Proposal et alia

Finally, a blog about ticks.  But not just any ticks, we only look at the active ticks; the ones either scurrying around or climbing high or the ones snugly attached and sucking like the world is their milkshake.

Don't think of me as a sick person, it's research.  Totally business.  So is this another one of those research blogs where I bombard you with facts and info and fake smiles through caffeinated-sustained impulses?  Does it sound like one?

I know... sassy.

First, I'll let you know where we stand.  In terms of real life, that depends on your position from good ol' Kirksville, Missouri, donned K-vegas by those who know it best.  It's a lot like Vegas, but meth is the drug of choice and instead of lights and strippers we have wind blowing in your face from all directions and cicadas.  Plan your next tipsy vacation carefully, we are quite the destination.  In terms of the mental work of the research, we are finishing up our proposal.  We gave presentations of it last week (I'll update another that story another time).  So it's a hurry-scurry to get all of dots crossed and our t's blotted with red ink of our mentors as we keep rolling out the editions.  If puberty could be reduced into paper form, this paper would be more of a confusing mess than Justin Bieber fans.  [Would hit Twilight with this, but I'm not interested in menopause: I'm looking at you Twilight Moms].  But if this foundation gets laid right, the road to a good project is paved.  Unfortunately, we are paving our road with mice and ticks.

In terms of physical work, we stand either in a field "dominated by non-native grasses" or a "secondary oak-hickory" forest.  "dominated by non-native grasses" is the last name of the field, "secondary oak-history" is the first name of the forest: don't forget it or you aren't embracing the biology of the MathBio study.  I'll get into the techniques of our sampling later.  Trust me; it's so much fun!  Take everything one could love about the outdoors: sun, plants, nice air, etc... and add ticks.  I think Alduos Huxley sampled ticks.  I mean, how else could he get that baby scene.


Well, the proposal is calling me, and by that I mean the idea of our mentors beating us for not working.  Tiger mentoring, it's cruel and vicious and gets you published.

Stay itchy,

~Justin Baraboo