cas-rolled - Tumblr blog

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sometimes your distress does indicate you should stop and respect your limitations. at other times it's more of a baby aquatic mammal being introduced to water for the first time thing. Too bad the difference is so hard to tell.

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thank you to whoever made this meme, it's a big hit in the lab and sends microbiologists into hysterics

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we are into week 2 and off with a bang! Over the last couple of days I did a BUNCH of readings for today and later this week, got some data organized, drafted an abstract, and worked on my mentoring program prep. We have been having an ant problem at home so I also did some deep cleaning and some preventative work, which has held up well so far...hopefully it continues to.

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i'm not going to describe the internships I applied to in detail while my application has an undetermined fate, but I spent maybe 20 minutes combined on submitting them so if anything comes of it I will be very amused. but they're very different so that would be...interesting

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⚡️ thesis progress

Finished my second draft of the introduction and sent it to my PI earlier today.

Agreed upon the timeline I created for thesis work.

Confirmed my participation in the college research symposium later this month. Which requires me to make a poster and. do other things. But I really enjoy presenting research, so some probable-late nights are worth it.

Scheduled data analysis for next week.

🌈 miscellaneous

For reasons I don't feel like fully explaining simply because it is lengthy and I'm tired, it's very likely that I did not get the internship (although I still don't have full confirmation). But I'm honestly kinda relieved because that would have been...rather a lot. I ended up applying to a couple random ones for after the school year that seemed interesting.

read ahead a little for my philosophy of science and environmental sustainability classes

catching up with my lab mates was really nice!! and the new members are very friendly; one of them I apparently share a class with.

Writing tutoring started properly this week and it was a lot busier than the beginning of semesters usually are! I had some really fantastic sessions with students, and the new cohort is shadowing us vets so they were very complimentary. Which is always nice :)

I've been making sure to schedule hangouts with various friends as well and I am excited!! For those to occur.

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I swear i'm not dead I am simply weary. But in a good way, I feel very satisfied.

This week was busy busy, as expected, but very enjoyable! I got everything I needed done, as well as a lot of planning ahead (and some upcoming readings).

I'm really happy with how the semester seems like it will go. I think that I will be posting more irregularly, although I plan to keep up with this sort of weekly checklist thing. And I do enjoy the day-to-day posts as well, I'll just not be able to hit that every single day.

work for the week (25-30 August)

readings:

Ch. 1 for plant morphology (done Aug 25)

Ch. 1 for sensory ecology (done Aug 26)

Ch. 6-7 for thesis class (done Aug 27)

Robertson article for environmental sustainability (done Aug 27)

articles for philosophy of science (done Aug 29)

Ch. 1 for philosophy of science (done Aug 29)

assignments:

second draft of introduction for thesis (done Aug 30)

baseline assessment for plant morphology (done Aug 26)

obligations:

fellowship meeting (done Aug 28)

mentor program introductions (moved to next week)

lab meeting (done Aug 30)

thesis meeting (done Aug 29)

tutor staff meeting (done Aug 30)

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listening to an audiobook while making myself a little snack after finishing school/work is SO <33333333

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If the copy/paste function kept in formatting changes you would never even know I forgot to check the blog settings

⚡️ thesis progress

Organized the remaining feedback and completed a few more sections.

Scheduled a study hangout with a friend to complete more work and catch up!

Drafted a progress timeline to review in my upcoming meeting.

🌟 coursework

Read ch. 7 for my thesis writing class

Read an article for my philosophy of science class

Read the Robertson article for my environmental sustainability class

🌈 miscellaneous

Completed some employee trainings

Went to an advising appointment and got the desired answer, yippee!!

Accidentally crashed a course because I misremembered my last lecture as starting 30 minutes before it actually did. This was fine though.

I think I made a good impression on my sustainability prof because I recommended he chat with my environmental justice prof from last semester, since my sustainability prof was thrust into teaching this class insanely last-minute. He seemed very interested in contacting him, so I'm interested to see how that goes!

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⚡️ thesis progress

Began working on the feedback that requires more time to incorporate.

🌟 coursework

read ch. 6 for my thesis writing class

read ch. 1 for visual ecology

baseline assessment for plant morphology

🌈 miscellaneous

made a lot of progress on cold weather! I am very pleased, even though my fingers are sore.

slowly beginning to befriend my new coworkers :)

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⚡️ thesis progress

I went through all the feedback from my PI and did the low-investment changes. The rest I organized and will be working through during the week, in addition to writing some more sections.

🌟 coursework

read and took notes on the first chapter for plant morphology

🌈 miscellaneous

I transferred a bunch of files from canvas into my notetaking app. Which requires me to rename each and everyone. So it is extremely tedious and arduous for the 20 minutes it took, but sets my organizational system up well for the semester.

I started learning cold weather by glass beach on bass. This is going to be a long-term learning process but, a gratifying one.

Photos below are pictures of the moon from the other night, just for funsies :)

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work for the week (25-30 August)

readings:

Ch. 1 for plant morphology (done Aug 25)

Ch. 1 for sensory ecology (done Aug 26)

Ch. 6-7 for thesis class (done Aug 27)

Robertson article for environmental sustainability (done Aug 27)

articles for philosophy of science (done Aug 29)

Ch. 1 for philosophy of science (done Aug 29)

assignments:

second draft of introduction for thesis (done Aug 30)

baseline assessment for plant morphology (done Aug 26)

obligations:

fellowship meeting (done Aug 28)

mentor program introductions (moved to next week)

lab meeting (done Aug 30)

thesis meeting (done Aug 29)

tutor staff meeting (done Aug 30)

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I don't think any of my follows are Florida residents, but just in case:

DeSantis's admin is currently (Aug 13, 2024) pushing to add pickleball courts, golf courses, and huge glamping lodges to some of Florida's state parks. The parks in question are nature and wildlife sites, and as anyone in Florida could tell you, we are not hurting for golf courses.

So! If this passes you off like it does me, you can fill out a survey about the proposal here: https://survey.alchemer.com/s3/7983173/Great-Outdoors-Initiative

There's also going to be local hearings in the counties of the affected parks, but they're rescheduling them because so many people are mad and intend to show up, so I cannot give dates or locations at this time.

This article has some details and shouldn't be paywalled: https://www.wfla.com/news/florida/floridians-balk-at-desantis-administration-plan-to-build-golf-courses-at-state-parks

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I forgot you are not allowed to use contractions in professional writing 😑 it is such a stupid rule. <- practice

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⚡️ thesis progress

I am continuing to read the fun fire ecology book; I have one last chapter about prescribed burns to look through.

My professor gave me really great feedback about my draft introduction! I'm hoping to incorporate her notes and write some more over the next week when school is still pretty lightweight, and hopefully I can get her an updated draft by next Friday (or Thursday morning when we are next meeting, but that is a stretch goal). I'm at about 11 pages and think it'll get up to...maybe 13? For the intro? Maybe a bit more? We'll see where I'm at next week.

🌈 miscellaneous

Yesterday we finished our tutoring training and I did some logistical tasks (transferring course assignments to my calendar, reviewing my work schedule, and emailing and such) but did not feel like posting because I was feeling anxious about the semester. But that is okay :)

I also had a brief orientation today for the mentoring program I'll be doing this semester but it was not noteworthy, it simply happened. All the other mentors seem friendly at least.

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thin layer chromatography is like a beautiful fawn scouring the forest floor for vegetal nutrients. if you approach her delicately she will lick salt from the palm of your hand and show you the beauties of the world. if you do not she will disappear into the foliage leaving you stranded and alone.

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cool info from the source I'm reading

The temperature of tree trunks on the leeward side, which is downwind, is generally twice as high as the temperature on the same tree trunk on the windward side, which is upwind.

Tree bark can significantly insulate the vascular plant tissue inside, to the point where the bark may reach extremely high temperatures, but the internal tissues are basically unharmed.

The death of vascular plant tissues depends on the plant's moisture content and temperature, but an extremely wide range of temperatures can prove fatal depending on the duration of exposure! With enough time, even relatively mild fires or levels of heat can kill the tissue; it's really a critical factor.

-Fire Ecology: United States and Southern Canada