weekly musings

It's been a fairly normal week here. I've been working on some data analysis at school, which is going well. We think we have a good handle on what happens with Cyclorana australis during the dry season (you'll have to wait for the manuscript to get the full story). We're still working out some holes in the water exchange part, but it is looking pretty interesting right now.

It has also been a good week for sports stuff. As usual, on Monday I played a bit of ultimate. We had a good game, though we were a bit light on players at first. for some reason, there has been a dropoff in the number of people playing lately. That mostly just means more playing time for those of us who want to do some running around. Some new guys showed up with some athletic ability, so that made the game interesting. I have also been playing volleyball with the university reserve team. For those of you used to US college sports, this isn't anything like that. It's more like a city league team with the university as a sponsor. That has been interesting. They play with a completely different strategy from what I've ever played before, but it seems to work. They have me setting, which involves a lot of running around, and a lot of strange placements, but it's keeping me active. Of course, we've lost every game so far, but we're starting to play as a team finally. This week we played a group of cocky young guys with a lot of height. Needless to say, I was happy when I got several solid blocks on guys several inches taller and fifteen years shorter in the tooth than I am.

I've also been setting things up for the next round of travel. I went to the travel agent today to talk about my next round the world trip. She was apparently new, and her eyes bulged a bit when I gave her my itinerary. Good training, I say. As part of this, I've been working on getting new visas, and such. Turns out that if all of my travel plans work, I may need extra visa pages in my passport. Never thought I'd fill up a passport, especially one that is only 3 years old! The problem is the places that use an entire page for the visas. I've got 2 pages taken by Australian visas, and I'm applying for another class now, which will probably take up another page. And for some strange reason, South Africa requires two facing pages. Not sure what that's about, but there you go. They don't really dwell on these issues on travel shows, or things like the Amazing Race. All part of the fun, I guess.

I've also been busy congratulating folks on babies. Seems that Christmas was a popular time to give birth. Must have been something about the end of March that I missed. Anyway, for those of you who have budded (or are budding) and reading this, "good on you" as they say here. I've also now had friends with a whole host of natal issues. One friend was pre-eclamptic, and then eclamptic, with seizures. Both she and baby are now fine. Another friend got stuck somewhere in the middle, and ended up with a C-section that got infected - and she's allergic to a bunch of antibiotics. A third friend has had some unsettling test results suggesting her baby may have Down's syndrome, and another actually did have a baby with Down's. Then there were the premature twins. Yikes. Of course, they all say it has been worth every bit. Good luck all!

Oh, one interesting thing happened yesterday. I found a wallet in the middle of the road. It looked like it had seen a few tires before I got to it. Big fat thing with something like 50 cards of various shapes sizes and colors. Actually it was truly impressive how much crap was in this woman's wallet. Well, the rest is pretty boring. I checked the phone book and found the woman's number after a bit of searching, and she came to get it. She said thanks, and that was about it. No undying gratitude, lifelong debts, huge cash rewards or anything. A bit of advice: leave your phone number in your wallet somewhere. I almost couldn't find the number to call. I suppose I could have turned it into the police or something, but it seems much more straightforward to just phone the person directly.

That's about it from here this week. More later.

Howard River Field Site

Howard River Field Site
Originally uploaded by wandering lizard.

This is one of my field sites just to the south of Darwin in Humpty Doo. This was taken in January, and the water isn't as high as it will get later in the wet. During the dry season, the pond dries out completely. I took the photo at sunset, and didn't use any filters or digital alteration of colors - that's just the natural lighting that night.

Wet Season Storm

Wet Season Storm
Originally uploaded by wandering lizard.

The view from the tea room in the Science Building at Charles Darwin University. This was a good wet season storm. It lasted about an hour, and dumped about 150mm (6 inches) of rain on us.

death adder

death adder
Originally uploaded by wandering lizard.

A death adder (Acanthophis praelongis) we found one night along the Arnhem highway.

Varanus panoptes

Varanus panoptes
Originally uploaded by wandering lizard.

This was a big (6 foot long) goanna I came across while biking across town one day. He didn't seem too bothered by me, as long as I stayed on the bike. When I got off the bike, he scooted away.

Litoria rothii

Litoria rothii
Originally uploaded by wandering lizard.

This little guy was calling away at our Mickett Creek field site in January. Their call sounds a bit like maniacal laughter, so it is a bit strange hearing a chorus of them.

Cyclorana australis

Cyclorana australis
Originally uploaded by wandering lizard.

This is the giant burrowing frog I talked about in the last entry. We've been doing a lot of research on these guys. During the dry season, they hunker down into a burrow and form a cocoon. There is a lot of color variation in the species - sometimes they are bright green.

Nightly visitor

Portia and green tree frog
Originally uploaded by wandering lizard.

This big female green tree frog (Litoria caerulea) hangs out at the door to Keith's house every night. She comes around and sits on the suitcase or on the doormat and waits for bugs to come by. She doesn't seem to be bothered by me going in and out of the door, and the dogs just leave her alone. I've been feeding her when I see a big fat bug roaming around under the lights.

Wet in Darwin

Okay, there is no way for me to catch up on the details of what I've been doing lately, so I'll go for the highlights, and whatever i can remember.

I've been pretty busy here, trying to get some projects finished off, and others started. the goal was to write two manuscripts while I was here. Not sure if that is going to happen, but we should be able to make a bit of progress on them. One of them is a model, that we are almost finished with. We just need to do a couple of more runs of it, and then start writing. The other is a big compilation of information on the ecology of dormancy in a burrowing frog (Cyclorana australis). They are pretty interesting, even when they are just sitting underground in a burrow. We're still working out what information we have, and what we still need for that one. Last week we ran another set of experiments on them, which turned out really well. It's going to be a big paper, I think.

It has been interesting coming back. I was gone for about 6 months, and there was a mix of people who didn't notice I was gone, thought I'd been gone for a bit, or thought I'd been gone forever. Darwin hasn't changed much - the same people go to the weekend markets for breakfast and produce, the same people work at the various shops. Of course, there has been some turnover at the university, but that always happens - students finish and leave, new ones arrive, etc.

I have noticed a much stronger anti-American attitude around here this time around. Before, it was much more directed at the Bushites, but now that he's been re-elected, many people here seem to think that the whole country is full of megalomaniacal, self-centered, fat, blowhards. I have been doing my part to try to convince people that only 51% of the country is like that. I've even had my 8th grade civics lessons tested by trying to explain the electoral college system to people here. Because of that system, there is a general sentiment that the election was actually a landslide (Bush did win a great majority of electoral votes). I've had to point out that he only got 51% of the vote, and that despite bragging about winning the most votes of any presidential candidate in U.S. history, Kerry got the second most votes in U.S. history. Of course, Bush's subsequent actions have done nothing to make anyone here feel better about him (except some rich vacationers, and the occasional farmer who will benefit from Bush's proposed cuts to US farm subsidies.

But this is starting to get a bit depressing. I have been able to get into the field a little bit, and the frogs are in full chorus. They seem to be having a good wet season. Actually, all the native critters seem to be doing well this year. I've seen a lot of frill-necked lizards (Clamydosaurus kingii) around, as well as a bunch of big goannas (Varanus panoptes). Actually, I've been seeing more goannas this year than I remember from past years. It's pretty exciting to be cruising along the bike path, and have a 6 foot long goanna zip across in front of you. Still no cane toads in Darwin, but there are a lot of anti-cane toad and 'stop the cane toads' signs around.

It's been a good mix of wet season weather here too. I arrived at the beginning of a small monsoon system, so it rained for several days in a row. Then it cleared up and got unbelievably muggy. It's not really that hot - about 32°C (90°F) - but the humidity is up in the 60% range. That makes the heat index up around 45-50°C (115-125°F)! Ugh! There has been a good westerly wind, too, so the ocean has been up. There were even several days where the surfers were able to find waves to ride, which is really rare in Darwin. And it was choppy enough that people were able to go in without worrying too much about box jellies.

I've been settling back into a routine of going to the markets on Saturday and Sunday mornings to get breakfast. It's a good excuse to get out a bit, eat, and even get exercise. The Saturday bike ride is about 8km each way, so I feel a bit better about getting a fruit smoothie when I get there. It is certainly a struggle to get motivated to get much exercise in this climate though - if you do anything more active than breathe, you start to sweat. Oh well, good for keeping the sweat glands in good shape, eh?