Goodbye skinny jeans...

Part of the recent cleaning of our house (including rearranging our office) was me going throu old clothes. Really this is just giving me a reason to buy new clothes. But it was about time. I have done this a few times in the past few years but a few things always seem to slip through the donate pile and end up back in my closet (or a tupperware moving bin).
If this shirt still fit me, I would still wear it. It doesn't. That's because I wore this in my senior pictures. From high school. IN 1998!!!
Also saying goodbye and what I consider my 'skinny jeans.' You know the ones- they stay at the back of the closet and after an especially encouraging shopping trip or week of workouts you try them on one more time. Well, mine actually fit! IF I wear them like they are suppossed to be worn. Not 3 1/2 inches lower on my hips like I wore them when I bought them. In addition to the unfortunate mom-jean cut of these 1999 Abercrombies (shudder), V told me that the color would only be appropriate to wear today if I grew a mullet. These MUST go to make room for a nice pair of khakis or cute skirt in the closet. Turtle seems to agree (and yes, she does have a sock turned t-shirt and pearls on. The shirt to help her cuts heal and the pearls + bow just for fun). Finally, these beasts must play a role in what stays in my closet beyond better judgment. How can I throw out this silver sequined halter when Seymour seems to love it so much?

At least Marie Osmond didn't run over my foot this year...

That is what happened last year in the airport coming home from our big science conference! This year I got to go on a nice hike and see lots of beautiful wildflowers at 11,000 ft.
My talk went well and work has been crazy since getting back. My advisor is writing a grant to try to get me some moola to do work out in the field and at a facility that has all the fish and lab supplies I need. In addition, I am writing a mini-proposal for the head researcher at the facility to try to get the a-ok on their end to do my work and even maybe get some free housing! The prospect of paying my mortgage and somehow paying to live in a different state is pretty daunting so free or cheap housing would be fantastic. I turn the proposal in tomorrow- Wish me luck!

I am in a weird state though. I am in a funk- hense the few posts lately. I am really feeling like I am on the right track research wise after a year+ of floundering around with side projects and complex out there ideas that would NEVER work. It is time to get it all on paper, make it official and get going. When I think about it all rationally, it is just the typical grad student strife. But still, I guess I am just overwhelmed with a lot of things. The worst was Winston, my red earded slider, dying just 2 weeks after Yoko (his 'girlfriend') dying. She died when V was gone so I had to deal with all the icky things that come along with a dead turtle in a tank. Winston was even worse though. He seemed fine so I was pretty caught off guard. Just the day before he was swimming around in all the little lettuce bits that he couldn't quite catch in his mouth. He was my first pet that was mine alone- I got to pick him out and name him and had him for over 9 years! He traveled with me from IL, to TX to PA. Winston and Yoko were good turtles and they will be missed. We buried them under our roses in the backyard.

DNA scarf

So I gifted the DNA scarf on one of the hottest days of the year last month! Here is the finished product...
I really liked the pattern and used Lamb's Pride in Raspberry. I hope to make a few more for V and I someday. I will probably use a differnet yarn though, Lamb's Pride is a little scratchy for my neck.

100th post!

I'm in Utah for a conference. My new computer magically erased Microsoft Office while I was on the plane. BEFORE I got to save the graph I was in the middle of re-doing. Now there's no excel, no word.....no powerpoint for my powerpoint presentation in 5 days. Boo.
I'll be back soon but until then...they are at the top of my list. (list thanks to a cat and twenty).

Blog the Dog

We have been trying to introduce Turtle to Cal and Seymour.

Notice how cautious Seymour STILL is of the dog.

Now look at the new best friends.
No pics of Seymour and Turtle yet. They hissed at each other a couple times but today both were on the bed playing. Seems to be moving in the right direction and no hissing today! They are still scared of each other though but it has only been 3 days that we have been working onm the introductrion. With time I think we might be alright...

CraftMemo

Have you SEEN this? It looks totally cool. Have you USED it? Let me know if it is as good for stash organization as it seems.

www.craftmemo.com

mmm speaking of stashes, I haven't bought yarn since MAY! I still am going to have to flash my stash and take suggestions for what to use it on. Plus show off my roving from MDSW and try my hand at spinning! All of this will come either BEFORE the big conference, which means I am not working on my talk. Or AFTER the conference, which means I was a good grad student.
Gee, I wonder which will happen.