As June 2010 Fades to Gray...

There's at least one nice thing about getting older: the birthday cakes get better! And so do the parties. And so do your friends.
I actually have a lot to be thankful for right now. I love where I am, I love who I'm with. I have some fantastic peers, supportive friends, some great projects on the horizon. I have a lawn mower! Who knew that mowing the yard could make me so happy?
I practically live in a wildlife refuge. I keep finding critters around here that I've never seen before. (Arkansas has humongous centipedes!) I have to refill our hummingbird feeders every day because we have so many that come to our house. (I counted 12 coming to feed at one time this week.)
One of my students recently invited me to go to Mexico with her to go snorkeling with whale sharks. How could I say no to that? I've never been to Mexico and I've never been snorkling with whale sharks. (Just call me Jacqueline Cousteau.... :)

About this fabulous cake: this was made by none other than Paula Pendergrass, owner of Cakes Alive! in Dover, AR. She is a former anatomy professor who decided to delay retirement by opening her own bakery. The cake was chocolate with buttercream icing. The top layer was a plastic molded scene, featuring the characters Jack, Kate, Locke and Hurley from the popular TV show LOST. The hatch had a functional light bulb it it, which looked great when the ceiling lights were turned off. And yes, that is the smoke monster spelling out "Happy Birthday, Jennifer!" It was made from marshmellows and black icing.
Thank you, Paula!!!

Best Time Ever!

   This was our first night on the pier, at the Gulf Coast Research Laboratory in Ocean Springs, Mississippi. The students from Tech's coastal ecology course were excited to be out of Arkansas, and I was elated to be near the ocean again. (I'm the one sitting with the fishing pole.) There were two other students who liked to fish, and we spent many nights after dark on this pier, catching strange creatures that you just don't come across in the freshwater lakes and rivers of Arkansas.
   You can see Biloxi illuminated in the background. I didn't go there the night the students went to check out the casinos. We were staying awake for the all-nighter diel study that needed to be continued at 4:00 in the morning. Instead I stayed up watching the final episodes of "LOST."
We did not come across any oil in the Gulf during or trip, but we could smell it in the air when the wind blew towards us. We saw dolphins playing out in the Gulf, and some near the pier where we fished every night. I am hoping they will still be there next year.

Power Tools Inspired by Godzilla

   Today at Lowe's, I was thrilled to see that the Hitachi line of power tools resembled something that would be used by superheroes. Look at this design (photos above.) It screams, "I'm Japanese, and I'm going to kick your ____!"
   An older gentleman was watching me handle the cordless drills, and he asked, "Are you going to buy me one of those for Father's Day?" I laughed and said, "No. I'm going to buy one for myself." I asked him if they looked Japanese to him, and he said, "Yeah, it looks like that kung fu crap."
   I talked to the sales associate, and he said that Hitachi made good drills and they had a good reputation. And, the one with the lithium batteries would last the longest.

   Watch out, world; I now have my own kung fu, Godzilla-colored cordless drill!

Lord, BP, what have you done!?

Photo by Rick Loomis / Los Angeles Times

   As of today, (May 31, 2010), crude oil from BP's ocean well explosion has been spewing into the Gulf of Mexico for 41 days. Since the "Top Kill" plan to dump heavy mud and concrete into the well failed to stop the oil from gushing out, it seems this disaster will continue to grow in magnitude for an indefinite amount of time.


   Here are some composite satellite images from NASA:

http://motherjones.com/blue-marble/2010/05/gulf-oil-space-35-days


   And here's a live-feed link from a remotely-operated vehicle at the the site of the well:


http://www.bp.com/liveassets/bp_internet/globalbp/globalbp_uk_english/homepage/STAGING/local_assets/bp_homepage/html/rov_stream.html

Return from the Gulf

My favorite place on Earth: Pier One at the Gulf Coast Research Laboratory

   Ahhhhh...my sunburn is gone! The laundry is washing, my cat is fed, and there are clean sheets on my bed. I am back from a week-long visit to the Gulf Coast. My school offers a summer speed-course called "Coastal Ecology" for biology majors. It is a wonderful alternative to our traditional, computer-based, heavy-into-statistics ecology course.
   The coastal class is only three weeks long, and the field portion is held at the Gulf Coast Research Laboratory (GCRL) in Ocean Springs, Mississippi. My school has had a partnership with the GCRL for many, many years, and we usually bring a group of 10 to 15 students down each summer.
   One of the highlights of the trip is the venture to Horn Island, a pristine wildlife sanctuary that boasts white sand and beautiful beaches. No man-made structures whatsoever. It only takes a little more than an hour to motor out to the island, then we usually spend a few hours on the island, and we troll on the way home (8 hours in the water-reflected sun - hence the sunburn.) This time, there was a snafu with our packed lunches, but the Larry-the-ever-awesome-captain ran to the store to get us fruit, drinks, and sandwich items. I asked for coffee, and Larry explained that the boat's generator was out, so he couldn't make any. Then he promptly got a cup and poured me some coffee from his own mug. I've never met anyone that nice.
   During the trip, I asked Larry if I could get a picture with him. He not only complied, but he handed me the wheel! I guided the Hermes up the channel, listening to Larry and the first mate as they told me which poles to stay between. After a few minutes, I saw a dolphin jump out of the water and I screamed, "There's a dolphin!" Larry took the wheel back so he could turn around and make the dolphin chase us. One of our students took excellent pictures of it jumping in and out of our wake.
   We caught some fairly large shrimp while we trolled on the way back from the island. One of our students cooked us a nice meal of shrimp and little red potatoes drizzled in butter and Worcestershire sauce one night.
   I spent many nights out on the large pier in front of the GCRL. I met many people visiting from other schools, and I particularly enjoyed talking with a shark researcher and some of his students from the University of New England in Maine. We sat for hours, baiting our hooks with gulf menhaden and shrimp, and catching sand seatrout and hardhead catfish. The students were here for a fish physiology course, and they needed gafftopsail catfish and the seatrout for their lab experiments.
   I had met a different shark researcher earlier at the GCRL. I was pretty excited to find out that there are new satellite tagging capabilities that transmit real-time data from sharks as they go about their daily business. Apparently, we know nothing about sharks! One shark that had been tagged was in the dark for more than 24 hours, so the researchers could tell that it had been eaten by another shark! One hammerhead that had been tagged swam down to a depth of nearly 1000 feet, and did this several times in one day. The researcher said that no one had any idea that a shark could acclimate so quickly to such a rapid change in pressure. The future of shark research is "understanding their biology," I was told. Sounds pretty exciting to me!

   After two days of fishing and seining, one student said, "every student from Tech should take this class. They'd be hooked," he said. I completely agree with him.

Star Wars Cookies

   I want these! Williams Sonoma, one of my favorite stores, has these adorable Star Wars cookie cutters for sale. They do not, however, have any Han Solo cookie cutters.
   That is truly unfortunate....I think a Han Solo cookie could cheer a girl up any day!

Grecophile

   This is a painting of Diogenes, the famous Greek who was purported to carry a lamp around in the daylight, "looking for an honest man." He shunned wealth and materialistic objects, slept in a tub in the city, and harassed Plato during his lectures. He has been described as a "Socrates gone mad."

   There are many famous quotes from Diogenes, but this one in particular hits home to me:
"The foundation of every state is the education of its youth."