Halfway to the Edge of the Universe

One year down . . .

Josh and I finished our first year of graduate school last week.  It's been an interesting year.  The experience has definitely been a lot better than the last time I was in school (the fateful MPH at Loma Linda that wasn't really a master's program).  But there have been aspects that I think we both wish would have been a bit different.  During our first semester, I was having a hard time getting to know some of the people in my program.  We're all introverts over here and I just needed to spend some time hanging out with folks before I could feel like there really was nothing wrong with me.  I struggled with feeling like I knew what I doing because in all honesty, I didn't know what I was doing. Meanwhile Josh became friends with a group from his cohort, whom he spent hours with while preparing this massive project for one of his classes.  Second semester was very different.  I finally started getting a handle on what I was studying, got my foot into some research for my program, got more involved with the grad student group for Forestry students, and got a decent job with the forest service.  Josh stressed about getting his thesis prospectus in and signed on time, got a decent job with the National Park Service, and toned down some of his course work (only slightly though depending on the week).  One thing that has been a dint has been the apparent betrayal by one particular person we thought was a friend of ours.  We went from going out on a regular basis with her to being the target for her apparent dissatisfaction with her degree program.  She took alot out on Josh for no justifiable reason and pissed me off with her immature and elitist behavior.  She ruined the time not only for us but for others in the Anthropology program as well.  In the end I kind of wish her luck, because she's going to need it in the future.  With her attitude and apparent lack of sensitivity, I really doubt anyone will want to collaborate or help her in the next semester.  All in all, I'm really done with people who think their intellect makes it okay for them to trash others or that their apparent status in life is a free pass to make others feel like less than who they are.  Here's hoping the good things from this year continue into the next and the drama will subside because we're not drama people.  With a new cohort coming in, we're hoping the focus switches to the next crowd.  We've got one year left, and we're hoping things go a bit smoother. 

Winter in May

We knew there was a chance for wet weather this morning, but I didn't expect to get awoken by Josh warning me to drive carefully because of the snow.  The snow??? Lo and behold, there are 1-2 in. of snow everywhere and they shut down the schools until 10am to help clear the parking lots.  Freggin' global warming. (Pictures to come, but I can't find the camera)

Oh, and . . .HAPPY BIRTHDAY NOAH!!!  one year down, many more to go!

(although I don't think we'll need to "beer" cooler outside this afternoon.  the crisp winter air should be sufficient)

A New Place

So we've found a new place to live.  It's on the south side of town, so it's closer to the freeway so Josh can cut down on some of his driving down to Tuzigoot.  They allow pets, but we're going to wait until we get a better feel for our budget before getting anything.  It's bigger (we're adding another bedroom) and they have a small gym, with a treadmill (a necessity now that I can't really run during the winter months).  It's pretty much what we've been looking for. . .

So the other shoe drops and now the bad part.  We have a week without housing.  Our current lease is set to end June 1st, and we can't move into a new place until June 7th.  We've rented a garage at the new place for June, and we're planning on storing a bunch of stuff at my sister's place.  The other part is that I have to be in Colorado June 1st so I won't be around to help Josh organize the new place.  So Josh will be living with my sister for a week, and I'll be hauling some stuff up to Colorado.  Right now we're trying to figure out how to coordinate this move so that Josh won't be completely in a mess while we move our life to the other side of town. 

Colorado Project

So I've gotten a lot of questions about what I will be doing on Colorado during the summer.  Since I have a tendency to get too technical, I'll try my best to explain the project since part of the fellowship is to develop my skills to explain it people who aren't as familiar with ecosystem ecology.  So here it goes:

So there's a lot of attention being given to the rise in carbon dioxide in the atmosphere from human sources (global warming and such), but humans also release a good amount of other things as well, one of which is excess nitrogen.  Now nitrogen can be good, it's needed to help plants grow, it's important for all the little things that live underground, and it's important for making proteins.  But too much, like most things, is not always a good thing.  The Western United States is an area that is limited in the amount of nitrogen available to living things, but it's also a place that's developed under such conditions.  So there's a big push to understand how excessive amounts of nitrogen affect ecosystems and most of what has been found hasn't been good.  Trees start having problems defending themselves against things like bark beetles (which occur naturally in forests) and disease.  Grasslands start increasing and replacing natural flowering plants, and waterways suffer from bursts of microbial activity from excess nitrogen in runoff waters (and this can make it harder for other plants and animals to live there as well).

New Seasons

We met up with a group from Redlands yesterday who are out in Arizona for the annual archaeology field school that Josh participated in for two years.  As we hiked around the pinyon-juniper forests looking for important Native American sites, it hit me . . . my sense of annual seasons has totally changed.  A huge part of it has been the weather.  I read the weather reports from Redlands and am thankful that we aren't in the heat anymore but it's made it hard to realize just what time of year it is.  At this time last year we were getting ready for Josh to graduate, I was deep into training for my first marathon, and we were both thinking about ways to beat the heat.  Now we're in the windy reprieve before the monsoon season starts awaiting finals week, and getting ready to start working full-time for the summer.  But it doesn't feel like equivalent time, it's feels sooner than it actually is.  It feels like it's still in the middle of spring instead of the beginning of summer.  That all may change within the next few weeks as the school year ends and we prepare for our summer plans.  But what strikes me is the difference that comes from changing your location and the natural rhythms that dictate how a year is played out.

Not Too Bad of a Job

My view when I get to work :)  That is Tuzigoot in front of the sun.

A New Place

So we've reach the end of our first lease here in Flagstaff and looking into moving into a new place.  We think we might have found a good place but it all depends on having the ducks line up in the right order before we move in.  We're kind of dependent on that nice big government rebate to be able to pay for the move in costs and we're looking for a few good strong backs to help us get all of our crap into a new place.  As rent prices have continued to rise the past year finding a place we can afford and that we can fit in has been a bit difficult.  What would be plenty of space to most people is like a closet to us, mostly because we were so spoiled in Redlands in a nice big apartment with cheap rent.  But everytime we start looking we're constantly faced with the dilemma of what attributes of our desired new place will be sacrificed in the name of convenience and reality.  For years now we've been contemplating getting a dog, but our living situation never allows it.  When we moved out here we said, "We need to get a place that will let us have a pet, the fish are getting a bit tired."  But that went out in the window pretty quickly as we struggled to find a place that would just be big enough for us.  This time our standards are "we need space and a dog would be nice."  Hopefully at our new place that we are considering, a dog will be in our near future.  Which will be nice, especially on days when Josh or I are working late and it starts to get a bit lonely at home or when one of us is in the field or out of town.  If we play our cards right we would move into a new place the week before I leave for Colorado for the summer.  While it might seem like much to have Josh stay in a nice big new place by himself, the dynamics of the housing market here are strongly influenced by the influx and outflux of students each year, so now is the time to jump if we want something priced right and with what we want.  Cross your fingers with us as we prepare for a new abode. 

Are we in junior high?

There are points in time when I really do think I've been time-warped back in time and have to deal with the petty nonsense that used to plague me when I was a young awkward teenager.  When people would discover your insecurities and play them up to make them look cool and you look stupid by comparison.  There are time when the self-doubt would just creep into your subconscious and make you wonder if it was even worth it to keep going because the slightest misstep would be read completely wrong.  I remember being a freshman in high school, in swimming for PE, and having to find a place on the wall of the pool with 50 other high school students and I accidently kicked a girl trying to squeeze into a place.  She promptly started a rumor that I kicked her because I was gay and couldn't keep my hands off other girls.  It crushed me and was one of those situations where the more you fought it the more other people thought you were just in denial about the truth. 

Balance

In hopes of finishing our first year of graduate school together, we've had to learn alot about balance, which sometimes gets us into trouble.  Let me explain.  So we got a considerable amount back from Uncle Sam since we're both now qualified as poor students.  Our decisions was to spend half of it on a new flat-screen.  Somehow I (Sabrina) decided it wouldn't be such a bad idea since they're switching all TV signals to digital next year.  Of course Josh jumped at the chance (and then proceeded to blame me for the purchase) so we bought one and hooked up the cable.  Now we have the problem of wanting to watch all these shows during the day and getting studying, paper writing, and reading done at the same time.  The easy answer of course is to shut off the television and the cable, we have to admit we're addicted.  So in the name of resistance we're going to have to learn when to put down the remote and to stop mindless watching if we're going to get through the next few weeks successfully.  In the meantime, the end of the first year is within sight.  We can see the light at the end of the tunnel, we just have to get there with a decent amount of sleep, some money in our pockets, and the realization there is a bigger world than the one on our giant TV screen. 

Funded

We marked an important milestone in the saga that is our graduate education, I received word that I (Sabrina) have received a fellowship for the summer.  Since my program does not require a thesis so I don't have a research project that I am required to work on.  However, since I only have two years to get as much experience as I can, I put together a small project in Colorado.  After working for months to put a project proposal and then waiting another two months to see what the research committee decided, I finally found out that I am a fellow now.  For a while I thought I might not want to do it mostly because it would have been easier for me to stay in Flagstaff and it would mean two months away from Josh, but it's hard to pass up this opportunity to run a research project and funding to go to a conference.  Josh and I talked about and  decided that I really couldn't let this pass me up and that it's just the nature of the biz.  So I'm heading up to the Rockies this summer to live on my own and start a new adventure.  I'm nervous and my workload just like quadrupled overnight.  So I have a lot of planning, organizing, and coordinating to do.  Wish me luck!