Mike Oren.com

I'm back in Iowa now, I moved back into my apartment Thursday night around 10:30 PM (well, I moved my clothes, laptop, and sheets in anyway). This morning (Friday) I went into the lab around 9:30 or so with some bagels to share and caught up with what's been going on over the summer and such. Anyway, I'm going to give an update on some of the things that went on since my last update and give a little bit of a summary of the summer.

My last five days of my internship were pretty fun--I had one day where myself and another intern stayed at the Googleplex until 11:30 at night working on our intern posters and finishing up some projects (and drinking some tea and eating some chocolate) and despite (maybe because) the fact that we were working late at night we ended up having a blast listening to music/talking while working. On my last Thursday night (after a massage), I went out to eat with a few interns and then half of us went back and played some Wii tennis, bowling, boxing, and Excite Truck. Wii boxing was hilarious--I hadn't really played it that much against other people, but it was a blast flailing our arms around trying to throw punches in the game. Friday I finished wrapping up my projects and other tasks, went to lunch with an Iowa State alum who had worked as a consultant on the C6 demo, and spent an hour drinking smoothies (my goal had been to drink as many smoothies as I could in an hour, but they were more filling than I thought so I ended up stopping at 2...), and I said my goodbyes to people and packed up my apartment.

My drive back was uneventful with the exception of the first day of the three day drive. Unlike my drive out to California, I decided to just drive until I got tired on my way back--figuring I'd stop somewhere in Utah or western Wyoming. I ended up deciding stopping before Salt Lake City was too early and stopping at Salt Lake City would cost more, so I kept on until Evanston, Wyoming but due to an oil and gas convention all the hotel rooms were taken--as were the rooms in Rock Springs, Wyoming (another 100 miles down the road--which I called ahead to). Faced with the options of backtracking, driving another 200 miles to the next major hotel town, or sleeping in my car--I ended up opting to sleep in my car.

I ended up back in the Chicago area Monday afternoon and made meat pierogi for dinner with my mom and grandma. Then Tuesday Danielle took me to the Chicago Botanical Gardens, then we went out for Italian, and then we had some ice cream and brought some back for my niece. Wednesday we made some breakfast (beneigt or however it's spelled--some donut-type thing from the New Orleans area--and some waffles). We also played some games with my niece and then Danielle and I went out to Olive Garden for a late lunch of soup, salad, and breadsticks before going to see Stardust. Thursday morning we cooked some eggs, said our goodbyes, and then then I packed my car and drove back to Iowa. It was a great, although short visit.

So here's my list of top 5 things I'm going to miss from the summer going into the school year:

• The friends I made over the summer, especially one friend who made the summer especially fun


• The free gourmet food


• The projects and the people I woked on them with--they were fun/challenging projects and the people whom I woked with were fun to work with


• Weather always in the 70's and almost always sunny (although I assume the weather will be changing as the seasons change)


• All of the attractions within an easy drive--state and national parks, theme parks, beaches, etc.