From CNN.com

"Approximately 12:30 PM (GMT -5), a group of scientists studying the depletion of the arctic glaciers observed a large chunk of ice break off and fall into the ocean. While that event itself was not unusual, what was revealed when the ice fell has become cause for curiosity and concern.

Like a coal vein buried between layers of rock, a cavity filled with an unknown, blue, gel-like substance about ten meters tall, 100 yards wide and an unknown depth peeked out from the ice. Chief Researcher, Dr. Eugene Preskin held a press conference about the discovery from the deck of his chartered research ship. The following are excerpts from that conference.

'The substance began to sublimate the moment the sun hit it. The blue gas that resulted gathered into a bizarre cloud that rode the wind currents east. I say 'bizarre' because though it began moving on the current immediately, it stayed together and traveled as a cloud rather than dissipating as one might expect. The cloud stayed low to the water, clearing it by only inches and rising to a height of about 10 feet.

The part of the vein that remained in the shadow of the overhanging ice did not sublimate as quickly, and we were able to scrape a sample of the bluish gel with a rescue hook. Early tests indicate it to be some sort of biological material, which we have carefully contained until we can return to our labs for more testing.

We intend to use explosive charges to remove a larger fragment from the wall which we will place in cold storage in the hold of our ship for our return voyage.'

That was the situation two hours ago. Since then, the scientific team has removed a piece of ice containing the blue gel roughly the size of a Greyhound bus. They used a crane on the deck of the ship to hoist it from the water and place it in the ship's cargo hold. While some of the substance escaped in a cloud in the process, the majority was salvaged and the ship is now turning on a course home for the United States."

Curious...

Email from Eugene says only "turn on CNN"...no time right now...makes me think I'll have big news tonight.

Good, but brief news

It is late, and it has been a very long day at the office.

We are close to beating the mutant ebola.

Conversation with Emily was delightful and we have a 'date' for Sunday brunch.

Eugene sent a brief email that he was having the time of his life in the arctic.

Details will follow after some rest to replenish my soul. Good night.

Congratulations Phillys and fans

Depression confession

The World Series was rained out on Monday night and they could not make it up last night due to rain. With luck, they will play tonight and end the series so Philadelphia fans can go back to ignoring this team for another quarter century. The problem is not that I hate the Phillys, I’m just oversaturated with news. All I have heard for the past two weeks is baseball and the election, baseball, election, baseball, election... It’s quite tedious. Luckily, both will be over within two weeks, no matter what.

I spoke with Amanda at lunch and she says she has only heard from Eugene once an evening since his ship reached the destination. He’s apparently not bored anymore. I am confident we will both hear from him before the return voyage.

My team is analyzing a nasty bug today at the office. It appears to be a mutated ebola strain from Peru with some new features that make it especially difficult to destroy, but I am confident we will tame it within the week.

That would seem to be all I have to update today. Well, I am planning to dine at the Essex tonight. Not that a journal is a place to record every meal — though I suppose it could be for food critics and the insane, two groups of people cut from the same cloth — however, while there I intend to as the manager, Emily, to join me for a drink in the bar. If the conversation is enjoyable, as I have every reason to expect it will be, I shall try to schedule a date for this weekend. Emily has always been pleasant to me, our conversations enjoyable, and I think I am reaching a point where my grief over Cecile is being outweighed by my need to have a personal relationship with someone.

Three years is a long time to mourn alone. I do not want to stop mourning, I just want to stop being alone. I hope Cecile understands.

Winter approaches

It is getting cold, which is completely normal for this time of year in PA, but people seem to have forgotten that after a decade of mild autumn seasons. Personally, I enjoy the cold, so the seasonal shift is welcome. I just wish we could get past the rainy dismal part and get right on to the snow. Regardless, it is forecast to be mild on Friday, so I suppose I should stop by the store for candy on my way home from the lab this evening.

Speaking of the lab, I suppose I should tell more about my occupation at some point for any voyeurs that might stumble by. Today, however, is not the day that will happen in any detail. To compensate, I have begun to update my profile here hoping that will keep any questioners at bay.

Eugene managed to get me an email through the satellite link this morning, it was simple but effective:

From: epreskin@cmu.edu
Subject: Arrival!
To: dr.bruce.stevenson@gmail.com
Date: Tuesday, October 28, 2008, 6:42 AM

Who knew ice cubes could be so damn beautiful?

If you knew him, you would be picturing him radiating like a saint in an ancient religious icon. ‘Ice cubes’ have been the focus of his research for the last decade, and while the satellite imaging and SOSUS data and all of the other information flooding to his office is more than enough to cover his needs, there’s nothing like field research to reawaken one’s passion for a project. Things are simply so much more real when experienced first-hand. I suppose this will lead to several months or years of dinners at the Preskin home where the topic of glaciers positively cannot be avoided, but I will suffer that to see him so excited about his work again.

I visited Amanda for lunch on Sunday on the condition that she would let me keep the TV on quietly in the background so I could monitor how badly the Steelers would fall to the Giants. Lunch was delightful, the game, less so. Amanda says she’s been getting hourly emails from Eugene and I should not complain for him being out of contact with me. She testifies one can bear only so many emails about gulls and dolphins. Regardless, Amanda had her MacBook on the kitchen table with her email client updating regularly so she would not miss a report.

Enough journal-therapy for now. I must return to my work. This does seem to be easing some tension, however. Maybe it is just the act of recording something for posterity — leaving your mark somewhere, however small — that makes it relieving. Whatever the case, I must try to better dedicate myself to it.

Until then...

Already a delinquent

Great. I finally committed to this journal thing and did it online so that I would be able to access it anytime the mood stuck me and already I have let several days lapse without writing anything. I'm never going to make it to the glee club auditions at this rate.

Regardless, here's what I missed reporting. Saturday I went to Penn's Landing to see off my old colleague and friend [Dr.] Eugene Preskin as his ship sailed for the great icy north on a grant from Carnegie Mellon to study the erosion of the Arctic glaciers. Eugene expects to be about 10 days in transit, have 5 days for his study and another 10 days for the return trip. A month on the ocean seems a bit longer than I want to spend testing my sea legs, but he lives for this kind of adventure. He has asked me to check in on Amanda at least once a week and see if she needs anything. I will be happy to do it. We've been friends for almost three decades now, and it's not exactly torture to have coffee and desert with Amanda. Some good conversation may prove to be helpful with my depression as well.

Sunday I went to my folks' home for lunch and football. As usual, father and I both got pleasantly tipsy and yelled liberally at the television. Also as usual, mother was louder than both of us without the alcohol to excuse her. The Steelers rather decisively handled the Bengals for a 38-10 win. It is hard to believe this is the same team that lost to the Eagles earlier, though it was probably just as well for my sake. Being a Steelers fan so close to Philadelphia does not make me popular. If the season continues to go well, though, I may have to see if I can get tickets for us to the Baltimore game in December since it's so close.

Cecile would have loved that -- hot cocoa and blankets at a chilly December football game. We always went to the games in college, even though the school's team hardly ever won. There's something more intimate about sharing body heat under flannel while your noses redden in the cold than almost anything else I can think of. It's so hard to believe that November will mark three years since she died.

I have to stop now, or this will likely descend into chapters of gibberish rather than just a journal entry.

And so it begins

This may end up being stupid. I have not kept a journal since I was like twelve, but my good friend Lucy Dunham has suggested that it might help me “sunshine up a bit” -- her words, not mine. Personally, I would rather turn this moderate depression into an excuse to buy a midlife crisis sports car but what the stock market has done to my financial portfolio suggests that I should not be making any substantial purchases in the short term, and the price of gas is quickly making anything that gets less than 40 miles to the gallon obsolete. Regardless, my “new age” friend has generally steered me right in the past in matters of the mental, so I shall give this an honest try.

I had considered making this blog private, but then realized I would have to be awfully full of myself to think anybody is really going to care about the drivel I record here, and let us be honest: the complete lack of anything interesting in my life is a huge part of what drove me to this point in the first place.

This whole thing may fail, anyway, in which case I will delete this blog and go back to debating opening the veins of my wrists or stupidly buying the ‘08 Carrera.