No fitting title

A couple of hours ago my husband and I heard our baby's heartbeat for the first time! It was so, so incredibly cool. Wow.

Otherwise the doctor visit went well. I am not at high risk for anything. I am healthy. I've actually lost 5lb since my last visit at the beginning of November. I didn't have to have a pap, just a little bit of blood taken to test my thyroid. All is well.

Thanks!

Thanks for all of your congratulations! I'm excited about having a baby, but sometimes it's really hard to be happy and excited *at the moment*. Like when I'm sick or sleepy at 7pm, or when I can't cook anything because it makes me nauseous, or when I think about how different things are going to be! Silly. I've got a doctor's appointment tomorrow, so I'll let you know how that goes.

I've decided that studying for comps will take precedence over counting pollen. Why? So I can get the darn test over with as soon as possible! Late January, probably. Which will be better than February because I think one of my committee members is going to be gone most of February. So, with a couple exceptions I will be reading constantly for the next month. I'm almost certain to fry my brain. But then, it'll be done!

I'd better start... I'll probably need a new eyeglasses prescription when this is done too!

Finally posting again

Yes, finally. After a loooong time. Sorry. I am finally done for this semester. This morning I had a 7am final. Actually, it was either 7, 7:30 or 8. I got there at 7:30. I was throwing up at 7.

Why was I throwing up? Well, I will tell you all now that I am pregnant. I got pregnant in October. Baby is due sometime around July 6. I don't know about any of you who have been pregnant in school, but the first trimester is killing me! I've been sick since week six. And I'm so sleepy! Sheesh. Somehow I managed to complete the semester. I'm so glad.

During break, we are going to visit D's dad and family for Christmas. We're leaving Christmas day again (we did this last year). It's fun though. I'm looking forward to Chicago. Then, just after New Years we are going down to Jackson for some more of my thesis research. This time we're going to hang out at the Historical Society in downtown Jackson for 3+ days. I'm looking for old photographs of any areas around the lakes I cored. I want documentation of land-use changes since settlement. At the Historical Society there are also documents and papers, journals, etc. So we've got our work cut out for us, but at the same time we get to hang out in beautiful Jackson in January, and we got a hotel for really cheap!

Then it's back to school. Over break I am also studying for my comprehensive exam, which will be sometime in Feb I think. My topics are: paleoecology, Quaternary history of the greater Yellowstone area, and settlement of the West and specifically Jackson Hole. I have to get on that settlement stuff, because I know nothing about it. I have a couple books already, and I have a list of papers that I have to get from the library. That's next Monday's project. Also over break I have to start counting pollen. I can't decide which is most important - studying or counting. I don't think I'll fail my comps, but I have to learn this settlement stuff and review everything else or I might do so bad they can't help but fail me. However, getting everything done is going to be a problem. I have to decide on a priority, and I haven't yet.

Everyone, enjoy your break (if you get one)! And do take a little bit of time off to appreciate the fact that you are alive. Happy holidays.

I made an age-depth model

Yes, this morning I sat down and made an age-depth model for the one core that I have fully dated. I did get those radiocarbon dates which I was waiting for to see how old my records are, and now I'm waiting on some 210 Pb dates from the tops of the other two cores. When you have both 14C and 210Pb dates from a site, you can put them together and make a pretty graph. So that's what I did. Here is that nice graph:
Isn't it pretty? I fit a 3rd order polynomial to the data (black line) which is the actual "model". Now I use that to make my charcoal data into a time-series. Then I can start doing all kinds of fun statistics on it. I am looking forward to getting my other lakes age-depth models worked out because one big thing I want to look at is possible correllations between lakes.

Shot day

Today was flu shot day. My husband and I both got them this year. I can't even remember the last time I had a flu shot. It must have been years and years ago.

Today was also nap-at-work day. Whew! I was so exhausted that I fell asleep in my chair for about 20 minutes. Then when I woke up I was all out-of-it. Needless to say, I haven't gotten much done today other than that flu shot.

I did grade tests, and I'm about to go get some dirt out of the oven and then go to class. I'm still way tired and just sluggish. I'm so glad the semester is almost over!

Well, well

Another week. I can hardly believe that Thanksgiving is next week! My husband and I are leaving on Wednesday for his mom's house. We're coming back the following Monday. Should be a nice vacation - if I could be assured of not being airsick.

The week after Thanksgiving I have a committee meeting that I have to prep for, and I have another presentation that week too. Ugh. At least the semester is almost over. I'm just looking forward to the break from classes. Yes, I have to work a lot over Christmas break, but at least I don't have to go to class at certain times. I'm getting really tired of that.

I have to go use the printer now to print some papers I need to read for class tomorrow. I completely forgot all weekend, and yesterday, so now I have to catch up. Yay. My brain is addled.

Long weekend!

I didn't realize until yesterday that tomorrow is Veteran's Day and that means no classes! No statistics tomorrow, yay! A long weekend will be nice. I don't know what we're going to do, but we'll do something.

I feel like I'm plodding along so slowly in my research. Now I'm supposed to finish by the end of June, and that doesn't seem plausible to me. I still have to count all the pollen samples, and then I have to do a whole bunch of data analysis, and write my actual thesis. I feel like maybe I could finish by then if I worked non-stop. But I can't do that. If I did I would just go crazy. Plus I still have to take classes next semester. Aargh! I'm a little worried about this. And I STILL have to go back to Jackson one more time to look at photographs. I don't even know how I'm going to work the photograph thing into my thesis. Yes, this week I'm supposedly "powering" through another round of thesis questions - so that I really can start writing my intro and methods and that preliminary stuff. I'm kind of stuck though. I guess I just have to sit down and think for a while - something I haven't had time for.

On a completely random side note, the strangest things can cheer me up. Just now, I was thinking about the above paragraph and looking at my desk when I realized that I still have these two fake rocks that are models of rocks on Mars. They're fake because they're not really from Mars and they're man-made. But they're pretty cool! That just made me a little bit happier.

Have a wonderful weekend, everyone! Relax a little...

To do this week

I had a meeting with my advisor this morning to talk about the dates and the next step in my project. So now I have a list of stuff to get done by next Monday. It's kind of nice to have research meetings on Monday. Here it is:

• rewrite questions in proposal - to get ready to start writing actual thesis
• "play around" with 14C and 210Pb dates from one core and see if they can be correllated
• figure out a temporally equal sampling interval for pollen in all three lakes.
  

This stuff won't take me too long. Except maybe "playing around" with the dates. That one's a little weird. This week I have a lot on my plate though. I also have:

• doctor's appointment Tuesday
• car appointment Thursday
• haircut (!) Tuesday
• read for veg history by Wednesday AM
• statistics test in less than 1 hour

At least the test will be over 2 hours from now. Whew!

14C

I finally got my radiocarbon dates! Now I have to make sense of them. This can be a little tricky. My biggest problem? Two dates from the same centimeter (one bulk sediment and one macrofossil) came back different. Very different. Not even close to being within one standard deviation. This is the biggest problem. The others I can probably work out.

I feel extra busy right now. I need to really get cracking on my presentation for veg history. I'm giving it on the Wednesday after Thanksgiving. I'm also setting up a committee meeting, which I think I'm going to have the Friday before Thanksgiving. Now I have to get cracking on my thesis again. I guess I feel like I haven't been working on it much, because I haven't been writing or anything. Now I can actually start writing something, and be writing as I count pollen. Processing starts next week hopefully!

Now I have to eat my banana.

AM pollen

This morning I decided I'd better get my pollen samples ready for processing, since I need to finish up my thesis next summer. In order to do this I needed an actual physical accounting for each sample that I have. So, I went down to the refrigerator in the basement to grab my sample box. I had to transfer everything to a larger box, since I had some extra that wouldn't fit. While doing this, I spilled everything on the floor! Ugh. It only took me a few minutes to pick everything up. Sheesh.

I got to my desk and started an Excel spreadsheet for all the samples. It took quite a while to write in all the numbers, since I have hundreds of pollen samples. Once that was finished I got to choose which ones I will process. I chose every 7th for each core for the low resolution record. I haven't chosen a higher resolution portion yet, so I can't pick those samples yet. Total processing amounts to 61 samples for the low resolution record. Not bad. I don't know the time-resolution that the pollen will be yet; I'm still waiting for radiocarbon dates. Now I need to start processing and then start counting! It'll take a little bit to get used to counting pollen, but I learn that sort of thing quickly, and I don't see it taking too long. That's the last thing before real data analysis! Oh, plus the January trip down to Jackson to look at historical photographs. I'm looking forward to that too.

My advisor wants me to help the new grad student in our lab write her proposals. She needs to write one for the department, and for Yellowstone NP, and she's applying for the NSF graduate fellowship (which I did last year, to no avail). Apparently my advisor thinks I write much better than the girl does, and she wants me to "coach" her. I don't really know about my coaching abilities in writing. I've never actually tried to help someone write a long paper before. I've edited or put my comments on a few longer papers, but I'm not really sure how to coach someone! I'm not even sure how I learned to write well!

I do remember the first time I tried to write a scientific paper. It was the end of my sophomore year in college, and I was taking a very awesome field geology course. We had to map a different area every few weeks, and then analyze the maps and come up with a geologic history of the area and present it in a scientific paper. It was one of the best classes I took. I remember getting that first paper back with a very bad grade, and hence learning what NOT to do in a scientific paper. I guess since then it has gotten easier.

Nothing to write about

I'm trying to come up with something, but it looks like I won't make it.

I've got to count some charcoal this weekend. And make sure the rest of the data I've already collected is in order. Next week I have to really start scheduling a committee meeting. And several other things I've been putting off. I should have radiocarbon dates in a week.

Last weekend my friend Marianne and I made pumpkin pies. We made them from pie pumpkins, which is really fun! You just boil the pumpkin until it's soft and scoop it out of the skin with a spoon. Then blend it until smooth and use like you would canned pumpkin. Makes really yummy pies. We made 5, which took all afternoon.

Yet another new template

I just changed the colors this time. I couldn't even stand looking at all that purple! I hope this is more aesthetically pleasing. If you missed the purple, you're probably better off.

Veg history answer

Like I mentioned before, here is a post of an answer for my vegetation history class.  The question: Does history matter?  In other words, do we need to know about events in the past to understand the present?
     History matters.  We do need to know about events in the past to understand the present, but even more, we need to understand the past to understand the present, and the future.  Understanding sequences of events that shaped the past or variables that interacted to cause events in the past will help us better understand the present.  
     The diversity of the Amazon rainforest is a pertinent question that involves the understanding of history.  If we can understand what caused the Amazon to become so diverse, then we understand the present condition better and can possibly plan for the future.  Adams and Woodward (1989) assert that diversity is controlled by modern-day net primary productivity.  However, they state in their introduction that, “ differences in species richness between three northern temperate regions, Europe, eastern North America and eastern Asia, can be mainly explained in terms of present-day climate factors … without the need to invoke the historical explanation.”     They conclude that history does not matter, because strikingly similar patterns in the productivity-richness pattern occur on various continents, separated by vast oceans.  Therefore whatever happened in these various places in the past certainly did not make any difference in what we see there now.
     McGlone (1996) has another argument.  He argues that, “A close relationship between climate and species richness is observable only at regional scales and results mainly from the influence of glacial-interglacial climatic cycles in determining the regional species pool.”  In other words, McGlone refutes Adams and Woodward’s hypothesis by saying that it is important what plants existed on each continent in the past, and what happened to those plants as climate changed.  McGlone argues that both the plants you start out with and the type of climatic changes they have to deal with all help to give us our modern-day assemblages.  He also reminds us that, “Ecological and biogeographical processes work continuously through time, and the current situation must reflect past ecologies.”
     Another author who advocates for the past is Retallack (2001).  In his paper, Retallack poses a lofty argument that Cenozoic climate change was driven by the expansion of the grasslands and the co-evolution of grasslands and grazers.  Throughout his paper, Retallack argues that grasslands have the ability to control global climate by being carbon sinks, fertilizers, dehumidifiers, and fire starters.  Besides his point that grasslands are important to climate change, Retallack reinforces the argument that understanding history is important for understanding the present.  An underlying point of his paper is that we need to understand what caused the Cenozoic global cooling that lead to the recent ice ages in order to understand our present situation, and what might happen in the future.  
     Leopold and Denton (1987) use grassland development to make a strong argument that history is important.  They study the development of grasslands in western North America, and the differences between the Great Plains, Rocky Mountains and Columbia Plateaus grasslands through time.  They state that, “The biogeographic, physical, and climatic contrasts of these regions imply that their historical development must have been very different.”  In comparing the evolution of grasslands over the western U.S., they found stark differences between the three regions over time.  Their conclusion: the regions had to have something different happen to them in the past, and that past affected what we see in those areas today.  
     Lastly, Whitlock and Bartlein (1993) show that history matters in the paleoecologic record of the northern Rocky Mountains.  They conclude that vegetation and climate changes in the northern Rockies during the Holocene were due, at least in part, to changes in summer insolation.  Knowing things like this about the past can help us understand why conditions are as they are today.  

New template

I've finally finished a new template. PLEASE let me know if you think it is the ugliest thing you've ever seen, and if it will make you stop reading my blog. Purple isn't my favorite color, but I wanted a cool-colored blog. Something relaxing. But if purple will cause me to lose readers, then I'll change it. :)

I've been combating the sleepy bug today. It seems to happen especially on Friday afternoons. I have statistics class at 1, in a warm room, right after lunch. That always makes me sleepy, and it seems I can't shake it on Fridays. I had some LOI analysis to finish (crucibles to take out of the oven) after class today, and that seemed to wake me up a bit. I was seriously considering going home at about 3 and napping, but I'm still here. I'm hanging on as long as I can today. I think I will go to the physics colloquium at 4. It's a nice change of scenery. Today's talk is, "The Compact Light Source: A Miniature Synchrotron Light Source for the Homelab". Maybe I won't go.

In the interest of something scientific, my next post will probably be from one of the questions we had to answer in my veg history class. I'm finishing them up for Monday, and some are interesting questions. We're learning about ecology, but I"m sure you ecologists out there know way more than I ever will. Maybe it'll encourage thinking. Next time...

The Salt Lake story

I've been back from GSA for a day now, and I finally have time to write. Sciencewoman asked what my favorite talks were, and how the conference went in general. So here is the story:

The conference started Sunday morning, with the student breakfast at 7. We got to SLC on Saturday afternoon, so we had a bit of time to relax, which was very nice! Sunday noon I had a meeting - and I got a free lunch out of it! Sunday afternoon I looked at the paleontology posters, and I met a couple grad students in paleobotany. They were all very nice. Later Sunday afternoon my husband and I actually got together with one of my friends from high school, who is at BYU. That was fun. We walked around the city and looked at the Temple, and then ate some really, really good indian food. Mmmmm.

Monday morning I saw some paleontology talks. My favorite was "Comparison of museum and published relative abundances reveals a consistent publication bias" by Edward Davis. But other talks were also really cool, like Dan Peppe's "Magnetostratigraphy and megaflora of the lower Paleocene Fort Union Formation along the southwestern margin of the Williston Basin, North Dakota".

Monday for lunch my husband and I went to this quaint little tearoom and had sandwiches and tea. That's where I realized my email problem, and wrote my last blog entry. Later that afternoon I went to some talks in the "Causes and effects of the Paleocene-Eocene thermal maximum and other Paleogene hyperthermal events" session. I think my favorite from that session was Victoriano Pujalte's "Abrupt climatic and sea level changes across the Paleocene-Eocene boundary, as recorded in an ancient coastal plain setting (Pyrenees, Spain)". But all the talks were great. After that session I had another meeting, and then the grad students that I met on Sunday afternoon invited me to dinner with them. We had empanadas, which were yummy and cheap. Monday night there were alumni receptions, and my husband and I went to the "Rio Grande Rift" reception (it was all NM schools plus UTEP) and saw some people we haven't seen in a while.

Tuesday morning I went to more paleontology posters and talked with Lael Vetter (Spider) about her "The Gilcrease Ranch mammoth site, Las Vegas Valley". I had yet another meeting that morning, and another at 1. We left SLC at about 2 that afternoon.

I didn't go to talks the whole time, but the ones I saw were really interesting. I also really enjoyed talking with the people presenting posters, and meeting new grad students doing what I want to do. It was good all around, I think.

Now that I'm back I have to get my butt in gear! I have a 10 page paper and presentation to write by Thanksgiving, I have stats homework, and I have to get my committee figured out! I'm still waiting for radiocarbon dates so that I can figure out my committee and re-write my proposal. I'm not worried about the writing, that will go quickly. I am getting a little antsy about my committee, since I need to have a meeting this semester and schedule comps for late January or early February. Argh!

In the midst of silliness

I'm in the middle of GSA in Salt Lake City. Very exciting. Geologists EVERYWHERE! I came here to meet people doing what I want to do, and so far I have had one success.

I am one of the few left without a cell phone. So I told the people that I wanted to meet with that I would be checking my email often. I have been checking it fairly often, several times a day, but I seemed to not be getting anything! The webmail I am using from my university has recently been changed, so I was trying to use the new system. And just a few minutes ago I realized that I wasn't seeing new emails because for some reason, I wasn't sorting by date... *sigh* I had a couple of emails from the people I wanted to meet with, all suggesting times or places. One was this morning, which I completely missed because of my email faux pas. Oops.

Hopefully, all will work out well. Yesterday was really productive actually. My meeting went very well, and I *maybe* found some potential projects (PhD or just work, either is good). I have seen some great talks and met some really cool people doing cool things. I'm just a bit angry with myself for being such a dork. And, it is very difficult for me to just walk up to people and introduce myself, especially when they're talking to other people. I haven't got that level of self-confidence I guess. I'm learning to be more assertive though. It just takes some time.

Anonymous thoughts

BotanicalGirl has recently written a very thought-provoking post about anonymous blogging, and what or what not to write. This got me thinking a lot (as I'm sure it got most people thinking) about my own blog and how anonymous I am.

I've thought about this a little before. I changed my "name" to just K (before it was my first name). I don't have much in the way of a profile. I have made my geographical location clear in previous posts, and my university. I have talked about my department a couple of times, nothing very specific. I have talked a little about my research, but not in any great detail either. This is different for me than BotanicalGirl, because I'm not afraid of getting scooped, I just think it would bore all my potential readers to death! I try not to complain about specific things, such as university policies, my advisor, department, labmates, etc. Because I don't want them to find my blog and potentially read what I think about them, of course. So I try to keep that to a minimum. Except that I have expressed the fact that I don't particularly love my research and I'm looking for something new. But my advisor knows that already anyway.

Very few people I know personally read my blog. I think my husband reads occasionally, and my mom reads maybe once a month. My *constant* reader is my father-in-law (hi dad!). I really love the fact that he reads my blog on a regular basis. I love it because I know at least someone will read what I write (and that's always a good feeling). But I also love it because I feel that by reading whatever I write, he is getting to know me a little better, and with that I feel closer to him. We get along well already(which is fairly lucky I think), but we don't get to talk much, so this is a way of keeping mentally in-touch.

Sometimes I would like to post more about my research (when it is interesting), but I do feel like it is boring to the average reader. A few readers of BotanicalGirl's blog commented that they enjoy her more personal posts. I enjoy them too! I feel that we're all sort of getting to know one another in the blog-world, however anonymously. And it is always soooo nice to find out that someone else is going through similar things in their life. Whether you read about it on someone else's blog, or post something personal yourself and get comments, you're pretty much assured that someone out there can empathize. I love that about blogging. It's almost like group therapy. I know that sounds totally corny!

Getting things together

I spent this morning getting ready for my trip to Salt Lake city, where I'm going for the Geological Society of America conference. I'm not presenting a poster or giving a talk - I'm going to meet some people doing what I really want to do. I want to get to know more people in the paleobotanical field, maybe to find some PhD research or just other research in general. I'm really looking forward to this.

The weather should be nice for the trip too. My husband is driving down with me. It should be a nice break from school here, for a couple days.

Hooray!

More time-wasting quizzes! What else is the internet good for?
.

You Should Get a PhD in Science (like chemistry, math, or engineering)

You're both smart and innovative when it comes to ideas. Maybe you'll find a cure for cancer - or develop the latest underground drug.

What Advanced Degree Should You Get?

I just did something extraordinary

For me that is.

I was having a misunderstanding with my advisor. And what I did was clear it up right away. I told her exactly what I meant and what I was thinking. The whole story is too complicated for me to write right now, but the point is that I did something I haven't done before. I didn't let this thing stew in my mind, I just made myself clear. That was so nice. Now I don't have to be annoyed or angry or anything. Whew!

This weekend - two field trips to Yellowstone. Saturday it's for the Yellowstone class (that I'm TAing), and Sunday it's for the Veg History class I'm in. On Sunday Danny's going with, which I'm super glad about. And I rigged it so we don't have to core (which we've done enough times, thank you very much), but we're going to hike up on the hills above the lake they're coring and take pictures! Heheh.

Changes to comps

Right now in the Earth sciences department here the faculty are discussing changes to the comprehensive exams. Here at MSU, the graduate college requires all Master's students be given a comprehensive examination before graduation. Previously in the department there were significant differences between the "geology" and "geography" comps. Your distinction as "geology" or "geography" was based on your committee and your project. I've been struggling with this since I got here, because I don't really fit in to either. I would rather be a geologist, but I can't escape the fact that my research is much more geographical than geological. I'm studying the last 1000 years! To a geologist that's practically nothing. They would all probably laugh in my face if I told them I'm a geologist. And I've got no training as a geographer, I've taken one geography class in my whole life. The paleoecological research I'm doing is definitely on the line between geology and geography. So I'm actually relieved that they're changing the comps.

Now the comps are going to involve an agreement between student and committee on 3 areas of depth that the student will be tested on. These areas will most likely have a lot to do with the specific project the student is working on. This is probably a good thing for the geologists, because previously they could be tested on any facet of geology imaginable. Whatever the people testing them wanted to ask. And it wasn't just your committee, no, any geology professor in the department could come and ask you questions. Your committee decided whether or not you passed. It's also probably good for the geography students. They used to have to decide on 2 areas of depth with their committee. This meant you had to know those two areas in fairly great detail. So it might be better for them because now they have to focus on 3 areas a little more "lightly".

I think these changes are great. They're super for me, because now I don't have to worry about being on the line. I can just exist. That's nice. I think they're good for everyone else too. It just makes more sense. I'll be taking my comps in late January or early February. I still haven't solidified on a committee. I'm waiting for my radiocarbon dates. *sigh*

It is way too late for me

I'm sitting in the "physics library" at school with my husband who is frantically working on a quantum assignment for tomorrow (I think). He's been in here since 5. I've been here since 7. We're not doing so well. It's past my bed-time.

I want to write a really long complain-y post about the huge hole in our front yard. And about how I hate Bozeman. I feel like I'm the only person in the whole world who hates this place. People flock here! To ski! Or snowboard! Whatever! I'm really going to try not to write that though. I want to try to have a positive outlook.

I suppose I'll use the rest of the laptop batteries for looking for a new apartment.

Yay for time-wasting quizzes!

I just spent a few minutes taking these tests:


You are Schroeder!


Which Peanuts Character are You?
brought to you by Quizilla

You are a Social Liberal (66% permissive) and an... Economic Liberal (30% permissive) You are best described as a: Democrat Link: The Politics Test on Ok Cupid Also: The OkCupid Dating Persona Test

Something we don't think about every day

I was just talking with a professor who I want to be on my committee. I'm way behind on this committee thing, since one of my members dropped off last spring. I haven't gotten around to getting another member until now. But I've also been re-vamping my thesis.

Anyway, I had a lot of great things to say about my project, which is one reason I think maybe you shouldn't have to choose all members of your committee so early. I have a much better idea now of who'se expertise I might be able to use. So I think that I can use this woman because she is a biogeographer and she's studied modern climate in Grand Teton National Park where I'm working. As we were talking about my project and possibilities for research, she emphasized something that I don't usually think about. She said that my ideas for pulling lots of things together sounded super interesting to her, but more importantly it sounded like I was interested. She said it is great to have a thesis that you like and that you can get excited about. That way you actually work on it, and you can be interested in the outcome.

I know that some people probably keep this in mind most of the time. Especially those working on PhD's. Who could do a PhD without being interested? But right now I'm surrounded by uninterested people. The other grad student who actually has cores working in my lab is completely "over" her project. She's just in the data collection phase and she has so much data to collect that she hates it. She's forgotten about the big picture.

And I think I had forgotten a little bit too. Sitting around collecting data all the time isn't really that great. I got super excited when I saw my raw charcoal data graphed because I think it shows something really cool. That kind of got me excited again. And thinking about adding a couple facets to my project also gets me excited. I'm not particularly a fan of pollen analysis. That is pretty mundane to me. Sure, you can find out a bunch of cool stuff about past climate and how vegetation has changed over the past few thousands of years or more, but it's not my bag. I'm much more interested in my charcoal questions, and also the possibilities of thinking about how local climate controls the low-elevation lakes, and how people affected the whole landscape. I like variety, and this brings several things into my thesis for a nice variety. But I think I had forgotten that I have to make this project something I like. Even if it is just until it's done and I graduate, I have to like something out of it.

Teachers/ lecturers

What are some things that you out there think make a good lecturer (or university teacher)? I'm saying specifically "university teacher" because I think that they need different skills than high school teachers and elementary school teachers. So, what ideas have you got?

I pose this question because I know a few people who want to be teachers (both elementary level and college level). Some of these people I think would be absolutely wonderful teachers. Some I think would really stink at it.

I might actually have something interesting to write about...

The first purpose of this entry is to draw attention to my "nerd score"(bottom of sidebar). I just took this test that I linked to from Ms.PhD's blog. I did NOT expect to be a "High-nerd"!! Hmm. I suppose I'm nerdier than I thought. Oh well.

Now, there is something that I'm trying to figure out that actually has something to do with my research. For part of my thesis I'm looking at the macroscopic charcoal records from 3 lakes. My advisor has done this sort of thing many times before, so she knows how do analyze this type of data. I'm reading *the* paper on the CHAPS program (written by P. Bartlein at the University of Oregon), which is what we use to "decompose" the charcoal record into background and peaks. Supposedly this is the only paper published on CHAPS statistics, and there is of course the manual that goes with the program. I am reading this to hopefully become more familiar with the actual statistical calculations that go into the program. But I have found the paper a bit un-helpfull. (By the way, this is the Long et al. 1998 paper from the Canadian Journal of Forest Research).

I think I understand the methods, but I feel there is something missing from the paper. I wish that the authors would explain their statistical methods better. I said that I am reading it to become more familiar with the calculations they use. But they don't specifically talk about their calculations. They describe their statistics with words, and don't ever show any formulas. I think this is a poor way to get your methods across to your readers. I don't think that I could just read this paper and then do the same thing all by myself. I have someone who can explain it to me, and I have people that I can ask questions independently. But I think it is crummy as a methods paper because it doesn't really give you any methods.

My advisor even said, "some people say CHAPS (the program) is a black box, where you just put in your data and it spits out some statistics. " She went on to say that it is not simply a black box, but that "we" know what is going on inside. I don't think this is true. I think someone knows what's going on inside (namely Bartlein, since he wrote the program and he is pretty brilliant with statistics), but the majority of people who use it don't. I have seen a few talks about this type of data, and usually the speaker just says some things that sound nice, so it sounds like they know what they're doing, but if you ask them specific questions about their statistical methods and why they did some things and not others, they usually falter and can't answer. This is a bad way to do science. I feel that any scientist presenting something in a poster or a talk should be able to answer questions about their data! Even funny questions. You shouldn't have to say, "Well, I know that CHAPS does a locally weighted moving average, but I couldn't do it by myself, I don't really know how to do it." I'm not saying that you shouldn't save time by using programs written for your specific situation, I'm just saying that you should still know exactly what is going on, and why.

Rain and sleepiness

It is cold and rainy today. And yes, I'm sleepy. Mostly from sitting in a warm room right after lunch listening to a boring statistics lecture. Very difficult to stay awake.

Friday's are Physics Colloquium days! I love to attend physics colloquia, and I have since I was an undergrad. I am a geologist, but I have always found physics colloquia to be more exciting and interesting than your average geology or earth science colloquium. Why? I'm not entirely sure. Geologists and earth scientists tend to have good ways of explaining topics to a wide audience, and make their topics interesting. But I find I'm usually way more excited by the physics topics. If I go to the earth science colloquium I'm usually bored.

An example of a super interesting colloquium - when I was an undergrad a physicist gave a talk about the atmospheres of brown dwarf stars. It was so interesting to me because he was talking about models for the condensation of these atmospheres, and these models were very similar to models that igneous petrologists use to simulate crystallization in a magma chamber. I was enthralled and sitting forward in my seat for the entire hour. It was so exciting. (The funny thing about that colloquium was that I was probably the only one awake. All the physicists there were bored out of their minds).

Now, today's physics colloquium is:

Thallium atoms, diode lasers, and 'table-top' tests of fundamental symmetries.
By: Protik K. Majumder Department Chair and Associate Professor of Physics Williams College

I'm not sure if this one will be super interesting. But here is the one I missed (sob!) last week:

Did a Gamma-Ray Burst Initiate the Late Ordovician Extinction?
By: Adrian L. Melott, Department of Physics and Astronomy, University of Kansas

Gamma-ray bursts are the most powerful explosions known in the Universe. A GRB within our galaxy could have catastrophic consequences for the Earth. Extrapolations from the global rate suggest an average interval of a few hundred million years for events in which the Earth is irradiated from an event on our side of the Galaxy. The atmosphere would become heavily ionized, resulting in major destruction of the ozone layer, darkened skies and nitric acid rain.
Both the prompt UV and the solar UV resulting from long-term loss of the ozone layer are destructive to living organisms. The attenuation length of UV in water is tens of meters. There is a strong candidate for a GRB based mass extinction in the late Ordovician, 440 My ago. Planktonic organisms and those animals living in shallow water seem to have been particularly hard hit during this mass extinction.
(www.physics.montana.edu/news/seminars/Semfcollomain.htm)

When I found out I missed that one, I was quite upset. Cool topic! I love learning about things other than my specific field, which is probably why I love physics colloquia so much.

Being a "secretary" is hard

Especially when it's only a very part-time job! I'm working for a small lab on campus for ~10 hours a week. I started at the beginning of the summer to make some money, because all I had for the summer was 6 weeks of TAing for $1500. And I needed more money than that to live on. So I got this job, which is really cool. I'm continuing during school so that I don't have to TA full time. I'm TAing 2 hours a week, which sort of equates to a 10 hour a week job (because of prep time and grading and all) which is a 1/2 time TA. So I'm working another 10 as a "secretary". I'm not an actual secretary, I'm doing all sorts of weird things. I'm keeping track of money, but separately from the department accountant. I'm trying to keep things organized in the lab space, and I'm doing odds and ends for my boss. I like organizational work, so this job is fun for me most of the time. But it is hard as well. Especially today. I'm supposed to get all the paperwork from purchases with POs and the lab corporate credit card. Apparently this hasn't been happening. So if people don't give me their paperwork, I don't know what is going on. And when things don't work out, the department accountant calls me and yells at me. (Actually, she's really nice, but she seems like a witch and everyone is scared of her) And if I don't have any documentation, I can't help her. So she gets blacklisted somehow within the University purchasing system. Altogether not a good thing. So, being around for only 10 hours a week, it is difficult to communicate with all the lab employees and get them to follow my purchasing rules. And they all complain that I shouldn't be able to tell them what to do because I'm only a "secretary" and I don't know the first thing about engineering or whatever else.

Besides this, everything seems to be going smoothly. I just remembered that I have to talk to my department accountant and see the records of what has been spent out of my grant. It is not really my personal grant, but it is specifically for my master's project. We got some more money (a lot in fact), and so I want to go over the entire budget. I had to pay for radiocarbon dates (6 at $300 a date) and lead-210 dates (I don't even know how much those cost), and I paid a bit for field work this summer and over Labor Day weekend. But now that we have tons more money, I think I have plenty left for some lab supplies and another trip to Jackson in December, and maybe I might even be able to afford to pay myself for 10 hours a week next semester, so I can just work on my stuff and not have to TA at all! That would be cool. My advisor wants to go over the budget with me, and I want to go over it myself so we'll figure out what we can spend.

Dedicated to Tom (dad)

Well, yes, it has been a long time since I've posted. Last night I promised my father-in-law that I would post more. So this post is dedicated to him. Hopefully knowing that he's out there watching will help me keep up.

First of all, I haven't posted in the last few days because I have been getting stuff done! Since school has started I have been having weekly meetings with my advisor about my research. Right now I still don't know exactly what direction my thesis will take (arrgh!!) because I'm waiting for some radiocarbon dates. But I do have some cool and potentially exciting data! I will show some of that in a couple days. But, that is kind of exciting and I feel like I've been accomplishing something.

Yesterday I drove on a field trip for the Yellowstone class I'm TAing. We went to ... Yellowstone. But it was really fun. It was cloudy and cool and starting to look a lot like fall. Very nice. We saw several bison and several elk. Some of the bull elk had huge racks, and that was pretty cool. There is one more field trip for that class, back to Yellowstone, in October. Hopefully that one will be just as fun.

And I'm definitely going to GSA in October. I've already set up one meeting, and hopefully I'll set up more. I'm looking forward to meeting more people.

It's turning into fall!

Today is the first football game of the season here. And the weather matches perfectly. It is overcast and drizzly. Ahh, it is turning into fall. Fall is definitely my favorite season. It feels like it's coming a little early, but I still like it.

I made up my mind yesterday and registered for the Geological Society of America meeting this year in Salt Lake City, UT. I'm going for the purpose of meeting people in the field that I want most to work in. I'm in the master's program here, but I'm not doing what I want to be doing. And I think I could be. So, my tentative plan is to finish up my master's here and try to work on a really cool project with a real paleobotanist. This is my dream, I guess. So I'm going to GSA this year to meet with some paleobotanists and talk to them about their work, and other paleobotanical things. Hopefully I'll learn some things that will be useful when I'm done here.

Supposedly one of the professors here has some nice leaves that go along with a dinosaur dig. I would like to work on these leaves. I understand the fact that no one here wanted to accept me as a real paleobotany grad student because nobody here knows a thing about it, and I'm sure they would feel inadequate as advisors. But that is what I really wanted to do! I thought I made that clear in my application essay! Rrr. It's okay though, I'll work something out for my Ph.D.

Eh?

What's your favorite NASA mission patch? Mine is Gemini 4. So many are cool though! Talk about a dorky post...

Happy September

Here we are almost done with a week of school. Wow!

I have to say that I really feel for all the people in Louisiana, Mississippi, Alabama and all the rest of the places hit hard by the hurricane. It is all over the news. We listen to NPR in the mornings during breakfast and then while we're making dinner, and we have hardly heard any other news but hurricane news. The other day they were talking to someone from Idaho Falls who had decided, along with her husband, to drive down to the affected area and offer to take a family back to their home and house them for however many months it takes to rebuild. And others in their community were offering the same thing, and to enroll children in school and provide transportation and help out with food. I was just amazed when I heard this, and it made me feel really bad that I'm not in a position to do something like that. I would love to help out in a "real" way like that, instead of just donating some money or some blood (although blood is very important). I just feel like I'm sitting around hearing all this news and not doing anything about it! Being a grad student leaves you in a funny place in the community because you don't have a lot of time or money to help out.

I also feel guilty because it's sunny and nice here, and I'm going down to the Tetons this weekend for a day of field work. It's supposed to be nice there. Why should I get to do normal things when all these people's lives have been turned upside-down? Huh.

Forgot...

Oops, I forgot to mention that my husband, Danny, passed his comps!!! This is an awesome thing because now he is officially in the Ph.D. program, and we have a bit of security. So next summer can be a real summer, maybe.

First day of school

Well, today is the first day of school. I only have one class on Mondays, and it is statistics. I went, and it seems OK. It might actually be interesting because I have data. I want to think up my own ways of analyzing my data. Or at least something new. So I'm looking forward to learning some statistics.

I had a meeting with my advisor this morning (whoa!). We had to talk about the lab I'm TAing for her. Plus we talked a little about my project. I guess it seems to be going OK at this point. I told her I'm going back out in the field this weekend, and I'm coring one lake... either Swan or Heron. I made up my mind, and she seemed to take it well. She was really not bitchy or confrontational. She thinks I'll finish this year (meaning by May). I'm not so sure, because I still have all my pollen to work up, and data analysis and writing to do. She thinks I'm efficient. Interesting.

Today the department here had a huge meeting of new grad students, old grad students and faculty. There are 11 new grads, which is a lot for this department! So many people! A bunch of the older grad student's weren't there, but most of the second-year's were. It's interesting to see all the new people and hear what they're working on. There's just so many! And I've been displaced from the department because I don't have a desk there anymore. I have to have a specific reason to head over there now. It feels a bit strange. Over the weekend Danny and I also met some of the new physics grad students. They seem fairly normal.

So, this weekend: the Teton's! Mucking around in lakes! Ahh well, at least I'm fully funded now. Yes, the Park Service found some end-of-year money for my project. So, where before I had $5k (which didn't cover my project in the least, because I need lead-210 and radiocarbon dates) I now have $13k. Whoa! Weird! That means this time the grant is paying for the gas to get there. It's not that much anyway.

Super Monkey Ball 2

The last week-day of summer. We had ham and eggs benedict this morning to "celebrate". Now D's playing Super Monkey Ball 2. We just bought it as an "end of comps" thing. We are the only people we know around here that play video games. I miss playing Mario Party with our old friends. Anyway, this is all there is to write about today. Just enjoy the end of summer!

Last week of summer

This week is the last week of summer. Classes start on Monday. So I've been taking advantage of a little bit more laziness. Last week I was in the pollen lab all week trying to figure out how to process pollen. We're trying something we've never done before - using a Schulze's solution instead of performing acetolysis. This means nitric acid instead of sulfuric acid and acetic anhydride. I'm not sure which one I'd enjoy doing more. Using Schulze's solution is easy though. But we were trying to come up with new standardized lab methods for this new procedure. So it took me all week to process 9 samples. (You should be able to process at least 12 in 2 days, normally)

Actually, this week I have been using my birthday present (a sewing machine). I have been sewing a shirt for my husband! I just finished it about half an hour ago. It turned out pretty nice! Sorry no pictures yet... My next project is a bag for my patterns that they will fit in properly, and then I'm going to make an easy skirt for myself and then on to the first pair of pants. I'm very excited about sewing.

So, like I said, school starts Monday. I'm taking 2 classes and 4 thesis credits. The classes are statistics and a vegetation history class. I'm TAing half time for one of my advisor's classes. We have talked about it, but nothing in detail yet. She doesn't seem too worried about this. But I just know I'll have to write a bunch of labs overnight. I think it is going to be pretty easy on me though. We're encouraging a lot of class participation, and I'm not sure how that will go over in a class dominated by freshmen and sophomore's who aren't majoring in Earth Sciences (the class is about Yellowstone "as a scientific laboratory" or something). I had quite a lot of trouble getting people to participate in my teeny geology labs last June. I had 2 labs, one had 4 people and one had 6. At the first lab I said, "I want you all to work together, and talk to each other. Because if nobody's talking it's going to be really quiet in here and it's going to get really boring." Well, in the lab of 6, nobody talked. In the lab of 4, everyone followed my suggestion and worked together. The smaller lab consistently did better, because they would discuss the questions and inevitably someone would know something about it and they got to "teach" everyone else. I had to work a lot harder (I don't mind that though) in the class with 6, answering questions all the time, and they consistently got lower grades. They didn't care to talk about the material with one another. And they had a real problem with creative thinking. Finally on the last lab I had to write a question that said something like, "Just think about this and give me a creative answer, don't worry so much about whether or not it is exactly correct!" They always just wanted to get the right answer, and not care about why or how it was right. So I had to force them to be creative. That was tough!

Anyway, so the Yellowstone lab this semester is going to be interesting. I'll have 2 labs of 15 kids each. Not too bad. I hope some learning goes on.

Bad about posting

I've been bad about posting in the last couple of weeks, I know. The funny thing is I could have sworn that I posted after August 2nd, but I guess not! Strange. Now I have only a couple minutes to catch up...

Last week my mom was in town visiting! That was fun. We didn't actually "do" too much, but we hung out and talked quite a bit. She and my husband bought me a sewing machine for my birthday, which I am very excited about. I have already sewn two bags to get started (I haven't sewn any big things since I was about 13). My next project is a shirt for D. So while my mom was here she was also helping me get started with my sewing machine, which was nice. I have to admit I was a little intimidated at first. But once I got started with my first bag, it all got easier. I am super excited about sewing all kinds of things. It'll be great!

Otherwise I finished my charcoal counting of all the samples I had. I still have some more to do but not too much, and I'm not sure which core I'll be using yet. This week I am learning to process pollen. It is a long process involving many acids and bases. Real nitty-gritty labwork. Hopefully by tomorrow or Friday I'll be ready to do it on my own. I feel bad for Christy, who has to teach me all this labwork. She's trying to finish her Ph.D., and I know she'd like to be doing her own work. I don't want to add to her stresses too much.

School starts a week from Monday. I have yet to register. I was thinking about doing that today... We also have to buy a new parking sticker. And I have to make sure I will get paid and all that. And I have to write a blurb about myself for the new lab I'm teaching. I suppose I have a lot to do.

Uh oh...

So I feel really bad right now. I just spent a couple hours with the new grad student Mariana. She is pretty cool. At one point I was trying to warn her about the department politics here, and she started asking questions. Anyway, I just feel bad because I feel like I scared her. She came here thinking everything would be super, and it was for a couple of days, and then she talks to me and I freak her out. I really didn't want to do that. I wanted to gently talk to her about a few things, but I didn't want to make her think it's the end of the world. I just feel like I depressed her for no good reason. On the other hand, I wish that someone here had told me a thing or two before I started. I would have made some changes to my plan. I wouldn't have left, but I wouldn't be doing the same thing. Definitely. So in one way I really, really, didn't want to scare her or depress her, but on the other hand she is going to find this stuff out at some point. Maybe better now than in 4 months when she's stuck with something she hates.
I don't know. Did I do completely the wrong thing? I don't know.

The amazing charcoal counting machine

I am the amazing charcoal counting machine! Yesterday I prepped 40 samples of charcoal to count today, thinking that it would take me the better part of the day. Well, I got here before 8, and I finshed my charcoal counting about 15 minutes ago. Whoa! Plus, I wasn't counting for that entire time! I was continuing some LOI work, and I even went over to the other building with the new grad student to get the dept. credit card. I kick some major ass! And that means that I don't have to sit around here all afternoon counting charcoal, which is a huge drag. Nice.

Instead, Mariana (the new grad) and I are going to buy wood for core-boxes. Yay. Mariana is going to get paid to make them, something I couldn't say, so she is happy to do it. I am happy to work my other job. I suppose it is a good trade. It is very interesting to get to know a new grad student who is in a similar position to what I was in only a year ago. For some reason even a year can make you feel like the old expert. I'm a little worried for her, since she has had no experience in this field (which I hadn't either). I'm just worried that she'll get stuck with a project that sucks and she won't like it either. I don't wish that on other people. On the whole though Mariana seems really cool. I have only talked to her for about an hour so far though. There will be plenty of time to get to know her.

I'm way excited for next week because my mom is coming to visit! I'm really looking forward to it. I've been sort of thinking of stuff to do for a while now, but I don't have any concrete plans. We'll just see what we want to do. But it will be fun. And in 23 days Danny's comp will be over!!! That is going to be a big change. Hopefully for the better.

Sad Partings

Life is changing for everyone this summer. I just got back from a visit to the grad office where I used to have my desk. I finally got to see my friend Falene, who I haven't seen since the end of June! She is still alive, about as much as I am. She is moving out of her desk, and moving across the pass to the Paradise Valley. Bonde already moved out of his desk and is working at home. I already moved out of my desk too, but I'm stationed at my two other desks on campus. Soon those other grad students who are finishing field seasons will have to move out of their desks too. Only a very few grad students are staying in there. The desks will be filled with all new first-years. Wow. It'll be like a whole different world.

There is a bunch of crummy politics going on in my department. I guess I just wanted to mention that - I don't want to go into any detail. It stinks for us grad students though, who often get caught in the midst of politics. I was chatting with my friend online this morning and mentioning that I don't like my project and I wish I could do something else, and she asked me if there is someone else I could work with here. I thought about it and decided that it is a possibility, but the department is so bad that I'm not sure I want to stay. However, crummy politics happens everywhere, so at some point you just have to deal.

While I was visiting I found out that the department now has a small collection of plant fossils - all identified and catalogged! Cool! This might be a good thing. I looked at a couple, and they're pretty nice. Bonde is catalogging them, and I told him if he needs some help with the plants he should tell me. I looove plant fossils. Paleobotany is my real passion, I only wish I was working on that instead of icky lake sediment. I like real rocks. And real fossils.

Friends

Friends are a wonderful thing. They have the tendency to make you feel better when something is wrong. I have some cool friends.

EARTHQUAKE!

There have been two earthquakes above magnitude 4 here in western Montana in the past 2 days. They have all been centered just north of Dillon, and about 5km underground. Check out the USGS website... Danny felt the quake at 10:08pm on July 25. I was already asleep! That's what I get for sleeping. There was another quake this morning at 9:51am, magnitude 4.2. We didn't feel that here in Bozeman. But the seismographs picked it up.

I have to take another blood test in a few weeks. Everything was normal except that my iron levels were a bit high. So my doctor wants me to take another blood test to make sure that nothing is wrong with me. She suggested the possibility of hemochromatosis. I'm not really worried though. I just don't like getting my blood drawn. Even just thinking about it makes my elbow tingle. Heh.


This is the logo of the satellite that Danny is managing. It is called Electra - A Barnacle Satellite. I'm getting T-shirts made with the logo at some point soon.

Allergies

Today I am allergic. I'm really not sure what I am allergic to, but it is definitely something. Something that makes me feel crummy. The weather today is kind of crummy too. It is overcast and a little chilly. Normally I wouldn't enjoy dreary weather like this, but it has been so hot for the past few weeks that this is welcome cool! And I want to go home and bake something, since turning on the oven wouldn't make the house too hot to live in today. No such luck though. I get to stay here and feel crummy.

Yesterday we went to have dinner with my lab-mate and her new boyfriend at her apartment. He made really yummy shrimp fajitas, and we had fresh blueberry-peach cobbler! They were just in Oregon, and they picked a bunch of blueberries and blackberries. They gave us a bag of blueberries, so I'm looking forward to making muffins and whatever else I can think of.

I have been reading Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince since Friday. I will finish it today, since I only have about 100 pages left. It is a very good book. I like all the books, and I'm looking forward to the next movie that comes out in November.

Well, tomorrow I will be taking care of baking crucibles again in the lab. Right now they are warming at 90 degrees C (for 24 hours). Tomorrow we'll get to see the beautiful glowing furnace again. I love that muffle furnace.

Ahh, blogs

Reading other blogs is fun. Especially when there are a few people like me out there. Grad students with the normal grad student problems. Ahh. Not that these problems are good. But it is so nice to realize that you aren't the only person in the world with your problems.

Today was "Taco Thursday", where a few of us girls in the department (currently only 3 of us) get together to sort of study for comps. The other two girls will have "normal" comps, meaning the standard geology comp from the department here. I, however, will not. I will have a comp more directed to my current work. In a lot of ways this is really, really nice. At least I know what to study, and I have a much better idea of the type of questions I will be asked. In the study group we're just going over a general undergrad textbook right now. Erin is using Geology by Tarbuck and Lutgens, and Trish and I are using Earth by Tarbuck and Lutgens. They are essentially the same books. They're pretty good. We're going to start going over some of the concepts in my favorite book, Plate Tectonics. I want the new edition, and I'll probably get it in August. That was my favorite geology class is college, which I took from Condie. It was very comprehensive and I learned a lot. It'll be super fun to use that book to study for comps. The big problem is that the material in that book won't be covered on my comps, at least on a large scale. So I'm doing this studying for no reason, except that I love the material and would love to have it more cemented in my head. The books I'm using for my comp studying are about the geologic and glacial history of Grand Teton National Park and the settlement history of the valley. Also good books (I don't have links for them right this second), but a little less comprehensive. I need to know how glaciers work, why the Tetons are there, what settlement was like, and how the vegetation of North America has changed in the past 5000 or so years. Pretty specific.

LOI and stuff

Today I am working on more LOI analysis. I took a cool picture for all of you...
This is the furnace where we ash our samples at both 550 and 900 degrees C. This is what 900 degrees C looks like, and there are all my little crucibles enjoying the blistering heat. Now, as I write, they are relaxing in the dessicator before I weigh them. They have to be cool before weighing. I like the 900 degree step because all the crucibles come out a different color than when they are cool. They aren't glowing like the inside of the furnace, but they are a different cream color.

This morning I had a little extra time while the furnace was heating up, so I got a chance to look around for more blogs I should be reading. I actually found quite a few! I will put up links, of course. I haven't found much related to geology. No geology journals that I know of publish an RSS feed. I am signed up for email notices when new journals come out. That is OK, but my husband is subscribed to 5 or so physics journal RSS feeds. I'm jealous.

I am doing my labwork for my thesis this summer, but I also have another job sort of in the physics department. I absolutely LOVE my "other" job! I am working as a quasi-administrative assistant. I've always been big on organizing, and that helped me get this job. But I've been learning a lot about things that I guess I wouldn't normally learn about. The best is the website stuff that I've learned. I am way behind the times but I recently learned how to use Cascading Style Sheets, and I have worked a bit with designing a website and maintaining another. And even when I'm not learning new stuff I love going to that job. I enjoy having a job that is different from what I am researching. That way I'm not overly focused on one thing, and getting lost in the details. I suppose some would say that doesn't bode well for an academic career, but I don't care. I appreciate learning, and learning about many things. Too many people focus on one thing and can't even remember things from basic undergraduate classes. Gone are the days of the "naturalist" who knew many sciences, which is good in some respects and bad in others.

Ever since I read Dune I wanted to be a planetologist like Liet. That's what I'm going for.

Hubba hubba

Remember that Simpsons?

I bought the 101ers re-release, Elgin Avenue Breakdown Revisited. Cool. I also bought Danny a Mark Farina cd. Also very cool.

More tomorrow. Right now I'm too braindead.

Techno, reggae, labwork...

Today I've been in and out of the lab, working on some Loss On Ignition analysis. LOI involves burning a bit of sediment in a crucible at three different temperatures. The last burn is at 900 degrees C for 2 hours. That furnace is hot!! It is a little difficult to grab the crucible tongs with giant gloves on too.

While I'm in the lab I love to listen to music. Today my music of choice has been techno. Some London techno, and European trance. Now I'm listening to reggae, also wonderful. Earlier today I was looking at the local Zebra lounge show schedule, and I found this guy. He's great! I might stop by there tonight. I read that his live shows are kick ass.

Now I have to go weigh my little crucibles.

Plonk

Last night Sean had a party at Plonk to celebrate his getting a job in Dulles. We had never been to Plonk before. It is a pretty neat place. The atmosphere is really laid back which I thought was cool. It is kind of like one of those nice coffee shops where there are plush chairs and couches to hang out on, except you're not drinking coffee, you're drinking wine! It was fun. And congrats, Sean!

I was just seeing if Plonk has a website, which it appears they don't. But I came across this forum with a lot of heated talk. I started reading all the posts and it gets a little strange. I don't think that you should withdraw your business from someplace that you happen to enjoy just because the owners aren't moral people in your view. I guess you could argue that by giving them your business you are supporting their lifestyle and their morality, but that is a bit of a stretch. Everybody needs to make a living. And everybody has morals that are just a bit different from yours.

I don't necessarily think that a bunch of big-city people are moving to small cities in the west and polluting them with their big-city preferences (such as wine bars or fancy places to eat). I moved here recently, less than a year ago still. Granted, I'm not a rich city dweller, but I'm still new here. And being new here one thing I have to say is that I feel much more comfortable walking into a place like Plonk as opposed to a dark bar full of locals. Even though I'm not rich! Those dark bars where locals hang out are always a bit sketchy.

Before my husband and I moved here we lived in Socorro, New Mexico. We loved it. The town has about 9000 residents. Definitely smaller than Bozeman. And it is not a place that is particularly attractive to rich city dwellers, so there weren't all these rich people moving in and putting up fancy restaurants and boutiques. So it wasn't being "ruined" that way. What did happen was a Wal Mart. Previously you had to drive about 45 miles to the nearest Wal Mart. An interesting trip. Now, you just have to drive across the street, practically. In my mind, those kind of big-box stores are what degrade a community, not small fancy places where only a few people shop. Like someone said on the forum, look at 19th avenue in Bozeman now. Ick. What caused all that traffic and congestion? Not Plonk.

Lazy summer

I guess it's that time of year. I've been feeling lazy all weekend. Of course now I'm at work (Monday morning you know) and I've been here since 8 and I've gotten a bunch of work done. So I'm not completely lazy, but I felt like it this weekend. Maybe because we watched almost all the extras on the Return of the King extended edition. We did sit in front of the TV for a while. I also took a nap, which often makes me feel lazy. I did get the house nice and clean and a bit organized.

This isn't much of a post but I'd better get back to work. I've got to get over to the department office to get a reimbursement, then I've got to head over to my other desk and get a bit of work done before this afternoon. Busy, busy.

Advice

In the past few years I have seen too many short articles giving advice about graduate school. Sometimes they are titled, "Is graduate school right for you?" Or how about, "Finding the right graduate school." I've read so many of these articles *after* getting in to graduate school that it has really started to bother me. People can only give so much advice. I'm starting to doubt that the advice really helps in most situations.

The advice always goes something like this: You have to think carefully about your future and what you want out of your schooling. Consider whether or not you really want to be in school for another few years. Are you burned out? If so, grad school is probably not for you, at least right away. So think about your ambitions, and plan out some of your life. Next, figure out exactly what you want to do. If you decide on graduate school, choose a specific area of interest that you wish to base your career on. Choose something that you think you'll love doing for the rest of your life. Then go out and find professors that research in this area and talk to them, get to know them, and get them to want you in their program. Really sell yourself. Additionally, you don't want to be stuck with an advisor that you don't get along with. So get to know your potential advisors well before deciding to attend their institution. This is always a very important point. And sometimes, additionally, another point of advice is to consider where you want to attend school, meaning what part of the country, or climate, or city you want to live in for the next few years of your life. Some people think that this is an essential consideration when thinking about graduate schools, because if you're a city kid you might get really restless and bored in a small town, or if you're from the country you might get a little overwhelmed in the city. Or you might not want to live in Louisiana, or Texas, or Washington state. Some others consider this to be secondary to the education you will be concentrating on while you're in school. Theoretically you shouldn't have time for much of a life while you are in grad school, so why choose the school based on the surroundings? What does that matter? And last but not least, apply to as many schools as possible.

I've been in graduate school for an entire academic year and half a summer. I got here somehow. I think I read some of the advice before applying to graduate school, but most of it I found after applying and being accepted. After that there is not much to change. When I was an undergrad I had my advisor for a class, and she took a whole class one day to talk about applying for graduate school. I was a junior at the time, and I was already thinking about what I wanted to do in grad school, and where I could go. I found her lecture helpful, but of course it didn't address everything. My first problem was that my real area of interest - paleobotany - is researched at but a handful of schools in the U.S. So that already brought my selection down. And then, nobody was researching the kinds of things that I wanted to research. This was a roadblock when I first started looking for schools. My second problem was that I was already married. Having a significant other is a big problem in grad school. We wanted to stay together. Otherwise, what is the point of being married? So we applied to several of the same schools. But that brought our pool of possible schools down even more. Try to find a school that has paleobotanical research AND gravitiation or relativity research. It gets a little more difficult. We were just happy that we weren't trying to apply to the same departments and competing with one another for the selected spots. And the third problem was actually applying. You are supposed to apply to as many schools as possible. The more the better! Well, that adds up to quite a lot of money, when almost every application costs $50. If you're independantly wealthy, I guess you're lucky! But when you are working for your money and trying to complete your senior year at college, a bunch of expensive applications become difficult to deal with.

So, we made it somehow, right? Well, we only both got accepted at one school, MSU. I was accepted at quite a few of the schools I applied to. But we wanted to stay together, right? So here we both are. Now I'm not doing what I wanted to do, but at least I'm only in it for a masters degree. Then I'll move on. But we're here for 7 or so years while my husband gets his Ph.D. We tried to follow all the great advice, but it just didn't work out for us. But we're making it.

So, after all that, my great advice is do your best if you're looking for grad schools. You might get lucky, or you might not. But try to follow the advice, and while you're at it you might come up with some great advice of your own to share with the world.

Long time ... no see

Yep. I'm not a real blogger. I haven't had the discipline to sit down and write about anything. To tell you the truth, I do have quite a lot to write about, but I've been too afraid because I think someone I might be writing about might read my blog and then they'd be angry with me or whatever. So there have been a couple of changes in the last day or so. Like I took my name off. Anyway, no big deal. But now I wish to write more often. And now I feel a little bit more comfortable doing so. I guess still if I talk about people and they read my blog they'll still know I'm talking about them.

Example: I just read the blog of one of my husband's office mates. We "secretly" discovered that she had a blog -- my husband saw her writing in it and looked at the address. So now we read it. Anyway, she wrote two sentences about us today. I guess it's just weird to know someone else is talking about you.

I got my new office key today, and therefore my new desk! I have one real "job" at the Space Satellite and Engineering Laboratory. It is so nice to not be working for my advisor!! I refuse to be a grad student slave. I did it for a semester and found out that it is the worst possible situation. So no more of that for me. Now I *work* somewhere different from where I *research*. This is the distinction that I like. When I was an undergrad I had the same sort of thing worked out. I did research on fossils, and I worked in the mass spectrometry lab in the geology department. Two things almost unrelated. I enjoyed both, and I liked having a distinction between work and research. And this past semester I found out that I still like having that distinction. I feel like I am always learning that way, especially when I enjoy both my work and my research. At this point, work is much more interesting and exciting than my research. But soon I will be finished with my Masters and then we'll go from there. But I'm NOT coring anymore lakes. NO.

Mars

I've been reading up on Mars lately (which has nothing to do with sediment cores ... but is terribly interesting). I've been trying to get enough background to give a simple talk about magnetism on a planetary scale and remanent magnetism and all that. I've found out some pretty cool stuff!
One of the initial papers is Connerney et al. in Science, "Magnetic lineation in the ancient crust of Mars." Then there's a really detailed paper on the "Magnetic field of Mars: Summary of results form the aerobraking and mapping orbits" (Acuna et al. 2001). That one has some really nice graphics of the remanent magnetism of the crust.
Both papers state that:

The observations show that the majority of the crustal magnetic sources lie
south of the dichotomy boundary on the ancient, densely cratered terrain of the
highlands and extend ~60 degrees south of this boundary. It is inferred
that the formation of the dichotomy boundary must postdate the cessation of
dynamo action because of the clear magnetic differentiation between the terrains
on either side of the boundary. The absence of detectable crustal
magnetization north of the dichotomy boundary in spite of a widespread record of
active volcanism and magmatic flows suggests that dynamo action had ceased at
this stage of thermal evolution and crustal differentiation (Acuna et al. 2001).

So there's a difference between the northern and southern hemispheres of Mars, really apparent when you look at the pictures. I've also been looking at a couple of other papers, one about the "Influence of early plate tectonics on the thermal evolution and magnetic field of Mars" (Nimmo and Stevenson 2000). This paper is in the Journal of Geophysical Research v. 105. They assert that:

Recent magnetic studies of Mars suggest that (1) it possessed a periodically reversing magnetic field for the first ~ 500 Myr of its existence and (2)plate tectonics may have been operating during this time ... if plate
tectonics, or some other process causing high surface heat flux, was
occurring on early Mars, it is likely to have caused convection in the core
and hence generated a magnetic field. Conversely, a reduction in
surface heat flux would probably have caused the core to stop convecting an
shut off the magnetic field. There is thus an important link between
surface processes and core magnetism, which may also be relevant to planets
such as Earth and Venus.

Anyway, this is interesting because it talks about a link between plate tectonics and core convection. The paper presents good models for heat loss.

Well...

It's been a while, but I have been busy. Not a good excuse, I know. Half the time I don't know what to write anyway.
I've been working on schoolwork and research. For my "Bioclimatography" class we always have a lot of reading to do. We're reading Song of the Dodo by David Quammen. And we're reading Biogeography by MacDonald. It seems like everybody out there loves David Quammen, but I'm not a huge fan. He's ok, but not THAT great...
I'm also taking a soil and water chemistry class, which is awesome! We got to go over to ICAL where they do all sorts of neat analyses. We got to see and learn all about the SEM, XRD and XPS. Fun!
So otherwise I've been working on my sediment cores. They have to be sampled. I've been pulling macrofossils and pollen samples. I'm almost done with one core, then I have to start on my short-core samples. Then I'll probably start processing pollen samples. This is what I'm going to be doing all summer too. Not much fieldwork for me.

This is a sediment core... Not mine, but they all pretty much look the same. This is what I've been working on for the past couple of weeks.  

I don't post enough

Yeah, I know, I am a lazy blogger. I should write something every day. My problem might have been that I started my blog right before Christmas break, and so I wasn't at school with the internet for a while. Now that I'm getting back into the swing of school I think I should be able to keep up better. Hopefully.

The most interesting thing I've done lately is fieldwork in Jackson Hole. We went down there last Monday-Wednesday to get some cores. We ended up with two. I guess that is good. I don't like coring, nor do I like the whole rest of my project. Eh.

On a note that has absolutely nothing to do with anything, last night we watched the old movie Failsafe. Man, that movie is really freaky. Danny and I were saying how it ranks right up there in freakiness with the original Mad Max movie. The scene with the shoe is a lot like the scene with the phone melting. Creepy. There are just some movies that you should see once, but no more.

REFERENCES!

Yeah, so it has been a long time since I've posted, and that's the worst thing anyone can do in a blog, I know. I'm sorry.

I'm working on cataloging and organizing my references. In my proposal I have two full pages of references!!! Most people at my stage have 7 or 8, maybe 10 references that they've read and include in thier proposal. Sheesh! Talk about overkill. You'd think I was writing an NSF proposal or something!

I've been looking through the papers I've read (which includes MORE than just my proposal references). I've got 45 papers. I don't have a favorite. Some were really boring. Anyway, now I'm trying to separate them into categories for easier reference. Fun!

We are going to get one or two cores a week from today, down in Grand Teton National Park. It'll be way cold, and I'm not looking forward to that. It'll be nice to be able to get started on something other than writing my proposal. Especially since it is done.