Albany 4 - Ups and downs

I put on the TV another time. The result was much better this time. They showed "Friends" first, but then it got scary. Since I was alone in the house and since the motion detectors go on once in a while, I was quite scared. The TV probably needs to stay off. Ayway, during the last days I
worked from 9 am till 11 pm every day and don't have time for distractions. ;-) They demand quite a lot. On the one hand I try to narrow down the topic of my dissertation. Although a month ago I still thought to have a dissertation topic, there are some grey areas now. But I'm writing about change, so I should not mind changing the topic a bit. So I take my courses, read, read, read, narrow down my topic, search for a case study, ...

Since I am a real German, I wanted to go to Aldi, the German supermarket in the next town. It turned out to be a real challenge to get over the Hudson River by bike. Actually, it is quite simple, if you have a car. The road going over looks rater like a highway and bikes are prohibited.


I wanted to go up there.









And over.





I asked some people and finally someone told me about a pedestrian ramp.





I asked a little more, went around on my bike, and finally I found it - the ramp.


It was 35°C (95°C) and I was biking for more than an hour already. But sometimes I arrived. Aah, German bread! German chocolate!
On my way back there was quite a thunderstorm then. I got soaked. Totally. And there was a branch of a tree that was as thick as my legs that came off a tree really close to me. I wanted to get home.



So, these were the downs. But people are really nice and helpful. Great for deep conversations, too.
On Monday two of my professors took me with them to a couny fair. We watched western riding and a rodeo. Riding on bulls, etc. Below you see a bull AFTER he got rid of his rider. I watched it with somewhat mixed feelings and liked the horse riding better.

The audience was most interesting. White people only. One black man, no Hispanics, no Asians. Looks like a really white cowboy tradition.

For one of my courses I had to do the most interesting homework ever. We had to describe some interation of people. On my way back from the grocery store I accidently passed a coffee shop where there were three guys playing the guitar and singing. Half an hour I was back with my laptop and spent two hours describing the interations in that cafe. But if you think this is a crazy idea, I must say that I was not the only one there. Someone from my class also showed up and also started his observations and typing.