Mt Cargill at Night

Shannon and I tried to catch the sunset at Mt Cargill last night but the sun was behind clouds when we got there. My pics didn't really turn out as there was not enough light and too windy for me to use a slower shutter speed. In the video the harbor and peninsula are behind Shannon and then there's a quick view of Dunedin right before getting to the tower and my truck.

Yay for infected snails!

Finally I have enough infected snails to start my experiments. After heading back to Chatto Creek on thursday (new album on right), I came back with heaps of snails and thus far have found 9 more infected snails for a total of 12. And I have a few more yet to screen. This made my day as I'm homesick as ever today! My friends backed out on going out this eve so heading to Shannon's now.

Sad news

I talked to my mom this morning and her good friend, Dick, died Thursday morning. She seems to be ok...he was in pain from lung cancer and it is for the best. But it has left me feeling very homesick today and just missing everyone at home.

Busy and exhausted

So I've decided to do a half-marathon in Sept and thus have started focusing a working out this week...Monday night pump class, Tuesday a jog on the beach, Wednesday shooting hoops (as I've also signed up for our department basketball team, which I've never done before), Thursday was a field day - long and lots of driving - and spent a couple of nights hanging out with Shannon, the night owl. So that leads to an exhausted Kristin by Friday. And I have so much work to be doing that I will be working the entire weekend - checking all these snails for parasites, working in the genetics lab and cranking out another draft of my manuscript.

Students are back for O-week, two weeks of partying starting the week before classes. So they are everywhere! Damn they are so young! I've also agreed to be a demonstrator (what they call teaching assistant) this semester for Behavioral Evolutionary Ecology, a third (and final) year course...my supervisor asked me so I really couldn't say no. For the most part it will require me supervising 2-3 groups that work on freshwater parasite projects, which should be heaps of fun!

2 Americans and an Aussie sitting in a tub...

So last tuesday Rachel from my lab took me to a bunch of her study sites for me to collect snails as I've been unable to find ones infected with my study parasite. So we drove to Central Otago (inland area of my region) and collected snails from 6 streams (well, only 5 cause there were no snails to be found in one of them) on farmer's land. Sheep country. In the pic there's a boy on a 4 wheeler and a couple of dogs herding sheep down the road. The farmers are very wary over letting people in their streams...water right issues...so we have to stop and chat with each one before wading in.



I brought back heaps of snails (couple thousand-ish) and found 3 infected snails...luckily all from the same stream. So WOO HOO I finally have a source to infect fish with! So I'll be heading back to this creek to collect a few thousand more just from here so I can get my 10-20 infected snails.

Yesterday, I met Rebecca at the farmer's market as her car broke down there. AA came and push started her to drive to the mechanic. I stopped to check my snails, then on to the mechanics where Rebecca had stalled in the drive and they needed another person to push to start it again to get it inside. Went over to Rebecca's for dinner last night...she was making me a tofu dish...the stir-fry was good, the tofu not bad, the best that I've tried I guess. In the meanwhile, I had left my lights on so when trying to leave to come back to my place for a hot tub we had to call AA again to come jump my truck. Chilly evening to be waiting 45 mins for the guy to show up. Finally back to my place...Deanna has an old bath tub in the back yard which she starts a fire under and you have a hot bath...it's awesome...incredibly hot so you have to keep adding cold water and sit on a board so you don't burn your bum. Rebecca, Dee and I took turns. Ahhhhhhhh...

Rippon Pics

Me, Lisa, Rachel, Deanna and Tania


My most remarkable I'm-loving-NZ moment thus far - really, how lucky am I?


The crowd


Hot as and we're looking at a glacier

Blah, it's Monday

It's one of those I-really-don't-feel-like-working Mondays! Friday night I went out with Rachel, her brother and her flatmates for a wonderful dinner and then out to the pubs and clubs. The flatmates petered out early but Rachel, Paul and I finally grabbed a cab at 4am. We had a really good time...the bars were quiet (school hasn't started yet) but that just meant more room on the dance floor. The dance floors were unusually male-dominated...at one point I was the only female on the dance floor 'cause Rachel was in the bathroom. Her brother is quite the entertaining storyteller and had all of us girls laughing most of the night. I spent Saturday afternoon hanging out with Shannon and exploring a bit of Dunedin...it was very cloudy so no great views of the city yet. Deanna and I got Thai and watched movies Sat eve. And I was mostly a bum on Sunday...did a little shopping, Rebecca came over and we watched Raiders of the Lost Arc, and new episodes of Ugly Betty and Grey's Anatomy are finally on here!

Waitangi Day

It's been a great week after coming back from the music festival. Spent monday night with Shannon...hanging out, seeing his place which is a total bachelor pad but well picked up for me. Tuesday I got 3 boxes from my mom packed full of things from my closet along with some new things. And I pretty much took the day off, doing laundry and bedding, putting all my new (or old) things away, hitting the supermarket, etc. Wednesday was another day off since it was a public holiday, Waitangi Day, which celebrates the signing of the treaty between the Maori and the settlers and ending war between them. Rebecca, Rachel and I spent it at the beach...it was beautiful we walked along the beach, had lunch, laid out on the beach and actually spent a good 15 minutes in the ocean...screaming every time a wave hit us...I wanted to get out after 3 mins but Rachel insisted it was just getting good - meaning your legs are just starting to get numb - and sure enough a couple more minutes and it wasn't so bad...we got knocked over by a few of the big ones and it was loads of fun. The guys next to us were arguing whether we were American or Irish and once they asked they figured out they were both right. Then we headed back to my place to BBQ, which entails starting an actual fire in our outdoor brick oven with a long grill over the top...we had potatoes and onions and sausages. Today was back to work...is it Thursday already?! Ha! And even took off early to meet Ralph (the guy I almost flatted with) for beers. Tomorrow eve I'm going out for a fancy dinner and drinking with Rachel and her brother who is visiting for the weekend (he's traveling in Australia right now visiting his girlfriend and making a quick trip here to see Rachel)...so we'll see if I can keep up the Irish...

Lake Wanaka the day after the Rippon Festival

Bird pics from Tomahawk Lagoon

RIPPON '08

oh, it was absolutely fantastic! got up to the house friday night...it was a beautiful 4 bedroom house. had margaritas and the first group of us were in bed before the second group even arrived. the concert was great, at a vineyard, looking at the stage with the lake behind it and mountains all around...BEAUTIFUL! A few of the others were being all judgemental about the bands, but I was absolutely in awe of the scenery and that I so lucky to be at such an awesome concert in NZ...did I mention how beautiful it was?! Music started at 11 am and the last band came on at 11 pm. Music was great, wine was great...we drank too much early on and then didn't drink at all in the evening. it was hot. Surprisingly, I only danced a bit...with one of the girls during the day, but then she got heat stroke and ended up having to go back to the house. I did stand up and dance on our tarp...mostly cause my hind-end hurt so bad from sitting all day. And finally Luke wanted to go to the dance floor (I found out later that he also had wanted to go up there earlier). My favorites were the first one, Anika Moa and then a band called Shapeshifter and the second to last band, Kora, which is the one Luke and I went to the dance floor for. The last band was ok...very different from the rest of the bands, much more hard rock, loud with lots of smoke that was making me sick, but it was the only band that I knew one of the songs as it's played on the rock station here. I'm proud to say we made it through all the bands...the rest of us girls left before the encore of the last band. on sunday, we had breakfast, cleaned the house, had coffee in town, drove around town and went down to the lake where Dee showed off her rock skipping skills and where as my rocks made one single plunk right into the water as usual. I'll get pics up later. On the way home we stopped for ice cream blended with real fruit, and then stopped at one of my favorite wineries from that wine tour I went on...Black Ridge, where the owner is a real story teller...we tasted all 10 wines and between 4 of us we bought a case...I bought 3 bottles...did I mention I'm broke?! ha! they are really cheap wines comparatively so how could I pass them up? got back to Dunedin and I was starving since we only had ice cream and wine for lunch so Dee and I picked up Burger King on the way home...my first fast food in NZ...whopper with cheese value meal...the only thing different is the size of the pop was a bit smaller. What a fantastic weekend!
http://www.ripponfestival.co.nz/