I found the olympic gold medalist of mental gymnastics tonight. Our bible study covered the parable of the rich man and Lazarus and one person (a nurse) claimed that we don't need to give to the homeless because paying taxes funds some social programs. Talk about missing the point of the story.

Starting to question whether my research ethics professor is going to put any thought into this class, we're going on 5 weeks of the same assignment with slight variations. The question has gotten nonsensical at this point.

The Holy See went pretty hard in their NDC. "Environmental justice - implicitly proclaimed by the prophets - can no longer be regarded as an abstract concept or distant goal" is a banger of an opening sentence

Realizing I promised my advisor I'd have all our abiotic data processed by the end of this week. Hunkering down to get it done today

Sad to find out that Cheekwood gardens has a financial relationship with CoreCivic. They were never a high quality botanical garden, but it was a pretty place to walk and look at trees. Oh well, no walking place is worth the horrors of the private prison industry.

Hey middle Tennesseeans, early voting for the special election primary starts today Find your way to a polling station over the next two weeks #Tennessee #Nashville

Tried to leave the university but it's raining sideways out there. Back to data entry I guess

Pro tip for any undergrads who will be working or volunteering with a research lab: Have neat, legible handwriting. Please don't make the grad students track you down to ask if the cryptic symbol you wrote on a datasheet is a "3" or a "5" or an "8"

The great thing about art is that Matisse had no conception of what a grad student office in 2025 would be like, and yet he painted something that really captures the feeling of working in one

Given that professors are being fired for teaching in their field, we have to conclude that Texas A&M is no longer a functional university.

Just found out I technically haven't been working for the university this past month because they make grad students sign new contracts every 1-4 months. My last contract was for July and the one I just got is September through December. They tricked me into a month of unpaid labor.

Just finished reading "Stop Saving the Planet! An Environmentalist Manifesto" by Jenny Price. Would not recommend. It reads like an extended blogpost, is poorly formatted/repetitive, and doesn't answer the main question in the introduction. Leans on broad generalizations and annoying catch-phrases.

Trump's claiming Chicago and Baltimore are more dangerous than Afghanistan

Plants phylogeny is a mess anyway Credit : @xkcd.com

I'm a hater of classes that say they have a "research" component but then it's basically already done. Hitting "run" on a model that the professor's postdoc wrote isn't research

Anyone have recommendations of good resources for learning LaTeX? I'm preparing my first manuscript for publication and I fear MS Word is making this process more difficult than it has to be.

I won a baby-sized Rite in the Rain notebook in a raffle at ESA, what should I use such a small book for? It's about 1" x 2". No idea is too silly

I hope that one day the librarians will see how many of my interlibrary loan requests are for Canadian Journal of Forest Research articles and just subscribe to it

Is anyone here going to ESA, and if so would you be interested in doing the ecology themed escape room with me?

Looked up ACA plans (because $21k makes me too wealthy for TennCare and the university doesn't offer health insurance) and I'm just going to have to be uninsured for 3 years. Cannot afford to pay the premiums even with the highest deductible plans.

Has anyone else noticed a pattern of students and administrators overemphasizing networking? It's not just a lack of technical skills, even soft skills are lacking; I have an intern this summer who hasn't given me any reason to write a good letter of rec and yet is focused on networking.

I wish the grad school would tell us what needs to be fixed when they send back thesis formatting revisions. Instead they just say "revisions needed" and attach the formatting handbook

All I want for Christmas is for the grad school administrators at my university to write clear instructions or to pick up the phone. These clowns won't even respond to emails from students unless you CC faculty. They make me think an EdD actually makes you less qualified to work in education.

Did you know that Enterprise's roadside assistance uses different software than the rental service? That's why they accused me of not being a customer and refused to send help. I had to hitchhike in the back of a pickup with my undergrad and all our equipment. The park ranger also never showed up.

Is it just me or has NPR lost their ability to critique the current administration? The last couple months of coverage have felt off.

Tip for undergrad techs - if you have a complaint, address it with your supervisor first. Going straight to the dean of academics to file a formal complaint before talking to anyone in the lab is how you get fired (because no one wants to employ a tattle-tale).

Pumped for ESA this year, I have a colorful schedule for every waking moment of the week and a system for notes/business cards/reading recommendations. Hope to see some of y'all in Baltimore!

Volunteering with a kids' summer program this week and it turns out they are unpredictable. I planned a fun activity for them involving dry beans and they ended up throwing them at each other.

I'm so ready to be done with field work. Very jealous of anyone who doesn't have to get dozens of ticks and get soaked to the bone for data.

We had another surprise thunderstorm today - not in the forecast until it was on top of us. Trump's NWS cuts are actively endangering my field crew, especially since there were flash floods with no warning.

Yesterday a thunderstorm predicted for 5:00 PM showed up at 2:45. It was raining so hard the dirt road to our field site was losing chunks, I couldn't see without shielding my eyes. I wish we could rely on weather predictions, but this is the third surprise thunderstorm we've had in two weeks #NOAA

Had to drive an undergrad home (2 hours) after field work yesterday, I texted the other one that I'd drive back in the morning because I was tired. She called me panicking because she was too scared to stay alone "in the middle of the woods" (an AirBnB with locks and wifi) so I had to drive back

Learned about R notebook today and I'm kinda peeved my stats professors never told us about it. You're telling me I can send my advisor code with associated outputs in one clean document??? And not fight MS word??

If anyone has a copy of this can you send it to me please? #SciSky Chapman, G. L. (1950). The Influence Of Mountain Laurel Undergrowth On Environmental Conditions And Oak Reproduction [Yale University].

Defense tomorrow

"I'll work on my presentation on the plane" is the worst idea ever.

Unfortunately getting to the point with anti-environmentalists where I don't even bother arguing with them and just hope that a natural disaster impacts them personally enough to get on board with solutions

Last day of writing my master's thesis!

Any book recommendations for a scientist to get into climate policy? I want to understand how that side of the environmental world works

Y'all got any advice on writing a thesis discussion? Currently scouring the internet for advice blogs

Day ??? of writing this thesis. Wearing sunglasses indoors because my ocular migraines are back for the first time in a decade and I can't work if I can't see. Still not making enough progress.

Remember that every accusation of "virtue signaling" is a confession by the accuser that they have no virtue.

Working hard on my papers so that I can get a post-doc outside of the US someday. The racism in my community is disgusting and I don't want to talk to these people anymore. It's exhausting to hear dehumanization and hatred all the time

Oh yeah nice one kid hook that hope for humanity right into my veins

I heard that reading fiction is good for cognitive abilities so I got a copy of Flannery O'Connor's short stories. I really don't understand why some white people are so eager to say the n-word in public because I feel uncomfortable even reading the censored version out loud in my own home

I can tell the new Pope is a decent person because the trump supporters in the diocese groupchat are furious

I think Dems could gain a lot of ground if they went after companies that employ/exploit undocumented workers. Companies like JBS are exploiting workers who they know can't go to OSHA or report wage theft, and cracking down on them would be popular across the political spectrum

Someone accused me of an ad hominem fallacy because I said that The Firearm Industry Trade Association was a biased source. Republicans really are something.

Just got a notice from my primary care office that if I bring up any problems at my annual checkup that it will be billed as a separate visit. What's the point of a checkup if you can't discuss your health with your doctor? This system is ridiculous