Nothing much… April 28, 2010

I’m starting to get really excited for my new job! It’s another 2½ weeks until I start and a lot of things will happen before then. I will quit my job in Zara, I will make a poster presentation of my dissertation at a conference at my old uni, I will go to Sweden and… well, that’s about it. But 2½ weeks feel very, very distant at the moment. Ooh! I’m also taking a distance unit in Statics that I haven’t even gotten started on! I’ve got looads to do! BUT still, tonight I decided to do nothing. I’m always so tired after work that I don’t get anything done.

But I do wonder what I will do for my first day. If it will be difficult. If I will make a fool out of myself. What to wear. Hmm… I wish I had money I could spend in Zara whilst still benefitting from staff discount.

Saw this clip yesterday on youtube. I thought it was hilarious the first time I saw it…

Anyways… cheerios!!

Wondering, pondering… April 19, 2010

A few days ago I was watching a very geeky TV-show on BBC called Beautiful Minds. It’s a series of shows depicting the lives of different influential scientist. This time it was about James Lovelock (what a name by the way! Gotta love it!) who developed the theory of Gaia. I can’t really explain it well, but basically, Gaia is the earth. And the idea is that the earth is a self-regulatory system that somehow serves its own purpose. That life is what creates the atmosphere and life on earth is what regulates the amount of gas and the temperature on the planet. Or sorry, rather that the temperature is somehow always regulated by the life on the planet.

He used the example of some alga that lives in the top bit of the ocean. When the ocean gets to warm it exhales some kind of gas which goes up in the sky and creates a cloud. This cloud then reflects sunbeams back to space and gives shadow for the ocean. Which cools it down and the algae are happy again. I really can’t explain this very well, but the theory appealed and fascinated me. I liked the thought that in the long run we’re just pieces of a puzzle and that the world will somehow outlive us.

Hmm, not sure if I’m making myself very clear here, but this is (roughly) what I thought: Once upon a time the world, plants and animals lived in peace. Then mankind came along, we spread all across the world and after the industrial revolution we started polluting the environment. Think of this as the parasite, the enemy or the cancer of the world. There is more and more pollution which leads to environmental consequences. And what does these consequences do to our environment? It makes the earth unpleasant for its inhabitants to live here. With time (and assuming that we’re not able to do anything against the problems we already have) this will lead to massive natural disasters which in turn will lead to a smaller amount of humans on the earth. After some time, a balance will occur, where there are either no humans at all, or a much smaller number of people who can then perhaps live in harmony with the earth. Aww, what a cute story!

Anyway, I didn’t think much about that until a big ash cloud spread out across Europe and all the little humans became very upset. It is almost as if the earth had to do something to regulate the amount of pollution across Europe! Now, now now.. I KNOW that this is not what happened, and the two (volcano and pollution from air travel) aren’t related. But I still do like the thought. Especially when I had just seen that show. Isn’t it ironic? Don’t you think? A little too ironic? Yeah, I really do think…

Anyways, I’ve got work tomorrow morning so I should get going. Oh, I forgot to say loads and loads of things!! I got a job in Zara, yeah yeah… but I also got a REAL job for a company I’m not gonna mention here! I’m so excited! I’m starting in the middle of may as a research analyst for a MAJOR market research organisation. Well done me! I’m very proud of myself. It took me 7 months to find this job and it’s been haaaard! But persevered! I should buy myself an award!