MAN OR MARSUPIAL?

Engrish - Japan photos.

2009-09-19T16:52:00.002-04:00

Some long belated photos from my trip to Japan in July. This set consists of signage and other oddities. Click the Happy Terrace to begin.

Dollywood

2009-08-10T22:16:00.001-04:00

I went to Dollywood, and it was awesome. Click on Dolly for more pics.

Great Ocean Road (Victoria)

2009-05-11T03:43:00.003-04:00

Just got back from a fab trip to Melbourne, which included a jaunt down the Great Ocean Road to see the sights. Click the big rock to jump to the album.

Sydney, wandering and Mardis Gras

2009-03-09T02:02:00.006-04:00

Went to Sydney this past weekend. I have TWO (yes, two!) photo albums for you:

Click the artsy bridge/cars picture for random around town photos.

Click the fabulous man/woman/peacock creature for pictures of the Mardis Gras parade (note: some pics are midly risque).

ALSO: if you have Facebook, surf over to my profile for a couple short video clips of random parade-ness.

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Melbourne, how I heart thee.

2009-02-11T06:02:00.003-05:00

Melbourne shenanigans this past weekend. Day one was horribly hot, then a cold front came through and made us all happy again. Click the skywriting for some arty pics, plus thumbsies.

Plants!

2008-10-30T02:31:00.001-04:00

Visited the National Botanic Gardens this weekend for the first time. It was very botanical. Click the Sturt Desert Pea to jump to the album.

Voting

2008-09-30T01:26:00.002-04:00

In the spirit of elections, we here at manormarsupial have decided to bring the question to you, our dear readers. So which are you? Please vote on the left-hand side of this blog.

Floriade!

2008-09-28T21:29:00.001-04:00

This weekend I went to Floriade, Canberra's gigantic celebration of all things flowery and tulip-y. Andrew Ward came over from Adelaide to help me explore the floral goodness.

Click the tulips for more pictures of tulips (and also drag queens).

Tidbinbilla Nature Reserve

2008-09-08T03:45:00.003-04:00

In order to combat my sour mood this weekend I ventured over to the Tidbinbilla Nature Reserve, just 40 min SW of Canberra. It was a great spot with a wide array of trails. Unfortunately I didn't see many marsupials, but theoretically some platypuses (platypi?) reside in some of the ponds. I may have to go back and investigate more.

Click the tree for a few arty nature shots (in lieu of marsupial shots).

Sydney randomness

2008-08-26T23:31:00.002-04:00

Went to Sydney this past weekend to hang out with Brenden and Jessica. Click on the pirates for some random photos, including loads of zoological goodness.

Melbourne shenanigans.

2008-08-18T21:58:00.002-04:00

Went to Melbourne this past weekend (or, "Melbs" if you're super cool). Widely known as Australia's grooviest city, it lived up to my expectations . I feel more groovy just having visited there. It's contagious.
Click the groovy crosswalk to visit an album of Melbourne pictures.

Batemans Bay

2008-07-27T23:30:00.002-04:00

This past weekend I took a trip down to Batemans Bay on the NSW coast (about 2-ish hours outside of Canberra). It was fab.
Location.

Click on the ominous shadows to jump to the picture album.

Scuba diving

2008-07-14T19:51:00.001-04:00

Click on the thumbs for a few pics from the Open Water scuba course I started this past weekend at Bawley Point.

Myrmidon Reef

2008-06-13T21:18:00.003-04:00

Finally have some new pictures to post!

Click on the thumb to jump to the pictures.

Most of these are pictures of my trip to the Great Barrier Reef last week, where I helped out sampling fish and corals from Myrmidon Reef on the edge of the continental shelf. Also included are a couple of pics from my drive between Adelaide and Canberra, where I am now officially located.

For those who are interested:
Map of Myrmidon Reef loctation
Information on the fish we collected

I AM LAME

2008-04-24T00:08:00.003-04:00

Just got back from my whirlwind tour of California and Texas. It was great to be back in the States - primarily because of the burritos, of course. Seeing family and friends was of course a bonus. But seriously, burritos won in the popularity contest hands down.

I am lame, however, because I have zero pictures to share from my trip. I spent a good five minutes during my packing routine debating about bringing my camera, and opted not to. This hasty decision was based entirely on the heaviness of my backpack. Of course, immediately upon arrival I slapped my hand against my forehead as I passed spectacular picture opportunity after spectacular picture opportunity. Chalk one up to a lack of foresight. Anyway, that's all I have for you now. Email me if you want details about 1.) who was the friendliest (or meanest) scientist I met during my trip, 2.) what alcohol we poured onto the roots of my Grandmother's memorial tree, 3.) how many movies I watched on my Qantas flights, 4.) my fabulous new ipod, 5.) contracting colds from a Motel 6, or 6.) how much I love burritos.

I'm back in Adelaide now wrapping things up and getting ready to move to Canberra. Plans are uncertain at this point, although I need to be in CBR by May 13th. Further bulletins as events warrant.

The times they are a'changing.

2008-03-10T03:57:00.001-04:00

The Turbotax software that I'm using to do my taxes just asked me whether I was in a same-sex marriage in 2007. That's progress, folks.

Kangaroo Island

2008-03-09T01:28:00.003-05:00

I uploaded some pictures from Kangaroo Island taken last month when I went to help Travis and Ali with some field work over there. Included are photos of sun, sand, seals, sea lions, skulls, and possibly other things that don't begin with the letter "s". Click the adorable creature below to see the album.

An odd request

2008-02-25T18:09:00.002-05:00

I was recently contacted by a website called Schmap.com who had apparently been trolling for photos on Flickr. The modus operandi of the site is to provide interactive maps and guides for cities using people's uploaded pictures of various locations. Apparently they found this unassuming photo I took of the Australian Antarctic Division in Tasmania, complete with ship, and wanted to include in in their latest Hobart Guide. I said yes, and now you can BARELY find my photo on their website. Odd, but gratifying in a minor way. So you see folks, upload hundreds and hundreds of pictures online and eventually one will gain minor noteriety.

Schmap Hobart Guide: Museums.

And yes, I realize I just totally and shamelessly plugged their website. So sue me.

"Did you know?" (Expat edition)

2008-02-19T01:26:00.004-05:00

Hi friends. Are you an American living overseas? Do you have an overseas bank account(s)? Did the total net worth of those bank accounts exceed $10,000.00 at ANY POINT during the last year? Well, then you my friend must fill out an obscure form that I've never heard about until today. Yes, the US Treasury Department, in all its wisdom, wants to know what you're up to, financially speaking. Once a year you must submit this little form in or face hefty fines/prison/unpleasantness. Who knew.
Form: http://www.irs.gov/pub/irs-pdf/f90221.pdf

Ah, the joys of expatriate living. I'm sure I'll discover more thrilling forms as tax season (US = April 15th, Australia = June 30) descends upon me. Just think: I'll get to file US Federal, Massachusetts (hello rental income!), Connecticut (hello Coast Guard!), and possibly Australian taxes this year. Not to mention the joyous addition of various Treasury Department forms. It's enough to make you Libertarian. Almost.

Today I found out that I have to apply for an Australian tax ID number for my new job in Canberra. That way they can withold taxes and such. Oops. Of course, I also found out that I can't apply for a tax ID until I hold a different visa than I currently have. Oops. Hopefully I won't find out that I need the tax ID to apply for the visa. Then I'm really screwed. Dr. Kafka, that's me.

I did decide to break down and purchase Quicken. I had been living a happy life of non-formal financial tracking, but now that is no more. I have no idea which edition to purchase, so will start with the Basic and see if my lifestyle requires more complexity. Fingers crossed. I like to think of myself as a simple guy, but apparently not.

Further financial bulletins as events warrant.

Various photos from Mom

2008-02-16T20:23:00.002-05:00

To wrap up photos from Mom's visit, here are a smattering of pics taken by her. All photos are by Judy Walther, unless of course she's in the photo herself. Click on the dubious advertising gimmick below to jump to the album.

Sydney with Mom, January 2008

2008-02-10T02:17:00.000-05:00

Click the strange architectural structure for some assorted shots from the trip my mom and I took to Sydney in January. Manly Beach! Dangerous surf! Festival nights! It's all included.

Christmas in the outback

2008-01-20T01:54:00.001-05:00

I'm lazy. Anyway, my mom came over to Australia for a month and we spent a terrific week in the outback for Christmas. Given my aforementioned laziness, I only just finished uploading and captioning the pictures. There are four albums.

Click the banner with the overconfident statement about deserts to view an album of Alice Springs photos.

Click the very red rock to view the album of Kings Canyon.

Click the tilting rock to view the album of Uluru.

Click the gas station to view the album of Kata Tjuta and an exciting camel ride.

Back from the deep

2007-12-16T02:10:00.000-05:00

Finally, pictures from the LADDER3 Atlantis cruise have been uploaded.

Click the map for the full album of all 244 pictures.

For those of you with weak constitutions, I made a significantly smaller album (just 27 photos!) of what I thought were the best shots. Click HERE for the Best Of album.

Wild Blue Yonder

2007-11-10T21:30:00.001-05:00

Hi all,

So I'm off to Manzanillo, Mexico tomorrow to hop on board the Atlantis and begin the journey to the East Pacific Rise. I'm helping out with some research looking at colonization, dispersal and succession dynamics of invertebrates at some hydrothermal vents. If all goes well I'll get a trip down to the vents in Alvin! Fingers crossed. You can track the ship by clicking here:

http://www.whoi.edu/page.do?pid=8231

I'll be back in Australia Dec. 6th and will post plenty of pictures then! I should have spotty access to my gmail account while on board, so send me notes when you can!

Cheers,
Benjamin

Halloween Party

2007-10-30T19:21:00.001-04:00

Fab Halloween pics. Click here for more pics.

A grand day out.

2007-10-18T23:48:00.000-04:00

This past weekend arrived with good weather, so naturally it called for a hike. Travis, Andrew joined Melita (a good friend of theirs) for a hike around Morialta Falls. Travis and I visited here before (see older posts), but this time we took a longer hike around the perimeter of the gorge and even saw some exciting wildlife. Before we left we stopped at Melita's house to meet her pets: Tildes the Dog and Louis the Duck.

Click the kookaburra above to visit the album.

Grand Final shenanigans

2007-09-30T21:04:00.000-04:00

This past Saturday was the Grand Final for Australian Football League (the game commonly known as "footy", which is distinct from rugby in a variety of ways that lose me completely). This is in a sense the equivalent of the Superbowl, only the teams wear significantly less padding and focus appears to be on the game rather than the half-time show. Adelaide was particularly geared up for the match since one of their teams was playing: the Port Adelaide Power (above left logo). These scrappy young Australians were playing against the Geelong Cats (Geelong being a town outside of Melbourne). In honor of this televised warfare, Travis and Andrew had a handful of folks over to the house for a ripping good cookout and communal game watching party. Word to the wise: kangaroo sausages cooked on a barbecue are not to be missed.

So how was the game? In a word: catastrophic. Adelaide suffered a withering defeat at the hands of the Cats, losing by a record-breaking 119 points (final score: 163 to 44). That, apparently, is pathetic. The Cats were entitled to a win after a 44 year stretch since they last won the premiership. However, Adelaide's miserable performance prompted a lot of collective hand-wringing and declarations that, in the words of one commentator, Adelaide was "disgraceful, dishonorable, disgusting, dismal." Harsh.

I didn't grasp much of what was happening on the field, although I did learn that footy players are allowed to pull a rather nifty move: a "screamer." When a player moves to intercept a pass to an opposing player, he can vault himself up onto the back of the opposed, lifting himself into the air where he can snatch the football before it lands into the arms of the poor sod under his knee. There was a spectacular example of this in the game Saturday by Paul Chapman of the Cats:

Good times. My Australian indoctrination continues, and maybe next time I watch a footy match a.) I can follow the action better and b.) it won't be such a "dishonorable" game. One can hope.

Canberra & Sydney (Road trip!!)

2007-09-23T00:18:00.000-04:00

Last week Travis, Andrew and I piled into the car at 5am and drove ourselves to Canberra, the capitol city of this fine country. We were ostensibly there for the annual conference of the Australian Society for Fish Biology, where Travis and I both gave presentations on our work. But there was plenty of time for touring and idling as well. We toured the Parliament House, the War Memorial, and other fine institutions. After we had our fill, we jumped into the car again and headed over to Sydney for a couple extra days of nonsense. We retrieved a friend of Trav and Drew (Paris, a former doctoral student in the marine bio lab in Adelaide) and hauled the 17 hours back to Adelaide. We managed not to kill each other during the interminable ride, although I suspect Paris was close to homicide when the three of us boys sang along to the entire soundtrack of Little Shop of Horrors 15 hours into the trip. Good times.

Click the above picture for an album of Canberra and Sydney (including Bondi Beach, where Paris lives). Prepare for plentiful Opera House pictures - I *am* a tourist after all.

At long last, Tasmanian Birthday pics

2007-09-09T03:17:00.000-04:00

For my 30th birthday I decided to assuage the aging process by jetting over to Tasmania for a week. It was quite a week, full of abundant wildlifem, amazing coastal scenery, hefty hikes, and self-instruction in driving on the left side of the road. Below are links to four photo albums chronicling my adventure. Be warned that a.) there are a lot of pictures, so proceed with caution and b.) I kind of ran out of steam with the descriptions, so some are minimally titled. That said, enjoy!

Click each picture to jump to the album.

Click the koala for pictures from the Trowunna Wildlife Park.

Click the mountain for pictures of Cradle Mountain National Park.

Click the boat for pictures of Hobart.

Click the beach for pictures of Freycinet Peninsula and Bicheno.

Pics from Semaphore and Barossa Valley

2007-08-12T01:05:00.000-04:00

Click above for pics from two areas. The first string of pics is from Semaphore, a beachside suburb of Adelaide. Then come pics from the Barossa Valley, a famous wine producing region about an hour's drive north of Adelaide. Travis and I spent a leisurely day there sipping vintages and spending too much cash on bottles to take home. It was a fab time. Included are some goofy portrait shots with an Australian emblem.

My new favorite show.

2007-08-11T23:26:00.000-04:00

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My new favorite show, discovered here in Australia, is called Inspector Rex. Well, that's the English translation of the title Kommissar Rex - the show is Austraian and runs here Down Under with subtitles. It's a heartwarming cop show about a police dog (Rex) who is incomparably more adept at solving crimes than his human counterparts. Rex's talents for sniffing, barking, jumping and picking things up in his mouth allows him to catch the bad-guy every week. He's also quite good at jumping through fake plate glass windows in a dramatic fashion. It's categorically atrocious and I'm addicted.

Apparently this thing has been running for at least seven seasons in Austria. Why don't we get this in the States??

Click here for a clip of the intro.

Yorke Peninsula photos

2007-07-30T07:40:00.000-04:00

More pics, y'all (click above). Two weeks ago I went out into the field to do some fish collections for the lab in Yorke Peninsula. Most of the pictures, however, are from a fabulous afternoon we spent in Innes National Park at the tip of the peninsula. There were some truly breathtaking vistas there, and my camera was set all a-snapping. Also, some more Australian critters were sighted. Very satisfying, overall.

Adelaide environs

2007-07-30T00:59:00.001-04:00

Click the above picture for a few pictures from a sojourn just outside Adelaide. Travis played tourguide and we stopped for a quick hike up Morialta Gorge and then drove to the summmit of Mount Lofty, where we could gaze down onto the Adelaide landscape.

Field work! Kangaroos! Australiana! Huzzah!

2007-07-25T22:00:00.000-04:00

Ah, after much consternation and keyboard-slamming I have managed to upload some pictures taken during a day of fieldwork the week before last. This was out to Deep Creek Conservation Park, and then afterwards a quick trip to Waitpinga Beach. Both of these gorgeous places are on the Fleurieu Peninsula, south of Adelaide. Click here for a map (scroll all the way down for Deep Creek on the tip of the Peninsula).

It was a spectacular place. The trail travelled through some dry scrubby vegetation down into a valley where a small creek cut through to the ocean, creating a petite estuary that was shelted from the pounding surf by rock barriers. Cool place. Didn't catch a single fish in our seines, but the vistas were worth the trip.

Click the above picture for the link to the album. ALSO included are some much anticipated photos of kangaroos. Mission accomplished.

Australian at last

2007-07-24T19:29:00.000-04:00

Well, here I am in the great Down Under. I've been having massive issues with posting pictures online, and so far have only managed to get a few up of sights around the city and the University. Click above groovy picture to visit. I'm in the middle of uploading pictures from the field (including some native Aussie wildlife), but those aren't finished yet. Argh. Things should hopefully be better once we get internet at home and I don't have to deal with crazy firewalls and stuff at work. Plus, I can get some work done at work, which would be nice.

But in other news, Australia is fantastic! It's amazing how much the outdoor landscape reminds me of parts of Texas. Scrubby vegetation, flat open vistas, dry creek washes. However, the similarity is shattered when kangaroos or cockatoos whiz by. It truly is a different continent, fancy that.

I hope to get the remainder of the photos up soon. Have patience, my Northern Hemispheric friends.

Hot times in Halifax

2007-07-04T15:51:00.000-04:00

Click below for some semi-exciting pictures of Halifax. I was there two weeks ago for a conference on diadromous fishes (e.g. salmon, eels, shads, etc.) and walked around a bit on the harborfront. So expect lots of pictures of boats boats boats!

A Cape Cod visit.

2007-06-18T20:46:00.000-04:00

Judy and George came and visited. I finally got the pictures up. Click to visit! Pictures of herring, seagrasses, fishies and family.

Presidential Pictures

2007-05-28T12:37:00.001-04:00

Click above for pictures from the actual Coast Guard commencement exercises, President Bush and all. I've finally recovered from the embarassing facial sunburn I contracted and am now more or less back to normal. Phew.

Pictures updated

2007-05-23T19:48:00.001-04:00

Took me a little longer than expected, but the photos from the military exercises yesterday are now online. Just click on the B&W uniform photo below to be taken to Flickr for some marching pics!

Military awards

2007-05-22T16:59:00.000-04:00

Today was the day for the military awards and review of the corps of cadets at the Academy (the pre-commencement exercises). Photos are now online, just click on the spiffy uniform!

Fun with spam

2007-05-21T22:46:00.001-04:00

I recently received this bit of spam in my inbox.

I don't know why but it strikes me as a bizarre confluence of marketing gimmicks that somehow smacks of desperation. "Maybe if we put pictures of ICE CREAM on our ad, people will click it. Oooh, oooh, and let's put a sultry woman on there too! Even better, we'll have her LYING IN THE GRASS! There's no way this pitch will fail."

On the other hand, maybe National Survey Panel is utterly convinced that we all have rather strong feelings about vanilla vs. chocolate. Feelings that we would not hesitate to express by clicking on their spam. "Hell yeah I prefer vanilla! What plumb fool doesn't? I'm submitting my vote to National Survey Panel like nobody's business!" *click*

The sad thing is I'm sure plenty of people respond. In some ways using ice cream is brilliant. It's certainly got broader appeal than viagra or destitute Kenyan billionaires. I've almost a mind to go voice my opinion...

No more teacher's dirty looks.

2007-05-13T12:44:00.000-04:00

I finished teaching my class at the Coast Guard Academy this past week. It was a great semester, filled with interesting moments and provided me with very valuable experience dealing with a classroom full of college seniors eager to get out of the place. I learned quite a bit, and would do many things different were I to teach it again. But on the whole I thought I did rather well, and they were complimentary in their evaluations. So it was a good scene overall. Surprisingly, their favorite part of the class was my "Fish Of The Day" segment. Guess that shouldn't shock me too much, since that was clearly my favorite part to talk about as well. Teach to your strengths, I suppose.

There were several common errors on the final exam that exasperated me, however. I don't know how many times I ranted about Ekman transport to them, repeating until I was blue in the face that when wind blows over water in a particular direction the surface water current does NOT flow in the same direction. Friction, Coriolis, blah blah blah. And yet several cadets still seemed to blank out on that entirely on the final. Even worse, a couple of them were still confused about wind direction. I want to corner them before they graduate and get it through their heads that a north wind blows FROM the north. ARGH! If there's one thing you should learn before you become an officer in the Coast Guard...

At least now they all think that fish are cool. Small triumph.

Spring can really hang you up the most.

2007-05-08T19:34:00.000-04:00

Ah, spring is finally here. Click the trippy daffodils for an album of an afternoon in Spohr Gardens (Cape Cod) and a couple goofy friend shots.

Why the Cape is great.

2007-05-08T19:12:00.000-04:00

It's the juxtaposition of things like this:

And really, what segments of the population wouldn't be served by an establishment that offers both crystal energy and bait? None that I would want to associate with, so says I.

What are these?

2007-04-24T20:29:00.000-04:00

A central perk of Connecticut residency is shopping at the Big Y market. While this store delights me to no end, there is one mysterious aspect to the whole experience: these simple silver (yes, silver) coins larger and lighter than a quarter. I have now accumulated several of these over the course of my visits. They arrive once you surrender your money to the surly teenager manning the cash register and passing silent judgement on your combined purchase of yogurt, q-tips, and the latest edition of Weekly World News. Once your apparently pitiable items are paid for, the teenager says "Congratulations, you won a coin" in the most anesthetized voice possible. After which you are the proud owner of a new Big Y coin. After which you return home, stow your q-tips in their appropriate cabinet and suddenly wonder what the hell you are supposed to do with said coin. Stack them in a tower? Glue them together? Make a necklace out of them? Or perhaps they have a more sinister purpose. Could Big Y be attempting to bring down the Fort Knox with an alternative currency designed to supplant our beloved greenbacks? What does Alan Greenspan think about all of this? Of course, no Big Y employee has seen fit to explain what these things are good for, and thus their value seems infinitely arbitrary.

My obsession with this quirky store is not unique. Some poor soul has taken time out of their day to compose a Wikipedia article dedicated to the establishment, confirming my hypothesis that Wikipedia is 95% effluent. But at least the entry clued me in to the meaning of "Mad Mondays" at the store, which is apparently not when Bellevue patients staff the cheese counter, as I previously suspected.

2007-04-15T23:10:00.000-04:00

Some family photos. Visiting NYC in March when the Alaskan branch came down to say hello. Click for an album.

A very gray day indeed

2007-04-15T22:19:00.000-04:00

A much-hyped Nor'easter is upon us, much to the delight of every TV weather alarmist in New England. It has been certainly gray and nasty for much of the day, although us Connecticuters (Connectittians? Connecticuttites?) are certainly avoiding the snow dumping on Upstate New York and Maine, poor bastards. You'd honestly have to pay me in mounds of gold doubloons to get me to live in that part of the country if this is the kind of weather you get on Tax Day. Rest assured, it will give us something to talk about in class tomorrow with the cadets (despite the necessity to cover the ho-hum topic of oil spills in the marine environment). Severe weather is always more interesting than organic chemistry.

The weather moved me to take a few photos of my surroundings today. So, in honor of the storm, here are a couple quick snapshots.
A gloomy portrait of my living room window. Were I a glowering teenage poet I would compose an ode to the rain against my windowpane. Thank goodness I have no such inclinations.

My herring mobile, unaffected by the downpour.

Yes, Virginia. It's wet outside.

This is my gym. As the name implies, it is simply the most amazing place on the face of this green Earth. No photos of the inside, since the wow-iness cannot be captured on film. That and the muscle heads would probably react violently if I strode in there and started snapping pics.

This is my supermarket. Again, you may infer from the subtitle that no finer purveyor of foods can be found. Who knew Groton was such a concentrated hotbed of class? That's right, no little or even medium-sized Y's are to be found here. Just rows and rows of big Y's for the sophisticated shopper. I admit that I find the name just a tad risque and giggle like a schoolgirl every time I walk in.

The most awesomely picturesque diner I have encountered, and just around the corner from my house. Now this is World Class, thank you. I went in once and had an omelet. The waitress at the counter was surly, which pleased me very much.

So there's Groton. More pics later.

2007-03-31T11:36:00.000-04:00

Some long overdue family Christmas photos are finally uploaded on Flickr. Click to visit!

What to bring?

2007-03-31T11:13:00.000-04:00

This question has plagued me for some time and my feelings have vacillated. Initially I was wedded to the idea of bringing my entire life, shipping scads of boxes and essentially transporting my house part and parcel. Those ideas have been steadily eroding, and at this rate I will likely depart with one sock and a box of mint-flavored floss in a plastic bag. Perhaps there's a happy medium. But really, what do I honestly need? This could turn into a more existential examination of possessions and materialism than I think I'm intending, but it does give me pause about the relative importance of my objects. This has been magnified by my current dual-household status with commuting between Connecticut and Falmouth while I'm teaching. Turns out I can subsist on relatively few things in my Groton apartment. Chiefly, my computer, clothes, toilet paper, and Battlestar Galactica DVDs. I suppose that indicates some regression back into a college-age existence. I prefer to think of it (naturally) as a maturation into a refined sense of necessity and simplicity. Thoreau, eat your heart out. The truth, of course, has everything to do with the bother and hassle of moving objects, which I'm sure will regulate my international shipping endeavors.

Any suggestions? Things you cannot live without, with which you'd travel to the ends of the Earth? Things you've tried to get rid of but haven't managed to shake?

Jumping the gun

2007-03-19T20:48:00.000-04:00

With much reluctance and personal inquiries into my own sanity, I've decided to start a blog. The principal reason is that in just a few short months I will venture to the Land Down Under to test my mettle, do a little post-doc'ing, remove some fish heads from unsuspecting fish, and answer that age-old question: am I a man or a marsupial? I think I know the answer already, but it can't hurt to find out for sure. This blog thang will help me broadcast news to family and friends abroad and provide links to the fantabulous pictures I'm sure to take. I promise no regularity or great insight, or even proper spelling for that matter, but I figured it was worth a shot. I have no intention of really embracing this whole "blogger" scene, so feel free to haul me off my high horse if I should drift that way. But hopefully we can share some laughs, some tears, some adventures, and some Vegemite. That last one is optional.