[Bangs head against wall]

I was finally getting cable and internet set up today (which...blogging from home....weee!). They were supposed to come Monday...never showed up...never called. A credit to my bill and a reschedule later...and I was in business. Or so I thought.

The internet got hooked up all fine and dandy. The cable...well. Right when the guy was getting my tv set up...my tv went on the fritz. While I do think the dude started the fritz (the tv had been working fine until he touched it), it's not like I would get anything from the cable company for a 10 yr old tv pretty much going crazy.

Once I did some googling to figure out what the problem could be, it came down to either the tv or the remote. If it was just the remote, then all I would need is to buy a new universal remote. If it was the tv, the cost to potentially repair it wouldn't be worth it since the tv is so old. So either I would be buying a new remote or new tv.

Turns out, the tv has gone batty. The problem appears to be an internal one where anytime a remote button is pressed (the original tv remote or the universal remote), the tv's end keeps thinking you are pressing random buttons. You push any button and a menu will pop up and you don't have control of just exiting out of the menu, because what button you push is arbitrary...the tv is going to do what it wants. Which is why I have no sound and the menus are all in spanish now. The only thing I can do is change the channel (which every time I do it has to go through its menu cycle thing and you have to wait until the menu defaults disappearing) and turn it on/off (which get a little menu flashing when you turn off and hav to deal with the menu flashing/cycling when you turn it on)

I don't personally know any tv repair people who would look at it/fix it for free. I also don't feel it is worth spending any money to have someone try to fix the tv.

So yeah...I'll be getting a new tv.

Not a Five-fer...but a Friday post

First I want to give a hello to some friends who stumbled upon my blog (because you know...they click links in other people's blogs). Hi 'Lil! Hi Hezah!

So...I had a lame topic for today...but I decided to not go with lame. At least not a lame list. This post might still be lame. But hopefully it will be less vague than Monday. But I will still leave the specifics out. So perhaps it will be 75% vague-free.

Sometimes I surprise myself at how selfish I can be. I mean...I don't act out in front of people, but I will practically stamp my feet and pout when I'm alone if I don't get what I want...or what I feel I should be getting.

This generally doesn't last long...and given sleep and/or some distraction from what I am being selfish about, it goes away. And I feel bad that I was being so selfish. I had no reason to be so unrealistic in my expectations. And I tell myself I need to quite being so selfish. Then I do it again. Lather. Rinse. Repeat.

I guess the positive thing is that I don't morph into bitch mode for long periods of time and I also keep things to myself. Sigh...perhaps one day I will ease up a bit.

Fuzzy Monday

I had a Five-fer Friday post in the works that I just never got finished and thus, it never got posted. It was kinda specific for last week, so I am just going to delete it (and plus, since you don't know what the topic was...I can recycle it..hee!)

I have some posts in the works. And come this afternoon, I will have both internet AND cable in my apartment. So I can "work" (that is, play online) at night now. While watching cable. So exciting! Perhaps now I will get back to posting more regularly.

Today I want to talk in vague terms. Perhaps a bit abstract. I dunno. Just bear with me and sorry if this is stupid and nonsense.

Have you ever had something that changed your brain a bit? Just how you think about things. I'm not talking about turn-your-world-upside-down-I-need-to-rethink-my-whole-life-and-the-meaning-of-everything type change, but just on a few things. Perhaps even important things.

Now, I do realize this would be a good point to start being more specific, give examples or something. But sorry, I won't.

One thing in particular scared the bejeebus out of me. It was something that I figured I would probably never do--due to both fear of it and the idea that I might not actually want to do it. EVER. But now it doesn't seem that scary. Now I might want to do it.

I think the most disturbing thing for me is how calm I feel about it. I would think I would freak out about this brain change...but I'm not. I'm just so zen about it. And the fact that I am so calm about it doesn't freak me out either.

I know...none of that probably made any sense.

Validation that I am not a complete idiot

Ok. I really want to graduate already. For reals.

I need this machine to finish a huge set of experiments. I am generally the only user of this machine, so it's ok, I can get the work done.

Except this machine keeps having clog issues. Which means there has to be a service call and a guy has to come out to fix it. So the machine is down for days at a time when there is a clog.

Remember how I said I am the primary user? Guess who gets the finger pointed at them for clogging the machine?

I have done everything the people at the machine company had said to do. Religiously. The professor who is in charge of this machine has even told me he doesn't know what else I can do to keep this from happening.

The machine has been down this week because of another clog. The guy comes to fix it. This time the guy says I am doing everything right...and that there has been a manufacturing problem with the part in the machine that keeps clogging.

It's nice to know that it really wasn't me....

You and your stupid new year's resolutions!

This is a rant. Feel free to stop reading now.

I already stated my opinion about New Year's resolutions. My thoughts of them in a nutshell: retarded.

One of the most common resolutions is losing weight/getting healthy/getting in shape/some other similar concept. Not that I have a beef with people wanting to get in shape and live healthy. Let's face it....we are a nation of fatties. So come January 1st...the "magical day of change," people cut back on soda and sweets and fried foods...and join gyms.

I don't mind people joining gyms--even my gym. I like my gym. I like the people there. I have my absolute favorite instructor ever who is crazy enough to make classes super fun even though she is kicking your butt. Good times.

What I do mind is this massive flock of people who join because of the "magical day of change." I went to the gym last night to take my usual Monday night class (which is so super fun...I'm sad if I miss it). It was so freakin' crowded in the gym. There were the usuals who take the class regularly...or who work out regularly at that time on Mondays. But that was the minority. There were so many new faces. Crowding my gym. And forcing me to be next to the crazy flailing lady in class.

I had been being a little slack in my gym routine. I was doing ok with cardio and ab stuff...but was really being lazy (ie-doing no) strength training. So in addition to going back to a strength training class I used to take religiously, I also thought that I could do an extra day of strength training after my Monday night cardio class. After class last night I just left because I took one look at the weight machine area and people were packed in there like sausages. Um, no. I'll pass.

It would be one thing is this was the usual after-work crowd. But it's not. This is the usual after-"magical day of change" crowd. So my options are to either find another time to work out or just wait until February when all those people who used the "magical day of change" as their reason to get healthy stop coming.

I'll wait until February...

This might end up a Five-fer Friday

Maybe. Maybe not. We'll see what I end up with. Let's just say...I'm not starting out with a list of 5 things...

I am not one to make new year's resolutions. I just think it is silly for January 1st to be this magical day of change. That since I now need to adjust writing 2009 and not 2008...that this is when I can change things. What is wrong with last Tuesday? Or next Thursday? If there is something I want to change, why not start the moment it hits me?

So perhaps this will be a list of things I am working on changing. Or it might start that way and end up something else. You'll just have to read all the way through to find out! Heh.

1. I am a very analytical person. That's the polite way to put it. The impolite way is that I overthink things. This helps with science because I can come up with several approaches to things. This hurts science because sometimes I overthink why something went wrong with an experiment (because...sometimes the reason something went wrong is that I am an idiot and I did it wrong!). This helps with life because I am a good listener and can generally help come up with ways of dealing with a problem in people's life (not that they have to do what I suggest...but just to give them some ideas). This hurts my life because sometimes I overthink something way too much. I feel this is generally a bigger problem when it comes to people. I just need to chill out and take things at face value. Not read too much into something someone said in a text or in an IM. That just because I might read it the wrong way doesn't mean it's a slight against me. Especially when nothing else but how I perceived some written words points to this being a slight against me. Now, I tend to keep all this neurotic behaviour locked in my head and don't unleash it on the world. But really, neurotic behaviour helps no one.
2. I need to graduate soon. I think all signs are pointing to this happening soon. It's kinda like the perfect storm is brewing for me to graduate. But now I just gotta get through the insane amount of work I need to get done so that I can graduate. Did that make any sense? I don't know. If you are in grad school or have been in grad school, that probably made sense
3. I knew I never dressed nice for school. Those who are in a job/school/whatever situation where there isn't a rule telling you how you should dress probably can relate to getting into a sloppy, schlumpy mess. I was there. I know I was dressing like a slob, but I convinced myself I was just being really casual. It all came to a head when one day I decided to wear my new shows (no...not the 4 inch heels...) and this cute jacket that had been sitting in the back of my closet forever. Sure, it was a cute outfit...but it wasn't terribly dressy (ok...and I had my first lunch date with Vanilla Ice...shut it). After like the 10th person asked what I had going on that day for me to dress up...I was like "wow...do I dress that bad???" Which I knew the answer was yes. So I have been working on dressing better. I have been weeding through my insane amount of tshirts (some that really should never see the light of day again). Wearing these random nicer shirts that I have more often. Stop living in my sneakers and oversized hoodie. It hasn't been a horrible thing. And yes, sometimes I do wear my sneakers and oversized hoodie. It's just no longer every day.
4. I have a big zit on my forehead. Right in the center about a 1/2 inch below my hairline. Normally my bangs would cover it. Today my hair did not want to cooperate hiding Mt St. Zit. It's a big ugly zit. It needs to go. But this bastard is being pretty resistant to my usual face stuff. Asshole zit....GO AWAY!
5. I should probably blog more often...