The Good, The Bad, and The Ugly

well, i got one happy surprise today and one that sucked big ass. the happy one was that i got my computer back about 4-5 days before i expected it, repaired and as good as new. the bad news, as i'm sure many of you know, is that hurricane katrina looks like it will be showing up in our area on monday. i cannot believe that we have to worry about something like this again. this morning when i left to go collecting with lindsey i wasn't worried about katrina. it looked like it would hit well to our east, and it didn't really concern me. this afternoon when i returned all muddy and bug-bitten, i was aghast to learn that the forecast track had shifted dramatically to the west. as of right now, pascagoula, mississippi looks to be the center point of the forecast cone. bad news for me. since the path has been steadily shifting westward, perhaps katrina will decide to bypass this area altogether and go bother some texans (sorry, texas residents). we can only hope, right?

now, the ugly part of this post comes from my day spent in the field with lindsey and joel. they are grad students in herpetology, so they really focus on tortoises, snakes, lizards, toads, salamanders, and critters of that nature. however, they do a lot of collecting in freshwater systems as well as terrestrial ones. for our freshwater ecology class, lindsey and i have to put together a collection of 80 different aquatic species. since she and joel go out collecting every monday and friday, she invited me to tag along so we could gather critters for our ecology class collections. the day was fine until we visited an ephemeral pond and were attacked by leeches. they didn't attach themselves to us or anything, but it was still pretty freaky. also, this huge unidentified bug decided that my forehead looked tasty and bit me, so i have this big, tender lump above my left eyebrow. despite the bad aspects of the day, i still had fun. catching things and watching them die in a vial of ethanol always gives me a little thrill.