One reason that animals are bad...

That reason is that they die. Sometimes, inexplicably, other times, because of old age. Either way, its horribly upsetting, even if you have tried your hardest to remain emotionally distant. I was thinking earlier about the kinds of people who are able to remain detached, and thus, their suitability to study to study animals, but then came to the conclusion that they probably wouldn't care enough to study them in the first place.

When the view becomes a nice bonus (TMIT)

I am really not sure why this particular experience sprung to my mind, but I thought it was valuable to air the memories, so to speak.



About four years ago, my family and I went on a camping trip to (in my mind) one of the most beautiful nature reserves in South Africa, Ndumo. The situated on the northern border of KZN and Mozambique, closer to Swaziland than the sea (see map).



The roads were really bad, so a trip into the park (you cant walk without a field guide - there are big things like rhinos running around). Added to this, it really isn't sedan country, so my dad's car (a rather low Toyota Camry) was considered to be a hero for tackling the roads the way it did. However, this meant that a visit to a picnic spot took a few hours, instead of just one.



We were returning home from an outing to a bird hide (camp was at least 45 mins away), when I felt the first grumble in my stomach... This rapidly developed into full on riots within my belly, and I knew I was never, ever gonna make it back to camp in time to reach the loo... it was gonna have to be a hole in the bush somewhere, or... someone checked the map, and realised we were not too far from a picnic spot... WITH A LOO!



A flush toilet, complete with clean and sparkly taps, I hear you thinking. But, we were very far from absolutely anywhere... So, no flush toilets. Rudimentary hand-washing facilities (a large drum of water with a tap set in the base). This was a proper long drop, complete with spiderwebs, a dodgy-ish toilet seat, and a three sided shelter, to preserve one's modesty.


I dashed around to the front of the shack, ripped up the seat (pretended not to notice a few flies. Although, there honestly weren't many), and proceeded to evacuate my bowels. Noisily, as one does when situations like these happen.


After a while, once the urgency in my abdomen had subsided, I noticed the view... I had a private viewing seat with which to witness monkeys playing on the opposite bank of the river, as the loo was situated near the edge of a cliff, overlooking a river dividing SA from Moz. Bliss. Until I started getting a pins and needles from sitting on the loo for too long. This was the best drop-and-listen experience I had had up until that point, it probably will remain one of my favourites...

Suggestions, please?

Since the last time I blogged about Frank (aka Ernest), he has become significant in my life. And thus deserves a new name.

I havent been able to come up with anything other than "Snacker", but then, I was really hungry at the time, and it probably isn't the best name for him. So, any suggestions from other bloggers?

Bringing out my inner engineer

I havent been bloggin in the past little while, becuase I have just been way, way too busy... Small dramas, when added together make a big drama, and I have been struggling to right myself after it has all passed.

 

The subject for today comes from one of my experiments: I am building a maze, but needed infared beams and detectors to tell me when an object has passed a certain point. Now, for starters, I am in no way an engineer. The lat time I worked withcircuits, lights, and resistors and things was in hight school. The males in my family, however, are all engineers. I didnt go to them for help though, I went to a friend, who is an engineer (go figure...). So yesterday, after getting the parts, I built one part (the detector part), under the supervision of my dad. And it worked! And I rebuilt it again this morning, and it still worked!

 

I wonder what next I will bring out... inner artist, perhaps?

Topic #1

Here is my list of helpful topic suggestions:

• Walking in circles in lifts
  
• The Moral Compass in the Southern African Context: Principles Gone Awry
  
• Perfect Low-light Pot Plants for the Office
  
• How to change a fuel pump
  
• Why the world might actually be flat
  
• How different the world be if there was no chocolate?
  
• Sometimes we see our bodies as separate from ourselves. Have a conversation with your body. Write the conversation in dialogue form
  
• Write about the colour of my childhood.
  
• "There are some things you learn best in calm and some in storm" - Willa Cather. Write about things you have learnt in storm. Begin: "One day..."
  
• Is 'Avatar' is worth any of the hype?
  
• How bubbles or a game of Uno would solve many of the world's problems?


• How so many varsity-aged women today appear to have some form of an eating disorder
  
• Some useful suggestions on how the save the planet that do not involve the UK submarine fleet.
  

Thanks for the topics!

It has been an extremely rough week for me, all because Frank (aka B) left on his 4 (maybe 3) month trip. Lab-mates Luke and Helen: You guys totally rock. Thanks for all the support and hugs, everyone!

*drumroll*

Aaaand, the first topic iiiiiis... Chocolate!

Or, more specifically, how different the world would be if there was no chocolate. I felt this was an appropriate topic, given my current situation.

Firstly, although I don't subscribe to this theory, some say that especially for women, chocolate is a substitute for sex. So, if this were true, there was no chocolate, and people had no self-control.... You get my drift, no? I disagree, because I eat chocolate when I feel tired, frustrated, lonely, etc. This doesn't seem to tie up with The Theory.

Anyway, if there were no chocolate, the world would suffer less from post-nasal drips (I would know this, about an hour ago, I snaffled ¼ of a bar, and now, I'm struggling with a massive PND...), spend far less money (when I go through a chocolate phase, I REALLY go through chocolate), and probably be reliant on other things to make us happy. Like exercise.

I think that the world might end (well, for me anyway) if there were no dark chocolate. Milk and white chocolate I can live without. They are the major reasons why I tend not to indulge too often, as the sugar and dairy content is just too much for my dear mucous-producing sinuses. Dark chocolate is amazing though – I absolutely love the bitterness! However, a lot of people seem to disagree with me about the merits of a piece of really smooth dark chocolate, so I don't think the whole world would change too much is there were none!

Update

The write-a-thon (well, thing where I write and publish a lot) has yet to commence, because I have just been way way too busy at the moment. Ernest (I need a better name now) is leaving next week, I've been doing field work, going to birthday parties, doing varsity admin type stuff...

 

So.

 

I will try and publish at least one topic next week, K? Happy sunday!

Not really panicking...

But at the same time, I'm panicking...

I realised this year, that I have just 1 year left in which to do my masters (well, much less than a year now). To complete it, I need to:

• Record and score all my behaviour data (barring recording 1 section from 1 population)
• Finish measuring vegetation, and analyse all vegetation, including the measurements that were taken a few years back
• Do all the stats on the above data
• Write up an entire masters
• Do my teaching assistant duties for the year, so that I can get paid
• Somehow maintain my image of sanity...

And, some of the above is being hindered by my not-quite-working computer system. So, somehow I need to increase my productivity, decrease faffage (real word). It seems that I might have to shut myself in a dark room for a while, but then, that increases the probability of insanity!

GAAAAH!