Spelunck!

Something else to add to my list of recent experiences: I went cave spelunking yesterday in a cave in western Vermont (yes, Vermont does have caves) a week ago. It was good fun! After crawling through ~ 100m of skinny corridor and three squeezes, we arrived in a cavern with a nearby lake. After visiting the lake, my friends and I sat around in one of the far chambers and meditated. I learned a lot: I learned that the human body can be made small enough to fit through a squeeze the size of a laptop. I also learned how much it sucks to get stuck in one of those things. I can't believe some people spend several days caving, going kilometers under the earth... I'd go nuts after 1 day! But anyways, good fun. My knees hurt for a while, but it was totally worth it!

More new experiences coming up, including MEXICO!

By the way, updated my links list to include the Beav. Sorry about the snub there! It wasn't deliberate.

Viagra

Oh yeah, I had edited this out of my original post today, but decided to re-post it. I recently tried Viagra. It works. In case you were curious. Not that I NEED Viagra...

Money, money, money

You want to hear something unbelievable?

Dartmouth undergrads have to pay $40,000 in tuition. Per year.

That is more than twice of what I paid for 1 year at Calgary, and 3 years at Alberta. Granted, many Dartmouth students have gi-normous scholarships, and most have a lot of support from wealthy parents. But still. Many students have to take out huge government loans to pay for things. I suppose the idea is that Dartmouth graduates will make enough money when they join the workforce to pay off their debt, but could you imagine coming out of college with ~$200,000 in debt??? Just so you can have the name “Dartmouth” on your diploma? I dunno, being in a field where starting salaries for PhDs are around $45,000, that seems a bit extreme.

Final note: Here is an article in the NY times on myrmecologists (people that study ants). Although I no longer study ants, I still feel quite a bit of attachment to the little guys (or girls, since most ants are female).

Nature is neat

I recently got into a discussion with tee dub about meat consumption by humans. As a biologist, I find topics like this to be pretty neat. Here is a cool diet-related article I found on the BBC webpage (don't worry tee dub, it has nothing to do with humans and meat):

Yummy mummy feeds young its skin

Neat, huh?

The Chinese curse: to live in interesting times

Last night, I saw the documentary Why We Fight, a film on the industrial military complex in the United States, and its influence on American foreign policy. It was mildly preachy, but much more informative and believable than a Michael Moore film (by the way, I think Michael Moore is a good guy, and his films have mostly good messages; I just find it frustrating that his films have quite a bit of hearsay). I definitely recommend checking it out. It’s interesting and sad that the United States and the entire world are suffering from the exact scenario Eisenhower warned against: war has become so profitable, there’s not much incentive for peace-time.

On a brighter note, it is so freaken’ warm outside! This is one of my favourite times of year, when winter is an increasingly distant memory (not that winter was particularly cold this year, but…), and the weather can only get better. I’m looking forward to drinking beers on the patio, going camping in surrounding forests, and seeing lots of skin!

Also, I’m heading to the Oaxaca region in Mexico in about a month! We’ll be doing some collecting (and a bit of R&R I’m sure). Should be amazing. This’ll be followed by a trip to Ashville, North Carolina, for a forest insect research meeting. Ashville is about a 30 minute drive from the Smoky Mountains, which I’ll most definitely check out. Unfortunately, this means I won’t be traveling to Alberta or Kansas that month, as I originally planned.

Enough bragging. Read about the amazing regenerating mouse!

How far I've fallen...

Man, it's been a long time since I've gone to church! So long, in fact, I have totally forgotten the meaning of religious holidays. In the last couple weeks, I've refered to Easter as the birthday of our lord and saviour on at least three separate occassions.

Somewhere, baby Jebus is crying.

FRANZ FERDINAND!!!

As mentioned in my previous post, I spent last weekend in Montreal at Johnny's photography show. I've actually had the fortune of attending a good number of concerts and shows the last few weeks. Two weekends ago I saw Blackalicious in Burlington, last weekend I saw Johnny's show, two nights ago I saw Clap Your Hands Say Yeah in Burlington, and last night I saw the Death Cab/Franz Ferdinand show in Boston. The concerts were great, especially the last two. It's fantastic to see groups like Franz Ferdinand, Death Cab, Clap Your Hands Say Yeah, Spoon, and others provide a great listening alternative to hip hop and electronic music (both of which I love, but it's good to have some variety).

The Death Cab/Franz Ferdinand concert may have been the best concert I've seen my entire life, despite the fact we showed up late, and had crappy seats. Death Cab put on a hell of a show, with very dark, moody tunes. Franz Ferdinand... well, let's just say I had to clean off the inside of my pants after that show. These guys knew how to rock! They told everyone to rush the floor in front of the stage, so we ended up within 10 metres of the stage. There was one song where three guys were playing on one drum set, which was one of the coolest things I've ever seen. The singing was incredible, the guitar and bass were incredible. The whole show kicked some serious ass!

I'd sleep with the entire group. Happily. There, I said it.

Driving out of Boston sucked, as it always does. It took me 1.5 hours to figure out how to get on the I-93 from where we were. The I-93, by the way, is the most expensive stretch of highway in the world, due to a seriously over-budget tunnel in Boston being conducted by Bechtel. Bechtel is a stong Bush ally that is coincidentally taking over management of the Los Alamos nuclear laboratories. Doesn't it make you feel safe to know that a private company with such a wonderful track record is taking over control of the United State's most important nuclear weapons research facility?

Road Rage

This is a story about the worst road rage I’ve ever experienced (I was the one receiving the road rage, not dishing it out). I was driving to a Super-Bowl party in Boston with my friend Justin. I needed to make a right turn to get onto an on-ramp to a freeway, but the traffic light was red. Although I was allowed to turn on the red at that particular intersection, I still had to come to a complete stop first (y’know, so that I didn’t die in a bloody accident if traffic was coming in the perpendicular road). Anyways, I had barely come to a stop, and this guy behind me in a big black van leans on his horn. Justin and I agreed that wasn’t cool, so as I’m turning Justin gave the driver a “thumbs down.”

We were driving up the one-lane on-ramp, and the van pulled up beside us, forcing me to the edge of the ramp. The driver was livid, and was making these crazy hand-signals at us. He then sped ahead of us onto the freeway. We thought that we had seen the last of him, except that he had taken the same exit we were taking. Not only that, we were stuck right behind him at another red light. The driver got out of his van and walked over to the passenger seat where Justin was sitting. He started yelling “get out of the car!” as Justin and I were trying to calm him down (“Why are you so angry, dude? Calm down!”). He then tried to open the door (which was locked) and started punching the glass. After a while, someone in the passenger seat of his van cracked open the door and said something to him. Whatever it was calmed him down enough that he got back into his van. For a few seconds, I thought that he might be grabbing a gun or a crowbar or a baseball bat. However, he floored his van, and drove into the intersection (still during the red light)!

I learned something from this experience: never communicate with other drivers, especially if they are driving black vans. A single “thumbs down” was enough to anger the dude into trying to break into my car and kick our asses. As far as the van is concerned, it may have been driven by someone with Malfia connections, or a drug dealer (if he was coked/methed up, it might have explained his maniacal behaviour)… I mean, who else would drive a black van, right? Whatever the case, I think that some people seriously need to calm the fuck down when they drive!

On the topic of rage, I just got back from Montreal where I saw the first photography show of my good friend, Jingly Johnny. For those of you that don’t know Johnny, he’s a short Chinese guy that regularly (chronically?) beats crime. He’s also Jet Li’s stunt double (or was it butt double?). Whatever the case, he’s an amazing photographer. Any of you single or dissatisfied ladies should check him out: his photography skills combined with his superb understanding of neurobiology and his ability to insanely ramble on about just about anything would make him quite the catch. Plus I’ve heard he’s amazing in bed. From a reliable source.

One final aside: one of the things I’ve grown to appreciate about the United States is the fantastic Interstate Highway system. The highways are always at least 4 lanes, and almost always in perfect condition. Although I’m a proud Canadian, I feel a twinge of America-envy every time I drive on the 2-lane pot-holed highways of anywhere, Canada.

My first real post

I've finally done it! After many false starts, I'm putting up my very first post.

I figure since I'm lousy at keeping in touch with friends, this will at least let people know what I’m up to. This’ll also allow me to delete moronic comments I leave on other people’s blogs after I’ve had too much to drink.

Soooo, yeah. Nifty.

I thought I’d start things off by writing about my new home, New England. I live in Vermont (famous for its independent politicians and mediocre maple syrup), and go to school in New Hampshire (famous for no taxes, cheap alcohol, and living free or dying). The coolest thing about where I live, other than it’s a 45 minute drive from some of the best skiing in New England, is its proximity to everywhere else. I can do day trips to Burlington and Boston, and weekend trips to Montreal and NYC without any trouble.

I've been here for about 8 months, and already have lots of crazy stories. One of my personal favorites is the time (the ONLY time) I took a cab in the Upper Valley (for those of you that don't know, the Upper Valley is an area shared by Vermont and NH, that surrounds Dartmouth College; Dartmouth is in Hanover, NH, and I live in Norwich, VT). So the story is I had just arrived at Dartmouth, naively thinking that I was moving to a progressive, all-accepting utopia (well, at least compared to Kansas). I still needed to find a place to live, and was staying at the Coolidge Hostel in the town of White River Junction, VT. I needed to get transportation to Norwich to look at the place I'm living at now. The evil troll at the front desk of the Coolidge recommended one of the cabbies, as they are "inexpensive and reliable". BTW, the evil troll is another story (a much shorter and less interesting story).

Anyways, I called a cab. After it arrived, I could immediately tell that I maybe didn't want to get into this cab. He reminded me of some of the country folk I saw down in Mississippi, that proudly flew confederate flags from their front porches. He also sort of looked like that hillbillie in Men in Black (you know, the ugly one that alien possessed). But I figured "Hey, this is Vermont! Everyone here is wonderful and friendly and accepting! This'll be fine." Pfft!

As he drove me to Norwich, he asked me where I'm from, what I'm doing here, etc. When I told him I'm moving to the area, he reassured me that I would have no problem finding a group. "You see, there're the hippies, the red-necks (which he was quite proud to tell me he was one of), the druggies, the slutty college girls, and the f*g&ots." While my mind was reeling from shock (oh my god, did he actually just say that?), he asked me what specifically I was doing in the Upper Valley. After I mumbled that I was attending Dartmouth, he told me that he had no problem with Dartmouth, except that it kept attracting "all those Indians" (as in people from India) to the area. When I asked what his issue was with Indians, he complained that they kept bringing all these prostitutes with them. I mentioned that I'm friends with many people of Indian origin, and thought it was highly unlikely that the Indians were "bringing prostitutes with them," as the cabbie was suggesting. He then goes on an angry tirade on how he can't stand how politically correct everyone is becoming. This tirade continued until the climax: "It's getting to the point that you can't call a black person a n*g&er or a gay person a f*g&ot!" The conversation was over at that point. I didn't want to risk pissing him off anymore, and quite honestly no longer cared to know what his opinion was on anything.

Thankfully, the cab ride ended. He drove me to the wrong address and over-charged me, but I survived. My very first impression of Vermont.

Whatever the case, Vermont kicks the shit out of Kansas.

Lots of other stories coming up! Stay tuned!