Guess How Many Green Sea Turtles I Saw?

Posted in Animals, Day Trips, Friends and Family, Me Me Me!, Non-cats, Travel by Marci

Today was a good day, one of those warm sunny autumn days that people actually come to visit southern California for. My friend Nicole and I headed down to the marina at Chula Vista to join up with a group of sea turtle enthusiasts (which also included my friends Tamara and Kari) and kayak out into the bay in hopes of getting a glimpse at one of the elusive marine reptiles. The San Diego Natural History Museum sponsored the program, so we got to hear a local sea turtle biologist talk about the different local species of turtles and ask a few questions. And lucky for you, I took the risk of bringing my camera along with me in the kayak so that I could snap a few pictures of the turtles we would surely see.

We paddled out of the marina and headed south towards the power plant where the green turtles hang out because they like the warmer effluent water. It was just a little breezy – enough for us to keep cool but not strong enough to make paddling difficult. It was soooo relaxing bobbing around in the waves; I saw an osprey and several flocks of Brandt’s geese, along with lots of other diving sea birds and jumping fish, which I think were mullet.

So while I didn’t see any sea turtles, I still had a good time, except for getting two blisters on my hands where I was holding the paddle. But I didn’t lose my camera, or tip my kayak, or accidentally cause anyone to bail out of their boat. So all in all, I can probably call the morning a success! Here are a few pictures to enjoy – you can see more through the slideshow link to the right.

10Nov2008

New Study Links Early Onset Alzheimer’s to Extreme Boredom

Posted in Complainments, Humor by Marci

A new study, conducted by the National Senility Institute, has revealed shocking new evidence that extreme boredom may lead to the early onset of Alzheimer’s disease. Under the most severe conditions, symptoms can start to show as early as age thirty in some patients. While only preliminary studies have been completed, the groundwork is set for more in-depth investigations as to the reasons why boredom can cause senility, progressing eventually to Alzheimer’s disease. Brain atrophy, a common result of chronic boredom, is thought to be the primary mechanism for advances in memory loss and dementia.

Marci Karski, NSI’s only study subject in the pilot studies to date, has exhibited startling signs of memory loss, a recent lack of creativity, an inability to utilize any kind of vocabulary other than rudimentary sentence formations, and a tendency to drool. “I started to worry, you know, because, like, I can’t think good anymore. I used to be kinda smart and stuff,” Karski lamented. Upon urging from colleagues and family, Karski decided to contact NSI for an evaluation.

Fortunately, NSI had been studying the effects of boredom on the human brain for quite some time. Preliminary investigations have revealed that extreme boredom (defined, in part, as sitting on one’s ass for up to 8 hours per day in front of a desk while performing tasks that don’t feel useful or fulfilling) can account for up to 75 percent of the variability exhibited by early onset dementia symptoms. Other contributing lifestyle factors may include excessive exposure to reality television, constantly whining geriatric dogs, and “not getting any”. Unfortunately, Karski faces all of these risks on a daily basis, so it is difficult to isolate which of these confounding factors may be primary causes for dementia, as opposed to just a minor pain in the ass.

“I’m hopeful that the NSI will find a cure for my disease,” Karski stated. “Maybe some day I’ll be able to think good again, and like, do stuff. Wait – who are you again? Where am I? What the hell are you talking about?”

For further information regarding this study, or to participate in future investigations pertaining to senility and boredom, contact the NSI and use trial code “I don’t want to end up like Karski” for the study reference.

21Oct2008

And we set off two ground sensors, too!

Posted in Animals, Career, Me Me Me!, Non-cats by Marci

I was fortunate enough to be able to leave the confines of my windowless cube-shaped office on Friday and escape into the Otay Mountain wilderness, just north of the US-Mexico border. A couple of us went on a tecate cypress reconnaissance mission for a monitoring program we’re developing for the Thorne’s hairstreak, a rare butterfly that lives in tecate cypress stands. It was a super nice day, and trekking through very dense prickly stabby vegetation left me sweaty, covered in charcoal (some of the stands we visited had burned recently), scratched, and minorly impaled. Needless to say, I was happy – I really do like being out in areas where I’m more likely to be speared by some sort of yucca plant than shot by a stray bullet (as is the case at home) or succumb to a severe case of carpel tunnel syndrome (as is the case at work).Actually, it was kind of sketchy – we came across numerous signs of illegal immigrants who cross the border and travel through the mountains (sneaker-not boot-tracks, empty waterbottles), and the brush is so dense that you’d practically be on top of someone before you knew they were there. Luckily, we didn’t run into any trouble, but we did set off at least two of the Border Patrol’s ground sensors, who deployed a helicopter to investigate us on two separate occasions. And holy balls – we saw a lot of BP agents, all driving brand-new trucks. Our government spends a lot of money trying to keep people from crossing the border, but I can’t see how it’s really worth it. We went to take a look at the border fence – we went all the way to the end of it – and people cut through it and tunnel under it, and the feds just patch the fence and wait for them to do it again. It’s just a cat and mouse game, and we keep spending the money to play. Pointless – we could be doing so much more with those dollars! Sigh…

Oh well – enjoy some pictures I took…

I spotted this burrowing owl from the road – the first one I’ve ever seen in the wild!

Moon setting over a ridge…

Looking southeast into Mexico…

The end of the border fence. Guess which side is Mexico!

16Oct2008

Holy "NO MORE" Moley!

Posted in Accomplishments, Friends and Family, Me Me Me! by Marci

Yup, that’s right, I finally got rid of THE mole. You know, the one on the bridge of my nose between my eyes. The one that was growing its own personality. The one that was going to start talking out loud any day. It has been a long time coming, let me tell you – people kept asking me, “when are you going to get rid of that thing?” And I kept putting it off – it’s a part of me, of my face. I didn’t even really notice it on a daily basis, looking in the mirror. BUT, when I saw photographs of myself, my eye would be immediately drawn to IT…so I knew it was time for me and my mole to part ways.It was pretty easy, really – it didn’t hurt at all, and the wound isn’t *that* noticeable (or at least, not as noticeable as an organism the approximate size of an eight-week-old fetus nestled between my eyes would be). And the wound is temporary…AND, my coworkers have been kind enough not to say anything about it.

Whatever…I’m just saying.

Here are pictures of me and Nicole at the Wild Animal Park at Lorikeet Landing last weekend (pre-mole-D-Day). By the way – not too many single guys will attend “A Taste of CRES”, so you can cross that off your list of ways to meet eligible single guys. Again, I’m just saying.

See that mole??? It’s no longer there!!!

Look at how cute Nicole is…

31Aug2008

A great start to a fabulous Labor Day weekend…

Posted in Animals, Cats, Complainments, Me Me Me! by Marci

Saturday:
6:07 am – wake up call from Zoe meowing and demanding food
9:30 am – phone call with friend Brenda in Minnesota, learned the meaning of the word “gitchy”
10:42 am – drive Zoe to Acacia for her monthly catupuncture session
12:24 pm – finally leave Acacia after learning that Zoe has lost 3/4 lb. (down to 5.4 lbs) and opting for a full panel blood test
1:09 pm – arrive at Joanne’s to figure out what to sew for class; pick out easy pattern for a closet organizer and black fabric featuring skulls and roses
1:54 pm – scarf down a chicken pita pocket prior to sewing class
2:00 pm – sewing class starts
3:14 pm – realize that I fucked up and cut large strips of fabric only half the width they were supposed to be
3:16 pm – realize that I knew I was going to fuck up and breathe a sigh of relief that I had purchased lots of extra matching fabric
4:42 pm – leave sewing class a little early
5:00 pm – walk into apartment as vet calls, telling me that Zoe’s blood sugar is extremely high and that she’s definitely diabetic and that she needs to get to California Vet Specialists asap for insulin
5:42 pm – arrive at CVS with Mom and a very pissed off Zoe
8:17 pm – finally leave CVS with Mom and even more pissed off Zoe, who has had an insulin shot and been taken off her cancer meds, along with instructions to come back Sunday morning for another blood glucose check
9:08 pm – give up on finding anything good on tv, read in bed, sleep

Sunday:
7:02 am – wake up call from Zoe, feed her food she doesn’t want to eat
8:17 am – take Zoe back to CVS
10:30 am – retrieve Zoe from CVS, who has been given fluids and instructions to come back again on Monday for another recheck
Current time – blog blog blog, realizing that I spent almost $600 on Zoe’s medical needs in the past 24 hours

Stay tuned for more excitement!

31Aug2008

My Pacific Northwest "Vacation"

Posted in Animals, Cats, Friends and Family, Me Me Me!, Non-cats, Travel, Vacations by Marci

So last week I used 40 of my hard-earned annual leave hours to fly up to Portland. I had originally planned on simply visiting my mom and brother (it was his birthday on the 19th – happy birthday, Paul!), his wife, and new daughter Adelaide. However, additional vacation duties also included helping my mom pack up her house, clean it, and drive back down to Escondido for her move back down to SoCal. I still had a good time though, even though Mom’s cat, Leo, had to be put down the morning I arrived in Oregon. Leo will definitely be missed, although I don’t think we could have fit him into the car for the long trip south considering that the parrot and dog took up the majority of the available space.Other activities involved visiting two (!) REI stores, walking around Lacamas Park in Camas, initiating a corruptive influence on my beautiful and awesome niece (I bought that ABCD onsie for her when she was only a fetus!), celebrating Paul’s 33rd birthday at Deschutes Brewery in downtown Portland, and spending the better portion of a day walking around the Pearl district.

Lacamas Park in Camas

Corruption Phase 1 Initiated

Packing for the trip home…

The drive back down to Escondido was fairly uneventful, and let me tell you that the landscape only gets MORE BEAUTIFUL as you travel south, leaving the lush green fresh scenery of Washington and Oregon for the shriveled brown smog-laiden traffic-scape of our urban coastal community. Sigh. And, to make things even better, Michael (Mom’s parrot, severe macaw, actually) took the opportunity to fly away the evening of our arrival home. She went missing for two days, but Mom miraculously recovered her after plying her with wheat thins, peanuts, and a squeaky ball. I’m thinking that with this experience, Mom now has the know-how for earning supplemental income recovering rogue feathered pets.

Then it was back to work on Monday…it will only take another five months of work to gain those 40 hours of annual leave back, so I’d better get on that I guess.

2Jul2008

Stress stress stress

Posted in Career, Me Me Me!, Updates by Marci

I know I haven’t written in a while, and I’m sorry to say that I don’t have anything particularly interesting to report. No pictures, either. But I’ve been busy, alright??? Work has been particularly chaotic – I’ve had to make some BIG decisions concerning my job, but I finally got my promotion so money will not be an issue. Basically, I was offered a position as the Recovery Branch Chief, and I went back and forth for a couple of weeks trying to decide whether or not to take it. In the end I decided to decline the offer; mostly, I feel like I still need to spend some time in the trenches, and one of the things I like most about my job is seeing the results of my work fairly quickly and concretely. For example, there are projects that I’ve worked on that have ended up having more habitat conserved partly as a result of my efforts. And I like that. So, that’s pretty much what it came down to, among a few other factors.

I’ve also been looking for a new place to live. I want to move to Carlsbad or Oceanside to be closer to work and friends, and to get away from the heat of Infernodido. Rent is a little higher on the coast, but with the way gas prices are going, I’ll probably spend less money just having a shorter commute. But, looking for apartments is one of my VERY LEAST FAVORITE things to do, and I have very limited tolerance for trying to get in touch with potential landlords and viewing crapholes. So, if anyone knows of a really great place that takes dogs and cats and is big and cheap and requires no security deposit and has a great view of the ocean and a complimentary on-call masseur, please let me know.

Sound good? Hope you’re all doing great and are having a fantastic summer!

17Jun2008

Babies Babies Everywhere Babies

Posted in Friends and Family, Me Me Me! by Marci

Wow, you people are reproducing machines! It seems like all of my friends and relatives are having first-time babies in the past few months. I feel like a reproductive failure in comparison! But not really – I’m glad that someone else is doing all that pushing and Lamazing and C-sectioning, rather than me. Here’s the short list of the latest batch of critters that are new to the world:

– Autumn Laura Monroe, born January 10 to my friends Jeremy and Dana
– Rhoan Morgan Alexander, born January 15 to my friends Ben and Jen
– Raimi Anne Juncal, born April 28 to my cousin Beth and her husband OB
– Adelaide Helen Koski, born May 22 to my brother Paul and his wife Anne
– Lucas William Craig, also born May 22 to my friends Kristi and Adam

So congratulations, all! Just remember, you only need to have one more in order to replace yourselves in the next generation. I know the babies are cute and everything (especially my new niece), but let’s not get crazy!

17May2008

It’s the story…of a girl named Marci…

Posted in Career, Entertainment, Me Me Me!, Movies and TV by Marci

I can’t believe that I’m 34 years old and I have never met a celebrity…before today. Yup, that’s right, I spent the afternoon hob-nobbing with the celebs when I went to Agua Hedionda Lagoon’s First Annual Celebrity Fishing Tournament! The main reason I went was to support the cause of protecting the lagoon, of course, but the other main reason I went was to meet Christopher Knight, a.k.a. Peter Brady. He was so nice! And he even remembered my name after a couple of hours of meeting other weirdos like me…actually, all the celebrities there were pretty nice. Hmmm…let’s see…who else did I meet? Adrianne Curry was there (who is married to Chris Knight and won the first season of America’s Next Top Model), but I won’t be posting the photo that was taken of me and her together because me standing next to a supermodel is hard for me to look at. Also attending was Brett Cullen (who plays Goodwin on Lost), Christopher Atkins (who was the boy/man in The Blue Lagoon), and Marc McClure (who played Jimmy Olson in all of the Superman movies). There were other people there too – soap stars, mostly, that I didn’t recognize. Anyway, it was pretty fun and I’m glad that I finally got to meet one of the stars of my all-time favorite TV shows. He even signed my program! Woo hoo!!!

8May2008

It’s not all about birds and butterflies…

Posted in Career, Me Me Me! by Marci

It’s also brodiaea season! Brodiaea filifolia, or thread-leaved brodiaea, is one of the several endangered species that I work with in my turf. It was a nice rainy winter, so the brodiaea is up and blooming. Some years it doesn’t bloom at all, so it’s always cool when the purple flowers open up and you can see where the populations are. These pictures were taken Monday, when I went to see one of the largest populations left in Carlsbad, on the La Costa Greens preserve. Enjoy!

We also saw tons of ground spiders. They usually hide down in the hole when they see you coming, but this bad-ass came up to see what I was doing as I snapped a few pictures of him. Also, a couple of days ago I finally got my first view of El Salto Falls, on Buena Vista Creek in Carlsbad. It’s a wonderful waterfall (very rare in the area) that has about a 40-foot drop. Native Americans have been visiting the falls for about 9000 years, and it’s on their list of sacred places; you can’t access the falls, but if you park at the northwestern corner of the Kohl’s parking lot off of Marron Road, peek over the fence and you’ll have a great view. Very cool!