Today I got another award! They brought me in to talk and just told me that I was doing a great job and that I should keep on doing what I'm doing.

:D

I told them that I was glad to be working there.

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What the f**k, Jon.

I HAVE BEEN WATCHING THE DRAMA OF YOUR LIFE IN REGULAR INSTALLMENTS FOR, LIKE, TWELVE YEARS. Triumphs, tragedies, drama, overnight buses, crazy housing situations, a Pokemon-based engagement, She-Who-Shall-Not-Be-Named, applications, graduations, ETC.

OK, IMAGINE, IMAGINE, for a moment, HAVING, as I have, as all of us have, READ THIS BOOK FOR TWELVE YEARS...

IN THE LAST INSTALLMENT OF THE BOOK, JON COMES TO MY HOUSE, HEARTBROKEN, hugging his Uber driver, we go to a waffle place, he drives to Sacramento and back in like three days for REASONS UNKNOWN TO GOD OR MAN, he flies back to London, SAD AS SHIT... CLIFFHANGER....


AND THEN THE AUTHOR TWEETS "BTW HE GETS MARRIED" and nobody in the fandom has ANY idea how to interpret that shit.

AND THEN ONE DAY I GO ON FACEBOOK, and THERE IS NOTHING THAT SAYS, "Spoiler Alert", no, no... there's just a picture of Jon marrying Antonia. SURPRISE! It ends up being Antonia! Happy Ending! Ha-ha!

NO.

NO.

No.

You have to give us more than that, Jon. We have been your loyal fans for EVER. 4-EVER.

"I'm married"

JUST AIN'T GOOD ENOUGH, SON.

"I met your mother and then she died but I'm really in love with Robin" was a better resolution than THIS.


btw Antonia, if you're reading this: Hi! Congratulations! Jon is a great guy!

JON IF YOU ARE READING THIS GET YOUR SHIT TOGETHER. STOP YOUR HONEYMOONING RIGHT NOW, AND ALL OF THIS SMILING-IN-PHOTOS-ON-FACEBOOK-BECAUSE-YOU'RE-SO-HAPPY BULLSHIT AND GIVE US THE NUTANG ENTRY WE DESERVE.

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We had a softball game today, and I was elected coach by virtue of the fact that I happened to be bringing the clipboard to the game and our real coach was called away to pick up his kids at the last minute.

Most of our team showed up about 15-20 minutes late. For the first inning the other team had to lend us a bunch of players. We were a bit nervous because they are one of the better teams in the league. At last a gaggle of interns and foreigners showed up, and the game began in earnest. In a great turn of fortune, a random guy named Drew happened to be walking by, looking for a soccer game, just as we were desperate for more players.

Me: "Is that guy ours?"
Josh: "Uh... he doesn't look familiar..."
Intern: "Oh, he works in my office!"
Us: "CONVINCE HIM TO JOIN THE TEAM!"

His name was Drew. Turns out he couldn't find the soccer game, and he just happened to have his baseball glove in his trunk, so he was drafted on the spot and instantly became one of our best players. I put him at shortstop, third base, first base, and outfield, and I was convinced that he could have played literally any other position if the game had gone on for more innings.

Thrust, as I was, into the role of team captain without any warning, I had to come up with the roster, announce the batters, and coach the team. 90% of the people on the team were total newbies, to the point that we only had a very few people who knew the rules well enough to coach first and third base. Most of the others were foreigners-- Israeli, French, Italian, Indian, etc. We had to say, "Run to second! Now STOP! STOP ON SECOND! GET BACK ON THE BASE! AHHHH! STAND ON THE BASE!!!!!!"

There was a lot of coaching. We ended up with tons of players, which is great, but which also makes coming up with the roster for each and every new inning a shell game of epic proportions. I started out doing pretty poorly (more than once ending up somehow with five outfielders, none of whom was aware that there was a problem), but as time went on things improved.

Raju, our Indian player, has graduated from being a total newbie who runs with the bat all the way to first base, to being a reliable fielder, thrower, and hitter. When he came up to bat everyone saw the awkward way he held the bat and brought the outfield in, and then someone said, "UH-OH, WHAT IF HE'S A CRICKET PLAYER?" and everyone scrambled to move back out again. For the record, he is a cricket player.

Despite all of these challenges, we found ourselves up 15 to 14 in the top of the last inning, with the other team up to bat. They got some runners going, and hit one to deep center where Josh's intern was playing for the first time in his life. I'd taken Josh out of the game (despite the fact that he was our star outfielder) because I was trying to give everyone an equal amount of playing time. Amazingly the intern ran after the ball and hurled it back to our good luck charm, Drew, who likewise lasered it to home, where we tagged out a runner before she could score. The subsequent outs were at least as amazing. Carla was playing right field, as she was recovering from surgery and forbidden from playing contact sports. They hit one out to her, and she got it after a few hops and fired it to second base, where the too-cocky batter was TAGGED OUT COLD by ubiquitous shortstop Drew.
Not to be dissuaded, they hit it out to Carla again, who got under it for an amazing catch. ESPECIALLY since we had run out of baseball gloves and Carla was fielding the whole inning with a tiny child's glove that didn't even completely fit on her hand!

The score was 15 to 15. Bottom of the last inning. Our team gets up to bat. Old fan favorite Steve leads off by hitting it hard to right but the first baseman snags it with an incredible catch. Dream outfielder and slugger Josh knocks it deep into right for a double. THEN, Marco, Italian, intern, person-who-knows-literally-nothing-about-baseball, pokes one into the outfield just far enough so that speedy Josh can score the winning run.

THE CROWD GOES WILD.

A bunch of other stuff obviously happened today but clearly this was the most important.

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The State of California tried to come after me for more than $7000 that they claimed I owed them in taxes, instead of paying me the $700 that they actually owe me.

After spending much of the day calling them and dealing with their impenetrable robotic defense network, I spoke to a living human being with a heavy accent who informed me after a long, long time on hold that "the system" had placed a number on the wrong line and I didn't actually owe them $7000, and that I should soon receive my payment for $700 in my account as expected, since I had filled out my tax return correctly. I can only assume that this will be accompanied by a "sorry" note and the same amount in "Interest & Fees on late payment" that they were planning on charging me.

I'm no mathematician, but 8515.00 - 109.00 does not equal 16811.00.

#ERR

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I felt my second earthquake ever today! I was at work, working away (just kidding, I was sleeping on my desk, because it was like one in the morning) and then SHAZAM, an EARTHQUAKE. Such a weird feeling from the 8th floor of my building. I couldn't be sure and then I looked over and saw that my empty water bottle was still trembling.

I think it was a 5.1. WOAAAAH.

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When I lived in Providence, Rhode Island, my apartment had a little backyard. In the backyard was a little tree with branches that grew like an umbrella. In the summer, bunches of white flowers bloomed, weighting down the branches. One year I planted a bunch of flowers in the harsh Providence soil. I traveled so much in those days that I didn't even see when they sprouted and bloomed. Our neighbors, a very young and impulsive couple, married themselves below our umbrella tree and wove my flowers in their hair. When I returned, the garden was empty.

It's a strange little life that I've made for myself here in California. My house sits in an eccentric little neighborhood with towering pines and leafy avocado trees. Occasional lemons, oranges, and stately palms give the place a tropical feel, especially this year, which has been heavy with rain. The clouds gather in misty splendor around the mountains and the arroyo has filled with saplings. When the leaves rustle, it's usually a lizard. I still find them to be quite novel after all this time.

I have a job that I love. I tell people that all I have to do for the next 30 years is not get fired. It's weird to feel committed to a workplace like that, especially after so many years of moving around all the time. I guess it's kind of like marrying someone. JPL has its flaws, clearly visible and annoying, but I'd be content to let them annoy me for the next 30 years at least. JPL's redeeming qualities more than make up for these things. JPL's campus feels like a playground. Each building you enter contains something more amazing than the last: people driving a half a Mars rover over a circle of fake terrain... a house-sized robot in the shape of giant spider... tiny robots that can climb up walls like my garden lizards... real flight spacecraft in the process of being assembled. There are plenty of buildings I haven't explored yet. There is plenty of time for that. People more senior than I am are in the midst of filling our hallways with new hires. We have no voice in the hiring process. I wonder if the senior scientists, a few years from retirement, realize that they're hiring our friends for the next 30 years. It's a mistake to hire the best one, people always tell me. Hire the one who will get along with everyone else in the group. One superstar is great, but a team is greater. I still have a frequent urge to move away to a place where I can buy a house on a big plot of land and have five kids and let them run wild through the great outdoors. But how could I leave my job? How many people wake up in the morning with their heart a-leaping at the thought of getting to go to work that day? Maybe I can buy a little shack somewhere in Utah and we can spend the summers there.

In the evenings my little dog Juan Pablo and I walk around the neighborhood, looking at the houses. When I arrived I'd looked at them despairingly-- tiny little shacks with prices in the high six figures-- it was criminal. Now I'm more discerning. This one is small, yes, but it has a beautiful Spanish balcony. This one has a large gazebo in the backyard. This one has a large, exposed front yard, but if I planted some hedges I could make a beautiful little private garden. There are always possibilities.

My gym is close by. When I signed up I told the guy that I was going to attend the gym for one year. "Exactly one year?" he said, skeptically. "Not three months?" "A year," I said, annoyed. "Not more than a year?" he said. I smirked at him. "My desire is to go to the gym for exactly one year, not a day more nor a day less." He gave me my year-long membership. Now we are a little community of zumba-dancers, women about my age and considerably older, from every race on Earth. We look at each other with breathless despair between all of the fast songs, and that's what brings us together.

I have habits now. After years of constant traveling, being gone at least one week out of each month, I've made an effort to be still for a while. Take classes. Host garden parties. Every weekend I have to wind my grandmother's old clock. Every morning I have to water my herb garden. I vacuum. I clean the counters. There is only me, so everything stays pretty clean. I am annoyed when someone moves something out of its place. This is new. I'll have to relax again a bit if I ever find myself a family. Sometimes, when I go out walking in the evening with Juan Pablo, I leave the door unlocked and all of the lights on, so I can pretend that we're not coming home to an empty home.

Since it is summer, I've been playing softball in a league. Everyone is always surprised, but JPL not only has enough softball teams to fill a league, but enough to fill THREE leagues. We are the C league, the lowest league there is. One time I played for the B league, but they actually have strikes there. In fact, you only get two strikes before you're out. It's too serious there. I've never even met anyone who plays in A league. I like the C league because sometimes a stray child or dog runs on the field, and everyone has to chase it. Sometimes they put kids up to bat, and let them catch. Everyone's boyfriend who is in town for the week can play, and in the middle of summer we fill the team with interns. I can't remember how I got on the LA Radars, but I'll play for them for the next couple of decades, God willing. Maybe even after I retire.

My house is a little two-bedroom rental in the backyard of a larger house. It has a picket fence around a little yard and patio. I have a deck for my herb garden that has the perfect amount of sun. Maybe at the end of the summer I'll have a tomato. I can walk to the library from my house. It doesn't have very many books, but it has enough of the basics to keep me busy. I'm in a book club, and I'm in town for most the meetings. What a novelty. My friends in France want me to come and visit them in France. My friends and colleagues want me to come to Iceland. Or Hawaii. Or Brazil. I just want to stay in Altadena, playing with Juan Pablo and watching my garden grow.

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Today I gave a seminar on asteroids. It's part of a seminar series that I've been doing, called "A Tour of the Planets". Each month I give a lecture on a different planet, working my way from Mercury through Pluto and beyond. Today's talk was fun--- the entire conference room was filled with people, which was kind of unexpected. There were about 34 people who came and there weren't even enough chairs for them all. I've been doing a lot of these talks in the same conference room, so it's been fun to see the room get more and more full with each planet as the people who came before return and the word spreads to new people.

Maybe by the time I get to Pluto I'll need an auditorium!

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I ran into one of my bosses in line at the cafeteria. "Hey!" he said, "How are you doing? Is everything going ok?" He seemed genuinely concerned about my well being, so I assured him that everything was going well. He had just gotten a big promotion, so he remained my boss, but much higher up the chain.

"So do I have to call you 'sir' from now on?" I asked with a wink.

"Nah, but if you see me with some really important people, we should pretend that we don't know each other."

"No problem," I replied, "I was planning on doing that anyway. So do you know who is going to take your old position?"

"Why," he asked, "Are you going to apply?"

"Oh, I would," I replied, "given how 'fun' you made the job seem..."

"You know," he said, turning serious, "I never thought that I would go into management. When I was in grad school, reading text books about pdf functions, none of that was to prepare me for management. But then someone told me the secret: in order to succeed at management, you just have to succeed in making people believe that you genuinely care about them, even though you don't!"

We were about to part ways. He looked at me very seriously and said, "So how are you doing? Is everything going ok?" He seemed genuinely concerned about my well-being.


Sly dog.

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