Bored

Staying in bed for days upon end gets rather dull, I have not seen a person since Thursday when I went on a brief foray to get fluids. I have slept enough for several people though, it’s been something to do. I am missing the department’s Halloween party tonight, this saddens me. I did not have a costume though and it was kind of compulsory so I guess it saved me from putting together something really lame at the last minute. Now if you’ll excuse me I have an appointment with some Nyquil (Night Nurse for the Brits among us).

Bah Humbug

I hate the flu, I dislike having a fever and I am not fond of having no food in the house when the two coincide.

I am, however, back at home so at least I have my own bed to feel rotten in.

Thankfully flu is transient so I shall be back to form soon.

Automation gone mad

So I should first confess I have had a couple of beers, and the first few were on an empty stomach, so my typo rate may increase in direct correlation with this. Those of you that know me well will know this is a rare occurence nowadays and will not judge me for it. My talk was today, enough said.

So I have decided to blog about toilet related topics again, I worry people will believe it is a regular theme, when in fact I am relatively shy about such matters. Besides today’s tale does not really involve me so much. Anyhow…. the toilets at out conference centre are the wonderful american model of automation to the nth degree. I hate automatic flushes to start as they are never a good guide of when you are done, either catching you unawares literally with your pants down, or not realising you stood up and left about an hour previously. Here you never have to touch anything. The soap is in dispensers with sensors, they actually appear to activate when you move your hand away, causing a swift movement back, which inevitably misses the soap leaving no soap on your hands and a ton in the bowl - this is then repeated till you perfect your backswing! The towel dispensers appear very sensitive and just keep ejecting the paper towels when any movement occurs in their general vicinity. I am sensing a flaw in the whole system and rejoice when I actually have to do something for myself as it tends to be far more efficient.

Zoooooooooomnmmmm

I thought I should try and get at least one post done while in Philly and I actually have 5 minutes so here goes. I have been non-stop busy since we arrived on Thursday, the ‘running around like a blue-arsed fly’ expression does not even begin to cover it - in fact from now on blue arsed flies will probably say ‘I have been busier than George’s friend in Philly’, I’ll admit that it does not roll off the tongue quite as easily, but then do blue-arsed flies have tongues?

My feet hurt from standing on them and using them to walk all around. Do they not know that it is for that express purpose that they are designed? Perhaps it was not made clear in the job description and some renegotiation of terms of employment are required. I think they have become complacent as they don’t feel threatened with redundancy as, quite frankly, they would be quite a hassle to replace. If I was going to trade them in I think I might just replace the whole lot and get a new body that comes with some sort of warranty. For now I shall just put up with it as I am having a lot of fun wearing the poor things out.

I hope this satisfies my loyal readers for the moment. I have stories to tell but I also have beauty sleep to catch (and I am waaaaaay behind at the moment).

In need of technology

So last night I managed to get to bed early with my book and a nice mug of hot chocolate. Sweet! I love being able to do that sometimes, seems like a real treat. Will admit that it was partly influenced by the fact that I want to finish this book I am reading - it is a detective one and I want to know whodunnit. However, it is a mammoth literary effort and will require several early nights to complete it.

Realised this morning I was down to my last clean pair of pants (the english kind) and well I leave for a week tomorrow. Last minute laundry anyone? I so nearly went out and just bought new clean underwear as most of my conference wear is actually clean. I don’t feel ready to go away tomorrow. Time is just zooming by at the moment and I would like to be able to slow it down a little. So if someone could get on with that time machine I would really appreciate it - oh and how is that teleporter coming along?

Guess I might not be blogging for the next week - hope you all have a wonderful weekend. Toodles.

Recovery

My face appears intact - no ill effects so far, so I guess the little mix up could have been much worse. The two offending liquids are now in separate cupboards and feel confident that the mistake will not occur again. Right onto the next topic…..

What is the next topic? I am not really sure. I have not really done a whole lot to blog about. Unless you want the ins and outs of the mundane tasks I do - like shampooing my hair in the shower, but no matter how hard I try I don’t think I can make that interesting I am afraid.

Perhaps I should leave you all to your own little adventures. Enjoy! Oh and make sure to tell me if anything interesting happens!

Uh Oh!

In case anyone wondered, buying nail varnish remover and toner that are the same colour is a BAD idea. Alas my mistake did not involve trying to remove nail varnish with toner. I only hope my face will cease the stinging eventually.

Grump

I am in a grump today - I don’t want to do any work but I really have to. I am not at my most productive when grumpy, which means stuff does not get done in a timely manner, which makes me grumpy….. vicious circle I tell you (I am sure that is how you spell vicious but it looks oh so wrong).

I am off to Philadephia on Thursday and really need to get my talk done for the conference. It is not flowing though and I like to talk so that is unusual. Not so keen on talking in public but when practising it I don’t have to be in public, I can talk to myself. My shampoo bottle tells me that the person everyone talks to the most is themselves (which again looks wrong but I am sure that themself is not good english even if it seems to sound better). Goodness knows why my shampoo feels like this is something I needed to know - have been rather aware how true it is though since reading it. I do blather on to no one in particular quite a lot, especially in my car. You’d never guess now would you?

What day is it?

I am rather confused as to the day today - I think yesterday being unusual since I didn’t work (although what I did seemed more stressful than work) has left me feeling prematurely like it’s the weekend. So today has felt rather like a Sunday, without any of the other Sunday stuff (well I did have a lie-in I guess). I need to work tomorrow to make up for my early sabbath now.

I did take a lady from the church I used to go to here to her Dr appointment today, so feel like I achieved something. She can’t drive and nearly had to cancel as no-one seemed to want to volunteer their time to take her. Muggins here could not really persuade herself that she was justified in ignoring the third email pleading for help so I took her. It was fun - I got to read for fun while waiting for her. I like books. Yea for books!!!!

Now it’s time for some reading before bed.

Kid overload

So at 6am this morning I was buying dinosaurs, plastic ones you understand. Quite clearly people don’t normally buy such things at such early hours as the cashier appeared most amused at my puchase selection. It was a cool set though - came complete with plastic trees, bushes, rocks, and this fabulous background to pin up behind them (that was so far from realistic it was even better than you could imagine).

It was Earth Science Day on campus today where the local schools come and do all sorts of activities. I run the IMPACT CRATERS activity with a fellow graduate student. We reinact the K-T boundary with some flour, a kitty litter tray, a paintball gun, and of course the plastic dinosaurs (they add a certain finesse). Because we tend to project flour everywhere we are an outdoor activity and it was somewhat colder than most of us expected (I am currently enjoying a hot chocolate to warm up), so we had some grumpy kids but most bore it well.

I might go buy some dinosaurs now actually - a chicken (the living relations of dinosaurs, those people who say they went completely extinct are liars).

Jobs

So I sent out my first job application today, well it was more of a grant proposal thing really but that made it more scary if anything. Fully expect to get rebuffed at the first stage as it is for a very competitive post/funding agency thing, but as everyone keeps telling me ‘it is good experience’. It would let me go back to the UK though, oh to be home again. London - not ideal but feasible and better than an ocean away from my nearest and dearest. It was all rather stressful with last minute panics and I had a nice little stress headache going at 8am this morning. One of the lovely ladies in the office told me it was too early for a stress headache, and I had to assure her there was no time limits on stress headaches, they ignore the 4th dimension no matter how inconvenient. But now all is submitted so no point worrying about it.

Everyone cross their fingers please….. well when it’s convenient anyway, don’t be crossing them at times it may not be wise to do so. Plus I need the prayers etc.. for the next few weeks and if you kept them crossed that long we may have some numbness and injury occurring and I really don’t want that. Thanks.

Battered and bruised

The gym has thoroughly beaten me today. I hurt. A lot. A whole lot. The conclusion must surely be that I am so far out of shape that I am not even a shape at all - at least not a regular shape as being shapeless altogether is rather difficult. If I were a shape I would like to be an isosceles triangle, an aside I know but I like the word isosceles, and triangle. They are two words best said slowly with annunciation. I-sos-celes Tri-ang-le. You should end with a bit of a flourish. I like a bit of a flourish every now and then.

What noise does a bear make?

So after teaching kids - who alas were older than normal (as in than the normal age range I teach, they weren’t abnormally aged childern or anything) and therefore not as responsive.. wait I totally lost track of where this sentence was going. I will try again. I went to see the Warriors of AniKituwha who do some of the traditional dances of the Cherokee. It was so much fun - my favourite being the bear dance (which is a mating ritual) where you get to growl at your prospective partner a lot. Anyway felt I would share that with you all.

Grrrrrrrrrr

Museum Musings

I got up early this morning, as has been my habit of late, and am happy as I have just made a rather tasty cup of coffee to help me stay awake till my brain decides to wake up and join my body (the whole brain-body discord thing continues, they are currently living in different time zones but managing well and gaining some independence). Today I will achieve nothing, and I am OK with that. It is just one of those days where I have so many appointments and commitments that no work will be done and, more disappointingly, I won’t be able to get to the gym (started back this week after roping a new person in as gym buddy).

I am volunteering at the museum on campus again (did not mention it last time but I do this occasionally). Get to speak to kids about geology and how exciting is is. Woo Hoo! Kids are great because some of them can actually muster up a bit of enthusiasm and when you ask a question they all bloomin’ well put their hands up, even if they don’t really know the answer. Fast forward to the University classes I teach where a lot of the time all of the students pretend they are incapable of speech and don’t know their arse from their elbow, let alone the rocks we looked at the week before. Sigh.

Anyway I am going to spend some quality time with my coffee before doing work in the one continuous hour I have available between now and 6pm.

Fat fat fatty

Note to self: american recipe claims 4 servings, will feed me 8 times.

Lump of butter

Today I went to a Dr, well actually he was probably a Mr (the whole reverse snobbery thing), about my pathetic excuse for a shoulder. It actually impinged on my baking this weekend as it was incapable of stirring my muffin batter. I had to use my left arm, which is really not quite coordinated enough for the job. I was rather concerned that one of my muffins may end up consisting of the all the butter the recipe required, with the rest not tasting of much at all (but they would have been really low in fat). My physio kept telling me how handsome the specialist was (and yes she even said this in front of the wonderful M when he visited so no revelations there), but he also turned out to be a very qualified man, with good ‘bedside manner’ (although there were no beds involved - what do you call it when there are no beds involved? Chair-side manner?). Have to go be MRI-ed… again. Nothing like lying in a small space not being able to move while there are REALLY LOUD noises going on around you. Happy happy joy joy.

I am now making jambalaya - never made it before so we will see how that goes. Felt inspired. It smells good. Makes enough for four and I am only one - anyone care for some dinner?

Today...

I have nothing to say… I really don’t. I got up, went to physio, went to work, came home, and now here I am trying to think of something to blog about. A blog gives one the feeling you should have more of a life. Tomorrow I get to do laundry - man the excitement is building!

The problem with work

I have been working quite hard recently and you know what the problem with 13 hour days are? Once you add another 8 for sleep and a few to shower and generally relax there is NO TIME LEFT. No time for things like cooking, cleaning, and the laundry. I actually left work at 5pm today (yes on a Sunday) just so I could do stuff. I finally managed to buy some food as being faced with dry museli for the third day in a row was getting a little much and then had a baking frenzy. Waaaaahhhhhh! Yes a frenzy. My freezer and fridge are now oh so full with goodies so if all else fails and I cannot make a meal I have about 5 different snack options. Even managed to resist trying everything I made (although goodness knows why as my diet is hardly going well right now - the ‘no food in the house’ problem tends to lead to the ‘let’s eat out’ one).

However, it is not all good as I managed to pick up wax paper out of the cupboard instead of my parchment paper and… well… wax paper tends to smoke in the oven. Was more than a little concerned that I would set off my fire alarm and that it may then, in turn, set off the alarms in general for the apartment complex. I was very busy opening the door, windows, and frantically wafting a tea-towel under the alarm - while checking on the offending items cooking in the oven. Stressful but the biscuits (cookies) came out really well and no sirens were to be heard anywhere.

Now for the whole showering thing so people can actually approach me tomorrow without wishing they were downwind.