Diary of a Carrion Eater

Gave my students their final exam yesterday. I always include two "treat" questions on the final. The first asks them to identify and talk about one of the physiologically "exceptional" animals we've learned about over the course of the semester. I always enjoy hearing about which animals stand out the most to the students. I highlight a lot, ranging from the fact that bears don't experience muscle atrophy during hibernation, to the fact that tuna breathe using a method known as ram ventilation. Anyway, I always enjoy seeing which animals stand out for any particular group of students.

The second question asks them to identify three things that they think will stick with them from the course, 6 months from now. The things aren't limited to concepts, so it's also fun to see what everyone has to say.

These questions are actually a super important part of the course; inasmuch as we are learning lots of concepts and information, learning is also inherently relational. The personal connection to the ideas is what helps keep everyone engaged.

Anyway, I am really proud of myself because I managed to slog through the exam grading right after I finished giving the exam. Part of my motivation was wanting to be able to work from home today, which is what I'm now doing.

That said, I am also intentionally not working very hard today. Instead I am drinking extra coffee, doing some prep work for the bike valet this weekend, and catching up on various other odds and ends at home. Because frankly, by the end of the semester I'm running on fumes, and I know I need the time to regroup and recover.

I'll be back at work again tomorrow, because I'm not completely done yet. I have a student who needs to finish up a research paper, animals to continue taking care of, and some other stragglers, too.

And it's just about time to start getting ready for the summer. Another busy one, at that.

These are mostly from campus, but also my garden.

The internet tells me this is a Japanese Kwanzan Double Blossom Cherry. Anyway, here it is shortly before blooming:



And then bloom'd:


This year I was also really struck by the beauty of this stand of trees, which I believe are all crabapples:


There are a couple of redbuds tucked behind the crabapples, which I also really enjoy this time of year.



Meanwhile, in the garden, the Useless Rhubarbs are going wild.


If they could talk, I'm sure they'd say, "The better to propagate, my dear." But c'mon, rhubarbs, you have one job, and that job is to make delicious juicy stalks! Harumph.

Meanwhile, the rest of the bed is full of strawberry flowers, which will more happily turn into delicious strawberries at some point.



To celebrate this season of flowers, I'm having a beverage made with Creme de Violette. And also with some of the gin that a cousin gave to me like 5 or 6 years ago. And with one of the precious Meyer lemons my sister sent to me. My stockpile is dwindling but I'll enjoy every last one of 'em!

The cats were asking so nicely yesterday if they could please please go outside, pretty please it's nice out and there are Birds to consider murdering*, so I relented.

I made George wear a purple vest in the hopes it would deter him from jumping around too much.

Here is a photo of George that illustrates how his brain is reduced to a single neuron whenever he goes outside:


He wanted All the Attention.


Plus lots of flopping around.




Martha is a bit more circumspect outside.


You can just tell that her brain can handle the overstimulation of it all, but it IS a lot to contemplate.


She did get interested in investigating whether a cat could jump from the lip of this wine barrel planter up onto the window ledge on the porch, but eventually decided against making an actual attempt.


George, however, is a different story, best told through this short video:
https://youtube.com/shorts/LK2SVg1ECeA?si=hS7nH3kiEZzxdo70

It looked like a rough landing for him but he isn't showing signs of major distress.

After this episode I brought him back indoors. We definitely need to create better climbing structures for him inside of the catio. Ahh, life with cats.



*The goal is to NOT have the cats ever murder the birds, to clarify.

Saturday's plan: first loop down to Connecticut, then loop back up through Massachusetts to Vermont.

https://ridewithgps.com/routes/54901197

With so many other things buzzing around in my head lately, I think I'll be glad for a day where I have One Job.

I've decided that it should be an annual tradition for me to gather up all my research ducklings for an end-of-year lab celebration. Conveniently, we have a day dedicated to research presentations, so we're going to just use one of the hours for our celebration.

In an ideal world I would have the bandwidth to make the festive drinks and snacks myself. Looking at my calendar for this week, I had to unfortunately conclude that I would need to resign myself to going to a conventional grocery store to obtain premade festive drinks and snacks.

Dear reader, the sticker shock. My usual grocery shopping habits involve purchasing ingredients in bulk from the grocery co-op. The co-op actually works really hard to keep prices down, with an awareness that everybody needs to eat and not everybody is rolling in the dough. Also, bulk raw ingredients and locally-sourced produce are inherently going to be less expensive than anything created and marketed by a middleman.

Somehow I was most amazed by the prices for a bag of chips, easily pushing upwards of $5-6/bag now. All told I still went ahead with my purchase of festive snacks and drinks, but, wow. Guess I'd better not develop a chip-eating habit anytime soon. More than anything, the unevenness of the price hikes fascinates me.

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Right now I'm in the midst of a supply ordering frenzy at work, and a supply ordering frenzy for miscellanea for the rowing club. It's a hectic double-whammy. You might be surprised to learn that rowing our carbon-fiber and fiberglass rowing shells out on a river full of fishing boats and logs results in damage to said vessels. At present it seems the rate of damage is outpacing the rate at which we can carry out repairs, particularly in cases where we have to order specialty replacement parts, sigh.

The ordering frenzy at work is always stressful. I have to sort out which of the various expensive instruments I might possibly be able to afford to replace, then go through whatever rigamarole is involved in getting a quote, sending it to the right person, et cetera et cetera. Right now I'm at the stage of just replacing all the consumables in need of replacement, which I need to do before I will have a sense of what else I can afford.

I'm also going to need to do additional parts management for my Bicycling class fleet, as mentioned previously. For that aspect I don't yet know whether I will be able to pay for things through work, or whether I need to set up a side hustle. The parts aren't going to be insanely expensive, but on the other hand, just on principle I don't really want to join the legion of teachers who pay for supplies out-of-pocket.

Oh, and then there's thinking about what field supplies we might want and need for the summer.

Yeah. Whee.