We processed soil samples today. We spent all day in the lab, but our data are coagulating into something greater than the sum of their parts. Synergy, I believe it is called. We are constructing a synergy of data, rendering meaning and significance from mere numbers.

I feel much better. Working with Cat is going smoothly again, and we're so close to the end of this thing its hard to feel anything but relief. Processes are winding down and gearing up at the same time. Jack arrives tomorrow night, and the consultation appointments start on Monday morning. Presentations will happen on Friday, and then... The beach!!! Oh, we are all frothing at the mouth in anticipation of the beach. Wave 'Adios!' to moldy La Selva, Evergreeners! We'll be on the next bus to the Pacific ocean!

Still haven't had much time to sort through photos. Just like everyone else in this class, when I'm not sleeping or eating, I'm crunching numbers. Charissa and Michael are still collecting field data, but only for a few hours a day. Mostly, we sit in front of our glowing windows into the Otherland, that datascape where our destinies swirl in a virtual cauldron of ones and zeroes, and we wield our techno-magic: a click of the mouse here, type a paragraph there, hmmm... maybe some data analysis here, what's next?

We are producing knowledge. We are tiny little spiders spinning the periphery of a web of information as deep as the ocean and much, much, wider. We are students. We are learning more than the we'd expected.

For the past three days, the forest has been glowing in the rays of everybody's favorite star. Today the sun bathed us all day in photon love, and a mild breeze ruffled the canopy. The forest is still, and very quiet, but the air positively sizzles with anticipation of the next rain. The plants are busy photosynthesizing, but few mobile creatures here can handle three days with so little moisture, and so they hide in dark, moist places, waiting for the water to return and make the world habitable again. For the forest wildlife, this is the calm between the storms.

Genevieve came bearing gifts from the city: real, fresh-ground peanut butter, and bread with more grain than preservatives! Oh, the ecstasy. Can you hear the choirs of heavenly Seraphim, singing her praises on high? A little background info: the local staple for uninventive gringos is called "Breddy" or "Bimbo", and on the matter of nutritional deprivation, it leaves Wonder Bread, that white trash icon of the United States, idling its engines in the trailer park dust. Breddy/Bimbo is so vapid, so devoid of anything mildy digestible, that I finally understand why everyone here eats rice and beans for every meal. Compared to Bimbo/Breddy, rice and beans seems like nectar and ambrosia.

Data is calling. I must answer its summons...