Maxcapades

Max Power, King God of all the Beautiful Empowerful Cats of the World, has been unusually squirrelly lately. I don’t know what is up with him but if he doesn’t stop I may lose my mind.

The Cereal Incident
Max loves cereal. More accurately, Max loves to drink the sugary milk left over from the cereal. Loves. As my friend D would say, pink puffy heart loves. Will he drink normal milk that we give to him? Oh, ew, no. That’s disgusting and disdainful, almost as gross as bananas (we once tried to give him some banana, just for fun, and he hissed at it. Hissed!). But USED cereal milk, well that is the nectar of the freaking Gods. So the other day LB is eating cereal. Not long after commencement of cereal eating, His Royal Entitledness hops up on the table and starts staring at the cereal bowl, then staring at LB, alternately. LB finishes his cereal, and Max makes a move for it, but not quick enough because LB gets up to refill the cereal bowl. “Oh noes!” Says Max, “I hafta wait for NOTHER bowlful?” Max decides waiting is for pussies. Throughout the second bowl of cereal, he emits frustrated, demanding chirps and growls. LB finishes his second bowl, drinks the milk and resumes TV watching. Max pounces upon the bowl only to discover his precious cereal milk is gone. GONE! Max decides that this is shit up with which he will not put. He WILL get a yummy and he WILL make LB pay. Max proceeds to the treat cupboard, where he yowls demandingly for 10 minutes until LB gives in and gives him a treat, whereupon he struts off triumphantly.

The Great Escape Incident
Max, like many indoor cats, is always and forever trying to escape. He isn’t usually sneaky about it; most of the time he merely sits by the door and demands to be let out. Every once in a while I let him out for observed exploration. Last night, I went to get groceries. As I’m bringing them into the house, Max demands to go out. My thinking was, OK, it’s like 10 degrees below zero, he’s been asking all week, perhaps if I let him out he’ll realize it’s not so pleasant out there. So I let him out while shuttling the groceries between the car and the porch. After scratching excitedly and urgently at the door to be let out, once I open it and hold it open for His Royal Highness, he stares at me for an eternity before gingerly stepping out, one dainty paw at a time. He cautiously makes his way down the four stairs. In the meantime I have made two more trips between the car and the porch. Max starts to realize that the ground, it is ass cold. He starts picking up his paws quickly, one at a time, propelling forward movement. He rounds the snow bank at the end of the walk and turns onto the sidewalk. Freedom is within reach! But damn is the ground cold! He adds to his quick-stepping a paw shake at the apex of every paw lift, resulting in a crouched wobbly march. This propels him forward faster. It is damn cold but will we turn back and enter the warm sanctuary of home? NEVAR!! Myself, having finished shuttling groceries and dying of laughter, decide it’s time to collect the poor, frigid cat. I scoop him up in my warm arms, only to receive a reproachful meowl and complaints all the way into the house. After glaring at me for a time, he decides I am his best friend and demands snuggles.

The Shade of Doom Incident
Later that evening, after the Great Escape Incident, Max was a-snugglin and a-sleepin upstairs with Milo while LB and I enjoyed Top Chef. All of the sudden, out of nowhere, we hear a MEOW! Then Max comes tearing down the stairs, at top speed, races through the living room and across the dining room in a bee-line for one particular window, leaps onto the window sill, stands up on his legs and intently inspects the window shade. I’m not exactly sure what the mission was, but damn he was intent on staring at that particular window shade at that exact moment.

R is for Random

I got this meme (and the post title) from my friend velocibadgergirl over at Pardon the Egg Salad

The rules are as follows:

1. I write 10 things that I love which begin with my assigned letter.
2. If you want to participate, leave a comment here (with a working email) and I'll assign you a letter randomly (how else could I do it?)
3. You write about 10 things you love which begin with your assigned letter (and I mean really luuuuurve, not like "oh I think Raid is nifty").
4. When people comment on your list, you give them a letter, then they do the same crap and we all have love lists.

Velocibadger girl gave me R using her scattergories dice, so, in order of whence they occured to me, here is my list of R things that I love:

1. RAINN - from their website: "The nation's largest anti-sexual assault organization." They gather statistics, educate the public, lobby for funding, provide a national crisis hotline (both on the phone and online), help victims connect with low-cost health and legal professionals in their area, all around, they help victims both directly and indirectly by trying to lower the abomidable rate of rape.

2. Ripe, fresh, juicy red raspberries - zomg teh best fruitz EVAR! I love rasperries so much I incorporated them into my wedding: our cake was flavored white chocolate, with a raspberry puree filling, buttercream frosting and topped fresh raspberries purchased that day from the local farmer's market. (I wish I had a better closeup of the cake on hand but you'll just have to deal with my ginormous clevage if you want to look at the cake).

3. Rice pudding - I like most rice puddings, but my family has a super yummy baked rice pudding recipe that makes my mouth water (and it's super freaking easy to make).

4. Randomness - Srsly

5. Ring - My engagement ring. It is a simple custom-made band of white gold. The center stone is a gorgeouse deep blue sapphire, with two diamond offsets. The stones are at an angle and the ends of the band are fluted around them. I never go anywhere without it.

6. Ruby Soho by Rancid - does that count as double? Nothing like an upbeat punk song about heartache.

7. Rum Balls - I made this recipe that DeeDee posted over at Fiddledeedee. Awesome. Chocolaty and nutty and rummy. And they only took me like 15 minutes to make.

8. Relaxing - What more can I say?

9. Reproducing - or, at least, pretending to ;)

10. Rocky Horror Picture Show, The - Let's do the time warp again! (It's the pelvic thrust that really drives you insane).

Ladies' Man

The town our store is in, because it is like the retirement capitol of the world, has a lot of old people. So a huge chunk of our clientele is old people with foot issues, who may or may not have their faculties intact.

So I was working the store yesterday with LB, and this 800 year old woman comes in with her daughter and granddaughter. She needs special shoes for her foot issues, so LB helped her since he’s kind of an expert in that stuff. They find a pair of shoes for her, but one of them needs to be stretched. While LB is helping her, she’s asking him all sorts of personal questions…like “oh where do you live?” and, “what time do you get off work?”

LB went to stretch the shoe, and while he was gone, she asked her granddaughter something that I couldn’t hear, and the granddaughter says “Well I don’t know, ask her, she’s right there.” I walk up and say “Is there something you’d like to ask me?” “Yeah, who ARE you?” Granddaughter laughs and clarifies that she would like to know my relation to LB, and I said, yes, we’re married.

LB came back and I rung up her shoes and some socks she was also getting. As her daughter was paying, she turns to me and says “What’s your name?” “QueenRandom” “How old are you?” “Twenty-seven.” “Oh! Oh well OK” I think she was surprised by my age; I think she thought I was quite a bit younger. She then looks at my husband, who is in the back of the store and can’t hear us, and exclaims, “I’ll take him!”

LB: Charming the pants off of old ladies since 1980.

20 Ways of Coming Out as Bisexual

I am not often known for my extreme timeliness, but this post is in honor of National Coming Out Week, which was 2 or 3 weeks ago.

Yeah I rock.


But anyway in honor of NCOW, here it is, 20 ways to come out as a bisexual:

1. I like both guys and gals.
   
2. I'm AC/DC.
3. My socket accepts both male and female connectors.
4. I don't limit my love to a single gender.
   
5. My attraction and love for a person do not rely on genital appearance (excluding warts and lesions).
   
6. Sometimes I like Earl Grey, sometimes I like Lady Grey.
7. I root for both teams.
   
8. I find both long johns and doughnuts equally tasty.
9. I like both roosters and kitties (think about it).
10. Angelina or Brad? Yes, please.
11. I fancy both Martians and Venusians.
12. I can't "just pick a side." To do so would be to deny half of who I am.
    
13. Sometimes I feel like a nut; sometimes I don't.
14. I enjoy situating myself between the yin and the yang.
15. On the Kinsey scale, I fall between 0 and 6.
    
16. I love the person, not the gender.
17. At breakfast, I can eat either saussage or muffins.
18. My extracurricular activities include both pole vaulting and ditch diving.
    
19. Innies and Outies are both appealing to me.
    
20. I can love a person of either gender, but I love that person just as much and am just as faithful and loyal to them regardless of their gender.
    

Go Go Gadget Gallimaufry

Uphevals

Well, I had to change labs. For those of you not in science PhD programs, that is a big, hairy deal. Basically? I lost 1-2 years off of my project.

In the end, though, it's a good thing. When I thought about spending another 2 years in that lab? I had panic attacks. I was scared and anxious every day. I was constantly (justifiably) scared of getting yelled at and called names. I had gastritis. My hair was starting to fall out. I couldn't have a conversation without getting defensive. Things were broken beyond repair.

There's so much more, but institutional policies, bla bla, plus, at this point, I just want to move on. I'm not afraid anymore and I want to keep it that way.

Since leaving? My stomach pains have all but disappeared. My hair has grown inches (in just 3 weeks!). My nails are suddenly so healthy I have to cut them every few days just so I can type without being annoyed. My relationship with my husband has improved dramatically, and I once again feel like, uh, gratifying him on a regular basis.

Life is good.


Let's get physical

So I am, like everyone and their brother, trying to lose weight. Not a lot, but started out slightly overweight and I'd like to get a little closer to the middle range of "normal" (according to the docs) before LB and I start trying to conceive (which, at this point, I have no idea when that's going to happen). I've been doing well, in bursts...10lbs gone since April! 10 more to go. Mostly it's a matter of developing healthy habits - eating well, drinking enough water, and exercising, none of which I was doing at the onset.

As a part of this, I've been going to aqua aerobics. It is awesome. It's me and like fifteen sexagenarians. So the other day, we are, as usual, dancin around to popular songs put to an aerobics beat, when the next song comes on. Dust In The Wind by Kansas. To a club beat. NNNN-TSSS NNNN-TSSS DUUUUUUUUUUST IN THE WIIIIIIIIIND NNNN-TSSS NNNN-TSSS NNNN-TSSS NNNN-TSSS And then I died a little inside.

When I finish my class, I head back to the locker room and take a shower. It just so happens that every Tuesday evening at 6:30, the gym gives tours to prospective new members. They pass through the locker rooms generally just after my post-aerobics shower, when I am changing back into my clothes, meaning they are often treated to me in gratuitous amounts of undress. That is how it came to pass that part of my gym routine every Tuesday evening is to flash my bare ass at random (innocent?) bystanders. I may not possess the sense of modesty to cover up, but hey, at least I'm polite enough to turn so they get booty instead of bush.


Deep Thoughts

Celebrity reality shows just wouldn't be the same without Danny Bonaduce.

I can't eat Fun'yns because they remind me of bunions and I'm convinced they'll taste like feet.

Getting out of a wet swimsuit is much more unpleasant than putting on a dry swimsuit.

Do all dogs think dead, rotten bird is THE scent that will drive ALL the ladies wild, or is it just mine?

I can't decide what is a worse wake-up call: Dog breath in my face or cat pouncing on my boob.

I like the word thesaurus. It engenders an image of a giant T-rex with a big ole book for its head rampaging through the jungle.


Dogs Rock

This video had me tearing up at work...and I'm not a crier!

Book Blog

So, yesterday I started a book review blog, Ecclectic Belletrist. It has a lot of posts right now, mainly because I took all my old facebook reviews and made an entry for each of those. They're pretty short, but in the future I plan on longer, more in-depth reviews. I ready probably 1.5 books per month, so it won't be too bustling. If you do go there, be sure to check this out first, as it has my comment policy and blog philosophy. That being said, here's a list of books I have so far:

We Need to Talk About Kevin

My Sister's Keeper

The Little Prince

Princess

The Power of One

Out

The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-time

Misconceptions

Wifework

Life of Pi

The Virgin Suicides

Middlesex

The Kite Runner

A Separate Peace

Blessings

The Bell Jar

A Wrinkle in Time

Goat

Brave New World

Lies My Teacher Told Me

The Ocean in the Closet

Whole new attitude

So. I have had an epiphany. (OK I must stop here to brag that, apparently, I spelled epiphany right on the first try. Go me!). About Grad school, or possibly about my advisor.

See, my advisor and I butt heads a lot. She is a very confrontational, controlling person, and I won't stand for any bullshit. It is very stressful.

But I realized...it doesn't have to be stressful. I care too much what she thinks of me, and it distresses me that she doesn't respect my professional opinion. But I realized...she doesn't trust ANYbody's professional opinions, even those people who have years and years more experience than her. Why should she respect me scientifically when she can't respect her scientific superiors? No, that would be illogical.

When I started in this lab, she pushed for a much closer relationship than I was used to, and I think that was to my detriment. She said she sees her students as her kids. That she wants to protect us from failure. This has fucked with my head bigtime. I allowed myself to think that this was true. It's not. It was a device she used to try to get me to open up to her, and a device she uses to justify her paternalistic behavior towards her employees. In all fairness, I think SHE thinks it's true, but it isn't. Or, to put it another way, if she treats her actual daughter the same way she treats her employees, than she's a pretty shitty parent. But if I can sever this "close" relationship and move towards a professional one, like I had with bosses before here, than I can protect and distance my emotions from her constant negativity. I will never have her approval, nor should I desire it. She is not, and should not be, a parental figure for me. Her approval or respect don't matter. As long as I can finish my thesis and get a decent recommendation letter out of her once I go job hunting, nothing else matters in the meantime. I will no longer let her manipulations, her misreadings of my personality, and her berating my not being perfect bother me. Screw that noise.

And you know what? I've been living with this new attitude for the past week, and I feel great. For the first time in 3 years I feel the knots in my stomach loosening.