I spent the first week of May in Tahoe, traveling there and back via Seattle, WA and Fresno, CA. The drive is one of the most beautiful and varied I’ve done in quite a while. Scenery changed from the damp, greenness of the PNW to the snow capped conifer covered mountains of North Tahoe, to the sunny expanses of central Cali, and back again.

Total mileage: 2,110 miles
Drive time: 50 hours
Highlights:
-Powell’s Books in Portland, OR
-That town with a big blue lake in CA
-North Tahoe, Squaw Creek.
-Napa Valley
-Cape Perpetua
-Haystack Rock
-The end of the Lewis and Clark Trail
And here is the map...

It's moving day!

In a few hours I'll be on the road, headed for Colorado via Nashville, Des Moines, and the Badlands. You can expect: LOTS of pictures, (This is my new life after all...) a few posts looking at why I'm moving and what my plans are, and of course a trip report at the end of it all. Most importantly, if you know about something cool along my route please email/comment/tweet it so I can go check it out.

Today I woke up, and for the first time in 12 years, didn't have a job. I've been unemployed before, but with plans or arrangements for a new job already made. Not this time. I really don't have a job.

Way back in August of 2009 I used a website called “Climbfind.com” to locate climbing partners for my upcoming work trip to San Francisco. I’d registered for the site some time early that same year, adding a profile pic and all that jazz like a good little user. The San Francisco trip was really the first time I’d used it for it’s intended purpose: to match climbing partners geographically. It worked beautifully. I went bouldering on Stinson Beach with three other great women, one of them I am still in contact with today (HI KELLEY!)

 I am the Formal Education Lead on the Education and Public Outreach team for the Solar Dynamics Observatory at NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center. At least I will be, until the 17th of May. I’ve decided to move on, but I feel like the significant impact this phase has had on my life deserves some reflection, and a whole lot of gratitude. I’ve changed, almost completely, since my time at Goddard began. The things I have been able to do, the people I’ve met, and places I’ve gone while in this job catalyzed that change. My time at NASA opened doors for me and then taught me how to walk through them. My life is overwhelmingly richer for having been here. The depth of my thankfulness for all I’ve learned is overwhelming me as I write this, so excuse me if this post gets mushy, but some of these things just need to be shared.

*I stole the vast majority of these photos. If one of them is yours, I'm sorry.