I can't hear you lalalalala

shiny sounds

This song has been in my head all day. There's a newer Ott album we finally picked up, and listening to that has got this back in my mind now.

This song.... which literally blew my mind when I heard it and still calms a little hidden part of my heart whenever I hear it. It inspires me...brings me a little snippit of how I felt right then and there. Kindles the flame. Makes me smile. Like hot biscuits with honey or a fresh espresso, the taste of prickly pear Gewurztraminer ...the smell after the rain. :)

Enjoy. Have a lovely weekend :)

What songs, or things, do this for you?

I find your lack of pants disturbing

I am embarrassed and annoyed to report that Saskatchewan is going to have a team in the Canadian Women's Lingerie Football League. No that is not a typo. I'll write that out again so you can see it for the ridiculous thing it is: Saskatchewan is going to have a team in the Canadian Women's Lingerie Football League.

Yes, there actually is a newly formed Canadian Women's Lingerie Football League...where teams of women in bikinis and stocking with suspenders (and a few bits of strategic padding I don't doubt) and helmets play football against each other. Yet another american creation for the entertainment of the drooling masses.

I am curious how the province will play this one. There is a really strict no alcohol served while there is stripping/erotic dance law in the province, and I am curious to see how this fits in there. I mean the main people going to games would be guys, who likely will drink booze and get tacky and rude (because, honestly, what classy guy would go within 10 miles of this sort of thing). If you can't even have a burlesque dance show and serve booze, how is this legit?

Hell, even with booze...how is this legit?

Why can't we just have a women's football league? You know, with pants? Like normal people.

Oh wait. WE ALREADY DO!

My mind is boggled that this is for real and not some April fool's joke.

To me it is truly the very definition of tacky...I mean why not hose down the field before they start so it's all muddy too?

*sigh*

Mead ahoy

After a long snowy walk last night, I am proud to announce that the yeast has been pitched in my mead.

I was all official and sciency and measuring the specific gravity...ooh. aah.

Here's crossing my fingers...I hope to come home to happy burbling tonight :) :)

Apple spice malamel

Just set up my apple spice mead last night. Because I juiced (yeesh) 17 Lb apples for the mead I had to add campden tablets to it and let it sit overnight before I add the yeast. YOu only get ~6 L of apple cider squish from that if you can believe it...I figured I'd get more than that, but you learn as you go...

Never done this before. It's all very wierd. And I feel like it's not up to lab sanitary standards. Yes I bleached the stuff well and used a newer no rinse sterilizer on the other things but...after culturing human cancer cell lines in a lab this feels like monkey lumbering kindergarten stuff that will be totally contaminated and spoiled. Gah. I would hate to do all this and have vinegar in 6 months, but here goes nothing. We shall see. :)

It took an HOUR to get the 4Kg honey and 10L water up to boil for 15 minutes, then I tossed in some Cinnamon sticks and cloves and a T of nutmeg. Poured this into the bucket of apple goo and campden and covered it up...and it smelled lovely. Tonight I'll add the acid blend and a bit of yeast food and the champagne yeast...and then try and ignore it for a few weeks until it's ready to be racked off..

Once I rack it into a carbuoy I need to ignore it a few MONTHS. Maybe longer until it clarifies somewhat.

Yeesh.

I think I'm made for beermaking. This takes ages :)

I may have to buy another carbuoy and get some beer going for the summer just so I ignore the mead properly...he heh. Apparently it doesn't taste very good for at least 6 months. Must be good.

I'm trying to get work done on my thesis since it's a day off but I really don't want to.

But I will. Honest.

Just getting my mead angst out...

I figure at this rate should be ready to drink right around my birthday. I will stick a bottle away for christmas...and a few for friends to enjoy on their holidays as well. :) If this works it will be an annual thing for the holidays I think...

Frosty morning

The hoar frost was gorgeous this morning...:)

I was almost late for work snapping a pic or two on my way across campus after my morning workout.

It snowed fresh overnight and there was a thick fog this morning, making a cm of hoar frost coating everything in sight. It's the little things like this that make life grand...

Grit your teeth...sleep is for quitters

Last night whilst boomeranging back and forth between time wasting, editing the first 2 chapters of my thesis and trying to think about my summer plans and new job I came to realise that it's time to just DO this. So the end is nigh. Ish. 2 parts done and needing proofing. 4 parts left. I came across a website that is a collection of posts by people writing articles who have nearly finished or just finished the hell that is writing the thesis. This post in particular about the process I identify with intimately.

I am thankfully just leaving step 7 and am at some blend of step 8 and 9.

I yearn for 10...

I just want to be done this damn thing and get on with my life...

I'm romantic, see?

Yes -this was my grunging acknowledgement of Enforced Displays of Love Day. Heart shaped pizza (with heart shaped pepperoni). Tasty...

Yum

Well...I now know what I'm having for breaky tomorrow.

THIS.

It'll be served around noon. Show up with a mimosa for me and I'll give you some :)

Had Feist running about in my head all morning. Which amuses me since I don't actually have her CD...and yet. Happy ears :)

the one about beverages

Somewhere between the grocery store and home last night we lost a case of diet coke. Not in the car...just gone.

Somewhere someone is drinking my delicious black fizz juice.

I will have to be content with my case of Canadian 67 - a newer light beer. Normally I'm more of an ale drinker, but sometimes I try and be a little more healthy about my beerism, and this does the trick nicely. It tastes like Heineken, only a lot lighter alcohol wise (only 3%) so I can have a beer with supper and not feel guilty at all.

On other beery topics, I am gearing up to start a batch of apple mead this weekend. I've been gifted 2 L of honey and need only get a bit more along with some organic apple juice and yeast and such and I will be on my way to making what I hope will be the first batch of many delicious meads. My sis in law's parents keep bees on their acreage now. He heh. They are willing to trade honey for mead. This can only be a good thing :)

I love it when a plan comes together

AH. Last night I felt like an old lady but I died my hair a lovely dark warm brown (as close to "normal" as I remember), read a book for a while and went to bed ridiculously early. I believe I was asleep by 9:15. Yes...it's how I roll. :)

It was wonderful. I very seldom do that, but I needed it. Not the least bit exciting, but so very very good for me.

I feel great this morning. I even woke up smiling to come into my exercise class and I'm feeling all chipper and cheerful. I'll never be a morning person, but I sure hope the sun starts coming up soon in the mornings. Getting up with the sun is so much easier...The sunrise

over the river is just gorgeous in the spring. Right now we have spring weather...so other than extended spring allergy season it all seems slightly out of whack without the sun. Not complaining tho - the mild winter is great.

Today I get a tour of my new lab. He hee...I love saying that. MY lab. The one I will manage. :D

It's almost done construction and they're putting in the benches and such. We just finished the ridiculously elaborate inventory of equipment and now are compiling it to figure out what we've got to set up all the labs. I love this. LOVE it. I'm looking forward to wandering about in my steel toes and hardhat and really having a chance to look at my soon to be new lab-home. I'm so excited :)

Have a great day everyone. I'm off to the land of inventory...I love it when a plan comes together.

There is no why. Only what is.

Cancer has yet again hurt people I care for and taken another kind soul. I used to ask why. Now it just angers me. For him and others I have known who have suffered from, or because of, the big c today I raise both of my middle fingers to the sky at sunrise to heartily tell it how I feel. These people are working for change to raise awareness...for earlier diagnosis...give people a better chance to survive it. They feel the same way. Every little bit helps.

All I know is this sort of thing makes me come out swinging. Makes me work harder at what I do...

Think before you speak...come on

Today at the gym 3 muscly guys were joking about typical guy jock stuff in the stretch out area. It's spring training for most of the teams right now so unfortunately there is a lot of testosterone floating around. Not a big deal...as long as you don't listen to them talk. They generally don't ogle...just get in the way and hog the equipment and make rediculous grunty noises as they lift stuff. ANYways...you can tell these are not used to having women around and being in a locker room from some of the crap that comes out of their mouths.

Case in point: One of them saw a sign posted about a rape/self defence class for women being held on the weekend. He turned to his buddy and went "alright guys it's strategy time! We can go to class and learn what the girls are being taught so we know all the countermoves! They won't be able to fight us off" and they started laughing. Needless to say every woman (and a few guys) around them just stopped and glared at them. They were so dense they didn't even get the hint...at first. I had a strong urge to go over and kick them all squarely in the jewels but you know with people like that that it wouldn't make a shred of difference. I knew if I opened my mouth I would have said all kinds of nasty things and perhaps voided my gym membership, but if I ever hear them spouting that shit again I will be reporting them to their coach and the gym desk. I know they were kidding...but that is not even remotely funny to me...

Guys...think about what you say. If you say crap like this in public we can only assume you are even a greater ass in the privacy of your own home, and I cannot believe that your girlfriend would put up with this crap.

Think before you speak. Have some respect.

Ah. That's better. Had to vent a bit. Back to work for me.

love that man

J and I babbled most of an hour when he got home form work late late last night.

Despite the late hours and the tiredness the next day, we do our best talking at 2 AM.

I'm tired today, but feel great.

He talked me down from the wobbles.

Love that man...he always surprises me :)

What's that spell?

Well today started out well but has slowly meandered towards lameness.

Slept in and work was good, but on the way home (very sad) friends called to say they (who had gone for years) did not get their BurningMan tickets. And later, after working out and heading home on a gong show of a 70 minute bus ride home (normally 15) I just learned we did not either. Been planning for years to go this year. There's likely still a shot of getting tickets, but without the whole camp of lovelies...do I? How do you plan to participate when you don't know if you can go? I mostly hate that this was to me a thesis writing night and I really haven't gotten anything done, despite being all pumped to get at it. Nothing.

At least I made muffins before settling down to a solid evening of nothing.

Oh I know, I know, this isn't much to really get bummed about compared to some. I'm healthy (albeit it helluva stiff from working out this week after not doing so for months) and my job is good. I have friends dealing with pretty major heavy stuff at the moment, and this seems trivial to talk about when other than my thesis I (and a number of close friends) am really just dealing with a LOT of dissapointment.

I just have no desire to tell my luv about the tickets when he gets home...

L to the A to the M to the E