December 6, 2008

The purpose of this blog is to let friends, family, or perhaps someone who is just curious, learn more about my current situation. As most of you know I now live in San Diego where I am nearing the completion of my Masters degree at San Diego State University(SDSU). My field of study is geological sciences with an emphasis on isotope geochemistry. 

Specifically, I work on lavas from Kilauea Volcano on the island of Hawaii. The project I work on uses high precision geochemistry to look at changes in source composition (i.e. what is melting) and melt production (i.e. how much magma is being produced) during recent prehistoric eruptions from Kilauea's summit magma reservoir. This past summer, I was lucky enough to present my preliminary data at a volcanology/geochemistry conference in Reykjavik, Iceland. My advisor and I spent 10 days in Iceland, and it's an experience I won't readily forget (for some pics see: www.flickr.com/dhb910). Currently, I 'm preparing to present at yet another conference. This conference (AGU) is in San Francisco from December 15-19th. I'm sure the conference will be a great time, but I sure could live without the added stress of preparing a presentation. 

 

Switching gears, I have developed a passion for playing the mandolin. I have always enjoyed bluegrass music, so the mandolin was a great choice for me. I have been playing at San Diego Bluegrass Society events, such as band scrambles and jams, and recently a small group of us have started meeting once a week and putting together some songs. We currently have a banjo player, 2-3 guitar players (rhythm and flat-picking), a stand-up bass player, and myself on the mandolin. Eventually we may do a gig or two, but for now we just jam. It's a great stress reliever and it gives me something to look forward to during the seven day work week. Also, thanks to the great people at Old Time Music here in San Diego I was able to trade some instruments and get a nice hand-carved mandolin. It's great, it cuts right through a jam even with 2-3 banjos playing. 

Finally concluding this blog, after I present in San Francisco I will be returning to Leggett for ~2 weeks, if you are in town and want to get together give me a call(my number is the same as it's been since I was 14)

One more thing, if anyone would rather get in contact by email my address is: dhb910 at gmail.com