Evolution 2008

I got back this morning at about 1am from a conference in Minneapolis called "Evolution". It's put on by the SSE (Society for the Study of Evolution) who publishes a big journal called Evolution and this is their annual meeting. It was great fun to sit a listen to all the latest research that is happening in the field. I personally had a poster in a poster session, basically I made a poster outlining my research and stood by it for three hours and talked to people about what I did and what I found. The session was actually on the Washington St. Bridge, the pedestrian part, that crosses over the Mississippi. It was pretty cool to stand there over the Mississippi to do the poster except that we were in this enclosed space that was really hot, with the sun shining in as it set, and it echoed. I practically had to yell to be heard. It was really fun to do and a really good experience. I didn't expect anyone to come to my poster, but found out through the session that my advisor's name is much better known that I realized, so I had a ton of people stop by and tell me that they had worked with him, wanted to know if he was around, he sent them down to see it, etc. I stayed busy talking to people for almost 2 1/2 hours straight, which was great because it made the time go really fast. It was so interesting to talk to so many people and hear their questions, opinions, life stories etc. which was made even more fun by the fact that the vast majority of people were drinking beer and wine while we talked.
Anyway, there are more stories to come from the trip (it was really quite fun and adventurous) but this is enough for today. I some other students from my lab and one of them brought a camera and took pictures, so I am going to try and get her to send them to me. If I am successful I will post them.

Road Trip

Left: Emily and I stopped the the Belagio in Las Vegas, just for kicks. For those of you who don't know, that is one of the very large hotels, which happens to be the one in Ocean's Eleven. We were looking for free things to do to kill some time before the long haul through the desert and found out the the Belagio has gardens that you can tour for free. The gardens we saw were impressive, but really small, so we are not sure whether that was all (and that's why they're free) or if we missed the rest of the gardens. Either way, what we saw was awesome! This is a topiary train. The whole thing was so awesome and entertaining. I would definitely recommend it if you are driving through.
Middle: Tara and David
Bottom: The Cranston family and me (Ashley, Nicki, Doug, Alyssa, Rob, Tara, David [hiding])


The great thing about this summer is that with no school, I have a lot of time to do some of those things that I always wanted to do, but never got to. The last few weeks have been full of them! One such event was a trip to CA to see two of my sisters and their families. My friend, and former roommate, Emily came along to keep me company on the drive (and I was so grateful for that because some parts of the drive felt so long!). We left after work on Thursday night, stayed in St. George, drove to Las Vegas and stopped for a break, then drove the rest of the way to Tara's house. Long, but worth it. We stayed with Tara for a day and then headed to Melanie's for about a day and a half before we headed home. It was so good to see their families and spend some good quality time.



Left: Kate, Nicki, RaeLynn, Jessica
Middle: Melanie and Kate
Bottom: Melanie and me