Well, its almost time for me to head off to Dutch Harbor, Alaska (yes, same port used in Deadliest Catch) to board the R/V Thomas G. Thompson (I know, Thomas Thompson?!) As my dad would say, I am about to embark on "little turtle's big adventure". I think that's the title of a children's book. My flight leaves at 7:10 (joy!) Tuesday morning and I am currently bracing myself for the abhorrent task of packing, which I will probably put off until absurdly late tomorrow night. However, I do have most of my clothes laid out on my spare bed and made a trip to Wal-mart today for some last minute items- you know, little things, like a camera. (That should be pretty illustrative of the nature of my procrastination).

I've come back to my parent's house for the weekend to visit before I head off. I've been trying to participate in some of my favorite indulgences, as I won't be able to do so in the coming five weeks. Yesterday, I went sailing and wakeboarding. (You know, I've gotta spend some time on the water before getting on a boat for a month) Also on the docket: eating lunch at CD cafe, the best restaurant in Calvert County. I also intend to ingest some delicious Maryland produce, which I shall sorely miss. You know what I won't miss? My brother complaining about how much he has to study for the bar, while in fact, he just watches the World Cup and drinks copious amounts of Crystal Light fruit punch.

I've also been collecting reading material on my brand-spanking-new NOOK (Barnes & Noble's e-reader), so I don't have to haul a bunch of books on my travels. There isn't much to do on board when not working, (mainly: sleep, eat, work out, read, or watch dvd's) so you need a lot of books. I've been on only one research cruise before this. It was a week long, in which time I read almost three books. That may not sounds like a lot, but I don't mean books like Twilight. More like A Picture of Dorian Gray (which was really good-read it!) and A Handmaid's Tale (which was not very good). To sum up, I am excited about my nook, and the potential for lighter luggage.

Ah, but why I am going on this vessel in the first place? Well, I am a research assistant for a professor who studies plankton ecology at Horn Point Lab in Cambridge, Maryland. This lab is part of the University of Maryland Center for Environmental Science. The professor I work for is involved in the Bering Sea Project, which includes many scientists studying different aspects of the Bering Sea ecosystem. The project's website is: http://bsierp.nprb.org/. We are studying the microzooplankton abundance, biomass, and grazing on phytoplankton. More on this wildly exciting topic later!