The Ultimate Late Bloomer

Today I learned about the awesome type of salamander in Mexico called the axolotl. When everything is normal and happy, they keep their gills, remaining in their larval form and living in the water. But, if the water stagnates and gets all blcky (my own word), it will grow into its adult phase with lungs out of necessity. Then it can go on land and find a healthier water source and reproduce there. This kind of change is called heterochrony, and more specifically neoteny.
I'd found a few pictures of the axolotl on the web a while back and had never heard of them. But, I loved them because they look like they're smiling at you. I love learning about this stuff. I like to know why.
School's okay. I have A LOT of homework at all times. It's around 11 pm and I still have chemistry to read, a math assignment to start, and a math pretest to study for (if I don't pass it, I don't get to take Calculus after all). But, I was so excited about my Paleontology reading that I had to write a post about it. The level of fascination I reach when I really get into this stuff reminds why I'm doing what I am. I even started enjoying Darwin's writing once I got used to it. And the man makes a lot of really good points (backed with much evidence or questioning of other evidence -- just the way I likes it). This past week we applied our reading of Darwin by trying to categorize a bunch of brachiopod fossils (shelly-type things) into genus, species, sub-species, and varieties, just by looking at the differences in them. Let's just say I now fully understand why Darwin could get frustrated. *wink* I love handling the fossils, though. In math, I thought I was getting behind, but today I was one of very few who had even finished the assignment. So, the panic has died down... a bit. Chemistry is good. The first assignment is due this week, as well as our first exploratory lab measuring out moles, so we'll see how I do. I don't have to do every lab, so I might need to skip this one to get ready to take that pretest. I get 2 tries on it, at least. Johnny was able to call me on Saturday for a few mintues, so I'm just getting by until I can hear from him again. I'm writing about his calls, letters, and progress on his blog, actually, at spyder311.blogspot.com if anyone is interested in checking up from time to time.
Well, thanks for tolerating my excitement about salmanders. :)