am i doing this right?

So I guess this is my first blog entry...is that what they're even called?  Entries??  Posts, maybe?  I honestly have no idea.  I'm no blogger.  Never have been.  I don't even read blogs...so what the heck am I doing here?  Oh, right.  Keeping family and friends up to date on all the sciencey happenings of my life.  Focus: science, monkeys, Bolivia.  I'm going there, ya know.  In case you haven't heard.  I'm leaving in a little over two weeks for Bolivia to study one of those cute little South American monkeys.  There I will study said monkeys and struggle to communicate with all those native Spanish speakers.  My Spanish is very bad (muy mal).  At this point, I'd probably have more luck asking for directions from one of those monkeys with whom I'll be spending so much time.  I can say useless phrases like, "Hay un hombre encima de esta casa" (There's a man on top of that house), and "El muchacho esta agarrando el rastrillo" (The boy is catching the rake), and "Cuidado con oso polar!" (Watch out for the polar bear!).  I told myself in May that I would use ALL my free time this summer to learn Spanish so I wouldn't look like a total fool.  Of course, I procrastinated.  Somehow I managed to fill up my time with Netflix and nightly trips to the dog park with my beautiful basset, Rosie.  Gosh, I'm going to miss that dog.  She's a crazy bitch most of the time, but I love her anyways.  Every night she curls up on my bed and falls asleep, snores for a few hours, and then somehow manages to steal all of my covers.  How a 45 lb. dog can take up two-thirds of a full sized bed, I will never know.  But I digress.

Got some new hiking boots last week.  My old, wimpy boots wouldn't stand a chance in the jungle.  Probably should have allotted more time to break in these bad boys...but it turns out I'm real good at the procrastination thing.  So I've been wearing them around the house.  Since San Antonio is fresh out of jungle terrain, I must improvise my "boot break-in" strategy.  And evidently it's frowned upon by the general public to traipse up and down the aisles of the local HEB sporting my quintessential Nike shorts with a new pair of all-terrain hiking boots. I'll be the first to admit...it's not my best look, but I do feel it affords me a new type of respect.  Like people will just know, "oh, she's awesome and outdoorsy."  But it's probably more of the, "what the hell was she thinking when she left the house?" type of mindset.  I'll just keep wearing them around the house to avoid any odd glances and/or confusing stares.

The entire time I've been typing this, I've been trying to figure out how to end it.  Do I just stop writing and then it's over?  Am I supposed to have some sort of catchphrase or tag line??  I'll do one better and end every blog entry/post/note with a fun science fact.  Fun science facts are better than 90% of catchphrases and tag lines.

FUN SCIENCE FACT #1: A new born blue whale (Balaenoptera musculus) measures 20-26 ft. (6-8 m) in length and weighs up to 6,600 pounds (3000 kg).  That's a really big baby.