Florida Folk Festival!

It's that time of year again! Uncle Stu and I will be set up under our oak tree at Steven Foster State Folk Culture Center in White Springs, demonstrating castnet knitting, telling stories, and playing music. We'll be there all of Friday, Saturday, and Sunday. Hope to see you out there!

Miss Sarah N. Dipity

Okay, so I stole that title from Florida Cracker, but it's fitting because this post has a little something to do with him.

I arrived at the Florida Institute of Technology last summer ready to be on my own and ready to learn. My main goal was to go there, be there four years, and return home armed with a degree in meteorology. During this time, though, I hoped to meet others who shared my interests in science and, to an even greater extent, Florida. Though FIT is in the state of Florida, it is not really Florida in my mind, though there are still some hints of real Florida away from the coast.

I didn't realistically expect to meet any fellow Florida crackers at a school mostly populated by out-of-state, technologically-oriented city dwellers, but I still kept my hopes up.

After a whole semester of hard studying, I came home for Christmas Break with many great friends, but none who shared my interest in Florida's wildlife, culture or history. Hm.

Things rapidly turned around one night this past semester, though. [Patience, FC, I'm getting to you soon :-D]

One night, our school's chapter of the American Meteorological Society held a "movie night" on campus to watch weather-related movies and "geek out" about various meteorology stuff. I spoke with a fellow that night who found out about my interest in Florida through my Facebook page (if you don't have one, get one.) He's a fellow weather whiz and was in my Aviation Meteorology class this past semester. Through our conversation, I learned that he is from FC's part of the state.

A little background...
I have been following Pure Florida for over three years now after finding it through Google, and actually met Florida Cracker once at the Florida Folk Festival. At this meeting, I learned his REAL name *gasp* and deduced that we are actually kin to one another somewhere along the line. As a matter of fact, we have a series of interesting connections in our families.

So I asked my new friend if he happened to know anyone by FC's last name, and to my complete astonishment, he said yes. As it turns out he is friends with FC's son and his oldest daughter. Another thing to add to the list of interesting connections!

The last thing I expected to run into at FIT was a friend of a blogging pal.

Through this new friend, I met two girls who are also from Florida - both identifying themselves as "crackers." So in one night, I went from having no cracker friends at school to having three. As an added bonus, we are all meteorology majors who are very interested in our field of study.

Alright!

Thanks, Sarah N. Dipity!

Hello Again

It's been a while hasn't it? Four months to be exact. Well here's a cursory summary of the past five months of my life, in outline form, some of which I might decide to write about in the future:

Christmas Break
- Family
- Woods
- Geocaching
School
- General Physics 1
- Physics Lab 1
- General Chemistry 2
- Calculus 3
- Aviation Meteorology
- Weather Briefing
- Class
- Studying
- Volunteer weather research
- Campus ministry, pizza, video games, grappling hooks, and llamas
Summer
- Pretty much nothing

More posts upcoming :-D

Epic Camping Trip Part I - Lost in Wal-Mart

About a month ago, I went with the Newman Club on a camping trip to Blue Springs State Park.

The Newman Club is an organization for Catholic students, and it just so happens that it's full of ourdoorsmen/women, too. It's great to be involved in a group full of students who I know will only build me up as a person, and not tear down my character and morality...Those groups are hard to come by on a college campus.

So we set off one Friday night after our classes were finished for the hour-and-a-half drive to Orange City.

Lucas (Caesar), HurricaneTeen (Octavius), and Hunter (Cassius)

Our first stop was to be at the Super Wal-Mart down the road to pick up some charcoal, lighter fluid, and ice. My friend, Hunter, and I were sent into the massive store armed only with a HAM radio and our wallets.

After about 15 minutes of searching, we could not find the charcoal. We searched up and down the store, probably walking upwards of a mile, in futility. Embarrassed, we radioed our situation to our friend and club president, Paul:


Hey, Paul...We're lost. Send help.
You're lost??
Yes, we can't find the charcoal and we don't know where we are.
At this point, everybody in the van is laughing at us.
Alright, ummm, I'll send Francine in to rescue you.
Thanks.
And might I add that we're thoroughly enjoying your predicament here in the parking lot.
Thanks, Paul.
I chuckle when I think of some local HAM radio operator listening in to our conversation. What must have been running through his head....


We find our way to the front of the store and meet our savior. Of course, within five minutes of her arrival, we find both the charcoal and the lighter fluid (who knew they were outside, right next to each other????) and pick up the ice at the front of the store.


Any wise person would abandon a camping trip after such a sketchy start, but we are college students, so we pushed wisdom aside and pressed on.


We chattered on the HAM radio with the other carload of people going on the trip and with Paul's dad, who was stationed on the coast to watch the space shuttle launch. HAM radio is one of the things I have picked up since coming to FIT. It is great in more ways than one.


We arrived at Blue Springs State Park to find the gates to the park closed. Again, any wise person would have turned around and called it quits, but we're college students. We followed another guy in after he punched in some secret code on the gate entrance. I'm sure he felt perfectly comfortable with that. After all we DID have reservations.


Just after we arrived and checked in with the campground hosts, we turned our eyes to the eastern sky just in time to see a bright fireball ascend into the heavens. What a view. No pictures. Sorry, I was too caught up in the moment.


NEXT INSTALLMENT:

Epic Camping Trip Part II - "It looks like a waterbed."

The Atomic Toilet

Come on and take a walk with me. We're going to the Crawford Science Tower...I have a secret to share with you.

Years ago, Dr. Lynn Edward Weaver, a professor here at FIT, was performing experiments in using ionizing radiation to treat wastewater. He used Cobalt-60, a mildly radioactive isotope, to destroy bacteria in sewage. The experiments were scientifically successful, but the public had a somewhat irrational fear of "radioactive water," so the idea was scrapped in the 1960s.
A problem that the school faced, though, was finding a place to store the harmful radioactive materials after they were used. So they dug a hole. A deep hole. This is where the atomic waste would be stored, and it would come to be known as The Atomic Toilet.

Alright come on and hurry. It's 9:00 PM, and there won't be too many people in the building at this hour, but we still do not want anyone getting curious. Come through the door. Let's go down the stairs.

Here, turn your flash light on, it's dark in here.

Come on inside...Try not to kick the door...It's not in very good shape.

Oh, also, don't step in that smelly, rusty water on the floor. It's groundwater seeping onto the floor, rusting out all of the metal in here. It'll stain your clothes.

Welcome to the Atomic Toilet. It is pitch black in here, I know, but the camera's flash will allow us to survey the damp room more easily.

There's the old typewriter underneath the big "DANGER: RADIOACTIVE MATERIALS" sign.
Nobody knows why it's here, but it hasn't been touched in years.

There's the doorway through which we entered. Our three friends are studying the ventilation system of the "outer toilet."

This is the back portion of the "outer toilet." You can see the trolley controls on the right wall and the Geiger counter back in the corner.

This console controlled the overhead trolley that was used to move the Cobalt-60 into and around the "inner toilet." A system of mirrors and the big gauge here were used to determine the position of the radioactive material. DON'T TOUCH THE KEY! We don't know what will happen if it is turned, and it may lead to trouble if we do turn it.

Here's the Geiger counter. It's hard to read in the dark, but we can clearly make out 1 millirem/hour...About 1000 times the normal background radiation on earth. That sounds bad, but it's really nothing to worry about...Notwithstanding the orange WARNING light.

Now let's go into the "inner toilet." This is where it starts to get really interesting. Just walk right past this big sliding 1-foot-thick concrete door. Now we're inside the place where the actual radioactive material was stored. This room was filled to some depth with water and the Cobalt-60 was stored under the water.

You see the trolley track on the roof up there? Also, you can see that the school has started using this place for storage...The tables and the overhead projector all came in after the Cobalt-60 was removed.

Our friend is studying something over in the corner. Let's go take a look.

Alright, we've been down here for at least 20 minutes now. Even though there's not enough background radiation in here to seriously harm us, it's best if we don't spend too much time down here. Let's go on back up the stairs.

Hmm, look at that chart over there. Being engineers, our friends absolutely must study any chart they come across.

It's a security sign-in sheet. Okay, we didn't see any DO NOT ENTER signs, but maybe we're not allowed down here after all. According to the chart, the last security sweep was at 5:00 PM. Following the pattern of past days, the next sweep should be at 9:30. What time is it anyway? 9:29!!!!

BREAK!!

Life at FIT

A picture tells a thousand words...

Every one of these pictures has a unique story behind it.

Take a wild guess as to what the circumstances were when these pictures were taken.

I'll tell the whole story later.

(Thanksgiving break begins tomorrow!!)

Cloud Chasing

Another reason why I hate politics!!!

You know that woman who allegedly had the "B" carved into her face? You know, the issue that I was so thoroughly "P-Oed" about this past week?
She did it herself.
Now she's the one I'm "P-Oed" at because I spent a good half-hour fretting about it and feeling sorry for her.
What a crazy fool.
Agh.
But right now I'm gonna forgot about politics and go enjoy the COOL weather and NORTH FLORIDA air with my friends.

I've Had It...It's the final straw

I generally don't talk politics on this blog.
But I've had it.

Just the latest in a line of McCain supporters being physically attacked by Obama supporters:
http://www.pittsburghlive.com/x/pittsburghtrib/news/breaking/s_594853.html

That's right. A 'B' carved into a woman's face simply because she had a McCain bumper sticked on her car.

My humble question...And, as an American citizen of voting age, I have a right...A RESPONSIBILITY...to ask this.

How can we possibly even consider electing a man like Barack Obama to the most powerful position in this nation?

1 : He has no experience. 4 years in the U.S. senate and 4 years in the Illinois legislature does not prepare a man to be President of the United States.
2 : His ties to people who are...
Blatantly racist (Jeremiah Wright)
Unrepentant terrorists (Bill Ayers)
Commiting election fraud in his favor (ACORN)
3 : His obvious socialist views: "When you spread the wealth around, it's good for everybody."

I'm not even going to mention his naive view on taxes and the economy...I really don't have the time for any of this tonight, but it's got to be said...I've seen too much of this...
...And I've seen too much of the liberal elite media neglecting to call any of these serious issues into question. They're in the tank.

And now this...A man's home shot up because he has McCain signs in his front yard:
http://www.local6.com/politics/17784129/detail.html
What if McCain supporters were perpetrating these sick crimes against Obama supporters? The public outcry would be DEAFENING! WHERE THE HELL IS THE OUTCRY?!?!

Our nation is in serious danger. WAKE UP, AMERICA!!!!!!

A peek inside my brain...

asjdhfjkashdfkjahsdjhaudhfsdFORTRANsdjhfsajdlhfuweyuwoeyruwerhjwebfhdfjkdfPARTIALFRACTIONDECOMPOSITIONhjhsdfkjhyeurhywefbdfQUANTUMMECHANICSydhfkjsdlfhywueryjkdhfbasdjkf!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

A peek inside my stomach:






*empty*

Thank You!

I want to send out a special "thank you" to Mr. Ernest Jones for purchasing Ms. Latrell Pappy Mickler's new book for me! There were some problems with the postal service, so Ms. Mickler hand delivered it to Uncle Stu, who passed it on to me when I went to visit him while I was at home.

I can't wait to absorb all of the information in Gaspar Pappy and Ana Pons: Their Lives and Descendants, and I may actually use it as a source for an upcoming research paper!

It is encouraging to know that there are still "phantom readers" out there who appreciate and enjoy my ramblings.

Thanks, Mr. Jones!

Caught Up!

After last weekend's visit home, I found myself quite bogged down in the school work. After a couple of late nights sweating out page-long calculus problems and writing out Fortran programs, I now consider myself completely caught up. Even better, the free time of the weekend beckons me to move even further ahead in my studies! ...But not before indulging in my Friday night shenanigans :-D (Don't worry, they're completely harmless, completely legal, but completely fun. You may see a post about that in the future.)
More importantly, however, I now have enough brain power left over to write a somewhat creative post here on the Minorcan Factor!

One of my most urgent needs upon returning home last friday was to get out in the woods. So my friend, Phill, and I did just that. Here's a video of us going out to perform a maintenance check on one of my geocaches. Caution: Sarcasm, random quips of humor, and weird voice inflections are common when in the company of me and Phill.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m-7yQS4IVQI

...I was serious about swallowing the mosquito, though.

If you don't know what geocaching is, you need to learn...Especially if you are an outdoors enthusiast like me. I see geocaching as an excuse to go wander around out in the woods and other out-of-the-way places. It's a very pleasant way to spend an afternoon. http://www.geocaching.com/

Have a great weekend!

It Smells Different...and an excuse

Stepping out of Mom's car at my Grandma's house yesterday, I was struck by a sudden realization.

"Oh my gosh! I smells like St. Johns County!" I blurted.

Having never been away from home for more than a week or two, it has been quite a transition living down in central Florida for the past month-and-a-half. Though Melbourne is geographically close to St. Johns County, the lifestyle is worlds apart from that of my home. Maybe that difference can be connected to the difference I sense with my olfactory nerves.

Maybe it's the live oaks dripping with Spanish Moss. Maybe it's the expansive pine plantations. Maybe it's the smell of the soil.
I couldn't tell you for sure, but it smells oh so sweet.

And now for the excuse...
I have been trying to keep up with the "post every other day" routine on this blog.
However, this past week, some things called "Calculus" and "FORTRAN" and "Chemistry" got in the way of that.

I got an 84% on a calculus test...acceptable, but nothing to rejoice over...just means I have to work even harder (if that's possible)
I got a 6/20 on a chemistry quiz...In my defense, most people bombed that quiz...But I still need to study more.
Had a FORTRAN midterm.
Finished writing a 3-page program for FORTRAN.
Wrote a 4-page paper entitled MEMORIES OF A CRACKER CHILDHOOD.
etc.....

I love my home, and writing on this blog helps to connect me back with my roots...
...But gettin' learned is more important.

This weekend, though, is about re-fueling on family, friends, wilderness, and rurality.
I hope to share some of that with you over the coming week.
GOOD NIGHT!

Into the real world

"Somewhere beyond the sink-hole, past the magnolia, under the live oaks, a boy and a yearling ran side by side, and were gone forever."

-Marjorie Kinnan Rawlings

...Studying most of today...

Tacos are pleasing to me...

To my astonishment, the art community has not accepted my concept of the Linear Dog, but I know that, with time, they will come to realize its genius.

I drew this on my Puerto Rican roommate, JJ's, dry erase board Sunday night. I am making a genuine attempt to learn Spanish, but sometimes I have to resort to this phrase and "Lucy you got some splainin' to do" to get me through everyday conversations.

Knee-slamming happiness

Around noon yesterday I strolled into my FORTRAN class and delightfully plopped into the office chair in front of a computer terminal. I was fresh off the high of receiving an "A" on my first of three chemistry exams, so my morning was off to a good start.

As I always do, I opened up my FIT "Squirrel Mail" account to check on the daily happenings around campus while waiting for my professor to begin his lecture. Before my eyes was a message with the simple subject "greetings."

When I saw the name of the message sender, I gasped. I let out a stifled "Oh my gosh!" Trying to remain somewhat quiet and controlled while other students worked around me was nearly impossible. I pumped my fist and inadvertently slammed my knee against the side of the desk I shared with another terminal. The monitors rocked, and the guy across from me glanced up. I didn't care. Opening the message, my eyes devoured the text before me:

"HurricaneTeen:

"Lauren tells me that you are majoring in meteorology and hope to work at the National Hurricane Center one day. I think that's great. We still have room for a lot of improvement in hurricane forecasting and need all the help we can get...."

The message went on much further; it was long! I didn't expect this type of extended response.

The former director of the National Hurricane Center, a man who had been a household name during the hurricane seasons of 2004 and 2005, a man whom I have idolized since I began closely studying hurricanes when I was 12, has sent me a personal email!

He went on to tell a story of a young high schooler who came to visit the NHC about 10 years ago, and said he would some day work for the Center. I immediately recognized the name as one of the newest Hurricane Specialists at the NHC, Eric Blake. His story is very much like mine. It struck a chord.

"...I wish you the best in your pursuit of meteorology. Give my friend George Maul my regards at FIT when you run into him.

Best regards,

Max Mayfield"

Looks like Mr. Mayfield is friends with my department head, too. I love the connections that college has suddenly given me!
I jokingly told my roommate, JJ, that I was going to enlarge the text to poster size, frame it, and hang it on my wall...It was a joke...But now I wonder about actually doing it...

I owe my sister many thanks for getting this to happen. A student in the bible study group that my sister leads is friends with Mr. Mayfield's daughter. My sister spoke to her about my interest in meteorology, and the rest is history!

There's few things more exciting than getting an email from a professional that you look up to. And, yes, I would rather meet Max Mayfield than any movie or tv celebrity that ever lived. Weird? As I've always said, I kind of like being "weird." :-D

My Life

You might be curious, so here's my schedule for this semester, along with some color commentary:

University Experience: Perhaps the biggest waste of a credit-hour I have ever seen. It's very laid back, I like the teacher, and the topics are easy. I just think it's a waste of time to tell us the obvious things about college life such as: "It has been proven that students who study perform better in their classes than students who don't." Pffft.

Composition and Rhetoric: Great class. Strict grading, but the essay topics are interesting, a couple actually very exciting for me. You'll hear more about this class in the future.

General Chemistry 1: Study and reading. Nothing hard, just a lot of time. Blowing up hydrogen balloons in class is fun. Flushing sodium down the toilet to make a "geyser" is even better.

Calculus 2: This is the math that makes some aspiring engineers (and meteorologists) contemplate changing their major. It's hard. There's nothing you can't do without hard work and commitment, though.

Computer Programming with FORTRAN: [CAUTION: NERD CONTENT AHEAD!] Yes, Fortran still exists. Believe it or not, it is still quite prominent in some government work and in numerical weather forecasting (which is why I'm taking the course.) And, contrary to popular belief, Fortran does support object-oriented programming (as of 2003). However, we are using Fortran 95, so we still get to deal with the wonderful world of Unix.

The courseload has been bearable, but it does take a lot of time. Fortunately, the courses are interesting, and it's cool to obtain a higher edumucation.

I'm off to go try hyperbolic trig functions again. It's just not sinking in yet.

"Florida Lacks Character"

Those were the words of one of my roommates who happens to be from a certain state in the Northeast U.S. I will share with you the full discourse of our short conversation that occurred tonight.

...I'll give you some time to guess how the conversation went...In the mean time I'll share some more thoughts...

When I decided on attending FIT this past summer, I knew that I would be in the minority here. This is an acclaimed private school well-known for its aeronautics/astronautics and marine biology programs. Private is the key word there. This school is packed with northeastern students from affluent families...Now my family's not poor, but we certainly couldn't afford FIT's astronomical tuition if scholarships didn't help ease the pain...And we all know about my little Southern streak.

...Have you guessed how the conversation went?...

"Florida lacks character. Up North we have all of the colonial buildings and everything that adds character."

"You've never been to North Florida. Melbourne has no character. My hometown does."
"No it doesn't. Florida has no character."
"Ummmm...My hometown is the oldest city in the U.S. It was established in 1565. We have some old buildings and a little history, too."
So? [Something was said here, which I forgot]"
Well, [classic St. Augustinian line here] my hometown was undergoing urban renewal when the Pilgrims landed at Plymouth Rock."

"Yeah, but they have Southern accents where you're from. I hate Southern accents."

Are some of my northern readers getting a better understanding of why it's hard for me to erase the word "yankee" from my vocabulary? This was not the first time blatant ignorance has reared its ugly head, and I know it won't be the last :-D

I was going to post some beautiful pictures of my characterless hometown, but I just realized that those pictures were left behind during my annual seasonal migration.

Change

It's hard to believe that it has already been a month since I left my home and came down here to South Florida to get an edumucation. My life has changed drastically - more than I had expected.

Naturally, this change in lifestyle will translate to a slight change in the way this blog is oriented. My feet have not come in contact with the soft muck of a swamp in over a month...
Actually, I haven't even left the city since I arrived here.
What a change.
Therefore, you may see more philosophy, reflection, and thought on here than before...
College makes you think about a lof of things...
I'll share some of those thoughts with you.
But, as always, every one of my thoughts and actions contains some form of a Minorcan Factor, so the title of the blog will remain the same.
I'm still the same old Minorcan Florida Cracker, just in a different habitat!

I'm excited about sharing some of my experiences with you, but for now I'm off to my chemistry lecture and my FORTRAN software development class.
Wednesdays are my busy day.

TROPICAL STORM FAY - LIVE BLOG

I will be keeping a live blog of Tropical Storm Fay as it passes through or very near to my school here in Melbourne, FL.

www.tsfay.blogspot.com

Go view live updates as the storm approaches!