Whole-Life Update

Hello Folks,

Since I left the Aquarium in April of this year, I have been healing (my body notified me dramatically that it will no longer be ignored), writing, and networking. I have updated my resume to reflect my rich experience in education, program development and management, capacity building (basically just helping people expand their horizons, skills, and knowledge), and volunteer management.

But I am looking for a new type of work that may be in a field well beyond marine biology. I want to work with people who want what I have to offer and love their work, people like the volunteers I left behind at the Aquarium. These wonderful volunteers love to learn, are curious about the world, and really want to make a positive difference. These are the kinds of people I need in my work life.

In between job hunting and healing and networking, I have been photographing bugs and my garden and virtually anything with an interesting texture or design. I have spotted several bumble bee species in my garden nectaring on the red clover that springs up along the burnt edges of what passes for my lawn, and on the flowering herbs and other bumble-bee friendly flowers in my small garden. Strangely, many perennial plants that grew tall last year and bloomed in mid-July last summer are much shorter and developing flowers already; is it the early heat?

Last Monday I presented "Six-Hearted Sex," a Powerpoint about giant Pacific octopus reproduction. I had detailed notes to go with my photos, but like the pollinator presentation I gave last year at Scarabs (the local entomology group), it was too dark to read them. So, I just dove into my inner entertainer. I had a great time, reflected by a cheering crowd and crowned by one nine year old boy's final comment                     "You are a-m-a-z-i-n-g!"

Back to the garden. Increased heat and more days of it means more plant-chomping critters. Even in the many painted pots I use to expand my garden space, herbivorous insects have been making forays. First it was cabbage white butterfly larvae, hiding by day along the spines of dinosaur kale leaves. Wise to their camouflage, I picked their unmoving kale-green bodies off the leaves at night and popped them into my carnivorous pitcher plants. Now I have leaf miners (larvae of an as yet unidentified insect) skeletonizing rainbow chard leaves. If I catch them before they pupate, I pick them out of the middle of the leaf layers and feed them to the half dozen sundew plants on the windowsill. Yum. And big old black flies that enter the house, well, this says it all in my sort-of poem, "Nightcap":

A big, black, buzzing housefly,

the kind that seems almost too huge to be airborne,

keeps banging into the shower curtain,

stuck in her routine.

House-bound flies like this used to drive me nuts

Now, they delight me

Because I have plans.

Big plans,

For this big fly.

 “Just stick around, honey,

I have someone I want you to meet.

Her name is Venus

She’s outside right now visiting the garden,

but soon, 

I’m bringing her pot in for the night.

Can you say: Venus flytrap?

I'll add more photos once I figure out how.

Cheers,

Hariana

Watch This

Because I care about what I put into my mouth and my brain, I want to know what the food industry is up to  (read or watch "Food Inc."). And beyond my own body, I want to to keep the world safe for the myriad of little creepy crawlies and other creatures that really keep nature running. But right now, the big thing for me is food security, which is featured in a video documentary I just ran across. Access to healthy food is an environmental justice issue, especially for people who live in neighborhoods without access to fresh food, but plenty of fast food chains. "Urban Fruit" is the video. I found it on Amazon's Prime video, had no idea what it was about, but it sounded cool. I have seen it twice. I loved it.

If you care about food security and have a rebellious streak, watch this. The people who are interviewed are just plain folks who are growing vegetables in innovative and empowering ways.
Share it with your kids, partner, friends.

Follow These Women

One woman has come from the world of fashion and filmmaking, the other from science and advanced degrees. Both have famous parents, courage, and bright, creative intellects. The also share a love of the natural world, especially invertebrates, and a rich fascination with the sexual proclivities, parts, and processes of these animals. Each woman has created a world that explores and celebrate the intimate lives of the spineless and other little-known animals.

Olivia Judson, an evolutionary biologist, has a current blog at http://judson.blogs.nytimes.com/. Her 2002 book, Dr Tatiana's Sex Advice to All Creation: The Definitive guide to the Evolutionary Biology of Sex, is not to be missed. Written like a Dear Abby column, it purports to give sex advice to confused critters with complicated and mysterious reproductive strategies. The result is a factual, funny, and very detailed account of much more than just what part goes where. I have found copies in used bookstores for under $10. Get one.

Isabella Rossellini's new book is accompanied by a DVD of short videos. Green Porno is a delightful visual exploration of the sex lives and more of marine and other invertebrates. Although shorter on accuracy than Olivia Judson's pieces, the paper creations that depict the animals and sexual processes are delightful.

Since these two books have been published, several other books about animal sex have come out. But these two are, well, ovular (I'm trying to find another word besides the male-oriented "seminal", meaning "formative, groundbreaking, original, innovative). Ovilar sounds like a character from a Hobbit story. Ovumnal or ovanal are awkward. I'll go with ovular.