I participated in my first batch of archaeological fieldwork on Saturday. 9am-12pm. Nothing major, but it was exciting… shovel tests at twenty meter transects. Pairs of two dug foot round/deep holes and sifted the dirt/plants/rocks through a shaker screen. Anything of interest is bagged and marked.

I’m trying to be careful about sounding too important… what I’m doing is very, very minor. But! I am incredibly jazzed and giddy about this whole project. So if I make it sound like a big deal, it’s not, but it is.

This is my pet project at the Lab. I do grunt work, learn the work bit by bit… I’m having a great deal of fun. I clean and analyze the artifact samples brought from the site. Analysis is pretty low-key, given my utter lack of knowledge and experience… so I read books, ask questions, and research.

I love research.

I came home, didn’t want to be bored so I went back out and biked a couple of miles, came home, cleaned the house, did Spanish homework, watched Much Ado About Nothing, spoke with Kristin, went to sleep. Sunday, I went to church (I’m joining next Sunday morning), did a little homework (not enough), went back to church, came home…

I need to have more productive days like Saturday.

Also! Jess found my cellphone! It’s been missing for days and I was highly distressed. When I was watching Much Ado, my couch cushion started vibrating… and it was Jess! on my cell phone.

A little wacky, but whatever works.

Meanwhile… I am headed into Serious Academic Mode.

I just printed off the lecture notes from my Latin Govt. class course reserves… 57 pages of testable material, and that’s assuming she’s only going to test over what we’ve covered. Doubtful.

I’m spending this evening reading the textbook and reviewing these notes. I’ll do the same all evening tomorrow. Thursday, I’m going to try to spend the entire day at the history conference — I’m excited. This is the first conference within my field that I’ve attended. Four 2 hour lectures/discussions each day! More on Saturday, I think. The hotel is only a few blocks from my apartment, making it all the better. The difficult task will be selecting which lecture I want to go within each time block.

I’d be bouncy if it weren’t for that bloody test.

I spent an extra two hours at the Archaeology center to make up for this next Thursday and Tuesday that I won’t be there (conference and in Arkansas, respectively). Today was spent re-archiving artifacts from Ecuador and Mexico into acid-free materials. Apparently the tooth-and-spit question isn’t quite so off limits after all… my supervisor insisted that I play the three-tone whistle for her.

I am a bad, bad archaeologist-intern.

I was assigned to identifying this button medallion, today. Brass, horribly tarnished, can’t be soaked because it would ruin the paint. I was trying to brush off enough of the green gunk to read the Latin on the bottom, and all I could think was “just a little spit! One scrape of the tooth! All would be revealed!” But, alas, I was surrounded by the real archaeologists who would likely not appreciate saliva in contact with artifacts.

Sigh. Indiana Jones wouldn’t have minded a little bit of tooth and spit.

When looked at in a certain light, that line seems a bit wrong.

——

Indiana Jones would mind tooth more than spit. Any way you look at it!

Posted by C @ 09/17/2004 05:46 PM CST

I miss Indy.

Posted by Lorien @ 09/17/2004 09:28 PM CST

i think indy would have appreciated being in a situation in which he could obtain tooth and or spit.

Posted by jess @ 09/18/2004 02:36 AM CST

It’s probably a good thing that my parents don’t know about the blog.

although, knowing mom, she’d probably out-innuendo you all.

Posted by Lor @ 09/18/2004 08:55 AM CST

Mom would definitely out-innuendo all of us.. and sit back and grin imagining our faces as we read it…

And.. I bet ol’ Indy isn’t missing out on much of anything.

Posted by C @ 09/18/2004 08:59 AM CST