I just noticed that Yugi's soul room looks like a six-year-old girl's, which is kinda disturbing ...
Why do the spring fashions come out in the middle of winter? I just don't get it - when you need warm weather clothes the most is when they're hardest to find...
Here's a true-life tip: Making your own meals really is cheaper than going out to restaurants - especially in New York. I've almost got my laptop money back!
Is it really smart to give out the DVD to a pilot TV show before it even airs on TV? I don't see what the incentive is to tune in and watch if you've already seen it commercial-free.
Winter weather seems to be shifting - it used to be really cold and snow a lot in Nov/Dec/Jan, but for the past few years, it's been Dec/Jan/Feb, with a little March thrown in - global warming?
I can't speak for the rest of America, but the reason I don't go to the movie theater as much anymore is a combination of the expensive ($10.75?!) tickets and the fact that you only have to wait a few months to rent it on DVD. I only go when I think a movie will be super-awesome, like Charlie and the Chocolate Factory.
Happiness is a sunny day without a cloud in the sky, sketching while listening to music, inhaling fragrant spring flowers, having a long conversation with an old friend, finding a penny, and topped off with the perfect tuna melt on a roll with Swiss cheese and a tomato ... and ice cream!
Ooh, remember when there was no Internet? And to look up information on anything, you needed to consult a dictionary, or if your parents had one, the encyclopedia? And then you also had to make a trip to the library and use the Dewey Decimal system to find books using the card catalog? God bless the Internet.
Well, I took myself off Proactiv for awhile to see if I can live without it. While I did break out, it's not as bad as I thought it would be. What's weird is that the acne makes me feel more sociable and approachable, the reverse of when I first went on the stuff so many years ago.
So, my acne has gotten out of control, ironically after I decided to go back on Proactiv. Of course, the problem is that I also went on a vacation around that time and was really stressed out, so who knows what is actually causing this breakout. A lot of my self esteem is shot - I feel like I'm back in high school and have to hide my hideous face as much as possible.
Well, my acne is receding somewhat - the several large pustules have been gratly reduced, but now they've been replaced by lots and lots of smaller ones. I suspect my daily facial regimen is causing this, but I haven't been able to weed out the variable causing it. I think it has something to do with controlling the dead skin being sloughed off.
2007 was a really rough year for me, full of stress from my face, my general health, financially, family stuff, and especially my lab work and graduate school. I just felt so overwhelmed and depressed. But I actually feel a bit ... hopeful this year. I learned my coping skills have fallen apart and I need to repair them.
My mother calls my poor little niece every weekend for learning. One night she conference-called me in, and told me to read something to her. The only little kid's book I could think of was my complete works of Lewis Carroll, so I read her a few chapters of Alice's Adventures in Wonderland. It's more advanced than I remembered.
My thesis committee told me to be more proactive, and that caused something inside me to snap, and start doing all the things I kept saying I would do but putting off - joining a church, working on coping skills, and really mapping out my research and future career path. I still really hate the word "proactive", though.
Ugh, maybe I was a little too proactive, because now I'm totally burned out in every way - financially, mentally, physically, spiritually, and academically. Now I'm not even sure I'll be able to get through the next month, but I guess I'll muddle through, somehow. Still not closer to finding a path for the rest of my life.
Before he left for Switzerland, the guy who took my blood as a control patient told me I had very low Vitamin D levels. That can affect mental well-being as well as cause scurvy, so I started taking cod liver oil, and man, it really makes a difference. It doesn't solve my problems, but I don't feel like I'm under a cloud anymore.
Flour beetles can be treated like roaches - bug bombs and Raid work well enough on them, as does crushing. Borax and ethanol don't work quite as well. But the best method to get them out of your kitchen is to locate the source, usually grains (like oatmeal) they got into, and throw it out. And bleach everything. Yes.
AAARRRRGGGHHH! So tired! So very, very tired...
At first after my thesis defense, I was fairly busy and productive, mostly with the particulars of finalizing graduation and attending other people's defenses and graduation parties and moving. Then I fell off for awhile, struggling to write a publishable paper and craft a brilliant resume, distracted with tidying things and fixing things. But eventually things got back on track and I've started applying for a few jobs, mostly government. But I'm still not sure what I want to do with myself. Sometimes I have fantasies of winning the lottery just so I won't have to figure it out.
Wow, I haven't been here in five years - so much has changed! I finally got a full time job, and get to draw biology things from time to time, so I'm putting up a site for biology drawings! Also, I live in a new state with a new bed, new futon, and new TV with fancy cable - everything else is old, though. The most recent big change is my robot-assisted laproscopic supracervical hysterectomy. I figured the post-op recovery was a good time to update things - I should be back to a more frequent schedule, though. Hopefully.
Mmmm, need to work on my work/life balance during the school year so that I can relieve stress better through more TV, drawing, sleeping, walking, cleaning, and updating the website of course! Also, my sister got married and had a son and would like time to fly to Boston for visits, and go to the Kentucky Derby with my mom! Just looking for that nice feeling of relaxation instead of anxiety.
Well, didn't end up updating the website as often as I hoped, but I did get some drawing in over the last year PLUS I found a lot of my childhood art that will be posted. It's made me nostalgic for the past - hopefully in a healthy way. Have been able to take opportunities to hang out with family more even though the Derby trip didn't happen. Still working on that work/ life balance - if I update more frequently, you'll know I've found it. Am slowly venturing from watching food shows to trying a few things I've learned. Baby steps!
OK, summer is winding down, time to go back to school! The hot science news is that a solar eclipse will be nearby August 21 - our department's going to try and get the special glasses so that students can view it. Hoping for clear skies! Also, there was another norovirus outbreak at Chipotle, poor babies that contracted herpesvirus, an expose on bacteria in kitchen sponges and on birthday cakes, and an Australian family that inadvertantly caused a piece of coral to attack them with a toxin released into the air. I also managed to find a few food items with the new Nutrition Panel!
After organizing and decluttering my office and apartment, and taking a microbiology supply inventory, after renting a Rug Doctor and shredding 3 bags of documents, after attending my niece's high school graduation and visiting my parents, I... have nothing to do. I'll try to get some healthy exercise in, make some meals, and update this site of course. But after that? Fortunately, there is a family reunion cruise in mid-July.
Slowly but surely, I am becoming a real adult. I have real adult documents that need real adult storage, real adult concerns about the future, and real adult responsibilities. Parents, health, career, purpose, balance, retirement, car. It was a good 40-year run, but alas adulthood has started to catch up with me.
I like to schedule a lot of my adulting tasks for the summer, when I am not working. Starting to reconsider that, though, as it puts all the unfun grownup tasks during extended fun vacation time. Last year I didn't take the summer off and worked; I think it made the following semesters much more difficult without the break, so I want as much summer break as is possible.
