back from fieldschool

A while since I've done funny news stories. Thus the next couple of posts may or may not be unbelievably funny."Here is how to safely shoot a fellow officer in the head."

I wonder why...


Microphones in the eyes... that's an understandable photographic error, but how is that photo then selected for use?!

Yeah I had something like that; an 18-wheeler crushed my feet and my right earlobe fell off.

Fieldschool was a good time, with some neat rocks and beautiful scenery. I surprised myself by not being totally inept at teaching students field techniques and concepts, despite than most of them were older than me and many had more field experience, albeit in the oil/gas industry, not hardrock (why are the undergrads at this university so old??).

Today they're working on their reports and good maps, and I'm around to help out. On Saturday I'm going home to surprise my sister for her birthday (I'm fairly certain she doesn't read this because she doesn't remember I even maintain a blog, let alone where it is). Also I'll be home for Mother's Day, which I'm sure Mum appreciates.

Remember a few months ago when some US defence contractors up here in Canada reported being spied on by Canadian coins that commemorate our war dead with the red poppy quarter? Well they thought the red poppy in the centre was some sort of nanotechnology espionage device, and that these quarters were being 'planted' on them by spies (eg in the cupholder of a rental car, or, as I prefer to think they believed, by the evil cold-hearted commie scum working at Timmy's). Anyway they've admitted it was all an incredibly silly mistake, and just reading the cbc article was enough to make me laugh.

Come on, America! Why would we want to spy on you guys? We're pretty much the best of friends, compared to most neighbouring countries, and we share much of our technology and military systems anyway. If for some reason we did want to spy on US military contractors, we would not use something so stupid as coins, since coins flow in and out of peoples' hands all the time. No we'd just head on down over the border and take a look around, because we look and (if we remember to say 'huh' instead of 'eh') sound just like Americans. And if our accents are a bit more than they're used to, we say we're from Maine. Or possibly Alaska.

I finally capitulated to the nagging alert window and updated my version of itunes, and for the hell of it, skimmed through the EULA. Look at section 15. How could itunes possibly be used for such things? Does it count if you have it playing in the background as you're working on such a project? Are Lockheed-Martin workiers exempt? I understand it's just a general-issue apple product EULA, but still, I think it's amusing.

A new contest, to be properly propounded next time: Come up with a word for the opposite of "dense", including opposites for "density" and "denser" etc. It bothers me that such a word doesn't exist. Maybe I'll come up with some more things that I think need words for next time.

Cheers.