Today is the last working day here at the lab. Things are winding down, we're making sure everything that can be shut down gets shut down. Our Division's holiday party will be this evening before everyone leaves for the holidays, so that should be fun, although I think quite a few have left already by looking at the number of vehicles in the parking lot.
It has been a good year, even with our severe budget constraints. Our annual review in March went well (they STILL can't believe we can do that much with so little and so few personnel), the AAC06 workshop we ran in the summer went extremely well, and the results we have from our high-gradient dielectric tube structure got enough heads turning that we received an invited talk to the upcoming PAC next year. So all in all, a very productive year.
The coming year will be a tough one. The continuing budget resolution to stick to the budget for Fiscal Year 2006 will severely affect our program. Our plan on building a second accelerator beamline may be hampered by this, which would mean that our ability to clearly demonstrate that we have achieved the accelerating gradient that we claim will be limited. I think everyone here at the lab is just trying to just stay above water for the next year and hope to come out unscathed by the time Congress gets their act together and do something productive. It does however means that in the meantime, a lot of projects that have been previously approved, would be at a stand-still without the approved funds.
2007 is going to be an adventure.
Zz.
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