bending_sickle | Ain't none of y'all scarin' me.*

I had a meeting with my other supervisor today - not my actual supervisor, but the guy who would've been had he had time, and the one who knows about the topic. He's got studies set up in Cameroon and Kenya, and he was trying to set up a study of African wild dogs in Cameroon, but they seem to be extinct there now. Anyway, yesterday, as I mentioned, he asked if I'd be interested in doing some field work for him in Amboseli National Park. We talked a bit today about the research - radio-tracking lions and their interactions with the cattle of neighbouring Maasai.

On the one hand it seems like a dream come true, but on the other hand I'm terrified of the possibility.

What the internship would entail is some 3-4 months in a lodge in Amboseli, doing research. Think a little bit about that. Me, in a national park, rolling out with a driver through the bush, for four months. Thinking about myself there, doing it, I'm all a-squee. But the getting there? There's the preparation, the grants - apparently funding's in good supply - the diseases, the supplies, the subletting of my Dutch room, the parents... It all just seems a bit too much. I know I can do this, it's not like I'm the first student to do field work in Kenya. And I know I'm capable. (Well, I figure I am.) The thing is, I don't feel it. Like, at all.

So I spent the morning being nervous about the meeting, and the afternoon freaking out. I have a boatload of papers - field guides, past proposals and papers - to read, and a colloqium of last year's field work to attend the 26th. I also have a tentative meeting set for July 21st, where I decide whether I want to do this or not.

So, terrifyingly awesome is the way I'm seeing this.

I also wandered about and bought stuff, even things on impulse, all the while thinking two thoughts simultaneously: existing and not spending anything at all. Why can't I buy a little something, just once?"

So I got the most adorable zip-up hoodie with pictures of flying saucers and robots and rockets at half price and turqoise-rimmed hoop earings. Le splurge, it is not so great. On the, "I need to buy this - for a given value of need" was a white belt for a summer dress (now I won't look like a twelve-year-old, hopefully) and a baseball cap. My first ever cap. (I'm not a hat girl, though I kinda appropriated Mom's straw hat when we were in Greece. ye gods, is that sun bright.) My reason? Frickin' rain whilst biking, or walking. And, oh yeah, the sun. The fact that it's nifty is a plus.

And I got food, which, like, I need.

One day I'll fiddle with my camera's record button and save for posterity my ~~lack of~~ dancing skilz. But not today. However, some music we've been dancing to:

Shawty Get Loose - Lil Mama ft. T-Pain
Holla' Back Girl - Gwen Stefani (Does she say, "Super kawaii?" Oy vey.
Touch My Body - Mariah Carey
Dough is What I Got - Lil' Wayne
G5 - Huey ft. T-Pain

And what I might get to, someday:

Hip hop dance class
Prepping for a competition
UCSD Ascension Hip Hop Dance Team 03-04 - Appaling camera work improves.
Lil' G Streetdance - Itty bitty kiddies!
Streedance somewhere in the Netherlands - Not so itty bitty, but still kiddies!
Hip Hop Dance World Champion Lil' Steph - Can I just point something out, for the benefit of all those categorizing and limiting bastards? White chick. So there.

Quote of the Day: Victor Anderson (c/o