Texas stuff

Well, Michael and I are in Texas. Michael will be attending a conference later in the week, and we both will be in a wedding next Saturday. Right now we are in Galveston visiting my dad, taking in the sunny beaches. Crystal (the bride-to-be) and another one of the bridesmaids, Ashley, came to Galveston last night, and we had a bachelorette party of sorts, with lots of bar-hopping good fun. Happily, I did NOT get sick. What is pretty freaking awesome is that we went to a bar called Poor Michael's (HA! Michael was our designated driver, so that was very fitting), and they had Guinness on tap. I had one, and liked it well enough. I will post a pic or two later of all of us. Tomorrow we set off for Corrigan to see more family. I'll post more when more happens!

Nifty internet things

There are lots of things that are nifty to do on the internet. Just when I think I'm tired of it, and there's nothing more I can do or nothing more I can think of to surf, Tina manages to send me a new thing to do. The latest thing is Rojo. I just signed up for it today, and it is a neat thing where you can keep up with news by selecting your interests and a group of sources. If you have any contacts in Rojo, you can share news stories easily. Another nifty internet thing (also suggested by Tina) is Stumbleupon. With a Stumbleupon toolbar on your browser, you can "stumble upon" other sites based upon your interests, reviewed by other users. You can also stumble sites to friends. It is a fun thing, though I don't use it as much as I should. So, if you're bored with the internet, try some of these things out!

Rum is still not my friend

I once had a bad experience with rum. Really bad. Ever since that experience, I have not been able to enjoy drinks with rum in them. It is POSSIBLE for me to drink them, but it is not pleasurable in the least. After the third or fourth sip, I start to shudder. I am amazed at the strength of my learned aversion to rum. It only took one bad time to effectively ruin my experience of that particular beverage. Even though I know how the aversion works, I am still amazed. I thought perhaps it was only the particular mixed drink that I had when the bad experience occurred (rum and coke), but no, it's the rum. I wanted a pina colada tonight, and Michael was gracious enough to go out and get the stuff, and come back and make it. I had a few sips of it, and realized that I wouldn't be able to drink the stupid thing. My stomach was saying, "OH no. Not that stuff again. Not going to happen." Ugh. Which probably means that vodka is ruined for me as well. Double ugh.

Fish Babies

Want some fish? We have tons now. Michael has an aquarium with several fish in it, and one of them just gave birth. We just thought it was a very chubby fish. The mother is a dalmatian molly, and apparently was impregnated before Michael bought her. She had TONS of babies. Lots. I looked up information on her breed, and how to care for the babies, etc., and found out that she may have even more babies. Apparently, they can have two or three batches of young out of one insemination. YIKES. I'm hoping she gave birth a few times before Michael got her. We bought a little tank to isolate the little fish in, and hopefully they will be okay. We also bought some weird liquid food to give them. The whole thing is interesting, but I wonder if many of the little ones will survive.

Rudeness

Sometimes I can't believe how mean people are to each other. I was walking back to my car from Dodd Hall (home to my office at school) when I saw an exchange in a parking lot that left me a little angry. A guy was apparently waiting to pull out of a parking lot in his vehicle, and his window was down. A female driver was approaching the parking lot to pull in, and did not use her signal. The guy leaned out of his window and spat out, "Way to use your signal DUMMY" and it was loud enough for me to hear even though I was across the street and there were cars going by. I felt my nose wrinkle in distaste at this odious person, and my brows lowered into a threatening and irritated glare. He sped off, oblivious to having caused my ire, and I walked along, pondering the situation. It isn't that I am so serene myself that I never get angry when other drivers do that same thing, but I certainly don't lean out of my window and CALL them dummies. I may think that very thing to myself, but I don't verbalize it. I have even said such things to myself within the confines of my enclosed car, but I am never so vocal when I think others may hear me. I mean, when you think about it, it's such a little thing to berate someone about. I am not saying that the other driver was in the right, but it certainly didn't merit the epithet issued from the extremely impatient driver. If he just would have left off the "dummy" I think I would have been much less offended. Perhaps there should be a push to be more courteous? Maybe he should have said, "Please use your turn signal!" Maybe I'm just a wuss.

Raccoon.

Last night (rather, very early this morning) was VERY strange. Around two-ish, my sleep was disturbed by the sound of Michael walking around the bedroom saying, "Did you hear that? There! Do you hear that?!" I immediately thought we had some intruders in the house and wondered why he wasn't on a phone, but Michael went to the window and said, "THERE! There's something on the roof! Look!" and I groggily got up and peered blindly out the window, then remembered to get my glasses. Just as I was looking out of the window again, Michael turned on the light and pointed to the roof, saying, "Look! It's a raccoon!" and I finally saw it. Michael beat on the window shouting "GO AWAY," etc., and I wondered how he had heard it in the first place. After he scared it away, he said the sound of scratching on the roof woke him up, and he couldn't get back to sleep. I have NO IDEA how he heard this, when he seems to sleep through TONS of other things. Especially since the very loud dehumidifier was on when I was brought into the situation. Anyway, it wasn't a nice way to wake up. Stupid raccoon.

AHHH!

I am an IDIOT. Obviously. I wrestled with a Greek translation for about half an hour yesterday, and for several hours today. What did I get for my foolish, misguided pains?? SEVEN SENTENCES OF DRIVEL. Why? It's certainly not Plato's fault, it is MINE. Two semesters of Greek, and yet I can barely translate any real texts. I know I learned things, but...this is so very difficult and frustrating. I MUST get better at this, or I will scream in AGONY from the time wasted on learning Greek. I need a punching bag.

The feeling of accomplishment

Well, I went to school today to do some research (I hope to update my philosophy blog concerning this research), and I feel like I really did accomplish something. I looked up articles, then printed out as many as I could access. I also checked a book out of the little philosophy library to read. Hopefully I will actually read all this information, so that this isn't just a way to pass the time. I always feel really good on the days I go to school. I think I must be very reliant on habit. Or maybe I'm just weird. I'm beginning to develop a summer weekday routine, which seems to go like this:
1. Receive wake-up call from Michael at 8:00 A.M.
2. Actually get out of bed at 8:20 A.M. to make coffee, eat cereal for breakfast and read comics online
3. Do light housework (clean kitchen, pick up wayward clutter) around 9:30 A.M.
4. Work out on treadmill around 10 A.M.
5. Shower around 11 A.M.
6. Specific chores/errand-running, etc., or just plain laziness and sloth

I AM actually getting some things done. For instance, I have worked on my website, put up some shelves after staining them, and reorganized the kitchen and office. Plus, I'm surprising myself with the whole exercising thing. Usually I stop this nonsense after about 3 days, but I've been pretty consistent for about a week and a half. There are, however, things I should be doing that I'm not as consistent about, like my Latin (only doing a chapter a week instead of the planned two thus far), and Greek (haven't translated a word). Ugh.

Ugh. Swimsuit Season

If hell exists, then for women it is surely a place where you have to shop for swimsuits for eternity. I tried shopping for a swimsuit today, and thus experienced a little bit of hell. Movies and magazines have taken their toll on me. I can't be pleased when it comes to me in a swimsuit. I never find a suit where I look in the mirror and say, "Wow, I look good!" Instead, I think, "I don't look horrendous," and then the longer it stays on, I begin to think, "Oh, wait. Yeah, I look horrendous." I don't know why I bother. As body-conscious as I am, it's not like I'll go swimming anyway. BLAH.

New Haircut

I cut my hair short today. It's awesome! I updated my profile picture to show it, but I don't know how much you can really see from it. Even so, just click on the profile pic and you can see sorta how it is. Anyway, I love it, and it's great!

Summer Uselessness

Well, it is the second day of my official break from school, and I feel USELESS. I hate this feeling! What is even more confusing, is that I was looking forward to this break so very much. Before the break, I thought, "Yay!! Months without a paper being due, without having a mountain of reading, and without grading student papers! I can't wait!" And now I feel weird. Like I should be in my office, feverishly translating Greek. I almost feel melancholy. I think that is the danger of becoming acclimated to so much activity: when it is gone, you feel useless and depressed. It isn't as if I'm just sitting around doing nothing either, as I make out these careful schedules of my time in an attempt to feel like I'm really accomplishing something. I clean, I exercise, and I complete little projects around the house that I never had time for before. I even schedule in time to do scholarly work, like learning Latin and translating some Greek. Before long, I plan to schedule in time to work on a paper topic I've been thinking about for a long time. Even so, with all this activity, I still do not feel right. I think I'll have to go to the office at least once a week. This SUCKS.

Not responsible for that last post

I did not make that last post. It was made during an attempt to show people my blog at a party, and so...yeah. I would delete it, but it is sorta funny. And that's all I'm going to say about that.