Obsession or Disgust

This is a picture of a partial Tilapia skeleton, and something I've been thinking a lot about these past couple of weeks. I have been working on a school project where I am doing actual real research that has not been done before. I am trying to figure out if it is possible to identify the species of a fish based on only the vertebrae. And if it can be done, how do you do it. Basically we found out that you can sort of tell. :) It has definitely been interesting though, I have really enjoyed the thought process and the freedom to just try and figure it out on my own. But at times I have got frustrated with it (especially with my ineptitude at using spreadsheets and other computer programs that it would be helpful). Several mornings between being asleep and awake I have swam in a haze of vertebrae and spreadsheets. Occasionally when I close my eyes I see vertebrae dancing before my eyes. I've procrastinated other homework to work on this, and I've given up in disgust multiple times. So the question is: am I obsessed? or am I disgusted with the whole project? Perhaps they are the same thing.

An Interspecific Cultural Comparison of Canis lupus and Homo sapiens

This semester I took a capstone class to finish up my college career. I got to pick my own topic as long as it had something to do with Biological Anthropology. I choose to write about the similarities and differences between wolves and humans. It was a ten page paper and so I am not going to post it all here but I found it really interesting and almost wished that I had had more time to work through it all and add more details and sources and such. Here are two paragraphs that kind of sum up much of what I wrote.
"Wolves and humans have many commonalities, the crux of which can be narrowed down to our adaptable nature and diet. However, some of these similarities, especially diet, are difficult to see in our technologically advanced world, they are more obvious in examples from the human past when most humans were hunters and gatherers. Until more recently when humans began to populate almost every corner of the world, wolves had one of the most extensive ranges of any mammal (Paquet and Carbyn 2003). Both species have complex social hierarchies, and live in family groups. As predators we both prey on large and small animals as well as feeding on plants. Hunting can be done in packs or individually and both species are territorial. However, the biggest difference between us is that because of extra-somatic adaptations, such as clothing, and weapons, humans are even more adaptable than wolves. . . "
"Genetic disparity between species causes variation in behavior. A few of the most blatant examples of these differences between humans and wolves are found when contrasting reproduction and greater human adaptability. Wolves have larger litters than humans and are only in heat once a year. Plus, their cubs are fully mature in two years and quite capable for some time before that. Compared to humans’ slow maturation, single births and year round reproductive receptivity wolves are very distinct. These differences require diverse adaptive behaviors. Both species are quite adaptable, but because of humans ability to create culture, particularly material culture we adapt more readily to a larger variety of environments."

The Graveyard Book

This week I read The Graveyard Book by Neil Gaiman. It was strange because it kind of felt like one of those books where there is no real plot it is just related stories and anecdotes from someone growing up like Louisa May Alcott's books. At the same time it felt like a novel with a single plot. After the book was a few pages written by the author about the process. This is what he wrote:
 "I wanted the book to be composed of short stories, because The Jungle Book was short stories. And I wanted it to be a novel, because it was a novel in my head. The tension between those two things was both a delight and a heartache as a writer."
No wonder that it felt the way it did. He definitely made it work though.
I also really enjoyed the premise of a little boy being raised in a graveyard by ghosts. And I liked how things like vampires and werewolves were portrayed in such a different light then they typically are.
At first I was disappointed that there was much more about Silas then there was about his parents, but when I talked to my sister about it she explained that when you are little parents are just there, they aren't exciting, so it is no wonder there wasn't much about them.
I thought the end was more sad then I was expecting though. He's only 16 and he can't go back... but I guess that is how growing up is, you can't go back. And this is what Gaiman said about that:
"I had set out to write a book about a childhood--it was Bod's childhood, and it was in a graveyard, but still, it was a childhood like any other; I was now writing about being a parent, and the fundamental most comical tragedy of parenthood: that if you do your job properly, if you, as a parent, raise your children well, they won't need you anymore."
This book definitely captured that feeling, because after all sometimes fiction is truer than reality.

Dandelion

Yes I know this is not a dandelion. But tough luck.

Today I saw a dandelion
That greeted me of Spring
The light against the darkness
It promised me of more.