In brief

I have succumbed to Twitter. See sidebar.

Our cable company seems to be confused about which channels we get. Tonight we are watching BBC America. Tomorrow we might not be able to get it.

I am SO GLAD I reduced my hours at work.

Matt will be finished with his BS degree classes this time next year.

Tali is in my lap. I think he is drooling on my arm.

Bracelet for my man

Bracelet, originally uploaded by Rosemary Grace.

I made this in a jewelry class I treated myself to in June, it turned out too long for me, but the perfect size for Matt's wrist. He loves it.

Wow.

Matt and I "took over" Christmas this year, meaning we took charge of the cooking. I still feel like Mum did a lot of the wrangling of where to put tables/chairs, and where the good china was hiding, etc etc, and I KNOW she and her sister did the majority of cleaning dishes and squaring things away after the festivities. All involved feel it was the easiest Christmas ever (even us), I suppose this means we were long overdue for a division of labor.

Hooray. Christmas was such a big warm busy party, 27 people, all over 18. The sweater we got my Granny fitted her just right. The drive back to San Diego went without a hitch, and Matt and I are relaxing with the cats, watching movies and drinking beer left over from the party.

But, ouch

Finals are done, I think I made it, I'll know for sure at Hogmanay when marks are posted online. I have been fighting off a migraine for the past two weeks. Every day I either wake up with an ok head, and end the day with a nauseous splitting headache, or wake up nauseous and headache-y and slowly get better over the course of the day. I have been to the chiropractor three times this week, and the general consensus is that my neck is messed up.

I have found my limit: taking 9 units of graduate study (full time being 12), but two of the classes had disproportionately large workloads, and attempting to work full time.

...and exhale

Both biopsies came back as normal - just moles, no further action required. My first exam is done, I think it went well enough, the big two are tomorrow: Biostatistics and infectious Disease.

Last week I got to put into action a plan I'd wanted to carry out for a while: I signed our lab up for an "adopt a family" program through a local youth charity. We got a note with the family size (three - single mother and two sons), the shoe and clothing sizes, their regular grocery store, and any special requests. This family requested home items and toiletries, and the notes said the 7 year old boy is creative, and likes making things, but gave no information about the 12 year old. I was able to phone and find out he's interested in sports. My lab was very generous, one PhD student even bought a hockey stick and a packet of balls for street hockey. In total we collected $335, plus the hockey kit, and I spent it on bulk-size toiletries from Costco, new towels, a pretty fleece blanket, a nice floral mug for the mom, shoes for the kids, a Lego kit for the younger boy, a pair of sketch books and a set of paints/pencils/brushes in a shiny blue case. Matt and I threw in a sports almanac, books on how to draw, and a blue purse I got for sale and have used all of once, I filled the purse with a toiletries gift set - a small luxury for the mom.

Of course, this coinciding with finals has not been the best timing, a classmate of mine came over so review survival analysis last night, and then we had dinner and she helped us wrap the gifts. It felt really nice to have this big pile of presents build under our tree, and picture these kids we don't know opening their presents. I feel a little like Santa. Loading the gifts into the car this morning in a hurry so Matt could take off to work certainly made me respect all those hard working elves loading up the sleigh.

I am more than ready for my finals to be done, work to be over for the year, and my family to arrive. This year Matt and I have put ourselves in charge of preparing the Christmas dinner, so the parental generation can take a well earned break. Just call me Ms Claus.

Security Hat

Urchin Front, originally uploaded by Rosemary Grace.

I finished this hat on Thursday night, and I don't want to take it off. Friday I had my regular checkup with the Dermatologist, and he removed two more moles to biopsy, which is good, because they're off, and I don't have to keep an eye on them any more. Until the biopsy results come in it's difficult not to worry and expect the worst. Even if neither one contains melanoma, they are likely to be "abnormal" and require more tissue to be removed.

One is from my right cheek, the sticky bandage starts just below where this photo cuts off, the last straggler mole left behind after everything else got taken for biopsy when I had the cancer diagnosis. The other was on my left ring finger, right above where my wedding band lives. I had some trouble getting my wedding band off.

After the appointment, I went to work, and got really upset, mostly worrying about the possibility of the one on my finger coming back as abnormal, how do you take a half centimeter margin of skin surrounding the biopsy from a finger that's only a couple of centimeters across? Typing was difficult because of the gauze taped around my finger, then I got a mildly snippy email from a professor we share some expensive equipment with and I just started to cry. Maybe I should have gone home after I got biopsied, but if I plan to take a day off every time I have a dermatologist appointment it would get a bit ridiculous.

Fortunately I work with a really nice bunch, though it's always embarrassing to be weepy, they all know something of the ongoing saga, last year I had the impressive red marks on my face from the laser treatments every month, and this August I had stitches on my arm from another abnormal mole. I emailed my boss to say I was going for a walk before the weekly meeting, and went to find my fellow knitting nerd Fiametta to come get coffee with me. She suggested I talk the doc into taking off every mole we can find, get it over with all in one go, part of me is tempted.

So I'm sitting on the sofa in my pajamas and new orange hat, trying not to mope about my sore finger (funny that I'm barely concerned about having stitches on my face now - it's the FINGER that bugs me), and reminding myself that there is no point worrying, especially when I have finals in a week and a half. Which is when the biopsy results will come in too, I'm not sure if that's such a good thing, but the timing can't be helped. Mutant moles and cancer threat notwithstanding, life goes on.

Besides, I have my hat to protect me

Belief-O-Matic.

Seen on K's livejournal. Interesting that Mainline to Liberal Christian Protestant scored higher than nontheist, I suspect this is cultural influence from growing up in Church of Scotland schools.

1. Secular Humanism (100%)
2. Unitarian Universalism (96%)
3. Liberal Quakers (93%)
4. Neo-Pagan (85%)
5. Theravada Buddhism (80%)
6. Taoism (71%)
7. Mainline to Liberal Christian Protestants (70%)
8. New Age (68%)
9. Nontheist (65%)
10. Mahayana Buddhism (62%)
11. Orthodox Quaker (60%)
12. Reform Judaism (53%)
13. Jainism (46%)
14. Scientology (44%)
15. Sikhism (42%)
16. New Thought (39%)
17. Baha'i Faith (38%)
18. Christian Science (Church of Christ, Scientist) (32%)
19. Hinduism (32%)
20. Seventh Day Adventist (30%)
21. Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints (Mormons) (28%)
22. Mainline to Conservative Christian/Protestant (20%)
23. Eastern Orthodox (16%)
24. Islam (16%)
25. Orthodox Judaism (16%)
26. Roman Catholic (16%)
27. Jehovah's Witness (14%)

Week 1, Day 1

Please ignore the two week delay in actually beginning the 100 push up challenge. I did the first intervals on the arm of the futon, as I did the initial test. But I moved to the kitchen counter because I wasn't able to get the proper depth on the futon arm. I managed 5 total at the last set. I'm going to keep going with the counter for a bit, then try moving up to a lower prop. Matt was a good cheerleader, monitoring my arm angle and saying "go go go go" when I was flagging. Besides telling me "you've always got TWO MORE in you!"

PS~My triceps feel like jelly. I'm having slight difficult lifting my glass.

PPS~It's fantastic.

America Decides

Tomorrow morning Matt and I are going to head over to our polling station early tomorrow to vote. I'm glad we're going along together, this feels like such an important election, even more important than 2004 felt (which is probably why it went the way it did - it didn't feel THAT important, so enough people just didn't bother), going together somehow acknowledges the event. I have voted every election since I moved here in 2001, a lot of them going along at the same time as Matt. The past few I've left for work early, pulled into an empty parking lot, and walked into an empty polling station to exercise my democratic rights as a citizen. Not to mention earning my "I Voted" sticker. I have been hearing stories about showing up to cast an early vote, and waiting in line for hours. I hope I don't get stuck for four whole hours, but I admit that showing up to vote and finding a line of people waiting to do the same would be somewhat reassuring.

I am fervently hoping that Wednesday morning will find us with the first African American president (by a landslide please), reinforcement of the rights of all to marry as they see fit in the state of California (No on prop 8), teenage girls still able to pursue termination without enforced parental notification (No on prop 4), and improved conditions for farm animals (Yes on prop 2). We just spent some time talking through all the initiatives on the ballot, so we have our cheat-sheets of how we intend to vote.

I wish I'd had more time this year to involve myself and be more of an activist than a couple of small donations and a lot of online petitions.

Drumroll...

My husband just mailed an acceptance letter for a new Systems Analyst job at a small local military contracting company. He had another interview in September, during the evil on-call week, but that job feel through, and he ended up hearing about this one through a former colleague. Also during an evil on-call week, which just ended on Monday. The new job involves some travel, mostly short trips, but no pager duty. No on call, and no weekend duties. This is a very nice way to head into a long weekend holiday to wine country!

Also, I can graduate 6 months sooner than I have been planning, IF I go full time 6 months sooner, and think up a thesis subject lickety split. I want to do it, it would be great to knock a whole semester off. I'd be defending this time next year, and finishing in December '09. Crikey.

The Challenge: Initial Test

Three.

Three measly incline push ups, using the arm of the futon as a bench. Week One, weakling column here I come.

I would do 100 push ups (just to be the one who fell down at your door)

I've been thinking about doing the 100 push up challenge a la Dietgirl, but I'm pretty sure that right now I can't even achieve one good form push up. Since I've been thinking about it, and my lack of ability, I've realized that the inability to perform even one is the perfect reason to make this a project. Push ups and squats are excellent simple indicators of basic fitness and right now I am earning a big fat FAIL at basic fitness. At least I used to be pretty good a squats, even though I never managed decent push ups.

This sounds like an excuse, but I am really feeling the difference of living in a car culture metro area, in a neighborhood that is not conducive to walking (neither by it's infrastructure nor it's climate). I'm grateful to the experience of going back to university for showing me how little I now walk and climb hills/stairs as part of my normal life. For the first month or so of this semester I was parking in the same structure as everyone else with classes on my side of campus, this involved at least fifteen minutes of trawling for a parking spot, following people as they walk to their car, playing chicken at intersections because whoever gets ahead of you MIGHT STEAL A SPOT FROM YOU...until I noticed that I was chronically late for class and getting mileage from my car that would be more appropriate for a small truck. Now I park in an unpopular lot close to the freeway and down a hill and a staircase from the campus. My thighs complain on the ascent, and it's less than half of The Mound in Edinburgh, which I used to trample up and down with no trouble.

So...I've been thinking that it would not be a bad idea to take the 100 push ups challenge, starting with bench push ups and working up (or down, really) to the floor version, and taking the same simple scale-up type approach to simple unloaded squats.

Feeling weak and achy sucks. I want to feel strong. I want to be stronger. It's about time I did something about it.

Sneaky Knittings

A perk of working in a lab (and being in charge of ordering surgical gloves) is that I know, when plotting to make fingerless gloves for my lab mates, that S. has slim hands, but fairly long fingers, and V. has hands pretty close to my size. It's nice not to have to rely on guesswork when putting in the time to hand knit something. All I have to worry about is picking colours (royal blue for S. and pinky red for V.)

We all spend a lot of time in an overly air-conditioned computer lab, looking at highly magnified photographs of nerve fibers, and using software to analyze those nerve fibers in excruciating detail. Last winter we all had very cold stiff hands. I can't make myself a pair of fingerless gloves to wear while my compadres suffer with stiff chilly hands.

Mouse 'flu* sweeps through laboratory

Over half the lab is down for the count. I'm in, but functioning on low brain power - only slow and steady computer analysis for me today, no sectioning or anything else involving sharp things.

*no such thing, but we work with rodents and I just had a class on avian 'flu.

For Isabelle

In explanation of my previous anecdote.



Monty Python's Holy Grail, the bridge scene.

Did somebody hide a rotten banana under my sofa?

I am plagued by fruit flies. Every day I'm finding one drowned in whatever I'm drinking. Matt and I have gone around the kitchen double-checking to make sure there's no bits of fruit half dessicated and hiding behind the coffee jar or toaster, no culprits.

I have my first quiz of the semester tomorrow, and am beginning to think about thinking about midterm exams. But not actually thinking about them. Yet.

One of the new crop of medical students is a Monty Python fan. A blackboard in our hallway had "Questions 23a-28b" written on it, and one day I noticed someone had added near the bottom:

"29a - what is the air speed velocity of an unladen swallow?"

So of course I added "African or European?". A few days later I was gratified to see "I don't know! Aaaaaaaaaargh!" had appeared underneath.

Frog Cabin

I am making a "Log Cabin" style baby blanket for a friend, and this weekend got around to taking and posting photographs of some finished objects and works in progress to Ravelry. Something immediately jumped out at me...

Next to everything else I’ve done it looks like it's being made by nine-year-old me, not 28-year-old me. The colour combinations are just NOT working, and it’s generally lumpy looking. I’m unraveling it and changing to a crochet patchwork of log cabin squares, half “warm” half “cool”, all tied together with the cream, which should be a much better way to combine these colours.

Ravelry has saved me from handing over a dodgy baby blanket! Hooray!

Of course not

I failed to mention that the skirting boards are not done, nor have the book cases all been returned to their homes and repopulated with books, nor the clean laundry from last week put away (I am dressing from the back of the sofa to reduce the amount left to stow properly). Situation Normal in other words. It is difficult to maintain the pre-flooring momentum of frantic painting and furniture removal now that we have no deadline other than the imminent breakdown our collective sanity. Especially since this week Matt has been on pager duty, being paged once or twice a night as we sleep, he has to get up and work for an hour or more when that happens, I just go back to sleep, but it's still wiping me out. He's also got some potentially exciting stuff going on, but won't know for a week or more, and I'd really like to know NOW thank you very much, so that I can plot and plan and stop being in suspense!

Done?

It is a strange feeling to have the entire flat painted to our liking. We've lived here for four years. Maybe it would have been better to just paint the whole place a neutral shade of a good quality paint before we moved in, so we didn't have to deal with the grotty white dirt-magnet paint they left us with (which, I suspect, was actually primer, not paint). It's even stranger to have the much-anticipated porcelain floor. I have not had a tiled home before, I've lived with wood laminate and sanded floorboards but not the hard, cool, smooth-but-textured feel beneath my feet that we have now. It makes errant cat litter granules much more noticeable, but also makes cleaning a matter of a momentary whisk with a broom. The weather is still hot and humid, so the tile feels pleasantly cold, in the winter we will probably put a big rug down in the living room.

Being back in classes feels a bit strange too. Familiar, now it's my second semester, but I am relearning things like having uni-related work to do on weekends, and having to plan my work days carefully on the days I have class to get the essentials done before I zoom off.

Back to School/Final Countdown

Last month of Summer before Fall session starts up.
Last week of Summer internship.
Last two days of ugly cheap carpet.

Classes start Sept 2nd: Infectious Disease, Multivariate Statistics and Health Behaviour. I get to have a couple of weeks one week of "only work", rather than work plus something Master's related. I would like to get a lot of knitting and movie watching done, but I may end up doing more home improvement and sleeping than knitting, which is how it's been going recently.

Tomorrow I've got my last morning of interning at the Violence Prevention Program, then I'm taking off work to come home and move all the furniture from the front of the flat into the back of the flat so that the contractor can rip out the carpet and put in tile. This will take nearly three days, then we'll install new skirting boards and I'll finish painting. I've tried to get all the painting done before the floor, but I've run out of time. Matt has been doing classes all Summer, so I've been painting bits of the living room while he sits in a corner doing his coursework, admiring my handiwork and bouncing ideas off me. I've managed to paint the front wall "pepper spice" (milk chocolate brown), and the rest of the living room "classic taupe", the dining area has one coat of paint on it, and I think I might manage to get the second coat on tonight: one wall taupe, the other wall turquoisy sky blue. The final cobalt blue colourwash on top will have to be done afterwards, with great care and lots of drop cloths to protect the pretty new cream tile.

This Summer has gone so fast, I'm looking forward to starting classes again (though the $350 pile of books stung more than a little), I don't know if life ever really stops accelerating, but it's feeling like a fairly productive hectic pace right now. It's also very exciting to have our first big project done: painting over the crummy absorbent flat white paint in the whole flat, and replacing the poor quality carpet with something more attractive and durable. Of course, we're already talking about changing the colour in the back bedroom , and framing the windows with molding, and...

I have told Matt that after the floor and paint are done I need a month or two with no projects in them, else I will run screaming from the place the next time I hear "so...shall we tackle xyz this weekend?".