefly, and she seems like she's interested in some really cool things. Whenever Oscar and I go to a castle I think of her- because she studies Medieval studies (sp?).

Anyway, I've been feeling better lately- and maybe in part that is because I feel a bit more connected to my family. Also, Oscar is helping me with my applications and I think I was really stressed about getting that work done and now that he is helping me I feel like it will be a lot easier. He is really good at writing and also really good at knowing what to say about oneself in an interview. He has been interviewing at his job for some time, so his advice will be extremely valuable as I'm applying.

Anyway, today I just got done talking with my new student. She is German and often teaches me something interesting about Germany. I really like that about her- she recognizes that all people can teach other interesting things and seems to find life quite interesting. She has a great personality and loves to do really creative activities. She is also a climber and I like that she is a very cautious one- as the careless ones are usually really annoying people. Anyway, another post-doc, Tobi, and I are working to mentor her towards getting her masters. She is a pleasure to have as a student because she is very sincere. She is critical- but what is great to see is that criticism really doesn't hurt nearly as much when the persons intentions are to learn or to make you or themselves better. So far (only a few weeks now) mentoring her is a joy of my week. It seems to provide me with some badly needed structure.

Now, on to the title of this blog- I really wanted to talk about how great a time I had with Lisa when she was here almost a year ago now. It was so great to see how enthusiastic she was about Europe. It was almost like looking at myself just two years ago when I first came to Europe! :) In some ways I was surprised by her enthusiasm, because I generally think that my sisters are just like me-- meaning as my experience updates, well then so does theres. However, in other ways, I realized that her enthusiasm was really what it should have been and she really made my "celebration of getting my Phd" quite memorable. I introduced her to all my friends and she was so sincere! She is such a great person. She really asked them interesting questions- she wasn't as shy as I am usually- and therefore came off as being super friendly, rather than stand-offish as I often do. She really taught me a lot while she was here. Also, we flew to Vienna where we had such a great time! :) The city was beautiful and we stayed in a hotel that was really pretty convenient to everything around there. I don't think I've EVER had as much fun travelling with someone more than I enjoyed travelling with Lisa! :) She is really sweet! :) I was telling Oscar the other day that the church in Vienna (Wien, to germans) is the most beautiful one I've seen in many ways. ;) Even more impressive than the ones in Rome. :)

Anyway, I wish Lisa could teleport over here to Germany once a week to have a girls night with me. If that were possible, for my sisters to join me every so often, I'd be a much happier individual. :) Instead, I just think about my sisters often. A few weeks ago I made a video for them and I watch it every now and then when I'm feeling really alone and missing my family.

I've included a photograph of Lisa and me in front of our church here in Tuebingen. Also, the video I made for my sisters. And for those of you who have been readed and are interested- the paper we submitted to IEEE-VR got in! :) I'm so proud of my student! Now, she just has to work hard and revise the paper so that I am okay with its final format! :) I'm coming to Reno this March, yeah! :) This might give me another opportunity to visit my family and friends! :)

Working in Germany

I thought I'd write a little bit about my work today, so that my family can know what I am up to. Yesterday, I spent a lot of my day with a robotics post-doc that I really like. He does cool work and always has some interesting student who is really sharp. I taught them what I know about full-body motion tracking. That was the first publication I got out of being here in Germany. See the photograph of the skeleton I use to track a person in motion in a large space. ;)

Now I'm working with a linear treadmill and they are currently building an omni-directional treadmill-- which is really cool! :) I'll send photographs of these items later. For now, I'm going to attach a photograph of a robotic wheelchair that I've worked on since I got here. It is frustrating a lot of the times to program this thing, but at least two experiments have used the wheelchair and at least in part because of conversations I had with my boss about buying this wheelchair, along with me having the patience to program it. So that feels good to have actually done some good work. ;)

I'm currently awaiting the decision from a conference that I have been wanting to go to for years. One of my students this past summer was able to submit a paper to IEEE-VR and I am hopeful that her paper will get in. ;) She is also returning this coming January to work with me and the robotics post-doc that I mentioned earlier. If that paper gets in, I'll devote a whole blog to the setup that was used in that experiment- since I also did a similar experiment years ago in the "PanoLab". It is one of our nicest setups here at MPI.

I like my work- most of the time! :) At least I get to do fun things. It might be nice to also help people, as I did when I was an undergraduate and worked on surgical simulators. Perhaps I will return to that someday.

Our favorite hiking trip in Germany so far

This past summer Oscar was here for just five short weeks to see what he thought of this side of the world! :) On one of his last weekends here in Germany, we took the slow trains down to Oberstdorf Germany. It is still in Badden-Wurtemburg so the train tickets are pretty inexpensive. This trip was suggested to us by a really cool author in the perception community who I had invited to speek that weekend at TWK/APGV conferences.

Anyway, on this trip we hiked to two different huttes in the mountains and we had such a great time! :) I realize that Oscar and I need our time away from people- probably me more than him- in order to maintain happiness. ;) We should go on another trip soon. We'll see where the cheap tickets lead us. ;)

I've posted two photographs below for you guys. The first is of the hiking trail (parents- don't look at the tiny little people on the edge if you get nervous) and the second one is a beautiful one of Oscar hiking down towards our last hutte of the weekend trip! :)

Biking to Lichtenstein Schloss

Today Oscar, our friend Frank, and I biked to a local castle (schloss). It was about 30 kilometers from here, and it was mostly up hill on the way out. I was really exhausted by the time I got out there!! and I think Oscar and Frank were also really tired-- probably because of all the uphill. The castle was really pretty and I was really excited to watch Oscar take photographs and enjoy the castle on the cliff.

I was thinking that on the way back I would really want to stop at the train station and pay for the ride back to Tuebingen, but in the end we biked back the whole way. Fortunately, it was all down hill, to my surprise-- i guess I hadn't realized on the way out how uphill it was. It took a little more than 3 hours to get out there and probably 2 to get back. ;) maybe even less.

When we got back we made curry (very yummy) and talked to our parents for a long while. All in all, it was a very nice Sunday.