Day Seven Hundred Eighty

This past Monday was flu shot day! Which means yesterday I stayed home with the post-shot mini flu, complete with fever, chills, and a sometimes-ugly headache. The good news is it was all better by today, and come 10 days from now I should be relatively protected from unhygienic undergrads who go to class sick and spread the flu virus like a modern day typhoid Mary.

Before the post shot ickiness set in, I went to a new book club Monday evening. It was an all women's book club composed of around 20 people ranging in age from mid-20s to mid-30s, and was so much fun. While the discussion had brief, extremely political forays (as is common when election season is upon us), it was exciting (at least for me) to be around a group of people where asking questions like "what's your favorite genre?" or "do you use the GoodReads app? Isn't it awesome?! Let's be GoodReads friends" are met with enthusiastic answers and conversation. I'm excited to get to know everyone in the group better, and excited to have extra reasons to go to the book store.

Today was back to the daily grind of experiments (today's failed, again), office hours, and sitting in my ice cave of an office reading scientific articles. BUT, it was pay day today! Which means I went out to eat for dinner. Obviously. Texas Roadhouse, thank you for your bottomless supply of sweet rolls and cinnamon butter. You sure know how to make a girl feel special.

Day Seven Hundred Seventy Seven

Dad was in town this weekend! While it was a very brief visit (and I do mean very) we were able to pack a bunch in to a day and a half. As in we were barely even in my apartment while he was here. We went to bookstores and football games and visited various family and friends. And it was lots of fun and I'm completely exhausted by it.

Outside the alumni center by big metal Bevo.

The view from our seats (aka - the highest up seats possible. Seriously,
the very last row).

We lost an extremely close game in wildly disappointing fashion (sound familiar? Same thing happened last weekend), so I won't go into any more detail with that. Except to say I found a place that sells excellent fresh-made kettle corn. That was certainly a bonus of sitting in the blazing hot sun for 4+ hours.

Tonight, I got to see Turtle Island String Quartet live in concert, a group that I have loved since high school. They were incredible and played bluesy/ragtime music and it was so good. And then I left the concert just in time to watch the lunar eclipse complete it's full covering of the moon! It was a pretty great night.

Day Seven Hundred Seventy Four

You guys, yesterday I was in a mood. I didn't have a horrible day or anything, but I was just in a funk I couldn't shake and I'm 99% positive it made me absolutely miserable to be around. It was a rough day, but thanks to a scented candle, a good book, and a box in the mail I started to feel slightly better by bedtime and today feel back to normal. Whew!

Considering the mood I was in yesterday, I went to yoga again today on campus. When I told the professor I'm TAing for my yoga plans (I wanted to let him know in case he needed me to do something beforehand, as yoga was from 11-12 and the lecture I'm TAing starts at 12:30), his only response was "oh good, you'll be a noodle sitting in the back of the room." He may have been joking, but after doing almost an entire hour of leg strength poses I definitely felt noodle-like qualities during his lecture. Climb the stairs from the 2nd to the 3rd floor to get to my lab? No thanks, I'll take the elevator this time and be one of those people everyone hates that takes the elevator for only one floor. The rest of my day was spent updating my lab notebook and doing data analysis. Riveting stuff, let me tell you.

Going back to the box I got in the mail yesterday...it was a Book Swap box! I'm in an online book club through Facebook/Goodreads, and in the month of September we all got paired up with a fellow book club member to send a Book Swap box to. I got mine yesterday, and it was so fantastic. Here's photographic proof - 

In case you're wondering, "Slow Brew" is a tea diffuser that's molded in to the shape of a sloth. And his little arms hang over the rim of your mug while tea diffuses out of holes in his belly. This may be one of the best things I've ever seen ever. I need to go buy some loose leaf tea just so I can put my tea sloth in to my new "famous lines from literature" mug. Maggie...book swap partner...you absolutely killed this box. We may have to do this again sometime, because you're a total master at it. For those of you curious about this online book club I'm in, it's called NovelTea Book Club, and sorry boys...it's girls only. If anyone reading this would like to join, just let me know and I can send you an invite. We have members from all over the world, and they have yet to choose a novel I haven't enjoyed.

Day Seven Hundred Seventy Two

So yesterday I went to a yoga class at one of the gyms at UT, and in attendance was a professor in his mid-70s (possibly 80s). He came ready with yoga mat in tow and was clearly a regular judging by the yoga teacher bounding over to give him a hug. Professor whoever-you-are, we should all aspire to be like you when we're your age. Yoga class full of young'ns? Time to show them how its done. I applaud you. Now please don't hurt yourself.

Today was an alarmingly busy day full of experimenting, TA duties, and meetings. And also - I created my own book review website/blog! It's completely separate from this one, as I figured I'd spare you all from my uncontrollable bibliophile tendencies as much as possible. So if your curious what books I've recently read and how I liked them, take a look at my new site (keep in mind I only have one post right now, since the site is in its infancy). More posts will be added as I finish more books/review old favorites.

www.theliterarychemist.weebly.com

Day Seven Hundred Seventy

Let's not talk about how either of my football teams did this weekend, okay? Okay.

Better weekend news? I made a giant to-do list of things to do over Saturday and Sunday, and guess what? I got them all done. And they were all legitimate to-do items, not things like "shower" or "read your book" or other nonsense items that I don't need a reminder or list to actually do. They were things like "clean the fish tank" (ugh, what a process), "make smoothies for the week" (messier than I anticipated), and "send week report to the boss" (because happy boss = happy life). And this was only three of the twelve or so items on the list. I'm pretty proud of myself, and I even made time for a nap.

So back to cleaning the fish tank...are fish always this hard to catch? Or is Moriarty just an elusive little wiggler that seems impossible to just get in to the cup (evidently you can't use nets with bettas because their fins are delicate, and since I'd be a little traumatized if I ripped my fishes fin off, I'm heeding this warning)? I eventually had to put my other hand in the tank and just shove him in there, and he wasn't happy. Or at least as not-happy as a fish can be before they forget what's happened. Regardless, the tank is clean and the fish is alive with all his fins intact. I call that a success. Until next Sunday, Moriarty...until next Sunday.

Tomorrow I have to go get blood drawn for my yearly physical. It's always a good time when I get to go to a new lab and tell the phlebotomist, "I'm a fainter." Once the needle is in my vein, I'm good. Until then, you best let me lay down and possibly have someone hold my hand.

Day Seven Hundred Seventy Six

I've been having all kinds of issues sleeping. It's making me a bit frazzled, which always works well with chemistry experiments that at times require levels of extreme patience. So needless to say, the experiments haven't been going as flawlessly as hoped so far this week. Maybe they'll suddenly get better tomorrow and Friday? Hope springs eternal. To make myself feel better I went to Schlotzkys for dinner, in which I asked for a water to drink and they gave it to me in the largest to-go cup I have ever seen. I can barely even grasp it with my hand. It's comically huge, and I just bust out laughing when I saw it because I'm so used to fast food places giving me the smallest cup possible if I only want water. Way to push hydration today, Schlotzkys, albeit a little aggressively.

Day Seven Hundred Seventy Three

So, my teams went 1-1 this weekend. UT won (yeah!) but the Seahawks lost (stupid Rams). Yesterday was the home opener for the Longhorns, and we played the Rice Owls. We all learned two major things during the game, that Malik Jefferson is an absolute beast on defense and that Jerrod Heard is a way more promising quarterback than Tyrone Swoopes. For those of you who aren't UT fans, that last sentence will mean nothing to you, but it's real exciting for us Longhorn fans. I got to experience my new seats for the season - a 26 row promotion from last season (row 66 to row 40!) - and they were as amazing as I thought they would be. Jordan Spieth even trotted out during halftime in his green Masters jacket and his two giant PGA championship trophies. Everyone went crazy. What topped off a fantastic night was the fact that it was less than 90 degrees out for the game! So wonderful.

Panoramic of the stadium from my seat.

Jordan Spieth!

The band was pretty excited about Jordan being there too.

Day Seven Hundred Seventy One

Yesterday was a day where I sat in line for 3 hours to see a free Brad Paisley concert. And you know what? It was so totally worth it. I've never even really listened to Brad Paisley, and I loved every minute of it, so I can't even imagine what it must have been like for a big fan. The concert was held in a parking lot (not even a joke) which was really weird, but ended up being a good thing considering it thunderstormed hard for 2 hours prior to the show, and standing on wet pavement is much nicer than standing on muddy grass. Brad Paisley captured the moment perfectly when he said "My god it's humid." Sorry, Brad. Welcome to Austin.

Duet-ing with Carrie Underwood for "Remind Me"

Brad by the lit up tower

To follow up an awesome concert last night, I decided to kick off this morning with a dentist appointment and two brand new fillings. Then I went and bought a new watch this afternoon. And now, I'm mentally preparing myself for the first UT home game tomorrow. It may be the only one we win this season, so I plan to enjoy it to the fullest.

Day Seven Hundred Sixty Eight

So, you know in that last blog post how I mentioned the dental hygienist who told me I sounded like I was from the TV show Big Bang Theory? Well, what I didn't tell you was that the same hygienist also emphatically told me I needed to buy myself a fish to help me not stress out so much. And even though she got a little sassy with me about not flossing as much as I need to...I decided to take her advice (on both the fish and the flossing). Without further ado, I'm proud to introduce you to Moriarty, my brand new betta fish!

Isn't he pretty?! I'm already a little obsessed with him. Also, bonus points for those of you who know what the origin of his name is. For those of you who don't, Moriarty is a well known nemesis of Sherlock Holmes. And since betta fish are also known as fighting fish, I figured Moriarty was an appropriately name.

This weekend also marked the very first UT football game of the new season, and we lost in spectacular fashion. It was so so so so so bad. I won't go in to detail, but I did have a good time at my friend Katelyn's house where she held a watch party. And check out the adorable cookies she made! The cookies were probably the highlight of the entire game.

And then...back to work on Monday. It was Labor Day, you say? Most people get that day off, you say? Well, welcome to grad student life, where your boss schedules a meeting on Labor Day and when you mention the fact that it's a national holiday he just looks at you and goes ".....and?" I did get a killer parking spot though (as seen below). And there was no traffic. Which I guess made it worth it (it totally didn't make it worth it). To be fair, I wasn't anticipating getting the day off. After two full years of graduate school, I know better by now.

The first UT home football game is this weekend! We may lose horribly, but my seating group got killer seats this year, so I'm super excited. And the high is only supposed to be 89 degrees that day! That might be the most exciting part of the entire experience.

Day Seven Hundred Sixty Four

Quote of the the day comes from my dental hygienist after she asked me if I had work after my appointment and I told her I had to go run an experiment -

"Oh my god, that sounded like something off the show Big Bang Theory!"

..........well alright then.

Day Seven Hundred Sixty Two

Let me tell you a short story. Usually, UT has two shuttles running the East Campus route at all times, that way there's a shuttle arriving at each bus stop about every 10 minutes. Today as I was waiting to be shuttled back to my car, it took an oddly long time for the shuttle to arrive. The reasoning? Both shuttles were running right next to each other. Call me crazy, but doesn't this kind of defeat the purpose of having multiple shuttles run at once? Also, are you impressed with how many times I used some form of the word "shuttle" in this story? I'm certainly not an English major.

Another story (not involving public transportation) - a few months ago I made a new friend through an online book club named Gail. We've been enjoying sharing book recommendations and discussing various book club picks (some good, some not so good at all). Today when I got home, there was a box leaning on my front door...full of books from Gail. Is there anything more fun than receiving a package? And even more so receiving a package full of things you love? It's a nice reminder that even though the internet can be full of creepy weirdos, it can also be full of kindred spirits who you may never have met otherwise. Gail, here's to many more book swaps in the future! And if anyone wants to get in on this online boom club action, just let me know. It's fun and you get to discuss literature with people from all around the world. What could be better?

Tomorrow I go to the dentist. Cross your fingers for no cavities!