Last Paper

School is getting crazy so I haven’t been able to leave campus at all, so I’ve been working on writing my term paper so that I can get a head start and not have to write it at the last minute. I’m going to be writing it on the Dona and Roberts Bay Watershed in Sarasota County. I came across it when browsing the Sarasota Wateratlas earlier in the semester when I reviewed the website; and found it interesting how much it has changed within the last century because of human activity.

I think I’m mainly going to be focusing on urbanization and agricultural development after the construction of the Cow Pen Slough and Blackburn Canal in the mid-20^th century. I guess there was a lot of flooding in the area and they weren't able to build or develop much on the land because the floods would destroy any buildings and kill crops. So they built the canals and drainage ditches to stop the flooding, which let them utilize the land without fear of flooding damages, but they never really thought much of the ecological damages they were causing. Especially in the bay estuaries since all the rainwater drained into them and disrupted their fresh and saltwater balance.

Red Tide

I found an article that really caught my interest from last week, which I’m sure you’ve probably already heard all about, maybe even took part in. It’s about the ten-year study on red tide that Mote Marine finished up last Thursday.

I had never heard of red tides until last year when I had some friends in the Ecology of Water class and they had to do an assignment on it. My family has a condo on the Atlantic coast in Cocoa Beach that I used to visit at least once every summer, but even then I never knew about it. Actually, I’m not even sure if they have red tides on the East coast or not, that’s something I’ll have to look up later.

Anyway, the study is the “most cohesive and longest-running scientific study looking at how humans are affected by Florida’s red tide.” What I found most interesting was not the negative side effects to human health that was tested, but rather the findings that could lead to potential new drug treatments. K. brevis was found to have approximately twelve toxins that could be harmful, yet there are at least three antitoxins as well. One of them is being used to develop a drug to treat cystic fibrosis. It makes sense to me that there would be an antitoxin to a lung disease when the blooms themselves cause problems in the lungs. I’m relating it to a snakebite and how the anti-venom comes from the snake itself.

Here’s a link to the article on the Mote Marine website: http://www.mote.org/index.php?src=directory&view=topic&srctype=detail&back=topic&refno=1179

SRQ

I know for a fact that I will not be making it off campus this week since it's the first week back from Spring Break and we're going to be pressing on ahead in my CA classes. I went home to Minnesota over break, like I do on just about all school breaks, so I've been to the SRQ airport quite a few times over the years.

It's extremely nice to have an airport so close, for when you need it, but other times it can get annoying with how much noise it causes. At home I live about 20 minutes from the Minneapolis airport, and it gets noisy from time to time even being that far away, yet here at Ringling I hardly ever hear an airplane overhead.

Not many people think of noise as being a sort of pollution, but if it disrupts your everyday life I'd classify it as pollution. Most outdoor noise is from either construction or transportation vehicles like airplanes, motor vehicles, and railways. It can even affect peoples' health because when people get annoyed, it usually leads to aggression, high stress, sleeping disturbance, and hypertension. Not to mention it helps aid in hearing loss, but that's usually if you're exposed to noise everyday for a certain amount of time.

I thought it was strange that SRQ, even though it is a small airport, is so quiet so I did a little research and found out that SRQ has a noise barrier design in place. There was a lot of mumbo jumbo I couldn't understand, but I was able to gather that they have two noise barriers: one extending along Runway 14, and a noise wall to the northwest of where they extended Runway 14. I never realized them, but apparently they have a nice aesthetic design so the community doesn't complain about them.

Pitch Adventure

This week the only time I was able to get off campus was yesterday with a group of friends in the CA department. We all met in North Hall to try and brainstorm some story ideas for our second Pre-Production pitch. After about an hour of not having much success we ended up deciding that we needed some ice cream to stimulate our brain cells out of hibernation, so we all piled into Jackie Hines' car and drove to Coldstone on Main Street.

The last time I went there was probably close to a year ago. I've been across the street to the Hollywood 20 movie theater a couple times since the beginning of the school year, but that's about it. Nothing had really changed that I noticed. Although, at Coldstone there was only one woman working behind the counter and we had a large group of about twelve people so obviously it took a little while before we all got our ice cream. There's a very nice fountain just around the corner that we found and ended up playing at for a bit before sitting down and trying to brainstorm again. But yet AGAIN, we didn't have much luck until a friend mentioned a board game he has that would help us come up with ideas.

Oh, and I finally found out where the Sarasota Courthouse is located. We’ve talked about it in class a couple times but I never had seen it before. It’s a rather pretty building and the little garden out front was very nice.

Chipotle

The only time I was able to get off-campus was to go and get dinner at Chipotle with Jackie Hines this week. It was the first time I went to Chipotle down here in Sarasota, so I guess I discovered something new this week. We’ve had Chipotle back home in Minnesota for quite awhile now and I was super excited when I heard there was one being built down here. Granted, that was last year, and I haven’t had a chance to go down to the one down here until now.

I love their burritos, but I always feel bad when I eat it, and any fast food really. I’ve been trying to eat healthier, along with buying my groceries at the organic grocery stores like Whole Foods. I like to try and buy my food from places that at least sell some local foods because that’s becoming a problem now a day. Food is almost all so processed and manufactured, that it hurts the local economy.

No Such Luck

I tried to find some free time to get off campus and enjoy even only a few hours outside, but I just wasn't able to. This week was extremely heck tick for the animation students because of all the assignments due at the same time. I were only given a week to do an animation to test our character rigs, plus having a full-faculty critique for our pre-pro stories and the development work.

The closest I got to going off-campus was down to the Academic Building because I normally only venture that far south on campus if I have Ecology of Sarasota on Thursday nights. So I’ve just got to say how annoyed I am at all of the smokers on campus. I was so happy when Ringling changes their policy and became a smoke-free campus, except for a few designated smoking areas scattered around. What’s worse is that they smoke RIGHT outside the doors to buildings so as soon as you step outside you’re greeted by a waft of smoke right in your face. I really want public safety to reinforce it, because I’ve seen them zoom right by students smoking on their little security golf carts and not even stop and say anything.

Library

I have to say; I am a complete bookworm when I’m not at school, which is mainly because I never have time to read while schools in session. I decided to take a day and go to downtown Sarasota and visit the library for the first time. I don’t have a car and couldn’t find a ride, so I ended up taking the bus. I haven’t taken the bus since freshman year, and now I remember why exactly. That first year I didn’t really know any better and I had a lot more time to spare and always wanted to get off-campus.

I learned the SCAT bus routes and I still remember it, and how terrible it is. One of the things that stood out most to me about the transportation system is that there are lots of bus stops, but they’re located in the worst possible places. Many of them simply consist of a sign on the side of the road where there isn’t any cover or even a bench for people to sit on.

Anyway, I went to the library to have a look around and ended up getting myself a library card. It was different from the libraries I go to back home, but mainly in the layout because I’ve never been in one that had two floors instead of one main room.

On the way to the library a homeless person asking me for some quarters for the bus fare had stopped me, and I didn’t have any to give him. He ended up going over to a couple that was walking in the park and got some money from them. Then when I left the library over two hours later I saw that he was still in the park, and still asking for money for the “bus.”

Beach

I was so excited I was able to go to the beach! My roommates told me they were planning to head out and asked if I had time to come with them. I didn’t know if I could because I had some character and environment designs due, but I ended up going anyway. Sometimes you just need to take a day, or even a few hours, to relax and have some fun. All work and no play makes Alex a psycho girl.

So we packed up a few sandwiches and drinks to have a picnic lunch on the beach at Lido. The last time I’ve been to the beach was last August before school started while moving my stuff down here. The water was pretty cold so I didn’t do much swimming, and instead just soaked up some vitamin D. I spend hours upon hours a day in the third floor of the Student Center where there are no windows whatsoever, so I’ve really missed the sun.

I didn’t really see anything all that interesting while I was at the beach, it was just the regular families and people out and about. The annoying and ever-present seagulls were there of course and got too close to stealing my food. It’s strange how they aren’t scared of people whatsoever; it kind of reminds me of Alfred Hitchcock’s The Birds in a way.