South by Southwest

As any of you out there that know me can attest, I am pretty well convinced that the Pacific Northwest is the best part of the world (those of you that don't know me all that well could probably figure that out from the title of this blog). The last few days, I've been on a brief road trip that's given me cause to say that many of the best parts of the best part of the world are in Southern Oregon. Here's what we saw that led me to that conclusion:

• Ashland - Besides being a lovely town in a gorgeous setting, Ashland has always been one of my favorite places because it's where I saw my first Shakespeare play, performed by one of the world's preeminent presenters of The Bard's works, the Oregon Shakespeare Festival. That was years ago, but I've returned several times since to see many excellent plays; this time, though, we saw one that tops them all. It was a production of As You Like It set in 1930s America. I was skeptical at first, but I was convinced before the first scene had ended: setting the the play in the Depression both complemented its fast-pace humor and underscored its more serious moments (particularly the "All the world's a stage" soliloquy). If you find yourself anywhere near Ashland this year, by all means go out of your way to catch this one. I can't sing its praises highly enough.
• Wineries - Not only does Oregon produce excellent Shakespeare, it produces excellent wine as well (Why even bother traveling to Europe?). We stopped at several wineries on the road between Ashland and the coast, and we tasted wine ranging from good to outstanding (and that's not just me being positive; we really didn't taste anything that was bad). The biggest surprise of all was a dry Riesling we found in a winery just outside of Eugene, something that I didn't know existed outside of Germany.
• Redwoods - Technically speaking, Redwood National Park isn't in Oregon, but we did pass through the northern corner of it en route to the coast. I mention it here because it's one of those places that everyone should see once in their lives. I'm willing to go out on a limb to say there's nothing quite like it anywhere: it's the Forest to End All Forests. There's something otherworldly about the groves of staggeringly enormous trees shrouded in fog and blanketed in a thick green carpet of ferns. I'm not the only one who thinks so: the redwoods served as a backdrop for both Endor in Star Wars and the Jurassic in Walking With Dinosaurs, and if both George Lucas and the BBC give the forest their seal of approval, then it must be a great place...
• The Coast - I've sung the praises of the Oregon Coast so many times on this blog that there really is no sense in me belaboring the point here. Suffice it to say that the southern coast is, if you can imagine, even better than its northern counterpart, and is certainly far less built-up. It also turns out you can get a great bowl of clam chowder at no less than three restaurants in Florence (we went with Mo's, which also has the best view in town).

So there you go, four great reasons to visit Southern Oregon (and Northern California). If you're still not sold on it, check out my photos from the trip, which on the whole actually turned out pretty well.

How Science Works: Patterns & Predictions

Good news, everyone! Now that my ridiculous Finals Week is over, I can start posting random ramblings again! I know that's what you're all here for, after all. At any rate, as I mentioned a couple of posts ago, I recently took part in an impromptu debate on the philosophy of science. It was in my Community Ecology class, and began as a discussion of whether or not ecology had any general laws (more on that in the second installment of this post). I'm not usually a big participant in class discussions, but one of the other students said something that I just couldn't let go unchallenged. He said something to the effect of "Who cares about general laws, anyway? I mean, it's science, who cares if you're finding patterns or not?" Effectively, his argument was that science is all about exploring the unknown, and that simply going out and describing things (in this case, ecological structures) was sufficient. With all due respect to this student, I would consider this view to be not just mistaken, but dangerously so. Science is, at its core, all about finding patterns. Reduced to it's barest essentials, science is a two-step process: first you make a prediction, then you see if it holds true in the real world or laboratory (that's the Scientific Method, after all: formulating and testing hypotheses). Observation of patterns is essential to both these components. First, how can any prediction be made without some pattern to base it on? To cite an example near and dear to my own heart, a cladogram is a hypothesis of how organisms are related. While it is based on observational data, it is the patterns formed by these data that are of real importance: they allow an evolutionary biologist (by way of PAUP) to predict which organisms are most similar ("Species A and B share features 1 and 2, while Species C does not; therefore, A and B are more closely related."). Second, once your prediction is made, it is tested by observing whether the patterns it predicts are in fact manifested. In keeping with the example cited above, a cladogram might be tested in several ways, most often bootstrapping or jackknifing, which reshape or prune the tree to see of the patterns predicted by the original cladogram still hold. Of course, the student in my class was right that description and data collection are essential to both processes, but they alone are not sufficient. Finding patterns in these data and to use those patterns to construct or test a hypothesis is also necessary.
I probably ruffled a few feathers by saying the student who made the claim that patterns were unnecessary for science was "dangerously" wrong. I'll explain what I mean now, and maybe that will also explain why I take this sort of thing so seriously (it's not just that I'm old before my time and hate people disagreeing with me). I may sound like a conspiracy theorist now, but to me it comes down to that menace that's constantly looming in the shadows, "intelligent" design. The powers that be at the Discovery Institute and throughout the ID world are very, very good at making people think that what they do is science (it's clearly not, but I'll save my lengthy explanations of why for another time). A key component of their campaign is confusing people about what actually constitutes science. At the risk of sounding jaded, I'm never too surprised when they're able to pull wool over the eyes of much of the American public, but
to hear a student at a major university - supposedly one of our educated elite - profess such a profound misunderstanding of the scientific method is extremely worrying. Of course, this has more to do with the generally abysmal state of education in this country than with the agenda of the Discovery Institute per se, but it was still enough to shake me to the point where this has been on my mind literally every day for the last week and a half.
Having said all this and knowing that my audience is, of course, a highly scientifically literate bunch, I'm curious to know what you all think. I realize it's possible that my opinions on the nature of science are divergent from those that you have, and I'd be curious to know if you're with me 100%, agree with some things, or think I'm just a nut job with too much free time on my hands. After all, skepticism, even regarding your own thoughts, is another important facet of science.

Happy St. Patrick's Day!

Given my curmudgeonly nature, I'm sure you're all expecting some rant about how turning St. Patrick's Day into purely a drinking holiday is a trivialization of Irish culture. It's true that I do have opinions along those lines; reducing the nation that brought us James Joyce, Oscar Wilde, and Jonathan Swift to an excuse to wear green and drink Guiness could be construed as offensive. On the other hand, I know that any one of the people I just mentioned would much prefer having a pint or two (or several...) to getting wrapped up in self-pity and victimhood. No, the reason I felt the need to post today was because I wanted to share one of my favorite Irish toasts:

May those who love us, love us.
And for those who don't love us,
May God turn their hearts. 
And if he cannot turn their hearts,
May he turn their ankles,
So we may know them by their limping.

At the end of the day, I really can't claim to know more about Ireland than any other Irish-American (which is to say about 90% of the country), but I do know that I've always liked that toast, hokey as it may be. I could drone on about how things like that remind me not to take myself too seriously, but doing so would be taking myself too seriously, so in the spirit of the day I'll avoid that catch-22. Happy St. Patrick's Day!

What a Week it's Been

It's the last week of the quarter, which always makes for a busy time. On top of that, the whole city of Eugene has had a buzz about it this week, because Oregon just won the Pac-10 and is poised to go deep into the NCAA tourney. Even for someone such as yours truly who doesn't really care for basketball it's an exciting time to be a Duck. Combine that with the idyllic weather we've been having, and it's been a week that's been anything but conducive to working. Of course, I've not had any time for idling. Here's a few of the things that have been keeping me busy:

-Continuing my jihad against the ants. The talcum powder trick worked to break up the trail that kept forming across my kitchen, but to actually reduce numbers I've had to resort to chemical weapons in the form of ant traps full of arsenic. They're pretty insidious devices that fool the ants into bringing back the poison to feed the rest of the colony. They seem to be working spectacularly well, and I feel almost bad for the poor things, but I'm not about to cut and run.

-Getting things in order for the summer. In the past week I've applied for a summer grant from the university (though I'm not holding out much hope for it) and for a class in analytical paleobiology down in Santa Barbara this summer. I should hear about both sometime next month.

-Vetting candidates for the department's next professor of paleontology. I seem to have timed my arrival here well, since in the next few months we'll have hired a new paleontologist (probably of the vertebrate variety). Given that we're still in the interview process, it's probably best that I don't elaborate on things too much, but the powers that be in the department actually seem to be interested in my opinions on the candidates, which is nice.

-Having an argument on the philosophy of science with some of the students in my Community Ecology class. More on this later, since I think this particular topic deserves a little more detail than I'm willing to go into now.

-Setting up my brand new replacement cell phone. It's got a camera in it and everything (not that I care that much about whether my phone has a camera or not, but I enjoy the novelty of it all). Give me a call so you can see how nice and clear the reception is!

-Reading up on the future of paleontology. Apparently it's robots.

-Finishing up class work. Nothing particularly exciting about this, but it's what I've devoted the bulk of this previous week to, so this list really wouldn't be complete without it. Next week being Finals Week, it's not going to be getting any less hectic, either...

Ants Aren't Gentlemen

Spring has sprung! The weather has been warm, flowers have been blooming, trees have been leafing, and baseball is back on the radio. All in all, it's a great time of year to be alive. Unfortunately, I'm not the only one who thinks so. The local any colony has responded to the change of season as animals always do: by reproducing like crazy and stuffing themselves full of food. Of course, my 1940s-vintage house is chock-a-block full of holes that make perfect entrances for ants, so I probably shouldn't have been surprised when I wandered into my kitchen the other day to find a long line of the little buggers stretching from the exterior wall to my pantry. As you all know, I love animals, even some that many people would find unsavory (case in point, I would never willingly kill a spider). Here's my dirty little secret, though: I really don't like ants. There are some pretty large ants in the world, some of which can deliver a correspondingly nasty bite, but even harmless little ones like those that have invaded my house give me the creeps. Maybe it's the whole hive mentality thing that bugs me (though bees don't bother me to speak of), maybe it's because they're so damn tenacious (you just can't keep them away from food once they've found it), or maybe it's just that they're very nearly impossible to get rid of. The good news is that they do have their weaknesses, some of which really make no sense at all. It turns out, for instance, that they won't cross a line of talcum powder (no idea why this should be, but it does seem to work), but of course it's only a matter of time before the persistent little gluttons find a new route to the pantry. So, if any of you out there have had this problem before, any advice on getting ants out of one's house would be greatly appreciated.
On an unrelated subject, I've posted my photos from my trip to England on my Picasa page if anyone's interested in seeing them.

Guess who's no longer draft-eligible!

Me, as of 7:30 or so this morning. Ain't aging great?

Britain, Britain, Britain

Last night I returned home from my farewell (for the moment) tour of England. As you already know from the last post, I spent the first few days in Bristol. We spent the second half of the week in Aldworth, a tiny village (small enough to fit the entire population into one photograph) in rural Berkshire. It served as a base from which to check off two of the major items on my "Things to See in England" list. The first was Avebury, which we visited on the way out of Bristol. Avebury is the stone circle to end all stone circles, and is leaps and bounds beyond Stonehenge because of its size (most of a village fits comfortably inside it), because of its extensive earthworks, and because of the relative lack of tourists. The other big item I can now cross off my list is Oxford, where we spent Thursday. My general impression was that it ranked slightly behind Cambridge on the charm scale but had excellent museums that make you feel as though you've been transported back a century or so. Both places are well worth the trip if you ever get the chance. We managed to see more than Avebury and Cambridge, of course: we also went to Castle Combe (often considered to be the ideal English village), the Uffington white horse (possibly the oldest chalk figure in England, and right next to the hill where St. George is supposed to have killed the dragon), Blenheim Palace (one of the most spectacularly ornate palaces I've seen in Europe and the site of Churchill's birth to boot), antique stores aplenty (if you sense my dad's hand in that one, you're right), top-notch gastro-pubs in Chinnor and Goring, and a "normal" pub in Aldworth that might well be the best in which I've ever had a drink. It was a hectic week, but a good one, and it certainly reminded me just how much I'll miss England. With that in mind, remember when I closed out my old blog with a series of "Top 7" lists about my favorite things in Britain? I promised I'd make one more, and whether you want me to or not, I'm now going to keep that promise with my list of the top 7 things I'll miss about England (and yes, I do mean England; sorry Wales and Scotland, I just didn't spend enough time in either place to get too sentimental).

7) Transportation
This may sound odd, but one of the great joys of my time in Bristol was that I could leave it so easily. This is not because I dislike Bristol (see below) but because I love to travel, be it by train to London or Cambridge or by plane to Madrid or Hamburg.
6) Place Names
Seriously, how can you not love a country that comes up with names like Chipping Sodbury or Wootton Bassett?
5) Pubs
No, they're not just bars, at least not in principle. You don't just go to a pub to drink (though I won't deny that plenty of that takes place, sometimes to excess), you go to sit down and have nice, long conversations with your friends over some beers.
4) Bristol
I'd just as soon not go back to many English cities (I'm talking about you, Gloucester), but Bristol never got old. It's got it all: an historic harbor, beautiful parks, a medieval core (albeit a very small one), a magnificent Georgian neighborhood, and enough pubs and restaurants to keep going out from getting stale.
3) The Landscape
Being quite a Pacific Northwest chauvinist, it's rare for me to rave about any countryside other than my own, but I've found myself oddly nostalgic for England's rolling hills and grassy pastures. The most striking things about it is its perpetual green-ness, a color that is striking even in the middle of winter and is almost overwhelming in spring.
2) Old Buildings
Even in Bristol, which was gutted during the war, it's not uncommon to run across a centuries-old building. Head ten minutes away by train to Bath and you'll see one of the most gorgeous collections of 18th Century buildings in the world. Coming from a country where a 19th Century building is considered ancient, that's nothing short of remarkable.
1) The English
Mind you, I won't miss everything about the English. Like any group of people, they have their faults. However, there are a great many qualities of the English personality that can be chalked up in the plus column. They can carry on a conversation masterfully, but they don't waste words. They will be unwaveringly polite to you, even if they hate you. Most of all, they have the best sense of humor in the world. This is an underappreciated side of English culture, I feel, but it is also true. I know several people who would disagree but, well, they're wrong. Sarcasm is funny. Deal with it.

The Avon Stream, Redux

This very possibly marks the last opportunity I will have to post a blog entry from Bristol, and I figured I had to take advantage of that opportunity for old time's sake. I'm back in Britain to celebrate an era that came to an end yesterday at a pompous (but exceedingly well-organized) graduation ceremony at which, to the strains of thunderous organ music, my classmates and I were officially awarded our master's degrees. Actually, you might more accurately say that the era came to an end after our subsequent gathering at the pub, which I imagine is the last time such a high percentage of the 2005-2006 MSc cohort will be in the same place at the same time. It is, of course, great to be back in Bristol (which, oddly enough, it feels like I never left), gratifying to receive the degree, and wonderful to see my classmates again. Still, this sort of thing is always bittersweet, since it finally hit home just how much I will miss this city, this country, and the people with whom I worked. Those of you who have been reading my blogs since Day One will remember that my first reaction to my classmates was that they appeared to me to be "one of the most outstanding groups of people I’ve had the pleasure of being associated with" and that I "will really like it here" in Bristol. A year and a half after making those predictions, my mind has not changed in the least. Have there been low points? Of course. Still, there is not the slightest doubt in my mind that I am a better person for having spent time at the University of Bristol, and I will be forever grateful to the university, the city, and above all else the people who I have had the pleasure of working with. Thanks, all. Now, off to Oxfordshire!

Canoe Conundrum

On Sunday, I drove out to Veneta to go to a canoe steaming ceremony. It was a dugout canoe that my uncle had been building for the Kalapuya tribe, and it turns out that in order for the boat to bow out into the right shape, it needs to be exposed to very hot water for several hours. This is done by filling the hull of the boat with water and periodically adding rocks that have been heated in a fire. It's a very tense time, since there's always a chance that the canoe will not expand correctly or, even worse, split, so needless to say the ceremonies surrounding it have traditionally been very important. The affair this weekend was much more toned-down, but it was still really interesting. I had a great time, but I'll admit I always feel a bit voyeuristic at such things. After all, my family history consists of white, white, and more white, and it's no secret that those of Northern European descent have had, at best, a rocky history with the Indians. Don't get me wrong, I have great - and genuine - respect for the Kalapuya and for pretty much all the tribes along the Northwest Coast, both because of their boat-oriented society (seriously, I have great admiration for any seafaring people, from Northwestern Indians to the Vikings to - I'll admit it - imperial Britain) and because their art, culture, and language are the foundation upon which modern Northwestern culture is built (I'm perfectly willing to support this claim of mine, just not now, since this post is long enough already). I've been to a smattering of ceremonies and events like this canoe steaming and for the first summer out of college I practically lived on the Makah reservation, and I've never once sensed any resentment or any objection to my being there. In fact, I've experienced exactly the opposite. Still, I can never shake the thought that maybe I shouldn't be so welcome. After all, just imagine how my Swedish forebears would have reacted if a group of Kalapuya had started showing up at their church services not because they shared the parishioners' faith but because (for some strange reason) they found Lutheran pageantry interesting. I'd like to be able to tie this all up with a nice, clear concluding statement, but frankly I can't. As a matter of fact, I've wound up with far more questions about the relationship between white Americans and Indians than I began with. I suppose you could argue that provoking thought is the highest goal of any human endeavor, so by that measure, this may be my first meaningful post ever! Hooray!

Happy Groundhog Day!

February has its share of worthless holidays (I'll spare you all my Valentine's Day rant for now), but I'll admit I've always had a soft spot for Groundhog Day, largely because it celebrates something totally meaningless and makes not one shred of sense. Of course there are the obvious questions of what a burrow-dwelling rodent has to do with weather prediction and why we arbitrarily rely on a groundhog from Pennsylvania, of all places, to forecast the turning of the seasons. I've also always thought that we've been reading the whole thing backwards all these years: if the groundhog sees its shadow, it must be sunny out, which seems to me to be more indicative of the onset of warmer weather than a grey sky would be. I'm probably overthinking this, but the good news is that Punxsutawney Phil didn't see his shadow this morning, so Spring should be right around the corner! Of course, any Oregonian groundhogs would disagree: our freakishly sunny stretch continued today, and any animal emerging from its burrow this morning would have been face-to-face with a particularly bold shadow. Fortunately, there are no groundhogs in Oregon (the closest we've got is another member of the genus Marmota, the Yellow-bellied Marmot), so that means Spring starts tomorrow, right?

A Devil of a Time on the Coast

On Friday evening, I headed up the road to Portland to celebrate my cousin's birthday. After my obligatory trip to Powell's the next morning, I decided to take the scenic route back to Eugene and drove out to the coast. You couldn't ask for a better day to take a trip to the Oregon Coast. It was windy enough to throw up some fairly impressive surf and the tide was particularly low, always a plus if you like tidepooling or beachcombing. Most importantly, it was bizarrely sunny and warm: 65 degrees according to a bank reader board in Newport (though a second sign in the same town said it was 18 below). I decided to spend most of the afternoon at the beaches below Cape Perpetua, one of the more imposing headlands along the central coast. It turned out to be well worth it, largely because of the Devil's Churn. The Devil's Churn is a surge channel, one of the wave-cut fissures that crop up all along the coast and often make for spectacular interplays between water and rock. I've seen my share of surge channels (during my summer of fieldwork on Tatoosh Island, we had to leap a pretty good-sized one almost every day), but this one is unique. Though it's fairly normal in terms of depth, it is both extremely long and extremely narrow (just a few feet wide in places). Because the Devil's Churn is so long, it runs far up into a ravine on the face of the cape, and because it is so narrow, it channels a massive amount of tidal energy into a roiling, frothing maelstrom (hence its name). Even on a warm, sunny day conducive to cheerfulness, it's a creepy place. It's perpetually in shade, the walls of the ravine are continuously dripping with water, and the rocks around the edges form weird, sharp-edged figures. Perhaps uncanniest of all is the sound of it: when a large surge hits the channel, it runs up to the end and smashes into it with an audible crash. This is pretty normal for a surge channel, but because of the sheer ravine walls on either side, the noise echoes around impressively with a sound like a kettle drum; you can actually feel the concussion. My point here is that if you're looking for a taste of the sublime (in the literal sense of the word) and you happen to be in the vicinity of Florence, Oregon, this is one you shouldn't miss. For those of you with less of a taste for such things, I can vouch for the rest of the beaches around there being very nice on a sunny day. Either way, it's worth the trip; so, dear readers, when are you coming to visit?

How do you keep the music playing?

I'd like to depart from my usual ramblings for just one post, because one of the seminal figures in my life died yesterday, and I want to do my small part to honor him. Many of you have probably never heard of Floyd Standifer, but it would not be an exaggeration to say that he was the heart and soul of jazz in Seattle. He also was one of the founders of The Northwest School and led the jazz ensemble there for somewhere in the vicinity of two decades. I had the inestimable privilege of playing trombone for Floyd for seven years, and much of my love of and appreciation for music is due to him. Besides just putting into words my sincere appreciation for the personal benefits I reaped from him, I can attest that Floyd was a truly remarkable person. His life's story is a fascinating one, and makes for a good read. However, if you really want to appreciate Floyd, look up one of his albums: you'll seldom hear a sweeter-sounding trumpet, flugelhorn, or sax, and you'll never hear another musician who loved what they did more than Floyd Standifer. So, to a classy human being, an excellent teacher, and a musician of the highest caliber, thanks for everything, Floyd. You will be missed.

Denouncing Dr. Dino

This news is a few days old now, but as many of you may have heard, infamous Creation "scientist" Kent "Dr. Dino" Hovind has just been sentenced to 10 years in prison for tax evasion. Apparently he had claimed that he didn't have to pay taxes because everything he owned belonged to God. I'm not writing this to poke fun at Hovind (though if you want a laugh at his expense, check out the back of an "educational" children's placemat he put together a few years back); rather, I'm writing it because I am decidedly partisan in the battle between Education and Ignorance, and I certainly didn't want to pass up the chance to point out the glaring hypocrisy of the latter side. Of course, I'm no theologian, but I know enough about the Bible to know that the issue of taxation is specifically raised in its pages, and that even a good Christian should "render unto Caesar that which is Caesar's." So, effectively, Hovind is going against both Biblical and United States law, and yet he makes himself out to be some sort of martyr. The scary thing is, people believe him! Just look at some of the comments people have posted on the article I linked to at the top of this entry. They say he's a good man, and that should excuse him from being punished for being greedy (one of the Seven Deadly Sins, I might add). They're effectively saying that it's OK if you don't actually act as the Bible says just so long as you say you do, which is just about the most un-Christian thing I can think of. At any rate, it's nice to see that for once one of these creeps got caught. Lest we forget, though (and because I like ending on an ominous and melodramatic note), figures like Hovind are just pawns in this game; there are far more insidious and effective forces out there on the side of Ignorance, and I fear the people at the Discovery Institute are far too clever to ever get caught at tax evasion...

I have a master's degree...in science!

A brief, albeit disproportionately eventful, chapter of my life ended today. Fifteen and a half months ago, I headed off to the University of Bristol. This morning, I got an email from the head of the palaeobiology master's program there to make it official: the final grades are in for my thesis, and I passed, meaning that I am now entitled to add three extra letters to my name (yes, that's right, three: that's one of the overlooked benefits of getting a British MSc rather than an American MS). I hope you all don't mind me patting myself on the back a bit, but it's not everyday I actually get to revel in the glorious feeling of accomplishment. Mind you, sending an Anglophile paleontologist to a England for a year to study fossils hardly constitutes torture, so I really can't claim I suffered much. I also did well enough in the classes there that there was never any real danger of not receiving my degree. Still, to have started something that big and to have finished - especially after having been out of academics for a few years - is a very nice feeling. That's all I have to say about that for now; back to my normal, self-deprecating self tomorrow.

Snowfall

Sure enough, it snowed last night and sure enough, the city of Eugene came to a screeching halt this morning. Every school and college in town was closed for the day (except, of course, the U of O, which apparently hasn't had a snow day in decades). Still, I had just enough free time to take a stroll to take a walk through the woods up the hill (yes, I have a forest behind my house, yet another reason why you all need to come visit more often) to snap a few photos as promised yesterday. My whining about local snow driving abilities (or lack thereof) aside, Eugene does look very nice under a coat (well, really more of a dusting) of snow.
Also, I read what I thought was an interesting article on the Chicago Tribune's website today about how democrats are hoping to gain a lot of ground in Western states, particularly Colorado, New Mexico, Arizona, and Nevada. Of course, I'm not at all qualified to opine on politics, but I think it's a splendid idea. Despite appearances to the contrary, I've long thought that it's fertile ground for fiscally conservative but socially liberal democrats. Here's hoping; as the article points out, the West could make the difference in 2008.

I was dreaming of a white Christmas, and all I got was this lousy white Treaty of Versailles Day...

As I write this, Eugene is crippled under the onslaught of what passes for a major blizzard in these parts. I have something like half an inch of snow in my yard right now, with periodic minor flurries still passing through now and then. This wasn't enough to deter a large group of particularly brazen-looking racoons that I spotted out of my window earlier, but it's enough to spook all the locals into thinking they'll have to miss work tomorrow. As you all know, I love the Northwest to the point where I start becoming horribly depressed if I spend too long anywhere else. However, we Northwesterners do have out faults, and one of them is that we really have no idea how to handle snow. In Chicago, there could be an order of magnitude more snow on the ground, and there would be absolutely no talk of anyone missing work; the snowplows would be out that night and the streets would be back to their usual crowded selves the next morning. Here, though, even the mention of snow is enough to get professors to collect everyone's emails so that they can send out a cancellation notice for their class. Of course, we hardly ever get snow here, so this is at least somewhat understandable; I doubt most Chicagoans would know what to do if it rained steadily for a month. Also, we have hills here, which makes getting around on icy roads considerably more difficult. It also, along with the larger number of trees here, makes for a much nicer looking snowfall than has ever graced the Midwest (or at least the urban Midwest). So, while snow in Hyde Park always put me in a foul and complaining mood, I'll admit I was actually kind of glad to see that the flurries they had predicted this week actually made it without turning into rain on the way. Expect pictures tomorrow if I am able to find photography time between classes...

Merry Un-Christmas!

Well, as you're all no doubt aware, today was Epiphany (or, if you prefer, Three Kings Day), the last day of Christmas. I kid, of course. No one ever seems to be aware of that. Oh well. At any rate, the tree's down, the decorations are packed up, and it's time to reflect on a fairly remarkable Christmas. In the last 12 days I've sold my old car, bought a new (used) one, spent a relaxing New Years in the San Juans, and adopted a cat named Dabby (special thanks to Michael for the name suggestion; it may be meaningless, but somehow it just fits). Tomorrow it's back down to Eugene for a quarter of GIS, geobiology, petrology, and perhaps even potoroo teeth. The fun just never stops!

Auld Lang Syne

This final post of the year comes to you live from my favorite place: Lopez Island. Looking back, I can unhestitatingly say that this has been the most ambiguous year of my life. It would not be a huge stretch to say that the very best and the very worst moments of my life happened in the last twelve months. Since I have so few readers, I don't want to scare any away with excessive negativity, so I'll just focus on the positives. First of all, I spend most of the year in Britain, which for an anglophile such as myself is pretty sweet. I also love traveling, and I set a record for countries visited (7; 9 if you count Wales and Scotland as separate from England) that I doubt I'll ever break. Of course, it's not all about quantity, but let me assure you that these were quality trips as well: paleontology in Ottawa, art in Madrid, Easter in Germany, Viking ships in Denmark, finding the England that I thought existed only in fiction in Cambridge. Of course, best of all was my acceptance into Oregon: there's just nothing quite as wonderful as knowing that I'll get to spend the foreseeable future "at home" in the Northwest. For those of you who I've known for a long time, and for those that I've just gotten to know since last January, Happy New Year!

Lovely Weather for a Fish Hunt Together with You

Of course, one of the things we all love about Christmas is that it's the time of year when people are more likely to work together for the greater good. Once again, though, mankind has been one-upped by nature: fish work together throughout year. A recent study of groupers and moray eels in the Red Sea has shown that these two totally unrelated fish regularly hunt together, to the benefit of each. Truly cooperative hunting requires two species with complex brains, as both must be able to communicate with the other, and the behavior has previously been observed only in birds and mammals. For more on the fairly major implications of this study, see the well-written (if somewhat overstated) response by Frans de Waal. Also be sure to check out the original article, particularly the videos of hunting groupers and eels. So, there you go, the spirit of the season embodied by fish. Merry Christmas!

Call to Arms

Don't get me wrong: I really enjoyed my time in Britain, and I firmly believe they do many, if not most, things better than we do. That said, they have to be the only developed country that can compete with us in being ignorant about the rest of the world. I'm not the only person who thinks this: a group of concerned geographers has recently put together the Geography Cup, an online contest pitting the US versus the UK. Of course, by definition, the readers of this blog are highly educated, geographically literate people, and I strongly recommend that you go to that site right now and give the quiz a shot. It's really very simple: you have to identify 10 randomly selected countries and answer three questions. Sadly, the average score for both Britain and America are just over 50%. So please, rather you're from the US or the UK, do your part to up those scores and show the rest of the world that we're really not complete idiots.