Nom nom...eww?

We have two lovely and devoted (when they want food) cats. One of these cats, Eve, is dumb as a post. The other one, Anya, is both reasonably intelligent (for a cat), and dutiful.

Before Anya's injury we used to let her roam around free outside. In appreciation of this she would bring us nice little presents, such as the ever-popular half eaten mouse. Unfortunately, she got seriously creamed by something (car? cow? who knows), so we keep her inside now. Apparently she has been worried about how to give us presents in her mobility-limited new lifestyle.

The result? Last night Anya came bounding into the kitchen from the garage. Seeing Mr. Sam standing at the sink, she proudly offered her newest gift: a dead cricket. Nice to know she still loves us... I think?

A break from book stuff...

Am too busy doing real life stuff to be bothered with "trying to get published stuff". (Oh, who am I kidding? I'm just tired of rejection letters). I passed my PhD qualifying exam last week, which is very nice and gives me a lot more time. On the other hand, I'm TAing a class of... shall we say non-biologists? In another section of the class yesterday three (yes, three!) students managed to catch their lab gloves on fire. I didn't even know that was possible! And to think I missed it all... the one section I don't TA has all the excitement. Wow. These kids find new and exciting ways to put themselves in danger. Who knew you could have so much fun with a bunsen burner? I mean, I've certainly considered the possibility of toasting marshmallows with a culture needle over the burner, but not so much with the setting myself on fire.

Hmm...

There are times and circumstances that force one to reevaluate one's choice of occupation and/or place of employment.

Finding oneself walking through the halls with a liter of e. coli in one hand and a fully grown cucumber in the other is one of those circumstances. 

Heh.

Dave Barry is covering the Democratic convention this year. His insights on how Hilary must feel are so, well, insightful, that I thought I should share:

"It's hard to blame Sen. Clinton for being bitter. Here she is, the smartest human ever, PLUS she spent all those years standing loyally behind Bill Clinton wearing uncomfortable pantyhose (I mean Hillary was, not Bill) (although there are rumors), PLUS she went to the trouble and expense of acquiring a legal residence in New York State so she could be a senator from there, PLUS she assembled a team of nuclear-physicist-grade genius political advisors, PLUS she spent years going around to every dirtbag community in America explaining in detail her 23-point policy solutions for every single problem facing the nation including soybean blight. And after all that, she loses the nomination to a guy who has roughly the same amount of executive governmental experience as Hannah Montana. Hillary is like: ``Are you KIDDING me?'' "

Yeah... that's pretty much how I would feel. 

Update...

on my success in the plan to become rich and famous:

Exciting, no? 

In other news, I have been reading some truly wretchedly awful murder mysteries (cozies, I think they're called?) I mean, we're talking bad here, people. But they're fun in an MST3Kish sort of way. And there are recipes in the books (I think I'm safe to say that without being too obvious about whose books these are, since I know of at least two separate authors who include recipes in their murder mysteries). The recipes are pretty good, I must say. They almost make up for the total lack of subtlety, plot-wise, and the awful pseudo-romantic bits thrown in here and there.

The scary thing? These books are best sellers.  

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Gah! and again I say, gah!

Sam's life in brief:

1. Closed on house (hurrah!)

2. Got icky summer cold (boo!)

3. Found new crystallization conditions for protein at work (geeky yay!)

4. Was attacked by monster mosquito from hell. I mean, seriously folks... one bite. And my forehead is grotesquely swollen. When people see it they recoil in horror (literally). It looks like I have a congenital disorder that results in swollen heads. Am wearing hat. Have taken/applied two benadryl, and roughly a metric ton of 1% hydrocortisone cream. Neither have noticeable effect except that now I'm all spacey from the benadryl (which I took last night).

Vermont mosquitoes take their job seriously, man. Vemont: not for wimps and commies. Well, not for wimps, anyway. Commies always welcome.

Now don't get me wrong...

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 Kthxbai.