Week Six

I saw snow!İ Anne's mother and father are in town from Ireland, so she took Monday off work to take them hiking. She decided to invited Laura and me along. We drove along the Sea to Sky highway towards Squamish, BC. Then we got out and saw a beautiful waterfall that is called Shannon Falls. We got back into the car and went on a bumpy dirt road until the road ended. Then we hiked. It was supposed to be a 5km hike until we got to some landmark. However, we hit snow before we got to the landmark. Anne and her mother were wearing sandals, so Laura, Anne's dad, and I went a little farther while Anne and her mom stayed on the other side of the snow. I do not think I have ever walked in snow without skis that was that deep before (it was about a foot to 18 inches). The temperature at sea level was around 70, so none of us was dressed for snow. When we got back to the car, Anne started to make us all sandwiches. She realized that she brought bread but forgot the cheese and salami. Anne joked about how she brought us up into the mountains and made us walk kilometers through snow in short-sleeves, and then gave us only bread and water. Her parents are very cool people.İ On the way home we stopped at a restaurant for afternoon tea.İ It was a wonderful way to spend a day.

Tuesday, I went to see The Taming of the Shrew at Vanier Park on the English Bay. The play was in a tent with three of the sides closed. The fourth was open to the mountains and the bay. It was really cold, but I was prepared. I had mittens, a winter coat, and a sweatshirt. Everyone else thought I was crazy and were wearing short sleeves and lightweight jackets. The play was wonderful, and the actors were terrific.

Thursday, I went to Seattle to meet my family who came from Atlanta to visit. My Mom said Seattle was "Atlanta with water".İ It is not my favorite city, but it has some good points. One of the best things about Seattle is that their buses are not on strike.İ I got tons of suggestions from Vancouver people about stuff to do down there. We went to Pike Place market. My mom loved it because there were cheap flowers that she thought were beautiful everywhere. I liked it because we got to see the original Starbucks. My brother Tim could not come up here so Mom bought him an "I survived the Feb 28, 2001 Seattle earthquake" t-shirt. The space needle is a really expensive elevator that I would consider the biggest tourist attraction in Seattle. Dad does not like heights, but said that we were all going up because we would regret it if we did not. On Saturday, we took the Amtrak train into Vancouver.

Anne wanted Laura and I run some test word sets through Barrys program to determine if some pre-existing word sets would work as expected.İ We are also trying to find a way to systematically test data to determine which properties of word design prevent secondary structures the best.İ The general hypothesis at this point is that words designed from only three out of the four letters will work best.İ This means that instead of choosing one of A, T, C or G, one would choose from A, T, or C.İ Therefore, a valid word of length 4 would be ATCA, and ATCG would be invalid.İ This prevents all the Cs from bonding because C only bonds to G.İ Knowing that each place that contains a C will not bond is a huge advantage in many situations. My notes can be downloaded here .