Another Quick Post

Yeah once again not much going on today. We finished cleaning up the project mentioned last post, took salinity data for the drought project, and put the rain-outs on just in time for it to pour down rain. I also sat down and started working out the setup for my project. A few kinks to work out in the plan, but I'll be talking to my adviser soon to get stuff figured out and hopefully have a finalized proposal ready by the weekend so we can get to work on it.

2 random thoughts. Firstly, I bloody hate ticks. There are a lot of insects out here, and I've already pulled 5 off myself total. Luckily only 2 had bitten. Fingers crossed, they hadn't been there long. Reaaaally don't want to deal with any nastiness that those guys carry.

Secondly, remember how I mentioned the fiddlers? I had the craziest thought today. I was walking through the marsh to one of our sites, and as anyone cuts through the marsh it's essentially like parting the Red Sea, except with fiddlers. They're very visual little guys, so any big, moving target sends them scuttling away quickly. But today was different. Because sitting in my path was this tiny, bold little crab,  claw raised defiantly, like so:

Coincidentally, not this guy specifically. This is actually a sand fiddler (Uca pugilator), spotted on a hike at Honeymoon Island, near Palm Harbor. The guy in my anecdote is a mud fiddler (Uca pugnax)

And the image that immediately popped into my head? A classical, iron-clad knight of old, shield raised and ready to go up against a massive, fire-breathing dragon. And I kinda had to laugh a bit.