6. We All Grow Up

Photos from Heather Lake Trail.

5. CEPicnic

"You look like a rainy day."

4. Sourced

 "Dam(n)!" Let the water puns begin.

 No leaning over, please.

And so it begins. Exactly five weeks from today I will be on a plane to Amman, Jordan, gearing up for four packed weeks of exploration surrounding Jordan's water engineering and management practices. Before any of that happens, however, it was natural that we first learn something about our own water sources here in the Pacific Northwest. It's a little crazy (and by a little I mean a lot) that this is where my drinking water comes from: snow melt that (barely) gets treated with chlorine (1ppm), some UV rays, and ozonated gas. In other words, this water is really ****ing clean. Sometimes I forget that I live in such majestic, green, and rain-soaked landscapes.

3. Algae Biofuels

What I've missed most about being a photojournalist is asking passionate people questions and seeing the wheels turn right behind the spark in their eye. Rose Ann Cattolico was no exception, and I loved every minute of hearing her explain the gritty details of her research. The chemistry threw me off for some parts, but I knew enough to understand the implications... You can't expect everything you learn in school to stick forever!