Email addicts in Big Meadows Lodge in Shenandoah National Park.
We’ve seen it before here on Quantum Diaries: One of the more important aspects of life as a particle physicist is being connected. Many things in our line of work are happening over email, since we have collaborators spread over the planet, many things require informing a large group of people and so on. While email is terribly convenient, it also tends to pile up. I always notice this in particular during vacations: Life does not stop, even if you are not paying attention. On a typical day I get between 50 and 100 emails, many of which luckily don’t require a reply, but are still important to keep up to speed on all sorts of things. This is just a consequence of being a member in several experimental collaborations, plus a committee here and there. So, I hardly ever go anywhere without my laptop, and I’m happy if I have wireless internet to keep the flood at bay – I really hate it to come home after a week or two to more than 1000 emails in the Inbox.
Of course there are compromises to make: If you spend time out in the wild, in a National Park, you don’t really expect to be able to go on line. So, imagine my surprise when I found out that the main building in the Big Meadows Lodge in Shenandoah National Park has free internet! It does not get much better than this: Adventures during the day, including a face to face meeting with a black bear, and still some connection to the outside world. And, not surprisingly, I’m by far not the only addict: After 9 pm, there were quite a few glowing laptop screens to be seen in front of the crackling fire place in the main lodge…
Connected at night, adventure during the day: Face to face meetings with a black bear included. He turned out to be a shy and friendly guy, luckily...
