All the little things
It's getting close to Christmas break, and that means I'm trying to finish up a number of tasks before I leave town. Since submitting my Svalbard manuscript, I've helped Andrew get some things organized for the expedition in February. We had to schedule plane tickets, order hardware and chemicals, and look into legal liability issues. So many logistics!
I'm really not sure how, but I also managed to write the first draft of another manuscript. Yes, a different one from the Svalbard image analysis. This manuscript is actually going to be a cornerstone of my thesis, because it concerns dropstone communities in the Fram Strait. I used the dropstone communities to test several different hypotheses based on the classical literature for terrestrial island fauna. I wanted to know if the same forces structuring bird communities on islands also applied to dropstone islands in the deep sea. As it turns out, some theories fit, and some didn't. My analysis was actually able to show some important new principles for how isolated communities are structured.
I'll tell you more once my co-authors have all had a chance to revise the manuscript. I'm hoping to submit it to a very good journal. It feels crazy to me that in the last four months I've been in Norway, I have analyzed and written up two whole datasets, outplanted an experiment in Svalbard, visited colleagues in Germany, and helped Andrew prepare for a cruise. This is by far the most productive I've ever been.
Still, several little tasks remain on my to-do list. It still hasn't really hit me that I'm leaving in two days to visit family. With any luck, I'll stay focused, chug through my list, and then have a relaxing break. Just two more days!
I'm really not sure how, but I also managed to write the first draft of another manuscript. Yes, a different one from the Svalbard image analysis. This manuscript is actually going to be a cornerstone of my thesis, because it concerns dropstone communities in the Fram Strait. I used the dropstone communities to test several different hypotheses based on the classical literature for terrestrial island fauna. I wanted to know if the same forces structuring bird communities on islands also applied to dropstone islands in the deep sea. As it turns out, some theories fit, and some didn't. My analysis was actually able to show some important new principles for how isolated communities are structured.
I'll tell you more once my co-authors have all had a chance to revise the manuscript. I'm hoping to submit it to a very good journal. It feels crazy to me that in the last four months I've been in Norway, I have analyzed and written up two whole datasets, outplanted an experiment in Svalbard, visited colleagues in Germany, and helped Andrew prepare for a cruise. This is by far the most productive I've ever been.
Still, several little tasks remain on my to-do list. It still hasn't really hit me that I'm leaving in two days to visit family. With any luck, I'll stay focused, chug through my list, and then have a relaxing break. Just two more days!
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