Fin.

It’s 4 am and I just woke up to work on all the things that I have to do this week.  I’m not actually panicking, but I suppose my brain is functioning at near “panic mode.”  I did a hackneyed presentation yesterday, and have a paper due in that class tomorrow.  I have a presentation to give today (which, thankfully, will be much better than yesterday).  And filling the space between these actual deadlines is me proctoring final exams for the 3 sections that I teach.  So, yes, it makes sense that my most available time is 3 hours before my alarm was set to go off.

I don’t even know why I set alarms during these last few weeks of the semester.  The only time a machine needs to force me to get up is when I am trying to steal a few hours of rest via napping in the middle of the day.  Napping is a tell-tale sign of a thrown off schedule for me.  In a normal day/week I never ever nap.  I have always found it too difficult to sleep with the sun shining.  But when you wake up at 4 in the morning to work on things, I suppose the sleep has to catch up with you.

A wonderful and relaxing break

I finally got to see my family again.  It took a lot of driving but I made it back to Indiana in one piece and had a week and a half to spend with them.  This time was filled with as many family dinners as we could get.  Now, these dinners aren’t the tense, awkward minefields that some family dinners may be.  My family gets as many laughs as they can in every minute. 

This creates a pretty chaotic environment for newcomers.  Many times I have seen new significant others (of sisters, cousins, family friends, etc) visibly intimidated by their surroundings.  It is what I was born into but I can understand how that environment could be jarring for others.  No matter what anyone else thinks, I wouldn’t want to live without it.  We are loud, near shameless, and quick to make a joke.  I pity anyone who dreads their family get-togethers.  Everyone should love seeing their family.

No, my truck doesn't have a D-Rig.

So, I have a hell of an update for this thing today.  I am just sitting down after a trip half-way across the country.  That's right, I made the trip back from Indiana today.  I had a wonderful time at home for Thanksgiving, and I will update you on that tomorrow.  Today's post, however, is reserved solely for the trip I just made.

I left my parents' house at 4 am EST this morning (so 3 am CST), which is normal (I have to drive in the dark for one half of the trip, I figure it should be the half where I am waking up, not falling asleep).  Much to my chagrin it is raining when I leave.  I hate driving in the rain, with a violent, burning passion.  I hate driving in the rain even more than I hate driving at night.  I was well rested, which is a pleasant change, but driving the interstate at night in a steady rain during deer season isn't my ideal Sunday. So, if you do the math you come up with the fact that this trip did not start off well for me.

Next on the hits parade we have the fact that my car is TERRIBLE at keeping moisture out.  So, the inside of my windshield fogs up, badly.  Turning the heat up only increases the condensation (while I am driving 65 mph), so I am forced to turn on the A/C to clear my windows.  It is 43 degrees and wet outside.  So, for the next 4 hours I stave off hypothermia in my polar bear friendly car to make it to sunrise and the end of my foggy window issues.  Luckily, the rain had stopped and I was almost to St. Louis.

Now, I really dislike driving through Missouri.  St. Louis is fine, but the rest of the state is just a bunch of advertisements for A) porno for truckers, B) Jesus and his Earthly minions, or C) Maramec Caves.  The scenery in most of the state is beautiful, but all those damned billboards just eviscerate that experience.  On top of this, the bulk of my drive happens in Missouri, so I am forced to stop and will my gas tank 2 of the 3 times in this state. 

I made one of these pit stops at a Flying J in Sullivan (I think).  I gassed my car up and got my obligatory water and snacks, but the interesting part of this stop happened in the mens room.  After washing my hands a gentleman behind me asked if the truck I was driving had "one of those new D-Rigs."  I politely informed him that I was not a trucker and went about my business.  Now, it wasn't until later that my wheels started turning on his question.  This man asked me, a complete stranger, about something called a "D-Rig" in a mens room at a truck stop...But I suppose I will leave any interpretation up to the reader from here.

Possible close calls aside my trip was going pretty smoothly now.  The only exception at this point was the fact that the town of Sullivan tricked me into missing lunch by misrepresenting where their Mc Donalds was.  So, I went hungry until my car needed filled up again, which was in another 3 hours.  I stopped in Joplin to fix all of these issues.  No odd run-ins here, but the mens room in this truck stop was the busiest bathroom I have ever seen.  There must have been a church without a toilet close by... Either way I made it out and walked over to the conveniently placed Hardee's right inside the gas station.

Eating the largest burger Hardee's makes while driving through construction areas is hard.  I made it through, however, and was now squarely in Oklahoma with a full stomach.  I cruise along for a while and end up doing about 10 over the speed limit on I44 for a large portion of my sprint across the state.  Now, I am confident in my ability to speed here because I have honestly never seen a police officer on I44, ever.  I have made this trip around a dozen times at this point, and I knew that cops just didn't exist until I hit OKC.  I learned something new today.

I got tagged by a state trooper just before the 2nd toll booth.  I came up over a hill and there he was, ready to pounce.  Luckily he let me off with a warning since I was a college student returning from Thanksgiving (Mise!).  I did, however, do the speed limit for the rest of my trip.  Well, with the exception of the merging point of I44, I40, and I35...

I think the one thing that I want to do the least after driving for 13 hours is sit in 40 minutes of stop-and-go traffic on the interstate.  I don't know the person who decided one lane was enough to drain 3 interstates into 35S but they should be shot, twice.  This exit is easily the worse part of my 14 hour drive back every single time.  Given enough time and annoyance, I made it through, and cruised the rest of the way to my apartment.

All in all this trip was about par for the course.  I almost always drive through rain at some point on a trip home each year.  Missouri always sucks, sometimes more than others.  I once again succeeded in not getting a ticket. And that 35S merger can still die in a fire.  I am so glad that I am flying home for Christmas...

Reduce, Rebuild, Reschedule

The end of the semester is quickly barreling down on us.  I don’t have quite as much to do as usual, but this semester has taught me a lot.  I will definitely be taking a different strategy next semester.  In the next 6 months I need to finish assembling a committee and present my research proposal.  I will still be taking classes.  So I need to make sure not to impale myself on teaching responsibilities again. 

I believe I will be splitting time with both a teaching assistantship and research assistantship.  This will give me plenty of time to focus on class and my proposal.  It is very nice having research funding to fall back on when I need to.  It doesn’t hurt that any research that I do (as long as it is prairie-chicken related) counts toward that assistantship.  I am looking forward to only teaching one section next semester.  Life should be much more normal.

The time is almost here

In a little more than 48 hours I will finally be back in Indiana.  I am taking the last 2 days of the week before Thanksgiving off, like I usually do, to spend some extra time at home.  I haven't seen my family in 11 months, outside of a 2 day visit by my parents in August.  I cannot wait to finally see everyone again and spend time with them!

A lot has happened since I left after Christmas break.  My little sister had a baby (and a very scary false alarm a few weeks after delivery), who I have not met yet.  My other new nephew gets bigger and bigger by the day (from what I hear he has hit the hilarious oblivious statements stage) and is 2 and a half now.  My oldest nephew moved back to Indiana to finish high school in a better environment (no family issues, he just hated Wisconsin and it's inhabitants...).  And my father develops a closer relationship with their cat every day (which is still very funny to me).

I am so ready for today and tomorrow to be over.  I have never been so excited to drive 12 hours in my life.

The Grind

Five weekends worth of travel.  Four of those have been out of state.  Two trips to Kansas City, 1 trip to Dallas, and 1 trip to San Antonio.  All of this grinding has been in pursuit of a larger goal; to play the game at a higher level.  Along the way my skills have increased as well and that increase is finally starting to show.

Unfortunately the grind is starting to get to me.  There is a break coming up for Thanksgiving and one more weekend trip to make.  I am not sure that I can make it 6 weeks in a row.  I have had decent success during this run, but the traveling is wearing on me.

These trips typically yield little sleep and require 1 or 2 full days of intense mental activity.  Needless to say it is easy to get burned out on this type of schedule.  The trips have been a lot of fun so far, but I am afraid I have reached my limit.  I am thankful for the break I am about to get.

Not only will I get a rest from competitive play, but I get to see my family as well.  I am very excited to go home for the first time in 9 months.  I will be able to get away from my school, teaching, and gaming schedules for 2 weeks.  This will be the perfect time for me to get away and recharge for the end of the semester.

I have been using these weekend trips to relax after my hellish weeks of teaching and learning.  Those trips have lost their luster as of this weekend.  I cannot wait to step away from all of it and come back afterward with fresh eyes.

Anticipation

I haven't had a lot of time for video games this semester.  I have been very busy with school and research and have used my precious free time for other hobbies.  Even having been away from video games, I still can't fight the call of a truly powerful title.  One such game is soon to release in stores and my excitement is growing by the hour.  That game is Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim and it releases in 9 days.

We are now within the most agonizing time period to be a fan of a soon-to-be-released game.  The last two weeks before a new game releases are brutal for uber-fanboys like myself.  At this point we have been waiting months (if not years) for the game to release and we can all but taste the gameplay.  To ease that pain (or make it worse, depending on your point of view) the game's developers usually leak a bit of pertinent information every day during this last two weeks. 

These teases are appreciated by most, but they often do little more than fan the flames of our craving.  This game is no exception; Over the past few days I have been anxiously downloading and reading any materials I can find about Skyrim.  This doesn't really help much, as I don't want to spoil the story via leaked information.  So, I have to be careful to dodge possible spoilers while probing the internet for juicy new tidbits about the game.  Even with these obstacles it's a fun way to keep my mind off how much I would rather be playing the game than anything else. 

Just 9 more days...Just 9 more days...Just 9 more days......

The best week of teaching

This week in Intro Zoo our lab was about Mollusks and Evolution.  We used mollusks as an example of adaptive radiation.  Usually these lectures are pretty boring, especially since I did not write the lectures.  It isn't that the lectures are poorly written, but writing lectures for multiple teachers isn't really a "one size fits all" thing.  I will often find myself jumping ahead or skipping slides to come back to them later.  This reordering sometimes presents the ideas with a better flow.

There wasn't much reorganizing this week, as the main topic of lecture was natural selection.  I believe I lectured for an average of 30 minutes too long in each of my sections.  This is one of the few lectures that directly pertains to my interests as a scientist.  The best part is that MOST of my students weren't asleep at the end!  Not only were the students interested, but I didn't hate the world at the end of my 3rd section this week (which is a first). 

I could hold out hope that this will become a trend, but I don't think I should.  I'm sure there will be other weeks which are nearly as interesting, but not many.  Ecology is where I hang my hat, and for 3 hours this week I got to talk about niches, what they are, and how they fit into the grand scheme of evolution.  Natural selection and its driving mechanisms are so elegant and simple.  I want to teach at the end of all this education and there is one reason for that; I enjoy helping others understand ideas and concepts that I find interesting.


"In the long history of humankind (and animal kind, too) those who learned to collaborate and improvise most effectively have prevailed. "
Charles Darwin

One after another

I am not a college football fan.  I love football, but my interest lies within pro ball.  I have been an Indianapolis Colts fan my entire life.  Since 1999 the team has posted a winning record and made the playoffs almost every year.  That success is mostly because the team decided to draft Peyton manning in 1998 and then build a team around him.

This season has not begun as well as the previous 12.  The team is yet to win a game this year.  This down trend is due to the absence of Peyton Manning.  Peyton had neck surgery (for the 2nd time this year) right as the season began.  He had to wait until the season began because of political complications within the National Football League.  League rules did not allow Peyton to see his team doctor over the summer (after the first surgery).  This meant no regular checkups of proper physical therapy, which led to the need for a 2nd surgery.

The team has had to make due without Peyton in the starting lineup.  The back up quarterbacks we have been using this year have not been up to snuff.  This fact has hurt out offensive production.  The unforeseen effects of Peyton's absence are the most harsh though.  He is a team leader, not just for the offense.  Without him keeping things running the defense and special teams have been lack-luster as well.  All these facts combine for an as-yet winless season.  I am still holding out hope, but I am not sad about missing all of the team's games this season.

There is always next year...and at this rate we will get the 1st pick in the draft :-/

A spark ignited

I am an avid gamer.  I have played just about every type of game you can think of, and most specific games that you could.  It all started with a flight simulator that my dad installed on our first home PC.  I was about 8 (I know why they don't make 8 year olds pilots) and I had hours of fun just trying to keep my jets airborne.  I was gifted a Sega Genesis when I was around 10, and that is where the obsession truly took hold.  I used to play the few games I had for hours on end.  I distinctly remember a love for NBA Jam, which is odd, as I hate sports games now.

My love of gaming encouraged broader and broader horizons as I grew older and met different people.  I rarely turn down an invitation to learn a new game.  This practice took me from video and board games into the world of miniature gaming, which led to both paper-and-pencil role playing games and collectible card games.  I still play each of these genera of games actively today (some more than others).  Upon moving to Oklahoma few years ago I sunk myself deep into video games as my escape from work.  That had given way to my current preoccupation with card games and RPGs.  I am quite happy with the progression that my gaming has taken here, as my interests today are the most social forms of gaming.  I am a social person, and love to be surrounded my friends and family.  In the absence of family, the nerds I pal around with now make my down time the most fun possible.

The wonders of talk-radio

I took a trip to San Antonio this weekend.  I went with a bunch of friends to cut down on hotel costs, share driving time, etc.  My friend Chris (who drove us both ways) filled our car in on his secret to long driving times: talk-radio.  In particular he likes to listen to Fox News (or something similar) as he finds their opinions and insights to be altogether laughable.  I detest politics, but I am open-minded and decided to give this method a shot.  My one condition was that I would treat these radio shows like Mystery Science Theater (Wiki page).  Our car had a wonderful time poking fun at just about everything we heard the hosts and guests say.  But I would like to share with you some of the things I learned from the radio on this trip (not all of these things came from conservative talk radio).

I learned that "Sister Joan-of-Arc" is an acceptable name for a Catholic nun.  I learned the difference between watts and lumens when choosing light bulbs.  We should all be investing most of our money into precious metals.  Some people expect silver to out-pace gold in price/ounce in the next 15 years.  I found out that not a single person who is "Occupying Wall Street" knows why they are doing it.  I learned that some people actually pay attention to what Roseanne Barr says now-a-days.  No one likes what Roseanne Barr says now-a-days.  The one fact that I for-sure came away with, after some 10 hours of talk radio, is that President Obama is ruining everything.

Ingesting science

I went to Cajun King Buffet with a friend this afternoon (more on the venue later).  At this fine establishment they had frog legs, which I had never had the opportunity to eat before.  The frog legs themselves were ok...not great, but not terrible.  Frog meat seems a bit odd, chewy and tasting like bland chicken.  The big story here is that I had never eaten something that I have dissected in a lab before.

It was a strange feeling.  When I looked at the legs I noticed the same muscle definition that I had seen in high school.  I remembered having to cut the skin before peeling it off the leg to identify the underlying muscles.  The only difference between the frog legs I had seen before was that the ones today were beaded and deep fried.  Thinking of all this did not stop me from enjoying my meal in any way (which made me feel like a good scientist for some reason).  I did, however, strip the legs and throw the meat into my gumbo, which increased their flavor all around.

Back to the topic of Cajun King.  This restaurant is amazing!  I am a big fan of Cajun food, which makes it a pretty obvious choice for me.  If you have never had correctly prepared Cajun, or if you love the style like me, then I cannot recommend Cajun King highly enough.  The staff is friendly (including a head chef who patrols the place to make sure you are having a good meal), the food quality is high, and it is right here in Norman (over by the Home Depot on Ed Noble Parkway)!

I promise they didn't pay me for that endorsement...

Broken headphones

So, as I have previously discussed, music is very important to me.  I normally get my daily allotment of tunes while riding the bus to and from campus.  I do try to respect my fellow commuters though.  Therefore I must use headphones to use whatever music playing device I have on hand.  I just recently had to buy a new pair of headphones.  This makes the 5th set I have bought in the last 3 years.

I understand that our current stage of technology pushes cheap and replaceable products.  That doesn't make this cycle suck any less.  At a point I realized that this break-and-buy method became a process for my headphone choice.  I first started with big flashy headphones, and they broke.  I then bought a pair of less flashy, equally as large headphones, and they broke.  Next up were smaller, weird-shaped headphones, and they broke.  After going through all these I bought the smallest, simplest set of headphones I could find.  To be fair they did end up lasting the longest out of any pair I have had (about a year).  But they still broke due to simple wear and tear. 

So, needing tunes, I was once again forced to buy a set of headphones.  I have now decided that my process for these purchases will be to find a pair like my last ones that costs the least amount possible.  Quality is obviously not a concern, as they WILL break.  If I assume they will break, then I can feel good about buying cheap ones. 

Connecting the world

I am still relatively new to social networking.  I started on twitter originally.  I got an account so that I could keep up with some of my friends from around the country.  Those same friends finally convinced me to get on facebook.  Before then I had avoided facebook and myspace and any other social networking site like the plague.  I had some idiotic notion that I was standing up for individuality by not signing up like everyone else (this mentality developed during undergrad, when facebook was just becoming popular). 

Once I finally got onto facebook I used it pretty irregularly.  I gradually got more used to the ins and outs of the site, as well as the proper uses for it.  Eventually it became my primary way of communicating with friends that I had developed here in Oklahoma.  I was also able to keep up with the lives of my brothers and friends from Purdue.  Thinking about it now, I realize that I have already started to take that opportunity for granted.  I remember how hard it was to keep in touch with my friends just a few years ago, and now I can stay just as close as they want me to be.



"Twitter is like being in a chatroom with the world, but you can only see comments from people you want to listen to."

A semi-unhealthy addiction.

Diet Dr. Pepper.  It is the best diet soda on the market, hands down.  I know this because it is the only one I drink.  I used to drink a lot of normal soda, but in the last year I have stopped taking in as much sugar.  To avoid the sugar I have switched to diet sodas but Diet DP is the only one that I really like.  It tastes as good as a diet soda can, but it does have some downsides.

It may not be triggering a possibility of diabetes, but the stuff is still full of preservatives and artificial sweeteners.  Those fillers are bad for me yes, but that isn't the part of drinking soda that annoys me most.  What really gets me is just how cluttered with soda cans that my apartment gets.  I am currently staring at half a case of cans strewn all across my living room.  Yes, this can probably be explained by my general apathy toward keeping my apartment clean.

Regardless, my apartment would look better if I simply installed a fountain drink machine...

Committee Selection

So, I met with my advisor yesterday.  He reminded me that I need to start assembling my graduate committee for this degree.  The committee has to contain my advisor, 3 professors from within the Zoology department and one professor from outside the department.  The outside professor is the only member (besides my advisor) that I have made a decision on.  I worked with Jeff Johnson at the University of North Texas last year; Jeff's lab was specifically created to process and analyze DNA samples that are more than 10 years old. 

The genetics portion of my dissertation work will be important.  It may be the most important part of my research scientifically.  I will be assessing the changes in genetic structure of an entire species over the past decade.  This assessment will give us insight into the past and possible future of the lesser prairie-chicken.  If successful, it will also show the scientific community that existing programs (currently used for spatial analysis) can be applied temporally.  This means that my findings could lead to some very exciting future research in the field of population genetics.

Fingers crossed.....

Teacher Appreciation Night

I just got out of teaching lab for the evening.  I have to say that these Monday night students are starting to shape up.  I am always glad to see a class of freshmen become better students as the semester goes on.  You can usually see the change as they start to understand how college classes work.  They begin to pay more attention, they ask better questions (or questions at all), and they can actually demonstrate their understanding of the material.

Tonight's class has actually been the best this semester.  It is odd to have a night class doing so well.  I have taught night classes before and they usually are just drifting through the lab for 3 hours until I let them leave.  But these Monday night students are outshining both my Tuesday morning and Wednesday afternoon labs.  I hope that this evening begins a trend for my classes in general.  I would especially like to see the Wednesday lab shape up...there is something off about that group.

Either way, we shall see, and I'm sure you will hear all about it...

Quick, like a bunny

This post will mostly be about my family, but I don't have a lot of time...so, it will just be a primer for later entries.  I am currently in the longest stretch of time I have ever gone through without going back home to Indiana.  My parents came to visit a few weeks ago, and I was very glad to see them.  But, man do I still miss home.  I haven't seen the rest of my family since January.  Within this time away from home I have missed 5 birthdays, both Mother's AND Father's day, and the birth of my newest nephew.

I am very big on family.  I have 3 sisters and a mother and father who all live back in the midwest (the real midwest...Oklahoma is NOT in the midwest) and I love spending time with all of them and their own families.  Our family get-togethers involve lots of incredible food, laughs, and a very high volume.  Most people miss "Mom's cooking," but when I miss that food I am missing the company and epic jokes that come with it.

Thanksgiving can't possibly come soon enough...

Life as it should be

I definitely can't say my life is perfect at this point in time, but it is doing it's best impression.  Sure, my schedule wrecks me for 3 days a week, but once I hit Wednesday night every week makes a full 180.  I love my current circle of friends and the community of nerds that I have fallen into.  I am very happy to say that my current situation reminds me of my time in the fraternity house.  I could never be as close to any group of people as I am to my brothers in Theta Xi but these dudes I hang out with now are not far off. 

We have such an amazing community of gamers here in Norman.  I love spending time at the shop (which is good because that's where I am if I am not in a classroom or in front of this computer), I trust the core group of people that hang out there, and the store owner is one of the best people I have ever met.  We encourage fair play, fun, and a social atmosphere, which is NOT what you get at most gaming stores.  But my nerdy fun isn't contained within those walls.

I am blessed to have a whole other set of fiends with which I game with outside the store.  This group is made up of people that I can truly trust and who have helped me build my life into what it is now.  Without the help of Ashton (especially, since he was my roommate for so long) Carrie, and Sylas I'm sure that I would have caved at some point down the line. 

Thank you guys, without you I wouldn't have reconnected with this side of myself, and would be much worse off for it.

Life is good.

The Science of Balance: Section Gamma

Today I want to talk a bit about this current semester.  It is already 3 weeks old and I believe I am just about settled in to the routine of my new schedule.  I have one thing to day about that new schedule: It sucks.  I do everything that a regular graduate student does on a weekly basis (minus research...mostly) in the first 3 days of each week.  I teach one section each day, I have all 3 sections of my 2 classes in those 3 days, and I have all my weekly meetings packed in there as well.

This compaction of activities means that I am constantly running around, both on and off campus, from about 7 am to 11 pm Monday through Wednesday.  The only upside to this at all is that I get both Thursday and Friday completely to myself.  I typically use those days to catch up on everything else (grading, research, homework, emails, etc.), but as these weeks have started to accumulate I am finding it harder to be motivated given the opportunity to just sit back and relax for a bit.

This is 100% me complaining, but hey, you asked for it by coming here... I made the comment several times on Tuesday that I was feeling much better about my week since Monday didn't exist this week.  Now I am trying to devise a way to make Monday not exist every week.  I will keep you posted on how that goes...

The Science of Balance: Part B

Today's edition in my multi-part series is about balancing fun with a graduate degree.  After recently going through the penultimate part of getting a Master's degree I believe I can finally sum it all up.  There were many points during my last degree where I slacked off a bit.  Figuring out exactly how to do a degree that is completely self-driven was pretty difficult at points.  But, that is really why I decided to get a Master's degree in the first place.  I have known for a long time that I want to go all the way for a PhD, but I also knew that I didn't want to go into that big of a commitment cold.  So, the plan was to get a Master's simply to figure out how grad school works.

Now that I have a 2nd degree under my belt I "know the ropes" and still want to keep going.  I figured out during undergrad just how important taking regular breaks is.  I believe that my learning how to balance school and fun is what has kept me from getting burned out up to now.  I think I may have let me "breaks" get a bit out of control during the Master's but I do have a much better appreciation for how to weave work and break time into one free-flowing thing.  I have already started to practice these findings this semester. 

I am pleased to report that the system is working, to now.  But I do think I will need a but more schedule structure throughout this degree...just to make sure I don't have a year-long repeat of this last summer...

The Science of Balance: Act 1

I had a fantastic talk with a friend last night.  My buddy Matt was in town for a fantasy football draft (which we were actually doing online) and ended up coming over to use my internet (luckily he brought his laptop).  Now, I have been doing fantasy drafts for about 6 years, ever since a couple fraternity brothers decided to run one during undergrad.  Those first few drafts (when everyone in our annual league was actually in the same state/town/building) were the most fun, because everyone was together and we could all yell at/slap/smack talk everyone else.  So, when one of my favorite people asked if he could hang out and draft with me in my living room, there was no question.

It was a lot of fun getting to talk football and make fun of everyone else and their terrible picks with Matt for a few hours.  Fortunately, Matt was in no rush to leave after the draft and we simply started chatting about life afterward.  He and I hadn't seen one another in a couple months and it was really nice to get to catch up with him.  We had both been pretty busy of late and, since his busy time usually kept him out of town, he couldn't come to our weekly card game. 

We also talked about that card game, and how that was how we had met, and how we met a few of our other close friends here in town.  Today I am still a bit baffled by the fact that something as simple as a weekly card tournament could have gotten me to where I currently am in life.  Before I started playing that game I was miserable out here in Oklahoma.  I only had a couple of friends, was coming out of soul-crushing relationship, and wasn't even sure if I had the chops to finish my degree.  After just a couple of weeks of showing up the "cool kids" started bringing me into their conversations and even going out for drinks after the games were over.

I am happy to say that those first few interactions have led to so much more.  I now have some of the best friends I have had in my life right here in and around town.  I have developed an enjoyable life here in Norman.  And I got my act together and finished my degree.  Life is going pretty well, even with some recent bumps, and I am in a good place.  My new friends out here have helped me through so much, even if they don't know it, and I can only hope that I will be able to help them just as much or more in the future.

Music as a Sanctuary

Music is very important to me.  My most practical use for music is as a personal divider I set up between me and the world when in public.  I just don't care to hear about the ongoings of people I don't know on the bus...and so I pop my ear-buds in and press "up" on the volume until everything else goes away.  This is usually pretty easy as my preferred genre is heavy metal. 

I love metal for its flat out, no holds barred style.  In my opinion it is the purest form of music, emotionally.  Generally, you can tell from a song that the artists were pissed when they wrote it, but they can also slow down the tempo and be "more expressive" or at least more comprehensible.  Regardless of the song, there is no mistaking how they felt, which makes the music very honest.  I am often asked why I choose to listen to metal, and my reply is normally, "Because listening to it is like punching someone in the face...with your ears."

There are other virtues of course, not the least of which is the way music can focus you on yourself and relate to things you are going through.  Taking 3 minutes at a time for yourself to think about life around you and your place in the world is a good thing.  My favorite quality that music has is it's ability to connect you to someone that you have never met.  When you hear lyrics written by someone else, in a different time, in a different place, that perfectly describe something that you are going through...there simply isn't another feeling like that in the world.  Simply knowing that someone else, typically someone you admire, has been there is a powerful support tool in this life.



TL;DR: Music kicks ass...go listen to some now.

Forecasting

It has been a teeter-totter few weeks for me and technology.  I ruined my laptop a couple weeks ago by throwing my morning cereal all over it.  I then got a copy of Windows 7 from the University to reformat the hard drive of my desktop (which had been rendered out of commission due to virus').  My desktop now works just fine, and that computer is where I write this message from. 

Today I installed Arc GIS on my PC and began working on a side project for the Sutton Avian Research Center.  This is actually the beginning of an exciting time for me and my career as I plan on publishing several papers over the next 6 months or so.  The work I am doing for the Sutton Center is with White-tailed Ptarmigan, a species of grouse which lives at high elevations in the Rockie Mountains.  I will also be reworking my thesis data to get at a wider array of deeper questions for publication.  I have also been introduced to several new modeling programs over the past few weeks, and I already see differences between those programs and niche modeling programs which have not been explored in the literature.  I am sure I will touch more on this later.

The new programs I speak of (I don't remember the names without my notes handy) are used to separate existing maps into categories based on color patterns within the maps.  These programs require a map of much higher resolution and quality, which can be quite expensive.  They do, however, offer results at a very fine scale, which is important when attempting to identify patches of habitat via aerial photos.  This process can be done without these programs, in a VERY time intensive process.  I have known graduate students who have worked on projects such as this and spent weeks processing a few hectares of geography by hand.  I am very excited to try out these new methods and see what they can contribute to the field of ecological modeling.

Backtracking

After the aside from my last post, let's get back to my 2 part sciencey introduction.

As I said, I recently finished my Master's degree in a bit of an odd situation.  I had to cram the research and writing of a degree that some people never finish into about 6 months.  My Plan B actually came from my desired Plan A.  About a year ago I decided that I wanted to forgo getting a Master's to simply roll my existing work into a PhD.  In an odd turn of events the Department (of Zoology) accepted me to the PhD program but wanted me to finish my Master's degree before beginning this fall. 

I had already planned out my PhD with my advisor (Michael Patten) and niche modeling (more appropriately called habitat suitability modeling (HSM)) was to be part of that work.  So, I proposed a change of focus to my committee, knowing that I had little time to finish a thesis and that my genetics work could not possibly be finished with my current time and funding constraints.  After lengthy discussion I was now faced with learning the HSM software and writing a thesis by the middle of this summer.

The program MaxEnt was my weapon of choice, and the basics of the program were simple enough.  The difficulty was within Arc GIS.  I struggled with the program for weeks before finally processing my data to the point where it could be run through MaxEnt and models could be created.  There were a few issues that I never truely resolved and had to work around in the end, but my results supported most of my proposed hypotheses.  (I would be happy to discuss my findings with you if you are interested, but since this data is what I will be publishing I imagine the topic will come up over the course of the semester)

The writing of the thesis is another tale unto itself, one which I likely won't be sharing here for personal reasons.  Suffice to say, it was an odd time in my life for multiple reasons, and it was very stressful on both me and those around me.  I did come out the other side though, turning in my 3 signed copies a full day before the deadline even.  And with that part of my academic career now behind me I am hopeful for the future and what I can make of this new period of my life. 

The Dung Beetle: Nature's Friendly Garbage Man

I know I left my last post with a cliff-hanger of sorts, but I would like to shift gears for this entry.  I would like to preface this entry by saying that I am not an Entomologist, nor have I ever actually studied beetles.  The closest I have ever gotten to that was working at the same lab bench as someone who was doing meta-population experiments using flour beetles.  Regardless, today I will be writing about a family of insects that has fascinated me since I first saw them on Wild Discovery as a kid.

Dung beetles are both sophisticated and majestic.  Within this superfamily of insects (Scarabaeoidea) can be found microcosms of ecological principles.  Not only are these animals a wealth of scientific knowledge, but they have a mystique about them that has intrigued human beings since the Ancient Egyptians. 

Species of this superfamily can be found throughout the world in various shapes and sizes.  The species which are best know, however, tend to be those of the African savannahs.  In these habitats species of dung beetle use feces (primarily from herbivores) as the foundation for their lives.  For these insects, dung comprises 3 of the necessary components for a species habitat: food, water, and shelter. 

There are 3 primary kinds of dung beetle and each uses dung in a different manner.  Rollers are they kind that we think of instantly when asked about these bugs.  These species gather feces, compact it into a manageable ball and roll it to where they need it most (generally to be buried underground and stored for continual use).  There are two other typical kinds of dung beetles: tunnelers and dwellers.  Tunnelers will bury their treasures wherever they find it.  Whereas dwellers will, as you may have guessed, burrow into and live within piles of manure. 

One theory to explain rolling behavior is that of competition.  When something like an elephant leaves a gift to the world behind that gift can sustain multiple beetles.  As in most societies there were individual beetles who figured out that they needed not gather or claim their own dung when they could simply steal it from another beetle who had done their work for them.  Thus, intraspecific competition created a  need to move dung away from gathering places and evolution took hold from there.

As odd as it sounds these creatures, who feed upon and dwell in feces, attained a revered status in one of the most advanced and sophisticated cultures in the history of mankind.  Ancient Egyptians used another name for these insects, scarab, and often used its likeness as inspiration for artworks of all kinds.  Their people held the insect sacred as its rolling of dung was likened to Khepri (god of the rising sun) rolling the run across the sky.  The origins of its reverence may be a bit more practical, however.

Dung beetles may be most welcome in agricultural settings.  A farm full of domesticated and herded livestock may be the ideal setting for the beetles as well.  In these situations the bugs natural activities keeps an excess of feces from accumulating in livestock pens.  Less standing waste can translate into fewer pests buzzing around the farm as well as less disease transmission between farm animals.  Reducing death rates of livestock would give any society cause to worship something.

For these reasons I believe the dung beetle to be one of the most fascinating animals on the planet.  Here I have given only a fraction of the information that there is to obtain about these incredible species.  Should I ever find myself on the Serengeti I will make sure to seek out and, if I'm lucky, study these fine creatures.  I hope we are all so lucky as to find that day.