musings

It's one of those days at work where I have the best of intentions to be highly productive. Reservations about where I am going to be in a month completely put aside, today I wanted to get stuff done. Partially I shot myself in the foot with this one by lack of ordering properly, but figuring out that I was out of one of my reagents was a small deterent; always something to be done. So instead I park myself in front of the computer, iPod headphones snugly in place, and pull up one of the multitude of bioinformatic tools available on the internet and start plugging away at one of my datasets using it. Eventually I come up with a few interesting genes and pull up their respective associated papers. This leaves me staring at a journal article on my computer screen whilst Jimmy LaFave whisks my thoughts away from what I was so recently attempting to focus on. Unfamiliar vocabulary slips through my gaze without really registering.

Lately the hours I put in at work have increased quite a bit. Nor am I shy about telling people how much I work . It's part of grad school and graduate students in the hard science fields take it in stride or generally don't make it through. It's also another thing to impress people with, on top of the usual "wow, you're in graduate school..." (Hey, these days I take what I can get.) It recently occurred to me that I actually don't mind the long hours. Not because they make me look diligent and dedicated, but because I have no reason to leave work at a decent hour. Going home to a 13 inch TV in an empty, messy apartment isn't exceptionally appealing prospect most days. Does this make me completely pathetic?

live from Edmonton

Sweet! Lee Knight, one of the women on the USA squad, is blogging the Women's Rugby World Cup! I've been enjoying her blog for months, and this is some major icing on the blogosphere cake.

life comes at you fast

Lately it seems that my social life has suddenly slipped through the cracks. It's kinda like the Nationwide slogan - life comes at you fast. Rugby and grad school have basically eaten my life. Work all day, then in the evenings I either work late or am trying to get my butt to Burnet middle for practice as quickly as I can. Then I come home and crash and get up to do it again. Not that I am unhappy with this particular state of affairs; it means not only am I accomplishing things, but I'm playing rugby as well. I think there's a positive feedback relationship between the two, actually. If only my boss understood that.

Yesterday I wound up in my friend Patty's office for an hour. She is in charge of event planning, basically, for my entire department. I get stories about her grandkids, a bit of vague gossip in relation to whatever my problem of the week is, and when I need it some advice. Yesterday part of our talk included a short lecture on staying in dysfunctional environs. God, I wish I'd known when I started this process what I know now...

after the flood all the colors came out

This morning is the first time I've truly felt good coming into work in a long time. Not great, but good. Mentally I feel better than I have any morning since Rome. Grad school things are looking up. Like I am capable of getting through it. There is a bit of a plan - I just need to figure out how to manuever my way through the DAVID program on the NIH website and choose a few genes to continue following through with. Problem being that the programmers have "updated" it in such a way that I'm finding it even more impossible than previously. It's not an insurmountable barrier to progress. I can handle this.

Physically, well I'm just sore. My body isn't used to the high impact of rugby anymore. But again, I know that I can handle it. Which is nothing if not empowering.

back on the pitch

While washing my face before work I found a tender spot along my jaw bone left by a teammates shoulder. My knees are a bit scuffed up from going down on the sketchy bermuda grass at Burnet. I'm remembering how to scrum. To run low. To trust my teammates. And what it feels like to really be alive. Damn, it's good to be alive.

enjoyment

Fabulous, fabulous weekend. House sitting is lovely. Particularly when it involves a garden tub (the really big ones, with water jets) and a pool. And an agreement that allows friends to visit.

Friday night I left work early and took a nap while waiting for Mopac traffic to return to reasonable. Got to Pat's where I was house sitting, put in a load of laundry and vegged in front of the TV until I got a call from Andrea saying that she and Matt, along with the Juiceboxes and Tim were coming over. We sat with our feet in the pool and drank beer and caught up. I am so happy that Jess is back in town. For good this time!

Saturday was a busy day of tubing and Matt and Andrea's party. Lots of wonderful people crowed into their relatively small one bedroom apartment. Our group of friends is so fantastic and amazing. There were classic Nintendo games and Guitar Hero being played, we drank too much and laughed too loudly and took turns on the punching bag on the balcony. Morgan and Rachel shut themselves in the bedroom for unknown purposes. Several people had their ears talked off. I still haven't been talked into playing guitar hero. Lauri fell backwards on to the coffee table while playing guitar hero and knocked over a glass of wine. Shh...no one is supposed to know about that, except the 20 people already in the room...

if we rode the clouds together

Josh Turner's voice gives me shivers. Every time. Randy Travis was my very first favorite singer. Hearing "He Walked on Water" makes me happy to this day. And CMT was good enough to put them together on a TV special. Happiness.

where the iron horses don’t roll

In theory the summer is winding down. Campus is starting to get busy again, there are tons of back to school sales, and in normal parts of the US people are looking forward to fall. Falling leaves, decling temperates...but not in Austin. In Austin our "fall" is one day in November where it drops to a chilly 68 degrees, the wind blows and all the leaves come off the trees. No gradual decline marked by mornings where you can taste the bite in the air telling of cooler temperatures to come. No lovely fall foliage decorated drives through the country side. Just more and more days of heat reflecting off the pavement until one day it's suddenly rainy and slightly chilly. Never really cold.

I'm not made for this climate. Triple digits in September makes every cell in my body, including the bacteria, moan in misery. I start dreaming about snow. Cold, sweet, quiet snow and the peaceful feeling in the air when there is eight inches on the ground and it's still falling. As a kid it was those nights when I could stand at the basement door and look up, watching the flakes fall past the flood light above my head and know that there wouldn't be school the next day. There was magic in the air and seemed as if all of nature was holding its breath in order to keep from breaking the silence. Descriptions don't come close to doing justice to the wonder of those evenings. Suffice to say Texas has nothing like it.

austin

upswing

Somehow, miraculously this week managed to end on a reasonably good day. I accomplished things. It's a novel thing these days. Now I just have to go back to work and get the results from the experiment I left to run at 6:30 this evening.