I drove on the sedimentary geology field trip to the Grand Canyon this weekend. It was a blast. My van was the cool van. But I didn't realize how tired you get driving those things while everybody else gets to relax. I was beat last night. I'm still pretty worn out today.

On another note, my Visa wants to change the rate on my card from 12% to 17%. My rate is high as it is, but there's no way I'm going to stand for a higher rate. Visa was trying to be sneaky about it by sending a plain-looking notice in a plain-looking envelope. Most people don't even bother to read it, but I did. I guess I have to get a new card now. There's a Visa/Amazon.com card that looks ok. Basically, every $100 you spend gives you $1 at amazon.com (or is it every $1000?).

Kelly and I watched Secretary this weekend...twice. The second time we turned on the director's commentary, which was quite interesting. Kelly likes that movie ALOT! We also went to Barnhardt Canyon on Saturday, which was really nice. We took Ed, and he had a great time playing in the pools. On the way back we came across a guy with four goats. Ed didn't like those so much. I think he prefers to be the largest thing on four legs.

Now that we have broadband internet at my house and a home LAN, I can fix my old computer. I backed up all my documents and mp3s to my laptop, and then burned the files onto CDs (it took 7 of them!). The first day I screwed up and loaded Windows XP without reformatting the hard drive. When my moniter wouldn't work, I decided to put Windows 98 back on, again without reformatting the hard drive. So once it started working again, I noticed that both operating systems were on my computer in the same partition. This is bad news, because things could start to conflict. Plus I still had all the shitty programs that I was trying to get rid of.

After a few days of thinking about the problem, I realized that the first step was to reformat the hard drive. Last night I did that. Everything went pretty smoothly, but my computer doesn't recognize my modem now (not that I really care about modems right now). I was very happy that the computer recognized my moniter, CD-ROM drive, and network adapter. Then I spent most of the rest of the night installing programs from the Windows 98 CD, Windows Update, and other internet programs like WinZip, Adobe Acrobat Reader, PowerPoint Viewer, and Kazaa. I also loaded Works Suite 2002, which came with my laptop, because it has a full version of Word, although the spreadsheet program sucks ass. Everything seems to be working really well now, and my computer is much faster. I'm happy with how everything turned out.

This morning I finished copying all my backup files to the hard drive. I'm also running a little Kazaa test over the weekend to see how downloading files at home compares to downloading files at ASU (which Kelly made me stop doing).

I'd like to do the same thing to Kelly's computer, because it's running worse than mine was, and her monitor driver is not working correctly. I also need to clean her mouse, which I keep forgetting to do.

Lah Dee Dah! I'm blogging again! Not much to say right now. I'm meeting Jack Farmer (AKA Buzz Lightyear) to get some samples with microfossils in them, and I have a few minutes to spare. I'm glad to see that Beth's blog is working now. I hope she does well on her presentation on the Southern Alps today (NOTE: the Southern Alps are not in Italy, as I first thought.)

I want to give a quick shout out to my girl Kelly, for being so nice to me this morning.

Kelly and I watched Donnie Darko in the hot tub last night. It's a pretty good movie. I would recommend it for all fans of sci-fi, or even people who hate sci-fi but like physics.

Here's an update about the film festival. We got to Tucson a little early, so we had dinner at this bistro called Barrio. It was pretty trendy, and I felt underdressed around all those stylish latino girls who worked there. I would have much rather gone to a place like that with Kelly, and I bet she would have liked it. The food was good though it was a little overpriced.

My brother's film was awesome! It was really cool on the big screen. People applauded when it was over, and a few people actually came up to my brother to say how much they liked it. But then everything went downhill, because the film after his was utterly awful. People always joke about how they just saw the worst movie ever made, but I'm being completely serious. That was, without a doubt, the worst film ever made. The acting was terrible. The plot was absolutely vapid. The characters were one-dimensional, completely unrealistic, and didn't even feel like they belonged in the same movie. The weirdest thing were the expensive special effects (involving a stopwatch moving backwards, a magical oven, and a "meteorite" flying across the sky <>). There was a subplot involving the ghost of a cuban baseball player from the 1930's, which turned out to be the main character's grandfather. By the way, the ghost gave the main character some good advice about being true to yourself, which she promptly ignored, basically telling the audience there was no reason for the ghost to even be in the story. Seriously, I wanted to pull a Britney Spears. I wanted to commit suicide. That was 90 minutes of my life I will never get back.

Then it got worse. My brother's friends showed up. I knew one of them from high school. Think of a female version of Adam Jew, but twice as ugly, and wearing cat ears. Then multiply that by three. I know it sounds mean, but my brother actually wanted to hang out with three fat, ugly girls, with nasty hear, and nasty clothes (one was even wearing a beat up Twister shirt!), all wearing those GODDAMN CAT EARS!!! They are all sisters, and their mom showed up two. I haven't seen anyone with feathered hair in a really long time. When the mom found out I was a geologist, she preceded to ask me if I knew anything about the recent space shuttle disaster. I am a goddamn geologists...what the fuck do I know about the space shuttle!!! Then, of course, things had to get worse. My brother and mom wanted to go get desert, but it was after 10PM, so the only thing open was Denny's. GODDAMN DENNYS!!! I am sure as hell not eating anything at Denny's. I ordered a Dr. Pepper, but they served me a nasty Mr. Pibb. So I just sat there sipping my nasty drink, trying not to watch with disgusted fascination the three fat, ugly girls wearing GODDAMN CAT EARS shoveling large amounts of chocolate fudge brownies and chocolate peanut butter pie in those garbage disposals in their faces they call mouths. I would have gladly watched that shitty movie again.

So we got back after 1AM, and surprise surprise, the puppy had pissed and shit all over, so I just said fuck it and went to sleep.

I spent most of last evening installing cable and ethernet lines in my house with my dad. We used the cool Motorola TalkAbouts I just got to communicate in different parts of the house. I got the two-way radios on ebay for really cheap. I guess the market was saturated...a lot of people were selling them. I got mine for 55% off the normal price. They're really cool radios too. They have a digital compass, barometer, and altimeter. Basically, they are top of the line for the 2-mile family radios. I planned to use them out in the field, but they came in real handy last night, trying to feed cable from upstairs to downstairs.

I got a neck cramp today. Seriously! I was yawning after tai chi and all of a sudden the muscle under my jaw cramped up. It felt like my chin was stuck to my neck. I sat down and stretched for a minute, and it was better. But it was still weird as hell.

I caught a glimpse of the ever elusive Tim yesterday (AKA Beth's Boy Toy). He seemed pretty cool. We all had dinner at Plaid, and then some of us went to Kelly's house to play Children's Bible Trivia (the link is only good for five days). Beth is taking a Bible as literature class, so this was like studying for her. It was fun. Then Kelly and I did some major sinning after everybody left.

Oh we got a new month on our hands now! I thought it might rain yesterday, but it didn't. No April showers mean no May flowers, but we'll have plenty of beautiful desert wildflowers anyway. I guess I'm in a better mood, even though I'm really busy now. My parents decided to cancel their phone service (read "not pay their phone bill") and go completely wireless, so anyone who wants to call me has to use (480) 215-2918. Now they want to get cable internet (without the cable) so that my mom can surf the web and decide what cabinets she wants. I talked to the cable america guy and got them a great deal, and the cable guy is coming to install everything next Saturday. However, my parents have to get their act in gear before then and buy the router and ethernet cables, not to mention move the cable jack into the study and drill a hole for the ethernet cable down into my room directly below. Plus, all this is going on while I am moving things from my room into my brother's old room (all by myself, I might add). I can only do a little bit each time I go home, but it's coming along.

But the hardest part of all it figuring out what to get Kelly for our anniversary...

Wow! I didn't realize how long it's been since I last blogged. I guess I was too busy preparing for my talk at LPSC (which went well, by the way). After that, I caught a cold, so that kept me off my feet for half a week after that. Anyways, I'm fine now, and I hope everybody had fun, enjoyable spring breaks, because mine was spent at the conference.

Now I have a chance to sit back and figure out what I'm going to do next. The next conference I'm going to isn't until the fall, so I've got plenty of time for research. I want to get some more samples, and I want to get something published, maybe even a letter to Science or Nature. Also, Tom wants me to get started on the synchrotron stuff before he goes on sabbatical this summer. At the synchrotron, I can basically do the same analysis I've been doing, but at a better energy resolution, so I can see additional peaks on the spectrum. This is important because biogenic carbon will have extra peaks that abiotic carbon won't, and I can't resolve those peaks presently.

Next week my brother is showing his film at the Arizona International Film Festival in Tucson. I'm excited, 'cause I think it's pretty good.

Check out this website. Actually, don't check it out. It's a little offensive, but it shows off the dangers of wearing tight-fitting clothing.

Check out the price hike that ASU is putting on for parking permits next year. This is rediculous! Couple that with the $1000 tuition increase. I was planning to get into a structure in the Fall so that I won't have to walk miles in the blistering heat next year, but I can't afford it. My PS2 cost less than a structure!

Check out the price hike that ASU is putting on for parking permits next year. This is rediculous! Couple that with the $1000 tuition increase. I was planning to get into a structure in the Fall so that I won't have to walk miles in the blistering heat next year, but I can't afford it. My PS2 cost less than a structure!

I found out today that the United States Army spent $7 million to create a realistic first person warfare video game. That's a little weird, but people make video games like this all the time, like SOCOM. But get this, the game, called America's Army, if FREE!!! The army didn't spend all that money to turn a profit. It is entirely a recruiting tool! There are even links in the game to Army webpages. Ok, ok. I understand their logic. If the kiddies get hooked on the Army via their phat video game, they'll be more likely to sign up to kill foreigners when they turn 18. However, this is completely unethical, not to mention useless. A video game in a completely romanticised version of what warfare is really like. The Army is giving kids the wrong impression with this game. Plus, kids just want a free video game. They won't sign up with the Army just because they blew away a few computer generated Muslim fundamentalists. I feel kindof disgusted that my tax-dollars went to support this.

I just realized yesterday that I only have about two weeks before my talk at LPSC. Better get crackin'. I pretty much have all my data, but I need just a little bit more to corroborate my findings. Kelly's sedimentary geology class needs an extra driver for a field trip this weekend, so I'm trying to do that as well. I like being out in the "field" with my honey. Most of all, I'm excited because I received my Colors Trilogy DVDs and my Father Ted Season 3 DVD!

Remember the days of free previews of movies? I've seen Mission to Mars, High Fidelity, Ghost World, and Amelie for free. Well yesterday I also had a free pass to see the Core. In it, the core of the earth apparently stops spinning, with disastrous consequences. The solution? Why set off a nuclear device in the core, of course! So a small crew of patriotic geologists pilot a submersible of some sort to the core. I can't even begin to tell you what's wrong with this movie. It seems to be as fun and rediculous as Mission to Mars.

However, the bad news is that I didn't get to see the movie. I had a TEM session until six, and the movies started at seven. I tried to make it on time, but it was raining real hard and I got soaked. I just wanted to go home and change, so that's what I did. I hate to see free movie passes go to waste, but there's nothing I could do. At least I got some homework done.

Here is an example of why it is good to help people altruistically.

Last week I received a random phone call. A Mr. David White from an unknown pharmaceutical company on the east coast wanted some information about the Java program I wrote last summer. Specifically, he wanted to know the reference for the formula I used for triclinic unit cells. I told him that the equations I used were not specific to crystal system and that they were general matrix equations. However, the book I used was a crystallography text, which is not readily accessible to a run-of-the-mill pharmaceutical technician. So he asked if I could fax him the pages out of the book with the relevant equations. I agreed. I asked him a few more questions about how my program was working out for him and whether or not he had any problems with it. Early the next day, I got the materials together and faxed him the information. It felt nice to help him out, and to know that something I had worked on for over a month was actually beneficial to people.

Then this week I received a strange package in the mail, from an address I didn't recognize. Inside the package were a big plastic mug, a pen, a squishy mini football, and a leatherman, all with the strange moniker "aaiPharma". The accompanying letter was from David White, thanking me for my help and offering me these "tokens of appreciation". How nice. It seems my generosity paid off.

That's how society is supposed to work.

My Astrobiology poster is now online!

I guess I just lost the blog I wrote, which is the same kind of shit I put up with this weekend. I'll just give the high points.
* I had to make a poster this weekend
* I drank six beers on Saturday night
* I threw up
* I had a fever
* My girlfriend took care of me (and I love her for that!)
* I still had to finish the poster
* The program (Adobe Illustrator) kept fucking up on me, making me lose information
* I've concluded that I can't binge drink anymore because I actually get sick the next day (last time I got the flu)
* I've had 2 good legal drinking years, and 5 illegal ones.

My LPSC abstract is now on the web. It's scheduled for 8:30 in the morning on the last day of the conference. Hopefully I can work it out so I don't have to go for the entire week. I'd like to spend some of my Spring Break doing what I want to do!