So today, I gave my first oral presentation since college. It was at ADASS 2004, an astronomical software conference being held here in Pasadena. My talk was actually a ‘focus session,’ which meant I had a little more time than normal “talks” but a much smaller audience. The focus sessions take place in between the main sessions, and they were also supposed to take place in a smaller room hidden away in the basement. The point of my talk was to demonstrate how to use Montage, software to create astronomical mosaics, and talk a little about how it’s being used for actual science.

Last night, I made Jeff come to IPAC and watch me rehearse my presentation in the small conference room, where I could play with a projector and laser pointer. By the end of the evening, I felt pretty confident that I could deliver my talk without speaking too fast or twisting up my sentences, and comfortable with the thought of talking in a small room to a few people.

So first thing this morning, they announce that the focus sessions have been moved into the main talk venue. This room holds about 250 people, has a big chandelier blocking part of the screen, and you have to use a finicky lavolier microphone. Eek!

My talk was at lunch, though, so I didn’t have too many attendees – maybe 30. I didn’t stumble or talk too fast, I finished in plenty of time, answered all the questions (and there were lots – people were actually listening), and only had a little bit of trouble with my hair brushing noisily against the microphone.

So the upshot is, my first post-college presentation went great. Got a big pat on the back from my boss and fellow Montage colleagues, and several people assured me I was animated and intelligible. Nice.

As for the rest of the conference…

It turns out that the academic equivalent of “So, when are you getting married/having kids” is: “So, when are you going back to get your PhD?” Awithout exception, the topic of graduate school has come up with all the new people I’ve been met at ADASS (and I didn’t bring it up). Several people have even gone so far as to point out that there’s really only so much I can do with only a bachelor’s. One implied that without a PhD, the work I was doing would eventually get boring and I wouldn’t have any options, because I wouldn’t be one of the people coming up with new ideas to implement, but would just be stuck implementing other people’s ideas.

Huh?

First, it feel like kind of a personal question, especially from people I’ve just met.

Second, I do pretty much the same type of work as the people in my department with PhDs. So I haven’t come up with any revolutionary ideas yet, but HELLO, I’ve only got 2 years of experience at this. Most of my colleagues have greater than 10 years, and I’m pretty sure that’s where they get their authority from, not their PhDs.

At my next conference, I’m going to write “DON’T ASK ME ABOUT GRAD SCHOOL” on my forehead.

Unfortunately, our day trip to Catalina (scheduled specifically to practice using the new camera housing) got off to an unfortunate start. While on the boat, we decided to check the menu settings on the camera – but when we turned it on, nothing happened. The battery appeared to have been drained somehow overnight (it’s still a mystery how, as auto-power-off was set to 2 minutes – perhaps it was left lying on a button such that it kept turning itself back on?). And of course, we hadn’t packed the charger! Jeff tried unsuccessfully to find a replacement battery and/or charger once we reached the island, but alas, it wasn’t meant to be.

I decided to look on the bright side: if we didn’t have the camera along, we were SURE to see something really, really cool!

For our first dive, we headed west along the reef. I was peeking into holes with my light, and spotted some reflective little circular things – which then moved, as they were the bottom of an octopus tentacle! Thrilled with my find (the first octopus I’d spotted without help), I waved Jeff over, and then spotted the rest of the octopus farther back in the hole. Sadly, he was not inclined to perform for us (changing colors or moving rocks), though I did see his eye apparently open and close several times.

We continued west until we hit the wreck of the Sujac, at the far end of the park. The only time I’d been there before was during my advanced diving course, on our way to 100′ for the required deep dive. That day, the visibility was such that I didn’t see anything until we were right on top of it, and then all I saw was a bit of hull with a hole in it that we swam through. Yesterday, the vis was at least 40′, and you could see the whole wreck at once. It’s lying on a steep slope, with the top in about 55′ and the bottom down around 90′. At 70′ in the shade of the wreck, we hit a nasty thermocline – brrr! We swam through the hole, and tooled around a bit. It’s a very cool spot, that we’ll have to visit again with a working camera.

Heading back east towards the stairs, Jeff scared up a few giant kelpfish and another octopus.

After our first dive, we grabbed lunch at the Dockside Cafe (diet be damned!) and then hung out watching all the dive classes to while away our surface interval. It was alternately comical and scary to see how much trouble new divers have on the stairs getting in and out of the water, and how much chaos and stair-blockage can ensue! We waited until the crowd on the stairs had cleared a bit, and headed in for our second dive.

This time, we were after the sailboat wreck in 60′ of sand (straight out from the stairs). I’d been to a sailboat once before (in my certification classes), and Jeff claimed it was right next to the glass-bottom boat, which we’ve found on our own several times. Usually, the vis out over the sand is such that we only manage to stumble upon one wreck, and never spotted it’s mates – turns out there are a total of three wrecks. First we found the nameless sailboat, standing by itself: this was the one that I remember seeing in my class (and in fact, Jeff may have swam to it before and thought it was the glass-bottom boat in the murk).

Nameless sailboat – photo by Chris Menjou

I noticed another boat off at the edge of my visibility to the west, and we swam over to it: the glass-bottom boat. I thought it was odd that the two were so far apart, since the map showed them touching – and then I spotted a second sailboat on the other side of the glass-bottom boat. Maybe the last time I was there I thought it was all pieces of one boat? Or maybe stuff has moved around (the wrecks do get moved by storms). Anyway, we were pretty happy to have found all four of the in-park wrecks in one day.

We saw some interesting sheephead feeding behavior by the wrecks; a female sheephead was scooping out a huge hole in the sand with her mouth, filtering through each mouthful for food. Mmm, tasty sand.

Back at the reef, we saw more of the usual suspects – and then something new: a really, really juvenile garibaldi! When they’re super-juvenile, they’re almost more blue than orange, and tiny! Very cool – here’s another picture not taken by us of a baby garibaldi:

Juv. Garibaldi – photo by Reeveseye (Scubaboard)

Moments after spotting the garibaldi, Jeff started making enthusastic pointing motions at something else – a small ray went cruising past us! It wasn’t a bat ray, or any other kind we’ve seen before – we’re not sure which one it is, though I don’t think it was the electric torpedo ray (didn’t have spots). Probably a round sting ray. Anyway, it swam right by us without stopping, so we didn’t get too close a look.

We were done diving for the day by 2:30 – and not slated to leave the island until 6:30. We dropped our bags off at the ferry terminal and started poking around the shops in Avalon, which is entertaining to do about once a year (just long enough to forget you’ve already seen the exact same knick-knacks). We finally picked up some reading material at a bookstore to help kill the time. I nabbed Mary Roach’s “Stiff: The Curious Lives of Human Cadavers,” which turned out to be a fantastic read; I highly recommend it!

All in all, a good day of diving, if not a good day for pictures. :( At least we learned a valuable lesson about carrying extra batteries and chargers along…