Hooding ceremony

Our department held its first ever hooding ceremony, and Jill, Nick, and I were the three doctoral graduates to receive our hood from our professors--a very symbolic gesture of being welcomed into the academy as a peer.



I'll try to get some pictures of the ceremony itself from people who were in the audience. In the meantime, this is Mr. Raven and me before the ceremony, so I have the cap and gown, but am not yet wearing the hood.

Mr. Raven is wearing a stole of gratitude--it's something the academic garment people offer that represents a tangible token of appreciation from the graduate to someone who has provided special help to the graduate.

Since I wouldn't have been able to do this without his support, I wanted to acknowledge that publicly; hence, the stole of gratitude.

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PZ @ DL

Last night, we got to meet PZ and his posse at Seattle's Drinking Liberally. It was my first visit there, but it definitely won't be my last--the crowd was so big that I didn't get a chance to talk to PZ that much, but I did meet and talk to some very engaging people, whom I'd like to meet again.

Even without DL's announcing it on the list, word had gotten around, and the crowd was huge--2-3 times the usual, according to a regular. At first, a lot of the regulars didn't know about the upcoming visit--I did get to see one of them almost do a spit-take on learning that one of his favorite science-bloggers was in town and would be there that night.

Here's PZ with kat.



I actually got more chance to talk to Alaric (who really knows from bad science fiction movies and homebrew!) than to PZ,



because of the crush around him, and then our friends George and Emma arrived, so Mr. Raven and I hung out with them.

One thing is clear about PZ, though--he really is such a prof :) -- he's genuinely nice, and really interested in hearing about other people and what they do.



He really has the air of the best mentors I've had. Sorry to blow the militant, fierce, tentacled reputation, PZ, but there it is.

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