Where's Polaris?: the beat goes on

It's been a busy few weeks...

after break there was a blizzard of homework and stress. imagine me curled up in a sleeping bag, outside, being pelted with sleet and hail. That's basically what it felt like with the possible exception of when we gathered geo people and watched 2012 with beer on Monday night.

the following weekend Simon and I cast all thoughts of academics and crooked social interactions aside and returned to Waimate for a weekend with the White family. Between the familiarity of the home, the quaint farmers' market, Rob's fascination with everything biology and geology, and their love for gourmet food (they're not wealthy, they just cook everything from scratch and only eat good food), this weekend was EXACTLY what I needed. For those couple of days there was nowhere in the world I would rather have been.

the next week was easier to deal with... we still had to finish both a micropalentology project and a field mapping report, but for whatever reason it was easier to just shoulder through.

last weekend we went on a field trip to Arthur's Pass with our Fossils, Strata, and Hydrocarbon Basins class. thankfully, this trip is just graded based on our field notebooks rather than a big project and evening lectures after daytime field work. We got to look at glacial geomorphology (nothing like Mt. Cook or the Dart Valley, but "big geology" nonetheless, meaning it's easier to visualize and touch and is therefore more fun) in addition to some not-as-exciting sedimentary sequences. Other perks of the trip: walking up an underground stream (yeah caves!) and getting destroyed in a Kiwis vs. American's boat race at the pub.

chacos: they're dead. once I figure my camera out I'll put some new pictures up.

whole different kettle of fish: my new favourite Kiwi phrase (use in place of "whole different ballgame")

munted: messed up/damaged

socks and jandals vs sneans: it is socially acceptable to wear flip-flops (called jandals here) with socks, but wearing sneakers and jeans is fashion suicide.

Here are a few old pictures from tramping with Chad over break!

Dart Valley