So here, at long last, is my up-and-coming blog.

Mindlessprimitive will chronicle my efforts to successfully get into graduate school for Cultural Anthropology, my dealings and thoughts about technology and my growing fascination with cycle touring and how I plan on making all of these seemingly disparate things work together.

And I’ll start off by giving you some details about myself. I’m in my early 40’s, I have a BA in Anthropology from William Paterson University. I was born with a congenital heart defect (basically I was born with a 3-chambered heart that was dextrocardic.) I’ve been an EMT-D, a book seller, a trekker for 40-some odd years, a stroke survivor and I celebrate two birthdays. My actual birthday and the date of my heart transplant. Its been a wild ride. I’ve been kind of off the horse for a while, but I’m back on it again (hence the blog) and pushing on ahead. I’ve had people tell me I couldn’t do things before, and I’ve tried just that much harder to succeed (and in many cases did.)

As will be a standard practice, I’ll list what I’m currently reading. And right now it’s split between “Anthropology, Theoretical Practice in Culture & Society” by Michael Herzfeld and “A Handbook of Practicing Anthropology” edited by Riall W. Nolan. Both are available through Amazon. Both are excellent works.

Reading “Anthropology” by Herzfeld is both interesting and vital for me because it brings me more up to speed with the history of Anthropological though. It is also a required text for the online lecture class UC Berkeley Anthropology 114, 001 given by Dr. Rosemary Joyce. For me, it’s a great way to stay more current, and it’s a fantastic way for someone looking to get an introduction to anthropological though. I enjoy Dr. Joyce’s lecture style, and hope to emulate her enthusiasm one day in my own lectures.

“A Handbook of Practicing Anthropology” is a look into how, what and where anthropologist exist in non-academic environments. I’ve only just started reading it, so I’ll give you a more detailed review later. But again, it’s an interesting read so far.

On a personal note, I have indeed scheduled a retake of the GREs for July 19. I hope to improve my scores from last time (V: 154 Q: 138 AW: 3) But then again, I purposely didn’t really study for them. I wanted to know how well I would do, what with being out of classes for about 10 years. I don’t think I did all that bad, but improvement is needed. Isn’t it always?

I know this is brief, but future posts will be more entertaining. Expect them about once a week.

Oh, and the picture on the mast-head? I took that one while I was visiting my brother’s family in Chicago. The plaque states:

“These poles of red cedar formerly stood in front of houses in Hiada Indian village along the west coast of the Queen Charlotte Islands, British Columbia. The pole on the right formed the actual doorway of such a house and the photograph on the right shows it in its original location in the village of Xaina.

The figures carved on totem poles are usually crests belonging to the families of house owners. Depicted on these poles are a killer whale, a sea centipede, a grizzly bear devouring a boy, a raven, a thunderbird, and other figures representing being and incidents mentioned in old legends. The figures at the top of both poles are watches, sometimes purely ornamental, but also suggesting that a good watch was being kept over the village.”

The totem pole on the right was presented to the Field Museum by Edward E. Ayer in 1902.

That on the left was received from the Department of Ethnology, Columbian Exposition in 1893.”