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The glorious thing about Anthropology was that it satisfied my diverse interests. I could learn about other cultures, learn new languages, transcribe phonemes and morphemes, dig up the past, watch monkeys, re-articulate skeletal material, sleuth potsherds, construct karyotypes and much more and still stay within one discipline. While all of these activities are performed by non-Anthropologists too, what makes the anthropological perspective unique is the recognition that all of these areas are interrelated. One cannot truly understand man's culture without knowledge of his biology, evolution, history, etc. just as one cannot understand man's evolution without knowing about his culture, history, etc.

I'm a native Southern Californian but have lived a year in Syracuse, New York, a year in San Angelo, Texas, 2 years in Crete, Greece (see photos), 1 summer on a Ford Foundation Fellowship at Tel Gezer, Israel, and 3 years in Milwaukee, Wisconsin (while in graduate school). I currently reside in Southern California.

Some of my interest areas:

Apiculture (Beekeeping).
Insects, especially Hymenoptera and bees (Apis mellifera) in particular, have been a fascination since I was age 6. My uncle was responsible for my first bee hive. I was probably about age 8 or 9 and spending the summer with my cousins in Northern California. A swarm of bees had taken up temporary residence on my uncle's wall. I scooped them into a cardboard box. My uncle then took me to a local commercial beekeeper who sold him a standard (Langstroth) hive and imparted a good deal of basic beekeeping knowledge. When my parents came to pick my up at the end of summer, they rented a trailer and we took the hive home to Southern California. I have kept bees since that time both as a backyard beekeeper and commerically with a partner. I have also taken Dr. Norman Gary's beekeeping course and hold a California State Agricultural Inspector certificate in apiculture. For a few photos, follow this link: beekeeping page .

Zymurgy (Fermentation).
I began brewing my own beer around 1982. I've tried many many diffent styles but prefer ales, specifically brown or other low hopped ales. For some years, I consistently brewed a light (colored) ale in two varieties, a normal alcohol (4-5%) variety and a light alcohol (about 2.5%) variety. I dubbed these Chino Hills Pale and Chino Hills Light respectively. In addition to this, I continued to try new styles and even succeeded in culturing some yeast from a Duvel (Belgian ale) bottle which resulted in a wonderful batch of Duvel look-alike.

In addition to beer, I've also made a number of Meads (fermentations of honey). Some were sweeter wine-like meads, some were dryer more like beer, some were sparkling and, around Christmas time I would brew a really nice Metheglin (spiced sparkling mead). As a beekeeper there was never a shortage of honey. I haven't brewed beer or Mead in some time now as I turned to wine instead. This brings me to the next interest area.

My attempts at fruit wine have been marginal at best. The one exception was a sweet blackberry wine which was too quickly consumed.

Subtropical Fruit.
When we bought a new home, about 17 years ago, it was unlandscaped. I determined that, if I had to plant trees and bushes, I wanted something that would produce. I joind the Calfornia Rare Fruit Growers and began reading up on Tropical and subtropical fruit. To make a long story short (I know, too late for that), currently in my back yard I have, Mangos (two varieties), Guavas (5 varieties), Kiwis, Bananas (Blue Java), Asian pears (5 varieties), Loquats (2 varieties), Cherimoyas (5 varieties), Passion Fruit (several varieties), Blood Oranges, Naval Oranges, Grapefruit, Pumelos, Kumquats, Limes, Lemons, Apples, Peaches, Nectarines (2 varieties) and Apricots. I know, these last are not tropical but variety is the spice of life. For a few photos, follow this link: Backyard Fruit page.

Now, you can see where all this fits together. The bees polinate the fruit trees, and the honey and fruit can be fermented.

Thank you for listening
C₆H₅OH

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