Giggedy

I have just received the last 73 slides (i hope i hope) for my MSc. This weekend I can scan and analyze them...and THEN.

THEN...

Barring statistical anomalies and annoying new committee recommendations I will officially be done the research for my MSc.

Muahahahaha!!!!

Sure I have to export these # and then do stats on all of them but ...GIGGEDY AND HOT DAMN!!! I really am getting there :)

Meep.

image source

Back to it then I suppose

Well...I'm back. I've had a lovely few weeks of relaxing, with very little resembling work in the middle of it all. J and I went to a few music festivals and caught up with some friends I never get the chance to see since I've been so busy. Saw a few of my favourite DJs from about the globe spin...got a most excellent tan...had a simply mad tea party...danced in my bear head...you know, the usual holiday stuff :)

After a day of work in the middle of holiday after festivals, J and I and his family went up to the lake and I got to spend some time with my Dad. J's family rented out the cabin next to where my Dad lives so we had a nice week of visiting and such, and best of all J and I could go "home" at night and stay with my Dad and escape our cute (but very loud and early rising) nieces at the end of it all. The weather was a bit rubbish, but the company was good. I do hope we can do the same next year...I see my Dad and someone else cooks for me while I sip cider, poke at a fire, toast marshmallows and read old National Geographics? What's not to love?

In the midst of it all Dad and I went to a family dinner - my Mum's brother is up visiting from Georgia where he teaches broadcasting...I find him to be the interesting uncle. Lots to talk about and he of all my relatives understands my work and MSc labours more than anyone except my Dad. I had a fantastic visit with Dad and together we stopped to see Mum's grave and also go to the old homestead where she grew up and I learned a bit about my relatives on my Mum's side. It was interesting to see where mum lived as a girl. There's only grandpa's old workshop left of all the buildings...the roof is caved in and whoever owns the land is now raising bees there (WTF??) so we could not really lounge about and see it without being muddy bee food, but it was so very interesting. Sometimes family history you never knew pops out...like I had a great uncle who went MIA in WW2 - *and* apparently my great grandma on my grandpa's side went all loonietoons and spent her life in an asylum. Well then. Excellent. It's good to have interesting family history don't you think? :)

I am now back after my first day of work and exercise and all that after a few weeks of gluttony and delicious wine consumption and I am just not in the mood to work on my MSc tonight. I have surfed da interwebs to my heart's content and made some curry. After being stuck on the freeway for over an hour coming home and then hailed upon during a torrential rain that popped up only for the duration of my walk home from the bus I am finding, now that I have dried up, that I am simply not ready for datamining. Yet.
Yes, this is lazy perhaps, but I honestly feel like myself for the first time in ages - all filled up inside for sleep, with a shiny brain and lots of colour and light twinkling about in my eyes. It's lovely. A few more hours of holidayishness remains I think.
Perhaps I will have my last dry cider and read a book for fun.
Joy.

Random Holiday pics (I *know*...I actually have some and I remembered to download/upload them. Noone is more surprised than me...):

Dad and I

Tea Party pics

Chill time

I'm a gonna go relax for a bit. Talk amongst yourselves. I'll pop in eventually...
Later taters...

I love it when a plan comes together

It rained a lot yesterday.
My roof did not leak a drop.

Damn I'm good :)

Weekends are delicious

The perfect mojito:
5 mint leaves - crush in a tall glass with 1T lime juice and 1t sugar until the sugar is dissolved and leaves are bruised. Add 1 to 1 1/2 oz spiced rum and skoosh a bit more. Add 3 ice cubes and club soda to taste. Drink with a straw.
Oh.
Yes.

Death and Taxes

My Dad is having one bizarro time with this year's income tax. Somehow, in filing my Mum's final return along with his return for this year, Dad's accountant declared *him* to be dead too...setting into motion all manner of strange things, the least of which is my Dad has not gotten his income tax rebate back :)

Yes. Fun. I'd be finding another accountant if it were me...

So Dad is in the midst of filling out forms and proving his liveliness so that things can be all sorted out...not only must he be resurrected, but be reinstated as Mum's executor...
Yes - there are forms for that :)

He's alive! ALIVE!!!
So the moral of the story? Make sure you don't check the wrong box on your taxes kiddies, cuz government sanctioned resurrection is a real pain in the ass!

I love saying that word

I have found fresh mint.
I have rum and lime and club soda.
And so, my good peeps, I predict this weekend will be full of mojitos.


Say it with me...moh heeet owes...

He hee. :)

I'm fixing a hole where the rain gets in and stops my mind from wandering...

Last night I was so very industrious...it was fun.

After I fought off the mosquito hordes and attacked the jungle like back yard (which looks rather respectable now I must say) I played Madame Fixit with our roof. Somewhere in the flashing about the vent for our bathroom fan there is a crack which has started to leak rather a lot when it rains and did some serious damage to the bathroom floor while we were away. There's no point in fixing the floor until the leak is looked after, and my usual thing of ignoring it has done nothing to stop the leaking, so it was time to try and fix things since I had a nice hot dry day to do it.
I was told how to try to fix it by a coworker who had the same issue and it can be a rather cheap and easy fix. The best part is that I got to climb up on the warm roof at sunset, ogle at the view a bit and then get busy with a bucket of tar roofing patch goop and a spatula to fill and smooth any obvious cracks or gaps. Tar smells awful, and it was like dipping your hands in black toothpaste, but it certainly wasn't difficult. Just sticky on a level I cannot fully or properly describe.

In the end, with all the things to patch I used the whole damn gallon of goo and patched all around the flashing for the bathroom vent as well as the other 4 roof attic vents which have been known to leak a tiny bit sporadically due to curling about the edges of the vents and shingles. I've been told that if I had called a "roof dude" they would just do what I did before they replaced the actual vents or flashing themselves, as this first fix is often all that is needed - apparently this is step one in trying and fix any roof leaks. I can't screw anything up with what I've done, so we had nothing to lose. I am crossing my fingers that smearing on a smooth patch of tar should do the trick....at least I know if this doesn't work we have to call a real roofer to fix it on a more serious level. We're trying to put off any more serious repairs for a few years until we do the whole shingle/roof thing and have at it all at the same time. I figure a bit of my time and a $10 can of roof patch is definitely doable in our budget. :)

And I quite enjoyed it. I got to be outside all evening and work with my hands. I've decided that I'm taking a few days to catch up on the house and the zillion things that need doing before hopping back into my MSc stuff on the weekend. I guarantee that all the other chores will be far less sticky than this was :)

Back for a little bit

Ah.
That was lovely.
Our little escape to Astral Harvest was short, yes, but in a week I'll be off again for a few days. I had a fantastic time. We got to catch up with lots of friends, meet new ones and relax in the sunshine and dance at night...it was lovely. Sunshine. Cider. Campfires...it was very very good.

We came home a few days before coming back to normal today. I've been fighting off a cold the whole time, but I haven't been good and properly sick, so I've just been ignoring it for the most part. It's been so long since I've relaxed I'm not surprised I came down with something :)

I didn't think to take any photos (oops) so I have not much to show you here, save this shot of J and I taken by my friend Curtis, but rest assured, it was a great time. So great in fact that I really want another week off to relax and make tasty food and catch up on life. Looking back on it, my body was fighting the return to normality yesterday...I was grumpy and tetchy and I'm sure I was all sorts of charming to be around. J gets extra suave points for not telling me off for being a pouty little thing -'Oh pity me!" and all that...thankfully I think I've snapped out of it. Realistically, I just need to learn how to disembark and return to life a bit more smoothly...I'll get the hang of it I'm sure. Times off like this remind me that I'm still all here, and life is good and that I am very lucky to have the life I do.

I must run...I've a schwack of things to catch up on. :)