Ugh! And critters!

I think my arm is rotting off.  Periodically throughout my life, my skin decides it hates me.  Sometimes it starts with a bug bite.  This time it was two little scrapes courtesy of the jungle that is my back yard.  Tiny.  One of them originally looked like a needle stick (I think it was a rose thorn).  And then I scratch.  Not thinking about it, obviously.  Sometimes even in my sleep.  And things explode.  I get serious inflammation that turns into big nasty half dollar sized welts.  It's ugly.  And then it itches.  Bad.  And I try soooo hard not to scratch.  Eventually these evil little critters heal, but it's a long, slow, miserable, itchy process, with a whole lot of my trying to convince myself that my arm couldn't possibly itch because I don't even have an arm.

Anyway, I have two of these that have been looking pretty ugly, but I've been being good and not scratching.  They have started to heal.  However, four new bumps subsequently popped up on my lower arm.  Which I studiously ignored, but one of them in particular is growing.  Groan!!!  Then yesterday I noticed a bunch of little bumps on my upper arm.  Maybe 7 of them.  I'm ignoring them too, and so far, they aren't turning into the growths.  Then this morning my other hand itched.  So i rubbed my hand over it and discovered a whole new herd of little tiny bumps, which I now have on both hands.  I think it may be time to take this one to the doctor.

Furthermore, there is a flea in my chair that has jumped on me like three times.  (And no, none of the creature bumps are flea bites...oh were it that simple!)  Go harass the kitty for crying out loud!!!!  Me and Mr. Lou...we're about to go flea murdering again.  Just when I thought they were all gone...  Poor kitty may be getting another bath, bless his furry little heart.  Funny part is, I think he kind of likes baths...  Silly kitty!

And also to keep things interesting, I have the tiniest bit of sunburn on my chest.  And it itches.  I think I'm in itchy hell.

This amuses me (and makes me a little sad)

So I've been arguing with this person on a message board all day about whether or not intelligent design should be part of K-12 science curriculum.  My first request of references supporting ID, he told me I should watch Expelled.  Eyeroll!  Request for references number 10 or 12, I got directed to the Discovery Institute website.  Bigger eyeroll!  But it was made all better when I found a reference on the DI website to a paper in, get this, the Journal of Fuzzy Systems.  I almost hope (for their sake) that a hacker was responsible for that.  Somehow I doubt that's the case though.  And what do you know...still no legit references to be found.  I must be in a good mood today, because this isn't ticking me off like it usually does.

However, what does really tick me off is that I bought some pita chips made by Snyder's of Hanover (whose pretzels I loooooove) and they are TERRIBLE!!!  Seriously gross.  They melt down into some sort of wet sawdust kind of consistency and it's just bad.  So bad I actually emailed them, which is very unlike me.  So just say no to Snyder's new multigrain pita chips!!!

Gag me with a spoon!

David Kirby has been up to his usual stellar (eyeroll) reporting over at his blog on Huffington Post.  The part that is really disgusting to me is the comments.  It's like some of these people worship this guy because he doesn't have the testicular fortitude to actually think for himself and critically evaluate, well, anything as far as I can tell.  Some of the comments are just praising his fabulous journalism and blah blah blah.  Except that in this post, all he does is quote from an interview somebody else did.  Should I be impressed by that?  Because, well, I'm like, NOT.  

Yea housework!

I've been rocking out some laundry and organizing and whatnot while TM has been working his landscaping magic.  Today is one of those days I enjoy housework.  I know, weird, huh?  I think it's genetic.  My sis and I both cope with stressful times by kicking it into Martha Stewart overdrive.  We both turn into crazy, manic cleaning machines.  It's actually pretty impressive, now that I think about it.

Anyway, one thing I do NOT enjoy doing is vacuuming.  We have the most horrendous piece of crap Kenmore vacuum.  It is nearly impossible for me to maneuver.  We have one room with carpet, a small den.  TM called halfway through this endeavor.  He wanted to know why I was out of breath.  The vacuum sucks that bad!  I swear it may have square wheels or something. 

 Meanwhile, the furry feline has his face stuck in an air conditioner vent.  Spoiled rotten.  

And now back to the laundry already in progress.  Maybe I'll get out my little hand-held super vacuum and get the mounds of cat hair off the furniture.  That one I can handle.

Grr!!! Stupid people annoy me!

Who argues that you can't prove a negative, and the proceeds to try and convince you that any rational person would agree that correlation equals causation?!?!  Please forgive my stunned silence, Mr. Stupid Person.

To be filed under incredibly annoying:

The rotating dude and I were the only ones in the lab last night.  Crazy man came in and started chatting with rotating dude.  That's all fine and dandy.  Where does rotating dude decide to perch himself for this conversation?  That's right, folks, MY CHAIR!!!!  It's not like there are 4 other chairs within 2 steps of my desk.  Why?  Are people really that oblivious and rude???  Don't know why I'm being cranky.  Hmph.

And something weird is going on with my laptop battery, but I haven't figured out exactly what yet.  Hmph.  HMPH!!!

May Scientiae is up!

The May Scientiae is up over at Flicka Mawa's A Cat Nap.  It's a fantastic carnival full of interesting insights about our career paths, goals, and how nothing ever goes according to THE PLAN.  Enjoy!

A blogalicious brain vomit!

One of my high school English teachers made us do this exercise he called a brain vomit.  The premise was that you just got all your thoughts out.  You were supposed to just keep writing for whatever set period of time.  There seem to be lots of things just running wild in my poor little brain, so I think it’s time to set them free on the blogosphere!

1. I have babies on the brain!!!  While we were visiting my mom this past weekend, we kept my cousin's two little boys who are 2 months and almost 2 years old.  Needless to say it was quite an adventure.  Despite not getting any sleep, I want so very badly to kidnap them!  Or have one of my own.  And that seems to be all I can think about today.  Fortunately, it’s a happy afterglow kind of thinking about it, not the painful, frustrated, longing kind of thinking about it.  I’m sure that will return shortly.
2. My father got married again this weekend, bringing his total number of marriages to three.  It was the most ridiculous thing I have ever suffered through.  I am the black sheep on this side of the family because I have very little to do with my father (and because I’m getting a PhD and haven’t popped out any babies yet).  The reason I have very little to do with him is because he was verbally and physically abusive to my mom when I was a child.  He’s mellowed a lot with age, and I appreciate that, but I still have no use for him. 

Back to the wedding, it was a super duper hardcore religious Southern Baptist young earth kind of ceremony.  Which is bad enough.  But this is his third marriage, and I don’t know how many times his lovely bride has been married, but she has two children that I would guess have two different fathers.  And he has at least one bastard child that was conceived while he was married.  So it was kind of disgusting to sit through all the be faithful forever, I’ll love you until I die crap. 

Everything was super tacky too.  It was an early afternoon wedding.  The bride wore a dress with a cathedral length train.  A dress that was “hemmed” in the front with duct tape.  I can’t make this up.  The groom’s cake was on a table covered with camo and the cake had a deer head on it.  I guess it’s better than a red velvet armadillo.  The reception consisted of punch, peanuts, dinner mints and the cake.  I didn’t expect a full meal, but some pretzels would have been nice.  Maybe some cheese and crackers? 

Okay, tacky wedding rant complete (and with no mention of the cankles or their arm/wrist equivalent.  Ew.)

3. Crazy Man ticked me off again last week.  We had joint lab meeting with our collaborators across town.  These are always painful occasions because our collaborator (Jabba the Hut) is outrageously obnoxious, but we’ll save that for another day.  Crazy Man had ordered pizza for us, and he was running late, so he called to tell us to sign for it and take it down to the conference room.  I answered the phone when he called, and he said, “Could one of you girls sign for the pizza and take it down to the room?”  I was seriously speechless.  And what do you know, us two girls were doing experiments while the boys were sitting at their computers.  Grrrrr!!!

I think that’s it for now.  I’m taking off a little early again today.  TM demands groceries so that he can concoct me some gourmet meals.  Who am I to stand between TM and groceries???  J  Crazy Man will probably be ticked at me by the end of the week, but whatever.  I got a lot of work done today, and by the end of the week I should actually (hopefully) have some data to show for it.  That should appease him.  I hope.