Phytoplankton on the brain...

After enough time has passed in school, when artifacts of real life like doing laundry and eating complete meals are but a memory, things begin to get a little weird. Until last thursday I had spent the last six months examining nutrient dynamics and phytoplankton growth on the puget sound, and now that it is over, I'm at a loss for non-science activities, and I'm finding that my work has recently been making it into my crafts. There is a knitted nautilus doll in the works for a fellow 'Marine Life'r (which can be found here), and just today my classmates and I discovered the joys of creating larger fridge magnets with Scanning Electron Microscope photos! We've also taken many photos with the Zeiss microscope, which is basically a camera attached to a compound microscope, and I just think they're all so pretty...

Garglemargle

Once again, the CSMSWB's sincerely apologize for the lack of postings: for those of you not enrolled in Evergreen, this is the last week of the quarter, usually associated with final exams, sleepless nights and various manifestations of insanity. In our house, the dishes are left undone, forgotten in the face of gargantuan study guides.

Now is also the time to dream of the things we'll create when we have free time again; the Joy calls out to us from the cookbook shelf, tempting us with cookies, and my unfinished knitting resides in the depths of my backpack, waiting to be bound off. Since this is invariably the time where nothing seems to get done, I thought I'd put up some pretty pictures of finished projects, partly for inspiration, and partly because I think they're cool:

For christmas break, I made marble fridge magnets for the family, and they turned out quite well (for size, each one is about as large as a quarter). I got the idea from Not Martha, another excellent craft blog, and the directions can be found here. I must warn you: the ease and thrill of creating personalized magnets only disguises the fact that they are extremely addicting! I ended up making hundreds of them (the top section of our fridge was coated in them), and was a little burned out by christmas. If you still want to try them, I found that Smithsonian magazine had some of the best images, and that the 5/8" diameter magnets looked the best under the marbles with no edges showing.

This next photo doesn't really qualify as a craft, but it was just too cool to leave out! In last week's lab after drawing crab hemolymph, we got a brief tutorial on usin the Scanning Electron Microscope (SEM). It's all very space-agey, and it doesn't hurt its novelty that it's hidden away in the depths of the lab buildings. After the introdduction by our professor, we each got to play around with samples, and take a picture of anything we wanted (!!). I chose a copepod:
...And if anyone is now wondering how a SEM works, I give you the wikipedia version.

I also made really cool retro aprons for Spencer, Celia and my mother, my domestic partners in crime. They turned out quite well, and I will be hopefully adding pictures soon.

Far South of the border

This past winter break, my cousin married an absolutely marvelous Colombian woman named Catalina. Despite the fact that they both live in Vancouver B.C., they decided to hold the ceremony in Bogota for her family, which is very close. Not to be stopped by such trifling obstacles as international boundaries, the indefatigable Blakelys packed up and went tropical for a week of foreign language, newfound family, and food.

The entire trip was completely amazing - Every morning we gorged ourself on fresh papayas, pineapples and plums. Every day we spent exploring the city, visiting the National Gold Museum, the collected works of the painter Fernando Botero, and the National Police Museum where we had coffee with the general and in the basement saw the bloodied jacket of Pablo Escovar. On a clear day we rode the cable car to the top of Mon Serrato, where we visited the church and surveyed the entire city of 8 million people. On another day, we drove north of the city to see the great salt cathedral, which has been carved out of a salt mine under a massive hill above the town of Zipaquirá.

The most amazing experience of all, however, lay in meeting our new Colombian family. Years ago, Catalina's grandfather built a gated compound with a house for each of his 4 daughters, and they are all very close as a result. We visited the compound for lunch, and were presented with a mouth watering display of colombian staples, which never seemed to end. There were arepas with fresh guacamole, boiled plantain, potatoes, mashed yucca, and an mountains of red meat. Later, when we were tired from eating and talking, we were given fresh buñuelos and flaky cheese sticks to eat with our freshly brewed, Colombian coffee.

They were all so amazing that by the end of the week it was very sad to say goodbye. I will miss them all, but know that the next time I'm in Bogota, I can always stay with my Colombian family!

existentialism hits home

These days, they're everywhere. Which Friend you are, who your ideal mate is, what historical figure you best represent - Internet quizzes are everywhere. Mostly they are mediocre at best, only representing base and insignificant questions that bear little meaning on our lives; in fact, who knows why they are still filled out by millions of americans every day.
My friends, all that is about to change.

We have offered you the ultimate test, one that will leave you sated and thoughtful, pondering the meaning of its question: are you Celia, Sierra or Spencer?
it lives here, and is the answer to everything you ever dreamed; all those tortured hours spent in existential agony are now a thing of the past!

On a side note, we here at the CSMSW-B headquarters (aka the 'wuthering-wuthering-wuthering heights house') would like to hereby apologize for the depressing lack of posts in recent times. Sierra has lost her camera cable somewhere between Minnesota and Washington, and Spencer has been deeply immersed in the world of political economy. We can, however offer up a photo of a recently made hat to satiate your need for images:

Spencer's Claim to Fame

Let's take a look at the June 1988 Cosmopolitan Magazine. Here's the cover:

That article on the right, "Attention Feminists! Why Some Smart Women Are Getting Off the Fast Track and Going Home" sure looks good. Let's flip to that page.


Who's that handsome child in the yellow jacket?


Oh wow! It's me at one and a half years old, next to my mom and sister.

(In case you're wondering, the caption says "Sharing a library job is Valerie's solution.")



Fierce! I bet even the world's first supermodel, Janice Dickinson, didn't have a photoshoot in Cosmo before the age of two.

P.S. The editor for this issue was the inimitable Helen Gurley Brown, in case you were wondering about that, too.

Out of the Darkness and Into the Oven

Okay, so when I came home and my mom was raving about this new method of breadmaking that she hadn't tried yet, I was skeptical. My family, it seems, adores miracle products. Not ones that you have to spend actual money on, mind you, but miracles all the same. This last Saturday was my dad's 60th birthday party, which resulted in many elaborate baked goods in his honor...
Quite fabulous, as you can see. For the feast, my mom decided to finally test her magic bread recipe, and to our amazement, it really was the best bread we've ever made - no exceptions. Due to the unique no-knead method, it manages to have the most amazing crusty/chewey quality reminiscent of the artisan breads of old. And now, having hyped it to such a great extent, I will now give you the magic recipe:

No-Knead Bread:
(copied from the St. Paul Pioneer Press Dec. 7th)

Makes 1 1/2 lb Loaf
Ingredients:
3 c. All-purpose or bread flour, plus more for dusting
1/4 tsp. Instant yeast
1 1/4 tsp. Salt
1 5/8 c. lukewarm water
Cornmeal or wheat bran as needed

To Mix Dough, Let Rise: In a large bowl, combine flour, yeast and salt. Add 1 5/8 cups water. Stir until blended (note: dough will be shaggy and sticky). Cover bowl with plastic wrap. Let dough rise 12 - 18 hours at warm room temperature (approx. 70 degrees) or until dough surface is dotted with bubbles.

To Fold Dough: Lightly flour work surface. Place dough on surface. Sprinkle with a little more flour. Fold dough over on itself once or twice, and cover loosely with plastic wrap. Let rest for 15 minutes.

To Shape Dough: Using just enough flour to keep dough from sticking to work surface or fingers, gently and quickly shape dough into a ball. Generously coat cotton towel (NOT terrycloth!) with flour, wheat bran or cornmeal. Put dough, seam side down, on towel. Dust with more flour, bran or cornmeal. Cover with another cotton towel. Let rise for 2 hours or until dough is more than double in size and will not readily spring back when poked.

To Prepare Oven, Pot: At least 30 minutes before dough is ready, heat oven to 450 degrees. Put 6-to-8 quart heavy covered pot (cast iron, enamel, pyrex or ceramic) in the oven as it heats.

To Bake Dough: When the dough is ready, carefully remove pot from oven. Slide hand under towel. Turn dough over into pot, seam side up (Note: It may look like a mess, but that's okay. Shake pan once or twice if dough
is unevenly distributed; it will straighten out as it bakes). Cover with lid, and bake for 30 minutes. Remove lid and bake for 15 - 30 minutes, or until loaf is beautifully browned. Cool on rack.
In our experimentations with the recipe, we've found that rye bread is a very tasty variation: simply add as much as 1 cup of rye flour (or any kind of flour that suits your fancy - whole wheat, oat, etc.). Experiment to find your favorite flavor, and please tell me how it goes!

Good Lord!

Last night, we had a huge windstorm here. At about 11:30, this tree fell over and managed to become suspended on a wire (fortunately not an electrical wire) about 12 feet off the ground. The police and a fire truck came, but all they did was put up tape around the intersection. The tree is still there this morning. This is right across the street. That stop sign is on our parking strip. The first picture is from our front porch, and the second is from our driveway. This tree made it difficult to sleep last night.

In other Good Lord! news, I direct you to this article about Martha's latest adventure.

UPDATE: I decided that those two pictures could hardly give you the full effect the amazing suspended tree. So I made this video. Please forgive my horrible camera-work. I don't have a steady hand.