Posts filed under “Uncategorized”
Congratulations! (not)
Several months ago I received a letter from my fellowship funders, self-congratulatory and long winded as all such letters are. But the patronizing tone was quickly forgotten at the line “your fellowship is being increased by $X for the next academic year.” Then there was great rejoicing among the fellowship recipients. Great plans were laid for […]
Berry Go Round!
I bet you miss all the blogging I used to do about plants. Go get your fix at this month’s edition of the Berry Go Round botanical blog carnival. And here’s a picture of some adorable Western hemlock cones to help make up for all the plant blogging I haven’t done.
In appreciation of thorough metadeta
I’m working with a weather dataset that has some peculiar trends. So, of course, I got my hands on the metadata. And what metadata it is! Most of it is just as boring (but useful) as you imagine, but this bit completely makes up for the blandness of the previous six or so pages: IMPORTANT […]
Why people pirate (or, Science’s paywall sucks)
Doing things legally: When I went to the AAAS meeting in February, I got a free subscription to Science magazine. Fresh from the Evolution 2012 meeting and motivated to keep up with the literature better, I click the big blue button in the weekly email to “Start reading now!” Except I can’t “start reading now.” […]
Annoying behavior of the Evol2012 schedule app
I’m going to the big Evolution meeting in Ottawa in a few days. It’s going to be awesome! I’ve been browsing the the schedule, choosing talks to see using the fancy app developed for the conference. I am pleased and impressed that they’ve got a system in place for setting up my conference schedule that doesn’t […]
Boy meets girl
Earlier this year I spent a week at a workshop at the boots, mud, and resource extraction applied end of my field. It was pretty different from what I’m used to culturally. The mealtime conversations were considerably less intellectual than I’m used to in my professional life, often revolving around relationships. People talked about wedding […]
Breaking the grad student budget
Grad students joke, cry, and complain about being poor. As a grad student, I definitely don’t make a lot, but I make enough to eat well, live in a cozy apartment, and make a dent in the debt I racked up as a student with no health insurance. Quite frankly, I feel positively wealthy sometimes. […]