In the everyday, strenuous monotony of engineering classes, it sometimes becomes difficult to remember what you are working for. Then every once in a while, something will happen or you’ll meet someone who will help you remember. This occurred for me during the ERAU Admissions Open House on October 17th.

The open house reminded me of several things, the first being why I’m doing all of this in the first place. “I’m really in awe of what you are doing and what my son wants to do’, said one of the fathers I spoke to on Saturday. “It almost seems like science fiction-what you work on every day.” I used to think of aerospace engineering as turning science fiction into science fact. I wanted to make a lasting technological difference to extend man’s abilities into the far reaches of space. Sounds pretty inspiring doesn’t it? It’s not something I think about everyday though.

It’s something you think about when someone asks you why you wanted to be a rocket scientist, or what you do as a rocket scientist. On an everyday basis, however, it’s hard to think, I’m solving Orbital Mechanics problems, and I can solve for exactly how long it should take a satellite to travel from Earth to Mars, and I can write a program that will generate a computer model of it. Usually my thoughts are something along the lines of how on Earth am I going to finish all of this homework? Why did I pick something so hard? Would I be happier with something simpler?

The truth of the matter is that what I am working on is amazing. The mission of the Dryden Flight Research Center is to “Fly what others only imagine,” and when I am working my co-op rotations there, I am a part of achieving that goal. How awesome is that? Plus, I get to say that I’m a rocket scientist! And of course that should never be anyone’s primary motivation for their studies, but it is definitely a huge perk.

Talking to perspective students whose excitement about aerospace engineering was fresh and unsullied was very refreshing. Speaking to students who were so interested in what I am doing was very rewarding. I was talking to several other engineering students and professors who felt similar. We all couldn’t help but feel recharged with a renewed sense of purpose.

Another thing that the Open House reminded me of was what I was like back and high school and then on the same train of thought, how much I have grown, changed, and accomplished since then. It’s kind of like when you were little and you hadn’t seen Aunt Edna in a couple years. You were able to see the gradual changes in your appearance and maturity. Aunt Edna didn’t though, and looking at you at time one, age eight and not again until time two, age ten, she saw the significant changes in your growth.

During open house I began to look at myself from a time one to time two perspective, and the results were somewhat dramatic. I know that I have said it before in other writings, but I honestly believe that I have changed more as a person in since I started college (about two and a half years ago) than I changed in the 13 years that I spent in public school.

It was a good feeling, being reminded of how far my hard work has really taken me. It reaffirmed that all of the hard work I have put in over the past several years has been worth it.

A siren, a trolley bell, the shrill and quick double whistle of a hotel employee calling a taxi, the intrusive honking of the car horns of California drivers all over the city, the soft hum of rooftop air conditioners, the low buzz of crowded sidewalks, the blaring trumpet and soft violins of starving artists on the streets – cacophony induced by the action of one of America’s most iconic cities drifts through the single paned glass windows of my 29^th floor hotel room in San Francisco.

The view outside of my San Francisco hotel room

The number of sirens that one can hear in a short amount of time in such a large city is astonishing to a suburb dweller like me. Almost as astonishing as the fact that the hotel elevator can make it from the 1^st to the 29^th floor in less time than the elevator in AC-1 can make it from the 1^st to the 3^rd floor, and that my ears pop every time I descend from my room to the lobby.

I’ve never stayed in a downtown hotel before, and the sounds of the city are not the only new things I got to experience on my Northern California Embry-Riddle Recruiting trip. Admissions ventures out to cities all over the country to hold Admissions Information Meetings for prospective students to have a chance to meet their admissions counselors and have any of their questions answered. As a high school student, you might have attended a similar meeting in a hotel conference room near your home town.I did when I was in high school. Admissions invited me along on this trip to act as a featured student who could interface with prospective students on what college life at Riddle is really like. I jumped at the chance to explore places I’d never been before and to share my enthusiasm and passion for aerospace with prospective students.

At noon on Thursday, October 1st I started my drive to the airport with the steering wheel in one hand and a Large Starbucks Mocha in the other to fight the effects of a late night of finishing homework that would be due while I was on the trip. You can tell that I’m not a coffee connoisseur when I order a Large coffee…coffee people call them Ventis.

Whenever I travel, people always comment on my luggage.My mom says that you should be wary of people who say “never” and “always,” because they are probably grossly exaggerating their story and are not a very trustworthy source of information.In this case though, the word “always” works, and is not an exaggeration.I wonder if people reach their destinations and tell their friends, family, or coworkers about the goofy, tall girl in the airport with the hot pink and blue polka dotted suitcase with a blue ribbon and bow on it.Fellow travelers always seem interested in asking me about it; TSA agents have been known to joke that they “need to watch out for this one.”

This is my hot pink with blue polka dots suitcase that attracts so much attention when I travel. It has been to over 15 States with me – Texas, Arizona, New Mexico, California, Arkansas, Mississippi, Tennessee, West Virginia, Virginia, Pennsylvania, Massachusetts, Connecticut, New York, Maryland, Nevada, Utah, and Colorado, just to name a few.

I arrived at SFO at six pm, caught an airport shuttle to my hotel, and walked through the doors of my hotel at seven thirty.It was rush hour.In San Francisco. I didn’t care though.I was so excited about my first trip to the city where you should “be sure to wear some flowers in your hair,” that I was fairly relaxed and enjoying the beautiful scenery, like the “Doughnut Shop and Bar” that I passed on the drive in.

I was shocked when I reached the hotel.We were staying in the same hotel where the Admissions Information Session would be held, and I have to say that it was the nicest hotel that I had ever stayed in during my sheltered life.My family members are typically Best Westerners or Motel 6ers.My room in this hotel was fully loaded with everything from a coffee maker to a fully stocked mini bar.I’d never stayed in a hotel with a mini bar. Of course you can’t eat or drink any of it unless you want to pay an exorbitant price (I mean no candy bar or miniature bottle of alcohol is worth my first born child or my right arm), but it was still a mini bar, which was awesome.

This is the awesome mini bar in my hotel room.

For dinner on my first night in San Francisco I went to this chic French-Country Restaurant and enjoyed a melt in your mouth meal of Beef Bourguignon.Walking back to the hotel, I couldn’t help but laugh when I saw a bunch of yellow rubber ducks floating in a fancy mosaic tile fountain in front of another hotel.It seemed indicative of the eccentricity of the city.

On Friday morning, I awoke bright and early to eat breakfast at the hotel and then travel to start recruiting at a high school.The restaurant at the hotel, Grandviews, featured a 36^th floor panoramic view of the city, Alcatraz (which the Harry Potter fan in me kept wanting to call Azkaban), and the Golden Gate Bridge.

The high school that we went to was Lowell High School in San Francisco, which had a 51% Chinese population, a 99.4% college admittance rate, and a number of students who are interested in coming to Riddle.It was most impressive.

After that we met with a group of designers from a company called Pentagram who design our admissions recruitment, informational, and acceptance materials.Their studio looked exactly how you would expect an accomplished design studio in San Francisco to look.The building that housed the studio looked like it could have been a refurbished factory of some sort to an uncultured girl like me, with long frosted glass windows and a very modern, industrial interior with no shortage of concrete, clean lines, metal hand rails on concrete staircases, and frosted glass that divided the loft-like space into different offices and work areas.It was just so cool.

We then went to lunch with a few members of the studio and discussed the brochures that we had made and other related topics.After lunch I returned to my hotel to work on homework, which was probably actually lamer than it sounds, but homework doesn’t stop for weekend trips when you study engineering.
The next day I got up bright and early again, ate breakfast and headed towards a park and museum called the Legion of Honor in San Francisco.I was told that it had one of the best views of the Golden Gate Bridge in the City.It was stunning.The park and museum were gorgeous and the view of the bridge was superb.

Me and the Golden Gate Bridge Part I

Me and the Golden Gate Bridge Part II

After playing tourist, we jetted back to the hotel for the main purpose of our trip: our first AIM.Apparently San Francisco’s “Love Fest” was occurring at the same time as the as our meeting, and the attendees of our meeting had to navigate around a street full of Love Fest attendees who were apparently present in varying degrees of nudity.After the AIM we were able to catch glimpses of a few participants, one in particular who was dressed in nothing but a pair of hot pink briefs that read “I’m Gay” on the back.

The AIM itself seemed to go very well. Admissions is testing out a new presentation with a free flowing form that is structured to be conversational, rather than a data dump.The format seemed to go really well and the 60+ people who showed up for the presentation appeared to be engaged and interested throughout.

Hotel sign

This is the presentation room where we held the San Francisco Admissions Information Meeting, or AIM.

In this picture, I am standing in front of the Nike Store on Union Square in San Francisco. The sign on the window reads “Actually, it is Rocket Science” which, as a burgeoning rocket scientist, I had to take a picture with it.

After the AIM we drove to Sacramento and enjoyed dinner on the river in Old Sacramento, a really cool tourist district where all of the building looked like something out of the old west, with wooden sidewalks and the like.Exhausted from several full days, I retired to my hotel room and slept for a solid 9 hours.I awoke refreshed, ate breakfast at the hotel restaurant (which was nice but not nearly as cool as Grandviews), and got ready for the next AIM.

Our Sacramento AIM was huge with approximately 70 attendees.The presentation went just as well as the San Francisco presentation, if not maybe a little better as we had a little more practice under our belts.I felt awesome whenever one of the students or parents would raise their hands and say “Actually this question is for Kerianne.”The parents and students seemed really interested to hear about why I chose Embry-Riddle, and what my life as a student there was like.

This is a picture that I took over Sacramento on my way back to school.

I feel that I was able to make a significant contribution to the presentations and I hope that I have inspired some prospective students to make Embry-Riddle their first choice.It was a great experience for me. I got to see the other side of the AIMs, having attended one myself before deciding to go to Embry-Riddle.I also got to see cities that I’d never visited before, had some great conversations with both Admissions representatives and families of prospective students. Overall, I had a lot of fun.

*Note: This is an extended version of an article I wrote that was published in the October 14th issue of Horizons Newspaper. Usually the editors get frustrated when I turn in a 1500 word article, even if I feel like I have to write that much to fully document an event or experience. 🙂 In other words I’m really long winded and I wanted to share my full experience including pictures (which didn’t appear in the paper due to space limitations) with my readers.

21st Birthday Cake - Poor College Student Style

Despite Prescott’s reputation as a retirement community, it is actually an awesome place to turn 21. This is because it hosts a street of bars known as Whiskey Row, and unlike many areas of the country, where gambling is illegal, it also hosts a couple casinos.

Whisky Row is such a self aware street that the street signs on this portion of Montezuma Avenue actually read “Whiskey Row.” The culture and history of Whiskey Row are a celebrated part of Prescott. Some of the bars on Whiskey Row date back to the 19^th century, when the street first started its legacy. There was a huge fire on Whiskey Row in the early 1900s that burned down almost the entire city block. I heard a story that a bunch of the patrons actually took the Victorian Style sold wood bar in one of the bars apart into pieces and carried it out into the center of the square to save it from the fire. When the saloon was rebuilt the bar was carried back in. During prohibition many of the bars on Whiskey Row were converted to speakeasies. Today Whiskey Row provides Prescott with some semblance of a night life that one can experience after they turn 21.

Each of the bars on Whiskey Row and in the surrounding areas in downtown Prescott, are so special and unique in their own right. There is one that has an outside balcony that overlooks the square, one that has an awesome tropical influenced back yard, one that plays country music with one of those rainbow disco lights on the ceiling, an Irish pub that you have to climb the stairs to get to, one that plays techno dance music and is always full of people, and one that is a rather relaxing hip bar with live music where it wouldn’t be unusual to spot a professor or two.

I had a few simple goals for my 21^st Birthday: to go to every bar on Whiskey Row and drink get a drink in a decent number of them, to not throw up, to not get a hangover, to remember the entire thing, to have a good story or two to tell afterwards, to gamble, and to have a great time with good friends. I was able to accomplish all of these.

Every bar on Whiskey Row offers one drink, whatever you want, for 25 cents on your 21^st birthday. As you make your way down Whiskey Row, that can accumulate into a lot of very cheap alcohol.

I had seen and heard about other people getting completely trashed on their 21^st Birthday. Because of peer pressure they drink so much that they spend the second half of their evening over a toilet, throwing up. Then the next day, the day of their birthday, they have a huge hangover and can’t remember half their night. To me, that sounds horrible. That type of experience doesn’t sound like fun at all, but neither does sitting at home on your 21^st Birthday.

So I opted for a milder form of a bar crawl with a few of my good friends. My friends and I waited the night before my Birthday until the clock edged towards Midnight, and then we set out for Whiskey Row. We parked at one end of the row and walked all the way to the other end so that we would end the night at the car. Just before the clock struck midnight, I entered my first bar ever.

Right as we walked into the first bar, the bouncer asked for our IDs and I excitedly held mine out proclaiming that it was my birthday. He smiled and let us pass after examining our IDs and wishing me a Happy Birthday. As I stepped up to the bar, I felt like was stepping foot onto forbidden ground. I slid onto a brown leather bar stool, and proclaimed again to the bar tender that it was my 21^st Birthday. He asked me what I’d like for my first 25 cent drink.

My first drink on my 21^st Birthday was a long island ice tea, partially because there is something epic about it, and partially because I quite honestly have very little knowledge of alcohol, I wasn’t really sure what to order. Did you know that there is no tea in a long island ice tea? I didn’t. I guess you learn something new every day.

Before my birthday I’d heard that hangovers were pretty much a form of dehydration from alcohol, and that if you drank at least an 8 oz glass of water between every drink while you were drinking, that you wouldn’t have a hangover the next day. I was testing this theory by drinking a lot of water between each drink.

I had seen my parents and friends order fruity drinks like margaritas and strawberry daiquiris in restaurants, but I wasn’t sure if that was the kind of drink you should order at a bar, so after ordering two long island ice teas I started asking the bartenders for their recommendations and ended up with a couple awesome drinks I’d never heard of.

My friends insisted that I end the night with an AMF, the PG version of which stands for “Adios My Friend,” and is made of several different types of alcohol. It was my fifth drink for the night in the two hour span between midnight and when the bars closed, and I knew I had my fill and I couldn’t finish the drink, which was fine because I was having a ton of fun, and I really didn’t want to overdo it.

The infamous AMF...this is me and my last drink for the night at Matt's Saloon on Whiskey Row

The night wasn’t over when the bars closed, though. From Whiskey Row we journeyed over to Bucky’s Casino, where one of my friends gave me a $20 bill to blow in the slot machines. I had a huge problem with this because I’m an extremely frugal person, and couldn’t blow an entire $20 in the machines. My friends insisted that being my 21^st birthday, I had to. I won $6 only to lose it all later.

In the first three hours of my 21^st birthday I had done a bar crawl and gambled. What else can you do on your 21^st Birthday?

Later on that day, after a little sleep, I was confident that I had spent my 21^st in the best way possible, and I didn’t have a hangover! Although, a hangover might have made a better story, huh?

Every year on my birthday without fail someone will ask me if I feel any different, and the answer is always the same– I feel the same as I did yesterday. How could someone feel that much different from one day to the next?

When I turned 21 I did actually feel different for the first time. I felt like I could finally enjoy freedoms that I’d been barred from for 21 years. I can now do just about anything but rent a car! I can walk down the alcohol aisle at the grocery store and not feel like I’m in a place where I’m not supposed to be, and someone is going to come and yell at me and tell me to leave.

I think part of the reason that this difference was so prominent was that I’d spend 6.5 months on a co-op rotation in California, where I was the youngest person in my social crowd and finished out the summer the only one who still couldn’t drink. We used to go out to a restaurant every Wednesday after work to happy hour for cheap drinks and appetizers. I would sit there with my Shirley Temple, which is the closest thing to a mixed drink that I could think of, and watch everyone else order a real drink. I really couldn’t wait until I turned 21, because I felt like I was being suppressed in a sense. As they say in California, “It was so not cool, dude.”

I didn’t feel the same way when I turned 18. I was pretty psyched that I could sign my own permission forms, and I could vote in the next election, but other than that there wasn’t anything else that I wanted to do. I had friends who went out and bought lottery tickets, cigarettes, and items from naughty stores on their 18^th, but that just seemed like a waste to me, a very straight-forward goody-goody. So my 18^th really wasn’t a big deal. My 21^st was a different story.

Since I could finally buy alcohol, and because my parents sent me a $100 gift card for my birthday, on the afternoon of my birthday I went to the grocery store and purchased $100 of alcohol. Why? Because it was epic! That and my parents told me I had to spend the money on something on that I wouldn’t normally buy. I drank a bottle of champagne with my friends on the evening of my birthday and I drank a bottle of sangria slowly over the course of about a week of dinners, but I haven’t actually drank any of the other alcohol yet, now more than a month after my birthday.

I don’t know that I would have changed anything about my 21^st birthday. I did everything that a 21 year old should do on their birthday, and it was awesomely liberating!

During my internship I was really fortunate to be able to see the Space Shuttle after it landed at Edwards Air Force Base. It was over Memorial Day weekend when the weather in Florida would be too dangerous for a shuttle landing, and NASA couldn’t delay the landing any longer.

Unfortunately I didn’t actually get to see it land, because I had gone home to see my family for the long weekend, but I heard that wasn’t nearly as exciting as watching it take off again. My friends who got to see it land said that they could see the shuttle just after they heard it’s double sonic boom and that it basically fell out of the sky like a brick.

When the shuttle lands they keep it at the Dryden Flight Research Center for about a week to get all of the excess fuels and chemicals out of it and to prepare it to piggy back on the back of the 747. This is part of what makes it such an expensive alternative to landing in Florida. NASA has to send specialists out to Dryden from other NASA centers to aid in the shuttle preparations.

This is a picture of the shuttle in the Mate DeMate Device from the closest spot you can get to it. The device lifts the shuttle so that the 747 can roll in under it and they can attach the shuttle to the top of the 747.

While it was there I had the opportunity to go up and look at it (not too close of course), and it was so awe-inspiring. I’m a space girl at heart, and looking at the shuttle right in front of me, I couldn’t help but reminisce about having childhood daydreams of seeing such a thing in person, and to realize that here I am, at 20 years old working for NASA. I’d been working towards this dream for years, and step by step, my dreams are coming true.

When they finally started rolling the 747 and shuttle away from the Mate Demate Device, the excitement was palpable. I was also very fortunate to run into the right people at the right time to secure a spot over by where the press stands to report on the shuttle and 747 taking off. It was awesome!

I like to take pictures where it looks like I'm holding aircraft up. I don't know why I think it's so funny, but it is quickly becoming a signature Kerianne pose.

Here I am standing in front of the shuttle and 747 on the morning before it left for Florida.

Another shot of Shuttle and 747 before take off

Later when I was looking at the online coverage, I was able to spot myself in a video on MSNBC's website. It gives you a good idea of how close I was to the shuttle

This is my reaction to watching the Shuttle and 747 take off.

One of my favorite things about going to school in Prescott is the variety and quality of outdoor activities.I was never really much of an outdoors person until I moved to Prescott.I still wouldn’t say that I am an outdoors-woman, because I when I go camping I really want there to be running hot water. I think the main reason I never got into hiking or rock climbing before college was that my family wasn’t really into it.

I really tried hiking for the first time when I moved out to Prescott, and since then I have fallen in love with the diverse landscapes and climates of the West.I grew up in Houston, which for thousands of years was actually an ocean bed.As a result, the landscape of East Texas is fairly flat, and it’s not even reasonable to drive to a mountain.I think it’s about a 12 hour drive to the nearest mountains, either to the Guadalupe Mountains in West Texas, or to the Smokey Mountains out around Tennessee and Virginia.

Since of I have lived in Prescott, I have taken several opportunities to venture out and try new outdoor activities.There are several reasons why I now love to hike.First, hiking gives me a sense of accomplishment.It is as relaxing as watching TV or reading a book for me, but it’s much better for my body, and helps me to feel physically healthier when I’m finished. Secondly, it gives you a chance to get away – away from people and anything else that is stressing you, to spend time with someone you care about and to admire the beauty and serenity of nature.

A good place for any Riddle student to start is at the Granite Dells, which are practically right across the street from the school.

In the picture above, I am climbing up a steeper part of the Dells. Hiking the Granite Dells is really a cross between hiking and rock climbing. Whenever I go to the dells, my legs always feel like I’ve done a few hundred lunges about 12 hours afterward.

Whenever I go to hike in the Dells, my goal is to hike to the dam that creates Willow Lake. It can take about two hours one way, or as little as an hour if you are a good hiker in good shape. It’s an awesome halfway point in the hike to stop, eat a granola bar, and enjoy the beautiful scenery around it.

Hiking in the dells affords great views of the dells themselves as well as Willow Lake.

After hiking the dells, there are so many places to hike in Northern Arizona.  One of my favorite places is Sedona, which has some of the most beautiful scenery in the west, and it’s less than an hour from the school.

This is a picture of me on top of a plateau in Sedona. Some of the most beautiful and challenging hiking that I have done has been in Sedona. On this trip, I learned that you should always bring foul weather gear with you while hiking, even if the forecast only predicts a 10 percent chance of rain. When I started this hike, it was sunny and pretty out, but I finished the hike in a thunder, lightning, and hail storm. I was drenched to the bone and freezing! Be prepared!

This is a great shot of the red rocks of Sedona that I took while hiking.

Another advantage of being at Embry-Riddle in Prescott, AZ, is that the Grand Canyon, one of the greatest natural wonders in the world, and the  great hiking that comes with it is only about two hours away.

This is a picture of my over a hiking trip to the Grand Canyon Spring Break Freshman year. The Grand Canyon is only about a two hour drive from the school.

This is a picture that I took of the Grand Canyon at sunset. Being so close to the Grand Canyon means that you can watch the sunset there and be back on campus by 9:00 that night.

After getting a little taste of hiking, some friends of mine talked me into going rock climbing (with ropes and everything).  Before this I had never even climbed a man-made rock wall.  Rock climbing is both one of the scariest and most rewarding experiences I’ve ever had, and it’s definitely not something that I can do back in Houston.

Every time I go climbing, I get about 10 feet off the ground and think, why on earth did I decide to do this again? But by the time I make it to the top my fears are mostly gone and have been replaced by a huge sense of pride. I defeated the cliff!

In this picture, I am climbing a rock face, about 40 feet off the ground.

Here is a close up of my adventures in rock climbing.

Whatever your skill level or motivations, there are tons of enjoyable outdoor activities in Northern Arizona that is sure to challenge or relax the typical college age student. Not that anyone at Riddle is really a typical college age student…we’re all pretty unique.  One might say as unique as the climate and landscape where the school is located, but then again that might be too corny… 🙂

One of the awesome perks of a NASA internship is the tours that you get of cool aerospace locations. During my 6.5 month internship at the NASA Dryden Flight Research Center I got to see a variety of aerospace research and development organizations, which have further inspired me to be an aerospace engineer.

The first tours that we got were of the NASA Dryden facilities. We toured several hangers and got to see several interesting aircraft as well as the Crew Exploration Vehicle for the Constellation/Orion project that will take us to the moon.

Inside the Cockpit of a 747 that carries the Space Shuttle Orbiter back to Florida

Climbing the stairs into the 747

Standing in front of the 747 that carrries the Space Shuttle back to Florida after it has landed on the dry lake bed at Edwards Air Force Base.

Ikhana is an Earth Science Unmanned Aerial System that was housed in a hanger in the same building that I worked in at Dryden.

This is the Crew Exploration Vehicle (CEV) for the Constellation/Orion project that will return man to the moon so that he can build a permanent base there. Dryden's role in the project is to design the abort systems for the CEV, which is basically the capsule that houses the astronauts. The abort systems were recently tested at White Sands Missile Range in New Mexico.

Here I am sitting in one of the F-18s at Dryden

The next big tour that we took was taking a drive up to China Lake, which is another dry lake bed, like the one at Edwards AFB that the shuttle lands on, where NAVAIR tests their aircraft and some weapon systems. Unfortunately, due to the classified nature of the facilities, I was not able to take any pictures.

We also got to see the communications satellites and mission control rooms at the Goldstone Deep Space Network, where they monitor communications to distant satellites and probes currently exploring different regions of the galaxy.

Me and fellow Dryden intern, Teressa, stand under the largest dish at Goldstone.

Later we got to see the NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, California. It was funny because before we went, I pictured the scientist and engineers of JPL to look like they did in the 1960s with dress pants and button down shirts and short haircuts. When I went there, I found that my picture of the JPL researcher was not at all accurate. Some of them were even wearing t-shirts, shorts, and flip-flops. I also didn’t expect JPL to be as beautiful as it was, with the green hills around it and the old trees around the campus. It had a very academic atmosphere, which makes sense because it is also part of Cal Tech. The campus was very in touch with nature though. There were deer just walking between the buildings, which were really exciting for many of the touring students to see. I was also surprised at how large the Mars landers Spirit and Opportunity are, when I saw their sister at the center.

Standing at the entrance to JPL

Outside the Spacecraft Assembly Facility at JPL

These were the deer that were walking right up to buildings and through the campus at JPL

This is the sandbox that the JPL engineers and scientists use to test rover maneuvers in before they test them on the rover on Mars.

Really awesome sign at JPL that makes Kerianne happy 🙂

Getting sick during the academic year is one of the most difficult challenges you will go through as a college student. School doesn’t stop when you get sick, and if you are sick enough that you need lots of rest, and therefore have little time for much else, you are going to get behind.

On this Labor Day, I had just about the worst headache I’d ever had. It felt like my head was in some vindictive machine designed by Jigsaw from the Saw movies that squeezed the entire top hemisphere of my skull.

It was really strange, coming on completely out of the blue, and ibuprofen couldn’t dull the sharp throbbing. Not even a little. I spent most of the day lying in bed, not doing much of anything, because I could barely even see through the pain let alone think.

Tuesday morning I got up and the pain seemed to be almost gone, but by the time I got through my first class, it was back with a vengeance. I went home at 3 in the afternoon, and slept for three hours, got up, ate, and went back to bed for another 9 hours.

On Wednesday I decided I really needed to get it checked out and headed to health services after my 8:00 class. After I described my symptoms to the visiting doctor and she did a quick evaluation, she determined that I was suffering from a sinus infection.

Now, Thursday night, after a few rounds of antibiotics, the pain is very dull and continuing to dissipate. My work load, however, has not dissipated, it had has grown immensely in the three days in which I have been practically useless. While I was ahead in my classes before, I am now barely keeping up. I know I’ll be able to catch up, and it’s just a matter of time, but while I’m catching up it’s going to be rough.

During my internship last spring and summer I was very fortunate to enjoy all of the benefits of a full time employee, including vacation time and sick leave. Although I didn’t need or use nearly as much sick leave as I was given, I did need to take a few days here and there to fend off stomach viruses or soothe an aching head and low grade fever.

I had the luxury of calling in sick when I was ill, and the really cool thing was that I still got paid! It was a really difficult concept for me to accept, and I only used it when I felt I was not in a state in which I could do productive work, but it is a huge perk of working in the real world. And although it may or may not be typical, it was my experience that I just picked up where I left off on my projects when I got back. I’m sure that as I climb the latter in the Engineering world in my future, that won’t always be the case, but as an intern it was.

At Riddle, you don’t miss class unless you have Swine Flu. When you are in a challenging major, you have to go to class, because without the lessons and notes you will get lost later on. In college, sometimes there really is no rest for the weary.

I believe that there are several aspects to a person’s well being, and to be fully healthy one must be mentally, physically, emotionally, and spiritually well. Every once in a while I have the opportunity to experience a day that is just simply good for the soul. This Sunday was one of those days.

This weekend I made the relatively short trek down to Phoenix to see a good friend who was in town visiting his friends and fellow graduates of Arizona State University for Labor Day. A former resident of the Valley of the Sun, he was excited to suggest a few spots in Tempe for us to spend the day.

My goal for the day was simple: no real plans, no stress, no work, no worries, and no rush. I was excited to simply relax with a good friend and enjoy a few sights and places that I’d never seen before.

The first place we visited was the Desert Botanical Gardens in Tempe. Until I spent a reasonable amount of time in the desert, both in Arizona and California, I couldn’t really see its beauty beyond its stark desolation and lack of vegetation. I have slowly grown to recognize and admire desert beauty, and the botanical gardens exhibited how beautiful the desert can truly be, even when it’s about 100 degrees outside, which it was.

We could have enjoyed it a little longer, but the heat drove us onto Mill Avenue, and into some cool stores and restaurants. We stopped in an awesome Irish Pub for lunch. It went really well until I suddenly came down with what I assume was heat sickness. I went from talking and laughing to sheet white, weak, and trembling, with a headache, dizziness, and nausea in just about a split second. After about five glasses of water, some saltines, and a mixed drink of ginger ale and Sprite, I was as good as new, with a new respect for the heat of the desert. It was the first time I have been so affected by the heat. Next time I’ll drink more water.

From Mill Avenue we journeyed to the Phoenix Art Museum, where we strolled through several inspiring, thought provoking, and beautiful exhibits. My favorite piece of art was the abstract sculpture that didn’t really look like anything from a distance, but when you stood in one particular spot, the entire thing came together as a U2 aircraft. It was so exciting. I definitely had an uber nerd moment.

From a distance it looks like some strange abstract piece of modern art

But when you look at it from the right angle, it becomes a U2. Pretty cool, huh?

After that he showed me around ASU, and a few of the places he used to frequent, then we ended with day with dinner with one of his friends at this awesome restaurant, with melt in your mouth steaks, good company, and great conversation. I went out and bought Friedrich Nietzsche’s On the Genealogy of Morals today, if that gives you any idea of how deep the dinner conversation went. All in all, the day seemed to rejuvenate the soul and made me ready to take on my week.

After being away from school for 8 months, in a completely new state, job, and lifestyle, it feels like such a long time since I was last taking classes. Coming back to the school school and seeing campus again after my time away was a great feeling. When I drove onto campus memories of my freshman year, the first time I had come to ERAU Prescott and seen it as home, seemed to flood my brain.  I couldn’t help but smile at how much I have changed in the last two years, my first two years of college. In fact, I can confidently say that I have changed more as a person in my first two years of college than I changed from the end of the 4th grade to the end of the 12th grade.

In this blog entry, I’d like to take a chance to reminisce about the beginning of my freshman year, when my transformation truly began.

College is very different from high school. It is way better. Like many high school seniors plagued with senioritis, I was “so ready to leave” and “uber sick of” high school. I remember getting so excited when my schedule came in the mail for my first semester of college. I went right to my brand new computer with my course catalog in hand and looked up the description of each class while I typed each day’s schedule into an excel spread sheet, like the nerd that I am.

The freshman year of college is a huge adjustment and it’s all about learning how to prioritize your time, live on your own, and a little about your coursework too, I guess. College gave me the chance to start over and be myself in a very accepting environment. Embry-Riddle gave me the chance to go to a school where everyone, like me, has a dream that they are working towards.

It was so exciting to move into my dorm room and meet my new roommates. I was so anxious to get started with my new life that I slept in my room the day I checked in. Most of my roommates stayed in the dorm that first night, although I think one or two went to stay with their families in their hotels. I remember looking up at the ceiling that was about two feet from may face in my loft bed, trying to go to sleep but staying awake thinking about how this was where I was going to live for the next four months, the first time I’d live away from home, and how strange, new, and exhilarating it was.

Rooming with students of my major gave me an instant group of friends that I have so much in common with. Traits and quirks that I had always exhibited, I found I shared with several of the students in my classes.

I don’t know that I have ever felt as good on my birthday as I did on my first birthday at Embry-Riddle. I am a September baby, and after a couple weeks into the school year, I was prepared for a little sadness on my first birthday away from home. Unexpectedly, my roommates went all out to make my birthday outstanding. They all went and painted the rock for my birthday, bought me a cake, and a gift, decorated my room with streamers, woke me up by signing “Happy Birthday” to me, and made sure that I couldn’t feel an ounce of remorse at not being home for my birthday. It was a very uplifting experience.

As I assume it is for almost everyone, my freshman year in college was very different than anything else that I had experienced before. It was really surreal. At first, it didn’t feel like school at all, actually it felt like I was at summer camp. I remember sitting in class on my first day and watching the clock as it approached 9 am, the end of my 8 am class. It may sound silly, but I was actually expecting to hear a bell ring at the end of the hour, but instead the professor simply announced that class was over. I walked out of the classroom in a daze. On the one hand, I felt a little weirded out that there was no bell in college, and on the other hand, I was excitedly reveling in my liberation from the bell.

For the first two months of school I was so wrapped up in all of the new people, clubs, classes and experiences that I didn’t have time to really miss home.

After a while though, it sets in that this isn’t summer camp. Not only is this still school (but don’t get me wrong, it’s way better than high school), it is your home for eight months out of the year, and you change so much over your first few months without realizing it. Until you go home and see how little has changed there, you don’t realize how much you as a person have changed.

College changes your entire outlook. While you are in school you are free to be whoever you would like to be. For the most part, the parental control in your life is switched off. The final say on when you sleep, when you eat, when you go to class, what clubs you join, whether or not to go to parties, even what brand food you eat is your choice.

During a summer internship at the Johnson Space Center in high school, one of my mentors told me that “There are three things you can do in college – sleep, study, and party. Now pick two.” For the most part I have found this to be true.

Balancing all three is very difficult because the more time you spend on one activity, the less time you have for the other two. If sleep and grades are your priorities, you can get 9 hours of sleep every night and make the Dean’s List, but you don’t have much time for partying.

You will also learn to live on a budget in college, basically dirt poor for a few years. One time, during my freshman year, my mom sent me $50 in the mail. I thought “Awesome! Now I can go out and party with my friends.” But as I was getting ready I realized that we were on our last roll of toilet paper so I decided to go grab some before the evening started, but then as I got into my car I saw my gas tank was empty. Well, there went that 50 bucks.

Although I love my life as a free college student, I miss the days when Pop-Tarts and Fruit Loops replenished themselves in the cabinet, doing my laundry was free, I ate name brand food, and I had great water pressure in the shower.

In college, for the first time ever, you don’t leave peer pressure when you go home at night, because you live full time with your peers. You learn about how people with completely different upbringings compromise to get along. You will have roommates that you love to hang out with and others that you will have to work through minor to major annoyances with.

One thing a freshman never needs to worry about at Embry-Riddle, is feeling welcome and finding a place at school. It is very easy in this small school to get involved in clubs and organizations. In addition, fellow students are friendly and looking to make new friends just as much as you are, and the faculty members are extremely supportive and willing to help you succeed in any way that they can.

My freshman year at Riddle was nothing short of amazing. Although my life has continued to change, and in some ways get better, I am sure that I will remember my freshman year of college as one of the best years of my life.

Waiting in line during my Orientation in August 2007

The Rock on my Birthday Freshman Year

The back of my birthday rock

The decorations that my roommates put in my dorm room Freshman year for my birthday

My suitemates and a couple of our friends a couple weeks into freshman year at the top of Thumb Butte at sunset

As this is my first Blog, I would like to take the opportunity to introduce myself. This is my third year at Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University, studying Aerospace Engineering, with a concentration in Astronautics. I am also pursuing an Electrical Engineering Minor.

I am originally from Spring, Texas, which used to be about 20-25 miles north of Houston, but as Houston has expanded to meet us, Spring has now practically become North Houston. Before school I lived with both of my parents, my younger sister, three dogs, and a cat.

My current classes are Aircraft Structures I, Aeronautics I, Space Mechanics, Thermodynamics, and Engineering Economics.

Last semester I was away on an internship with NASA’s Cooperative Education Program at the Dryden Flight Research Center in Edwards, CA. From January 20 through July 31st, I worked in the Aircraft Simulation department developing a software program for generating Monte Carlo Simulation Scripts and designing hardware components for the Aircraft Simulation Cockpits. A return to school with a little taste of what lies ahead in my career, and a renewed excitement to continue with my studies.

My extracurricular activities include Horizons Newspaper (ERAU Prescott’s Campus Newspaper), Silver Wings, Campus Academic Mentoring, Embry-Riddle e-communications, and 1,2,3 Step Dance Club. For Horizons I write, edit and do layout as a Columnist and the Diversions Section Editor. Silver Wings is a service organization that supports the community through events like highway cleanups and canned food drives, as well as supports the military through events like volunteering to help out at events like the Veteran’s Day Parade at the Veteran’s Hospital. I have been President, Development Officer, and Activities Officer for the club in the past. At the beginning of my sophomore year, I was selected to be a College of Engineering Campus Academic Mentor, where I teach and mentor a group of freshman students each fall with their Faculty adviser in a class called College Success, and more commonly referred to as UNIV 101. As an Embry-Riddle e-communications student employee, I write this blog, as well as help support the Facebook account for ERAU Prescott (http://www.facebook.com/embryriddle) and I post tweets at ERAU Prescott’s Twitter account (http://twitter.com/ERAUPrescott) and on my own Twitter account (http://twitter.com/Riddle_Kerianne). I am also a member of the ERAU Social Network (http://embryriddle.ning.com/). 1,2,3 Step Dance Club is a fun outlet for me. It is a dance club where students bring their own knowledge of dance styles and teach the rest of the class. For example, I came to one class and taught Country-Western Line Dancing, Wheel Dances, the Texas Two-Step, and the real Cotton-Eyed Joe Dance. Other students have taught lessons like Latin Dances including the Tango, Salsa and Meringue.

I consider one of my greatest achievements to be having a life on top of all of my classes and extracurricular activities (which can be quite challenging at times), a factor which I have found to be vital to my success as a student.

In my spare time you will likely find me writing, reading a science fiction novel or science magazine, scrap-booking, sketching, painting, hanging out with my friends, or starting spontaneous dance parties.

So that, in a nutshell, is me. 🙂

This picture was taken last February at the Dryden Flight Research Center during my 6.5 month internship.  Dryden is an alternative landing site for the Space Shuttle when weather prevents it from landing in Florida.  When the shuttle does land at Dryden, it rides piggy-back on a 747 back to Florida.  In the picture I am sitting in the cockpit of one of the 747s that carries the Space Shuttle Orbiter back home.