Biting my tongue

I generally have a very good relationship with my mom. We went through a lot of crap when I was much younger, and so we've always been pretty close. But I swear to God if a screaming baby doesn't burst forth from me in the immediate future, I may be forced to kill her!

I went to the doctor today for my yearly checkup. My mom knew I had an appointment, so I emailed her to let her know that everything was fine. What response do I get? "You're not preggo are you?" Of course meant in a please-God-let-her-be-I-need-grandchildren-now-now-NOW way.

Of course, now she says that she was just joking. After I told her that I was biting my tongue and trying not to flip out on her.

What I really wanted to say was some combination of the following:

-How many times do I have to tell you that we're waiting until I finish grad school?
-How many times do I have to ask you not to go there?
-What part of we aren't ready to have a baby yet is unclear?
-What part of daycare costs more than our mortgage and we're not exactly rolling in dough is unclear?
-How many times do I have to explain that it's hard enough being a female and a scientist and I'm just not ready to make that more complicated yet?

I know she doesn't mean to be shoving a knife through my heart on a regular basis, but dammit this isn't easy! I have enough frustration and guilt without her continually heaping more on. I can't tell her how when my dad was dying all I could think about was how much he loved my cousin's little boy and how he would never meet my kids. And how much that still tears me to shreds.

Why do I feel bad for being different than my cousin who
-is 20 and on her second baby, with two different fathers?
-doesn't work and lives with his in laws, but has two adorable boys that he and his wife dump with a different relative every weekend because "they need a break"?

Why is it that I, the responsible one, the one with a husband and an education and a steady income and a car and house I can afford, who chooses to make responsible reproductive decisions, am the one crying over things?

A Brighter Monday

I would like to take this moment to thank Katie for Dishy Guy Monday. DGM never fails to perk me up just a bit. And somehow always leads to browsing of the DGM archives...

Speaking of Katies that I love, welcome back Katie! I missed you, and I'm super glad you're blogging again!

RBOC: Not a 3 day weekend edition

• I’m all for encouraging kids to read! Even if it is fluff (or trash). God knows I read a lot (and I mean a LOT) of fluff and trash when I was younger. For that matter I still do. I just think when books become as popular as, say, Twilight, that perhaps we should be thinking and talking about them a little more.

• I had an incredibly hot dream this morning about an incredibly hot guy, and although it was totally (and almost disturbingly) G-rated, I’m still distracted about it. Still.

• Despite the fact that it is a university holiday, we’re all here in lab. Apparently the Crazy One only believes university holidays apply to us when it suits him. He got seriously ticked last year when most of us were only here a half day or so on MLK day. But of course, it’s fine for him to take off to Disneyworld for the better part of a week and not even mention that he may not be in.

• On the other hand, Crazy Man and I have been on pretty good terms lately. Maybe it’s because one of the private society grants I wrote got funded!!! Of course, he also doesn’t realize that I really don’t have any new data since before Christmas, despite all my best efforts.

• Hopefully, the data will start flowing again. If not, I’m going to lose it. It’s starting to get frustrating.

• Crazy Man looked like I had kicked a puppy when I told him that I had found a meeting to go to. By myself, since he won’t commit to going anywhere with me. I assume he looked so sad because it’s a more signaling/cell biology oriented meeting and not really focused on our sub-field. I figure it’s a good idea to leave the nest a little, since hopefully I will be leaving the nest for good in the not too distant future.

• Speaking of which, things seem to be happening so quickly! It’s really starting to get a little scary. More on this later.

• Three of my cousins are pregnant. THREE! All younger than me, of course. Wait, of course they’re all younger than me…I’m the oldest girl. I don't knit that fast people! I'm not sure I'm going to be able to keep up. Of course, I do have one blanket almost done. More to come...

• My brain is definitely functioning like it’s Monday. Guess I better get to work.

Twilight, or how to warp young girls...

I hope you all had a lovely Christmas! It was 80 degrees when I left my mom’s house on Saturday. If that’s not Christmas weather, then I don’t know what is! There are so many things skittering around in my brain that I don’t even know what to write about. But since I’ve been reading so much lately, and I’ve seen several recent blog posts about books…well, here we go!

My most recent reading binge started with The Historian by Elizabeth Kostova. I was enjoying it, and we had a Books a Million gift card that was about to start being charged due to lack of use, so TM went out and bought me Twilight.

At this point, I had no idea what Twilight was all about (except something vaguely about vampires), or any of the hoopla surrounding it, or even that they were making a movie! (The rock I live under, it is nice and big and shelters me from lots of pop culture crap!) So I read Twilight. I have to admit, it sucked me in a bit at first. Though the plot was thin (among other issues), I liked some of the characters and I thought some of the premises were interesting (i.e. what could be bad about sparkliness??). Lots of things, especially about Edward and Bella’s relationship, bothered me, but I read the book so fast that I didn’t really get bogged down thinking too much about all the things that disturbed me about it.

And then I read the second book. Seriously? SERIOUSLY??? The whole book was just a disgusting whine-fest. Boys and girls, this is what happens when you have seriously unhealthy relationships.

Honestly, I’m still just kind of dumbfounded by the whole series. And deeply disturbed. I freely admit that I am obsessive. But I am so completely disturbed by the obsession that young girls and even adults have with this series. It makes me sick, and I don’t know what I can do about it.

Come on girls! Go find a heroine that’s not seriously nuts! Ugh!

On the flip side, this whole thing has made for some absolutely hysterical snark. Check out this…I especially enjoy the summaries of the books. I thought I was going to die laughing. Fursplode is now officially a part of my lexicon. And yes, I do giggle every time I say it.

(As an aside, I totally agree with what Abbie has said about the Sookie Stackhouse series. It was nice after coming off Twilight to see a chick stand up for herself. Sheesh!)

Hm

Now that my cold is really waning and I'm really starting to feel good for the first time in over a month, I thought I could be super productive. I thought I would feel like doing all kinds of experiments and blogging and catching up on sciencey reading. Then my friend Jennifer came by. And left me with this:

How am I supposed to accomplish anything with that sitting in my living room???

Yeah!

This! Almost exactly this, in fact.

Six random things meme

Acmegirl has tagged me for the six random things meme. I’ve finally managed to get around to actually writing a post, so here it is! The rules:


Link to the person who tagged you.
Post the rules on your blog.
Write six random things about yourself.
Tag six people at the end of your post and link to them.
Let each person know they’ve been tagged and leave a comment on their blog.
Let the tagger know when your entry is up.

1. I am obsessive. It’s weird, though, because I only obsess about some things. An occasional movie or singer or book will suck me in and eat my brain. And it’s all I can think about, all the stinking time.

2. My life is a musical. I enjoy soundtracks, but I never expected for my life to turn into a musical. This is mostly due to TM, who likes to sing at me. The really interesting part is that he never actually knows the lyrics, so they get made up on the spot. This is how we now have songs like “Louie Cat of Horrors” and “O Figgy Tree”. Seriously.

3. I dance in the darkroom. What am I supposed to do, just stand there and wait?

4. I cry. Over anything. I’ve seriously cried over a Publix commercial. And if anybody else is crying, I cry too. This sometimes even happens with characters on TV or in movies.

5. I binge read. This is why I stopped reading for pleasure shortly after I began college. If I like a book (and sometimes even if I don’t), I sit and read until I’m finished.

6. If I weren’t an immunologist, I would totally be a meteorologist! I sometimes really think I missed my calling. Maybe that’s what I’ll do if I ever retire.

I’m a little late to the game on this one, so I’m not going to tag anyone (mostly because I’m too lazy to dig through my reader and see who hasn’t already done this meme). If you haven’t done this one, and you wanna, go ahead!