Quirky Things Meme

If you thought I disappeared, I did. Under a mountain of schoolwork and research. I'm almost halfway through this class, my last one, so you may not hear from me again for another couple of weeks. My every spare moment seems to be devoted to research and writing papers.

But anyways, on to the point at hand. It seems I have been tagged by Brandi in the Quirky Things Meme. So here it is, six quirky things about me:

1. I don't like mail and I don't open it. I usually only get it out of my mailbox once a week unless I'm expecting something. Actually- I love personal mail, but 98% of what I receive is junk and I hate having to open all of it. Thus, everything clearly non-essential that cannot go straight into the trash (like catalogues), sits on my table for several months until I finally sit down and open it all and shred it.

2. I don't eat beans. Not at all. Not in chili, not in soup, not in anything. Not even if the recipe was handed down to you from your great-great-grandmother and everyone who has ever eaten it swears it is manna from heaven. Some people seem to think this is strange. Personally, I think bean eaters are the strange ones. (And if you ever want to be cured of eating refried beans that you did not make yourself, ask me to tell you a Food Safety story about them).

3. I hate it when people type in all caps. It is the equivalent of yelling at people and it is rude. If you intend to yell at the person, then that's a different matter, but I don't need you to "yell" your Out of Office email auto response at me. It makes me want to pick-up my phone and yell a message into your voicemail.

4. I hate it when people who have issues with spelling and grammar clearly do not use spell and grammar check. I'm not talking about the one offs where you used "their" instead of "there" or some other simple mistake. I make plenty of mistakes myself. I'm talking every single sentence has a spelling or grammar issue. Spelling and grammar check are there for a reason, use it. You just look like a dumb ass when you don't- especially if it is a business email.

5. I love Excel. There is almost no problem that cannot be solved more easily or made more clear using Excel. Okay- I exaggerate (a little), but I still love Excel. You would too if you had my job.

6. I love all sorts of animals and critters, including snails. I feel bad when I see a snail on the sidewalk or in the road because I know they'll probably get squished before they get anywhere, so I always pick them up and move them to safety.

I'm supposed to tag someone else, but I don't like to play by the rules. If you want something to blog about or you have some funny quirks, then please consider yourself tagged.

Polipoli State Park

Last Sunday I went hiking at Polipoli State Park. Several people had told me I should check it out. I had tried to go earlier this year, but the road in is a dirt track (you're supposed to have 4WD, but I managed in my car) and part of it had been washed out in the flash floods this past past "winter." I was able to get in this time and go hiking. I had not realized that the area where the hiking trail is is also where we had a large fire about a year and a half ago. The park is a hardwood forest in the Kula Forest Reserve, high on the side of Haleakala.

Here's some shots of the hike. You'll see a lot of evidence of the fire, but I mostly didn't take pictures of the really dead and burned parts of the forest.