In the meantime, you can find me in any of the following places:

• Facebook (though I warn you, I’m just barely starting it–it’ll be a few before it looks like a real facebook page! In fact, I haven’t even figured out how to link to my profile here. I’ll update that link when I do.)
• Game reviews at JayisGames (This link takes you to my author page, where you can find the latest review by me, even if they are few and far between.)
• The Ditch Project (I’m designing the website for this event, as well as preparing labels for a series of historical maps for a museum exhibit. It’s fun, but the project probably won’t be complete until May.)
• ChaoticUtopia.com (For now, it looks worse than it did when I moved to ScienceBlogs in the first place. I plan to clean it up and use it as a portfolio site. That update might happen as late as March.)
• Writing a historical novel. You can read it when I’m done!

Now, before I go, I really feel like I owe you folks a ton of gratitude. Writing here gave me a place in the world, a community. You all helped me justify my own existence. And that’s no small thing. It’s like this song, No Rain, by Blind Melon:

I feel just like that bumblebee. Yay!

Now, finally, I’d like to leave you with one last piece of fractal art, and a bit of advice. First, the fractal:

These layered fractals, filled with fractal Brownian motion patterns, were designed to look like these images showing heat being absorbed and emitted by our planet.

While this is obviously meant to show the way heat is trapped in our atmosphere, thus adding to climate change, I’m sharing it for more broad reasons. Dynamic change is an essential part of our world. It’s something that happens on not only a planetary scale, but in our day-to-day lives. That’s where the bit of advice comes in.These changes are often so complex, that they seem to come in waves. When you are hit by these waves of change, and start to feel overwhelmed, don’t fight it. You can battle, but it doesn’t get you anywhere. Instead, trust that such complexity can lead to beauty and synchronicity. There is simple approach to any complex problem.

Or, in other words, just ride the waves.

Thank you all and (hopefully) see you later in the year!

I’ve learned that I can only keep so many balls in the air at once. Sort of. I’ve stopped trying to throw in new projects–I just ignore those out-of-the-blueprints that pop into my head, or add them to my much-neglected list of ideas, rather than obsessing over my latest and greatest epiphany. That helped. I’ve come a long way, learning how to focus my interests. That was supposed to be a good thing… and it is. But maybe not for this blog.

That night, as I lay down to sleep, I was still overwhelmed by blogging guilt. The Chinook winds were blowing–erratic, chilling gusts that blew down from the Rockies and slammed into the plains. They haunted me all night with whistles and whines, shaking the house and rattling the windows. I closed my eyes and tried to shut it out, to let peaceful sleep come and silence both the winds and my guilt. But that only led me to think about classes starting in a week, about the work I’ve started, and the Christmas boxes sitting downstairs waiting to be packed away for another year. I wondered how I would have the time to deal with everything. Then it came to me. Let it go. It isn’t worth the sleepless nights, the pressure, the guilt.

Now, don’t get me wrong–this blog has been a wonderful experience for me. That’s why I’m taking the time to explain all of this. It has been worth it. Totally worth it. This blog gave me a voice, and showed me how to use it. It gave me a level of confidence that would allow me to succeed and to follow my goals. I’m doing that now, and it feels great.

I gave it a week to think this over, but in the end, I decided this would be for the best. So, now, like the title says, this is goodbye. (Now I’m going to have Moby stuck in my head all week, too.) I might be back someday, if or when I find the time and passion to return. I will continue to do the occasional game review at JayIsGames–that’s a different sort of blogging, more of a release than pressure. Mostly, I’m going to keep writing, hopefully for publishing in print somewhere. I’m working on a novel on local developments, as well as trying to publish a variety of other stories and articles that I’ve written over the years. Hopefully, you’ll soon see my name in a byline somewhere!

I still plan to update ChaoticUtopia.com, perhaps more than ever, now. It won’t really be a blog, per say, but it will be a way to keep track of my various projects. In the next week or two, I’ll post a final piece here, along with links to places you can find me in the future.

In the meantime, thanks to everyone–to my readers, to my friends and family, to everyone here at ScienceBlogs, and the blogosphere at large: thanks for all of your support over the past few years!

In the meantime, check out this series of photographs compiled by the Boston Globe. The entire collection of 120 pictures is incredible. Some are amazing, others shocking, but all are excellent works of photography. This one was my favorite:

In this photo by Irfan Khan (AP), workers are releasing the first of four million black balls into Ivanhoe Reservoir, in order to prevent a chemical reaction between chlorine from water treatment, natural bromide, and good old California sunshine. Thus, they are hoping it will protect the Los Angeles water supply from the carcinogenic product: bromate. It reminds me of a giant plastic pool covering, separated into individual bubbles.

You can find many more great photos in these three articles.

Ooh! Oooh! Oooh! Could it be? I tore the paper, revealing the cover. YES! A book by Andy Goldsworthy! I opened it, and began to flip through the pages of ephemeral artwork, each structure more impressive than the last.

"KARMEN! Stop reading and get back to your gifts. Pass it on!" I’d forgotten it was still Christmas. Reluctantly, I closed the volume and passed it around so everyone else could take a look. Would you believe it; I didn’t get to look at it again until I went home that night. Every time I turned around, I’d see several of my relatives crowded around, peering at Goldsworthy’s lovely photographs. I suppose I can’t blame them–discovering Goldsworthy’s art is an experience that begs to last.

I discovered his art a few months back, after being assigned a movie review in my water policy and science class. The assignment was very open-ended: watch a movie about a river, and write an essay discussing the importance of the water to the film. We were provided a list of possible films, but I went for the raw Google search. That search turned up the film, Andy Goldsworthy’s Rivers & Tides:

It ended up being the subject of my review, which I’ve shared below. It seems especially timely, since we’re transitioning from a focus on art and complexity to a focus on water and sustainability. If you enjoy the review, I’d highly recommend renting the video. I rented it from itunes for a few dollars, and watched it on the computer. Even though I was supposed to be doing homework, it turned out to be the best couple dollars I spent all semester. So, read the review, then go check out the movie for yourself!

Rivers and Tides: The Art of Andy Goldsworthy

Rivers and Tides is an art documentary exploring the ephemeral work of Andy Goldsworthy from Penpont, Scotland. The artist works exclusively in nature, creating art that is born from the environment, exists with it, and decays back into the earth with the natural processes of time. Various works are shown in natural scenes, while Goldsworthy describes his methods and inspiration. His soft narration is backed by soothing music, giving the entire film a meditational feel. The scenes include sculptures in ice, stone, and other natural media, but are generally related to the flow of rivers, if only in appearance.

The movie began with a river in an unexpected form-it is frozen. On the surface of the ice of a small pool, Goldsworthy had traced a wavy line, mimicking a meandering river. Then, he repeated the meander using other forms of natural media, such as a row of leaves, lain on a rocky river bank, embellished with twisted and flattened blades of grass. Arranged in a row, the grass revealed the same meander Goldsworthy had traced with his finger on the ice, before the wind lifted the leaves and scattered them onto the river. Next, Goldsworthy shaped chunks of broken icicles into sweeping curves, repeating the meander on a rocky seashore.

Goldsworthy depended on natural tools and items to create his work. For instance, the icicle sculpture was "glued" with a mixture of snow and ice, and shaped with the most convenient tool for cutting–Goldsworthy’s teeth. Sticks, leaves, ice, and the water of a river, all became elements of his art. Yet, the most intriguing medium that the artist worked with was time. The icicle sculpture was finished just as the sun rose, illuminating the winding meander. Soon, the sun’s heat melted the ice, and the glowing bends dripped and fell away. A whirlpool of sticks built in a tidal estuary was slowly washed out to sea. "It feels like it has been taken into another plane, taken off into another world, another work." Goldsworthy said, watching his carefully-constructed sculpture float away on the waves, "It doesn’t feel at all like destruction."

The natural elements, combined with the ravages of time, Goldsworthy’s work echoed the ephemeral aspect of nature. The world around us is constantly changing, with water as a most essential agent of that change. The rivers shape the land, the land directs the rivers. Something about the art reveals another connection between the river and nature; the flow of the water seems to give rise to life itself. A string of leaves, released into a gently flowing pool by Goldsworthy, seemed to be alive as it wound snake-like downstream.

Penpont, the artist’s home in Scotland, was an important source of inspiration to Goldsworthy. In the film, he was shown near his home, first building stone cairns along the riverbank, and later arranging pictures using poisonous stalks called "bracken." Despite the plant’s dangerous nature, Goldsworthy explained that it was one of his favorite items to work with. "I think we misread the landscape when we think of it as pastoral or pretty. There is a darker side to that." He held up one of the stalks; the root end was stalk is black, and the top a rusty orange, which created a beautiful contrast for his work: a black square surrounding a pale orange circle, which appeared to be the sun reflecting on the surface of a pool of water. He explained how the different colors, to him, represented the exchange of energy between the land and what is above it.

The film reflected on time and change, both through Goldsworthy’s art and his personal life. The sculptures moved by tides, leaves moved by river currents, and poisonous stalks channeling flow were all highlighted by their ephemeral nature. But the also film follows Goldsworthy around his home village, where he explains the slow, but constant changes there. People grow from young to old, businesses come and go; the juxtaposition of these artistic scenes and memorabilia suggests that we are as much a part of nature’s transient aspect as any leaf or stone.

A stream of yellow flowers wound gently through the forest. A chain of red leaves was laid against green grass and hedges. Nearby, ripples murmured gently in a river, just downstream from charging rapids. A ball of marigolds rested momentarily, in a divot in a boulder by a waterfall, looking very much like a patch of lichen. The scene was natural, yet guided. The bright colors sat as reminders of never-ending seasons, as the sound of falling water echoed constantly, like the turbulence of daily life. It is in this complex, yet peaceful scene, that Goldsworthy explained how the river became his most provocative source of inspiration:

"Somehow the river is that line that I follow. The river has an unpredictability about it–it really is unpredictable–and that line, running through, yet at the same time, having its own cycles related to the weather and the sea… so if I had to find something to join the year together, it would be something like the river."

In the following scene, a vine was seen dangling from tree branches over a wide river. The camera followed the vine, as wound about through a jungle, around thick trees, and into a grassy meadow, with sheep grazing nearby. As the scene continues, a shepherd appeared and crooked one of the sheep. Shortly thereafter, the ewe gave birth to a newborn lamb. Goldsworthy watched, no doubt thinking of the complex cycles of life and life’s connection to the river. This scene captured the essence of the film: life, connected to the river, creates art. Art, connected to the river, creates life. We’re caught up somewhere in the middle, left to admire the beauty and complexity of all creation.

Well… Santa got in the Christmas Spirit (or was that into the Christmas Spirits?) and now he needs your help to play connect the dots. Yup. It’s just what you think: (flash required)

Ho! Ho! Ho! Yellow Snow!

For more Holiday games, check out the Holiday Link Dump over at JayIsGames, written by yours truly. Yes, I’ve spent a bit more time playing games over the past few days than I have updating my website. (That’s still coming.) When you see these adorable treasures, you’ll understand how I got distracted.

Here is one gift that didn’t make it into the holiday link dump:

Build A Squid

So, now, if you forgot to buy something for your mother-in-law, you can name a squid after her and send it via email. Don’t you love Christmas in the 21st century?

Before I go, here’s one more Bob Rivers song:

I think it is really bizarre that the lyrics fit to that song as well as they do. I’ve heard most of these songs for years, growing up, but this one is new to me… and a new favorite, indeed.

Merry Christmas and Happy Holidays!

Humans!
A film by Three Legged Legs

This snarky little film is my way of saying: I’m back, but I’m still busy–you know, being a human, consuming resources, yadda yadda. Since Christmas is only a week away, I’m going to use this time to post nonsense filler (hopefully some of it holiday-themed) and work on the style changes that are now long overdue. Stay tuned for more!

There must be some corollary to Murphy’s law that states every time I want to do something nice for myself, I will be swamped with other things. That seems to be the theme for the entire autumn of 2008. I want to update my blog and home site, but thanks to family issues, computer problems, and class work, this fix-up keeps getting postponed.

I’d like to say that I have the solution, that I’m finally free, but the fact is, even this note is on stolen time. I have several final exams and a couple of papers to complete from now until Monday. After that, I expect a bit of the holiday rush, but that won’t be fraught with the same sense of intellectual urgency. Hopefully, I’ll be able to get some quality website work done in between rounds of shopping and baking. My head is bursting with ideas, so I’m eager to make the time to work here. Hopefully, this will be the last apology/non-update post for a long time. In the meantime, and once again, I’m sorry for the slowness.

Shoot your own dinner! via Southbank

Thanks to my pal, Sara, who recommended this manic turkey shooter for Thanksgiving Day. I know it doesn’t make sense, but then again, most holidays don’t anymore.

This story begins sometime in the mid-1990s, when I was still young enough to do stupid things with friends who had too much to drink. It involves a sort of tradition for those of us who grew up in the Front Range of Colorado, a world famous natural amphitheater, and a close encounter with the local flora.

It was late on a warm summer night. A group of us had decided, just on the spur of the moment, to go over to Red Rocks Amphitheater, and see who was playing. Now, this didn’t mean going to the ticket booth. It meant parking the car off the side of the road, and climbing over a hill to a place where you could overlook the concert below, and hear the music reverberating off of the monolithic rocks. Every teenager in the area has supposedly tried to do this at some point, although over the years it has become increasingly difficult–or so I hear. I might just be getting old.

Now, those of you who have never visited Colorado might have something of an idyllic view of our foothills. You see photos of aspen groves, forests thick with ponderosa and lodgepole pines… but that’s not really what we have in the foothills, close to the cities. Instead, it is more like a high desert scrub… lots of barren rocks, bristly grasses, stands of yucca, and most importantly (for this story at least) lots and lots of prickly pear:

(Note: I’ve used that picture before. It isn’t actually from Red Rocks, but from Table Mesa in Boulder.)

Ok… so, now, you might see where this is going. They don’t exactly provide nice cleared trails to sneak up into Red Rocks. So, we parked near some small, fenced fossil bed along Dinosaur Ridge, which runs up the right side of this map:

We were near the upper right-hand corner of the map, right about where the "sat" button appears–nowhere near the actual amphitheater. We knew we weren’t going to be close, although we really had no sense of the scale of the place. From the bottom of Dinosaur Ridge, it looked like an easy hike to the top, less than a quarter mile. We’d brought along a few pairs of binoculars (only one of which came home) so we assumed the distance from the stage (about a mile) wouldn’t matter.

So, there we are, in the dark, climbing up this ridge, with a couple of flashlights and a bunch of idiots. (Myself included.) As we climbed, the hill seemed to grow. We’d get a little higher, thinking we were right near the top, when another steep stretch emerged before us. Up and up, climbing around shrubs and boulders, slowly making our way up. We realized, too late, that a quarter mile on a steep, craggy slope was not anything like a quarter mile in the ’burbs. Once we started, we knew there was no turning back.

I was already winded and trying to bite back nasty complaints when I met the prickly pear. I didn’t see it… I just reached out to catch my balance, and set my hand right on top of it. Owshitfuckgoddammit…. a stream of swearing echoed forth into the dark wilderness as the pain registered. I grabbed the flashlight that I’d dropped, and shone it down onto my palm. I winced. My hand looked something like the prickly pear, with little spines protruding from my skin.

Suddenly, I didn’t care about the music, or the hike, or the stars above. I hated nature. I hated my friends and their stupid ideas. I hated myself for going along with them. Grumbling, I followed them up the ridge, slowly plucking spines from my hand, one by one.

When we arrived at the top, I had to bite my tongue. Our view was pretty incredible. The music was but an echo–I still have no idea who was playing that night–but all of Red Rocks was spread out beneath us, under a brilliant starry sky. We could see the roads leading to the parking areas, winding around the foothills, dotted by a half dozen pairs of lights, concertgoers who were leaving early or arriving late. I remember feeling a little awed by the way the roads and the rugged hills blended together, and the way the amphitheater glowed like some jewel off in the distance. It’s one of those moments I remember feeling that humanity and nature were linked, that maybe somehow our constructions were a part of nature. After all, I had a part of nature in me–or rather a bunch of them, making my hand feel like a pincushion. Despite the pain (or perhaps because of it) it was quite a memorable experience.

I wouldn’t dare try to climb back up there again to get a photo, but Google Earth does a pretty satisfying job of trying to recreate one:

There was actually a footpath at the top of the ridge, and it took us little time to follow it back down to the road, which we followed around to get back to the car. I left feeling a little humbled by the whole experience, and spent the next few days getting the last of the spines out of my hand.

Flash forward a half dozen years. I’ve moved, had a family, gone back to school, and started writing again. Seemingly out of the blue, I get a wart on my finger. Eh, warts happen, I figured. If anything, I was slightly amused by it. I even gave it to one of my favorite characters in the story, A Hint of Rosemary:

She looked into the eyes of the girl, (who had been, so far, an apt pupil,) and saw laughter dancing in her pupils. Why is she about to giggle at this card? She raised an inquisitive eyebrow.

The girl blushed in embarrassment. "I’m sorry… I just noticed." She pointed down at the card. No, not the card, my finger, the old crone thought. "You have… um… well… I didn’t know witches really did have warts!" The young girl snorted, slightly, trying not to laugh out loud (and failing miserably.)

With a scowl, the old woman pulled back and curled the finger in question under her other hand. So I’m a witch, eh? No wonder she thinks I have secrets. She looked at the cards, then at the hooded cloak hanging by the door, which she wore on trips to the village. I suppose with my business, and that dark hood wrapped around my face all the time, I really do look like a witch. She uncovered her hand, and examined the wart on the side of her index finger, then shook it at the young girl. "You’ll get yours someday, girl… just wait…You’ll get yours."

The young girl suddenly looked quite worried. Bet she thinks I can put a curse on her, the crone thought. "You don’t mean…" the girl stammered, nervously.

Laughing, the old woman winked. "I mean… sometimes when you get older and wiser, warts… amongst other things… happen."

Oh, the foreshadowing I hid in that wart… I love it! Anyhow, you’ll have to read the story if you want to see what happens.

So, I had this wart on my finger. I figured it didn’t hurt, and I didn’t really care about its appearance. Living in Colorado’s arid climate, my hands are usually sort of dry anyways. So I left it alone. I didn’t really think about it.

Recently, a spot appeared in the middle of the wart. Still, it didn’t hurt, and I didn’t think too much of it. Until today. After washing my hands, I noticed that the top layer of skin on the wart had split. I poked at it, and the wart fell off, revealing the spot below.

It was green.

I freaked out.

"I have an infected wart! OMG! I’m gonna die! Maybe it’s ebola!" (Ebola happens to be mentioned on the bar across the top of this page, so it’s no surprise that came to mind.)

Well, my pragmatism and curiosity quickly took over my paranoia when I noticed that whatever was green was solid. Reassured that I wasn’t about to start oozing pus all over the place, I grabbed a magnifying glass and a pair of tweezers.

I bet you can guess what I found. Yep, a 12-year old prickly pear spine. For some reason, I thought I’d gross everyone else out and take a picture of this and blow it up to an unreal size:

Don’t worry, I was able to fully extract it, and afterwards I cleansed my finger and put on a bit of antibacterial goo and a bandaid. As you can see, the spine was about 3 mm long, which meant it was pretty deeply embedded in my finger.

I figured I spent a dozen years with that thing in my finger, I could take an hour out of my day to write about it.

Now, to all of the young people in Colorado who are considering sneaking around the hills around Red Rocks someday, please, trust me… stick to the trails.

And watch out for warts and prickly pears.

It has been a strange road. When I first started writing in earnest, developing my ideas and going back to school to refine them, I didn’t have much focus. Sure, everything revolved around chaos theory and fractals, but that was the rub–my focus was everything. Plus, they don’t generally offer undergraduate degrees in chaos theory at the local university. That didn’t stop me, of course. I just looked for the most all-inclusive, interdisciplinary degree I could find. If anyone asked me why, I’d sort of make something up on the spot. I might as well have majored in magic.

Partially Clips by Rob Balder

Ok, so, I didn’t go for a major in humanities or English (like the author of that comic, or a good number of my friends) but I did choose a fairly ambiguous program, and one that seems to be the current popular choice for the undecided: environmental studies. That isn’t to say environmental scientists lack focus–on the other hand, those who work in the field generally have a very specific and important focus, like cleaning up abandoned mines or monitoring the effects of climate change on a certain species of tree. Those undecided kids in the environmental studies program end up choosing one of those specific careers, sooner or later. But that wasn’t me, either. I had a lot of trouble choosing a single aspect.

It snuck up on me.

I could blame my advisor… I told her my vague goals, what I’d done so far, and what I thought I should do next. Originally, I panned to focus my degree on fluvial geomorphology–a scientific study of water and the way it shapes the landscape. Without even blinking, she recommended I change to a focus on planning and policy. What!? Not a science focus?! I balked. But what about calculus? I wanted to take that, I said. She shook her head and suggested that statistics, for the time being, would be more useful. I could take calculus when I went to grad school. Reluctantly, I agreed, and let her sign me up for a few classes that focused more on social issues than on science. I felt like I was betraying my kin.

(insert foot in mouth here)

The schedule we came up with was interesting, to say the least:

• Water Policy and Science: a small (less than 20 students) course, focusing on the Clean Water Act
• Don’t Fence Me In: This was my choice for my upper-division writing credit. Later, I found out it would work for credit towards a certificate that I’ll describe later.
• Microeconomics: I dreaded this one. Now, I’m not sure why. It’s useful stuff!
• Critical Thinking: Property and Protest: another small class, combining philosophy (ethics) and environmental issues

No labs, only a hint of science, and a whole bunch of policy/law/economics type stuff. I was pretty skeptical, to say the least. But, as it turned out, it was the perfect track. In a way, I was studying the "everything" I had in mind. Even better, I remembered why I wanted to get my degree in the first place. I wasn’t just there to refine my ideas, but to learn how to apply them, to put them into practice in the real world. And, well, I’ll be damned if I wasn’t learning how to do that!

This semester, I was introduced to the Center of the American West and CU Boulder. Boy, was that overdue! I entered their writing contest last year, but that never added up to anything, like any other writing contest. The center takes an interdisciplinary approach to it’s title, encompassing many different issues, like history, environmental science, Native American studies, and more. When I approached them with my research on Church Ranch, they were very excited. There’s plenty of knowledge to be exchanged there! They offer a certificate at CU; I’ve signed on to get it. That will allow me to get credit, through independent study, for writing my book about the development of Church Ranch, which seems more important than ever.

My focus emerged from two major aspects of my studies–adapting to complexity and the development of the American West. When I put it that way, it seems so clear. I was going to study the way water shaped our landscape–but it wasn’t in terms of fluvial geomorphology (although I still want to take that particular class!) Instead, it would be in terms of people–in our individual and collective choices. Sustainable development. Now that’s a focus. It isn’t about being overwhelmed by the complexity of our world, but making simple choices that benefit all of us.

In other words, Chaotic Utopia is dead. Long live a Chaotic Utopia!

That’s right… I’m going to change the focus of this blog to reflect my change in focus, but much should remain the same. Here’s what will change:

• Rather than focusing on chaos theory and fractals, this blog will mainly be concerned with the use of natural resources, specifically water, in the American West. In other words:
• Less fractals, and more about:
• –Water as a natural resource
• –History of the American West
• –Sustainable solutions
• The banner, categories, and sidebar… in other words, most of the layout that isn’t specific to ScienceBlogs.
• My posting rate: I’m going to try to develop some more regular features, and get to a huge backlog of research and essays that I’ve been saving, nearly all of which are concerned with either water quality or develoment. Expect to see more life here, not less!
• My "about" blurb. At some point, I hope it will say: "Sustainable Solutions Consultant"

Here’s what will stay the same:

• The title of the blog. I think it still fits pretty well.
• Visual appeal. Even though art and graphics do not directly relate to the issues we’ll be discussing, I think they’re highly important when it comes to communicating difficult or complex issues to the general public. I will always consider myself a writer and an artist, even if it isn’t obvious.
• Lillybridge! I know, it’s been a while since I’ve shared these wonderful historic photos from the early 20th century on a regular basis. I have no excuse for that. Expect to see more pictures from Charles Lillybridge and other photographs from Colorado or Western history.
• Style of writitng. I don’t think I could change that if I wanted to.
• Science! Even when we’re looking at history, or the future of development, scientific studies are relevant and important. We can’t make rational choices if those choices aren’t based on rational research.
• Fractals. Even though I can’t promise them as a regular feature any more, I still see them everywhere. I don’t want my fractal-generating software to just gather dust.

I expect it will take me a week or two to make all of the changes that I’d like, but after that, this blog will have a new life. While I’ll be trying to organize most of my work to publish later on, I’ll try to dig out some goodies to post during the construction process.

Thanks to all my readers out there, who have been waiting patiently for this blog to return to normal. I apologize for all of the delays over the past few months… I knew I was ready for a change, I just didn’t know what it would mean. I hope you will stick around and see where this leads!