I am a southerner by birth and upbringing, but I haven't lived in the south for years. To compensate, I tend to spend the summers haunting the farmer's market and cooking lots of southern food. I am particularly fond of fried stuff like green tomatoes, okra, catfish, and hush puppies... all the stuff you can't eat very often. Last year I also had one heck of a balcony garden with three kinds of of tomatoes, three kinds of peppers, and lots of flowers and herbs. I'll have to see what's in the works for this year since I'm not quite sure what will grow in Tucson yet. My collection of succulents, so far seem very happy.

I really enjoy all the research I get to do and be involved with. But, when I'm not at the university, I prefer to be fly fishing, cooking, watching the TV shows I've become addicted to, or reading (the frequency of these activities is unfortunately in backwards order-- I never get to go fishing these days). Although, I have to say I recently caught TWO ginormous (14 inch) brown trout within 10 minutes of each other. Sometimes a girl gets really lucky, and then that girl can't really complain about not fishing very often.