12-29-04
First, it's unbelievable how much destruction there is in the Indian Ocean. I just saw on CNN that all these small islands in Sumatra were wiped out... no one left at all. They're now estimating up to 80,000 lives lost, it's just terrible. And you may have heard by now, our Prez took time off his vacation ("clearing brush") and offered 15 mil -- equal to about 5 hours of combat in Iraq. What a dick. Where are the morals now, buddy?
So, I forgot a couple of things from Xmas, most notably that Ryan and Suzy got engaged. They're good people. Also, Ryan's website will be friggin' awesome in the New Year. He showed me a sneak preview and it is really cool -- with tons of flash and everything is clickable. Don't forget to check it out here (won't be updated until Jan. 1st though) .
Ok, and here's a couple photos from Brooke and my Christmas out here. Click on the ornaments to see up close shots.
12-28-04
This is a belated "Happy Birthday" to my beautiful sister Lauren Mayfair. And I also forgot to wish a birthday to my mom. Hey happy birthday to everyone I missed.
12-26-04
Brooke and I had a nic Xmas, we exchanged gifts and there were no tears... nice. We then partied down with the neighbors, and continued to party down with Leo and Suzi's family. Then we saw two movies... one -- The Life Aquatic -- was my favorite movie of the year. Amazing, Wes Anderson spent so much money on it, it was more than slightly ridiculous. Extraordinary. Oh yeah, I like it.
Then I woke up this morning and watched some political talk shows and I've been pissed ever since. You see, I had to see a couple new Repuglican senators talk about what they were going to do. I hereby predict, bad things are going to happen to the Repub's in the upcoming years. Someone said, "Pride goeth before the fall" and that's exactly what I predict... a big fall. I think it will make Nixon look like a schoolgirl. Happy new year.
12-23-04
Yes, there is no one here at SIO, but I am... about done. Just needed to put up some cheesy snowflakes... I may change them into something more fun. Maybe. I wish I could randomize it, I'll try.
Ok, so I'll be back east on New Year's Eve, rock out in Philly then back to NJ to see the family and friends. What am I doing on Xmas day, you may ask? Well, Brooke and I will be celebrating with our neighbors and then we'll be hanging out with Leo and Suzy. We'll be ok, but we wish we were back east with our families. Stay safe out there children.
12-22-04
Oh man, this holiday season is strange, Vaughan Hall (where my office is) is nearly empty, but I am here writing and reading... oh yeah and updating my website. I just needed to point out a new website that is the perfect way for me to waste hours of my time...
the site is www.realclimate.org and it is a blog run by actual climate scientists to provide a "rapid response" to climate change fallacies. You know, the kind of "news" reported by Fox and in the new Michael Crichton book. That guy has his head up his ass, I don't know what to say about that. the Real Climate site has a point by point here. As I'm sure I will be asked these questions by many people, I will address--what I see--as the important points to remember:
--The MEAN global temperature has risen and will continue to rise in the near future despite what we do right now. "Mean" means the average... so there will be areas where air temperature is actually falling, which Crich. points to as "evidence" there is no global warming. Then he points out the "Urban Heat Island" effect, which has been disproven. Either way, the take home message is air temperature is rising.
--Ocean temperatures are rising. As far as I know, Crich. does not even address this, probably because he has no argument against it. The ocean's getting hotter, that's a fact. My little nephew Christian can tell you that if something gets hotter, it probably means it's "warming".
--Sea level is rising, but it's hard to tell exactly how fast. Hey, sea level is all relative to where the land meets the ocean, what if that land is rising (rebounding actually) from the weight of the last ice age glaciers?
--Most glacier's are receding. It's just a fact, go to "Glacier National Park" in Montana and you can see how far and how fast they are receding. Hey here's a cool site to see this.
I need to go back to work.
12-21-04
Hey, life is busy. I'm trying to get my thesis proposal done, but too many things keep popping up. Where are my water samples? Somehow they got sent to Princeton (they were supposed to be sent to my lab at SIO) and they haven't even arrived yet... they need to be frozen for at least 24 hours.
So, I was in San Francisco last week and when I got back the internets/computers haven't been working so well. Didn't take many photos in SF, too busy going to the AGU conference (think 8000 earth scientists... yeah it's THAT fun). Here's some photos from the hotel I was at:
More photos to come when I get the film processed (maybe never...).
While I was in SF, I heard the waves were good. That is guaranteed to happen. But I came back and gotten even better waves on Saturday, according to Sander and Leo who were also out. I'm quoting Leo from that afternoon, "some of those waves looked like Pipe". Accordingly, I had the biggest, fattest barrel of my life -- and Sander saw it. When it looked like I was coming out I put both hands to my sides, then straight up and was nowhere near the top. Sorry, to anyone back east where it hasn't been too good. Hey there's photos from Sunset Cliffs two weeks ago here and there's more crappy photos here and here. That day was pretty big.
Ok and here's a neat panoramic shot from yesterday:
Also, Tommy Serwatka came out for a couple days. He ate burgers, drank some beer, talked to some girls, went to Mexico, then went to see some animals that were mostly asleep. I need to scan the only photo we have from that Mexico trip.
12-11-04
First, I need to apologize to Ryan Leonardy for not putting a link up for his website before now. Here is a screen shot and link to his homepage. If you need graphic desing work done, check him out.
Hey, I got my qualifying committee set up and Gimp came down from Ventura--his new home--and we surfed Sunset Cliffs. Pretty fun.
12-8-04
Better now.
Lots of political gossip, where to start? Here's the story:
Who knows if this is true or not, but it's very interesting.
Also, despite attempts to block it, the Intelligence reform bill made it through the house. The 9/11 families are happy, but does anyone remember when Dumbya was against this? Does anyone remember when he was against even creating the 9/11 Commission that suggested these reforms?
Also, the soldiers tell Rummy what's up:
If you're going to send people into a fictitious war, at least give them all they need.
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Hey surfing is fun. Here's some photos from some guy on the internets:
And here's my friend Brian Leslie:
Both were taken during some small day at Black's--last week.
12-07-04
Anyway, it's raining again in California and it fits my mood just fine.
Before it started raining I was having a great series of days, yesterday was friggin' big at Black's. I got to Scripps, looked at the ocean, whipped out the digital camera, and... nothing. I left the batteries in the charger at home. I needed a photo because I know that no one would believe how good it was right here at Scripps (known to be one of the most closed out, bullshit wave in La Jolla--that everyone surfs). I estimate it was 6-7' or ~3' overhead at Scripps, glass-clean, and A-frames. So, I grabbed the 6'9" I haven't ridden since I was in Hawaii and ran down to Black's. Got a couple fun ones, but I was too far inside for the the biggest ones (easily 10'+). Took some on the head, pulled in on some, was really cold most of the time. I'm sure you'll see some photos somewhere, there was hardly anyone out, but one guy taking photos on the beach. And it was a perfect California winter morning.
12-05-04
Ok, some new stuff. Go here to see some photos from Thanksgiving and the new Soens house. These are just the digital ones, there are much better ones in my new Yashica T4 and Shaun has some too.
12-03-04
Thanks to everyone who called and wished me a happy birthday... I'm old. Ok, ok, to all of you yelling at me/the computer right now, I know I'm not old. I don't even believe in "old". But I do have some pain in my knee and my hip as we speak, but that's probably due to all the running down to Blacks I've been doing. Fun waves the past two days, surfed with the notorious Tim Chapman, who was killing it. Oh yeah, Sander smacked the lip really hard, but he said it was just a, "speed pump". Whatever that means.
Very soon I will have much more photos up here, soon as I get the new Photoshop program. Technology is great and thanks to Leo for pointing me to that.
More new stuff will be up soon, at least some more writing, but I need to go learn Matlab and then eat pizza at the SIO Student Seminar Series. Oh, I put a new music link over there to the right, it has a much more updated list of stuff I'm listening to right now.
I feel a rant coming on!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!--------------------------------------------
Someone recently told me that what they liked about my political discourse is how "passionate" I am about it. You would be to, if you felt that a fierce enemy of individual liberties--as established by our founding fathers--was sitting in the oval office. Maybe you support that fucking idiot in the white house? Well, we have a difference of opinion. Yeah, basically I'm right and you're wrong!!! Ha ha. Man, I have so many friends that voted "right". I don't know what to do. Oh I guess we'll always clash on this, but there is one sticking point--and this is addressed to all of my repub. friends--how bad does it have to get? I just don't get it. I'm sorry, it's still a very sore subject for me.
Ok, it's over now....................................................................................................................
News in my world, eh? Well, I've been working with the people over at NOAA (Nat'l Ocean. Atmos. Admin) to help collect water samples from the equatorial Pacific. Why? Well, I'm going to see how far west the eastern tropical Pacific denitrified waters spread. I have a feeling that it is all the way past the dateline, so I'll be running some analyses on these water samples at Princeton--probably for about a month this Fall. What analyses you ask? Well, d15N and d18O of nitrate to be precise.
Also, looks like I will be going on one of these NOAA cruises myself this April. If everything works out right, I will board in San Diego, three weeks to the Galapagos, a couple days off, then over a week to Manzanillo, Mexico. From there, I'm free and I should be getting barreled off my ass the next two weeks... who wants to meet me down there? Hook it up. I will be in MX on May 12th.
In a somewhat bacwards manner, I will now discuss my trip to San Francisco next week... going to a big friggin' meeting of earth scientists for a couple of days. It's sort of my introduction to these conferences, the next one I go to I might be giving a talk.
Next, Brooke and I will celebrate Xmas in the SD, feeding hungry people somewhere. Then we will fly back to Philly for new years and then to my home, Avalon for a couple of days.
Next quarter, looks like I will also be qualifying, that means taking the next step to my Ph.D. Pretty exciting, but doesn't mean I'm getting any research done... the damn machine isn't working and I've been waiting for about two months to run samples (not typical).
Hey, could you tell I had a bunch of time on my hands today or what? Now, to check the mass spec...
