sponsored by Cheez-It ®

This post should really be called "Abuse of an Asian Mussel Part II" but I have to keep the sponsors happy if you know what I'm sayin'.

No sooner than after finishing my fried rice breakfast was I back in bed to catch some sleep due to round 2 of lobster tracking in La Jolla the next day. Mind you, this was not overnight fine scale tracking hell, this was a different form of tracking that doesn't involve grad student torture (or so I thought). Our task was to recover listening stations anchored to the sea floor from depths of 20-50 feet. These devices "listen" for lobsters that have little back packs that emit pings (barely audible to human ears). The great thing about them is that you can put them in the ocean (or wherever) and have them do the dirty work for you. No inhalation of carbon monoxide fumes necessary. This mussel is a big fan.

However, you still have to go out there and retrieve the data from them. This means driving up in a boat with a GPS and diving down and tying a line to the device. Then you surface and pull the station up, with its requisite 30lb block of cement. Somebody tell me why I went into marine biology?

That morning; Shakira, Beaner, Julia Guliah (no relation to Glenn Guliah), Princess Leah, Nelly (our new labbie), and I rally at the marine lab to assemble our gear. We break up into two teams, lets call one of them the "fast" team and the other oh....I don't know... the "slow" team.

Princess Leah, Julia Guliah, and I are on the "fast" team and we take my favorite boat (the one that almost killed me) out to La Jolla. We arrive quickly at the sites and recover our stations with relative ease. You can take a guess at how the "slow" team was doing. I'll keep their identities anonymous to preserve their dignity. No matter...we have to dock with the other boat anyways because they have the computer necessary to download the data from the receivers.

After docking, the "slow" team reports that they are low on air and ask us if we have any tanks we can spare them. We do (because we're so dang efficient) and we offer a trade. Air in exchange for food of some sort. "What do you got?" "Cheez-Its" replies Beaner. Uhhhhh...JACKPOT!



If you aren't in the know, Cheez-Its are the grad student equivalent to barrels of crude oil. Marine scientific research revolves around these tasty little baked crackers. How do they get all that cheesy flavor inside? Not only did we get Cheez-Its, they were BIG Cheez-Its. NICE.

After I finish doing some Cheez-It lines, it's time for a group picture. Little did I know that it could have been my last (even though I'm not even in the picture).

After we depart from the other boat we proceed to the sites where we picked up the receivers to deploy them again. This is a much easier job because you don't have to find them, you can just put them down and record the location. Julia Guliah jumps into the water at the first site and I begin handing her gear when a cell phone rings. I pick it up and its Beaner.

Beaner: "Heya, the lifeguards just came by on their jet-ski. There was an unconfirmed but reputable report of a white shark in the area. It might have been eating a seal."

Me: "Oh right, I saw some seals earlier, but there was so much blood I couldn't really see them that well. Haha. No really, where is the alleged shark?"

Beaner: "Uhhh, right about where you guys are right now."

Me: "Hey Julia Guliah, you might wanna get out of the water."

Nice... the tax collector is here and he's hungry. Julia and I quickly huddle and discuss our options. The problem is that we have deployed a receiver but there is a line attached to it. We could either do the wise thing and A) pull it back up and untie the line and devise another way of lowering the receiver without diving or B) dive down and untie the line (the preferred method in the absence of the man in the grey suit).

For some reason (perhaps it was my Cheez-It induced euphoria) we decide on plan B. I don my gear, while noticing the peculiar absence of the Harbor seals I had spotted at this very site 40 minutes prior, and join Julia in the water. On our descent I'm practically spinning like a corkscrew, keeping my eye out for you know who (no, not he who shall not be named). After what seems like an eternity we find the receiver, untie the bowline knot and get the hell out of dodge. Forget the safety stop, I might die here! I swear, every kelp bass I saw looked like it could have been jaws, ready to strike and eat me. I briefly think, with all the cheese in me right now, I bet I taste pretty good.

Upon reaching the surface I fling my gear into the boat (that I don't hate anymore) and hurl my body, like a salmon going upstream, onto the deck.

Great success! (insert Borat voice)

White shark - 0 Asian mussel -1

We deployed the rest of the stations without incident by lowering them down using lines in a sort of "cradle" fashion. However there is a clincher to this story. Later the Beaner tells us that the lifeguards now think that the shark could have been "a large bull sea lion".

Thanks.

I had a great story but now I just look like a wuss.

Well... at least I got some Cheez-Its.

As promised, here is a nice pic of Rothomabobo and Shakira.



Lookin' good gals.