Dr. Hasterok

To no one's great surprise, Derrick successfully defended his dissertation. The defense was really pretty fun--definitely more of a formality, and everyone in the room knew it. One of Derrick's labmates passed out seminar bingo for us all to play. Amazingly, Derrick had a laptop malfunction! Three times, actually. His laptop spontaneously decided to reboot in the middle of his presentation. The whole thing was pretty fast--Derrick started at about 1 and was done by 3.

I dragged Derrick away from the congratulations of his labmates to relieve Melissa of Sylvia and then my Mom and Melissa went back to Grantsville to feed the dogs. Derrick's decided to make wine bottle stoppers for all his committee members, so my Dad, Derrick, Sylvia, and I went to Woodcraft to pick up the hardward Derrick needs. Sylvia had a blast, I think mostly because she loves being with her Grandpa (who she calls by a name that's strangely similar to 'bubbles'). She giggles and plays and cuddles with him, I think in much the same way we kids used to.

We joined my Mom and Melissa for dinner at Rodizio grill. Sylvia fell asleep on the way to Trolley Square, which was not the best news. Yesterday she fell asleep on the way to dinner at Bombay house after refusing to take a nap all afternoon at Mimi's. Yesterday she woke up when we moved her and was clingy all through dinner; tonight she slept through the move into the restaurant, but not through the drums the waiters use to announce birthdays. By the end of dinner she was rather punchy, spending several minutes throwing herself backward in her Dad's arms.

Today was a great day.