I had not really intended to update again until I took care of some administrative details regarding my past posts (hiding those unfit for public consumption under proverbial lock and key, streamlining all the tagged items, etc. in preparation for eventual domination of the blogosphere... that sort of thing), but I find I have some spare time on my hands. That tends to happen when you are at the mercy of a printer that operates at the speed of about 30 seconds per page and you have no less than a trillion articles to print (and perhaps even read) for a literature review on the role of Wnt signaling in embronygenesis that you were supposed to hand in to your lab PI, oh, six days ago.

Not to mention the fact that this hunk of plastic and ink jets is way ancient. In order to print double-sided pages—which, you know, is absolutely the only way to go—you have to print all the even-numbered pages first and then manually insert them back into the tray in order to print the odd-numbered ones on the other side. It's all very complicated. Plus, the pages have to be oriented a certain way to ensure that you don't, for example, accidentally print massive blocks of text right over pictures of sad underdeveloped frog embryos. *grumble grumble*...

Oh, whoa. I may be angry, but certainly not angry enough to rearrange Jared Padalecki's face with my fist. I think my mood has significantly improved already. Thanks, Jensen Ackles! You're dreamy.

Everyone in my lab has apparently decided to take a snow day, so now I am left to fend off the urchins all by my lonesome. Luckily, I am armed with this soggy half-munched hummus wrap acquired from Dolce Vita downstairs, along with a cup of tap water from their sink that I have yet to touch because its odd opaque color has only just cleared up, and I can still see fizzy little bubbles hanging out on the plastic rim. Pretty sketchy, if you ask me.

So not only did the snow put a moratorium on the super cute outfit I had planned well in advance (as in last night, because I knew from unfortunate prior experience that my fashion senses would not be fully functioning at 7:30 in the morning) by forcing me to don a different pair of shoes; it has delayed my journey towards that elusive destination called Scientific Discovery. Even if I had wanted to see the results from my double fluorescent in situs (and I don't, because I know from unfortunate prior experience that science has some vendetta against me), now there would be no point because without my trusty lab technician, I wouldn't know what they meant anyway.

One of my belated New Year's Resolutions is to practice better time management skills. I began today by taking advantage of a 15 minute interval between washing my embryos to update my Chem 180L lab notebook on all the things that went wrong last Thursday. To Dr. CPR, I recommend consideration of the following:

01. Just because we all took orgo at some point in the last three and a half years does not mean that we remember how to recrystallize things properly.

02. Just because some of us remember how to recrystallize things properly does not mean that that the rest of us should be forced to endure another four hours of serial filtrations to isolate some obscure copper complex that serves no purpose other than to demonstrate how I should have paid more attention in orgo the first time around.

03. Does this mean we don't have to start Experiment 3 until next Tuesday :)?

Dear Nina,

Happy birthday!! Sorry this wasn't up earlier, I was working on my extended essay. :( You are SUPER OLD NOW. I hope you have an awesome birthday that was infinitely better than my day today. I love you!! I hope you like your present. :D

Now back to extended essay work.

Love,
Maloopoo Posh Ouchies

Hello again! It certainly has been a while. There is so much to say and do (in terms of this humble little livejournal page, of course; don't even get me started on the real world), where do I even begin? For one thing, I am so behind on reading/leaving fangirlish comments for Dark Angel fanfiction of the seamagik variety, it is embarrassing (because it's not embarrassing enough that Max and Alec are my OTP, duh). For another, I need to resume badgering harvardbarbie about making me a Robert Downey Jr. header, because it is time to move on to more well-seasoned pastures (sorry, Jensen Ackles, but this was never meant to last, you and I; I turn you loose from our exclusivity clause).

Oh, RDJ. Where have you been all my life? Rehab, probably.

Jensen Ackles is the guy I wouldn't mind dating in college (greetings to all potential candidates, my undergraduate years are numbered down to one, so you'd better hurry up and take advantage of this delicate rosebud while you still can), but RDJ? He's the man I'd want to marry and make lots of adorable Wasian babies with.

I am also in dire need for some Rachel McAdams and Ryan Gosling icons, so that I may further rejoice in their reunion. (It turns out that the Kirsten Dunst thing was merely a rumor - cue enormous sigh of relief - so my apologies go out to she with the snaggle tooth and bad posture.)

My column is due tomorrow before 10 PM, but nothing as of yet has tickled my writer's muse fancy. This is a problem.

I hate to go and leave this pretty sight, but... Spain is calling to me now.

First, a pit stop in Philly. if one can consider a three hour layover to be a pit stop. Luckily, I will be well-armed with snacks and reading material. (I wonder who is on the cover of InStyle this month.)

Anyway. Back in two weeks!

(Officially speaking. I'm sure I will manage to find a way back to the interweb sooner than that. After all, I can only survive without my Perez Hilton fix for so long. And you know the consumerist thrill I get from monitoring the price changes of the 100something items that I have in my Amazon shopping cart. Plus, with R having been granted temporary possession of my precious mailbox key - although I suppose my being out of the country might have something to do with that - Entertainment Weekly is going to have to keep me entertained somehow.)

My mind is still reeling from the 2 hour season finale of Lost (I totally called who Jeremy Bentham was, by the way) (I also figured that his face in the coffin would be the last thing we saw, because there's nothing Lost loves better than to answer a question with something that spawns a million other questions). But I need to get up early for work tomorrow, so logic would argue that I should go to bed early, too.

While waiting for my brain to settle back down into its cranium, I would like to use this brief but opportune interlude to announce to the world, as if it didn't know already, that boys are stupid. (Except for Desmond. Desmond + Penny = TRUE LOVE. Ahem, anyway.)

My first boyfriend chased after me with such alarming indelicacy and vigor that before I had the chance to call a time-out, he was already planning our future together and professing his love to me through prose of embarrassing theatricality and overt self-awareness. I had to cut him loose.

And now my latest "romantic interest" - a bacterium one is often liable to inadvertently attract when not sufficiently persnickety about giving smiles away - is misconstruing all of my friendly gestures as coy advances. What would be the nicest way of telling him that I DON'T WANT THAT KIND OF ATTENTION FROM HIM? When did it stop being possible for a guy and a girl to just be friends? Or was it ever?

Carrie Bradshaw couldn't help but wonder... since when did an invitation to lunch become an invitation to a relationship?

When am I going to learn that McD's crispy chicken snack wraps do not sit well with me?

*tummy gurgles unhappily*

Apparently never.

Also - and I'm not positive about this - but I'm pretty sure that I had well over the daily recommended serving size of cereal this morning. I was mixing Special K Red Berries with Lucky Charms and things just got out of hand. Plus, I was using a bowl big enough to fit my face in (not that I would actually try this to verify; I'm just making a rough approximation here). While this does ensure that I am getting plenty of calcium from the copious amounts of milk I must thusly consume, it's hardly a well-balanced way to start my day. Too many pots of gold and rainbows, not enough vegetables and protein.

Speaking of all this food, I am way too excited about going to the grocery store tomorrow for it to be normal. And to further sweeten the pot, it's nearing my favorite time of year... PEACH SEASON! Come on, you guys. I bet you can't think of anything better. Chrismukkah doesn't count. Ok, your time is up, I win!

Oh yeah, and I'm making R take me to see Sex and the City this weekend, even if I have to yoink her keys, lock her in the trunk, and drive us to the movie theatre myself. The trunk part might prove to be a difficult task, as she drives a Volkswagen Beetle and the only thing preventing a person from climbing out of the trunk and into the backseat is a flimsy board on hinges. But hey, Eminem wasn't a musical staple of my childhood for nothing; I'll find a way to make it happen if I must.

Jonathan Kent died in the episode of Smallville I watched last night, and embarrassingly enough, I shed a few tears. Not just for the unnecessarily callous and sudden manner in which he was killed off and subsequently forgotten; but also for Clark's infinitely stupid handling of the entire situation (which Chloe so brilliantly pointed out and he so stupendously ignored), i.e., ultimately not telling Lana his secret; and for Lex's selfish and unforgiving pursuit of winning Lana's heart and losing Clark's friendship.

I really don't like where this season is headed right now. But as long as Lois and Chloe (how this one ever managed to steal my heart, I will never know, just blame Allison Mack) never abandon ship - *cough certain co-stars cough* - I'll do my best to stick around too.

Side note: if I had my own personal trainer, I'd request Erica Durance's body. Because if I had a personal trainer, I would ask for nothing less than the perfect body. Sheesh.

This is why it is a good idea for me to stay out of the kitchen.

R went home for Memorial Day weekend, kindly leaving me to fend for myself. No car, no company, no freshly brewed coffee or surprise French toast in the oven (and fruit salad in the fridge!) awaiting me in the morning.

However, this also means that I am free to wander around in my underwear, hog the bathroom mirror and the TV remote, and, most importantly, establish a foothold in what I consider to be the best room in the apartment: the kitchen.

So I decided to make some blueberry pancakes for brunch today. Nothing I can't handle, right? Everything proceeded without a hitch until I went to turn on the stove. Each of the four knobs was accompanied by a little diagram depicting which stove top it controlled - handy for a visual learner like myself, not so handy for a visual learner who just tumbled out of bed and is having a difficult time grasping this concept of pictorial association rather than whatever just makes the most damn sense.

You see, the knob directly above the stove top that I wanted use actually controlled the one below it, and somewhere between pouring the batter for the first pancake and sprinkling it with blueberries, I forgot this tiny detail and kept adjusting the wrong knob between medium and low, leaving the one I was actually using on high. (Or rather, HI.)

The blueberries boiled, the pancakes burned, and the bottom edge of the spatula melted into a crusty exterior, parts of which wound up in my pancakes and thus my mouth before I spat them back out in horror ("What the hell kind of blueberry was that?!").

But other than that, everything was just fine.

I need to get out of this apartment. There are no windows in the living room, so I could sit here for hours that seem to pass like minutes and never know how much the day has actually progressed. My room is the size of a pea, but at least it has one wall entirely composed of a window and a sliding glass door.

Of course, every inch of my desk is currently covered in folded clothes and unpacked boxes, so it is out of commission until probably forever.

About a month ago I told my patient at the VA Medical Center that I would come back and play a game of chess with him in a couple of weeks, so apparently I have made a liar out of myself. It's rather unfortunate I no longer live on West Campus, which was only a 12 min. walk from the VA, because now I have to walk there first, and that always takes at least 5 songs on my iPod. *resigned sigh* I should probably make the 30+ min. trek over there while it is still sufficiently light outside.

Although it's kind of hard to tell from where I'm sitting.

I have two hours to kill before the prism stage of my sea urchin embryos call to me. I could have spent at least half of this time baking mini loaves of heart-shaped banana bread with R, but apparently she has it all "under control." Now, generally I am pretty well-versed in her personal dictionary of secret meanings behind bland statements, discrete body language, and subtle moods. So I'm feeling pretty confident that what she is really saying in this instance is, "this is my recipe, bitch. But since you so kindly let me use one of your bananas, you are free to help yourself to some when I am finished." Or maybe she is suffering from a Friends marathon-induced coma, still hasn't quite gotten her marbles in order for the day, and just wants to spend some time alone.

Pretentious kitchen hog.

A smarter and more well-fed version of myself, one who did not accidentally leave the banana (ironically enough) she planned on having for breakfast on her bed before running to catch the 9:33 bus, would still be sitting in her research lab right now, getting paid $10 an hour to type pointless livejournal entries and gripe about being excluded from all the baking festivities.

Well, I hope she's having fun at her party for one.

I opt to talk about happier things now. They replaced the Bank of America ATM machine in the student center with one that actually has a reliable-looking slot in which to insert your checks. Gone is the ghetto, gaping hole where one was simply expected to dump their checks enclosed in envelopes and just hope that the machine was smart enough to know what to do with them. Talk about sketchy. I imagine a little person crouched in the old one with outstretched hands, awaiting the monetary goodies that people so trustingly relinquish.

It would be advisable for me to go do something useful, I suppose, like reply to Daddy's e-mail about our upcoming trip to Spain. I think I'll go paint my toenails instead.

In the last four hours, I have accomplished the following:

1. e-mailed E a highly detailed update on my summer plans (I expect a response in about a month or so... my tardiness is contagious), with the added bonus of a harrowing account of my most recent research lab experiences, which I shall shortly relay again here;

2. significantly downsized my Facebook profile to reflect my latest aspiration in life to embrace simplicity and thrift (except when it comes to shopping for things with which to decorate my apartment), whittling my favorite movies and music lists down to the stuff that actually matters. I then compensated by making my TV shows list longer;

3. made a trip to the post office to pick up what I assume is the second season of Popular, as I have yet to open the box and I ordered seasons five and six of Smallville around the same time (no, thank you, I did not have a lapse in judgment. I adore Erica Durance's Lois Lane, and a Lex and Lana romance is exactly the kind of guilty pleasure I have been craving since giving up on One Tree Hill; I might even forgive the muddled Jason Teague storyline that was only exacerbated by Jensen Ackles abandoning the show for Supernatural) (not that I'm complaining). And don't worry, everything was on sale;

4. convinced myself that having a chicken taco salad with honey mustard and black beans was a valiant enough effort in my latest dietary quest to shave off some unnecessary back fat; this is perfectly acceptable because I plan on having Robert Downey Jr. for dinner when R and I go see Iron Man tonight (mmm, protein).

5. listened to the new mix that harvardbarbie made for me... three times on repeat! And let me just say that it is awesome (although I have learned not to expect anything less). Amusing anecdote: I strained very hard to pinpoint why "Dancing," by Elisa, sounded so familiar. Could it be that I heard it in a TV show before? Grey's Anatomy is always my default assumption whenever I can't figure out where she unearths these melodic morsels. But no, the answer came to me when my mind slipped wayward into a daydream about Jensen Ackles, as it tends to do on an alarmingly regular basis. Anyway, I realized that the song is a backdrop for one of the countless (and generally deliciously awful) Max/Alec YouTube videos I have perhaps been prone to stumble upon and maybe watch on occasion - harvardbarbie, STOP LAUGHING BEFORE I CYBER-KICK YOU IN THE FACE. It was actually one of the better videos, if that makes you feel any better, and I think the song is pretty, so >:| ;

6. wrote this monstrosity. Good thing I don't have a lot of friends, otherwise I might feel slightly bad about "flooding their f-lists," or whatever the expression is. Like I know these things.