What I'm Considering as an Xmas Gift to myself...

...to replace my aging Canon A650 IS camera:

A650 IS specs at Canon

G12 specs at Canon

D10 specs at Canon

ABCDeals refurbished A650 $450

Refurbished A650 "from China" $290

A650 at Amazon, varied prices

G12 at Amazon $430

I really like my A650 IS, I have had it cleaned or fixed once (dust or spots internally on the lens or mirror, a glitch that somehow develops during airline flights). It's a great camera that has already survived one E18 or "Lens error, restart camera" event, which I fixed by carefully whacking the camera, as per the percussion advice on some forum (maybe this one; other options were send in for repair or take the camera apart and mess around). I'm now facing a growing spot of no pixels on the vari-angle LCD screen (vari-angle is a higher requirement for me than AA batts). I'm sure Canon can fix this, but I don't know at what cost (yet). In the meantime, before I send my camera off, I'll need another camera (though I could pull out my old A620, like I did in the spring of 2010 when I last had the A650 in for repair). eBay currently has A650's that generally sound no better than the one I already have.

A note: Xmas always comes early when I buy something like this for myself.

UPDATE 20Nov2011: Nikon Coolpix P7100 review

UPDATE 28Jan2012: Just ordered a Canon G12. This option retains the vari-angle LCD screen, adds slight weight and height, aperture drops from max 4.8 to 4.5, total zoom drops from about 210 mm to 140 mm, wide angle increases from about 35 mm to 28mm, megapixels drop from 12 to 10, have to use Canon battery packs, gain High Dynamic Range shooting.

Various Identities

Get Your Cyborg Name

Get Your Cyborg Name

Get Your Cyborg Name

Get Your Cyborg Name

Notice the keywords of "exploration" and "observation."

Interview Me Meme

An interview-me meme has been going around - here and there in the science blogosphere - and I contracted the meme from Phizzle Dizzle. She has asked me five questions, as per meme rules listed way below, and I've attempted to answer them. Since the questions are about me, hopefully my answer attempts will make some sense! PD has apparently listed the questions in order of importance. ;)

1. Which is your favorite Ender book? Who is your favorite protagonist, Ender or Bean? Is that two questions?

My all time favorite Ender book is the original trilogy - which actually turned out to be four books, unless you buy a combined edition the way I did so I could get around this favorite book question. For those not in the know, the Ender series of books, and related Shadow series, were written by science-fiction author Orson Scott Card, who has an official website. Having now visited his website, I see he has a new book out, which I will forthwith have to order. So excuse me while I do some online business...

Seriously, my favorite book is probably Speaker for the Dead, with Ender's Game being a close second. My favorite character, as you might be able to tell by my choice of books, would be hands-down Ender (Andrew Wiggin), who is the Speaker for the Dead. Bean's okay, too!

If you like these books, you should read all of his others! Also read The Dispossessed by Ursula K. LeGuin, which is in the 1001 Books You Must Read Before You Die. I also recommend many C.J. Cherryh books, including the Chanur series and the Cyteen series, the latter of which was originally issued as three books - and now there's a new book in that series, also. I have some reading to do!

2) How did you get into geology?

There are a couple different answers to this question, the first and easiest of which is that my dad is a geologist. Because of his choice of fields, I spent a lot of time stopping at road cuts while young, I knew which way north was at a very early age, and I had started a rock and mineral collection before I was five, which I maintained for a very long time (I may still have some of those original rocks and minerals somewhere, or maybe my parents still have some of them.)

I didn't, however, plan on being a geologist, although I did take Earth Science in high school, and already knew a number of things including the geologic time chart. I went to college, having known for a long time that I would go to college, and started out with a major in history, of all things. During my first quarter, I took one history class - a very boring one, it turned out - and Intro to Geology, which was for majors and non-majors. By the end of the quarter, by December, I had switched my major to Geology. I didn't start in geology partly out of fear of Chemistry. I was good in math, had no qualms about Physics, but had an inordinate fear of Chemistry! I did fail one quarter, but that was a bad quarter all around. Those things pass.

I didn't know where I was going with my Geology degree while I was getting it; I just knew that I loved geology. It took a kind of bad personal moment (or series of moments, months) to crystallize my future as being one of going on to get an M.S., with a focus on Economic Geology. I have occasionally thought about getting a Ph.D. in geology, and have had a couple opportunities, but ultimately I haven't wanted to spend that much time back in classes or on a university campus. A Ph.D wouldn't in and of itself benefit my career, though what I could learn - probably structural geology in more detail - could benefit me greatly. I once knew who I would do a dissertation with if I took the time, but no longer know of any particular professors with whom I'd want to work. I guess if I was going to do that, I'd have to do a bit of research!

3) Do you think it would be feasible to colonize Mars in the next 2 centuries or so?

I think that we could probably colonize either the moon or Mars anytime we decide we want to, and I firmly believe that if we haven't colonized Mars in two whole centuries, that it would mean we just didn't want to or didn't try. I also think it would be a mistake not to explore and colonize planets in our near future. I think we are behind schedule on these things. I had planned on being a space explorer when I was growing up, and instead, I explore the earth.

4) What's your perfect Sunday like?

What is a Sunday? Oh, sorry, it's like I said in the comments earlier. When I'm working a ten-and-four schedule, a Sunday off is a just a day during which I can't go to town and get any business done (banks, doctors... ). It's also not necessarily a day that MOH and I have off together, especially with his current schedule. When I'm working a longer schedule, like twenty-and-ten or 28-and-14, Sunday is often a day that will either be a partial day, so people can do laundry, or it will be a shorter day so people can sleep in a little. At one place I worked in the field, everyone would meet at a cafe for breakfast, sometimes at the same time that work usually started, and sometimes at a later time so people could sleep in. Those sorts of thing - like breakfast get-togethers - foster camaraderie.

Sunday is nice, nonetheless, because I don't feel pressured by things-to-do when on days off, at least not as much as on weekdays. When we had a TV connected, I enjoyed getting up and watching CBS Sunday Morning. When I'm working, Sunday's are often a bit slower or calmer - I think because people are just generally in a more relaxed mood, and also because sometimes contract or technical work will slow down or stop on weekends.

5) What is your best comfort food?

My favorite comfort food has long been ice cream. The flavor will vary some from time to time, but has mostly centered around coffee, mint or peppermint (like B&J's mint chocolate cookie), lime sherbet, and chocolate-chip-cookie-dough when it came out a while back. Any flavor with caramel or chocolate will also do! Almost any other ice cream flavor will do in a pinch. My all-time favorite flavor was a Baskin-Robbins flavor called Mandarin Chocolate, which hasn't been around for a decade or two. It can be approximated by putting rich chocolate syrup on orange sherbet.

Now for the meme part! Do you want to be interviewed?

Here are the rules:
1. Leave me a comment saying, "Interview me" AND leave your email address (or blog link) in the comment!
2. I will respond by emailing you (or commenting on your blog) with five questions. I get to pick the questions. [It has recently become standard in this meme to limit the number of interviews I will have to do to the first three respondents.]
3. You will update your blog with the answers to the questions. (If you don't have a blog, I can post your answers here.)
4. You will include this explanation and an offer to interview someone else in the same post.
5. When others comment asking to be interviewed, you will ask them five questions. [Again, the limit will be three interviewees according to new memish practice.]

100 Things Meme - Geology Style

Geotripper started this geological 100 things meme - anyone, including non-geologists can play - and check out Highly Allochthonous for the current score. Bold the ones you've done and add any notes, and put drop your link here.

1. See an erupting volcano [Pu'u O'o in Hawaii, 1987]
2. See a glacier [several, several times, in Alaska]
3. See an active geyser such as those in Yellowstone, New Zealand or the type locality of Iceland [Yellowstone]
4. Visit the Cretaceous/Tertiary (KT) Boundary. Possible locations include Gubbio, Italy, Stevns Klint, Denmark, the Red Deer River Valley near Drumheller, Alberta.
5. Observe (from a safe distance) a river whose discharge is above bankful stage [a small wash or creek near Reno, Nevada, in flash flood]
6. Explore a limestone cave. Try Carlsbad Caverns in New Mexico, Lehman Caves in Great Basin National Park, or the caves of Kentucky or TAG (Tennessee, Alabama, and Georgia) [I've mostly seen caves on tours - Lehman, Nevada, Carlsbad, N.M., and Luray in Virginia - I've also been in a cave now under water in the New Melones Dam area, California]
7. Tour an open pit mine, such as those in Butte, Montana, Bingham Canyon, Utah, Summitville, Colorado, Globe or Morenci, Arizona, or Chuquicamata, Chile. [Several, including many of the big Carlin Trend mines in Nevada, Pinson, Nevada, a copper mine in Arizona, and the Mesquite and Picacho mines in California]
8. Explore a subsurface mine. [A couple active U.G. mines, including the Gooseberry mine in Nevada, and I've mapped several old, inactive mines]
9. See an ophiolite, such as the ophiolite complex in Oman or the Troodos complex on the Island Cyprus (if on a budget, try the Coast Ranges or Klamath Mountains of California). [California]
10. An anorthosite complex, such as those in Labrador, the Adirondacks, and Niger (there's some anorthosite in southern California too).
11. A slot canyon. Many of these amazing canyons are less than 3 feet wide and over 100 feet deep. They reside on the Colorado Plateau. Among the best are Antelope Canyon, Brimstone Canyon, Spooky Gulch and the Round Valley Draw.
12. Varves, whether you see the type section in Sweden or examples elsewhere. [Pyramid Lake, Nevada and Summer Lake, Oregon - I think some of the Pleistocene lake deposits qualify as varves.]
13. An exfoliation dome, such as those in the Sierra Nevada. [Half Dome, others]
14. A layered igneous intrusion, such as the Stillwater complex in Montana or the Skaergaard Complex in Eastern Greenland. [only in labs]
15. Coastlines along the leading and trailing edge of a tectonic plate (check out The Dynamic Earth - The Story of Plate Tectonics - an excellent website). [the west coast of North America, especially Oregon and northern California, also Alaska; the east coast of the U.S., especially Virginia and Maine]
16. A ginkgo tree, which is the lone survivor of an ancient group of softwoods that covered much of the Northern Hemisphere in the Mesozoic.
17. Living and fossilized stromatolites (Glacier National Park is a great place to see fossil stromatolites, while Shark Bay in Australia is the place to see living ones). [fossilized ones, only]
18. A field of glacial erratics. [British Columbia]
19. A caldera [Crater Lake, Long Valley, Yellowstone, many old ones]
20. A sand dune more than 200 feet high [Sand Mountain, Nevada, Imperial Sand Dunes, southern California]
21. A fjord. [Turnagain Arm and Knick Arm, Alaska]
22. A recently formed fault scarp. [The 1954 Fairview Peak fault scarp in Nevada]
23. A megabreccia. [Alaska, Nevada]
24. An actively accreting river delta.
25. A natural bridge. [Natural Bridge, Virginia]
26. A large sinkhole. [Somewhere near Austin, Texas]
27. A glacial outwash plain. [Alaska]
28. A sea stack. [Oregon coast]
29. A house-sized glacial erratic.
30. An underground lake or river.
31. The continental divide. [Loveland Pass]
32. Fluorescent and phosphorescent minerals. [Smithsonian Museum of Natural History - and fluorescent ones under black light in core, in skarn, in labs]
33. Petrified trees. [Petrified Forest National Park, Arizona]
34. Lava tubes. [Subway Cave north of Lassen Peak, California, Hawaii including one in action, and northern California]
35. The Grand Canyon. All the way down. And back. [Rafted out]
36. Meteor Crater, Arizona, also known as the Barringer Crater, to see an impact crater on a scale that is comprehensible. [I don't remember this very well, back in 1973]
37. The Great Barrier Reef, northeastern Australia, to see the largest coral reef in the world.
38. The Bay of Fundy, New Brunswick and Nova Scotia, Canada, to see the highest tides in the world (up to 16m).
39. The Waterpocket Fold, Utah, to see well exposed folds on a massive scale. [A couple times, most recently in 1993]
40. The Banded Iron Formation, Michigan, to better appreciate the air you breathe. [Marquette Iron Range, 1975]
41. The Snows of Kilimanjaro, Tanzania.
42. Lake Baikal, Siberia, to see the deepest lake in the world (1,620 m) with 20 percent of the Earth's fresh water.
43. Ayers Rock (known now by the Aboriginal name of Uluru), Australia. This inselberg of nearly vertical Precambrian strata is about 2.5 kilometers long and more than 350 meters high
44. Devil's Tower, northeastern Wyoming, to see a classic example of columnar jointing.
45. The Alps.
46. Telescope Peak, in Death Valley National Park. From this spectacular summit you can look down onto the floor of Death Valley - 11,330 feet below. [I've seen the peak from Badwater and from Panamint Valley, but not from the top looking down]
47. The Li River, China, to see the fantastic tower karst that appears in much Chinese art
48. The Dalmation Coast of Croatia, to see the original Karst.
49. The Gorge of Bhagirathi, one of the sacred headwaters of the Ganges, in the Indian Himalayas, where the river flows from an ice tunnel beneath the Gangatori Glacier into a deep gorge.
50. The Goosenecks of the San Juan River, Utah, an impressive series of entrenched meanders.
51. Shiprock, New Mexico, to see a large volcanic neck.
52. Land's End, Cornwall, Great Britain, for fractured granites that have feldspar crystals bigger than your fist.
53. Tierra del Fuego, Chile and Argentina, to see the Straights of Magellan and the southernmost tip of South America.
54. Mount St. Helens, Washington, to see the results of recent explosive volcanism.
55. The Giant's Causeway and the Antrim Plateau, Northern Ireland, to see polygonally fractured basaltic flows.
56. The Great Rift Valley in Africa.
57. The Matterhorn, along the Swiss/Italian border, to see the classic "horn".
58. The Carolina Bays, along the Carolinian and Georgian coastal plain
59. The Mima Mounds near Olympia, Washington. [I've seen these in several places, including northern Oregon]
60. Siccar Point, Berwickshire, Scotland, where James Hutton (the "father" of modern geology) observed the classic unconformity.
61. The moving rocks of Racetrack Playa in Death Valley.
62. Yosemite Valley. [Practically grew up there]
63. Landscape Arch (or Delicate Arch) in Utah.
64. The Burgess Shale in British Columbia.
65. The Channeled Scablands of central Washington.
66. Bryce Canyon.
67. Grand Prismatic Spring at Yellowstone.
68. Monument Valley.
69. The San Andreas fault.
70. The dinosaur footprints in La Rioja, Spain.
71. The volcanic landscapes of the Canary Islands.
72. The Pyrenees Mountains.
73. The Lime Caves at Karamea on the West Coast of New Zealand.
74. Denali (an orogeny in progress).
75. A catastrophic mass wasting event. [Blackhawk slide in southern, California - huge; and the Toutle River flooding and mudflow event following the 1980 Mt. St. Helens eruption]
76. The giant crossbeds visible at Zion National Park.
77. The black sand beaches in Hawaii (or the green sand-olivine beaches). [Maybe just the black sand beaches]
78. Barton Springs in Texas
79. Hells Canyon in Idaho.
80. The Black Canyon of the Gunnison in Colorado.
81. The Tunguska Impact site in Siberia.
82. Feel an earthquake with a magnitude greater than 5.0. [Not sure]
83. Find dinosaur footprints in situ.
84. Find a trilobite (or a dinosaur bone or any other fossil).
85. Find gold, however small the flake. [Lots]
86. Find a meteorite fragment.
87. Experience a volcanic ashfall.
88. Experience a sandstorm. [Mojave Desert, California]
89. See a tsunami.
90. Witness a total solar eclipse. [1970]
91. Witness a tornado firsthand. [Only a very small one]
92. Witness a meteor storm, a term used to describe a particularly intense (1000+ per minute) meteor shower.
93. View Saturn and its moons through a respectable telescope.
94. See the Aurora borealis, otherwise known as the northern lights. [As far north as Anchorage, as far south as Reno, Nevada]
95. View a great naked-eye comet, an opportunity which occurs only a few times per century. [First in the late 1950's or early 1960's - not sure which one]
96. See a lunar eclipse.
97. View a distant galaxy through a large telescope.
98. Experience a hurricane. [Only the spent portions of these]
99. See noctilucent clouds
100. See the green flash.

That's 55, counting Telescope Peak from the bottom up, black sands for sure but maybe not green, and not hiking out of the Grand Canyon just all the way down. That's just about one per year. I probably won't make all of them, and there are a few I'd rather not experience except from a safe distance.

UPDATE: I just added #75, after reading Geotripper's One Hundred; I've seen (and mapped part of) the Blackhawk slide in southern California, and was at the Toutle River while it was still in flood after the 1980 Mt. St. Helens eruption. That would make one per year.

What Have I Done??!

No, it's not as bad as it seems: it's just a 100-thing meme I saw over at Callan's, and one that many others have been doing [the non-geo version]. It's that memish time of year, I think - long posts are hard to come by while everyone gets final things done before the holidays - at least for me! [With the title, was that a good lede?]

The idea is to bold the ones you've done (and I'll add notes in parens).

1. Started my own blog
2. Slept under the stars
3. Played in a band (I've only played "air guitar")
4. Visited Hawaii
5. Watched a meteor shower
6. Given more than I can afford to charity
7. Been to Disneyland/world (only once, because we were there)
8. Climbed a mountain
9. Held a praying mantis
10. Sung a solo (only while playing air guitar)
11. Bungee jumped
12. Visited Paris
13. Watched lightning at sea (looking to the east, I think)
14. Taught myself an art from scratch (kind of)
15. Adopted a child
16. Had food poisoning (minor)
17. Walked to the top of the Statue of Liberty (walked to the top of the Washington Monument)
18. Grown my own vegetables
19. Seen the Mona Lisa in France
20. Slept on an overnight train
21. Had a pillow fight
22. Hitchhiked (only once, in Boston)
23. Taken a sick day when you're not ill
24. Built a snow fort
25. Held a lamb (milked a cow!)
26. Gone skinny dipping
27. Run a Marathon
28. Ridden in a gondola in Venice
29. Seen a total eclipse (1970)
30. Watched a sunrise or sunset
31. Hit a home run (I doubt it, unless the backyard type counts!)
32. Been on a cruise (Alaska Marine Highway System Prince Rupert to Haines)
33. Seen Niagara Falls in person
34. Visited the birthplace of my ancestors (in the U.S.)
35. Seen an Amish community
36. Taught myself a new language (does a vague smattering of html count?)
37. Had enough money to be truly satisfied (that's a sort of variable thing, but yes)
38. Seen the Leaning Tower of Pisa in person
39. Gone rock climbing
40. Seen Michelangelo's David
41. Sung karaoke
42. Seen Old Faithful geyser erupt (many times!)
43. Bought a stranger a meal at a restaurant (a hitchhiker in New Mexico)
44. Visited Africa
45. Walked on a beach by moonlight
46. Been transported in an ambulance
47. Had my portrait painted
48. Gone deep sea fishing
49. Seen the Sistine Chapel in person
50. Been to the top of the Eiffel Tower in Paris
51. Gone scuba diving or snorkeling (tried once, didn't like it)
52. Kissed in the rain
53. Played in the mud
54. Gone to a drive-in theater
55. Been in a movie (not that I'm aware of)
56. Visited the Great Wall of China
57. Started a business (does consulting count?)
58. Taken a martial arts class
59. Visited Russia
60. Served at a soup kitchen
61. Sold Girl Scout Cookies
62. Gone whale watching (have seen beluga whales in Alaska several times, but that's a chance thing)
63. Got flowers for no reason
64. Donated blood, platelets or plasma
65. Gone sky diving
66. Visited a Nazi Concentration Camp
67. Bounced a check
68. Flown in a helicopter (lots and lots of times!)
69. Saved a favorite childhood toy (well, for awhile)
70. Visited the Lincoln Memorial
71. Eaten caviar
72. Pieced a quilt (I've made one, not sure it was *pieced*)
73. Stood in Times Square
74. Toured the Everglades
75. Been fired from a job
76. Seen the Changing of the Guards in London
77. Broken a bone
78. Been on a speeding motorcycle
79. Seen the Grand Canyon in person (from south, north, and down inside)
80. Published a book
81. Visited the Vatican
82. Bought a brand new car (exactly two, including the very old truck I now own: it was new once upon a time)
83. Walked in Jerusalem
84. Had my picture in the newspaper
85. Read the entire Bible
86. Visited the White House (only the lawn area)
87. Killed and prepared an animal for eating (do fish count?)
88. Had chickenpox (back when everyone got it)
89. Saved someones life
90. Sat on a jury
91. Met someone famous
92. Joined a book club
93. Lost a loved one
94. Had a baby
95. Seen The Alamo in person
96. Swam in the Great Salt Lake (waded?)
97. Been involved in a law suit
98. Owned a cell phone (only 2)
99. Been stung by a bee
100. Ridden an elephant

Done 51 in fifty-something years. Some that I haven't done (like #97), I wouldn't really care to put on my to-do list. Others that I haven't done (like #44) , I wouldn't mind doing.

I'm a Doer?

What am I doing?

This little personality quiz, based on the writing on one's blog or website, was pointed out recently by Suvrat at Reporting on a Revolution. The website analyzer can be found here. The analysis is based on the Meyers-Briggs Type Indicator test or the Keirsey Sorter. I'm supposed to come out INFP, but my blog comes out ESTP. (Actually, since the first time I took the assessment in the early 1990's, I have come out all over the place, apparently depending on my mood or something like that.)

ESTP: the active and playful type. They are especially attuned to people and things around them and often full of energy, talking, joking and engaging in physical out-door activities. The Doers are happiest with action-filled work which craves their full attention and focus. They might be very impulsive and more keen on starting something new than following it through. They might have a problem with sitting still or remaining inactive for any period of time.

As I write this, I'm not feeling particularly active or playful, and am not full of energy. I probably am overly attuned to people, although that doesn't always help me do or say the right thing. I do occasionally work outdoors (surprise, I'm a geologist!). I almost always spell occasionally wrong, but that apparently isn't part of the test. I don't know if the test would give different results for different posts, or if it's just set up for a whole website. I will warn you that they save your site and results, although I can't really think why, unless they really think their analysis means something.

Five Things Meme

I'm taking this one from Cath @ VWXYNot?, who tagged "anyone whose breakfast included / will inlcude cheese." [The breakfast was scrambled eggs with cheese.]

5 things I was doing 10 years ago:
(Let's see, 10 years ago was 1998.)

1. Watching one of my nieces take her first steps.
2. Packing an over-full U-Haul.
3. Driving down the Alcan.
4. Finding a new place to rent.
5. Looking for work.

5 things on my to-do list today:
(Checks calendar - oh, today's a day off.)

1. Sleep late. ✓
2. Have coffee.✓
3. Mail bills.✓
4. Do some laundry.
5. Go for a hike.✓

5 snacks I love:

1. Ice cream, almost any ice cream.
2. Coffee with cocoa / coffee without cocoa / cocoa without coffee
3. A Blizzard (especially when in Alaska).
4. Peppermint patties.
5. Reesie cups (okay, so I spelled it wrong).

5 things I would do if I was a millionaire:

1. Drive the Alcan again, taking my time for once.
2. Buy a new field vehicle, one that gets good mileage.
3. Build a new house in the back yard.
4. Use solar panels.
5. Work less; donate more.

5 places I've lived:

1. Nevada.
2. Alaska.
3. The East Coast.
4. North of the Arctic Circle.
5. In the field.

5 jobs I've had

1. Receptionist [yuck].
2. Teach Op Min and Petrology.
3. Geologist.
4. Artist.
5. Consultant.

5 rocks I love:
(For geologists or any others who also want to add rocks.)

1. Breccia, any kind.
2. Ash-flow tuff (did I mention breccia?)
3. Veins (and brecciated veins)
4. Rocks with secondary K-spar veinlets (I don't like these to be brecciated, but the veinlets can cut breccias).
5. Jasperoid (also to hate, if sampling), brecciated or not.

5 categories of people I'll tag:

1. Any geologist.
2. Anyone who has driven the Alcan, in either direction.
3. Anyone who has lived north of the Arctic Circle.
4. Anyone who hates moving.
5. Anyone who considers themselves an artist.

Six Word Meme

I have been tagged by ReBecca of Dinochick Blogs for the Six Word Memoir Meme.

The rules are:

1. Write your own six word memoir.
2. Post it on your blog and include a visual illustration if you’d like.
3. Link to the person that tagged you in your post and to this original post if possible so we can track it as it travels across the blogosphere. [This one seems to have lost the link so must not apply anymore.]
4. Tag five more blogs with links.
5. And don’t forget to leave a comment on the tagged blogs with an invitation to play.

Here's my very lame one:
"My life: traveling here, traveling there."

I'll tag:
Wayfarer Scientista
The Lost Geologist
Green Gabbro
Clastic Detritus
Roads of Stone

5 and 10: where has the time gone?

10 years ago in 1998, I was just about to leave Alaska in order to follow my desire (goal?) to get back into the mining exploration industry after a hiatus of many years. The hiatus was due to an unfortunate event that I won't go into right here, right now; it's something I've had to let go of (detach from?). I decided in the late fall of 1997 to get back into the industry, and set about doing so by going to meetings and renewing old contacts. The price of gold had just plummeted to $250/oz or so, and the industry was going into the frenzy (tailspin?) that followed on the heels of the Bre-X scandal/scam, which made it even more difficult for companies to raise money to conduct exploration. So my timing was - well, not the best? Anyway, I had not been able to find a job in Alaska, possibly from starting to look a little too late in the year (who was to know they would be hired-up for a June field season by February?), and probably from not really having any contacts there. I did have three or four job offers from outfits in Reno, at least two of which sounded firm, so I decided to move back to the area I had been centered in for more than two decades. Short story: by the time I had driven down the Alcan and gotten an apartment in Reno, all the job offers had turned to dust.

So, I started beating the bush, pounding the pavement, knocking on doors, making calls. I had several more interviews; money was tight. At some point, a job was passed around through channels: sitting a drill rig - in Nicaragua, in the rainy season, for a pretty low daily rate. I thought about it, could kind of visualize it, didn't like what I saw, and didn't apply for the job.

Being kind of impatient at times, I didn't feel like I could just sit around waiting, calling and waiting - even though I figured I could find something agreeable by fall. I couldn't wait that long. I needed something to occupy my mind and self, so I started volunteering at a local kindergarten. It was one of the best things I had done for myself (and others) for a long time, besides moving to Alaska for two years. By fall, I was considering getting an education degree so I could teach Earth Science in high school; by the end of the year, I had enrolled in a program to do so. I would never have imagined myself doing something like this even 5 years prior, and certainly couldn't have imagined it when I was an undergrad or grad geology student - and wouldn't have even considered it as a possibility.

For various reasons, I found I probably wouldn't like teaching in high school (I really have never liked high school students very much, even when I was there - and that is something I've been having to let go of, also, now that two nieces and one nephew are in high school, and one niece just graduated a couple years ago), so I re-oriented myself toward teaching in elementary school. I didn't make it - did not make it through student teaching after trying with two sets of teachers. I was still fairly sure I could do it, on a third try I was planning for the following fall - when opportunities changed. MOH and I moved to "the lake" to follow jobs in home construction and to move to an area we had become interested in (I had been working at that with him that one summer; by then it was the summer of 2001). I had set two goals - consulting and teaching - and those hadn't panned out! I had met MOH in the process of all that, and that has worked out!

5 years ago in 2003, with the above story having shifted gears but still continuing - I was just about to lose a job in construction, as a carpenter's helper, a job I'd had for a short time (in the meantime, I'd done a lot of artwork, had sold some things, was too impatient to stay at it, at least to make a money-making career (ha!) out of it). And I was just about to quit a second job in construction after less than a week, working for a very strange person who ultimately gave me the creeps. I had also, not long before that, taken some classes in soil science, and was just about to get a short-term job sitting around outside watching leach tests for septic tanks, working for - ?? - $50 per test - which amounted to less than $10/hour. That didn't ultimately appeal to me very much, and it was barely geological (although I could do art part of the day) - so, late in 2003, coming back with MOH from a trip to "our" hot springs in central Nevada, I looked up at some ash-flow tuffs lying there just off the side of the road, and suddenly - it came to me: I can do that! I can still do that - I can still map and do geology! What a revelation.

I set about, once again, getting back into the business of exploration geology. The price of gold was up, and companies were coming out of the woodwork. It took 3 to 4 months, but I got a job (sitting a drill rig) - my first job ever as a consulting geologist. (Maybe I was less impatient this time?)

I had thought, when I got out of the business for personal reasons, that if I didn't get back into the business in 5 years, that I would never do it, that it wouldn't even be possible, that I'd be out-of-date and no one would want me. My first attempt, in 1997-1998, had already been 2 years past my "due date" - doing it in 2003-2004 was more than ten years down the line. It worked, nevertheless, meaning that my idea of what was possible, and my long-term planning ideas, really were out of touch with ultimate reality. But then, my mom and dad (M+D), had always told me when I was growing up - you can do/be anything you want. (Obviously, though, I'm not really cut out to be a major league basketball player.)

Goals? I'm not really great with goals or long-term planning, and have found that some of my best ideas have been almost spur of the moment things, ideas that have ultimately taken me to places I never would have imagined - like being a field geologist. I never thought I was cut out for that, but circumstances and choices I made showed me that I was wrong about that.

I've had three major goals in my life: 1) move back west after moving east, 2) don't become a secretary, and 3) go to grad school. The first goal I developed at the age of 10 prior to moving east from the west coast to follow M+D when my dad got a job back east. I knew I would come back here (The West); I knew I would do it as soon as possible (at the time, I was thinking 5 years max, but by then I was in high school, and it wasn't quite the right time for me to move on my own!). The second goal I accomplished by not taking typing in high school (I took it later for my own use when it was clear I wouldn't somehow get sucked into the secretarial direction). The third goal, grad school, came to me in a matter of minutes during a personal crisis, in which a sig-oth was telling me that - I would quit undergrad school, I would move into this really awful old, falling down farm house, and I would become a - what? - housewife? Or he would leave me! Yikes! (BTW, don't ever, please, give me an ultimatum!) While crying, I told him that those things absolutely weren't possible, and at that second, I knew I was going to grad school to get my M.S. in geology.

Quite frankly, I never imagined myself as a field geologist, not until I became one, and I never really planned on being a consulting geologist, either. (I didn't really plan on getting any gray hair, but - oh, well). And I think that's "deep enough," as they say in the mining industry.

A Brief Update: BTW, I have the deepest respect for women who have chosen to be what was known then as a housewife - my mom, for one, and my exceptional bright and talented sisters, for two and three. It just wasn't the right thing for me at the time.

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