The Last Day of CERN

Yesterday was a full day of working on our projects. We had a deadline of 5:00 unless we wanted to work late into the evening. Since security is tight to get into the CERN facility, it is much less tight inside. Many of the buildings are open 24 hours a day, although some we have to use our ID to get into. It's very safe to walk at night, and since the LHC runs 24 hours a day, there is always movement.

At 5:00, we had a suprise lecture by John Ellis, a sort of rock star physicist. You can google him to find out his many accomplishments or you can search for the Daily Show (Jon Stewart) episode he was on talking about the LHC and the possibility of it making black holes.

Following our lecture and a few last minute tweaks to our presentation we had been preparing, it was time for supper. Four of us went to an Italian restaurant and shared a pizza and meat on a mace. The mace was a medieval style mace with spikes coming out of it. Cheval (horse), veal, and beef pieces were put on the spikes and cooked. Then they brought it into our dining room, doused it with cognac, and lit it on fire.

Underneath where the mace hangs is a bowl of rice that catches all the cognac and meat drippings that you can also eat. I was really hoping to try the cheval, and I have it say it was quite tasty! All of it was very good though.

The pizza was also interesting. After it came out of the oven, they cracked an egg on the top of it and the heat of the pizza cooked the egg. Our pizza also had ham and ricotta cheese.

For dessert we had limoncello.



And then back to CERN for a nightcap.

Today each of our working groups presented their results. The Americans went out for lunch with Professor Homer Neal from the University of Michigan, the person responsible for the grant that brought us here.

Following the presentations late afternoon, the Director General of CERN, Rolf-Dieter Heuer came to speak with us.

And with that, it's all done except the farewell barbecue tonight. It just seems like there's not enough time left, even after being here three weeks. It was so busy and it went so fast that it seems impossible that we're at the end.

Tomorrow, hopefully I'll have one last excursion out to Chamonix and up Mont Blanc. Then it's pack and hop a plane home!