today has been one of the best days i've had in awhile. which isn't to say that the last few days haven't been great, because they have. i don't know what's going on, but i've been riding a high for the last 2 or 3 weeks. a lot of it is probably spring. tomorrow is finally april, which means we've hopefully said goodbye to low 40's and rainy. it's been a dreary winter.

but the last few weeks, i've just been feeling better and better about my life, and the way things have gone recently. i'm enjoying the freedom that i have now. i need a stick to (selectively) fend off the boys. academically, things haven't been this good since high school. and i'm doing original research. today i figured out something that no one has ever known before.

let me repeat that. today i figured out something that no one has ever known before. how fucking sweet is that? it was all me. brock helped, but it was my pcr, my gel, my dilutions, my dna pools, my pipetting, my labeling, my eye that spotted the missing band in the mutant fish.

i think i'm going to name it pinball wizard.

the answer to life, the universe, and everything... turns out to be the number 42.

portrait of a lady

poster of a girl

i am SO in love with marriedtothesea.

for some unknown and ungodly reason, i've been up for an hour. what? when do i wake up, ready to go, at 5:30 AM?

i've been reading metafilter and dailykos, which i don't read very often, but they do seem to be a trend indicator of the "netroots". which is where our next political movement needs to come from. they seem to be big supporters of feingold, which i think i can get behind.

the crucial moment though, will be midterm elections in november.

photorrhea

9 hours
1 pitcher of beer
2 coffees
1 art gallery

one game of scrabble in gasworks park
1 6-pack of beer

several good pictures
one good sunday

meta-metafilter

is the tide turning?

insert polemic here. aaaargh. i seriously hope this trend continues.

because my water tastes better than the water in the dish over there.

end of quarter what?

finals week is always so disorienting. no classes, but it's not really spring break. i ought to be studying. so i just replaced the battery on my ipod. after having had the replacement battery for almost a month and trying repeatedly and unsuccessfully to dissect the damn thing, i finally figured it out. you just gotta jam a tiny screwdriver or three in between the metal and plastic casing, prying the metal outward and off. connecting the battery took a little fumbling, but i managed to cram the new, slightly larger battery with its slightly longer cable into the case no problem. i was particularly impressed with the hard drive, though - it's like the size of a credit card! but anyway, that's done, and now my ipod is charging, and it will play for 18 hours. and life will be good.

i think i have a plan for my little sunroom. i'm going to build a false floor with some plywood and cinder blocks (or something like that) and put in a bamboo mat. ideally i want a tatami-like thing, but i looked at those online and they are hella expensive. i'm thinking bamboo beach mats or something. that way my kitty won't be able to escape from that room, and i can leave the inside door open when it's hot and sunny. i need to do something about the mold, though. damn mold, ruining everything.

"...we tend to easily blame others for our suffering, and we can justify it because maybe other people are mistreating us or exploiting us or don’t understand us or are doing dreadful things to us. We’re not denying that, but we make nothing of it any more. We forgive, we let go of those memories, because taking refuge in Sangha means, here and now, doing good and refraining from doing evil with bodily action and speech."

from. Long, but worth a read.

it seems like things are mellowing out, which is nice. classes are winding down. all i have to do for 355 is finish up our project and present it. and that is well under way. after that, it's just 2 finals - chem and bio 220. both of which i intend to ace. or at least come close.

we get to use a note card in chem. i mean, come on. i've had trouble with this feature in the past, since i tend to scribble out my notecard the day of or night before and never know what to put on it, but this time i'll plan it out and get it just right and be able to totally pwn that test.

and on bio i will actually READ the questions and the answers carefully. i hate it when i make stupid mistakes. someone got a perfect score on the last bio exam and i hate them, i will hunt them down and make them give me their grade. or something.

hopefully my gpa won't take too much of a hit.

this weekend: moving! whee!

time to vote.

exhibit (a):

exhibit (b):

so which should i do with my hair?

week 9 already. what?

and a tickle in the back of my throat reminds me of the chorus of hacking coughs that accompanied the lecture this morning in bio 355. suzie gave me some "airborne" which is supposed to be one of those supplements that helps ward off colds. i'm hoping it does its job, because week 9 of the quarter is a shitty-ass time to get sick.

i'm getting really fucking sick of my classes this quarter, too. bio 220 ceased to be interesting and started being just boring when we switched from animals to plants. oooh, plants photosynthesize. no fucking way. i dunno. i'm not a plant person. o-chem is still marginally interesting, which will cease next quarter because the guy who barely speaks english and had a stroke last year is my new professor. he's easy, but you don't learn, is what i've heard. and today we had our last real lecture in bio 355 - wednesday is a quiz, and next monday and wednesday are the expo for our projects. it'll be nice to have that class totally out of the way, though i think i blew my chance for a 4.0 with that last quiz and discussion paper. but then again everyone did bad on those and so maybe i was still ahead of the curve. who knows.

ochem test and bio quiz on wednesday. bio presentation next wednesday. two finals two thursdays from now, and it's all over.

at least we're studying stereochem in ochem right now. that's one of those things that either you get it or you don't, and i get it. i can rotate 3-dimensional objects in my brain and distinguish between stereoisomers pretty damn easily. i'm hoping this helps me dominate the next test like i did the last.

aside from school, my project for this week is to paint my new room in my new house. and then move in. and hopefully my new housemates were not hiding psychopathologicalities. i just made that word up.

i saw bill gates last night at bis on main in bellevue. paul allen was with him too, as were 3 other unidentified but undoubtably stinking rich dudes. my grandma sure does know how to pick a good restaurant.

kill harry

"He hates his children, he treats his wife like dirt, he gets high all day."

kevin federline is the most pathetic excuse for a famous person ever. at least paris hilton looks cute (/slutty) on camera and has a bunch of money. K-fed is just a stupid lazy mooch who doesn't shower. Eugh.

craigslist is down. this is annoying.

so i started watching grey's anatomy tonight, at the suggestion of several of my friends in bio... fuck me, this show is awesome. it almost makes me want to go to med school though... actually a lot of things have been making me want to go to med school recently. i know, how fucking weird is that. i have NEVER wanted to be a doctor, ever. but the last year or so it's been one of those recurring random ideas. i don't know if i can do it, if i'm capable of it, but i think that i could give it a shot, right?

and i know it's nothing like it seems on tv. if it were like it is on tv i'm not sure if i would want to do it. man, that show makes seattle seem like a fucked-up town. and what the fuck is wiht having the hospital right at the base of the space needle? and the aerial shots "look, we're in seattle! hey guys, this show is set in seattle! did you notice the space needle there? this is seattle!" bah. there's no hospital in seattle center.

evidently the northwest has dire need for pediatric neurologists.

OK, so I guess yesterday wasn't a complete waste. between a few well-timed myspace messages to and from semi-random people (I guess everyone else gets lonely too) and some much-needed chocolate from brian, i went to bed a lot happier than i started out.

I still haven't got my fucking paper review that's due tomorrow done... gah, this thing is kicking my ass. I keep writing and writing and then I realize that I'm only half done and it is 550 words and the word limit is 500 and I don't know how to cut it down! fuck! i am tempted to just leave it until tomorrow afternoon, but i know that's a bad idea since i only have an hour to take care of stuff before it's due. fuck. fuck fuck. i haven't had this much trouble with one of these reviews yet, but this one is by far the most info-dense paper we've had to read (no one else i've talked to even read the paper, much less *understood* the damn thing) and we're supposed to summarize and critique in 500 words or less. Fuck.

In other news, I'm going to look at an apartment/meet a possible roommate on saturday. I would rather find my own place, but I figure it's worth a shot to see if we get along, since $400 is cheaper than $535 and my parents can only give me $750 a month, total, and i have bills and bills and i have to eat, you know, small stuff. blegh, why is life so stressful right now??

today is the worst day of the year. it's like a day for everyone to say, ha ha, kat, you can't manage to keep a man happy, instead they all fall in love with your prettier friends and ditch you, leaving you with nobody when you need somebody. i started crying on the way home from the bus. valentines day is the stupidest, shittiest holiday in the world and i hate it.

and now, just in case this might be pertinent to anyone reading this: 10 reasons why you should never accept a diamond from anybody.