Things are looking up

After a somewhat brutal summer at work, things are finally looking up. Today, for the first time in many, many, MANY months, I actually felt back to my old self and excited about future mineralogical research. A couple of things have been the catalyst for this:

1. A new project - woo hoo!! I have agreed to do a project on the mineralogy/geochemistry of the Los Island syenites. The Los Archipelago is off the coast of Guinea, West Africa. The first person to study these rocks was Lacroix, the famous French mineralogist. Luckily, all his original material is still at the Natural History Museum in Paris. Conveniently, I happen to know the curator there very well!! So, this joint project is coming together, which also will include a trip to Paris to study the material. And the rocks are cool - neat mineralogy, and no one has really studied them indepth yet. Ya, the geology has been studied a bit, but not extensively. There's a possible wealth of new species waiting to be discovered.

2. I'm going to Golden, Colorado for the "Mineralogy and Museums 6" meeting. This happens every 4 years, alternating with the IMA conference. In 2004, it was in Paris. This time, it's being held at the Colorado School of Mines in Golden, about 40 miles from Denver. And since I'm the Canadian rep on the commission, I should probably go. I wasn't going to go as I have no budget, but one of my colleagues and friends has graciously offered to pay my way. I'm so excited. This is going to be a great "welcome back to mineralogy" conference. On top of it, it's in the friggin' Rockies AND in horse country!! How much better can it get? I'm staying after MM6 to go to the Denver Mineral Show for one day, meet with a colleague from the Smithsonian, and of course meet my Parisian contact. Oh, and also hike Pike's Peak and go to the New Belgium Brrewing Company and take the tour. And hit up every western apparel store I can possibly find. I'm thinking I need a brown pair of cowboy boots. I have a black pair, but a distressed brown pair would be awesome!! Hand made of course.

Oh man, I'm so excited. It's going to be a great first week of September!!

Right now, my quads are so sore. I did a Phase 2 class tonight, then stayed for CSW afterwards. And we did 'cards' as our "warm up". For anyone who has not had the pleasure of doing 'cards', this is how it works:

1. Take a deck of cards, shuffle well, place in centre of circle of people
2. The are three main exercises to be performed: jumping squats, push ups, and crunches (in that order)
3. The first person in the circle flips a card over: for example, a 7 of clubs. Everyone must then do 7 jumping squats.
4. The second person in the circle flips over the next card: for example, a 10 of hearts. Everyone must then do 10 push ups.
5. And so it goes, repeating the exercises in whatever rep the card dictates. Going through the entire deck takes about 20 minutes.

It's a much more enjoyable experience with interesting cards. Kruu has one set that has military/political leaders from the Middle East on them - it always makes the session interesting when each time you flip a card, you have to pronounce the dictator's name. :)

I actually enjoy doing cards. My quads don't! Jumping squats will kill you if you keep hitting them on the face cards, or the ace (11). But given that I've been a lazy slug for the last weeks, this was a good way to get back into it.

Tomorrow evening, I'm playing my first session of squash in more than a year. This should be interesting! I guarantee that I'll have squash butt on Friday morning. Actually, more likely it will be Saturday morning! I've decided to play women's city league this fall, and the ladder at the Sportsplex. I suspect I'm not going to have a fight this fall, so thought I'd cross train a bit. It's the skinny end of the racquet that you hold, right?