An amalgamation of jejune apercus

Friday, Friday, Friday. I'm so glad. Although it's sad that Traves will be gone after today.

I bought donuts for our section today. Well, I bought them for the section next to us, which we used to be a part of. And I have a lot of leftovers from yesterdays pot-luck, all cuz some fool in the cafe up there forgot to put away the to-go boxes. A lot of it is excellent middle-eastern food--little stuffed zucchini with rice and minced meet in them. And I plan on going and getting sushi today.

All in all the good outweighs the bad, though I'm bored out of my mind here at work and ready to go home. Technically I have another hour to go, but I don't think I'll be able to hold out. It might have been different if I hadn't given up caffeine yesterday, but I did and I'm having trouble focusing as it is now. Plus I have the sinking feeling I'm forgetting something, or I will forget something.

Last night I had a dream that my dad died. I usually never remember my dreams. And actually, when I do, I forget them within an hour or so of waking. But anyway... I was incredibly calm in my dream, because I knew it wasn't the end and that it'd be okay, even though I was amazingly sad. In real life I would have freaked out, guaranteed. Needless to say, when I woke up I was relieved. I also dreamed I got a new car, a new old car, which slightly resembled FK's old convertible with a sun-roof--although there was no top, so no possibility of a sun-roof. This was especially forsightful, considering my car died this week. My transmission went out, and as it would cost more than I paid for my car to fix it...well, I refuse to fix it. So I'm back to driving Eve. I've missed my old car actually. I didn't miss not having air conditioning, but I did miss not having to constantly replace every part on my car one after another. I was never not fixing something on it. At least for the past year anyway. It was a good car while it lasted. And really it didn't give me many problems till I ran into that freeway barrier with it, so maybe it was resentful. Apart from not having air conditioning, Eve has a dysfunctional radio, which isn't that big of a difference from my old car, which had crappy sound. All in all, I don't so much mind this turn of events as much as I likely should.

I made enchiladas last night for the pot-luck today. It feels like a Sunday for once, so that's nice. I'm going to go observe this with my scriptures in the locker room in a second. I'm excited that when I move here for real my ward will be close enough that I can leave work and go to church every week in my own ward, instead of one week in a ward that once was mine but hasn't been for a while, and one week only attending sacrament meetings in a ward where I know no one, when I can.

This next week I'll be house-sitting my parents house--feeding the animals and the like--so that's where I'll be sleeping. Just in case anyone wants to play tennis. They're going to Wyoming with my oldest sister and her family. I'm jealous. I almost went with them, but I have my League tournament on Thursday, and we've been playing savage lately, so it's important I go; and they're only going to be gone 3 days, which is not long enough for the effort. Though I would like to hang out with my older niece and nephews more, not to mention the two little ones who are not as used to me as the rest. Both classified as a "mammas child," though my nephew (who my sister refers to as "Best Friend") is less so now that he's older. Now he just gets mad at me when I take pictures of him and points accusingly, which is so cute I just have to make a point to take pictures of him whenever I see him. I'll just have to find another time to spend quality time with Jessilee, Doll Face, Best Friend, and Girlfriend--as my sister respectively refers to them all, except for the first one, which my niece started.

So what can I say? Work has really sucked this week. I think it's probably good for Leon to realize this in the beginning, but what a crappy goodbye for Traves, who's last day is Monday. Basically at this point we're really behind for various reasons. I had to defrag our instrument's computer yesterday and the day before to make it workable. The one bright note is that Micro-manager has been gone all week, so we'll only see him Monday of our week. Don't get me wrong, I like him as a supervisor, but he pops out of nowhere and has some pretty drastic ideas he randomly implements, and sometimes it's nice to just be able to breath when working.

That said... I spent my first night in Salt Lake Wednesday. I figured it would be easier to get to work in the morning and I might as well. I only have limited things moved to my new place though, so that was the first and the last till next week. It was weird sleeping on such a small bed so low to the ground, but not as bad as I expected, which isn't surprising since I can sleep anywhere. But my room is nice, albeit a little echo-ey, but I got to work in 5 minutes flat.

Before that point I went to Graywhale Music with two friends I know from work, Sheidi and Golden Boy, to watch a Pete Yorn promotion--I guess that's what you'd call it. It was small--intimate if you will--so everyone could see him clearly, and it was pretty good. I hadn't really heard too much of Pete Yorn before this point, but he's okay. I think he's the kind of singer you can listen to a whole cd of and be content, because they're all good songs, but not wowed by it either, because though he's good, he's no David Bowie. Or should I say, "He's no Neil Diamond." Basically I like his sound, but he's not legendary, so you could probably find several people who have a similar sound. But he plays his guitar well, has a pleasant voice, and his lyrics are not bad at all. On our way there it was incredibly windy and a little rainy. Me and Sheidi heard this loud pop/sizzle and saw sparks that I swear indicated the explosion of a power line. Random. Golden Boy met us there.

After we went to that we went and got pizza, and of all the things in the world, watched "So you think you can dance." I don't really understand why everyone I know is so into this, but they are. I was content to watch it as well, because Golden Boy is moving to Ohio in a month, so I won't have many more opportunities to hang out with him, and I could honestly have more fun throwing paint chips with these two people than doing almost anything else with almost anyone else. Some of the dances were painful for me to watch, but a few of them were really good. Mostly it was the commentary by my friends that made it so enjoyable. The judges were pretty funny to watch, though I'm not sure what gives them the authority to judge other people's dancing. I mean seriously, being a choreographer for the backstreet boys should count against your ability to judge dancers if anything. And I'm pretty sure the second judge was getting drunker by the minute, and the louder she got the harder it was to not laugh at her absurd statements, which were generally always positive. I think the real hook they set to make people continue watching is that you don't find out who will get kicked off for that night's performances till the beginning of the next show. But I haven't watched it again, so I have no idea the outcome of the one I watched. And there's my two cents on the subject.

So I went on this date on the 24th... I don't think I like dating that much. Such a frustrating process to put one's self through, even necessary as it is. But we went hiking, or attempted to. I don't think he had a particular trail in mind. Well, I know he didn't, but people from Oregon shouldn't go hiking unless they know what they're doing. It didn't help that I generally have no idea what I'm doing. But yeah, I don't think he knew what he was doing the whole time. I've noticed this about this boy, that he's very into spur of the moment ventures and not planning ahead. It's nice to have and be comfortable with that kind of deviative system, especially since things in life rarely turn out how you expect, but it's also good to start out with a plan in the first place that you can deviate from. And I hate having an executive say in matters, as to what we're doing and where we're going, when I'm on a date that I didn't ask the other person out on. Stupid guy. The hiking was fun (because outside is pretty), but I'm surprised we didn't end up getting trapped in an avalanche or something, with all of the thought that went into following trails that I don't believe were meant to be followed. We ended up going to eat after, then played Sorry--of all the random things, then went to a movie. It was fun I guess, after sorts, and I do consider him a friend, but I can guarantee you that I'm one who's way too easily frustrated to end up with someone so indecisive. Too much like myself. And yeah, it was pretty frustrating. If he wasn't so many feet taller than me, I would have seriously considered shaking him. Which can't help but remind me of a certain friend on a date telling the guy that 'if he touched her again, she'd rip off the appendage he touched her with and beat him with it.' Just thinking of that story makes me smile:)

I didn't so much do the whole fireworks thing. Duckling and I went to the store to develop pictures, as we often do together, and I totally scammed the system. I guess you're not supposed to make picture copies of photographs taken in professional studios. I had three pictures of my parents from when they first got married that I totally loved and wanted copies of, and of a better quality than my printer can provide. My mom told me the guy with the studio had been dead for at least 20 years, so it's not like I could get his permission or anything, but I found out only after making them that I wasn't supposed to. I'll admit, I never read those disclosure statements they have at the beginning of things. So I basically just put them amidst all my other photos, and all was well. Anyway, they totally don't have a way to make copies of 3x5 photos, except for one that's about $1 a pop. I was not going to pay a buck for every picture, those of which I was just going to cut up and make smaller anyway. So with all my 3x5's I ended up going to my older sister's house, scanning them in, and saving them to file to print at my parent's house. It would be easier if my dad would have just figured out how to install the scanner we already have, but though he has no intentions of doing so, he won't give it to me to do either. Anyway, as I was leaving I noticed that my sister and brother-in-law had these stupid grins on their faces. Also, they were looking out the window through the curtains. A bit of side information here might help to clarify. So my sister wants me to marry into this family, of which a friend of hers belongs, for the selfish reason of her wanting to be in-laws with her. I don't think it even works out that way. But this friend's younger brother was sitting out on the lawn with her husband or something on camping chairs, no doubt anticipating the firework show they were about to watch (only it wasn't dark, and they were in their own yard, so it's not like they needed to get good seats in advance), which is what my sibling and her spouse were spying on out the window. So then my sister says to me, "That's the boy we want to set you up with," to which my brother-in-law avidly agrees, and then she says, "Just a warning, so you don't do something to make yourself look stupid. Like falling flat on your face." HAH! Like I have any control over the things I do to make myself look stupid. But yeah, I didn't fall on my face, and I got home in one piece. I then fell asleep to the sound, and more importantly--the feel, of fireworks going off outside my window. I'm thinking the selection chosen by my neighbors could not have been legal, because you don't feel fireworks like that everyday. You know they're good if you can feel them go off. But I absolutely love watching firework shows right up next to where they're setting them off, because you can feel them and I love it.

As is often the case, I don't really know what I did last week. I really should keep a journal or something, because I did do things. I don't think much happened till Thursday though. Friday I went to a pub. It was with a group of friends I don't see as often as I'd wish, but I do rather enjoy the quality time we spend together. I got the meat loaf. Like Duckling, I LOVE meat loaf. We could all definitely benefit from a uni-loaf. But it was seriously the best meat loaf ever. Kind of spicy, with a sweet glaze on top...it was good. It kind of reminded me of my first experience trying haggis. Anyway, the mashed potatoes with it were way too good and too creamy to not have some sort of dairy incorporated, so they were either made with cream or cream cheese or there was something else that made them slightly cheesey in there. And let's not forget the fried green beans, which I thought were asparagus at first, but were tastey nonetheless.

After the pub we decided desert needed to happen. They were out of the cheesecake, so we went in search of gilato ice cream. Once we'd found it we decided to see if there were any movies at the dollar theater we might want to see. I've got to say, not that good of a selection right now. The only thing that most of us hadn't seen, and that the one who had seen it was willing to see again, was Akeelah and the Bee. I hadn't really heard anything about it, but it was really good. Very feel good for the family, but pretty funny as well. It doesn't hurt if you're the kind of person who will find something to laugh at regardless of whether it's funny or not though. So I laughed at the funny parts, and I laughed at what struck me as funny, which made my good friend Mody next to me laugh, which made me laugh more...and I enjoyed it. You'll all be happy to know that I wasn't as loud as sitting next to Clarkie in X-Men though. Or afterward when he tried to put his hand through the window pane and then exclaimed, "I can turn air solid!" A very nice power to have as a mutant I must say:)

The unfortunate part of this was that I missed a rodeo to go to the pub. I don't regret it of course, just that the rodeo was on the wrong night. I've never been to one before, and I'd like to eventually, but mainly I'm sad because it's been so long since I've hung out with the work friends who went, and I never laugh so hard as when I'm around them. Sheidi in particular not only makes me laugh, but usually surprises the laughter out while making me laugh, so I don't know how it can be better than that. And my old bench mate has entertained me for so long with stories of her randomly impulsive and hilarious brother that I'm sad I missed out on the opportunity to finally put a face to her stories. Oh well, what can you do? I am going to Pete Yorn with some of them tonight, so that will be fun.

Let's see...that puts us at Saturday. By far the best part of this day was the cheesey Hallmark movie that Pinkie, Duckling and I watched in Pinkie and FK's basement. Love Comes Softly. So funny, but decidedly not through intention. Except that one part: "IT. The love." But about half way through the movie I had the ending predicted exactly. It was kind of cool seeing it play out exactly as I had described, but no one could have predicted the music that went along with it. Very westerny, and totally reminded me of that "beef, it's what's for dinner" commercial. So he's coming over the hill on his horse, and it's all like, "dah, DAH--dah, DAH!" Very dramatic. And then there was the softer "chigga dung, chigga dung, chigga dung" part which followed, which Duckling impersonates best with her riding on a horse actions. Then they kept alternating them while flashing back from him riding the horse, and the wagons he was trying to catch. A classic movie moment, though not so much if you weren't enjoying it with us.

And I think I'll end it there. I could say something about the 24th, but I'll wait till next time.

I suppose I'm a bit prone to overexaggeration lately, at least in the case of my new pad. Rather, I'm a terrible judge of size, because thankfully it's not as small as I suspected...which is easier to see with the lack of someone else's stuff in it.

I started moving my stuff into it the other day. I have the small size of bed--a twin? A full? I don't know, but it looks pretty small in that room. My dad says the room is larger than my room right now; I think it's about the same. But I'm not bringing half the stuff I have now there. It should be interesting. I'm pretty sure I'll fall out of it at least once, used to a Queen as I am. My dad helped me move all of my heavy things down there yesterday. I'm still deciding what to bring and what to leave behind.

And so I've spent the last two days packing. I get easily distracted, but I did have League yesterday, and I have a gathering of sorts tonight, so I haven't wasted my days completely... While attempting to pack I've found myself trying to organize things--like all of my pictures and papers, and getting rid of a lot of stuff I don't know why I kept all these years, and I'm farther than ever on my pinata--which I feel needs to be done before I move due to a lack of resources once I move (FYI: I've been using a 15 page paper I wrote on the planets, in the ninth grade, to paper mache this thing--which is an excellent example of something I never got around to getting rid of that should have gone long ago). Not to mention I've accomplished all of this while listening to some stellar music. So basically I feel I've accomplished a lot, but my room looks pretty much the hurricane it has been since I started the moving process. And I'm on my fifth Mountain Dew for today. Bad news.

That said, I can't believe it's 4 in the afternoon already, and a Friday at that. Man the week has flown. And not in a good way.

Saturday was Llama Fest. I don't know why I got it in my head to go this year, but it's something I heard about long ago and have since wanted to go. Personally I enjoyed the experience, despite some minor setbacks. Beginning with the heat.

I think it hit somewhere above 100 degrees...like 101...which is plenty hotter than 100. This and it being held at a Hindu Krishna Temple (on the fringe of the Fork of Spain) made it feel like we were in the middle of the desert. It was a pretty cool looking place, although the pictures of their blue god scared me quite a lot, I don't know why. We (Duckling, FK, Pinkie, and I) first went into the temple, because we got their half an hour early. It was nice because not a lot of people were there yet, and after it started the place was packed. We had to take off our shoes to enter, and on the first floor was a gift shop...weird; both being in a temple shopping and shopping without shoes on, with a stone--or otherwise hard but smooth and cool-to-the-touch--floor. A lot of llama stuff. Surprisingly the only thing I bought was a snow cone. I wanted to get my sister one of the little dollar llamas that were woven out of string or whatever, but by that time the fest was in full swing and I wasn't going to wait in the line for something like that. Also, they sold out of small shirts pretty quickly, and as much as I want a llama fest shirt, this years was not as cool as the one hanging on Arbogast's wall. I'll have to go again with my sister when they have better shirts.

So with 10 or so minutes till the start we went upstairs to the actual temple part of the temple. They had this central piece at the front with quite a few colored statues of gods lined along a wooden carved inset that was quite impressive. I'm a little sad I didn't get a picture to explain it better, but I wasn't sure if that was an insult to their religion or not to be taking pictures in there. I'm thinking not, because I saw someone else do so and they did allow the public in their holy place. Next to this central piece, on either side, were statues, presumably of gods, one a man and the other an elephant man. The other walls of the room were lined with very ornate (possibly Persian?) padded chairs and sofas that had hard frames that could have been made of wood, but I really didn't inspect that particular part of them all that well. It was highly impressive though.

Then we went outside and sat down to watch the llama judging. They did form, look, and all that stuff, then had an obstacle course they judged them at. I thought it was cool (I'll admit that on occasion when bored at home I've been sucked into watching the occasional dog show, which is what this reminded me of in a slightly convoluted way). Other than that there were a lot of llamas and a lot of judging which made it go by more slowly than weÂ’d hoped for, yet it was enjoyable. It was here we really noticed the heat though. Pinkie in particular is not one I would recommend hanging out with when she's hot because she gets incredibly cranky, but FK was also somewhat irritable--I think it must be a family thing. I've noticed that they're always hot regardless of whether or not it is hot, so when it actually is...beware. I don't know why it didn't bother me at all, but while I recognized it was incredibly hot, I also really was enjoying it. Maybe it's because I've been drinking incredible amounts of caffeine lately and thus have felt the need to over-compensate in my water intake, which can't help but prevent dehydration. I noticed the other day at Frisbee this was the case; I've never played so well in League in my life, except for the time I played in the pouring rain, while at the same time feeling so good. Then again, it could have been the fact that the humidity that's seemed to accompany the heat this summer (making it more oppressive) just happened to be absent. I like dry heat, but detest wet heat.

We actually weren't there very long, because no one else seemed to enjoy the heat as I did, and we only briefly went to look at the llamas up close. It took quite a bit of convincing even to get Pinkie and Duckling to come with me and look at baby llamas, and IÂ’m not sure we even found them. I would have liked to have gone into the pens to pet the llamas, but I realized my compadres wanted to leave, so we left soon after. We then went to a diner down there before heading home, and I for one enjoyed the food.

It was a pretty exhausting day at that, but that may have had as much to do with not really sleeping the night before as it did with the heat. That said, I would go again next year, but I doubt my companions this year would be enthusiastic at the prospect of going again, when it's sure to be that hot again, so I won't drag anyone into it next time. Except possibly family members.

So it turns out Leon is not Brief-Case-Guy. I'm glad, cuz that guy looked all too serious. He is however still a Leon, but only because I found out that he is good at tennis. Apparently that's his sport; so in honor of Pinkie's first and now forgotten racket named Leon, I won't come up with another name.

Regardless, he doesn't look like a Leon. From far away you think he's a normal person, then when he gets closer you realize he's a giant. He's not one of those tall skinny guys, and he's not fat; he's just tall. But he seems like a nice guy. Of course, I doubt he'll put chocolate in my drawer like Traves, and unlike my 3 last bench mates we don't have religion in common to talk about on Sundays, but that's not really a big deal and he does seem nice. It wasn't necessary, just more of a nice benefit than anything else. And he's learning pretty quickly, which is better than I could have hoped for.

Having said that, I'm not looking forward to work today. Oh sure, I'm at work all ready, but I just feel a doozy of a day coming on. I have a headache, and I was going to donate platelets today, but I'm thinking I'm going to cancel my appointment because I don't feel so good. Thankfully I won't have to train at all today, Traves is taking care of it, but still I'm ready to go home now. We had a bit of a nasty day yesterday. This entire last week, after a hiatus of two months without any real problems, the UniCAP 1000 at long last showed its true colors yet again by breaking down a little every day I worked. Only yesterday, however, was it bad enough to put us a day behind. So now I have to make up for yesterday, deal with some nasty sample issues, and pray that it decides to work today. Knock on wood.

So I started thinking recently that I haven’t been a very positive person lately. Oh, I’ve always been sarcastic and somewhat caustic in my cynicism, but I’ve always been happy in that, and I have at least tried not to be that way around people who will take me seriously. But recently I’ve been wondering if people who I’ve thought wouldn’t take me serious have been all along. I won’t lie, despite cynicism and sarcasm being on the board at church of things not to be, I like being them, and I don’t see it changing in the near future. Oh yes, I can and probably will try to tone it down a bit, but I was born with the sense of humor I have, and without that I’m not even sure who I’d be…some stranger I guess (I mean, it’s not my only trait, but it probably overshadows any others quite impressively). But I did have this realization in Florida that if I were to meet someone exactly like me in every way, I wouldn’t be able to be their friend. Which made me think, why exactly do I have friends? I think it’s a testament to the kinds of friends I’ve made that they’ve been willing to put up with me.

Lately however, with the stress of life and my general attitude, I think certain friends don’t want to put up with me any more, which makes me sadder than I can say. Also, recently I found out that at least two of my good friends are scared of me most of the time. I know it should make sense to me why this is, but I still don’t understand and couldn’t help but be deeply hurt. I tend to be argumentative and passionate in what I argue, but I automatically think people will approach this in the way that I would…which is either to ignore it, or to just know me well enough to realize that I don’t mean to be that intense in my arguments, and to know that I don’t hold it against anyone for disagreeing with me. I’m pretty incapable of holding a grudge, since I never can remember to hold one when I feel I deserve to. I think that’s one of the reasons that it’s good I’m moving. I can’t rub anyone the wrong way or be intimidating when I’m not around as much to do it. Hopefully I’ll be able to succeed in the next while with trying to come off as less strong in personality and thus less mean. I never mean to be mean, but I think with out a doubt I can be. I tend to be too blunt, because I'd rather be honest than fake, and ultimately I just need to exercise tact better. I’ve also started to be less oblivious lately, which is unfortunate. Oh, I guess it’s good to know if you’re annoying someone so you can stop, but when it makes you feel badly about yourself and at people for not taking it how you meant it…I’d rather just stay where I can choose to see the best of everyone. Especially when you realizing that you’re annoying doesn’t necessarily employ you with the means to stop it. Somehow my oblivion has changed recently though, and I need to learn to get back. I would rather be naïve and lost than aware and unhappy. So I can’t be happy without being positive, and I don’t think I can be positive if I’m aware of everything around me.

The day before yesterday I went to look at my new apartment. It's actually in a house, but it's not the whole house, so I don't know if it's considered an apartment or something else. I guess I could call it a pad. Anyway, I'd seen it before briefly, so it wasn't a huge surprise, but in that time I managed to forget just how small my room will be. The whole experience stressed me out quite a bit. For starters, it reminded me of how close school is to beginning again, for me to be moving within walking distance of it. Secondly, it reminded me of how broke I'm going to be paying for rent, and otherwise how differently it will be from what I'm accustomed to. There are benefits with the drawbacks, but it's hard for me to get past the room drawback. It's definitely the smallest in the house, is at least half the size--maybe three times--of my old room, and I don't think I'll be able to move even a quarter of my things in. In fact, I'm wondering if I'll be able to fit my bed, computer desk, and a bookshelf in the same room, literally. This kind of gave me a bit of anxiety. I got home--after getting lost trying to get to the freeway--and spent the rest of the night cleaning and somewhat packing my room up before I gave up and just went to work. I guess this all could be a decidedly good thing, in a way. I have a lot of junk. This gives me a reason to finally get rid of a lot of it, but even then I'll have to leave a lot of it at my parent's house, and my dad likes to get rid of stuff when he thinks others won't notice. Even without all the unnecessary stuff, I hope my parents will be willing to keep around the stuff I actually do need eventually. I stopped panicking once I started packing, but it's going to take some creative organizing to move into my new room without getting too claustrophobic. It wouldn't be a big deal if I didn't spend so much time on my off weeks in my room studying. Of course, I'm within walking distance of the library which has always been my favorite study area (at least until the crane came through the window at me), so that could be nice. Ultimately, after I panicked I prayed, and I do feel pretty good about the decision. I'm excited to live so close to school and it should be a good learning experience, getting out of my comfort zone by being in a place where I don't know many people, but still close enough to still crash in on those I do know if I can't stand where I'm at. And the roommate that I do know I love to death, so everything will be fine. My other roommate is incredibly nice as well, though I've only met her once and it takes me a while to feel comfortable around new people. They both have boyfriends, so I doubt I'll be seeing that much of either of them anyway. We'll see how it all turns out.

So moving has forced me to start doing a few things I've meant to do for a long time now, but haven't made myself do till now, due to laziness. I've printed off a lot of my digital pictures to fill my several blank frames acquired over the year. I've also started work on my pinata. Nothing appeals to me more than being able to whack the UniCAP 1000 over and over again with a baseball bat on my birthday. I've never made a pinata before, or anything with paper mache. This is a little strange since I was always the artistic child in my family, but at least I'm learning something new. I currently have a newspaper wrapped balloon hanging from the spinner on my fishing pole, for lack of a better place to put it while drying. I still have a list of things to do I'd like to accomplish before moving, but we'll see how far I get. I also have a booklist for the summer that I'm not making quite the progress on that I'd hoped for. Now if I can just get through this week of work.

Before........................................After

Ahhh...that poor lonkey. Personally I liked that name better than llamadonkey, but whatever. It was it was actually quite painful for me to watch it being beaten in such a vicious manner. I mean, I realized upon filling it with candy that it's demise would come one way and one way only, but sheesh...brutal is the only word for it I think. Pinkie and Josh should never be allowed near fire pokers and shovels again. I thought the wood floor was doomed for sure. This because we had nowhere in the house to hang the thing up, and it was too heavy for me to hold up for very long. So we put it on the floor and it was tall enough that we could hit it like that. A very fitting ending to a birthday week. That said...new subject.
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So tennis has been coming along nicely. I was just reading Duckling's blog of things that have happened recently, and was thinking, "oh yeah, I was there, how come I haven't written about that?" So a lot of this is repeated, but whatever. I realized I haven't written about tennis since before we stopped being terrible. Now we're only mediocre. We were actually forced into being better when Aaron and Brett came along and started playing by the rules. We learned to play doubles, which was a nice change. Generally we run around for 2 hours, and because it's so hot we end up running through the sprinklers, or--more likely--whining about just how hot it is and how it's just too taxing on us to play tennis in such hot weather. Such a day was the 4th when we played at dear old BHS, my ever so delightful "Used to Be" high school. Only it was pretty nice because they had the sprinklers on over by the portion of the field where the pole vaulters usually are, which instead it held those big football training things you push. I know, I've wowed you with my abilities of description, but I have no idea what to call the things. They happened to be sitting in the midst of the running sprinklers, and because in sweltering weather sprinklers beg to be run through, and we happened to need no begging, thus happened to be right there next to them soaking wet...we decided to see if we could move them. I stood on one, and Duckling came running at me full speed and moved one maybe a centimeter. I did the same and moved it not at all. She got off and I tried again...still it moved not at all. It was a pretty sad (sad as in pathetic) moment, which I guess was the cue for all of the football players from previous years, who prior to this point had been standing over on the track, to come over and show us up. Which they did; good for them. We just continued running through the sprinklers, then commenced playing tennis. It took all of 5 minutes for me to completely dry off in that heat. Man the weather has been crazy this summer. I don't like humidity with my heat thank you very much.

Before that point I went on a donut run due to me not being able to lift my arms from weakness, and then proceeded to eat three of the dozen on the spot. Needless to say, I wasn't feeling so well when the tennis playing was over, though I felt great during. Several other things happened throughout my off week, none of which I feel like expounding upon more than I already have. I got completely fried though. Just call me bacon.

I've noticed that I tend to write really long posts, and during my off week--due to having much better things to do--none at all. In an effort to make shorter posts, and to post some when I don't have anything to write about on my on week of work (which is when I have the time to write no doubt because I'm not doing anything exciting enough to write about), I've decided on occasion to go back and write about events from my off week that were overlooked.

So Monday Pinkie, FK, and I went to GV for tea. They have this cute little tea shop in the village with quite the selection of herbals for those of us who'd rather not go black. FK in turn had heard of it from Bliss, who went, and when she (FK) heard I'd also gone for tea in the nook of my Kinder Bueno supply store, decided she wanted to go have tea too. It was seriously so cute it was hard not to vomit. I fell in love with the place. In and of itself it was adorable. Very pink and sunny. We each got our own tea pot that had some sort of padded cloth on the outside which kept it hot throughout our entire visit. And they had sugar cubes (far superior to grain where tea is concerned) with little tongs, and little beehive honey jars with drippers. didn't so much like herbal tea in London, but it's quite enjoyable if you have honey in it. I got peppermint, which I love. Then they also brought out a bowl of lemon slices, and this cute little metal bird contraption that squeezes them, and added to the tea it was even better. Man, I actually liked the tea part of tea for a change. In addition, we asked for water, and they brought out cucumber water--far more refreshing than regular water. Finally, they brought us out 3 tiered trays of delightful little sandwiches (cucumber, apple and cream cheese, ham and cheese, and tuna), scones with jam and clotted cream, fruit, cookies, cake...it was awesome. And they offered and gave me a to-go box at the end. I'll definitely be visiting again.

I ate a taco for breakfast this morning. It happened to be there, and it appealed to me personally, so I did it. Which made me think, why are breakfast foods what they are when lunch and dinner are so similar? Who decided that tacos and pizza and Mountain Dew are unacceptable breakfast foods for anyone other than starving (and let's face it) indolent college students? I personally think it's the idea that massive amounts of sugar will help us through the day, for those of us who put syrup on everything we eat in the morning, and go for the pastries above all. Although that doesn't explain all of the bran cereals out there. That pondered and out of the way...

So my good friend Traves has decided to forsake science and become a business man. This affects me because he will be the 3rd coworker in our little section of two to move on. The other two are in sections right next to me, so I still see them, but Traves is moving to Texas. I’m beginning to think it might be my fault. The other week will probably die in this section, but I go through at least one work partner a year. I for one can’t blame those who have gone on; I plan on jumping ship as soon as I can see another that isn’t sinking. But it sucks to go from working with a person who randomly puts chocolate in my drawer to utter uncertainty. I’ve been blessed with a lot of good coworkers, but there’s no way I can be as consistently lucky as I have been forever.

So Leon, my new section buddy, started yesterday I think. I haven’t met him, there’s a lot of pre-training that happens before you can officially train in the lab. I’ll call him Leon because his real name does start with an L. My own cleverness kills me, if my sarcasm doesn't first. Also, both his real name and his alias seem fitting for someone we’re fairly certain is actually Brief-case Carrying Guy, which seems exactly the type of person my supervisor would hire. Quite the fall I’ve suffered. My old supervisor went with the care-free candidates who would calmly shrug if the machine caught on fire--which unfortunately hasn't happened yet, and which works well with my apparently anal and somewhat tightly strung type--but New Supervisor is a micromanager and I expect anyone he would hire to be the same. It figures he would pull something like this before he himself leaves to climb the totem pole of power we have here at ACME Labs. One day the Immunology section is bound to turn into a pyramid of slightly littler replicates of my Now Group Manager.

A work friend of mine sent this picture to me. It's of an indoor beach in Japan. Note the real beach sitting right next to it. True, it sounds really cool because it's massive, has no pollution or salty water, has a retractable roof so there will always be a blue sky even if outside isn't, is kept at a constant warm temp, has wave machines for surfing, there's a volcano that erupts hourly...but dang it, why would you pay 50 bucks to go to a fake beach when there's one right next to it for free? Are they that rich over there? If so, I'm incredibly jealous.

Oh that I were Bill Gates and could buy a holiday. However, then I'd have to be Bill Gates.