I finally returned back to Buffalo Friday night after a week and a half of research/lab in the Florida keys. The weather was amazing. We basically worked every day. Most days went something like this:

5:45am wake up
6:30 lab prep at the dock outside the hotel
7-8 traveling to dive site and getting set up
The day included about 4-5 different dives into different waters to take sediment and water samples as well as to observe the fish, coral, plant and creature populations.
5-5:30: arrival back at the hotel for shower and to make dinner
7:30 back to the lab to run tests on the data, make species list of what we ovserved during the day and analyze data
10-11 hopefully finishing up lab work and then...
FREE TIME! - which basically meant hanging out til you couldn't keep your eyes open anymore because that 5:45 wake up comes pretty darn early!

All and all the experience was amazing. I must say though it really did toughen me up a lot. Most dive sites were pretty dangerous and the waters were filled with barracudas, sea urchins, diadema (they look like black golf balls with 6inch spikes coming out of them), sting rays, jelly fish, sharks and many other poisonous corals and creatures.

A few people got hurt including katrina who had her foot impaled by a sea urchin but she survived and is fine now. I had the usual pretty deep scratches, cuts and bug bites but was able to remain relatively healthy.

Obviously after a week and a half I have accumulated quite the collection of stories; however, there are far too many to type. For me the best experience on the trip was the trip to looe key where we went about 10 miles out into the open ocean on a reef dive. The water was as clear as water coming out of a kitchen sink and you were about to see about 30 down to the bottom without any problems. The coral systems, plants and fish were absolutely amazing and it is an experience I will remember forever. I was literally in awe of the whole thing. The barracudas were about 4 feet long and some of the fish were literally about 20 pounds.

But to top it off, there were sharks at the reef. My biology teacher said that in all her 35 years of diving at looe key this was only the third time that she saw sharks. Well lucky me. Sharks and fish as probably my biggest fears and I thought I was handling myself really well throughout the whole trip. I was obviously very scared but I think one of the best cures for a phobia is to face your fears. I didn't go out of my way to swim where the shark was; however, as me and katrina separated a bit from the rest of the group and were snorkeling a 6 foot shark swam within about 5 feet of us. Hopefully my pictures of it will come out and I will be able to post them. It was really scary but also amazing.

So I'm glad to be back home and see everyone that I missed; however, I did have an amazing time! This was one spring break I won't forget anytime soon.

Here is a picture of the group of people that i went with. I case you can't tell, Im the one in the pink/orange tank top in the bottom row and katrina is next to me in the yellow and blue trimmed tank top.

uh oh. i think i officially have it. while walaboo ((e:mike)) claims to of had it since freshmen year, I think I have finally caught it...and possibly the worst case ever. I'm not sure if its a combination of graduating and just wanting to be finished with everything or with other new stuff in my life...but whatever it is, I can't seem to get my work done for school.

The good news is I have decided which grad program to apply for at Roswell/UB and am going to force myself to get the application out before I leave for the Florida Keys next week. That way I wont have anything to worry about except getting eaten by fish.

The bad news is I am doing terrible the semester in everything. Like so terrible it is embarassing. I have been doing so well too since after soph year. It seems like a shame to quit now with only 3 months left, yet why can't I seem to get stuff done? I think half of the problem is that the classes I am taking now have nothing to do with what I want to go for grad school for or have anything to do with later in life. I took all of my biology classes that I was interested in already so right now I am in marine biology (which i will forget everything come may 21st), and 2 computer science classes (large scale programmin and databases), and some honors classes. I need the computer science classes for my bioinformatics major, but decideing to major in bioinformatics as well as biology only helped me to realize how much I like biology better than programming or computers. I guess its a good thing to find out what you like; however, looking back on all the programming classes I had to take for that major and countless hours spent in front of a computer screen just doesn't seem to make the lesson worthwhile.

Oh well everything else is going well so maybe I will be able to get my act together soon. haha we'll see. If you don't see me walking across that stage at the end of may then you will know what happened. haha just kidding. its not that bad! :)

Wow. i seriously don't think i've ever had a week with so much stuff going on. It was absolutely insane. like every possible test/paper/presentation was all this week. Good new is, its over! I gave my last biology seminar today on the immune system response in the elderly. It went well. Not as good as my previous one, but it was ok. THe material was much harder, so maybe thats why i was more nervous. Anyways...its good to have this week behind me.

Although, I do have 2 computer science projects that are now going to be over 2 weeks late. I just can't seem to figure out the code and really wish i didn't have to. Oh well. No time this weekend for that. I work everyday and then im sure will go out at night

Tonight i went ice skating. who would of thought the difference it would make to sharpen your skates. i didn't even fall and it was tons of fun :)

Oh yeah, and i just got my first ticket. A parking ticket mind you but still. I was parked outside on the street in tonawanda and got a ticket. who goes ticketing cars for being on the street when it isn't even snowing out...it makes no sense. i guess that makes it an expensive date. haha oh well..i guess there's a first for everything.

anyways, things are lookin up and im happy...even though I have no clue what I'm gonna do in 3 months when im outta school :- oh well. i guess i just have to take things as they come...

You wanted a picture of snow on trees (e:julie)... well here it is. you miss it? You should bc snow is sooo pretty and so much fun! :-) That is except for the fact that it made me a half hour late to my first class... oops. who needs to learn about data structures anyways haha. ENJOY!

I just want to thank you (e:ajay) for helping me out and giving me the link to download The OC. I don't know how you did it but thank you a billion times! It was one of the best episodes of the season.

Since everyone knows I like to add in pictures, here is one:



This is a happy me in front of the computer downloading the episode when I found (e:ajay) was going to help me out.

Thanks again!

Wanted: Anyone who knows how to dowload past tv episodes from the internet!

Please if anyone knows what sites to go to get past tv episodes could you please please please please let me know! did i say please? I'll make it up to you somehow. just let me know if you do. I know people can do it and i did some internet searches to try and find out how, but i had no luck. i think some people use something called BitTorrent so i downloaded it and then couldn't find out what sites to go to to get the epiodes. So if you know please let me know. i worked last night and missed the OC because my tape didn't work, and i guess it was really really good. All i want to do it find it online, download it and watch it.

Pretty Please :-) Anyone?

So.... i've never been tanning before. Never really found the need or thought it was that good to do. But we are going to Florida in a month and are going to be out in the sun for basically the whole day for two weeks doing research, so i thought i'd get a little bit of a tan so that maybe i wouldn't burn out there...and everyone knows i don't want a repeat of my last Florida trip burning. blisters hurt!!!

Anyways, it was ok. I went with Katrina. A little scary to go in the coffin like thing, but the standing up ones looked so small. I didn't know how clean it was though laying on that thing so that kinda freaked me out a bit. I heard before someone got some sort of bugs from laying on them. yikes!

ok well at least i tried it. it seems so many people go regularly. like at work during people's lunch breaks i hear them saying they are going tanning. that seems so crazy. but maybe its not. it doesn't take long and i didn't burn, so who knows. we'll see if i make it back...

Ok so I think I'll write about Friday even though i know I'm a bit late and its Sunday already. Friday was a good day. First, Walaboo, or (e:mike), and I went to one of my favorite places for lunch. It was formerly called the Juicery, but i think now they switched the name to Sue's New York Deli. It's like inside Shea's and has tons of vegetarian sandwich options and is really good. everyone should check it out. I recommend the Super veggie with that oh so scrumcious miso dressing. Even Walaboo is hooked and he's not even a vegetarian :-) Although getting there on the subway is always an adventure...haha those crazy underground things. Just like in the matrix! who would of thought they really existed! Thanks to Walaboo i know now. haha. i'm sure that sounds crazy because im sure everyone reading this has taken them before. oh well.

So then we decided to go to bingo before going out at night. Now i've maybe been to bingo like at most 5 times in my whole life and have never found it that exciting....but every once and a while it is fun. Although, usually half way through I end up wishing i didn't buy so many boards It seems they always call the numbers too fast for me and it gets tiresome starring at all those numbers for like 3 hours. I know, i know i'm going to be a terrible old person. But maybe Ill take up shuffle board. who knows. there must be more than bingo!

Ok well walaboo in his expertise could handle playing six boards in bingo as well as checking my boards and finding called numbers that i had missed. Thanks walaboo!!! I don't think i ever have gone to bingo and expected to win. I almost am sure i couldn't yell out bingo even if i did. and i really never thought i would win on friday. But, to make a long story short, i won the big game of the night... $350!! Here is a picture of my winning board. It was cover all and that orange dot in the corner is from walaboo's bingo dabber finding numbers i missed. but yeah when i won he yelled bingo for me and got the people to come over. The whole process was very embarrassing. Not only was i nervous that i would win but then they were like verifying my numbers and kept making all these mistakes and it took a really long time before they said i had a good bingo. My other big fear is calling bingo and then being wrong. but it worked out and i made a ton of money!



It was also really strange because like everyone we went with seemed to win. We went with Katrina and her family too, and her mom won $40 and little brother won i think $15. And Walaboo won too! So like when we were walking out people were saying how crazy it was that one table had that much luck. So although I don't think i'm ready to become a regular friday night bingo junkie, it did turn out to be fun.

Then walaboo, me and Katrina went to TGI Fridays and to some bars. But don't worry, i didn't spend all my money. I have a Florida trip to pay for! ;-)

I love it (e:julie). A true sacrifice!

I have this thing with people giving up stuff for lent just because its something you're supposed to do. If its done for the right reasons, fine. go for it. But it seems pointless to go though the motions and totally detach your sacrifice from the whole religious meaning/purpose behind it. As you probably can tell, I am not giving up anything for lent, nor have I since I was a lot younger. I think I would just feel hypocritical. Maybe someday I will feel its necessary or something I should do with the right reasons in mind, but right now, I just don't think like that.

But good luck to everyone giving up stuff. And remember its pointless to start something if you can't finish it. You guys can do it!

And remember, ill always be here to test that conviction -whether it be with a funny away message or profile that you just have to read (e:julie) or a tasty fast food snack (e:mike)
;-)

Here is the pic I've been promising with each entry!
This is the awesome present (e:julie) sent me. Its my favorite animal, the elephant, as a puppet! who wouldn't be excited over that...especially since it came in the mail. There are few things that top an unexpected package! Ok well thanks again Julie for the great surprise. It did make my week much better!