Amused

What would Megan read: The Egg and I, by Betty MacDonald
What would Megan listen to: ¿Quién?, on Segundo from Juana Molina

Barack me, Amadeus!

The attendance to Obama's inauguration broke the former record by 600,000 people, previously held by Lyndon Johnson's inauguration in 1965. 1.8 million people watched the first black president of the United States, more than three times the amount that watched Bush in 2001.

Holy crap. Awesome.

P.S. I know it's supposed to be "Barack me, Obamadeus" but I think it doesn't have the same ring to it with the "ob" in the front.

Ri-frickin-diculous

I cannot believe people who plagiarize. I hope my words are worth something, and if I use them in a way that moves people, they will credit my abilities by not claiming my writing to be their own. It frustrates me to no end when people--especially in an academic setting--subject their fellow classmates to such low standards as to copy and paste directly from a website. It's just as frustrating when they use incorrect grammar, punctuation, spelling, or conventions, but at least then it's only their own integrity they are destroying, not the integrity of another individual who has every right to be credited to their talent and hard work!

I am so disenchanted with the academe right now, and it is even more frustrating that I can't punish students who break such a serious rule. I know I shouldn't want to punish people, but I want them to fail. It's not as though they haven't had warnings (I have personally warned them!), and it's not as though they have no idea. This is college. Be responsible, or get the fuck out.

RTFM, motherfuckers.

. . . _ _ _ . . .

I finished Passage by Connie Willis today. She is one of my favorite authors. Passage is about dying, and I cried during the last part of the book, but I couldn't put it down. Even when I was falling asleep, I could barely put it down, I was so engrossed in the story. I had to know what had happened, and I had to finish it, like it was some sort of mission I had. It was a long book to have read in only three days. Someday I will reread it, I am sure.

What is my message? What do I need the world to know? What is my SOS? I don't know the answer to any of these questions. What was Dylan's SOS? I don't know that either. Did he have a near-death experience before he died? Was he on the Titanic, or was he in Arizona? Was he in India? Taiwan? Did he see his high school English professor? Did he use Morse code?

Good research asks more questions than it answers.

Alas, poor Yorick! I knew him, Horatio

My great-grandpa had a stroke on Thursday, and has lost a lot of strength in one side of his body. He's having a hard time swallowing, and may need to live in a nursing home.

Hearing this news has reminded me of the fragility of life, how lucky each one of us truly are to be alive. The way the earth has developed has fallen inside the tiny margin of criteria in which organisms can survive and evolve. Billions of years ago, the earth was formed of cosmic dust and materials similar to meteorites, conglomerating into a large mass. The layering of earth's materials into crust, mantle and core began when radioactive material in the earth's mass began decaying, releasing energy that became heat. As the earth heated, rocks melted and softened, allowing them to shift positions freely, the densest rocks moving towards the core and the lightest rocks moving outward, forming a thin crust. Still, the heat of the core and solar power from the sun kept earth's surface at a temperature that allowed for liquid water to accumulate, probably originating from water vapor in volcanic gasses and comets (solid balls of ice) that collided with the earth.

The ocean is likely the most important step of life's origins and evolution in the earth's history. Because the atmosphere of earth at that time was formed mostly from volcanic gas, it was toxic to life as we know it today, high in sulfur, carbon monoxide, and carbon dioxide. In addition, the atmosphere was too thin to protect earth's surface from solar radiation. The oceans supported life by providing oxygen, and filtering radiation from the sun more efficiently than the atmosphere at that time. Life began in the primordial soup, what we today call oceans. We are indebted to water for our lives and lifestyles.

About 1.8 billion years ago, an extremely primitive alga developed a special technique for nourishment. Using solar energy, these organisms converted absorbed carbon dioxide into sugars, and expelled oxygen. Today, we call this process photosynthesis. Because plants need carbon dioxide to survive, the atmospheric content was suitable for their development. Eventually, the spread of plantlife began to replace the excess of carbon dioxide with oxygen, which paved the way for land animals by developing a thicker atmosphere richer in life-supporting elements.

These events and my own life are dependent on: the explosion of a star, creating a nebula where a solar system could form; the conglomeration of cosmic dust in an orbit at a specific distance from the sun; that the materials massed included radioactive elemtns that would eventually decay; that the energy released would heat the planet enough to cause volcanic activity; that enough water vapor and ice would amass to form oceans; and that environment, mutation and other circumstances would cause algae to evolve to use photosynthesis as a method of nourishment. All of these things are simply a few of the prehistoric events that were necessary to my life existing today. Millions more exist, in addition to the millions of historic and recent events that caused my life to be possible.

I am thankful for geology, for evolution, for mutation and changes. I am thankful for water, for air, for volcanoes and earthquakes. I am thankful for creation and destruction, for evolution and stagnation, for animals and plants. I am thankful for my ancestors, for my grandparents, for my parents and other family. I am thankful for each individual that ever crossed the path of one of my blood, for it is every decision ever made that has influenced what is today. I am thankful for scientists and inventors, for new dogmas and resistance to change. I am thankful for life, and while today I cannot be thankful for death, I can say I know it is inevitable, I accept it must happen, and I vow to look for what I am thankful for rather than pitying myself or others. Sympathy is acceptable; pity, moping and self-doubt are not.

I miss my uncle.

Knitting and cats

• Classes are going well
• I'm promising myself I'll read a real book after I'm done with this last romance novel (or I guess 2 since it's a 2-in-1 book)
• Still aching, neck and mind
• Finished the GLB for Sharon, picture below! :)
• Got some circs for making socks, 2 on 1 needle!
• Need to take a shower for family pictures today

Here's the finished GLB, bigger photo on my Flickr. It's really nice, I wish it were mine! (but it's probably too big for my head...

This is Milkshakes sleeping on Ha-hoon. Ha-hoon is the raccoon stuffy Shane had when he was a kid, and he used it as a pillow. Milkshakes loves to sleep and/or knead on Ha-hoon, and it's very very cute :)

I also did a little experiment (didn't snag a picture of it), where I made cookie dough and then used it as crust for a little tart. I used a stoneware muffin cup for the cookware, and lined the inside of the cup with dough. Then I put two or three spoonfuls of applesauce and a cube of apple inside. I topped that off with a little maple syrup, and then put a weave sort of top of dough, like an old-fashioned pie. Sort of like this, but tighter (not as many holes):

Then I topped the top crust with a little more maple syrup, and stuck it in the oven on 375. It only took about 10 to 12 minutes to cook, and it was still doughy, and since I left it out on the oven for a while (and had previously greased the cups with margarine) they came out easily and were delicious. I love experimenting with cooking :)

What would Megan read: Love by Design, by Nora Roberts
What would Megan listen to: Teardrop, on Mezzanine from Massive Attack
What would Megan watch: Napoleon Dynamite

Overwhelmed!

Boy... It's not going to feel so overwhelming soon, but for now I'm practically swimming in anxiety. School is just as crazy as I remember, and because I haven't been there for so long, it feels new and scary. I don't like being around people so much, and I don't like not knowing what's expected of me. Hopefully as the week goes on I will slip into routine and start feeling easier...

Ativan to the rescue!

First day...

I'm back taking classes at the main campus of SPSCC for the first time since June 2007. It's very strange, especially since I am also taking an online class, but I have high hopes. My goal is all As, which is sort of a high expectation, but I need it to get my GPA up. The cumulative is currently 2.97, after adding my fall quarter 4.0. If I get all As through spring quarter, my GPA should be around 3.2, but that's not necessarily true considering if SPSCC uses specific weights for certain classes. I can at least expect it to be over 3.0 which is good.

I would rather have a 4.0... hmmph.

ETA: Well I guess I only need a 2.5 do be considered for UW, but I would still rather have a 4.0

Lookin' good

Painting my nails.. I baked a whole chicken today! It was actually pretty easy, the hardest part was making sure it was defrosted and battling the smoke detector during cooking. I'm deathly afraid of the apartment's fire alarms (these giant, scary looking, office-grade alarms connected with metal pipes all around the building), so I refuse to disable the smoke detector because it warns us before the fire alarms go us. Although, there really was no fire, and my chicken turned out great. Shane did most of the work, but I made the seasoning and told him how to do everything. And I pulled out the lungs or liver, I'm not sure which it was. I don't really like handling raw meat, and I was in the middle of doing 3 hours worth of dishes. I also papered my dishes cupboards (previously were scantily clad in the ugliest paper ever, and where they weren't clad, they were sticky or gross), and reorganized the dishes, pots, pans, mixing bowls, appliances, tupperware, utensils, and cooking accessories. I found that easier than papering a drawer is finding some fabric and folding it up nicely, sort of like a little pillow for whatever goes in the drawer. I also consolidated our junk drawers (we had two) and had Shane sort the result out. Yay for progress! Here's what I've been doing:

Nails. This stuff is FABULOUS for doing nails. It's Avon's quick dry spray, and within 10 seconds it makes your nail polish/topcoat/base coat/whatever dry. Sweet!

And here they are, filed and base-coated. I still haven't decided if I want red nails or natural nails...

Writing/Drawing. For a couple days I literally had to get up and draw or write because I couldn't sleep with all the images and words dancing in my head. I think it's one way I deal with pain, and it's certainly pain I'm feeling, losing my uncle.


Shrinky-dinks. I've been thinking about opening a page on Etsy, and selling my stuff, since we're certainly not rolling in dough, but I am rolling in craft supplies! These ones are an idea I have for earrings. They're swans, I think, but at least some kind of bird.

These two will be pendants. I'll call them, respectively, "Freeform" and "Jungle." They haven't been shrunked yet, but I forgot to ask my mom to bring the hole punch, so they'll have to wait some more.

Last but not least, knitting! Here's the progress on my turtle, it's just the body. I hope Jo will like it! All I need to do is pick up stitches along the side for legs, head, and a tiny tail. So cute! The diameter is shorter than my pinky finger.

Here's my progress on Sharon's GLB. It's looking pretty fine, if I do say so myself. 22 pattern rows down, 14 to go...

This is my very own knitting spool, in the shape of a mushroom :) It makes i-cord really quick, and it's super easy to use, and HEY it's a mushroom. Awesome.

This is mad scientist knitter Megan's latest experiment, knitting with wire. I think it looks pretty swell for a first try, and I'd definitely have to practice, but I can see potential. There are patterns for knitted wire earrings on Knitty.com, but I kind of want to make my own pattern. I don't know that I can sell something I made with someone else's pattern, or that I feel okay doing that, even if I can.

I've thoroughly exhausted my latest doings, and neglected to decide whether or not I want color on my nails, so it's out to smoke and read and make an impulse decision I'll probably renig when I get inside.

Also, there is going to be a Gears of War 3! Exciting!

What would Megan listen to: Amplified Heart from Everything But the Girl

For shits and giggles

What I need to do today

• Dishes
• Clean up a bit
• Use the ground beef for something
• Bake a chicken

What I want to do today

• Read my romance novel
• Play GOW2
• Make a family tree
• Knit
• Watch a show
• Make jewelry
• Make shrinky-dinks
• Play with the kitties
• Make a song with Electroplankton
• Write
• Fuck around on Librarything
  

Aaaauuugh!!

What would Megan read: Blue Dahlia, by Nora Roberts

Rabbit rabbit

Happy new year everybody!

I had a horrible dream last night, and woke up dripping sweat, although really I should say I was woken up dripping sweat, since despite my dream terror, I was really awful to Shane when he tried to wake me up.

I started knitting a little tiny turtle for my grandma, because although I was going to make her a bookmark, I was in a bad mood while I was making it and didn't like anything I was creating. The turtle is very quick and fun, so I figured I would enjoy that more for now. It only takes a few yards of yarn to make.

Okay, here are my wishes/resolutions for 2009:

• Keep blogging, even if my theme is dumb
• Get all As winter and spring quarter
• Apply to UW
• Make patterns and at least try selling some of my knitting/crafts
• Keep a date book or calendar of some sort
• Do dishes regularly (Which should be easier when we get rid of all the dishes we have that don't match. We have a set of dishes my mom gave us that all match, and about the same in dishes we bought from Goodwill. Since we have so many, it's that much easier to put off doing dishes, since we can have piles of dishes all over the counter and still have clean dishes in the cupboard.)
• Keep up reading novels even while I'm in school
• Quit smoking, maybe
• Spend more time with my family
• Stop spending money frivolously
• Enjoy each moment
• Turn in library books on time
• Take my pills every day
• Stop picking at my zits
• Move into an apartment with a dishwasher
• Get all achievements on Gears of War 2 and Fallout 3
• Let my brother spend the night more often
• Keep a clean house

They don't seem too hard to keep, as resolutions go. I've given myself room on quitting smoking (I have a love/hate relationship with cigarettes, because I certainly like smoking them and I like going outside to do so, but it gets irritating needing a smoke break every once in a while, especially when it's cold, they're expensive, and I want to quit before I decide to have children. That last part should be easy since I don't plan to have those anytime soon...) and most of them are achievable simply by changing my perspective. I like goals like that, that I can work to accomplish but that don't really have a set finish, so I can decide if they're finished or not finished whenever I want.

We're due at Tas and Teresa's for new year's games, so I suppose I'd better jump into the shower.

P.S. I tried the rice bag my mom gave me. You heat it up in the microwave and then put it wherever you hurt, but unfortunately it's heavy and constricting and although the heat feels good, it isn't good enough to counteract the above that makes my neck hurt worse. Poop.