(no subject)

Yay, my computer is back. I hope i have made reasonable partitioning decisions. One terabyte. Not that we don't have other terabyte drives in the house, but this is in *my* machine. The crossing the benchmark takes me back to when i bought my first real computer (not the Timex Sinclair) and had a whole one gigabyte drive, and my awe at that size of disk.

Viva Moore's Law, and all that.

Christine is off to see her siblings and her mother for an early celebration of her mother's birthday, and possibly a last chance to see her. The doctor said earlier this week that her mother has entered late-stage Alzheimer's. I am so happy we could send Christine off to NC at short notice: doubly happy that, for once, there was a Delta flight at a reasonable time so i could use up some of the accumulated points.

I was sick yesterday: i seem to have had a 28 hour cold. This morning there's no headache and little congestion.

I have plenty to keep me busy, as i need to get some of the work due yesterday done before Monday.

Yesterday i tracked down more lupines of the Bay Area, finding more "lost lupines" and a few "new lupines." My current theory is that the lost lupines are at the southerly end of the range in the early 1900s and the new lupines are at the northerly end of their range. Lupines of the central valley in the 1900s could be moving west by creeping up the elevation of the coastal range. It's a hypothesis. The counter-hypothesis is that the lost lupines are simply unobserved or extirpated by development, but i'm left with the question of the new lupines, ones now reported but not reported in the early 1900s. As i go through the key, i'll be able to see if the new species might have been lumped in with another observed species, explaining the more recent occurrence.

I have recognized that what am thinking about as my next career is that of essentially being a writer-photographer. I need to begin paying attention to my writing, and so i've moved Virginia Tufte's book on style next to my pillow. I have little hope that the proximity is all that is needed to improve my writing, but it is an indication of awareness.

One of the glorious benefits of this clarity is that i know how to trim my interests. Should i network with python developers? Big data analysts? More identity management folks? No. I may still need to learn python and analyze the data i collect, and i have no idea how long i will remain working in identity management, but i should follow my heart to botany, writing, and photography.

I have lists of things i need to learn to give depth to my writing: topmost is more about the practice of botanical nomenclature. Physics has its egotists and adventurers, but botanists seem to have a bit more drama about them.

If i was to state my interests right now it would be in the interaction of natural history with social history in limited geographies.

Off to start the dungeons and desktops game for the day.