Category Archives: Travel

One of the stops on our trip to Boston was Cambridge to check out my cousin’s stomping grounds at MIT and check out Harvard as well. That’s right. We went on vacation to watch smart kids in their element.

Here is a common area in my cousin’s fraternity house. Creepy, right down to the velvet drapes. I think I saw the portrait’s eyes follow me around the room.

MIT’s theather. It’s so odd that they leave everything unlocked. This would never happen at a public school, because the piano would probably be stolen.

The entrance to their classrooms is as grand as the one to the Mines of Moria!

Inside, a hack to honor Steve Jobs, just two days after his death.

We stepped out into their courtyard and there was a class project happening.

Holy crap, they have  catapults and sling shots!

Normally when you see a guy in a costume with a pistol and a megaphone, you run for your life. Here, it’s a professor and an Angry Birds physics project.

Knock down those pigs!

“My nerdy students, physics is everywhere!”

“We love physics!”

This is where they do a lot of the hacks. A full-sized plastic cow and a police car were placed on the top of this dome.

The Ray and Maria Stata Center, except it’s missing a few letters. The Ray and Mar A Stat Center.

Does this look like it was designed by anyone you know? Frank Gehry designed this, and every time it rains, it leaks.

The classrooms at MIT. I bet if the rooms at UCLA were brightly colored, I would have stayed awake more often in class.

The media center at MIT, so white.

Michelle, taking in some media.

They have a camera that measures happiness based on facial expressions, and they have four different stations around the campus to measure the overall mood of MIT. Look how happy we are to be at MIT!

Michelle in front of the conductive paint wall. Touch any of the pink flowers and the light next to it goes on.

At Harvard to see the other smart kids in Cambridge. Their buildings are all so beautiful.

Harvard Library, with books that survived the Titanic’s sinking.

Michelle at the Harvard Library. When they told us only Harvard students could go inside, we really want to go and look at their books.

Michelle with Harvard’s founder. See, future children? Mommy went to Harvard. (Technically it’s true.)

Another grand building on the Harvard campus.

The nicest chemistry building I’ve ever seen.

They have a lawn in the center of the campus, where past commencement speeches are played through speakers hung in the trees. The only thing I wondered is why the chairs weren’t chained down. It’s just the public educated side of me that thinks someone is going to steal these chairs and set them up in their dorm rooms.

After seeing MIT and Harvard, Michelle and I decided that our future children will attend Ivy League schools. Sure they’ll end up in a world with people that we have little in common with, and their parents will be a classless embarrassment,  but at least we get to see more fun school projects like Angry Birds. Also, they’ll be successful and support us in our old age. Go, smart offspring!