Ciao!

Hello from Pompeii! Italy is as amazing as I ever could have hoped, if not more so, and I am having a fantastic time.

The first two days here I toured Pompeii with my professor and labmates, and it is fascinating and amazing. I keep having these staggering feelings of awe and exhilaration, knowing what tragedies occurred here, but also getting to see what life was like and understanding people's experiences.

We met the German group for research in the Herculaneum on Sunday. That morning we discovered there was no electricity for our site because of some conspiracy with the Napoli workers stealing all the extension cords. It did provide the opportunity to explore the site and go into restricted areas with the head conservator, but it was disappointing that we missed an entire day of measuring because of silly logistics.

Measurements went splendidly on Monday, and we were getting very promising and unexpected results. Unfortunately, that was all we were able to do. We weren't getting signal this morning, so they started to move some equipment. Part of this equipment is an extremely powerful magnet, and the other parts are extremely delicate sensors and a radio frequency coil. As they were moving it, I thought to myself, "Wow, that's awfully close to the pre-amp (another piece of equipment in a metal case)," and as I was opening my mouth, the pre-amp flew into the magnet, damaging the coil and breaking the sensors. Everyone was crestfallen, as that has ended NMR measurement for this trip. My main project is to do with these measurements, so while I am still working on other things, my research here is put on hold until the repairs can be made and we revisit the site in the summer. To say I'm devastated would be quite an understatement.

I have had great news about my art history thesis research, however, and I'm moving forward on plans for that. It will be a nice change of pace to work with manuscripts and books after the complexity and physical challenge of lugging heavy yet delicate equipment through an excavation site.

Otherwise I am having a wonderful time. It's fantastic to be in the sunny south of Italy with great friends and colleagues. I'm looking forward to touring more of Pompeii and the Herculaneum, maybe even Boscoreale and some other sites in the region.

I regret that I can't upload photos yet. We are staying in bungalows, and while there is wireless, it tends to drop out every few seconds, with maddening slowness in between. I hope this will improve in Venice. Also, it is almost midnight here, so yknow, another time.

Oh oh oh but HAPPY ST PATRICK'S DAY!!!