Conversing in Crazy

This is a IM transcript from a mate (name protected to protect their innocence) after a random Tweet about the return of the crazy Greek lady.

(mate) how your ninja skills coming on?
(me) sure. i'm working on 'hide-in-plain-sight' strategy right now.
(mate) haha - even though the "#crazygreeklady" is around? :P
(me) _because_ the #crazygreeklady is around.
(mate) hahaha - what makes her crazy?
(me) [context] the #crazygreeklady runs the sweetie shop on campus.
(mate) yeah?..
(me) [crazy comes from] her pricing strategy - (a) it's seriously inflated compared with other stores selling the same stuff (b) she asks you what you paid for other stuff from other shops. Then also (c) she's so strict on what you can say and do in her tiny little shop and (d) she's more than a little rude to her customers. So over all some of the crazy comes from the fact that the store is still open because of (a) through (d) above.
(mate) whahahahaha - she's like the teacher that hates her subject :P
(me) a while back there was a notice on the door that said "closed due to death in family" and for the longest time (since then) she hasn't been back. I thought she had died. But now she's back so it must've been a #crazygreekrelative in Greece.
(me) funny thing is I think she and the guy from Nino's (Mario) are connected in a #crazygreek-italian way, but Mario is a nice bloke and his prices, generally, are reasonable and he's friendly, with his regulars at least.
(me) I may have to blog this story. I'll remove your name to protect you ;)

A lil bit of craziness posted for your crazy enjoyment.

What happened to me?

For the last few weeks I've felt not quite myself: overwhelmed and more of a half-empty outlook compared with my normal half-full perspective. Some of this feeling I attributed to the Fifa 2010 World Cup mayhem and foolishness and I wanted nothing to do with it. "Soccer's not my game" I've said over and over. So what happened today, hours before kick-off, that got me so excited: tweeting posting googling sharing whooping and giddy? I've always called myself a Proud South African and I guess today my 'gees' is based on the fact (it is now a fact) that we're pulling off a feat many people, other Saffas included, didn't think we could pull off. Dang those stadia look good and the Gautrain runs and the airports are impressive and the weather is sunshiny.

We still have issues of slow development, poverty, lack of service delivery, crime, potholes, litter and really bad road driving habits. So today I'm going to again adopt a half-full perspective and state that maybe this showcase of national spirit and unity may be a surge to solving these issues sustainably.

Maybe I get to have this spirit-filled attitude because I decided weeks ago to stay out of public areas and off the roads today. A good decision that was too, considering how Wits has become the Jozi Soccer Central - hosting 2 teams training camps, an international media centre and park-and-ride facilities. All this to the exclusion of the PG students and staff who have not taken (cannot take) vacation time to revel in the celebrations or get away from the busy-ness. Well if I can't work because of these restrictions I may as well blog.

Whoa! it's here - I'm feeling it. We'll start a new count down at 16:00 today: counting down until this all ends and we can return to a life forever changed and hopefully more normal. Welcome WC2010! I'll say it while I feel it - it may only last a moment.

Could this be me?

I always wondered if the safety-net of the postgrad life I remembered at Wits was part of the reason I came back to do my PhD. Now I see the symptoms in this recent Piled Higher & Deeper strip.



Some context: The good doctor has told Cecilia that she's allergic to her thesis and also to reality outside of her research manifest after seeing fellow students graduate. Use the 'previous' button on this link to see the 4 previous strips if you need more context. I ♥ PHD Comics :)

So if this thread is to be believed, when will I show symptoms of allergy to my work? Does avoidance of deadlines count?

Time travel

I love getting mail. More specifically I love getting snail mail: the kind that goes travels through that good (or not so) old network of post-offices and mailing centres and then lands in my mail box. There's something nostalgic about receiving 'post'.

In my post-box today was a postcard written by me, last November, when I was on a post-graduate workshop at Warwick University. It was one of our last tasks of the workshop; to write down some outcomes that we had planned to achieve within 3 months.

What was on the card is, for this audience, not relevant. What is significant is how I responded: an almost surreal feeling - it was my handwriting on the envelope (yes it came in an envelope) and on the card, but bizarrely it didn't feel like I had written those questions. And their relevance now was astounding, even just considering what I thought, back then, would be important now.

This little time-travel experience brought a smile to my face and giggle in my voice as I read the postcard. I recommend this experience as a reminder of what you've achieved by a certain time in the future. Write 3 questions to you-in-the-future, from you-as-you-are-now; seal it in a self-addressed stamped envelope and ask a friend to mail at a predetermined time in the future. A few months is enough. Then just wait for the future to happen, you needn't remember anything, except to check your post-box. I suspect it'll be a worthwhile experience for you too.

Boycotting the commercialism of V-day

Yes yes. Maybe I would be more into this Hallmark holiday if I had a SO. For the most part I think that couples should make a tiny little fuss over their partner every day and not just on one designated by the calendar. The level of commercial depravity that V-day has become, leaves me feeling rather sad. If I was in a couple, how would I know that he would make the effort because he feels obliged by society and all the retail efforts or for more sincere motives. Well the truth is I don't have to double guess.

Most V-day's are for me a bit like Charlie Brown's:


(Source)

V-day rant over.

[Edit] Better late than never, today's Over the Hedge comic did make me go "Oh cute".

And in other news...

In this morning's news I bring you a few observations from the life of Terri.

Recently, invited into a mentor's office to help with spreadsheets, I was calm until I heard the phrase "Are you good on (spreadsheet-application-name)?". This was when I panicked; thinking that I had to help with complex computations, vlookup statements I'd only heard about or even use a pivot table properly (as opposed to the playing around I normally do). I like to think that I'm proficient at spreadsheets - I'm in no way a super user but I use the common functions often. I learned from a friend who uses spreadsheets to write music for percussion instruments that spreadsheets can be used for almost any purpose and I use them a lot. As it transpired my mentor needed to add text annotations to a spreadsheet - very simple stuff. This is what I learnt: super smart people may not be spreadsheet people. One day I hope to be both.

Through frustration and fatigue I realised that Pyott's may not really want you to snack on their Provita crackers. This is especially true of the last 10 crackers in the packet. This is based on the fact that they're almost impossible to get out of the packet without force and breakage of crackers. Pyott's if you're listening: what are the chances of the little pull-tab strip on both ends of the packet?

Paper

Now that's a good topic for a writing assignment[1]. Thanks Leia! A writing assignment with the aim of reminding me about a useful writing state; a state that as I become more familiar with I can access at will and get writing, since 2010 will entail a lot of writing for me. This state is just about writing: long-hand on paper; judgement free. The editing state will come later. So write now it's me scribing for the writer in me and I'm jotting down the words that float to the surface. The surface of the paper, as if this was a tracing paper with invisible letters and moving the pen fluidly across the page, the letter, words and meanings appear. How fabulous this would be when writing papers, articles for scientific journals - the measurable outcome of my research. Imagine if you could find a magic notebook where the words are not on show to everyone but as you access the write state the words appear as if they'd been there all along. That'd give confidence; an untapped source. It's really easy then to be a writer, published, a research scientist.

Consider all the paper used to publish all these seemingly important findings about the world around us and how we are in the world. Paper is really a visual documentation of our history. Even the history of our planet, once "written" in stone in the shape of organisms and geologic events preserved for all time is now transcribed on paper, in journals, in books, in libraries that'll be outlived by the fossils they describe.

Would we write or transcribe anything in this digital information age if not for rock paintings, papyrus leaves, parchment and A4 white bond 80g/m2? Would we know how far we've come and how much we still have to write?

[1] This was the product of a free-writing exercise over a timed period of 11 mins. There have been some edits from the rushed unintelligible long-hand - although these have been generally cosmetic and the integrity and style of the piece has been preserved.

Christmas cards, tweets and squeaks

How will you be sending Christmas wishes this year?



From: Over the Hedge, 1 December 2009

Travel tales Part 2 - Coventry & Statford-upon-Avon

It's quite evident that Coventry went through a forced revamp in recent history - it was severely bombed in the 2nd world war and show signs of hasty rebuild. And yet it's an ancient city with it's claim to fame back in the 11th century when Lady Godiva trotted through the town on horseback naked to protest the extortionate taxes her own husband demanded from the residents. See the Wikipedia write-up for the suggested links between this event and the origin of the phrase "Peeping Tom".

Part of the Lady Godiva story is attached to the old cathedral that was damaged in various attacks and wars. The city has successfully managed to maintain the shell of the building and have preserved it, next to the new cathedral, as a monument. It was so touching and real and such a beautiful place.

As we were exploring the old cathedral a graduation ceremony was taking place in the new cathedral. The joy on the faces of the graduands from Coventry University was clearly evident.

After a warming latte in Starbucks(TM) we headed out to Stratford-upon-Avon and straight to the birthplace of The Bard himself: William Shakespeare. The real priceless artefacts on show were incredible and walking through the house and room where he was born was surprisingly emotive; his works in the 16th century have shaped so much of what we know as the English language today. There's more to WS than just Romeo and Juliet. We also went from his childhood home, of a family with a moderate income, to the home of his (and Anne Hathaway's) daughter, Suzanne. A much larger home as her husband was the town doctor. The garden's alone speak of the wealth of the family. Some pretty scary surgical instruments on display though *eww*.



At 16:30 the bells of Trinity church pealed in glorious tune. The place where WS was entombed after his death. The fading light and growing cold signalled time to leave this enchanting town. I will make my way back there in the warmer months on day to explore more fully this picturesque place. Tudor is so retro.

All this manic exploring was followed by equally manic packing: not surprising since the volume of my suitcase had shrunk and the contents to fill the suitcase expanded substantially! After a wonderful breakfast in Leamington an eventful journey home commenced: train to Basingstoke, taxi to the hotel, lift to the house, rest for 2 hours, lift to Heathrow, serious last minute shopping and relaxing in the Club lounge and then boarding and home.

Thanks to all hosts, co-explorers, drivers and companions on this trip. I was exhausted from fun and chatting when I got home. I hope to return the favour soon.

More photos on my Flickr profile.

Travel tales Part 2 - Windsor & London

This is a long post: steel yourself! So the rest of the nearly 2 weeks I was in the UK were about seeing friends and family and some of the country I hadn't seen when I was last there. What a rush! Six hour train from Edinburgh to Birmingham, then a train change and on to Coventry. Yay! Claire was there to meet me. Lots of chatting, brief nap, laundry and back on a train to Basingstoke to the family. Train change at Reading and there they were waiting at the station with hugs galore. Quick stop at the house and on to the Apollo hotel where I stayed for the weekend. How posh! Felt like I was walking more upright and behaved in a proper well-mannered English style.

After a good evening chatting to the family and answering hundreds of questions from the girls (All good K&S - we had kinda lost touch for a while there while you were becoming great humans) a good long peaceful sleep in pure comfort in a king size bed with a down duvet *swoon*. Brekky and then out exploring with Rob & Lorraine.

We started in Windsor and explored the town and the outside of the castle. The £15 entrance fee to the castle seemed rather steep. The Royal Standard was not flying when we arrived, but after walking and having coffee as we left town, having decided to go through to royal London, there it was, flapping in the breeze. So while we were exploring QE2 herself snuck in a back entrance. Even the paparazzi were setting up hoping to catch a glimpse. Maybe they also missed her arrival.

On to London avoiding the normal route R&L use as there was rugby at Twickenham. Still with all the roadworks (sound familiar Saffas?) and general pay-day-before-Christmas-Saturday congestion we got through to Hammersmith and took a tube to Westminster and popped up above ground right underneath Big Ben.


Exploring the parliamentary and royal end of London, which I didn't get to when I visited in 2003, was fascinating. Dang there were a lot of people out to see the sights! Highlights were the Houses of Parliament, Westminster Abbey, the Royal Guards, St James park, the 'royal mile' down towards Buckingham palace and then back around past the treasury. Plenty of history there. Then a view of the London Eye (the weather was bleak we weren't paying to see the top of the grey clouds we could see the bottom of from the street!) and the London-end of the Thames then back underground and back to Basingstoke for Nando's for dinner - a little taste of SA in the UK.

Sunday was shop shop shop and then a dash out to Stone Henge and back via The Vyne. Again the weather was bleak and really windy and cold at Stone Henge. Crazy how they're just rocks in a circle but so much mystery and myth surrounds them and the folks who walk in a giant circle around them. The Vyne is a beautiful quintessential olde English stately home in the heart of Jane Austen country - something you'd see in a period movie or book adaptation. The image below is of the summerhouse. Darn shame we didn't get there with enough time to look around the house proper.


Excellent home cooked meal and some more chatting and present wrapping and back to the station for the train back to Lemington Spa. The next 2 days were spent on a post-grad workshop for PhD students at the University of Warwick. So much of fun and learning - Thank you Kate, Jane, and Nathalie for the generous welcome and all the arrangements.

Stayed tuned for the next instalment of Travel Tales: Coventry & Stratford-upon-Avon.

Thanks to BA.com and Charlie R.

... for the upgrade to BA club class on the way out from Johannesburg to London Heathrow. What a way to fly: real comfort, real sleep, real cutlery, real food, real service.

I also have reason to believe that I sat in the same seat that KP - if you're an England / South African cricket fan who'll know who he is - sat in on his way out for the current series. Ooooh *faint*! (no not really, he plays for the other side).

Sadly on the way back from Heathrow everyone who paid for the Club seats showed up and I had to manage in World Traveller, not unlike a long tube (London Underground) ride! Noisy and a lot more squishy. Seriously though BA rocks! Travel with them if you can.

Travel tales, Part 1 - Edinburgh

That's Edin-bur-ah, not Edin-berg. Well it took me 2 days to find someone who spoke with any kind of Scottish accent! So the "bur-ah" vs "berg" story was relayed to me via an American delegate at the Nitrogen deposition workshop I attended. What a culturally diverse city with many many foreign nationals doing the business end of dealing with the public. To start with the young lady in customs at Edinburgh airport (story to be told in person to protect the not so innocent) had family in South Africa, but she hadn't been to visit them yet. And then the hotel I stayed at, on the dodgier side of town, had staff mainly from Eastern Europe. And the lady at Subway(TM) who was from some part of Asia and I struggled to understand her - although she probably wondered where I was from too. I later found out that there are a lot of young Polish people moving to the UK looking for work. The point-at-item-when-there's-no-other-option-system is well in place in Edinburgh.

The weather was typically fine, and much warmer than I expected, for the 3 days we were cooped up inside for meetings. Then the wet weather arrived with a serious gust of wind that blew for the next 1.5 days until I left. I felt really sad for the people in South West Scotland who had their neighbourhoods washed away. At least I could get a train down the east coast and not be too affected by the flooding.

I did find a way to spend some time in the wet weather before I left on the train; possibly one of the most amazing museums I've ever visited, Our Dynamic Earth. Loved the interactive style, touching an 'ice-berg' and being shaken by an earthquake, being sprinkled by a rain-shower in the rain-forest and being an astronomer for 20 mins.

Some photos are in a collection on Flickr.

Oh the workshop went well too: met lots of new contacts, got good feedback on the research our group is doing, and good feedback on my talk too.

Exam are fun...

... when you're the other end of the question. Not the writing end but the assessing end. While invigilating exams can be boring: watching 60 students write for 2 or 3 hours while you twiddle your thumbs and creatively imagine that they're writing sense and that judging by the furious rate of pen-to-teeth-tapping, the eye-rolling and the frantic hand-cramping scribbling that they all rose to the challenge.

The marking can be seen as labourious, spending precious weekend time getting through the ink-filled pages. I had such hope with this year's Functional Ecology exam. And up until the last 2 questions - grant it the longest and highest stakes - they were doing almost too well. Enough to be simultaneously suspicious and proud.

The dashing of those creative images can be very frustrating. Keeping conscious record of all the "What the heck!?" moments does serve a comic relief purpose. This years best of the 'Real answers to exam questions' is now on view. The names of the innocent have been excluded to protect their dignity.

P.S. The site is not exclusively mine; a bunch of teaching assistants and lecturers have been making light relief of student answers all year. Thanks Luke and Leia for this frustration-outlet!

Close to my heart

Today is Blog Action Day. Bloggers taking action through their blogs, and this year the issue of global importance is climate change. An issue close to my sensibilities.

Climate change has become a lot more press-worthy than when I was in undergrad and was first introduced to me by then Dr Coleen Vogel. How fitting it is then, that last night I went to her Inaugural Lecture, now that she's a full professor at Wits and was inspired by a glimpse into her research into how people deal climate variability and her role in the IPCC as a broker between African scientists and government policy makers.

Coleen, an inspiring speaker, reminded her audience about the projected climate changes at a global scale, and a continental scale - what's in store for Africa - and then at a regional scale and what we can expect here on the sub-continent of Africa. Some scary stuff if you let it get to you. Some days it gets to me - especially when I consider not just the change in climate alone but all the knock-on effects that are, in some places on the planet, already evident. This is the stuff that I'm interested in finding out more about. About how our planet works and how humans are a part of that system. Leonie Joubert's book Scorched is a wonderful work explaining both the science of climate change and the impacts that are projected for southern Africa.

The press now is filled with ideas that when each person making more ethical choices about the food they eat and the products they use we can all make a difference to the emissions that started all of this in the first place. And there are many organisations that are mobilising individuals and families to make changes. Check out 350.org and Earth Hour's "Vote Earth" campaigns and get involved. These movements are needed to make the policy makers take note that communities care and are willing to make a difference and help. Find a great book, printed on sustainable paper, filled with tips of how to make little changes daily that will have global ripples. I was inspired by the ideas in Simon Gear's book:
Going Green: 365 Ways to Change Our World: 365 Ways to change our world because it's relevant to all South Africans, presented in a practical hopeful and amusing style.



This issue is close to my heart. Thanks Blog Action Day for an reason to make it public.

No wonder

From Over the Hedge : 2nd Sept 2009


The jump rope I bought a few months ago is lying in a bunch under my bed. I'm starting to believe it's the nature of jump ropes to make knots, with or without you in it.

I found myself daydreaming...

Maybe it's the extra time I have on my hands now that my crazy teaching load has lifted. Maybe it's the thought of a few days out of the city. Maybe it's just spring time and thus time to contemplate the meaning of life love phds and the universe.

Same day-dream. Different day. And always about driving the same spot of highway out of Joburg. Wishful thinking?

The Amazing Green Race - Public Lectures

The Wits chapter of Roots and Shoots, in alliance with our 'local' Biosoc and the Explorers club, are currently running a campaign to promote environmental awareness about making small lifestyle changes to make a global difference. They call this The Amazing Green Race. Something that I support - it's great to see good citizenship being driven by this energetic young committed bunch. Next week there are a series of public lectures here on campus as listed in the graphic below. What a good opportunity to learn more about our planetary home.



Save the ice-cream!

Somedays I'm the hippo

Scientists tell us that the Artic ice-caps are melting faster than ever and this means that "sea-level rise is worse than we thought". Read the full New Scientist article here. What would life be without the Florida pan-handle? And I bet the top of Table Mountain would make a lovely beach. *Vote now for it to be one of the New 7 wonders of nature*. That might be a bit extreme - I'm sure you get the point.

Last weekend when it was icy-cold in Joburg and as I was standing in the shower I got thinking about how the ice-caps are melting and yet some of the people that could do anything about it, were freezing. The warm steamy water served as a melting medium defrosting my extremities... and I just stood there.

We're often told that showers are more water and energy efficient. I guess this does not apply when you stand in the shower even an extra 3 minutes to defrost, de-stress or de-dirt. With a water crisis looming, my extra time in the shower did my Catholic guilt no favours. So I blog before you today saying: "Hi. My name is Terri and some days I'm the hippo".

If you're privileged, like me, to be able to watch the Discovery channel or Animal planet you may have seen their "Save their planet" campaign, specifically the spot advocating using only the water you need. Watch the clip on YouTube here. Yup yup yup. Some days I'm the hippo. Taking a long hot bath and using your dexterous chimp foot skills^ to keep topping up the water is the likely equivalent to the sauna-esque shower. We're blessed to have had those days. Use them wisely.

^ with apologies to the original author, who shall in the interest of protecting their life from an angry mob of thirsty animals, remain anonymous.

Removing scum

This is not an infomercial. Do not adjust your monitor.



Care of Comics.com.

I recognise this situation.

I wonder if my family, friends and students hold back when I start spouting off about biology.