Dr. Nielsen

I had my defense today. I gave a 50-min presentation and answered all the questions from the audience (not many questions and most of them came from my committee members anyway :) Then the doors were closed and the committee asked me a few more questions....not bad at all...very few changes in my dissertation. Bela thought I should add a few paragraphs in the introduction about general waves in the atmosphere (Tides, planetary waves and gravity waves of other scale-sizes than short-period gravity waves). All-in-all...a very successful defense and my committe members thought it was a great presentation and dissertation.

Afterwards we had cake etc...Melissa had made a chocolate cake with an airglow image on top :)
So...I am done and Mike have produced his first Ph.D :) Hope he gets many more since he is a top-notch advisor with a lot of work available.

update after returning to US

Ok...so Soren and I had an easy trip back to the US. The time after getting back have been busy getting the dissertation ready...and we also wanted a new car. Well, as we were going down to look at the new truck the old one broke down in the canyon with a thrown rod...sucked...I hitch-hiked 6 times during that day. Anyway, we managed to get a good deal and got a 2004 F-350...YEAH!!!

way too long ago...

It has been way too long since I last posted something here.
We are back from Denmark. Soren and I didn't make it back with Melissa since I didn't get my travel parole from INS before we were suppose to leave. So we ended up with another 4 days with my mom and grandma. It gave us a few more days to relax after the funeral etc. My grandma's new boyfriend (have known him since I was a kid, though :) made creamy potatoes and eel...yum...love fish! Here are some pics from the trip...

Just 5 minutes walk from my moms house is an old burial site from the yougn stone-age...way cool...so thought Soren...and Melissa almost went nuts with the camera...and when I crawled in there :)


Outside town is a larger burial site from the viking-age...it is a small hill and it has never been opened...fascinating...great view of the area from there.



On the island where I grew up is a ship yard which are in the process of building the largests container ships in the world (Maersk MCKinney). One such ship was pulled put through the canal while we were in Denmark and we went out to see it...HUGE.



Soren working on the latop...



Just 10 minutes drive from Skamby is a nice forest with a lake...the area belongs to a castle, but it is a really nice place for a Fall walk in the danish forest.






Finally, a picture of my dad's grave the day of the funeral. We carried him out to the herse and it pulled out from the church as we walked behind it. At the gate we said the last good-bye. Then the nearest family gathered at my moms house and we all later went up to the site to see the flowers. We had asked people to make a donation to the Danish Cancer Society instead of flowers and it resulted in several thousand $. A better use of the money!



One advantage of being delayed on my return trip to the US...I could stay and help pick out plants for the grave and help plant them. My dad really enjoyed working in their yard/garden.