Upwelling=productivity

I have this image of my brain all bandaged up in a hospital bed–one leg up in traction, a vase full of flowers on the table nearby–bravely pushing through recovery after a nearly tragic run-in with the 80-dimentional freight train called My Data. Though the writing has been going well, Breck’s exceedingly kind words about my ability as a writer were of no comfort to me this afternoon when I was up in front of my class trying to explain estuarine circulation in a well-mixed environment without ever having had a chance to discuss with Jan what I thought I understood, but what she tersely pointed out to me at the end of my lecture I did not. So it’s back to the flash drive and the Sigma Plot, trying to find patterns where there are none, trying to explain 70,000 possible influences on the variability of one dataset, and generally doing everything I can to short-circuit myself entirely. Yesterday evening I had so totally had it that all I could do was curl up on the couch on the bridge of the R/V Centennial on the ride home in the dark with my headphones in and play solitaire on my ipod listening to country music for an hour. It made me feel better but my brain still feels battered. I think I’m going to call it the weekend now.

99 phyla to eat in the sea, 99 phyla to eaaaaaat!

My previous consumption of Strongulocentrotus gonads in sake several years ago notwithstanding, I am proud to announce the addition of a new member of kingdom Animalia… to my diet!

Holothuroidea in the pan.

A sunrise and a sunset- can you tell the difference?

I am in the library. Sunshine glare is pouring in off the sea through the wide windows. It’s getting filtered through the linen curtains but still makes my hair and my shoulder hot, and the side of my face. To my right are the book stacks. I can see all the back issues of Science magazine, Zoomorphology magazine. Behind me are the titles like Neurobiology of Invertebrates: Gastropod Brain, and Standard Catalog of Shells. Octopus. Cephalapod Behavior. A Survey and Illustrated Catalogue of the Teredinidae. I have been in heaven all morning as I work on my paper. I can watch the light change over the water, see the divers come and go on the dock below me: one minute they are all standing around planning their day in their cute little fleece jumpers. The next time I look up they are in their dry suits, hefting air tanks and BCDs onto our little aluminum dive boats. Next time they are gone, the dock is empty, and there is the Aukelet buzzing off into the channel, a gleaming comet with the sun glinting off the windows and a frothy wake angling out to dissipate behind it.

Here are some pictures that I took, not of today, but from our cruise on tuesday. Sunrise and Sunset. Can you tell the difference?

sunrise?

Awake yet?

Sunset?