so, i'm going to be coming home for 8 days over thanksgiving, from the 16th through the 24th. we really should make sure a breakfast at the dinkytowner happens.

nothing really exciting has happened lately, except when three of us grad students just about got the department's truck stuck on a mountain the other day. i've been working outside on mapping projects and going on field trips close to every other day, which is pretty awesome. people told me Idaho State was a field school, the kind of place where you learned geology walking around outside, and it is certainly true. on wednesday we leave for the cascades and central oregon on the departmental seminar trip. it'll last five days. it should be fun. oh, and i almost ended up going to tucson to a mining conference. caleb, a grad student here that i worked in alaska with, is going and i almost managed to weasel my way in too. anyway, i told him he should check out the meet rack while he's there. sounds like he will, and hopefully he'll take advantage of the meet rack's generous lifetime discount by getting branded with jim's face.

i also noticed i haven't been rubbing my stomach when i'm lecturing to my labs. and i even lectured my intro lab for close to 45 mintues the other day, a new record. pretty amazing...