Hello Spring!

Spring has finally sprung around here, and my mood is so improved! I still miss Austin a lot, and I think a large part of that is the weather. I just do not like cold, dark, wet weather. It makes me gloomy. This time of year is also helped by the fact that classes just ended and so I now can smell the hints of free time again! (Still have finals and grading, but I'm ignoring that for now.)

This semester I taught a new course on Observational Astronomy, using the on-campus telescope and teaching about CCDs and data reduction. After last semester's new course on Extraterrestrial Life, I found this one a bit less interesting and much more challenging to prep. In the end I got the course to a place that I was happy with, but it took longer than I would have liked. Two semesters in a row of new preps has really wiped me out, though. I feel like I have lost touch with all of my friends and have had just zero time for anything interesting or new. Next semester I am not doing any new classes, which will be a huge relief. I am, however, testing a large-class format, jumping from ~45 students to 150+ students. I may even go bigger because I have had 45 students email me to get on my wait list! 45! It is a little ridiculous. While I would like to take all the credit as being an awesome professor, it is also that there are limited good science general ed courses on campus. I think that is a shame and I really want the students to have the opportunity to take an interesting science course, so I am going to do my best to teach as many of them as I can. I am actually excited to see how the big class works out.

In my personal life, the big goings-on is that Alex and I are finally moving forward on wedding plans! We have decided to do the wedding in Key West on New Year's Eve. As I mentioned earlier, my mom lives in Key West and our original plan was to get married there this summer, but Alex's mom's illness prevented us from going to check things out last winter. Since we didn't want to get married during the school year, and we didn't want to wait a whole another year (whole 'nother year? what is the expression?), that left the winter break. We were worried that travel might be challenging for people near the holidays, but most of the people we have talked to have been excited about the idea. I think it is going to be super fun! My mom is ecstatic and has pretty much planned the whole wedding in the last week. I am being quite the downer by asking questions about rain plans and parking and whatnot.

Alex and I recently acquired two new pets! They are baby sugar gliders (sugar bears) and they are super duper cute. They are like flying squirrels, but are marsupials, and they will one day live in our pockets :) We are still in the bonding stage, when they are getting used to us being their new family. It is very hard not to just pick them up all the time, but we are slowly getting there. It is tough to get a good picture of them because they are nocturnal, and their eyes look a little wild with the flash, but nonetheless allow me to introduce you to Bacon and Buttons:

More cuter pictures to come :)

The other thing that I have been wanting to blog about is that I have gone "primal" and have been following the paleo/primal diet and lifestyle for about five months now. I really really like it and feel as though I have discovered some secret to easy healthy living. I also have lost over 30 pounds and am feeling really good about myself. I'll tell you more about it in a future post!