Circling

History has a funny way of repeating itself in slightly different settings and contexts.

10 Minutes to Bingo

Obligatory fan photo.  Photo: Ashley

There's a new show on ABC called "Ocean Mysteries with Jeff Corwin" that explores various marine (or other underwater) environments which are sources of great unknown.  As I have mentioned several times before, UM has a very special underwater archaeological site about 3 and a half hours away from Miami called Little Salt Spring.  Thanks to the way and the time that the spring formed, it is home to countless bones and artifacts from the Paleoindian era some 11,000 years old.  Thanks to the anoxic conditions of the water, these clues to the past are left intact and preserved in astonishing quality.  Needless to say, the site fit the bill for Corwin's show and incredibly enough everything came together and he and his crew ventured south to North Port, FL for a day of filming.

I will not reveal very much in the interest of keeping the theme of the show.  Actually, I don't want to say much because I urge you all to tune in at 11am EST to ABC and see the 30minute segment yourselves.  The things I will expand upon are those things that you will not get from watching the final edit.

Me managing surface supply.  Photo: Mark

Jeff Corwin is good at what he does.  He is a television personality who is the star of his show, brings energy and excitement to anything, and makes science understandable for society.  He's reasonably down to earth but years of being in front of the camera seem to have had an effect.  He was genuinely interested in the site, the science, and the wildlife on the compound of Little Salt but largely disinterested in the little people like me.  It was difficult keeping him engaged in conversation so I stopped trying, even when I sat near him throughout all of lunch.  I never met Steve Irwin but after meeting the guy most commonly compared to him, I wish I would have had the opportunity.  After seeing so many shows and interviews of Irwin, I really do feel that his heart was really into everything, not just putting on a good television show and "paying for my wife's Lexus" as Jeff seemed to be.  Perhaps I'm being too critical and really I'm just disappointed that he had more to think about than showing any interest in the little people.  As I said above, he is very good at what he does and no one can take that from him.

Delayed Gratification

Sad times are these that I don't post for weeks.

I'm afraid during that lapse, significant detail has fallen through the cracks.  At any rate, I will do what I can to hit the important parts.

Marc inspects the inside a full face mask while Jesse prepares to dive.

A few weekends ago, I was at Little Salt Spring.  Nothing has changed there since the last time I saw it (and probably for about 10 years prior for that matter).  This time however I was the one driving the van, setting up equipment, helping teach, buying groceries, and being much more in charge than last semester when I was there as a student.  We managed to have loads of fun making up a plot for a horror film, looking for shark teeth, having bonfires, telling stories, playing Taboo, and hanging out together.  Like last semester, we spent an entire morning at the Florida Aquarium where the students who earned the top 6 scores on the midterm were allowed to dive in the aquarium.  It was much more exciting this time as there are now several new sand tiger sharks in the tank.  Everyone who had the opportunity to dive there had a blast and those of us watching them enjoyed the show.  We then traveled to Venice Beach where we spent a dive in search of ancient shark teeth and I managed to find 9 within 20 minutes, 9 more than I found during the entire trip last semester.

The rest of the trip was eventful and enjoyable but will be sadly scratched from the record in the interest of hitting other parts of my life.

I am helping to head up the Science Diving Club at the university, something that has been in the works for over a year but lacking the resources and time to be put together officially.  The time has finally come and I am on the forefront.  There has been more than just talk about turning the classroom portion of the class I help teach into an online course.  I have been the driving force behind it and there are many reasons we want to do it.  Our program has been referred to as a bottleneck since we can safely only have 12 students per semester.  The plan is to turn the lectures into online modules which would give us enough time to offer twice as many in-water training sessions (which is the limiting factor - student/instructor ratio) and thus work through twice as many students.  It has a long way to go but I feel very empowered to be the one pushing the envelope for creative and resourceful ways to expand the program.

I was talking to a friend of mine recently and over the course of a long conversation was able to lay out very clearly an important observation which I will simplify for you all here.  I am exactly where I need to be.  I wake up every morning excited to go to work and it would take a lot to get me to give that away.  I feel important, useful, appreciated, and happy and I couldn't ask for more.  Praise God.

I'm going to Little Salt Spring tonight with the diving class and we will be there until Sunday.  Once we return I will be able to post about it.  Perhaps it won't be as exciting as last time but I expect it to be equally as fun even though this time I'm doing it for work rather than for credit.  Pictures and stories to come next week.  Until then, enjoy the changing seasons everyone!

Real World

As of today I am officially a full-time employee of the University of Miami!

Thoughts and Plans

Being certified to dive with helium, teaching the college science diving course, getting trained to go cave diving, learning to dive on a rebreather, taking and then teaching the boating course, and diving in various locations around Florida and the Caribbean are all things that are potentially in my future.  All of these things have been presented to me as plans, not mere possibilities.  The prospect of these opportunities is what is keeping me very securely hooked into this position.  As I mentioned in a very recent post, I need regular stimulation in order to keep me satisfied.  If there was no promise of great excitement and benefit, I would be thinking about sending my resume out to distant corners of the earth and hopping on another plane.  I look back on my year of scuba instructing with a particular longing.  However, even if I went to do the same thing tomorrow, it wouldn't be the same.  I'm a different person now with different skills, experiences, and wisdom that I did not have last time.  It would lack a distinct thrill that it presented the first time around.
This topic is relevant because I was reminded today about a friend of mine who graduated this past spring from UM and landed a job on a liveaboard in Palau.  It is a country that has been on my list for 2 years but was too much of a risk to fly to without the promise of a job.  The internal monologue is simply the result of me reasoning with myself that it would be foolish to try repeating it.  Frankly there are some days that I really do wish I could be on a remote island with locals, fresh fish, and no worries in the world.  It usually happens when I'm sitting in rush hour traffic taking 40 minutes to drive the 10 minutes to get to my house from either campus.

Good ol' Sunshine State

Speaking of driving, I got my license plate changed today so now I'm pretty much a real Floridian.  I tried to get the plate that said Save Our Seas and had a shark on it but it turns out those cost about 80 bucks and then another 25/year to have.  No thank you.

On the job front, I'm very nearly official.  I'll keep the blog updated on my employment status which SHOULD change sometime around Monday.  Stay tuned!

Photo: http://www.15q.net/fl.html

Floridian Life

There it is!  It's official!

Allow me to start out by announcing I am now officially a licensed Florida resident.  On the right is the proof.  In Florida, getting a driver's license is the only step required to becoming a permanent resident.  Fancy that!  Not only is all of that taken care of, but I registered to vote, bought some work clothes, had lunch, and renewed my causeway toll card all before noon.  I then took the liberty of going to get a haircut (my license picture makes it pretty apparent that I needed one).

Diving the Sapona Wreck from Steve's Boat

Enough about Florida though.  This past weekend (Sunday and Monday) I went to my 25th country: the Bahamas!  I'm one up on my goal of seeing as many countries as my age.  ...one up for the time being.  The experience was fantastic, going over with the diving class on one of the students' 50' boat and staying at his vacation house.  What a treat!  The only semi-downer of the entire experience is that the weather was constant sorrow the entire trip from the moment I woke up in Miami until the moment I finally walked back through the door back at home in Miami.  That being said, the Bahamas had it a little easier than Miami did in terms of Monday morning's rain.  The bottom line though is that we left RSMAS with 13 people and returned back with the same amount the next evening and had a fantastic experience.  Big shout out to Steve, Rick, and UM Risk Management for allowing this trip to happen!

Moving farther backward in time, Saturday was my first shark trip in 6 months!  Due to some complications and scheduling issues with our normal boat agency down in Islamorada, we are now going out of Key Largo which is only an hour away as opposed to two so I can leave at 6:30 instead of 5:30.  I love it.  Anyway, needless to say we went to a new site and while there, we caught a shocking 7 Nurse sharks and 2 Caribbean Reef sharks as well as one Goliath Grouper.  Although I was rusty and made a few mistakes, it was great to be out on the water again with the team.

Getting Antsy

It was a good guess, but the title has nothing to do with my job.  It instead refers to ants.  Not aunts.  Ants.  I have ants where there should be no ants.  If you guessed my pants, you were hoping for a good rhyme (and there's no shame in that of course, we all like good rhymes at the right times) but if you guessed my bed, then you're a winner.  I usually don't have much of a problem with ants when they're not eating my food and when they're not crawling on me.  They mind their own business and I mind mine.  There have been quite a few in my room over the past couple weeks and I squash them now and again but generally don't pay them much attention.  It's weird because I have food sealed up in my closet but they're not there.  Instead, they like to hang around my desk where there is never any food.  However when I came home tonight and found a half dozen ants in my bed, I turned into Donkey Kong from Super Smash Brothers and started swatting and squashing them.  There is something fundamentally sacred about a bed that cannot be violated by any creature whether they understand it or not.  A bed is like a temple, a safe place of reverence and peace where nothing and no one can harm you.  Beds are where we seek refuge from the boogie monster as a child, school as a kid, and dementia as a college student.  No matter which way you slice it, beds are no places for ants.  Period.

 In other news:
I managed to have a parking ticket nullified by talking to the parking and transportation office.
I will get my first paycheck tomorrow... as a temporary employee that is.
My first shark trip in 6 months is coming up on Saturday.
There's a CHANCE that I could be spending Sunday and Monday in the Bahamas.
I've now taught sailing twice with the sailing team at UM and it will hopefully open up more sailing opportunities.
Tomorrow after work I will be going to dinner and a movie with some friends then will immediately go home to watch the World Cup match between the US and Australia.  I reckon our odds are about 1 in a hundred at best but I'll cheer them on the whole way!

Top 10 Rugby Commentating Quotes

From last night's game against Russia, I liked the commentating so much that I started writing down all the funny quotes I heard.  Try to imagine all of these in a Kiwi accent.

10.
-...American defense looking 'slick willy.'

9. (regarding a punt from the American team)
-Fairly dusty looking effort. 
-Looked like a lame duck, didn't it?

8. (in reference to the Russian team)
-That's coming from a country that's known for tackling abrasively.
-Did we see that?  Yes we did.

7. (about an American player who had finished getting bandaged up for a small cut above his eye)
-Now they've strapped his head back together. 

6.
-...and go ahead and hit every Russian like his name's Nick.

5. (with respect to a fight)
-He's got an angry face on, hasn't he?
-Yeah, that's because he hasn't done anything.

4.
-He should be arrested for that haircut.

3.
-He got slapped!  That's why he went all agro.
-Who does that anymore?
-Well I hear women do.

2. (talking about a couple buff American fans)
-Which one's the girl?
-I don't know but one of them is on sterroids.
-They both might be, mate.

1. (from the referee to an American player after a rough play that didn't quite merit a penalty)
-You'll be picking up my laundry tab after this.


Overall, it was a phenomenal game and the US fought their way to a 13-6 victory over the Russians.
I'll post about my job later but for now, enjoy the commentating and the glorious win because it is predicted that it will be our only one of the tournament.

Stimulus Plan

I have determined that one of the ways for me to be happy is to be constantly stimulated.  Much like an 8 year old boy, I can't sit and do the same monotonous thing over and over.  This is one of the reasons I would not last a single month in an office job.  I need change, expansion, development, action, improvement, and constant stimulation.  This explains why automatic cars are so boring to me, why I like to move, why I decide to randomly pick up new hobbies like rock climbing and playing the ukulele, and it helps explain the way I run my life.

I bring this up not due to what the new job is but what it has the potential to be.  UM has one of the top diving programs in the country already, but we don't want to just stop there.  In a conversation I had with my supervisor tonight, we have the potential to earn the respect of THE premier university diving institution in the country.

I am totally amped up about all the possibilities that there are such as the science diving club, the advanced techniques in research diving course, and the eventual masters degree involving diving and field technician training.

If I end up staying in Miami for more than 4 years, it will be specifically for this diving program.  If it continues to grow, it's pretty much the only thing I can see that might keep me here in Miami and for good reason.

It's well past my bedtime but I'll keep updated about any new developments.  Stay tuned for greatness!