Life on the Hamster Wheel: What I am Doing For the Next Few Days

Grrrl, I have to say I was extremely happy you could come this year (and reminded me how sad I was this was not possible last year). You were the life of the party and your cheerful presence, seemingly everywhere and everytime, rubbed off on me as well and made me very happy.

Your session with Kevin was excellent. I tend to think about these things in long-term perspective: this session was just a beginning, defining what nature blogging is (and, if it differs from science blogging, how?) and setting an agenda for action for the future that you and other nature bloggers will spearhead. I'd love to see you present next year about the way nature blogging progressed in a year, what it accomplished and what actions did it pursue. I am especially excited about various new applications and websites (like iNaturalist - see this recent post, for instance) and I hope you monitor what they do, how they develop and what they accomplish in 2009 so you can report on that.

Thank you so much, again, for coming to ScienceOnline09 and being your wonderful self.

i loved being there and am determined to figure out a way to return next year. i had a great time with kevin and we already have plans for future mischief .. erm, future collaborative writing projects .. on this topic.

to my three readers .. i want to remind you that i did not pay bora to say these things! (i can't afford to pay him -- or anyone else -- to say such things, actually)

It's easy to say such things when they come honestly, straight out of my heart. No need to pay me to do that ;-)

Foremost on my agenda at the moment is getting the students in my neuroscience course through their final exam this week. Really need to go paperless for this, but the software is not up to snuff yet.

Next on the agenda is doing some proofreading and editing of grant proposals for others, and writing drafts of two manuscripts. That has to be done during my busy volunteer period with the Horse Show Committee at the livestock exposition, for which I crawl on and into a lot of horse trailers (usually in vile weather), and look at dozens and dozens of Coggins papers and health certificates, and match them to the corresponding horses, donkeys, and mules.

Then I actually get to travel somewhere on vacation for a week and a half. Wonders never cease. ;-)

In general, I'm trying to be more frugal this year ... not because I necessarily have to, but rather because I leave less of a footprint in the process, and can save more. Who knows when/whether my retirement funds will expand again?

I look forward to reading your upcoming blog posts, Grrl!

Right now it's dawn to dusk trying to cobble together a grant application. If a non-religious miracle would happen this would give me 2-3 years of actual money. (Do non-religious miracles exist?) I'm supposed to be avoiding blogs for that... they suck up too much time...

After that? Ideally a holiday walking in the hills, but I have a possible short-term contract on something I actually would like to work on for a change, so later in the year maybe. We'll see.

I keep wondering if I should be trying to pick up contracts from overseas where there is supposedly more research money. Supposedly. So maybe I'll try a little advertising spree, too. (Which from past experience will cost money and yield nothing!)

If none of this works out, maybe I'll give up and write a book. The sort that no-one would buy or read :-) (And obviously no publisher would deal with. Such a positive attitude...)

I'm still recovering from the jetlag. I've managed to file a few emails, and I have n more to deal with. I also have to move into a new flat this weekend.

Grrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrl (I remember your remark), Bora is absolutely right. It was wonderful to spend a little time with you. I am so glad you came.

Kisses

"Now that the world is brand new again, thanks to President Obama being safely ensconsed [sic] in the White House..."

Wow, take it easy on the Kool-Aid there, grrrrl.

Me, I'm going to be bitterly clinging to my guns and waiting for Cheney to launch Operation Valkyrie II. My VRWC contacts at the Undisclosed Location tell me it's coming any day now.

ooo, janiebelle, was it THAT good for you, too? if so, does this mean we are an item now?

Now I'll be on the lookout for a Janie Belle story for Grrl's b'day! I can only imagine where it might go! :-)

Also, I thought there was some kind of second law of enthusiamsodynamics that mandated that Bora radiates so much enthusiasm that it can only pass from Bora to others and not the other way round! OMFG Grrl! I think you just broke physics!

Yes it was, Grrrrrl. It was... inspiring.

and if I were ever to consider monogamy, Grrrrl, it would only be for you.

....or maybe Abbie.

... or Greg.

or Mike Haubrich.

or Steph.

but that's it!

'cept Blake. Yeah, Blake.

and Bob O'H of course.

oh, uh... sorry. Can I just be monogamous with all of you? Is that legal?

Kisses

arvind, let me just tell you. Grrrrrrrrl and Bora in the same building?

It was like they weren't even in one given place at any given time. Two balls of blinding energy.

It was like watching two clouds of quantum probability or something like that that Blake would talk about and we'd all pretend to understand.