Fence lizard
This macho dude hangs out on the fence below my flat every day. He's usually out first thing in the morning, surveying his domain. (Lophognathus temporalis)
Lizard Man's Travels
This site is a journal of my travels and other adventures while I shift from doing postdoctoral research on tree frog ecology in Darwin, Australia, to research on digestive physiology of lizards and bats in Sede Boqer, Israel. Enough friends have been asking me for regular updates on this journey, that I thought this would be the best forum to keeep everyone up to date (including me).
- Return to Darwin
- Litoria bicolor in pandanus
- Cyclorana australis funny
- Magnetic termites
- Story of a puppy
- more good news
- More good news
- Busy week
- Kimberley art 1
- kimberley art 2
- August 2004
- September 2004
- October 2004
- November 2004
- December 2004
- January 2005
- February 2005
- March 2005
- April 2005
- May 2005
- June 2005
- July 2005
- August 2005
- October 2005
- November 2005
- December 2005
- January 2006
- February 2006
- March 2006
- May 2006
- June 2006
- July 2006
- September 2006
- November 2006
- December 2006
- January 2007
- February 2007
- March 2007
- April 2007
- May 2007
- August 2007
- September 2007
- October 2007
- November 2007
- January 2008
- Current Posts
Tuesday, November 22, 2005
Mangrove and egret
Just the view on a peaceful Saturday arvo. Nice to have elegant critters in sight from home.
Sunset 3
I thought I'd give a taste of the amazing sunsets I can see from my balcony. These are obviously on different nights, and are all taken from the same spot. I have not touched up any colors or digitally enhanced any of it, except to crop some a bit. You can see why I have been making a special effort to be home at this time of the evenings.
Tuesday, November 15, 2005
Knee redux
Just a quick update on the knee injury. It still doesn't really hurt, but it is still swollen a lot, making it hard to move. I managed to get to the bus, and then to the doctor on campus. His diagnosis... well, it passed all the tests for stabillity, pain, etc. and so it remains a mystery. Possibilities: torn meniscus or cartillage, which may be masked a bit by the swelling; partially torn cruciate ligament, which may also be masked by the swelling; buggered mystery knee parts, which may heal themselves when the swelling goes down or may get worse. Next stop, sports physiotherapist, once I'm mobile enough to get to them (they are on the other side of town).
Body exchange
So, I'm about ready to return my body for a better model. I must be just past my warrantee dates because it seems to be falling apart. Either that or there is something about Darwin that is particularly hard on me physically. Since I've been back, I've had an ankle injury, a sprained finger, a back strain, stomach flu, a cracked filling, and now some sort of knee injury. Basically, I seem to be falling apart at the seems. Unbelievable. The latest seems to be a well done injury. On the last point of the night at frisbee, I came down in a pile of legs, and something wasn't right. I thought I heard a snap, and then realized that my knee was already swollen to about twice the size of the other one. Impressive response really - I didn't realize that swelling could happen so quickly. The strange thing about it was that it didn't really hurt much - just "Oh, I think that's bad" and suddenly it wouldn't move because it was so swollen. Very odd.
Now comes the hard part. Figuring out how to a) work with the Australian medical system, and b) get myself around town. Fortunately, the knee doesn't actually hurt, so I may be able to walk around a bit, but that doesn't really help getting across town to see doctors, or physiotherapists or any such folks. Argh.
Now comes the hard part. Figuring out how to a) work with the Australian medical system, and b) get myself around town. Fortunately, the knee doesn't actually hurt, so I may be able to walk around a bit, but that doesn't really help getting across town to see doctors, or physiotherapists or any such folks. Argh.
Tuesday, November 08, 2005
Walker Creek walk
Last weekend, I managed to escape Darwin and go to Litchfield National Park. I hadn't been there for a couple of years (ack!), and I have been going crazy sitting in front of my computer. So I took the weekend off and went for a walk. Litchfield is about an hour south of Darwin, by the paved road, and a little less by the dirt one. It has only one main road through it, unless you have 4-wheel drive, and there is a series of spots to stop and admire various waterfalls. On the far end of the park, about an hour from the entrance by the paved road (about 5 min from the dirt road side), is a nice walking trail at Walker Creek. The trail has several camp sites along a couple of km of nice trail, and right next to the creek. Very pleasant (except for the mozzies, but you can't really escape them if you want to be near water). I went for a walk along the creek and took some photos. Unfortunately, by the time I finally got to the trail head, it was one in the afternoon. The sun was about a week past being directly overhead, but it's close enough to be a bit unpleasant at that time of day - you don't really cast much of a shadow at that time. But there was a nice stream for cooling off. And I was the only person on the trail. I walked for a couple of hours, took a bunch of rather unexciting photos along with a few good ones, sweated a lot, and generally had a great time.
We're in the middle of the build-up season here now, which means it's really hot, really humid, and there are some really amazing storms that don't really produce very much rain, except for a 1 square-km area directly under that particular cloud, which can be dumped on. There had been a bit of rain at Walker Creek, so things were really starting to green up. I should mention that the build-up storms follow about 6 months without rain, so things are pretty dry and dormant until a storm rolls by. There had been a bit of rain at Walker Creek in the previous couple of week, so things were starting to get active again. There was a lot of germination, and regeneration. As with most of this area, there had been some fires there, and the trees and other woody plants were regenerating. And the grasses were germinating. I didn't see many critters, though there were some friendly red-tailed black cockatoos hanging around chattering, and some white-throated honeyeaters taking a bath in the stream.
On the way back, I took the much shorter, dirt road back to Darwin by way of Berry Springs. That was a nice road. I found a patch of magnetic termite mounds (see below) and stopped to explore for a while. The termites here are really amazing, especially the magnetic ones. They have tombstone-like mounds that are 3-4 meters tall, 1.5-2 meters wide, and about a half meter thick or less. They all align in the same direction, so they really look like a graveyard. Amazing stuff.
Closer to town, I found a farm selling mangos for $5 per bag, and the bags were huge - 15-20 mangos each. So I bought 3 bags and am not eating mangos at every meal, and some for snacks in between. I'm surprised my kitchen counter hasn't cracked under the weight of mangos. I'm on the verge of getting sick of mangos, and I still have about 40 mangos left. Fortunately, they freeze well, so I'll be doing some chopping and freezing this week. That has the added bonus of relieving the pressure to eat them all now while they ripen, and I'll be able to have lovely mango smoothies in a couple of months, when the fresh ones have gone away.
On a nerdy note, the manuscript that has been beating me up the last few weeks has finally been sent to the third author for final review before we submit it. This one was a real slog, but it's almost done. So, I'm happy for today. Tomorrow I go to the dentist, and I think I'll need a filling, so I think the happiness will be shortlived.
We're in the middle of the build-up season here now, which means it's really hot, really humid, and there are some really amazing storms that don't really produce very much rain, except for a 1 square-km area directly under that particular cloud, which can be dumped on. There had been a bit of rain at Walker Creek, so things were really starting to green up. I should mention that the build-up storms follow about 6 months without rain, so things are pretty dry and dormant until a storm rolls by. There had been a bit of rain at Walker Creek in the previous couple of week, so things were starting to get active again. There was a lot of germination, and regeneration. As with most of this area, there had been some fires there, and the trees and other woody plants were regenerating. And the grasses were germinating. I didn't see many critters, though there were some friendly red-tailed black cockatoos hanging around chattering, and some white-throated honeyeaters taking a bath in the stream.
On the way back, I took the much shorter, dirt road back to Darwin by way of Berry Springs. That was a nice road. I found a patch of magnetic termite mounds (see below) and stopped to explore for a while. The termites here are really amazing, especially the magnetic ones. They have tombstone-like mounds that are 3-4 meters tall, 1.5-2 meters wide, and about a half meter thick or less. They all align in the same direction, so they really look like a graveyard. Amazing stuff.
Closer to town, I found a farm selling mangos for $5 per bag, and the bags were huge - 15-20 mangos each. So I bought 3 bags and am not eating mangos at every meal, and some for snacks in between. I'm surprised my kitchen counter hasn't cracked under the weight of mangos. I'm on the verge of getting sick of mangos, and I still have about 40 mangos left. Fortunately, they freeze well, so I'll be doing some chopping and freezing this week. That has the added bonus of relieving the pressure to eat them all now while they ripen, and I'll be able to have lovely mango smoothies in a couple of months, when the fresh ones have gone away.
On a nerdy note, the manuscript that has been beating me up the last few weeks has finally been sent to the third author for final review before we submit it. This one was a real slog, but it's almost done. So, I'm happy for today. Tomorrow I go to the dentist, and I think I'll need a filling, so I think the happiness will be shortlived.
magnetic termites
Just outside Litchfield Park, I ran into this field of magnetic termite mounds. They align themselves to take advantage of sun at certain times of the year. They are reallly huge - some looked to be about 4m tall - but thin. The ones here were about 3m tall, and about 50cm thick at the base, dropping to <20cm at the top.
Somehow, I managed to get a photo without any 4X4 tracks, or upturned mounds, but that was a challenge. Apparently, it is irresistable to drive around in the mud around these, and test your manliness by seeing how big a mound you can knock over. Fortunately, many are still in one piece. And I did see one upturned mound that had started to recover. It looked a bit funny, since the new mound was growing at right angles to the old one.
Somehow, I managed to get a photo without any 4X4 tracks, or upturned mounds, but that was a challenge. Apparently, it is irresistable to drive around in the mud around these, and test your manliness by seeing how big a mound you can knock over. Fortunately, many are still in one piece. And I did see one upturned mound that had started to recover. It looked a bit funny, since the new mound was growing at right angles to the old one.
Walker Creek waterfall
This was a little waterfall along Walker Creek in Litchfield National Park. There was a camping site just next to it - not a bad place to spend the night (except for the mossies, of course).
Monday, November 07, 2005
Not really like autumn
We've had a little rain in the Top End, so things are starting to green up. Some of the trees and shrubs start with red leaves on the new growth. It sort of reminds me of autumn back home, except for the 38C heat.
