This past week was very interesting between working during the day and playing during the evening! At work, I finished searching for values for aragonite saturation and pH thresholds for bivalves. There were so many papers that had the impacts of ocean acidification for bivalves—mainly oysters (Crassostrea virginica and Crassostrea gigas) and mussels (Mytulis edulis). With so many papers, this particular literature review took longer than most of the others so it was basically the only thing I worked on this week! However, on Friday, my mentor and I went out on the estuary to monitor a rare estuarine plant that only occurs in Newport and Coos Bay in Oregon. It wasn’t blooming this week, so I think we’re going out again next week to see it in bloom. While we were out, we saw a dead seagull without a head, so that was a pretty interesting way to end the work week.

The social part of the week was quite eventful! On Monday we went blueberry picking at Siletz and made blueberry lemonade. I’ve made blueberry smoothies so often this past week. Also, on Thursday, the scholars and I went to the Oregon Sea Grant picnic and had a blast playing and ladder ball, walking on the beach, and eating delicious food! That evening we all went to karaoke with some REU interns. We also went to Yaquina Bay head and lighthouse on Friday after work. The view was great and the walk was refreshing.

On Saturday, Abby went up to Eugene for a wedding and Ron, Rosalyn, and I accompanied her to Eugene and explored the city that day. We went to the Saturday market, Buffalo Exchange, and the movie theater to see Inside Out. It was a packed and fun day. Today Rosalyn, Ron, and I went over the bridge to look at an Antique mall and then explored the Nye Beach district. Abby joined us for dinner at Nana’s Irish Pub. This past weekend the scholars and I also made a Newport bucket list of things to accomplish before the end of the summer. This list includes kayaking, glass blowing, hiking Cascade head, going to the wooden boat show, and going to Nana’s (which we already checked off the list). I’m looking forward to the next couple of weeks.