The Wind-up

My Thesis Defense is scheduled for Thursday, June 24, 2010. It's essentially the last day before my committee scatters into the wind. One for the rest of the summer, and one for good.

I've got good data. I'm just aiming for some sense of coherence.

Thesis timeline

Here is the short version: TOO LONG.

Now for a little bit longer version: TOO LONG, but it may end.

And for further details:

My graduate studies have had a few breaks here and there. I didn't go to any classes for an entire year. (I did attended one class, but I didn't get credit.) I got married in the middle of one semester. I went through a strange change in my program of study and traded out one committee member for another the next semester. I still really like this former committee member (Hi, Cliff), but I moved from a thesis in Science Education to one outside of Education. Next up, there's no financial assistance during the summer. There's a year for you.

While I've been in school I'm sure I could have done more along the way, but some of the time has seemed to slip on by. After babies being born (we've got two you know) and Laura's surgeries following having babies (she's had two you know), I lost a little bit of time to just taking care of the family. Laura wasn't supposed to be lifting our girls for a good while after each surgery. Some class loads have been heavy some semesters, and it's hard to work your TA hours part-time and study full-time and see your wife at least some-time.

And then there is the total work load. ¿Who knew that there would be so much work to sorting all of these bugs? So many people have put some time into these bugs:
- a dozen and then some undergraduate students
- at least four graduate students
- 30+ secondary science teachers.

Some people have put in less than 10 hours. Others put in a few hours a week for a semester. A few have committed to a solid 10+ hours per week for more than a semester. I have no idea how much time I have spent with these bugs, but I'm sure I've pulled every sample out of every bag at least once, if not twice and many of them 3 or more times. SO MUCH TIME.

here are the numbers:
- 11 Orders of insects
- 13 Orders of arthropods
- 44 families of flies
- 66 overall taxa
- 71 samples sorted completely, and another dozen partially but we won't use their data.
(one bag got lost somewhere that we did want to sort, but what can you do.)
- Over 81% of the individuals identified was a fly of some sort. In non-scientific terms, you could say that we had "a lot" of flies. (one, two, many, lots).
- 62,497 individuals have been identified, and sized. (a few estimates were done with a couple of groups, but seriously... i checked the accuracy of our estimation procedure and 62,497 is the number I'm sticking to.)

I personally had gone through all of the samples at least once by Friday, March 5th. By then, every insect had a name label connected to it. There were bugs that still needed to be sized after that, but all of them were named. ¿Didn't I tell you that our experimental design guaranteed that every bug was going to get handled at least twice? YEESH.

Since March 5th I've consolidated multiple spreadsheets, corrected spelling errors from all of the different people who have entered this data on to a computer, and tried to make one coherent body out of this information we've collected. Spreadsheets, pivot tables, databases, statistical and community analysis software. With scientific names, there is a high propensity for misspelling. Misspelling really makes your data come out wrong when you're trying to explain how many groups of things you have caught.

I also spent time going back and identifying insects that were named wrong the first time through. There are a few names that I knew gave other identifiers problems. There were a few names that I knew that gave me problems. I got smarter, so I went back to as many of the problem children as I could find.

I have made quite a sum of graphs and charts this last month and a half. Today, I slapped some of the results together into PowerPoint. I had my Defense of Research. The Defense of Research is with your committee members. I basically got to say, "Here is my data so far," "This is how I plan to analyze it," and the committee tells me what I REALLY should be doing instead.

We collected in two habitats, during two summers, with two types of traps. From what I've analyzed so far the habitats are significantly different, the years are probably significantly different, but trap type doesn't seem to matter.

My committee likes my data. During the defense they wondered if I could do both a methodology paper (trap types) and a diversity paper from my data. Then, right at the end I remembered that I had done a bunch of Jaccard's similarity indices with my data. ¿Why did I do that? Nerd is the answer. The abundance analysis (#s of individuals per category) in my presentation says that habitats are different, but the richness analysis (# of types of bugs) using Jaccard's says that habitats are very much the same. My little "oh, yeah" at the end of the defense gave my committee even more reason to consider two publications. And if we don't get two publications, we lump the whole study into one submission and try again.

Here is some other good news. I was going to do a species listing of Bombyliids (Bee Flies) from the Escalante-Grand Staircase National Monument, but my current data will give me enough to graduate. I didn't present any data on the Bombyliids today, and my committee was fine with that. Riley would like me to finish my work, but my Master's will not depend on finishing the Bombyliid study. I can sort Bombys after I submit my thesis at the first of July. It would be good for me to work for another publication or two and I know too much about Bombys to just let them slip away. Above all, it's nice to know that I don't have to also have all of that sorting done by the end of June, in addition to writing up all of this work.

All week long I was working out how I was going to discuss the Bombyliid issue. I got exactly what I was hoping for: A place to work on those bugs if my time works out for that, but I can still graduate without knocking down that next mountain before July.

Here's to defending my thesis at then end of June. Whew!

(The Second Edition of) NEWS FROM MAMA DEB'S HOUSE OF PANCAKES AND INTERNATIONAL RELIEF

Ladies and gentlemen, devoted fans of the "deb green irregular"(referring to everyone's favorite newsletter, not deb green herself.) We, the faithful members of Mama Deb's House of Pancakes and International Relief (M.D.H.O.P.A.I.R.), have finally come to the arrival of another exciting newsletter.

Hopefully you all took some time out for National Peanut Day last September. Things were pretty busy in Mama Deb's kitchen and National Peanut Day wasn't given it's due share of respect or celebration. Oh well. National Peanut Month is less than three months away and March gives us 31 days in which to celebrate all things peanut.

Speaking of peanuts, due to recently acquired knowledge, several items including peanuts have found their place on the menu at M.D.H.O.P.A.I.R. becoming rather precarious. Apparently peanuts are seeds, and seeds have this peculiar habit of coming from ovaries. With this startling news making itself known, anything ovarian in nature now faces the risk of being stricken from the menu altogether. The test menu is looking rather bleak.

At first the menu was only slightly smaller, but as further connections were made to seeds and ovaries, a continually increasing number of items on the menu have been walking the plank. The BLT has been forced to become bacon wrapped in a lettuce leaf, no mayo (mayo is made with eggs after all) nor bread (flour is made from wheat, which is a grain, which just happens to be a SEED). The listing for the vegetarian menu has been reduced to a mere section title immediately followed by the rapidly shrinking desert menu. The breakfast menu is a nearing a total loss.

We cannot offer you eggs no matter what way you like them cooked. With the recent loss of flour, all of the pancakes, waffles, crepes, etc. have also been relieved of their breakfast duty for the time being. Our most popular breakfast item, the Super-Duper Breakfast Trough, has been reduced from eggs, breakfast potatoes, pancakes, waffles, toast, orange juice, milk, peaches with cottage cheese, two strips of bacon, and two sausage links (with the ever present side of peanuts and the option to sponsor an orphan child) has been reduced to the bacon, sausage, potatoes, milk and cottage cheese. We have tried a multiple of combinations, but no matter how we arrange the bacon on or in the cottage cheese it just doesn't present itself as a visually appealing dish. Mama Deb has even threatened to strike the potatoes from the menu although we are working hard to convince her that a potato is just a root, and that there aren't any seeds in the roots.

On brighter side, the time we are saving by having fewer items to choose from on the menu has given us a chance to beef up the brochures on sponsoring orphans; more reading material as you peruse the menu for the components of a meal. With the menu turmoil raging here on the home turf, there are somethings to still look forward too. Mama Deb has chosen to take leave of the troubles here at home, in exchange for the troubles of Uganda for the Christmas holidays. She will be given a chance to get over her fear of ovaries (please no Freudian psychological analysis of that topic) in exchange for more rational fears, such as her fear of sharks(feel free to enlist Freud here all that you want). Uganda does have a large body of water after all, and you never know when the next shark population is going to make that brave move to cross the African continent and take the fresh water option of settling down for retirement in Lake Victoria. Maybe by January we will be returning to the original menu.

Mama Deb attributes the reason for this trip to Africa to her need for a change of pace, but we here at Mama Deb's House of Pancakes and International Relief have our own ideas. Rumour has it that she is going back for a few more drum lessons. We all remember Mama Deb's last trip to Africa, where she gave away all of her belongings and only came home with all the drums she could carry, and the few other scattered photos and souvenirs that she stuffed in those drums. At least this time around, deb will get to put her drum lessons to immediate use as she plays for change in various locations on the London leg of her "Away From the USA" tour.

Then again, maybe she is just looking for a change of pace. She has begun the habit of referring to herself as deBORah, and occasionally THE deBORah. At least she has outgrown the "goose" phase.

Well, that is it for this update. We of M.D.H.O.P.A.I.R. thank you for your interest and hope for your continued subscription to the M.D.H.O.P.A.I.R. newsletter.

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for more information on peanuts or the Ugandan Children's Fund, please contact deb green at debgreen20@yahoo.com

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And no for a final word, here are a few links for those of you who are interested. This American Life produces some of the best radio programs ever made, most of which are readily available online:http://www.thisamericanlife.org

Here are a few links in connection with some of the topics covered in this edition of the M.D.H.O.P.A.I.R. newsletter. Hopefully you will have some time to check them out online. They are all free for your listening pleasure.

Babysitting - Deb is going back to the orphanage, and here are some very interesting stories on babysitting. If you don't have time for the whole program, you really should forward through to the last 25 minutes and hear the true story titled "Yes there IS baby". http://www.thisamericanlife.org/ra/175.ram

Kid Logic - ¿What would an orphanage be without children? This is one of our favorite programs of all time. http://www.thisamericanlife.org/ra/188.ram

Music Lessons - when deb is not with the kids at the orphanage, she'll be honing up on those drumming skills. Here's a little homage to music lessons and some of the reasons why people take them. http://www.thisamericanlife.org/ra/104.ram

Dreams: Rabbit-man X (Down, down, down you go, No way to stop)

As you fall, hear me call
"No, no, no."

Dreams: Rabbit-man IX

Dreams: Rabbit-man VII (In the bear-trap of its tender warm embrace)

Dreams: Rabbit-man VI (The lunchtime crowd, they won't even blink...)

But what words rhyme with buried alive?

Timing

last night i was talking with a friend about about timing and it reminded me of something.

i have a friend who has an extreme fear of sharks, even though she grew up in Idaho and hasn't seen much of the ocean. she's only stepped a into the surf a little ways and that was more than she wanted.

so there i was. i have a pile of cartoons about sharks and stuff. ¿why wouldn't i have a pile of cartoons about sharks? i picked out one that i thought needed to give to my friend. then i forgot to take the cartoon. so, i set out the little piece of paper where i'd see it so i'd remember in the morning and i forgot again. i probably forgot at least one more time after that. finally one night, i remembered that i had the cartoon and walked over to my friend's apartment and taped my selection to her door.

¿what's this i hear? ¿it was her birthday? i had no idea. and here i thought i was dropping things off on a random day. mmmmmm... timing.

(all together now: fists in the air...)