“Who’s your favorite musician?”

“Who’s your favorite musician? … What’s your favorite genre of music?”

A friend recently asked me these questions and I didn’t have an answer for him. I’ve been thinking about it for several days and trying to write a blog post about it, but I still don’t have an answer. Every time I try to look up a good sampling of my favorite music on youtube, I get distracted by all the other videos and just end up listening to all kinds of stuff.

The truth is that I can rarely pick a “favorite” anything. I love learning, listening to, and seeing new beautiful things. The urge to find something new to love is always too strong to stick with any one thing for very long. It just struck me how ironic this fact is, because I really love to find people who are so passionate about something that they dedicate their entire lives to it, dedicate countless hours to it. You can hear it in their voice and see it in their face. They LOVE whatever they’re doing. And that makes me love it too. Pupfish, plants, pipas, painting… (once an alliteration starts you can’t make it stop!)… phylogenetics? photography? No those don’t count.

Maybe I have a short attention span (product of the internet age?). Maybe I’m just a connoisseur of passionate people! Maybe I’m an intellectual-hoarder. I don’t know. What I do finally know is the answer to my friend’s question:

“I don’t have a favorite musician! And I hope I never will!!!” For now, here are two amazing, passionate musicians that I’ve liked for at least a week, found through the NPR Tiny Desk Concerts which is an great place to sample music.

Life

We just finished watching Tree of Life. It was exactly what I needed to see, hear, feel today to put everything in perspective.

It hasn’t gotten any easier. Maybe it never will. I miss you, Cameron. I know I’ll see you soon, I just don’t know how long that will be.

Bikes and Bottles

Wyatt and I have started riding our bikes to campus. It’s a beautiful 20-30 minute ride along the flat, flat terrain that is omnipresent in Florida. A small section of the M-path is still under construction (right by our apartment). We’ve had to find some creative ways to bypass that, but otherwise it’s a great ride.

My second week of work has been much more relaxed than my first. The students have finished all of their labs so I have some time to peacefully organize and inventory everything. As I was updating a chemical inventory today, I found a collection of really cool oil bottles full of essential oils as well as a bunch of “aromatic organic” compounds that smelled lovely. I have a feeling that these items are verrrry out of date and not needed in these labs anymore. Perhaps I’ll be allowed to save a few (empty) bottles before they head to the trash. Because if you know me at all, you know that I love old bottles (that Wyatt would call trash).





As a side note: Both of those photos were taken with film. We’re hoping to have a photo-walk with some biology friends during Thanksgiving break and I NEED to get my paws on some more film before then!

Blue fingers

Today my fingers and white shirt are covered in indophenol. Yesterday I spilled coffee on myself right before taking my ID picture. Dang dang dang it. I hope I don’t start a fire next.

On the bright side, I have my first meeting with the undergrads I’m managing tomorrow. That’s exciting… I hope I don’t set them on fire!

Contrary

to popular belief, I’m not dead. Nor have I given up on my blog.

Being unemployed for a few months gave me a lot of time to play around on the internet. I found lots of cool websites and blogs written by designers, scientists, artists, humorists, thinkers, …and housewives. I don’t want my blog to be famous and entertain thousands of people; I just want to keep in touch with friends and family. Still, I couldn’t help wondering which category I was falling into (in life, not just my blog) and feeling kind of crappy about it. Not that housewives are crappy. Not at all! I’m just not that person.

Anyway, after a certain point I felt that I couldn’t just start up again without having something awesome to say which just made me feel worse about the tremendous amount of time I was spending being un-awesome.

But here’s something: I started my first day of work today! Yay!!! It was hectic and overwhelming and crazy and I loved it. Some things on my new work-to-do list: alphabetize chemicals in storeroom, find out how to legally get rid of old microscopes, and get all bossy when other people aren’t clean enough. All the things I love in the world, basically.

Now I will post pretty things so that this isn’t just a whiny, all-words blog post! I promise to blog much more often. And take more pretty pictures for you. And try to generally not be a hermit.

Birds, band nerds, and Plumeria blossoms:

P.S. I’m working my way through all of the NPR Tiny Desk Concerts. There are so many amazing musicians in the world. I can’t even whistle!

P.P.S. Wyatt and I have had several great weekend adventures since I last blogged. It’s probably part laziness that has kept me from blogging, not just lack of material.

P.P.P.S. Lauren White, that crazy-wonderful gypsy friend of ours, came to visit us last week. It was so much fun! I even drove the Red Beast around Miami so we could see gators and people-watch on Miami Beach. If she ever gets around to blogging *nudge nudge*, I’ll put the link on here.

Maybe I should take up paper sculpture

These sculptures by Anna-wili Highfield

are so beautiful.

Some things I’ve been up to

Eating yummy food like these stuffed shells

Getting inspired by my trusty ball of red string

and visiting the Fairchild to look at plants

and a few animals too

Charlie’s Angels (Full Throttle, my favorite) with brownie goo. Mahvelous

A beautiful end to a great weekend

Two things I learned today

Plaid, even hipster-plaid, is out of place in Miami. People will notice and brand you as an outsider.

Everyone loves The Kraken. *pat on the back*

I think I feel more comfortable being in Miami than I did in Stillwater. All of our Stilly friends need to move here pronto.