Lunar eclipse

We stayed up last night to watch this beauty. Copper moon. It was so cool. Image from the Honolulu Advertiser.

TBBB and lots of other things

Lots of exciting adventures have occurred since Flossie failed to come for dinner. Meg ended her wonderful visit, and it was so AWESOME having her here. I hope she will send along some of the pictures of her time here since we still don't have a camera.

And then, last weekend was the Tweedle Beetle Beach Battle (TBBB). I was co-director of the tournament, which essentially means that I had to make sure the keg arrived on time. K and I also made mixed cds for the event; if anyone wants one, let me know as there are leftovers...

Here are some pics from the tourney. The beach where we play is right next to a military base, and they were having "maneuvers" that weekend, so Kim awoke to a lovely scene of 20 National Guardsmen/women in uniform above her hammock. Classic.



Gaffers always looks miserable at the beach. Especially while I am eating hot dogs..



We played afternoon ultimate, but everyone got tired, so it regressed into Double Disc Court (DDC) to allow people to practice for the Hawaii State Overalls this weekend:



The players:



Enjoy the pictures. I am off to work, where I have to cram in a day and a half's worth of time into one half day. I started teaching this week at Leeward Community college (Anat & Physio), so I am now working two jobs (and likely getting paid less in the process...oh silly me.) The good news is that K and I are going sailing this afternoon with one of his students he met this summer at a workshop. I'm really looking foward to being out on the water at sunset. I am going to try to take pictures with our broken camera and hope for the best....

Pathetic

WORST. HURRICANE. EVER.



And, to top it off, the tsunami warning from the earthquake in Peru has been canceled.

The "weather" here. Pathetic. Absolutely abysmal.

updated weather

it's getting windy!!!


FYI: The hurricane is hitting the Big Island currently and they're expecting 10" of rain, 50mph winds, and 30' waves. Oahu (where we live, 2nd of the larger islands from the top) is not supposed to get more than 3" of rain, >15-30mph wind gusts, and 6-8' waves.

Just in case you were worried...

Look who's coming for dinner!

Flossie Friday?

Hurricane Flossie is fast-approaching the islands of Hawaii. It probably will end up going south of us, but it is exciting to think that we may actually get some weather around here.

Meg is coming this weekend and we are planning to go to Ka'ena point Saturday night to watch the Perseids meteor shower. Gaffney is very pumped to see her friend, Meg, who is the only person ever to send the poor thing any mail.

Last Sunday, K and I finally ventured to the Maunawili trail and then to Lani Kai beach. It was a wonderful afternoon, especially since K and I discovered wild mountain apples were ripe and ready for picking. Here is a picture of a mountain apple:




Mountain apples have a texture a lot like pears, and taste sort of rose-watery; it's a nice, light flavor, perfect for a summer treat. "Picking" the apples involves shaking the tree and trying to catch the fragile little pears before they hit the ground and explode into a million pieces. So, you can imagine my excitement, when K grabbed a tree full of very ripe fruit, shook it vigorously and then, and then, got COVERED with fermented fruit shards. The best part? He actually caught one despite the deluge. Too funny.

And finally, happy 28th birthday to my lil' sister KK. Party hard, KK!!

RIP LaCretia

Yesterday, Kyle discovered our pet gold algae eater, LaCretia (similar fish shown, our camera has been broken since March), at the bottom of our fish tank sucking on what appeared to be not algae at all, rather one of our larger snails. That was certainly surprising.

"Oh", he says, "LaCretia is not eating the snail; the snail is eating LaCretia. She's dead."

And so ends the tragic life of our little one, leaving us with a mere 13 fish, forever destined to the same fate as our little algae imbiber. LaCretia was a good fish, although I did find her skills of late to be dropping considerably. But she lived probably a good 2.5 years or so (I have had her only a year; I inherited the fish from a friend leaving the island).

Which begs the question: do I get a new algae eater if I, myself, plan on leaving?

and, inevitably,

Should I really be keeping fish in an aquarium anyway?

I like my fish. I like coming home from work and watching them dance around in the water, with ol' Blacky, the shark, chasing the striped ones whom we haven't bothered naming. I like taking care of something too, which I'm sure is some kind of deep mothering affectation I can't completely satisfy by having a dog or a boyfriend. The fish just seem to be there for me, which is why the loss of one is not entirely ignorable (although, admittedly, the small tetris disappeared a long time ago, and I have no recollection of when it died or got devoured at all...)

In any case, I am sad to see the little one go. This loss comes at the end of a summer of many changes: friends leaving the island, my grandfather's passing and subsequent cleaning of his entire house full of memories, and the end of me playing around as a student, and starting a job as a teacher. The inevitable progression of life. I guess I will have to embrace it; I'll go to the pet store tonight and pick out a new algae eater. I hope it will live up to the legacy that was LaCretia.

And now the future...

There is an interesting comment string on the Scientist online today. Does tenure need to change? The overwhelming majority of those writing in seems to be against the tenure process as it is today. Too much emphasis on publications and grant money, and not enough emphasis on innovation and student support. It looks like a lot of bitter postdocs are waiting in line for jobs. Ah, I should get out now while I still have my sanity.

Tuesday update: The link above should work now!

Lost days of my youth, and such and such

Life goes by in a blink of an eye. I realized today I had not updated the blog in quite some time, and my only excuse is that I have been busy building sandcastles.*



Just kidding, I have never and probably will never build anything this cool in my life (although my knitting is coming along well, I don't think building scarves and hats count; btw, Lisa, I loved the "neurotrans-knitters" group. too funny). If you would like to look at more awesome sand art, check out this website. I have seen sand art like this only one time in my life, in Siesta Key near Sarasota, FL, during one of the AChemS meetings. A nine year old girl was the artist. Some people have all the skills...

I hope to get some sandcastle builiding in this weekend while camping with the Sally crew at Waimanalo beach. That is, of course, if I get all my real work done!

* Technically I have actually been writing a grant, rewriting a manuscript, preparing a frisbee tournament for August 18, preparing to teach Anatomy and Physiology this fall, preparing for a workshop in Durham in September, taking care of the dog since I'm by myself since K is on the east coast partying with Bart and teaching workshops, and last but not least, preparing to leave for the east coast this Thursday to go to two weddings, visit with my family, clean my grandfather's house, and maybe sit by the pool one day and enjoy the upstate New York summer. This has been the busiest summer I can remember, and I don't think it will let up until Christmas. C'est la vie!,

with love, Caro-whine

The Line abides

Episode 56 is a big disappointment

So far, Episode 56 is about as exciting as Star Wars Episode 2 (ZING!). After the initial new crack formed, little lava came to the surface. The earthquakes stopped, and the flow into the ocean that has gone on steadily for years, also stopped. Apparently, the lava is being rerouted, but no one knows where. Could it be that we won't have to hike 3 miles the next time we go to see it? Oh wait, I forgot, Kyle and I only walked one mile and then collapsed (Brian, Dacks, Penny, and Carolina went further, but they too, turned around. Hiking 9 miles with packs in the same day probably did not help...)

Here is the update. I hope this isn't the end of the volcano as we know it. That would make me sad. How sad? As sad as this girl:

Episode 56

The volcano gods are smiling. A new crack in the Kilauea crater formed this morning resulting in a new lava outflow. The geologists thought something big may happen after a series of hundreds of mini earthquakes hit on Sunday.

See info here and here.

This is the first time there has been a change in the lava flow since K and I have lived in Hawaii. We may have to plan another hiking trip to the Big Island, although I expect Halape Beach, where we stayed last time, is going to be a prime tsunami target after any major changes. Here's Halape after the October 6.7 earthquake.
You can see the plume of brown water from the rock slides:



Can't wait to see what the gods have in store for us next!

Happy King Kamehameha Day!

Today is a state holiday in Hawaii, which means no work! Yeah! King Kamehameha (Kah-may-ha-may-ha) established the united Hawaiian islands in 1810 by brute force and, oh yeah, guns. If you ever visit Oahu, you will visit the Pali lookout where Kamehameha's troops forced thousands of the other guy's men over a three hundred foot cliff to their deaths (when the Pali highway was built in the early 1900's, the engineers discovered several of the skulls). Once, he was reported to carry a 1000 lb. rock between villages without dropping it. What a guy.

To celebrate the day, I am going to work at home. Part of working at home is procrastinating, so I decided to post some pictures of some of our latest adventures.

First, I reported a couple weeks ago that I was going to ride around the whole island on the back of a motorcycle. It was amazing, and now I want to own one.

Here is my driver, Megan, and I cruising around Makapuhu:


And here is the hang glider who flew above us (can the sky get any bluer than this?):



It was Kim's first time driving around the entire island. She was nervous, but she finished in record time!



And Andjrez and Brandee completed the biker gang:



And then last Friday, we went to the top of Kokohead to watch the almost full moon rise. It was a beautiful hike, although a bunch of us got cold in the 75d winds. Pathetic, I know.

Here are Kim, Kim, Kyle, and I overlooking Hanuma Bay:


Enjoy your King Kamaehameha Day, wherever you are!

Slight update...

Hi y'all. Things have been busy here. K just finished teaching / running experiments and I am in the tangles of collecting the last data for a paper. In the meantime, we have been checking out the best bread puddings the island has to offer (thanks Honolulu weekly's article) . So far we have tried "European with a twist" and "The best of both worlds". The Grand Cafe and Bakery (B of BW), by the way, has an excellent outdoor patio where we also enjoyed smoked salmon and regular eggs benedict, the best corned beef hash since Ghini's in Tucson, and apple banana french toast with vanilla gellato. I am drooling just thinking about it now.

What else, oh yeah, I am seriously considering buying everyone this for Christmas. After all, who wouldn't want a deed to a piece of an island that may or may not break the surface of the ocean in the next 10,000 years?!? (Mahalo, Meg, for this article!)

Well, I am off to go collect slipper lobsters today. And by collect, I mean I need to go meet a guy from NOAA who will present one to me in a wet cardboard box. What fun!

Who needs men? Not sharks!

Hawaiian waters are full of hammerhead sharks. One of the guys we play frisbee with even studies their electromagnetic sensing capabilities. And now, researchers have discovered that female hammerheads can reproduce asexually through parthenogenesis.

The last line of the article reads:
“I would be concerned about a lot of other things than whether or not a female shark can get a date for an evening."

It makes me giggle to think about sharks looking for dates.

Attack of the killer jellies!

Eight to ten days after the full moon, box jellyfish descend upon Oahu's beaches, threatening Hanauma Bay and Waikiki tourists with their stinging nematocysts. One species, the sea wasp (Chironex fleckeri), is:

"claimed to be the most venomous marine animal known," according to the Australian Institute of Marine Science. They state that it causes excruciating pain to humans, often followed by death, sometimes within two or three minutes, and that the chance of survival if stung while swimming alone is "virtually zero."

The body of Chironex is the size of a basketball.

Luckily, here in Hawaii, we have the Carybdea alata and Carybdea rastonii species. They're not so big (less than 6") and not so bad (only cause anaphylactic shock in the lucky individuals allergic to their venom) as their relatives in Australia. One of the ladies in my department, Angel Yanagihara studies their venom and goes on regular collection trips in the middle of the special "8th night".



I would also like to comment about the figure the author of the Wikipedia article chose for the box jellyfish. It is a drawing by Ernst Haeckel, my new favorite scientific rebel who apparently made up some data to support his pet hypotheses. A case of artistic license, maybe? Some of his famous "fakes" were included in the embryo drawings, shown here in Romanes's 1892 version where the background has been changed to white from black:



He later admited that 6-8% of the images may have been "falsified" (translated).

Tomorrow, we plan on going to the North shore to snorkel Shark's Cove. The jellyfish are not so prevalent up there, so we should be fine. I am more worried about riding up there on the back of Megan's motorcycle. An hour and a half on a cruiser. I can't wait...

The quaking ground

Friday fun facts!!!, by Caroline

The Big Island has had three earthquakes this week, two at 3.5, and today's at 2.1. No tsunamis have formed, but I have a feeling a bigger earthquake may be coming soon. The Hawaii Electric Company (HECO) has replaced their ill-fated mercury containing switches, with new ones so our electricity should fortunately not magically disappear during the next earthquake. Note to engineers: do not place a movable liquid in a switch when the liquid may move from the shaking of the ground.

And did you know, "The brain is the only organ that hates crime"? I love Achewood.

The end of an era...

The Maui Land & Pineapple company, the last exporter of canned Hawaiian pineapple, is ending its operations on June 30. This marks the end of 100 years of canned pineapple exports from the state of Hawaii. The loss of the cannery is, "is a victim of cheaper overseas producers" like Costa Rica, Mexico, and Ecuador. Moreover, it marks the decidely necessary, but disappointingly bitter shift from Hawaii's agriculutural heritage to one of land developers and tourist dollars. Aloha, canned pineapples!

Don't worry, though, Hawaii still exports fresh pineapples! For now, anyways.

Read more at the Honolulu Adverstiser.

p.s. Did you know pineapples grew on the ground in these crazy agave-like configurations? I always thought they grew on trees until I moved here!

UFOs in Hawaii?!?

A Katysux original....

p.s. I don't really believe this is a UFO. This is actually a picture I found on the internet. In the "Where's Waldo?" tradition, I have hidden the words, "Katy sux" somewhere in the picture. Can you find it, Katy?

Now presenting....

Creatures of the deep....



The science journal, Marine Biotechnology picked my image of a Labiodocera sp. copepod for its cover for next month! Last June, a colleague here at U. of Hawaii, Gabor Macz asked my boss, Petra, if any of the local copepods expressed green fluorescent protein (GFP). Petra, who was in Maine at the time, asked me to take a look. We discovered that the local species, like some of the other Labidocera, likely contain (a previously undescribed!) GFP in the female sex organs.

Here is the caption for the image:

Confocal microscopic image of the Pacific copepod Labidocera muridae with green fluorescent protein-like fluorescence. Colorful fluorescent proteins (FPs) occur in hydrozoan, anthozoan, and copepodan species, and are the source of exciting research opportunities and technological development. Copepodan FPs are among the brightest FPs in general which lends special value to this class of proteins. FPs have been used to address questions relevant to evolutionary and developmental biology and aquaculture. Photograph by Dr. Caroline Wilson, University of Hawaii, 2006. See the article by Mocz, pp. 000-000.

Isn't science fun?

Beer, earthworms, and lots of shrimp...

For the first time since I have lived in Hawaii, I feel like I am home. It happened this weekend when I was down at Kapiolani Park hanging out with a bunch of friends at a pre-Kokua fest party, when I looked up at Diamondhead and realized that it was my backyard. I live here, and I like it here. And I think I get to stay at least one more year, so I better take advantage of all that Hawaii has to offer.

The feeling was accented by a weekend of parties, starting with a Thursday surprise party for my friend, Kim, at the Ice Palace. Kim used to be a semi-pro figure skater, so it was only fitting to take her to the only ice rink in Hawaii for her 30th birthday. Then, on Friday night, the Sally's camped at Bellows beach, easily the most beautiful stretch of beach on the island. Saturday was the Kokua festival (I got to hear Jack Johnson and Eddie Vedder do a duet, but didn't actually see them since I didn't go into the show. One just needs to set up camp behind the Waikiki shell to hear the bands. Incidentally, this is where Kyle and I "watched" Hootie and the Blowfish play last spring.) Finally, Jake is in town, so we went on what is easily the most beautiful hike on Oahu yesterday, the Maunawili falls trail. People go to the falls and jump off; we saw about 4 guys do it; one came out with a bloody lip from the impact. It was pretty sweet.



Tomorrow begins a new experiment and my list of experimental necessities includes beer, earthworms, and different kinds of shrimp. The beer is for the boat driver, and the animals will hopefully be my control group. If all goes well with this experiment, my boss wants to send a paper to Nature. Hah! We shall see, we shall see!!!! Experiments never work that well, do they?