Despite appearances, I'm not dead! (My professors are trying their best, though) Unfortunately I haven't had the opportunity to visit any awesome caves, and it doesn't look likely in the foreseeable future either. Instead, I'm inexorably being driven out of my mind by absurd deadlines and unforgivably high expectations in my field geology course. I swear, for the past few weeks I've fallen asleep on a pile of work every night, and woken up every morning feeling either inescapable dread, or near-total apathy for my schoolwork. And that's not to speak of my other courses too. And in case that's not enough, I have to take a 6-week long summer field course. Six straight weeks of doing this garbage constantly, with no weekends and only a few half-day long breaks. What the hell did I get myself into? I'd probably be happier as a chemist...

But good things have been happening too! A few weeks ago I gave a talk at my school's undergrad research conference about my research in geochemistry and hydrothermal resources. I think my pa might put it up on Youtube or something.

So yeah, I'm here to: a) Give excuses for not doing anything here, and: b) Explain why I won't be doing anything for the next couple of months, if not more. I'm considering putting up some of my field photographs, just for the sake of having something new, but they're really more of a scientific reference, and they weren't really taken with an eye for composition or form. And i'd rather not cop out like that. But, we'll see what happens. I might end up liking a few of them enough to share them.

Oh yeah, and blacksmithing/glasswork seems extremely unlikely for the time being, at least until next Fall...

One last thing: I recently had a crazy idea for a MLP fanfic. Originally I thought this idea was the crazed result of my mind wandering too far while under the influence of too little sleep and too much progressive rock, but I started developing the story in my head and I'm actually liking what I'm coming up with. If I ever have the time, I'll outline something about it, and who knows, I might have a draft for someone to proofread/review.

To conclude, don't worry too much if I don't do anything new for the next coming months. If anything might come up, I'll be here to let you know.

By the way, this is the greatest thing: [link]