Liz's Bloglet - Saturday 10 November 2001

"I was looking at a book today and it actually had the word limnology in it."

my dad _
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05:20:32 PM, Saturday 10 November 2001

I know everybody else has linked to it, but if you haven't looked yet you've gotta. Let's roll _
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10:19:42 PM, Friday 9 November 2001

Training Day is really good. The characters are complex. Nothing is predictable. If you like gritty, complicated, and dialogue driven, I recommend it. _
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09:52:56 PM, Friday 9 November 2001

I finally managed to register for next semester. I'm taking aquatic entomology, which should be very buggy, and two seminars, stream ecology and geomorphology. And some research hours, which is supposed to encourage me to actually work on a thesis. and stuff. A "seminar" class is actually a read and discuss class, like one might think. But the "ecology seminars" every Friday are actually lectures. At least they don't call them symposia I guess. _
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02:13:05 PM, Thursday 8 November 2001

Our "trial three months of complimentary cable" has ended. Of course, when we moved in we were not told about the "trial three months" part, just the "comlimentary cable" part. I figured, no big deal, we'll just get rabbit ears. So we went to Radio Shack and were told that they do not sell rabbit ears because they are essentially useless in Athens. So I just said, forget it, I lived without TV for the vast majority of recent years. But tonight is the West Wing... _
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07:40:58 AM, Wednesday 7 November 2001

I know that complaining to Johnnies about having to take tests is silly but I have a big test tomorrow and it's really awful. Even when I tell myself the point of tests in grad school is evaluation of progress, not damnation, it's still awful. There are so many other things I could be doing today, useful things for school as well as fun things and good things, but I'm stuck reading notes and textbooks and articles trying to hold in my head all at the same time everything I'm supposed to know. As we complain about a lot, at many universities grad students are only evaluated as to satisfactory or unsatisfactory (with a more than satisfactory catagory sometimes thrown in) and there are rarely tests, just lots of papers. We do lots of papers, too. Because only A's and B's are acceptable course grades, it really comes down to the same thing anyway. _
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03:04:38 PM, Tuesday 6 November 2001

How did I watch the whole season of 6 Feet Under and never realize that the actress playing Brenda is British?
_
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02:26:48 PM, Monday 5 November 2001

St. John's was the best place for me, which is the only ranking any college in the world ever needs.

Everyday I have to read complicated things very carefully in order to be able to discuss them. I have to work multi-layered problems where innovation and efficiency are just as important as getting the right answer. As Mike says, all a generalist among specialists has to do is ask . If I don't know a term or acronym it is not unlikely that somebody else with a bachelor's in biology doesn't know it either. There is far more knowledge in any field than is taught at the undergrad level. And I am not afraid to sit down and read an allegedly difficult book. I struggled through Kant and Hegel; no civil engineering book on stream bank stabilization is going to be any worse.

That said, there are three skills that I did not use at SJC that I use daily in grad school:
1) photocopying
2) searching for information (in books, journals, databases, and google)
3) running regressions in Excel _
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07:57:45 AM, Sunday 4 November 2001

Big groups of people suck. I would have been very lonely at a large university as an undergrad. _
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07:59:58 AM, Saturday 3 November 2001

I just heard a most remarkable speech by William McDonough . He proposes a New Industrial Revolution whose main principle is "waste is food". His company has built offices and factories that are pleasant to be in, have no net waste, and produce more energy than they consume. They have also designed a fabric that is durable, attractive, and safe enough to eat. _
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04:21:04 PM, Friday 2 November 2001

I found an interesting quote today, which I promptly lost, to the effect that ecologists study ecosystems and environmentalists get upset about them.
_
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11:40:12 AM, Friday 2 November 2001

"There was a fire and I was enjoying some yogurt and it occurred to me that I didn't know what I was doing, though I was doing it well."

Dean Brann on why she switched from archeology to philosophy _
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08:19:13 AM, Thursday 1 November 2001

"If I had another chance, I'd do it just the same. Just wouldn't do it with you."

Reid Paley
"Lazarus in Brooklyn" _
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08:17:45 AM, Thursday 1 November 2001

But yield who will to their separation
My object in living is to unite
My avocation and my vocation
As my two eyes make one in sight.
Only where love and need are one,
And the work is play for mortal stakes,
Is the deed ever really done
For Heaven and the future's sakes.

Robert Frost
from "Two Tramps in Mud Time" _
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08:16:47 AM, Thursday 1 November 2001

I used to be a quote collector (Debbie can attest to our door decorations). I found the book that I used for that, when I remembered to write them down. Most of them seem to not be in there, but for Mike's amusement, and everybody else's, I'll post a few. _
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08:14:45 AM, Thursday 1 November 2001

So it doesn't seem like any malls blew up last night...
Thank you Mr. Ashcroft _
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07:11:19 AM, Thursday 1 November 2001

Since we moved in we've had a problem with a dripping bathtub faucet. Since the complex pays for water, I complain about it because it drives me mad to think about gallons of water being wasted. The guy has come to fix it several times and has been completely unsuccessful. This past Friday he came back. Whatever he did, it still drips, but now the shower won't work. I like baths, but I like options, too. We reported the no-shower problem at the beginning of the week and were told we are on the "emergency list". No fix yet. I can't imagine if there were an actual emergency. _
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06:42:28 AM, Thursday 1 November 2001

I have to add that I hate recalling books, because I know how much I hate to have my books recalled. Ordinarily I would never do it. But:
1)There really is somebody on campus who has checked out every single book on stream restoration.
2)I really, really wanted this book.
3)It was overdue anyway, so I may have saved my nemesis some money.
4)That might be good, thereby counteracting the evil of recalling the book.

However:
a)Money is evil.
b)Therefore, saving money is evil.
c)Overdue fines are used to buy more books, which is a method of converting evil to good.
d)Therefore, by recalling the book, I prevented the conversion of money to books, which means I committed evil.
e)Recalling books is evil.
_
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11:16:35 AM, Tuesday 30 October 2001

I am now in the possession of the library copy of James A. Gore's The Restoration of Rivers and Streams . It is out of print. I asked my advisor, who has every book, if I could borrow this one, and she handed me a folder full of photocopied chapters. I went online, and could find no used copies.
I read some of Judy's xeroxed chapters. I really wanted this book. So, after waiting and waiting for my nemesis, who has checked out every book I want from the Science Library, the Main Library, and the School of Environmental Design Library, to finally return it, I have recalled it. My nemesis returned it (in spite of his/her nemesis role) and I now have it. And I will read it. It is the counterfoil to Dave Rosgen and his ilk (i.e. it considers biology). I am excited. _
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11:07:54 AM, Tuesday 30 October 2001

I'm amazed by how few people take the time to be aware of their audience, both before speaking in tailoring the speech, and during the speech, to make sure they're not bored out of their skulls. _
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01:03:55 PM, Monday 29 October 2001

AmeriCorps rules. Preston is far more eloquent than I, but I can say that hard work helped me recover from St. John's and want to learn again, because I spent the day shovelling, not thinking. _
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06:59:24 AM, Sunday 28 October 2001

A public service announcement:

Fall back. _
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06:37:51 AM, Sunday 28 October 2001

"All things being equal, with no history of discrimination, it might well be desireable to assign pupils to schools nearest their homes. But all things are not equal in a system that has been deliberately constructed and maintained to enforce racial segregation...in these circumstances, we find no basis for holding that local school autorities may not be required to employ bus transportation of school desegregation.
The order of the District Court is affirmed."

US Supreme Court Chief Justice Warren Burger
Swann v. Charlotte-Mecklenburg Board of Education
April 20, 1971
_
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08:09:46 AM, Saturday 27 October 2001

From the frontier of medical research (as heard on CNN):

The US military announced today that it will be making available to soldiers in Afghanistan 100-600 mg doses of caffeine, the equivalent of 1-6 cups of coffee, to aid in mental alertness. _
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09:24:12 AM, Friday 26 October 2001

That was my first attempt at html and it worked! _
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07:41:08 AM, Friday 26 October 2001

In response to Mirabai. I was the Ravenous Bugblatter Beast of Traal once. My costume was a very large cardboard box painted green. People were supposed to throw candy in the mouth.
At SJC freshman year I was a Republican. I wore a suit and somehow conned Nelson Hernandez into loaning me a tie with a big elephant on it and some old campaign buttons.
Remi is required by law to tell those of you who missed it about the year he, Laurel, and Evan were a glam rock band, or whatever the hell they were supposed to be. _
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07:40:06 AM, Friday 26 October 2001

Fall break at UGA is scheduled based on the date of the UGA v UF football game, held every year in that party town of Jacksonville. Apparently, all of our neighbors are there right now, because the whole complex has been quiet and dark for a couple of days and mine is one of the few cars in the parking lot. That said, it may well be fall break, but it's 7:30, almost time for me to go to my office and start reading. _
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07:24:48 AM, Friday 26 October 2001

fluvial geomorphology _
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01:22:12 PM, Thursday 25 October 2001

Hear and answer, Baal! _
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07:57:07 AM, Wednesday 24 October 2001

Debbie's Zorak reference made me think of a front-page worthy story. Today at the bus stop a girl standing next to me yelped. She plucked a very large praying mantis from her shirt and put it on a tree. The ten or so people standing around watched this most remarkable bug until the bus arrived. _
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07:01:13 PM, Monday 22 October 2001

It is a warm, pleasant day, I have much work to do, and I have a cold. _
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06:57:27 PM, Monday 22 October 2001

We had our first lab party last night. I think Remi was overwhelmed by the tendency of every conversation to turn into a discussion of aquatic ecology. But we did have a very pleasant bonfire by the previously mentioned lake of doom.
_
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07:18:47 AM, Sunday 21 October 2001

This weekend I have to write a paper about a lake. The whole class does. We all are using the same data, we all have to refer to the same two papers, and we have to follow basic scientific journal format. The professor actually lives next to this lake. I do not envy the readers of these papers.

Oh, and yesterday I forgot to formally announce just how much Mr. Moss rules. It is a whole lot. _
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08:35:29 AM, Saturday 20 October 2001

I have a bloglet. I am very excited. Unfortunately I have been computerless for a few days because I was attending a conference on urban stream restoration at NCSU. It was good. The State of North Carolina and its inhabitants are very into the work of this one guy Dave Rosgen, who runs his own stream restoration school. Which is fine, but not necessarily scientific. We all learned from Bacon that one should seek the truth, not to support one's ideas, and that the names of those who discover the truth may well be forgotten. So there. Anyway, nobody at UGA is that into Rosgen, so we told lots of rosgenite jokes. And it was fun. So, anyway, that's my first blog. I hope that you are all enthralled by the world of urban stream restoration, because there's more where that came from. _
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04:47:43 PM, Friday 19 October 2001

Does adding things from the web interface work? _
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11:55:18 PM, Wednesday 17 October 2001

This is a test. _
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11:49:42 PM, Wednesday 17 October 2001

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