Cottontail Rabbit in the snow

Greetings and a Happy New Year from our home in Johnson Canyon, Utah.

First, some good news:

New Year’s Sale:

During the month of January, you can get a full year’s subscription for only $19.95, $10 off the usual price. If it is getting close to time to renew, this is a great way to save some cash. This is open to everyone, so tell your friends. No coupon codes to worry with. Just go to: http://thehappyscientist.com/content/subscription-levels

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December was a challenging month, with me wrestling with so many different things that I feel I should have an honorary membership in the Word Wrestling Federation.

Health Issues

The biggest thing I have been wrestling with is my health. My adventure with the Epstein Barr virus continues, making me incredibly tired, and causing a variety of aches and pains. I had more blood work done, with some strange results, which will probably lead to more testing to see what is really going on. I will be incorporating this into some lessons/videos on the human body. If I seem a little tired or droopy in the videos, don't worry.

Video Players

I have also been wrestling with the videos on my website. I had switched from self hosting the videos to using Wistia in order to overcome some of the compatibility issues with so many different web browsers, operating systems, etc. The switch to Wistia has helped a lot, but I am still running into compatibility issues, so I am testing a dual system.

If you go to the home page of my site ( http://thehappyscientist.com ) you will see three videos that I posted for New Years. The main videos on this page are hosted on Vimeo. They have a huge content distribution network, which means you should get fast, smooth playing videos. The downside is that some school districts block Vimeo, so under each video, you will see a link to play the video with Wistia, my alternate player. It is my hope that with these two options, everyone will be able to get the videos to play properly. If you run into any problems, and especially if you can’t get either to play, please let me know.

Learnalong

I had high hopes for the Learnalong program, and have not given up, but see that I need to make some changes. I had really hoped that it would turn into a rich conversation with all of you, with chances to discuss things, find out where I was not doing a good enough job of explaining, learning what you wanted and expected from a curriculum.

Along the way, it has bogged down. I suspect that I have not been open enough with requests for questions, and that I have not focused enough on getting you to tell me what you want and need. I understand that this is not the usual way of doing things, and it is going to take us all some time to get used to it.

I am going to try some new approaches, and will be letting you know as they go up, in hopes of finding the right formula for this. Thanks for your patience, help, and any questions/feedback/suggestions.

ScienceLog

Because of my health issues, I have also slacked off with my online journal. It has just not felt right to keep writing, “I am incredibly tired again.” every day. I am working on getting some of my Happy back, and having more fun with science and photography. I will also be adding some of the science behind Epstein Barr, investigation the Lymphatic System and other lessons about the human body. I will work to at least post a brief update and a new photo every day.

Mule Deer discovered the bird feeder.

We have some snow, with a LOT more on the way this week.

Little Bit's cat tracks in the snow