One Last Day of Birding for 2011

Despite the fact that we've reached the end of December, it has been quite pleasant here in Edmonston, Maryland.  The last few days have seen temperatures over 12 °C, which is a welcome treat considering some of the colder weather we had a few weeks back.  It was great to get outside and do some yard work without having to put on layers.  It was also great letting my terrapin back out into her pond for a few hours a day (as she normally spends her winter months in an indoor tank).  But the last few days have also been great for birding.  It may have nothing to do with the weather at all, but in the span of about 45 minutes today, I saw a greater variety of birds in my yard than I sometimes do all season long, two species of which were a first for me in my "new" home.  But why tell you about it when I could just show you? In fact, how about an end of the year bird quiz? Leave your guesses in the comments section!

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May your Cephalopodmas be gibbous and bright!

And by bright, of course I mean bioluminescent and chromatophoric!  Here's a tentacular "gift" for you all!

I realize it's not much to look at now, but it's just one piece of a much larger project that I've been working on for a while (and hope to complete soon). Anyway, if there was ever a day to post it to the blog, Cephalopodmas would be that day. So here's to the cephalopods and the teuthologists who study them.  From the tiniest tainoceratid, to the largest lepidoteuthid, happy Cephalopodmas to all, and to all an inky night!

Get out the map!

This is a map of the United States of America I have hanging in my office. Why am I taking a photo of it and posting it to the blog? Good question, and I have a pretty good answer: Blogger FINALLY has a mobile application for your smart phone. Which means that wherever I am in United States, as long as I have mobile service, I can post photos and text to the blog. So when I can't get my thoughts out in 140 characters or less, this is going to be a great alternative.

Gasoline? Where we're going we don't need gasoline.

If you've spent some time here at Superoceras, you may have realized that in addition to being interested in science and natural history, people might consider me a "geek" for a lot of other reasons.  I certainly do fall into more than one geek subgroup, that's for sure.  So when two of my geeky interests intersect, I'm all for shouting from the rooftops about it.  But I don't have a 30 ft ladder which I would need to access said roof, so I'm going to use the blog instead. Here it goes: The DeLorean DMC-12 is coming back, and this sucker's (all) electrical!

Coffee!

It's Thursday morning.  The weekend is almost here.  Please enjoy this educational film about "the fuel of the modern world" while I go make myself a cup.  It's coffee time!