Robotic Nautilus People

I kept meaning to write down the dream I had last night, and only now have I had time. I dreamt of a race of robotic nautilus people (picture mechanical cogs and wheels in the shell and head and biological tentcles and some sort of human body extending from the shell) fighting against that of a robotic cuttefish nation and the human race helped to build the society of the nautilus people (because they lost the war). It was weird. I spend too much time with cephalopods--wait, that is not possible.
Most nights I dream of siphoning cuttlefish tanks. Sometimes there is some weird variation--one time there were miniature naked humans in the tanks that I had to try to siphon around without injuring or scaring them. Also, the other night I dreamt that a pale bluish whale with legs and tentacles came into Pie in the Sky to order some food. It took up most of the store.

Also

Most important thing! I started experiments today! I finished all the image analysis Roger wanted me to do while he was gone, so now I have to much free time and they are going to let me do experiments too. I'm very excited and I will most likely be spending all my free time in the lab doing experiments :)

Time-out

Ooooooh, applications. Poo. Anyway, this morning, I fed the sea stars, and they are really funny to feed. They are actually quite stiff animals, contrary to what you might think. So I would have to somewhat forcefully lift one arm up to try and stick a piece of squid to their little suckers on their undersides. Then, I would push the arm back down to ensure they didn't drop it. If it registered that there was food, there would be the slightest retraction of the tip of the arm. It seems an excruciatingly slow process as they guide the food down the arm towards the opening to the stomach at the center of the body. Sometimes it looked as if the sea star had folded in on itself in pain (but of course I am anthropomorphizing) and it pulled the food to a place where it would be able to regurgitate its stomach to begin digesting the food.
This afternoon when siphoning, a terrible thing happened. I went to siphon my favorite tanks first (I know it's terrible to pick favorites!) when they all began inking, without provocation! Inking, inking, inking, until the tank was black and it was all I could do to find their little plants to take out and clean them. I found out that they had actually been inking on and off all day, which is evidence of some dominance issues happening in the tanks--one cuttlefish is getting to big for his britches and trying to fight with the others, causing them to ink in retaliation. This meant that I would now have to separate them. This is actually quite a difficult process, especially in inky black water. I had to somehow add walls to the tanks to separate them, without injuring any of them, and ensuring there was only one cuttlefish per separation, all the while unable to see much of anything at all. Thankfully, I did manage to get it done (only one scare when the wall fell down on a cuttlefish temporarily--I saved him quickly) and now they all look pretty lonely. I'm sure if the cuttlefish could apologize, he would. Now they are all in a time-out.

Skates and Pomegranates

Yesterday, as I was siphoning the skate tanks, I saw that they had laid some eggs. If I hadn't known what they looked like, I may well have siphoned them up! They are really beautiful looking cases. Imagine a ladder with two rungs. In between those rungs, a thin membrane stretches across and over a persimmon colored ball (that is the embryo). The legs of the ladder are fragile, twisting, branches. That's what a skates egg case looks like. And I found five of them! We put a rubber band around them with the date, and then put them into a separate area where they can hatch some day :)
Also, yesterday ended a two day extravaganza of trying to eat the largest pomegranate I have ever seen or purchased. It was delicious, but I think it made me a little delirious. I call it a dream fruit, because Dali used to put them in his paintings. They have a mysterious quality to them. The succulent seeds pop with bloody juice and stain my fingers. It was delicious and I was very proud of myself for finishing it because it is quite a commitment. I feel like in the past, I usually give up about half way through (if not before). This time, I ate the entire fruit, and my mouth got quite the workout :)

Analysis

As I have been here almost a month, you may be asking yourself, where is the science? I am seemingly just doing animal husbandry. Wait, actually, I am only doing animal husbandry. Well, last week I was given a "choice" of what to do. I thought it had already been established that I was going to do experiments on uniform camouflage, but it seems that it would be more beneficial for me to do image analysis. The images are cool, very exciting photos taken from the field in exotic locals I am dreaming about, but it's hard to get excited about the fact that I have gone from one job staring at a computer screen to ultimately be doing the same thing here... However, I don't mean to sound ungrateful. I have been told that working on this image analysis will effectively guarantee me a publication, which is a chance I will not pass up. I could have argued for doing experimentation, but this will give me even more skills that will (hopefully) make me attractive to the potential employers and fellowship givers in the science world. Actually, I do see the necessity of this work, and I'm sure that I will grow to love it :) Someday, I hope I will be the one taking the pictures. In the meantime I will learn valuable methods for analyzing camouflage in the field.

Morning

This morning, I woke up at 4:30 so I could be at the bakery to work at 5:00am. I think I have always romanticized the time around four in the morning; thinking it was an beautiful, lonely time, where people are at peace in their beds. Instead, I found it quite eerie. There wasn't much wind, but what there was made the wind chimes sing weirdly. I felt like the only person alive for miles. Until I reached the water. Then I heard water lapping softly at the shore and looked up at the moon that was almost full, and I felt calm. I'm so happy to be close to the water. It makes me feel human.
I worked at the bakery until 1pm, and then had to siphon the cuttlefish tanks, which I have just finished. I am really starting to feel connected to them :) I think they know I am a sucker and they know how to beg me for some crabs as a treat.
Time to go write some essays, and then out for a drink with my friends :) (Not my cuttlefish friends...I do have some friends without tentacles).

Tonight I get to sleep with Rose

She's the chihuahua that sometimes spends time over here. Here's a picture. She's so cute!! It's nice to have a little warm body in my bed :)

And here's a silly picture of me sitting in the living room.