Below are the 20 most recent journal entries recorded in jadescarlet's LiveJournal:

[ << Previous 20 ]

Saturday, May 3rd, 2008
4:13 pm	May Day! Hi everyone...just a note to anyone who reads my journal - I'll be at Bryn Mawr for May Day this year. I'm getting a train in to be in time for the last of the Morris Dancing, then I'm around until 12:45ish (hopefully enough time to watch the entire Greek Play), then I've got to get a train back to Philly for a lecture at the UPenn museum. Hopefully I'll see some other alumae running around. (9 Comments |Comment on this)
Tuesday, November 27th, 2007
6:59 pm	Grad school hasn't killed me yet! Well, as the first semester of grad school comes to a close, I have several papers and projects due next week, all in varying status of completion. So I'm wasting time on the internet by updating my livejournal. The purpose of updating this livejournal is to stop doing work for 30 minutes. In this update I will tell you about mine and Andy's fantasy weekend trip to Sri Lanka or Boston, whichever is cheapest, my problems with ninja nightmares, my thanksgiving holiday, and my christmas plans. Andy and I are trying to find something to do or someplace to go for a weekend in Decemeber after my classes and papers and projects are done with, but before Christmas. Andy has almost no time off, but he's got a frequent flyer mile shortage and we want to go somewhere that will get him 2500 miles (New Jersey is about 250 miles short). We could go up to Boston for a weekend, but I'm also playing fantasy travel, looking up package deals on weekend trips to Sri Lanka, which...really isn't cheap or practical. I haven't been able to sleep well for the past few weeks, and I've started having nightmares again. I used to have nightmares that I was drowning, but in one dream I learned to breath under water, so now I have dreams where I'm trapped underwater, but I can just swim around and breathe easily. I also used to have dreams people were chasing me, but I learned how to turn myself invisible, so I could just stand still and blend in and no one could find me. And I had dreams I was falling, so I learned how to float. I still can't fly in my dreams, but I can jump extremely high and hover, then float gently to the ground. However last week I had a dream I was being attacked by ninjas, who could see me even though I was invisible, and they could fly, so even though I jumped 50 feet in the air and turned myself invisible and hovered, they just flew up and caught me. Any suggestions on how to deal with ninjas? My Thanksgiving holiday was great, and I even got work done! I still have loads more to do, but it was nice to be with Andy. We cooked a turkey, boiled the giblets and bones to make turkey stock, used the stock to make fantastic gravy, and we made stuffing and bourbon sweet potatoes, and a really good pumpkin pie. I'm not sure I really made any progress in establishing myself as the matriarch of the family, but the food was really good and everyone had a good time eating it. This Christmas I'm going to cook a goose. I found a really exciting recipe. Andy and I will be at home, and my parents might come over (although my dad is a vegetarian, but that's okay, more goose for me!) I'm sad that we can't get to England to spend Christmas with his family this year, but a lack of vacation time for Andy combined with several of his co-workers taking time off sort of stopped that. So now I must write a conclusion so I can get back to reading a paper on something for class tomorrow, or work on one of my various term papers. I can't decide which. I wish I could just go to sleep right now, but I'd probably start having ninja nightmares and wake up, then I would have to stay away and get work done. Grad school is fun. (Comment on this)
Tuesday, August 7th, 2007
10:07 pm	Travel choices I have a question for those who read this journal... If you had the opportunity to visit Pompei or Herculanum, but not both (keeping at mind that its not impossible that you will one day return to Italy, just on this particular trip, the timing only allows for visiting one, and you've never been to Italy before), which one would you visit? (Comment on this)
Monday, February 12th, 2007
6:47 pm	I killed my fish tank So I'm moving in a few weeks. But I haven't clean the fish tank since Christmas. I went into PetCo, and they said that I could leave my fish with them and they will adopt them out. So I thought I might as well give the fish a nice clean home to live in for 3 weeks before sending them back to petco. Siphon out 5 gallons of water with the gravel-vac, sucking out lots of brown fishie poo in the process. Yuck. Adding in 5 gallons of fresh clean tap water and 4 teaspoons of cycle, the miracle fishtank bacterial balancing solution. 5 hours later the fish are all floating at the top. wtf??? I used to work in a pet store. I have no idea what went wrong. I do the exact same thing every month. Either the city is putting poison in the tap water (which would explain why I've been sick for a week) or .... thats it. I can't think of anything. We don't own any bleach or extreme cleaning stuff, I've never put any soap in the bucket I use to add water to the tank, cycle always works to keep a freshwater tank balanced. Some of those fish I've had since May. :( I guess now I don't have to worry about catching them and leaving them with petco. The great big fishbowl in the sky is probably a nicer home than the petco fish adoption tank. On another note, I've had a persistant stomach ache since last Thursday. Everytime I eat I feel good for about 30 minutes then icky again. And I've got this weird aftertaste in my mouth. This morning it was sugar. My water tasted like sugar water, and my normally bitter green tea tasted unusually sweet. Now I've still got a weird taste but its more like cinamon. I feel like I've been eating those red hot cinnamon cake decorating sweets. But I haven't had anything like that. I bet the city is poisoning our tap water. Thats the one common denominator between me and my fish. Come to think of it, when I drank my bottle of water that I filled up from the cooler at work, I was fine by the afternoon despite feeling miserable in the morning. I come home and refill it from the tap and its not too long before I'm huddled on the couch feeling miserable. (1 Comment |Comment on this)
Friday, February 9th, 2007
7:30 pm	Life and stuff I haven't updated in a while so I thought I'd say some stuff. I had a great visit back east a few weeks ago and got to visit lots of friends in Portland, Boston, and New Brunswick. I also had a very encouraging yet worrysome visit at Rutgers. Summary: The professor I want to work with is very enthusiastic about taking me on as a grad student and offered me a fantastic project in Kenya. The worrysome part is that the department is facing its worst budget crisis ever and may not have any money to fund students. They also tend not to take students without funding because unfunded students get frustrated and drop out. They also said that even if they did get funding, I probably wouldn't be able to get any because of my low GRE verbal score. I retook the GRE's last week and raised my verbal by 50 points (hurray for last minute memorization of 900 vocabulary words in one week!) Its still below 600 though. Sigh. Why does it seem unfair that my eligibility for funding comes down to my ability to do analogies? I'd go to Rutgers with or without funding. I can get a stafford loan if I have to for the first year. Once I'm accepted I can apply for NSF and Fulbright grants, as well as some other funding that they have specifically for students writing PhDs. And maybe in 2008 they won't have be having the worst budget crisis ever and could give me the regular tuition waiver/stipend package that they usually give to students. So I have no idea whats going to happen grad schoolwise. My interviews at ASU kind of sucked so I'm not expecting to get any offer from them. I'm moving to Houston in a few weeks. Andy is getting transferred there. I'm excited about the move. Houston is a much better city than Dallas, and I'll be living in a much better neighbourhood in Houston than where I live in Dallas. And I have a job in Houston. And Houston has better museums. And the traffic doesn't suck as much. But mostly its great because we'll be living within walking distance of lots of cool restaurants, bars, coffee shops, and right now in Dallas we only have 1 restaurant in walking distance. I'm not sure how the cat is going to deal with moving. Angel is really happy staying in familiar territory. She hates being confined and travelling. But in our new house she'll have even more space to run around, and we're probably going to buy her some furniture and give her her very own room to play in. I guess thats all my updates. I'm sure in a few weeks I'll post a superhappy gradschool acceptance letter...or in a few months I'll post an unhappy depressed my life sucks and it looks like I'll have to work in CRM for another year before reapplying to gradschool yet again. (1 Comment |Comment on this)
Sunday, January 7th, 2007
2:37 pm	News and stuff I'm heading back east for a week. January 18th-26th, making stops in Portland, Boston, and New Brunswick for a combination trip of visiting people and interviewing at Rutgers. My interview at ASU was only so-so, mainly because I became insanely nervous and forgot everything that I was going to say, so when they asked me simple questions about what sort of research interests I had, I just went blank. I think Rutgers will be better. I hope it will be better. Rutgers is my first choice anyway, so in a way it was good practice to do the second choice university interviews first, because now I know how to avoid screwing things up at Rutgers. If any Boston people are around from the 20th-24th, let me know what is going on. I don't have any plans yet. (1 Comment |Comment on this)
Monday, November 20th, 2006
10:35 pm	National Geographic I recently saw a few National Geographics from the 1950s cited in a book I was reading, and I thought that I would go to my parents house and look them up. My parents had every National Geographic dating back to the 1940s. They always had them in a shelf in a room that my dad uses as an office. I went home to look for them and the shelf was gone. I asked my dad and he said that they got rid of them. My parents said that they were tired of saving them and found a collector who wanted them. So no National geographics on the discoveries at Olduvai Gorge in the 1950s for me. Sigh. I never thought my parents would ever get rid of anything. Let alone the huge collection of national geographics that I used to go through and read for fun when I was little. Now I'll have to search Ebay or something for copies. (Comment on this)
Monday, October 30th, 2006
1:21 pm	Why I hate driving I was in a car accident last week. Friday afternoon. Driving home. Terrible traffic. Construction has blocked both lanes. Only open lane is the shoulder of the road. Cars are driving like crazy in the shoulder. My exit is 1 mile away. I wait 45 minutes. My exit is 1/2 mile away. Fuck it, I'm getting on the shoulder and getting off at my exit. No since in waiting when I can see it up ahead. I look. No cars coming. I pull out, speed up and drive to my exit. Right before I get there, some fucker pulls out also, knocks my car into the ditch. I freak out. I scream. I panic. I try to calm myself and pull myself back onto the road. The guy gets out, gives me his insurance. he's covered in tattoos and very creepy looking. I feel like I'm in danger just being near him and I can't stop shaking. Finally I get in the car and drive away. Then I remember I have a cell phone. I was so freaked out when the guy hit me that I forgot I had it with me. I could barely even write down his name and insurance policy number because my hands wouldn't stop shaking I stop at a gas station and call them to report the accident. Progressive says the accident is my fault because I was on the shoulder of the road. I think its more like this guy that hit me gave progressive a disconnected phone number and so they can't bill his insurance because they wrote him a letter and he won't respond and they are taking it out of mine instead. I have a $500 deductable. No way am I paying $500 for someone forcing my car off the road. I haven't spoken to them since they left this delightful message with my parents. When they get around to calling me (because I'm not going to waste cell phone minutes or pay long distance to call them) I'm going to give them what for. Some idiot smashed my car door in while I was driving and I'm not going to pay to get it fixed. I would rather move to a city with decent public transportation and sell my car and never drive again than pay progressive any money for someone elses stupid driving. (3 Comments |Comment on this)
Tuesday, March 21st, 2006
8:20 pm	Does my job suck? I can't decide if I have a good or a bad job. The pros: Pays well enough Very flexible hours so I can work as little or as much as I want. Halftime, full time, take long weekends for fun, anything. The cons: No benefits. (no paid vacation days, althought I can take unpaid leave whenever I want. No health insurance and I really need to go to the dentist also). No relation to what I actually want to do (archaeology). I'm vaguely learning a little about seimsic data and subsurface landscapes which might relate to something I do in archaeology someday, but at the moment it doesn't help. Its EXTREMELY BORING! So does my job suck, or am I lucky to get a job that pays me well and lets me take lots of vacations. (Comment on this)
Monday, March 13th, 2006
1:27 pm	MayDay! I'm going back to Bryn Mawr for May Day this year! So any and all who read this that still live in the Philadelphia area, or are still at Bryn Mawr, leave me a note and we can make arrangements to meet up at MayDay or something else. The next exciting part it that the Monday after May Day (May 1st, the actual May Day) Andy and I are driving up to Boston, and will be staying there until May 5th. We already have a place to stay (not definate yet), but want to see everyone that lives there now, maybe play some games of settlers and other exciting games, watch movies, order chinese food, wander around boston and see all the fun historic sites, and just hang around to catch up with people. So leave me a comment or send me an email, or an instant message (I still use PeacefulQ, which also works as an email if you don't know my current email address) with what time you will be free when we're in Boston and what you'd like to do. I've never really had the chance to explore Boston, I only drove through it twice without seeing much, so I'm open for any and all exploring. I'm looking forward to seeing everyone again. Current Mood: excited Current Music: none, just watching star trek on spike TV (3 Comments |Comment on this)
Tuesday, February 21st, 2006
11:47 pm	Random thoughts about being robbed I got back from Dallas today to pack up some stuff in my parents house which I'll be moving back up to Dallas after Mardi Gras. I go into my bedroom, and the first thing I notice is a pile of trashy romance novels left over from my Bryn Mawr days that I had carefully hidden away in a cabinet by my futon. I wonder who took them out of the cabinet, as I put them away then turn around to sit down and watch TV. The TV was gone. I immediately question my brother, then my dad, then we all start searching the house. Not only was my TV and my DVD player missing, but so was the TV from the living room, and some things from my brothers room. My brother also complained that a few days ago he came home to find that all the drawers of his desk had been pulled out. This is really really bothering me. Someone broke in our house, possibly through the door with the cat flap, since all they would have to do would be reach up and turn the lock through the catdoor, and stole my TV which was fairly cheap as far as TVs are concerned (20 inch color TV, $110 at Best Buy 2 years ago). Its not like I really care about the TV. I was planning on putting it in the guest bedroom of my new apartment in Dallas and probably never watching it. The fiance already has an even larger TV and DVR for our living room in Dallas. The DVD player was a combo with a VCR, which is now something that I need to buy, if I ever want to watch my tapes again. Its bothering me though because of what could have happened. Sure a TV is probably easier to pawn than a mint-in-box Luke Skywalker action figure, but the truth is that Luke Skywalker action figure actually cost more than the TV, and I have no idea where I could buy another one, even if I could afford to replace it. They even left the Nintendo (an original nintendo, none of this supernintendo or N64 stuff) which was on top of the DVD player and all the games, and all my DVDs. I could probably search local pawnshops and buy back my TV if I really wanted it back. My dad said he'd even buy me a new one, but if he's willing to spend the money, I think I'd rather get a sewing machine. I don't really like watching TV, but I like knowing that I have the option of watching TV. Someone was in my room and they went through my stuff. Thats what bothers me. It happened once before and I had nightmares all night about people breaking in through the windows. Now I'm afraid to go to sleep. The stupid dog loves people too much. Sometimes I wish I had an angry pit bull. Not a "Look at me with my big brown eyes and wagging tail! Would you like to pet me and rub my belly!" If my parents had an angry pit bull instead of a dopey king charles spaniel this never would have happened. And the cats are just as bad. I should send the stupid domestic house cats back to the farm and get some hungry bengal tigers. Whats even worse is that I think the robber was one of my brother's friends or ex-friends. Definately someone who had been in the house, who knew that I was away for periods of time and that no one ever came into my bedroom thus would notice the TV was missing. The living room TV is really close to the door, and my parents never actually watch TV since the living room doesn't have any cable hookups so that would be a while before anyone noticed it missing also. And the stuff in my brothers room was well hidden so I doubt they could have taken it unless they knew where to look. And someone who knew about the door with the cat flap. I spoke to the neighbours, who said they saw a white van in the parking lot last week. I'm going to talk to someone on the construction crew thats working nearby tomorrow. Maybe one of them saw something. When something is bothering me and I can't sleep, I usually turn on the TV. Grrrrrr. I want my TV because it will help me go to sleep and forget about the fact that some guy who is probably a creepy drug-addict pawning my TV so he can buy heroin was in my room, but I can't because the creepy thief stole it. Grrrrrrrr. I guess I'll have to watch CSI on my much smaller screened laptop. Boy am I ever glad I took the lappy with me to Dallas. Because when I do leave it at home, I hide it in the same place where I hide my trashy romance novels. Current Mood: totally freaked (Comment on this)
Monday, February 20th, 2006
12:49 pm	China! A friend of mine recently posed the question: Why are you babbling on about cheesy bread when you just got back from a three-week trip to China? Surely there are more interesting things to write about. That is true, and I haven't yet mentioned my trip to China, which was fantastic, mostly because its so fantastic that when I think about what I want to write about first, my head explodes remembering all the great stuff I got to see and do. I'm actually making a powerpoint presentation about the trip, which isn't complete yet, but when it is, I'll be happy to send it to anyone who wants to see it. But I suppose I could make a short summary of the trip. The itenerary: Just got on a plane and went to China. Changed planes in Beijing. Arrived in Shanghai really really late at night where I met my friend Marjorie. The next day and weeks after were spent wandering about Shanghai. First we went to the park, where I finally got to understand what she meant when she said that she throw 30 kilogram stones every morning. I even filmed it so its in the powerpoint presentation with lots of pictures. I learned how to throw shi suo (stone locks) also, which managed to be lots of fun despite straining muscles which I didn't know existed. We also went to a wedding of a friend of an acquaintance, and it was also interesting, even though neither of us really knew anyone there (Marjorie was a distant friend of the groom). That was my first taste of real Chinese food, which was great. It also got me to thinking about my own wedding (which as a side note, I've finally gotten Andy to start talking about planning it, since even though it is going to be in 2007, we really need to have a place chosen and reserved by the end of this summer so we can send out the well in advance invitations and get my parents to stop trying to plan stuff). The following day, we went to the clothing/knock-off markets. I don't really consider shopping to be a fun activity, nor something that I do very often, but in China I actually really enjoyed it, and did it often. I got lots of really cool shirts, and I even bought counterfeit magic the gathering cards. I also had fun at the antique/junk markets where I bought lots of cool stuff and had fun looking at all the little knick-knacks for sale (I love knick-knacks!). And most exciting was the cloth market. That alone made me wish that I could just live in China with a large book of patterns and a sewing machine, then spend all my time making fancy rennaisance and medieval style clothing and only pay $3 a yard for the silk. I bought 22 yards of silk for my wedding dress that my mom is going to make for me while I was there, as well as about 10 yards of lace which I may not need, but decided to get just in case. But there was so much other stuff that I thought about projects for. I could knit things, and make beaded jewellery, and fancy clothes all day long. But I didn't really have time on this trip. We had four day trips from Shanghai, mostly these trips were spent looking at gardens. We went to Jiading, Suzhou, Qinbao, and Hangzhou. Chinese gardens are really beautiful, and I especially like how they all have lots of rocks placed amid the flowers and shrubberies. I really like rocks, and these were worn river rocks that had really neat natural designs in them. I have numerous pictures of interestingly shaped trees, rocks, and windows that I saw in the gardens in my powerpoint presentation. I spent the last two days in Beijing, mostly to do the tourist stuff that everyone is supposed to do. I even followed my Lonely Planet Guidebook exactly (Day 1: Morning: Forbidden City, Afternoon: Temple of Heaven. Eat Beijing Duck for dinner. Day 2: Day trip to Badaling for Great Wall and Ming Tombs, see Acrobatics show when return to Beijing). The forbidden city was a bit confusing at first since I didn't really know my way around it, but I saw lots of it. The northern entrance has more interesting things around it than the southern entrance. There was a guide taking a group of English tourists around and I thought about sneaking onto the tour to see what he had to say, but it ended up they seemed to be following me (everytime I walked into a new room they seemed to turn up a few minutes later). Also, it was very icy so I almost fell several times, but fortunately passed all my saving throws and never fumbled. Beijing was really really cold and covered with snow. The Great Wall was even colder. The wind was like ice. The section that we were in was in the mountains, and the views were outstanding, but the wind was cold. It would be nice to go in the summertime, but it also might be really crowded. The acrobatics show that I went to was at a theater only a block away from the youth hostel, and it was an impressive show. It was much better than the last circus I went to, which was when I was about 12. The food: Fantastic. Cheap noodle places were great. Cheap snacks on the street were great (I love squid on a stick!). The fancy restaurants were fancy and great. And the beer was great and cheap. I drank a lot of beer in China. It was good. The weather: Cold, always cold. A few days it was mild enough to go down to only 2 layers, but that only happened once. The language: I can now count to 999 in Chinese, as well as tell people my name, how old I am, and that I'm an American. My powerpoint presentation of the trip and everything I saw should be finished in a couple of weeks if anyone wants to see it. Current Mood: accomplished (1 Comment |Comment on this)
Sunday, February 19th, 2006
7:18 pm	I want my Cheesy Bread! So, today I ordered a pizza, and although the pizza itself was quite satisfactory, there is something that is bothering me. An unfortunate string of events occured which resulted in the lack of cheesy bread in the order. The first step was logging onto said pizza delivery's webpage, and although I won't say the name of the pizza company, it begins with a P, and ends with an appa Johns. My fiance and I had a coupon, an online coupon, which entitled us to a free order of cheese bread with our regularly priced pizza. However, when the order was placed and the coupon was entered, the webpage informed us that our hotel was not within a delivery location. We knew this was not true since we saw the delivery car parked outside the hotel lobby as we came in. So we looked up the locations, and sure enough one was only 2.07 miles away. We called them and determined that they would in fact deliver to us, however after a very static conversation with the order taker, and a second static conversation with the manager, we were informed that it was not possible to use the online coupon with the telephone order, nor would it be possible to place an online order. So we decided to splurge and just buy an order of cheesy bread with our pizza. I specifically told the manager to forget the coupon and put the cheesy bread on our order anyway. He said something that was eaten by static so I could barely hear him but he did mention cheesy bread. I said, YES, I want my cheesy bread. The pizza came, and there was no cheesy bread. I called the manager back, and after being put on hold I was told that the conversation went like this. ME: blah blah cheesy bread. Manager: Do you want me to take the cheesy bread off the order? ME: Yes. Blah blah cheesy bread. So the conclusion is that I'm feeling angry with Pappa Johns right now. And I'm not sure what I should do about it. I could have told the delivery guy to take the pizza back, that I wouldn't buy a pizza from a place that gets my cheesy bread order wrong, but we were starving and the pizza smelled very good, and I didn't really want to order another one. So we kept the pizza. I also thought about calling up Pappa Johns again and angrily announcing that I would never use them again unless they sent me free cheesy bread right away, but I don't think that acting like a drama queen would have worked, and they probably would have laughed at me, or spit in my cheesy bread, or just not send it at all. Since I worked for Petsmart once I know this won't phase them. People came in all the time with stupid complaints, and then they always said, "Forget you, I'm going to PetCo." And then we think, PetCo must get a lot of really annoying people if they get all of our angry customers. So do I just accept that life isn't fair sometimes, and that sometimes you have to go without the cheesy bread and just enjoy a regular spicy italian pizza all on its own? I suppose its not like we ran out of food. There are still two slices left and I'm not hungry at all. Should I stage a boycot on Pappa Johns, or just accept the fact that the manager was an ass and move on with my life. I bet that cheesy bread would have been stale anyway. I'm better off without it. Yes, thats what I'll tell myself. Current Mood: irritated (1 Comment |Comment on this)
Tuesday, January 17th, 2006
4:26 pm	Up up and away! I called the courthouse about my being called for jury duty, and after 3 months of phoning them, rescheduling, and asking questions, they finally told me that they'd just make me exempt. So I guess all you have to do to avoid jury duty is live in 4 different cities at the same time. I'm leaving for China on Thursday. Any recommendations on what I should do in Shanghai or Beijing? (Comment on this)
Tuesday, January 3rd, 2006
6:27 pm	A recap of the year Well lots of good and great and wonderful things have happened this year. And some bad/annoying stuff. Lets make a list just for fun. Good: I did not smoke a single cigarette the entire year. Bad: My brother smokes too much, and otherwise causes trouble for doing troublesome things. Medium: In my last years resolution to become fit and healthy, I have managed to stay the exact same weight for the entire year, thus breaking a cycle of gaining 10 pounds a year for the past 6 years. Maybe this year I'll actually manage to lose 10 pounds. Good: My brother is being much friendlier since I got him some DVDs for Christmas that he really really wanted and all my parents got him was a new jacket. I haven't seen him so happy in a while. Who knew all it would take was the Dukes of Hazzard and Shaun of the Dead to cheer him up? Good: I finished my dissertation and graduated with a masters degree in Archaeology. Good: I had my first job. That is, an exciting archaeology job instead of a boring minimum wage job. Bad: My dad frequently insults me by telling me that I wasted my money on a useless degree and that archaeology jobs are simpleminded and I should be doing better things. Great: I'm going to China in three weeks! The best: I got engaged!!!!! The most annoying: My parents keep trying to insist that I should get married in Houston. So that was last year. It seems like a short list, but that dissertation took up a good 6 months of it. I had a fantastic Christmas with Andy the fiance's family, and an exciting New Year with his friends in England. I even managed to stay up, something that I usually just get too tired to do (I took a nap in the afternoon to help). We got Dr. Who season on DVD there also. I'm not sure if its been released in the US yet, but Andy has the setup to play region 2 DVDs. My resolutions for this year: Stop biting my nails and run a mile in less than 11 minutes. Current Mood: thoughtful (2 Comments |Comment on this)
Saturday, December 17th, 2005
10:25 pm	Lemons... When life gives you lemons...you should chuck them at people that annoy you. Because that's a lot easier than making lemonade. After an episode with my grandmother freaking out because the juicer was missing, and me trying to convince her that I could find it by myself and she didn't have to walk outside with her walker in the cold rain to the cluttered shed full of things to trip over, I found the juicer behind the food processer and a bag of sugar in the cabinet underneath the microwave. Then I spent all morning squeezing about 12 lemons. I made a whole gallon of fresh lemonade for the potluck tomorrow. I tasted it and it seemed tolerable, but thats because I actually don't like lemonade so if I find it tolerable, it is probably good to someone who likes it. The lemons came from the tree in my grandmothers yard, and she's been anxious about that also because we nearly got down to freezing a few nights ago and I'm not tall enough to reach the lemons. Fortunately a neighbour came over with a ladder to get them. So now we have about 3 large buckets of lemons (not including the ones which I've already squeezed) in the kitchen and my grandmother is worried about what we can do with all of them. I suppose I could make pies, cookies, souflees , or more lemonade with them. Except I hate lemons. Really, I don't like em. I can tolerate lemon cookies and some lemonade, but in general I don't like them. But at the moment I can't think of anyone I know who deserves to be pelted with fresh lemons. (1 Comment |Comment on this)
Tuesday, December 13th, 2005
10:39 pm	Help? My Grandmother has alzheimers. I have a list that says "100 things to do with a person who has Alzheimers." Its a great list, and we've done things on the list that my grandmother enjoys. But she still hallucinates and it still bothers me because I don't know how to help her. I'm not even sure if the hallucinations are because of Alzheimers or because of her heart medication, or her Parkinson's medication, but they are there. She thinks that her house is full of little children, and that they are touching her nice antique furniture with grubby hands and leaving muddy footprints. She also became convinced that a statue that one of the neighbours gave her had a bomb in it. Supposedly, Mr. C found the statue in the garbage, but he knew that my grandmother liked antiques so he saved it for her. And my grandmother was convinced that an old broken statue (she actually only has half of it, the back has broken off and it was once hollow on the inside) was just the sort of thing a terrorist would put in the garbage waiting for an unsuspecting dumpster diver/antique/junk collecter to find and bring home where it then explodes. I tried to tell her that terrorists put bombs in suitcases, not statues, and that they don't do that anymore because suicide bombing is all the rage these days but she didn't believe me. So I had to get out of bed at 4 AM to find the statue and inspect it. She told me not to touch it, just to try and get it out of the house without touching it, but when I finally found it, (she put it on a bookcase out of sight) I saw that it was in fact hollow and pointed that out to her. She decided it wasn't anything to worry about. Then she started asking about an Angel statue that a friend gave her for her birthday. I inspected that one. It had a music box inside but no bomb. I finally managed to convince my grandmother that there were no bombs in her house and she went back to bed. She also calls me Mary all the time (my mothers name) then gets really upset when she realises I'm her granddaughter not her daughter. She says its embarrassing and cries when she does it, so I've stopped correcting her. I don't really mind that much anyway. Lots of elderly relatives that I only see once every 20 years think that I'm my mom, since they haven't actually seen my mom since she was my age anyway. I just wish I could do something to reduce her paranoia. I wish she didn't hallucinate so badly either. I don't know how to help that. I've enjoyed staying with her the past month, but I'm glad to be moving on in January. Waking up at 4 AM to search the house for bombs is just a little too stressful for me. I want to go to China. (4 Comments |Comment on this)
Monday, December 5th, 2005
10:52 pm	Fun with Math! Okay, I know its a bad idea for me to do math before bedtime. But for some reason its all I can think about while I'm driving. But now I can't solve any of the questions I come up with so any math geek who reads this can do them for me and tell me the answers! I did an experiment on my 6-hour, 315 mile drive from Houston to Lockport Lousiana, but now I'm too tired to figure out my results. For the first 100 miles, I didn't excede the speed of 60 miles per hour, and I tried to stick to about 55mph, as traffic permitted. According to the nifty gauge in my car, my car was getting 57 mpg (yay for hybrids). For the second 100 miles, I wanted to go 65 to see how that effected speed, but I couldn't because the speed limit around Lake Charles is 60, and I didn't want to break any laws while doing my experiment. So I sort of went 60 for a while, then 65 after Lake Charles. When I got past Lafayette, I had to go 55 for a while and stop at red lights, because Hwy90 is like that. Then once I got past Morgan City, it was 70 the whole way almost. When I got to Lockport, my car told me that over the entire trip, my car got 49.8 miles per gallon of gas. Questions: 1. How did my car do on mpgs while I was going faster than 60? 2. If it takes 5 hours and 90 minutes to drive from Houston to Lockport (315 miles) what is my average speed? 3. How long would it take to get from Houston to Lockport if I averaged 55? 60? 65? 70? mph? 4. How much gas would it take to get from H to L if I averaged 55?60?65?70? mph, based on the answers to question 1, and the fact that I got about 57mpg going 100 miles at 55. 5. Is it worth me trying to save money by driving slowly to use less gas, or should I just speed all the way there (and by speed I mean go the maximum speed limit, maybe 5 miles over if I really feel daring). Note: cost of gas in houston: ~$1.99g, cost of gas in Lockport ~$2.15 6. How much is my time worth, if time is equal to money and when I worked that crappy job at the grocery store I made minimum wage, but as an archaeologist I make $9/hr, but I'm unemployed at the moment so I don't really earn anything. and question 7. WHY THE CRAP WOULD ANYONE STOP ON THE FREEWAY, IN THE LEFT LANE, WHEN THE PERSON BEHIND IS GOING 70MPH? THUS FORCING THAT PERSON TO SLAM ON THEIR BREAKS AND SPILLING WATER ALL OVER THE CAR AND THEN HAVING NOTHING TO DRINK BECAUSE THEY DIDN"T FEEL LIKE STOPPING TO BUY ANOTHER BOTTLE???? Plus it made my CD case fall under the seat after I had carefully balanced it on the front seat and put the CDs in order so that I could change them without looking at them. I had to listen to the first half of Les Miserables 3 times over because I didn't feel like stopping to buy another water bottle and retrieve my CDs from under the seat. Seriously though, that person could have been killed, or killed me. There was no way I could get into the right lane to avoid them as the big truck that I had been speeding up to pass was blocking me. They just slammed on their breaks and stopped, forcing me to stop behind them with seconds to spare, then they just started their car and drove off??? why???? Well there is my math problem that I pondered over for the past 6 hours. Plus it came with a free driving rant! Aren't you lucky you read my blog? (Comment on this)
Monday, October 31st, 2005
5:46 pm	This Halloween sucks. I'm all dressed up, but the thunder and lightning is so bad that none of the little kids are coming by to Trick or Treat. I've got the jackolanterns out (just plastic ones, since I didn't have time to get a pumpkin), I'm sitting by the door with a basket of candy, but our porchlight is broken so people will probably skip our house anyway since the porch light isn't on. Sigh. If it was nice out I could sit out on the porch and hand out candy. Better luck next year I guess. I hope everyone else is having a great time doing whatever it is they like to do for Halloween. I don't really eat candy anymore, but I like drinking cocktails named after the 7 deadly sins. I also like bloody marys. I got some Vampire Wine today so I'll have that with dinner. Maybe some punkass teenagers will come out in the rain later tonight and I can dump all this candy off on them. (Comment on this)
Sunday, October 2nd, 2005
1:03 pm	I got a job! Three weeks excavating a site in South Carolina! I feel like I'm a real archaeologist now. Current Mood: ecstatic (6 Comments |Comment on this)