The Mild January

After a five week hiatus, I once again have a busy schedule and hold many responsibilities. Tuesday brought a reunion of the survivors of Statistics for Biologists I. The classroom buzzed with chatter before our instructor welcomed us back; there was a sense of familiarity there, filled with friends.

I have been ambitious and have taken on the challenge of preparing two more grant proposal applications due by February 1st. Practice practice practice. 

I taught my first section of the spring semester today. With some experience behind me, I went ahead with more confidence and ease. Three sections of Introductory Biology (Organismal) for biology majors to teach in a week. That's around 55 students. Well, the pay check will be a little bit larger. s

Let's celebrate to one week of diligent exercise! Thank you, Dad, for the funds to attend fitness class for the semester. The joys of exercise had evaded me. It is difficult, sweaty, and pushes me to my muscular limit, but benefits do indeed follow. Furthermore, I have curbed my dessert and sweets intake and I have not made a dessert in almost two weeks. For this dessert connoisseur, it is quite an accomplishment. 

The weather has been beautifully mild and wonderful. I confess: Minnesota is miserably and brutally cold in January. Sunny skies with crisp mornings and warm afternoons, reminiscent of Minnesota in autumn.

I enjoyed a walk to the Supple Science Castle this morning. The castle happens to be on the complete opposite side of campus from where I live, as well as through a land of rolling hills. 

Oakleys on as I walk out of the door, down the stairs, and towards the campus. Pass the neighbor's orange tree. As I walked down the hill, I listened to the vocalizations of the ubiquitous feathered vertebrates. A lovely symphony composed of a myriad of voices and varieties. The chickadees are loud and chatter their name along with a suite of vocalizations. 

The Blue Jays make their presence known in the neighborhood. They squawk loudly. One squawks in flight while more garrulous jays' calls can be heard from all directions. 

Mocking birds and Great-tailed Grackles are also abundant. 

If you stop and watch the birds, you enter a world that our feathered kin inhabit around us. The grackles continue on communicating with one another by bill tilts, puffing their feathers, songs, and various other behaviors. To me, it's mildly amusing and brings about a slight calmness. 

They carry on with their avian ways, above and around their bipedal cousins.

What would it be like to live as a bird? One can only try to imagine, restricted by our world view based upon the lives of our nature as ground-dwelling, bipedal mammals.

But, at least we can appreciate the diversity of other sensory worlds that exist in parallel to ours.