Spanish Migrants

With the Italian gov't taking a hard turn to the right, Spain is now one of the last places for refugees from north Africa to land as they cross the Mediterranean Sea. Spain is also one of the last progressive gov'ts on the continent still showing some compassion for refugees. Even here, there are right wing politicians attempting to use the refugees as a wedge issue. What's interesting is that the flow of refugees from the middle-east and Africa is not really any higher than historical averages, but the number of politicians willing to stoke the worst parts of human nature against these unfortunate immigrants to gain a political advantage in their countries does seem to be at historic highs.

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I saw a few boat races this morning during my walk. I would have went down and watched more, but it rained all day. Luckily, it's a two-day event and tomorrow is supposed to be sunny and 75 degrees.

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It's Balloon Stampede time back in Walla Walla. Mick sent me a picture of the balloons taking off this morning.

Looks like the weather was perfect.

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I got this picture of the center of Sevilla this evening during my trash run:

Still kind of damp and foggy out there. Speaking of which, finally had to put the heavier blanket on the bed yesterday. It's getting down into the 50's at night now!

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Did some math, read a bit, watched a bit of Netflix, practiced some Spanish. Pretty ordinary day. Thought about Emily on her 24-hour plus trip from Ethiopia back to Santa Barbara. As I write this she's about an hour from landing at LAX. Then, it's the shuttle up to Santa Barbara. If nothing else, this PhD program has given her the iron butt needed to be a long-distance flyer.

Sevici Load Balancing

The bike share program here is called Sevici, a portmanteau of Sevilla and "bici" the Spanish word for "bike". The bike station nearest us is always empty in the morning. The next nearest one is also typically pretty depleted in the morning. I've always wondered how the service handled load imbalances like this and suspected that there had to be some way of shifting bikes around to balance the load. This morning I saw that load balancing in action as a worker was replenishing our depleted station:

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All week there have been workers on the river setting up lanes for what appears to be an imminent boat race. This morning I saw that they had the "starting line" set up in the water:

I went home and googled "sevilla regatta" and found 2nd Sevilla International Rowing Masters Regatta – October 20-21, 2018 Spain. Hoping to see a few races this weekend. If nothing else, the splash videos at the race web site are fun to watch.

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Almost got something worth calling a draft paper today. This paper has some accompanying python/jupyter worksheets. Next on the agenda is to set up a github page. Apparently github satisfies some kind of data archive standard so that you can put data and programs on the site and get DOI numbers for use in journal article references.

Test the Face

I tagged along on the "cultural activity" at Laura's school again this week. The teacher that organizes this weekly event is very kind. I like her focus on the local art scene. This week we went to a gallery at yet another branch of the Universidad de Sevilla. The exhibit poster:

I also like interactive art. In this case, the public is offered a blank face and a number of magnetic eyes, noses, mouths, and eyebrows to place on the face (a kind of pin-the-tail-on-the-donkey exercise).


In this video, we see Laura's version of the face. Here's my version of the face:

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We had rain here most of the day, but it cleared out in the evening. I took a time-lapse of the river as the clouds moved past and the boaters crowded the river:

Life in a Swimming Pool

Today was pretty low-key. I worked on a manuscript most of the day. Hoping to submit something by the end of the month. Also finished a datacamp course on data visualization with python. I took a break at 4 for my spanish class. We did some vocabulary and worked on the verb gustar and responses. For example, if you agree with a positive statement like me gustan manzanas you might say a mi tambien. But, if you agree with a negative statement like no me gustan manzanas you would say a mi tampoco. In english it would be like me too vs. me neither. Never really thought about that in english before. Funny, after all that, I still screwed it up in class when called on today, haha.

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Laura works harder on spanish each day than I do on my research (not joking). She does spanish essentially all day every day:

She may not be fluent when this is over, but she'll have learned about as much as one could in the span of a year.

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The scaffolding that the painters put up in the courtyard yesterday was used today by a worker to clean the walls in preparation for painting. The bleach solution that he used made the entire building smell like a swimming pool area. I guess we'll just have to get used to it since he knocked off at about 3pm and it still smells right now at 10pm. Luckily, it doesn't really penetrate the flat. I just hits you when you go out into the hallway.

Snail's Pace

Work continues on our building. The crew set up a scaffold in the main courtyard today:

Not sure how long it will take them to get the job done. They don't seem to be in any real hurry. Possible that Rachel will see them in December haha.

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Pretty typical day. Nice weather, cool, sunny. Working on a paper submission. Also wrote a couple of letters of recommendation for Whitman students. Also working on getting a data science minor set up. Even in Spain the ties back to Whitman are strong. Speaking of which, I noticed that the women's basketball team is back in practice. And, the women's tennis team has a match this weekend. Those are my two favorite Whitman teams and I miss them.

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I walked Laura over to her "intercambio" this evening. On the way back, I got some video of this snail sprinting across the 1st floor hallway in our building:

Look at her go!