Evilsciencechick » daily

10 years

ESC — Sun, 11 Sep 2011 06:23:08 +0000

I will preface this by saying that I have not had the best of weeks. While many of you reading this know that I tend to love the drama, and will readily pull up a chair and a tub of popcorn whenever shit goes down, I do NOT like to be the one in the middle of the drama. Or put there against my will. Or worse, my own stupidity.

It is ASTOUNDING how I can unintentionally make things worse for myself. I’m amazed I’m still functioning in society, really.

ANYWAY!

10 years since 9/11. Holy shit.

I didn’t experience it the same way some people had – I wasn’t there, and I didn’t know anyone personally who had died. Living in Georgia, I felt like I experienced it all through a thick filter, or a lens smeared with vaseline. I was surrounded by a lot of people who had never been any further north than the Carolinas, let alone been to New York City. As a result I turned a lot of the horror and shock inward, and became very very numb for a long time.

I was on my way to campus for a department meeting when they reported the first plane to hit the WTC. It dominated the conversation for the first part of the meeting. Bizarre accident? Drunk pilot? Weird! Before we then moved on to the business of SCIENCE!

As the meeting wound down, my adviser went to speak to a part time faculty member who had come to the door, and they both spoke in hushed voices. Then my adviser walked back in the room and spoke loudly to get everyone’s attention. ”A plane has just flown into the world trade center.”

Uhhh, yeah, we know.

“No, I mean, another one.”

Immediately we fled to our respective labs and turned on radios. There were no TVs in the department and remember this was before you could get streaming video on computers (not that our lab’s ancient mac and pc could have even handled such a thing). We huddled around the stereo in the lab and listened to what happened. The planes had been hijacked. The buildings were burning. They were bringing down all planes that were in the air. Some planes were not responding. We only had descriptions of what was going on.

After a little while, the news was getting repetitive and there was no new information, and I thought that I had to get SOMETHING done that day. I had some overnight E. coli cultures that were ready to go to prep for plasmids, so I preoccupied myself with spinning them down and adding the buffers needed to extract the plasmid DNA. At one point I had to go to the lab next door to use some piece of equipment…I can’t for the life of me remember what or why…was our centrifuge not working? Anyway, I was over there for a couple minutes and when I walked back over with the preps I was confronted immediately by the post-doc. ”Another plane went down! Near Pittsburgh! South of Pittsburgh!”

Oh shit. My parents lived south of Pittsburgh. Hell, most of everyone I knew in the world at that time lived south of Pittsburgh.

I dug out my cell phone and dialed my parent’s number. Mom answered. Oh thank god. ”There is a plane down near Pittsburgh, have you heard anything?” ”I don’t hear sirens or see flames, so it’s not anywhere near here!”

It wasn’t. It was near Somerset, an area I had driven through frequently when I was in college – right between Pittsburgh and Johnstown.

Crap. I left my samples as they were and sat with my labmates by the stereo again.

Eventually, my adviser walked into the lab and announced that she was going home. Because if ever there was a terrorist target in Atlanta, it was the CDC. Located right next door to the campus. Oh, in fact, right next door to the building we were in.

Well that was a terrifying thought. And at that, we all scattered to our homes. By ourselves. I curled up on my couch, dragged Sadie up with me, and glued myself to CNN for the next 48 hours or so. This was 2 years pre-Kev, and all I had was Sadie for comfort. She didn’t know what was going on, but she liked sleeping on the couch behind my legs as I watched the horrific videos over and over.

Numb numb numb.

I remembered…how old was I? 14? 15? On one of several visits to NYC with my family. Going up to the observation floor of one of the buildings of the WTC and thinking it was so incredible that any building could be so tall. I remember standing on the step in front of the floor to ceiling windows and leaning against the railing so that my forehead was touching the glass and I could look down, down, down at the miniature cars that drove by. I remember jumping back with a small scream as a robot with big circular brushes crept up the window I was looking down. There were machines on tracks that cleaned the windows, and one had scared the crap out of me.

I think that was the same trip when we ate at the Hard Rock Cafe, and as I waited outside with my grandparents while my brothers and parents browsed the gift shop, an older gentlemen walking by stopped and asked me if I was a prostitute. I was wearing a Penn State tshirt, plaid shorts, and a fanny pack.

New York, man. Boggles.

But that feeling of being so high up and still on solid ground, that stuck with me. And now it was gone, it was all gone. Reduced to a giant hole and a pile of rubble, and the remains of countless loved ones, and no one around me seemed to understand the enormity of it like I did. So I let myself go numb and wrapped it around me like a blanket and then like armor as I watched my country go to war, and war again.

I wish I was stronger. I wish that I felt some kind of intense, patriotic surge on this day. I wish I could raise my fist and scream that the terrorists didn’t win. But I can’t. They didn’t win, but neither did we. I don’t think anyone has won anything in the past 10 years. I think we all lost and continue to lose a little more of ourselves every day.

Maybe I’m just still numb.

The funny will return later, I promise.

We got the beat

ESC — Thu, 11 Aug 2011 03:34:29 +0000

Last week, my good friend Olivia called me to let me know that she had won tickets to the Go-Go’s concert, and would I like to accompany her?

Free concert? Outdoors at Chastain Park? To see a band I hadn’t thought about in years and years but kind of rocked and had several songs I enjoyed?

SIGN ME UP!

To be honest, growing up I just missed the peak of the Go-Go’s. This tour was for the 30th anniversary of their first album. I was…four.

Some of you are rolling your eyes at how young I am. Others are wondering if I watch NCIS because I am SO OLD. The rest of you are my age. FIST BUMP!

HOWEVER, I was not the youngest person there by far – plenty of the 20′s and teens were in attendance. There was a lot of awkward white people dancing and we even spotted a couple black dudes! They were probably lost.

Olivia and I classed up the place by picking up a six-pack of lemon Jeremiah Weed malt beverage and some Subway sandwiches.

We were ignorant, classless HOARS compared to other people there. There were tables! With tablecloths! And votive candles and floral centerpieces. Wine bottles! (dammit, we had assumed glass bottles were verboten!) Cheese plates! Man. Next concert I go to at Chastain park, I am going to be PREPARED. With a BUTLER because I do NOT want to drag all that shit around.

Tonight a night in to relax.

I managed to paint my nails the EXACT color of my pink shawl in progress. Goddammit. If it gets any more girly pink up in here, I am going to grow another vagina.

Day 18 – Halloween in July

ESC — Wed, 20 Jul 2011 04:12:47 +0000

What is in the air this week? My eyes bugging the crap out of me – red and itchy and URGH! all day, in spite of drops and allergy pills and such. I look like shit. Like I’ve been smoking CRACK!

Note: I’ve never actually met anyone who’s smoked crack, so this observation is based SOLELY on some episodes of Law and Order I saw once. And my best guess. I’m sure smoking crack has other effects besides red eyes. Twitchiness? Or maybe that’s meth. This is what happens when you get a job and can’t watch the Law and Order marathon during weekday afternoons. USEFUL INFORMATION LOST FROM MY BRAIN FOREVER!

Today was not a total wash, though. We had EXCITEMENT and DRAMA at the office! It was quiet and boring until someone rounded the corner by my desk and asked me “ARE THEY COMING AROUND THE BUILDING YET? THEY WERE WALKING THIS WAY!!!!” And I thought WOW I’m not the only one smoking crack around here!

HAHAHA! Just kidding.

No, actually I wondered if someone important had shown up and if maybe I should have worn nicer shoes. But NO! It was not people. It was a deer! And her two babies! Here’s my shitty phone pic taken through our tinted office windows:

One of the fawns – you can see the other to the right of the shrubbery at the top.

Someone tried to shoo them away from the road, and managed to separate the doe and one fawn from the other fawn on opposite sides of the fence. NICE ONE. So for the rest of the day, I was distracted by DEER WATCH 2011. I don’t know if mama and baby were ever reunited – I’m assuming so, because deer aren’t THAT stupid and it’s not a very big fence.

But you did not come here for adorable baby deer. You came here for a spinning update, right?

Hey, where are you going???

I decided to pick something that would be fun. So I decided on some 50% superwash merino/50% tencel from Knitwitch in the All Hallows Eve colorway. I got it as part of their christmas gift in the swap we did at last year’s christmas party. I don’t have a good picture of it, but here is a shitty, blurry photo of me at the party with satanic eyes and the fiber shoved down my top:

You know…as you do…

It’s nice stuff. It spins up nicely, too.

Niiiice!

Day 11 – battered and plied

ESC — Wed, 13 Jul 2011 03:34:28 +0000

Internet friends, I did not feel well today. I felt like someone spent the night beating me up, and then I woke up hung over, even though I hadn’t drunk anything the night before.

Ever have one of those days where you walk around like a zombie and just hope nobody asks you anything too complicated at work? That was me today. In such a daze was I this morning that I forgot to take my morning meds, which means I’m sure my blood pressure was wonky all day. So ON TOP of the fog, I was woozy. I was a woozy zombie.

It was not a pretty sight.

I came straight home and passed out on the couch for an hour and woke up feeling good enough to eat and then PLY ALL THE YARN!

Not sure of the yardage yet. Tomorrow I’ll skein it up and check. Tonight, I pass out, and hopefully feel better enough tomorrow to start something new! Something NOT BROWN!

sex, drugs, and unemployment

ESC — Thu, 20 Jan 2011 06:27:12 +0000

Contrary to what you might have heard, the life of the unemployed is not full of excitement, fast cars, sex, and rock and roll.

Ok, well, there’s some sex.

There’s just not a whole lot going on. There’s just looking for work, (slow), watching Netflix on Demand (Eureka!), cleaning (bathroom is sparkling!), cooking and baking (low-carb? what’s that?), knitting (see previous post) and reading (kindle!). All which is keeping me sane, but does not make for good blog fodder. Hence the prolonged silence.

It’ll get better, though. Right? Sure.

Perfect boots

ESC — Mon, 22 Nov 2010 17:24:46 +0000

Every time we plan a trip to PA, I think about one or two things I’d like to buy for myself while I’m up there, to take advantage of the tax-free status of clothing there. This time I’m thinking “black boots.” This is not a serious, ZOMG NEED BOOTS NAOW!!1!!! idea, this is just a “I’ll keep my eye out for a good deal on black boots” thing. At least, that’s how it starts.

Allow me to predict how this will play out, based on previous experience:

1. Go shopping with mom. Mention “I think I’ll go look to see if they have any good deals on boots here – I’d like a pair of black ones.”

2. Try on some boots – reject for ill fit, wrong price, “too boot-like”, “not boot-like enough”

3. Mom finds 80 bajillion pair for me to try on. Reject for reasons listed above.

4. Mom drags me to every shoe store in the mall BLACK BOOTS!!! WE WILL FIND YOU BOOOOOTS!!!! Mom, really, it’s not a big deal – ooo, wait, how much are those?

5. Mom’s obsession is contagious. BLACK BOOTS ARE THE ONLY THING I’VE EVER WANTED IN TEH WORLD!!!!! In our frenzy, all other shopping is forsaken. No Christmas shopping gets done. No door busters are chased after. ALL BOOTS ALL THE TIME!!! But there are no boots – no boots at all for me!!!! ::weeping and gnashing of teeth::

6. After two days of shopping and feet chaffed from pulling boots on and off, I take an afternoon off while Mom runs to some discount store because they have kitchenaid mixers on sale, or something. She returns with a pair of black boots. Perfect black boots that fit like a dream. They cost almost nothing, and were the only pair of that style there. Worship mom AS A GODDESS!

7. Next time, vow to hit discount store FIRST.

8. Next year, amnesia sets in – MUST GO TO EVERY MALL TO FIND GREY DRESS PANTS!!!!

REPEAT FOREVER!!!

Witchy Woman

ESC — Sun, 31 Oct 2010 23:07:43 +0000

I think I’m about due for a post here. Things have been trucking along swimmingly so far this fall. SAFF was a huge success, I think. I arranged for a group of us to stay in a nice cabin nestled in the NC mountains.

The listing failed to mention the ZOMG SCARY DRIVE! with the guardrail-less cliff drop off and the vertical curves. But aside from the…interesting mountain terrain, it was a nice stay. We were apparently in apple country.

Lots of places like this around there. We had a fun weekend of eating, knitting, buying, petting sheep..

..gawking at fires on the side of the road…

Yeah, we were confused, too. We passed about 7 of these the one day.

In the end, we all did our part to stimulate the economy, and came home with a cars full of fibery goodness. My share:

Of course, I also came back with the one souvenir I get every year – a cold! And a trip to the doctor’s office for a breathing treatment and steroids.

This post brought to you by…steroids! Ruining baseball and keeping Regan breathing for years!

I still sound like a 2 pack a day smoker – which oddly my husband thinks is SUPER SEXY, so I’ve had to fend off a lot of his advances in my weakened state.

HEY, don’t you know that “COUGHHACKCOUGHCOUGHGACKPLEHHORKCOUGH” means “NO”?????

Have a great Halloween, and don’t eat too much candy!

I swear, it was an accident

ESC — Fri, 09 Jul 2010 22:27:37 +0000

So.

After work, I decided to drive a little out of my way to stop at a produce stand and pick up some fresh fruit and veggies for the next week. Because we are healthy eating people.

Upon arrival I start picking out all the yummy things we need – tomatoes! mangos! (for slaw! minus the cashews!) peaches! cucumbers! watermelon! Yes yes yes, bag them all for me, please. And my total comes to $18, so I reach into my wallet and pull out my debit card.

Uhhh, our debit machine is out of order ma’am, but we’ll take a check.

A check? What’s a check? Who carries around a checkbook anymore? Who under the age of 50, I mean.

I ask for the nearest ATM, and he points me across the street to a butcher’s market. Promising I’ll be back for my produce, I hustle to the market looking for the ATM.

Which…is out of order.

ARE YOU KIDDING ME???

Taking pity on me, the manager said that he would ring me up using my card for whatever amount I needed and then give me cash.

How could I walk out of there empty handed (save for my cash) with that kind of customer service? Huh? And we already have steaks in the freezer, so what I ended up with was…

BACON

So THAT is why I came home with a big bag full of fresh, delicious produce, and a pile of thick cut bacony goodness. WAS NOT MY FAULT!

I am a victim of circumstance. Delicious, delicious circumstance.

*************

suck it, dodos!

ESC — Thu, 04 Mar 2010 02:16:38 +0000

Woooo! Thanks Bloggess!!! I am in fact not dead. I swearz it! I’ve been busy. Doing…stuff.

I don’t know…STUFF! Knitting, twittering, obsessively watching the olympics…

OH MY GOD, there’s nothing ON! Where is the downhill? Where is the speed skating? WHERE IS CURLING??? I CAN’T GO ON WITHOUT THEM!!!!

I do not have a problem.

In lieu of entertaining content, how about some semi-interesting pictures?

I got a cool new bag. You are totes jealous. I love that it’s my work bag but also secretly a knitting bag. With an Ugly Doll!

I pulled my arrow lace shawl out of hibernation. Maybe I’ll even finish it while it’s still cold outside, so I can wear it!

Sadie and I visited Grace! Her cats were skeptical. Here, Sadie is thinking “I sense an evil presence…”

I had a double matrixectomy!!!

Sorry you had to see that. Biscuit?

topless fast food

ESC — Wed, 13 Jan 2010 03:29:56 +0000

Kev: I’m craving a cheeeeeseburger.

ESC: Mmm…I want some chicken nuggets.

Kev: Well…um…why don’t you get us some, baby?

ESC: Naaaaahhh…ummmm…I already have my slippers on.

Kev: I only have my slippers on!

ESC: and I’m not wearing a bra…

Kev: I’m not wearing one, either!