Moustache-iversary

Sunday was my one year anniversary of having a moustache. The last year has seen various forms of the moustache as I worked my way from Undergraduate life to beginning my Graduate Studies.

I started growing a beard while interning at Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution. It was an incredible summer on Cape Cod, where I was a part of the Institution's Summer Student Fellows Program. My weekdays were spent with my advisor, Ken Brink, as we analyzed model data; my paper from the experience was entitled "Topographic Rectification in a Forced, Dissipative, Stratified Coastal Ocean."

My weekends were spent enjoying a region of the country which was new to me. Boston, NYC, Connecticut, Montreal, the Cape itself, and Nantucket all offered exciting weekend trips, but my favorite weekend was during Hurricane Bill; without making landfall, Bill threw some incredible waves at the coast, and I was there to catch them on Martha's Vineyard. After renting a board and hitchhiking around the island, I landed some beautiful waves at Squibnocket Beach, suggested by one of my rides as the beach to get this swell.

The beard began to truly flourish as I returned to the West Coast, due in part to a 100 mile backpacking trip I completed with my father; it is a proven fact that the manlier one's activities, the quicker facial hair grows. With each incredible vista, dehydrated meal, and night on the dirt, my beard sprouted and thickened.

Come January, I was lucky enough to take part in a research cruise in the South Pacific. CLIVAR P6, Leg 2 took me from Papeete, Tahiti, to Valparaiso Chile. With 36 days at sea, this was the longest cruise in my minimal experience. For my reaction to this adventure, please read a post from my travel blog.

Following the cruise, I shaved the beard into a Goatee; I felt the need to clean myself up after becoming a bit scraggly with my time on the R/V Melville. A four month adventure began that took me throughout southern South America, through six countries, over 250 hours on buses, countless hostels, beautiful waterfalls, foreign friends, stomach viruses, too many clubs, and too few empanadas. The same travel blog above gives this experience.

My moustache reached it's current state during this South American Adventure, in the capitol city of Asuncion, Paraguay. Here, I received my acceptance from Scripps Institution of Oceanography, where I will spend my next 5-7 years.

Once returned, I began the transition to San Diego, moving into my apartment, setting myself up on campus, and beginning work with Uwe Send, one of the professors on my first year Advisory Committee. We are analyzing the optics of the first 80 meters, with special attention to chlorophyll concentration.

I have met everyone down here in San Diego with this moustache, and I honestly don't know when I will cut it off. To celebrate, on Sunday I had friends over and we ate a delicious 3-course meal featuring the manliest foods possible; a starter of green salad and hot-wings, followed by pork ribs, corn on the cob, and potatoes with gravy, and for dessert, baked apples over vanilla ice cream.