sticking with goog

I'm a Google girl. I've a curious mind and simply must know the answer to things that people ask or that randomly come up like...
...do ducks have ears?...yes, no pinnae but have special feathers, auriculars, covering their 'ear-holes'
...can turtles hear? yes. Do they have ears too? yes they also have inner ears.
...do turtles also have special feathers?...obviously a smart-aleck comment :)

In lab, when stuff like this comes up, if no one has a convincing answer, then someone has to google it? immediately if possible :)
We also check dictionary.com fairly often if we can't all come to a concensus on the spelling of a certain word. Got to do something while our reactions are reacting, right? :)

ask.com has an almost cool ad to try to convince people to switch over from Google...they almost had me thinking of trying them out until the phrase "instant getification". Getification? A made up word? No thanks.

Nadal just won his match against Tipsarevic. TipsyRay retired finally. About time too, kept holding his ribs. Had them taped in the most peculiar way and also massaged in an odd way but continued playing. I was afraid it would turn into another farce like last night's James Blake vs fabrice Santoro match. Santoro played one point then jumped up and down for the trainer to massage/ice/rub his legs then played another point and stopped for another treatment. It was ridiculous. I was glad Blake was able to win in the end. Santoro seemed to be really faking it to me or at the very least over-doing it. I wanted to tell him to stop being such a wuss and either retire like a man or suck it up and play. I did actually shout this at my tv :)
I do get quite passionate sometimes about tennis, baseball too.

mini epiphany

Just realized something...I have not been exercising (only been to the gym 3-4x this month) and I have not been sleeping well at all. Coincidence? Probably not. Got to work on that.

Finally, finally, some of my chemistry has been working. I don't want to jinx it by talking about it too much. I've been assigned additional targets that are similar to ones I've made previously. my boss has been on vacation/to science conf. for the last 2-3 weeks ans has only been to work 3-4 days during that time. It's been fantastic and will not last so I'm savoring every moment.

my dilemma

Last night is the first night in ages that I've been able to fall asleep in my bed soon after getting in. I only got ~5 1/2hr sleep but it was a continuous 5 1/2 hr and that really makes a difference. I also slept fairly well the night before but I slept on my futon (intentionally) b/c it was too hot in the bedroom.

Had a nice chat today with my current crush aka my boy-toy :). I know it's not going anywhere and that's probably for the best. He's so cute though, all the way through. There are guys who are more good looking, more muscular, my age, etc. but none give me tingles in quite the same way as this guy does. It's sad and little pathetic, I know but there are moments...moments when I'm completely content...content to just listen to him talk about anything. He's very witty and quick. I do like a smart man, I do. I never have to explain things, he's gets it right away.

I kinda want to ask him to go to this festival with me. I want to go partly b/c Teada will be playing/for an opportunity to hang with him. When we hung out at our company picnic, it was great fun. He never left my side. It was very cool. I want to hang out with him, outside of work, but I don't know how to bring this about without seeming desperate or like a complete dork. Therein lies my dilemma.

movies, movies, movies

I've seen 5 of the movies currently in theaters. I'm out of control. Yeah I am b/c I was trying to have a movie budget. See 1 movie or so a month. I'm way past that now.
I've even seen one of them twice (harry potter). I don't usu buy anyting to eat, I eat before I go to see a movie most times and also sneak in my own bottled water so I'm really only paying for the ticket. But at $8.50-10/movie it adds up real fast.
I guess it's not such a big deal. It's not like I have kids or pets that are going without so I can see all these movies :) So what movies have i seen in the last month? (I know you're dying to know - all 2 of you :)

The Bourne Ultimatum was non-stop fast-paced action. My friend Z and I went. She and I both love Matty-Matt aka Matt Damon. If you blink during this movie you will miss stuff. We tried not to blink.

Becoming Jane was ok, not quite as good as I expected it to be from previews.

No Reservations - I kinda enjoyed this one, though C. Zeta Jones is "not at all vulnerable" as I think the character was in the original movie - which I plan to see soon. I think the chemistry between the 2 main characters took longer to develop than the story implies.

Ratatouille - a fun movie, even if you have an aversion to rats. They're almost cute in this movie and the main character is totally cute. I think he's cute b/c he's blue and less rat-like than a brown/black rat would be.

Sunshine - not my usual kind of movie. My friend S recommendation, it was better than I expected until the last 15-20 min. At that point it went from science fiction to slasher movie. Still don't get it.

Harry Potter & the Order of the Phoenix - I had to see this since I've seen all the others. I felt like stuff was missing though in a way different from the other movies. I'm inclined to read the book now. I haven't felt the need to read any of the other books before.

battle scars

I've been having trouble sleeping again. Last Fri I took the day off...mainly b/c most of my lab co-workers were also taking the day except for my boss and one other guy. Yeah, definitely a good call. Good thing too b/c I could not get to sleep. I spent most of last thurs night awake. I tried to get to sleep but couldn't. I didn't actually sleep until 5am Fri morning. I slept till 11am. Kind of a waste of a day off. I keep having these nights where I can't sleep at all or can't stay asleep and keep waking every couple hrs. I decided to take a couple tylenolPM last night since I also had a sinus headache. I took them at 7pm and by 9 I was really sleepy. So I went straight to bed. Woke up at 3am and didn't really nod off again until ~5am. Groggily woke up at 730am. Go to work at 8:40am. Later than I would like to.
It's only Wed and I'm exhausted. Had long meeting today and had to prepare/present slides - tons of bio data plus the structures of compounds tested. Took me a couple hrs to put them together - I'm not used to going through the database so it took me quite a while to find the info I needed and then arrange everything in Powerpoint. All in all, 8 slides. Luckily we only have to present once or twice a month. I am not cut out for staring at the computer for too long. I'd much rather be in lab even though most of that time I'm on my feet.

I took Benadryl last week at night b/c I had a major local reaction to my allergy shots. It knocked me right out at 7pm, woke up at 2am but went back to sleep shortly after that till my alarm. Woke up feeling groggy. Lately I've been having local reactions to my allergy shots, particularly the dust mites and mold ones. I get 3 shots every other week or so and the dose seems to have reached some sort of threshold for both of these. The 3rd shot is combo pollens one and that one is fine - no local reaction. Last week, I had to take Benadryl, my arm still had a huge hive on it for 2 days. Local reaction is kind of like a huge hive. They measure them in different degrees e.g size of a pea, a nickel, a quarter, a half-dollar. My latest reaction was 8cm across. They don't have a denomination for that. It was pretty knarly. Didn't stop me from showing all my friends like it was some kind of battle scar I was proud of :)

too old for facebook

I think I am b/c I just don't understand why people want me to add them as friends when they have nothing to say to me...ever. Oh they say a quick hi when they want you to add them, then nothing. I don't get it. Maybe I'm just too old for this.

glass half-full again

I'm in a much better frame of mind now than I was when I wrote that last post. Getting it all out helped a bit, I think. My boss is on vacation this week so I'm dealling with his boss instead. She's much more reasonable and her suggestions make more sense than my boss usually does. He either doesn't understand me or he is unable to express himself in English enough to get his point across. When I'm looking for feedback, he asks me the dumbest, most irrelevant questions, instead of helping me address the issue(reaction) at hand. It's like pulling teeth sometimes. Enough. NO more talk of him. I'm just going to try to enjoy this week.

I'm still working on the difficult stuff but I've also gotten a few other targets to make that are similar to ones I've had success with in the past. I've gotten more done in the past 2 days than I did all last week. My motivation was virtually non-existent then. I find that I can get so much more done when I have 5-6 targets to make as opposed to just 1 or 2 sucky ones.

I did a couple paintings on the weekend, one is finished and the other is half-way done. The finished is not very good but I did it more as a distraction than anything else. It was good just to paint something. They both feature painted lines. I'm going to try to paint more, maybe 2-3 times a week. I think that'll also help me relax more - take my mind off of everything but the paint.

basically screwed

Every 6 months we are supposed to have informal reviews of our work. For most people, this means a 5 min chat or sometimes even less and it is actually informal. Not for me, as usual my supervisor of the moment reserved a conference room for my "informal" review. And as usual, the same shit. I seem to be doing as expected of someone at my level. He mistakenly thought I have been there 3yrs instead of 5. HE should know. He's seen my other evaluations. Surely with only one person reporting to him, he should know that much. Also as usual, he said "someone" told me they think you talk to people too much, I don't have a problem with it, b/c you have to talk sometimes in lab. To make thinks "fun"...the first 3 months you were very productive but now your productivity has dropped off a bit and so maybe it might have something to do with that. What do you think of that?"

I told him that I'm not talking any more or less than usual. No more now than before when my rpoductivity was much higher. My current chemistry is difficult chemistry that has not been done before so of course it's taking me a while, plus it's a long, multi-step synthesis with shitty yields. Of course it'll take longer. I told him I would try and talk a bit less and he seemed satisfied with that.
I wonder if they say "someone told me they think you talk too much" when they really mean that they do. I could almost accept that. It's the whole idea of someone so vindictive that they want to get me in trouble so they go to my boss and say these things. What the fuck is wrong with these people?

I feel so trapped by this job. Every year I have to listen to this fucking shit from these morons. It wouldn't be so hard to take if maybe the fuckers had thought of promoting me like they have every other chemist at my level who started around the same time I did (some deserving and others who are complete morons without a lick of common sense). It'd be a little easier to swallow their shit. Basically, they want me be a different person. This makes me so angry, I want to scream sometimes. It also depresses me. I spend way less time than most on the phone/the internet/at lunch/on coffee breaks. That never seems to matter to these mofos. I can't just leave this job. For one thing, I can't afford to. For another, I'm not trained for anything else. Once my green card paperwork comes through, which could be anything from 6mths to 2yrs, I'm contracted to work for this company for at least 2 yrs after that. I could try to move to a different company at that point but I would just be exchanging these shit-eaters for new ones. Chemists as a whole are generally very similar with few exceptions, they tend to antisocial. I don't know if it's b/c many of them were teased/bullied in school, if that's why they're petty and mean-spirited-at least all the ones I've had as bosses have been.

Maybe, it'd also be easier to deal with if I had someone to talk to. Someone to call when I'm so overwhelmed and depressed that I can't relax enough to sleep. But I don't really have anyone to call. I do have a few friends here. That's true. I don't feel as if I can call anyone at this hour though. Or when I'm at work, I certainly can't call anyone from there to vent.

I just feel so alone most of the time. Every time I meet a guy I think likes me who I really like, nothing comes of it. NOTHING! Only the weirdos ever call or want another date.

I wish I didn't feel this way. I'm tired of crying myself to sleep. Maybe I should call the psychologist I saw last year and make an appt.