Update - the big news of the week

Ok, here is the big news in my life at the moment.

My research proposal is finally completed and submitted. Yay! All that stress, late nights, and Saturdays spent at uni are now over. At least for now. I don't even want to consider whats going to happen when I'm trying to finish my thesis. At least with my thesis, though, I can devote my time fully to it rather than trying to fit it in around spending most of time doing fieldwork up the coast. Anyway, back to the topic at hand.

With the stress of the research proposal now gone, field work has returned to being quite enjoyable. Apart from the weather, that is. The weather has been ridiculous. It hasn't been really hot, but it has been so humid that it is stifling anyhow. Look, this is Denison beach. See the mist? That's been almost constant for the past two weeks. Its not quite so bad at Swansea, but its still insane.


Last Friday, Moose and I finally managed to get our hands on the night vision binoculars and see what my little birdies do at night. The cloud cover was initially a problem, but that eventually cleared and the NVBs were awesome. Turns out my little birdies do exactly the same thing at night as they do during the day which is pretty awesome (especially considering that its a brand new scientific discovery never before published). It also turns out that Moose and I can manage to spend an entire night without trying to kill each other which I personally think is the more surprising discovery out of the two. Apart from the cloudiness and it getting rather cold, the only problem we had was a car load of drunken idiots going skinny dipping, but they didn't even notice we were there so it wasn't actually a problem.

Also big news, I have a new favourite word- "smef". Smef is a creation of Douglas Adams and should probably actually be written as S.M.E.F., but I like it better as smef. Smef stands for spontaneous massive existence failure, and describes perfectly that Friday I had two weeks ago that I don't want to talk about. Its also useful for such sentences as:
"I think it's smeffed!" which means "I think its suffered a spontaneous massive existence failure" or in the colloquial - "Its stuffed."
also "What in the smef is going on here?"
and simply "Smef!"

Unfortunately, 'smef' was the best part of Starship Titanic if you ask me (which you didn't). It definitely doesn't display Douglas Adams' genius in the same way as Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy does. It was still very useful as something to listen to while I was driving up and down the coast this week, though, as I have very sadly now run out of the Sherlock Holmes audio books Rob burnt me. Its quite disappointing really, but I guess all good things must come to an end. As has now, this post.

New Neighbour...

Most of you would remember a woman at uni that, during the final year of my degree, latched on to myself and my friend Megan, made our time at uni almost unbearable, and almost completely ruined our reputations and our relationships with both our colleagues and the faculty. It eventually got so bad that Megan and I would actually hide from her during lunch to avoid having to deal with her.

When this woman graduated (without flying colors, I feel compelled to add) and went up to Launceston to do her honours on something boring about squid, Megan and I were overjoyed that we would never have to deal with her again. Of course, I hadn't thought about the fact that I still have family and friends in Launceston and that they might have to deal with her instead. She then proceeded to embed herself into the life of one of them, and did her best to completely ruin it. At this point, I completely ran out of all Christian love and compassion towards this woman, and really, really hoped that it would be the last I ever heard of her.

But, alas, it was not to be. On Saturday I went in to my office at uni to work on my research proposal and there, in the office next to mine that had been empty since Malcom finished his thesis, was the woman herself. I nearly screamed. I said 'hi', but then immediately got to work and put my headphones on to discourage any conversation with her - I know from personal experience that if you show this woman the tiniest bit of friendliness, she can completely take over your life.

I assumed that she must have returned to do her PhD, but found out later from one of my friends that she had never finished her honours in Launceston and had come back down here to have another go. This made me feel a little better - I would finish my honours before she could finish hers. There is something about her that just makes me want to be better than her at everything and take her down a peg. Megan and I had both felt this way and it gave us a reason to work extra hard on all our assignments, and whenever we got a chance to compare results with her all the extra hard work paid off.

Competitiveness had worked as a coping strategy with her before, so I decided that I would use it again. Rather than despair that she had come straight back into my life, I decided to use it to my advantage. Everyday that I sit in that desk next to her will become a competition - who gets to uni first, who makes the most productive typing-like noises, who stays longer etc. I have the immediate advantage for two reasons: I actually know that we're competing and she doesn't (although it is in her nature to be competitive about everything anyway) and she has to take a smoke break every hour or so (or at least she used to and I'm assuming she wont have quit). It probably isn't the best strategy for dealing with anyone, but its going to have to do until I can muster any feeling of kindness, compassion, or brotherly love towards her and deal with her in a more Christian way.

Tomato!

My cherry tomatoes are finally ripening! And they're really yummy :)

Rejection

The other day I was at uni when I overheard a conversation between two of my colleagues that share the office with me. One of the two had recently submitted a paper for publication in a scientific journal and had just received a rejection letter. The other apparently has more experience in having papers rejected than anyone in the building and so had been the natural choice for the first to come to for some sympathy and commiseration. The conversation ran in such a way that it reminded me of this piece of pure awesomeness and I thought I should share it with you all in case you have yet to see it.

Dirty, stinky smoker, but comic genius.

"Here have this basket of stuff and stay for the weekend."

Photo album

Here are the photos that belong with the last post :)

Rob continually getting soaked while filling up the bucket.

Rob and me doing science

More science

Martin doing science

Martin not doing science :)

Quicksand: the very definition of aventure.

I dont want to talk about the last couple of days, but I will tell you about the days before that. As you all know, I spent two days doing intensive invertebrate sampling over the last week. The operative word in that sentence being 'intensive'. I'm sure that all of my volunteer helpers would say that it was a pretty intense couple of days.

On Tuesday, it was, of course, Australia Day and my parents had the day off and decided to devote it to helping me out with prey sampling (aren't they lovely). Mum and Dad went camping the night before so that they wouldnt be too far away from Bicheno in the morning and we could get started nice and early. Unfortunately, their lilo let them down (literally) and they didnt have the best nights sleep, but they managed to be pleasant company anyway. I left Hobart a little after 6am and Mum and Dad joined me on the beach at 9am.

The way intensive prey sampling works is that at 6 locations along the beach (at 2 Hoodie territories, 2 Red-cap territories, and 2 sections of the beach between territories that is unused by either species) 40 sand cores are taken, seived through a very fine mesh sieve that lets most of the sand through but keeps all the tiny little creepy crawlies, and then the bugs are picked from the sieve using forcepts and put in a sample bag labeled with the date, territory and location. 40 samples are taken at each of the six sites; 10 in the swash (where the waves are lapping on the shore), 10 in the lower beach, 10 in the hight tide mark, and 10 in the upper beach. All in all, I took 440 samples over 2 days.

Here, have some photos.

These are taken at Denison beach just north of Bicheno when Mum and Dad were helping me.

On Tuesday night I returned to Hobart after hanging out with Mum and Dad for a while (and having a very nice BBQ, seeing an Orca, and having a very much appreciated cup of coffee or two). We didnt finish sampling until after 6pm, but I dont remember how much after that it was. I dont know if Mum and Dad enjoyed themselves, but I actually did. I like being able to share my wonderful beaches with people - they are far more enjoyable that way. Unfortunately, it took so long doing the sampling that it was cold and windy by the time we finished and Dad and I didnt get to go snorkeling around the awesome rocks near Diamond Island.

On Wednesday I had to repeat the whole process on Friendly Beaches in the Frecynet National Park with two of my friends for volunteers. With only just over 4 hours sleep, I was very glad that Moose was doing all the driving and all I had to do was talk enough dribble to keep him awake. Rob was completely useless in this regard and snoozed in the backseat on the way up and back down. We stopped at Macca's in Sorell for breaky on the way and got to the beach around 10:30 and set to work.

We sampled all day (well, I did - the boys had a bit of break in the middle), but still had time to have a slight adventure and get eaten by quicksand on the edge of the lagoon. I knew there was quicksand at the lagoon from a previous experience getting my foot eaten, but I thought that it was only at that one place on the edge of the lagoon so I was telling the boys all about it, standing at the edge of the lagoon when suddenly I disappeared up to my waist - I really wish Moose had been quick enough to get some photos, but I was pretty quick to get out incase I got eaten completely. Then Rob decided it was his turn but he only disappeared up to his shins. The awesome thing about quicksand is the fact that you can stand there for a few minutes before you overcome the surface tension and then *slurp* you're gone. If you struggle you'll just break the surface tension more and sink further so you have to stay calm and try to increase your surface area in contact with the surface of the sand (eg you lie down and crawl/wiggle gently away until you're safe again). It was awesome, though, because, as you know, quicksand is the very definition of adventure.

Moose took some photos of us working and playing around and stuff, but I dont have them at the moment. I will, however, put some up if he sends them to me.

We got off the beach at around 7:30 (I think) and headed back down to Swansea for a BBQ, followed by chocolate biscuits and junkfood all the whole way home. We eventually got back to Hobart at 10:30ish, but it felt more like 2am. I was very glad to have a bit of extra sleep that night, I can tell you.

Anyways, I had a good couple of days and am very grateful to all four of my volunteers (Mum, Dad, Moose, and Rob) for coming and helping me and being good company despite long days, early starts, not enough sleep, quicksand, wet shoes, and marsh flies. Cheers guys, let me know when you need me to return the favour. I hope it wasnt too horrible for any of you, and I'm glad we're all still talking to each other.

The week ahead.

Its lunch time, so I'm taking a short break from my gruelling mental gymnastics for a few minutes to update you on how everything is going at the moment.

I was really looking forward to this week. All last week, I just couldn't wait for it to be Friday so that I could go home to my little shoebox of a flat in Hobart and not have to leave again for an entire week. Well, I would have to leave everyday, but the point is I could come back again every night. I was really looking forward to having a nice relaxing weekend, too. While Sunday was nice and relaxing despite being overtired and having a headache all day, Saturday really wasn't. I spent over 10 hours of my Saturday in my office at uni working on the research proposal, which, despite my best efforts, has been taking a ridiculous amount of time to finish. I just keep hitting road block after road block with it. Thankfully, all that remains to be done now is to put all the scattered sections into one coherent document and email it to my supervisors for their feedback. I fully expected to have it emailed off by the end of the day today.

Once that is done, I have to organise field equipment and do some paperwork so that I can spend the rest of the week doing far more interesting stuff. This week, I'm taking a break from my usual observations and focusing on some slightly different areas of my research project. One of these areas is a block of intensive invertebrate sampling covering two of my study beaches. Due to the intensiveness of this sampling, its not something I can do by myself so it is given me a great excuse to have some fun with my family and friends while working. Tomorrow, Mum and Dad are helping me in Bicheno and on Wednesday I'm bringing a car load of friends for a road trip up to Freycinet National Park to help me sample there. While there is quite a bit of work to be done, I'm really hoping that we manage to get it done quickly enough to fit in some fun on the beach as well. Hopefully, there will be some photos of said fun on the beach that I can upload later in the week.

Thursday will be spent in Hobart at uni, staring down a microscope all day to sort the samples that we've collected (not fun but at least its something different and I get to stay in Hobart another day).

Then on Friday, if everything falls into place, I get to sleep all day and work all night. I've been having a bit of trouble getting my hands on one of the pairs of night vision binoculars owned by the school, but I should be able to get them soon. Once I know whether I can have the binoculars on Friday night, I'll know for sure what I'm doing on Friday. I'm quite excited about doing nocturnal observation because no one actually knows what my birds do at night. There is a general consensus that they expect them to forage at night as well as during the day, but no one has actually seen them do it. Plus (and this is a very big plus) I can get a full nights observations and not have to worry about sunscreen or a hat or anything. I like it! The problem will be trying to figure when to eat and what to eat and how much coffee we have to take with us to be able to drive back home from Orford on Saturday morning.

I suppose I should get back to work now.