Yesterday I learned that being the President is not NEARLY as fun when you're playing as Chief. I didn't get to play with the Quorum cards because I was too busy fixing the frakking ship. I was the third president we had that game, after Baltar and Zarek.

One of Zarek's traits in the game is the ability to use Soylent Green as a solution to the food problem once per game. Amusingly, the crisis immediately after that was riots. Possibly because of the cannibalism. Just sayin'.

The humans all died in the end. It was very festive. WE're thinking we need to implement some house rules that actually give humanity a fighting chance. Because DAMN we die a lot. (Which wouldn't be so bad... if I were ever a Cylon :p)

But there was good food, good friends and the death of humanity! All in all, a good Christmas party. :p


Aaaaaand out come the Christmas icons!

QotD

Ryan: It's not a fish anymore, it's a torpedo!

I just read an academic paper that used the phrase "0.1 M or so".

OR SO.

In an academic paper. Very scientific, guys. :p

I won at prize at the conference! It is exciting! When they were doing the poster prizes, they realized they had one extra and immediately decided to award it to "I don't remember the name, but the lady from the Baines group doing 73-Germanium NMR."

The prize was a desk organizer from Fisher Scientific. I'm definitely more excited about getting to put that I won a poster prize on my CV. :p Apparently they were really happy they discovered the extra prize because they'd really wanted to give me one. He made a comment as he announced it about how it was not an easy nucleus and I may have doubled the known germanium shifts.

I don't think I have, but now that I think of it, I may have doubled the number of known quadrupolar coupling constants, since three of the five solid state papers are pure spinning and one is elemental germanium. :p

It's, uh, easy to do when the number of known CQs is two. :p

QotD

Jello: ...also I was just discussing how to Jews, the New Testament is basically LOTF
Jello: with God In Name Only
Jello: :-P
Jello: (they do not consider it canon, true fax.)
Me: LMAO!!!!
Jello: I mean he's totaly out of character
Jello: and I think the writer is obsessed with this Jesus guy
Jello: who wasn't in any of the other books
Jello: and now he's God's son, whatT/
Me: LMAO
Jello: plus none of the books really match each other. One book will go on an on about this one thing, and the next one totally ignores it.
Me: *dies8
Jello: :-D
Jello: then the fanfiction
Jello: like that bit about the Inferno
Jello: it's arguably better written than the canon
Jello: but it's just by some dude name Dante.

For frak's sake Angewandte, ENOUGH with the puns. "TB or not TB"? Just when I think you've used every possible variation on that joke, you find an even worse variation.

QotD

My little brother, on Twilight:
Brian: I mean come on, STALKING'S SEXY NOW!
Brian: LET'S GET THE NIGHT VISION GOGGLES GUYS!



Also, my seminar is DONE! Everyone keeps telling me I did well. I didn't stare blankly at any of the questions! Not even the one from completely out of left field!

I must say "too much junk in the trunk" is not a rationale I've seen before for why SN2 reactions don't go at tertiary carbons. My usual way of explaining it is "it's too squishy".

The word squishy gets used a lot in mechanism discussions. Certainly more often than the word bendy, which also comes up from time to time. And good old "hates its life".

Also...




It's such a shame John Barrowman is so shy, eh?

(The boxers are currently at 2050 pounds. :p)

UPS is such an adventure. I did most of my Christmas shopping at ThinkGeek.com (you know, the way all normal people do, right?). So that means customs, so they can't just drop the package off, someone needs to pay the fees.

And yet they do their deliveries when most people are at, y'know, work. :p Once Paul found the note they left (it fell off the door), I got to go scramble to tell them to hold it at the depot for me to pick up in person. Naturally the depot is only open from 5-6:30. Oh well, I usually get Ryan to pick me up from work lately anyway.

I also had a fun adventure with this week's crystallography assignment. Which consisted of... solving the crystal structure manually. When there were more peaks than atoms. But I did it!

Glee is a leads episode. I'm not as keen on leads episodes.

You know, the transit union swearing that they don't want to interfere with students' ability to complete their academic requirements or compromise their safety would mean a lot more if it wasn't blatantly obvious that that's what's going to happen now that they're on strike. Words, words, words, full of sound and fury and signifying nothing. If they really didn't mean us any harm, they wouldn't be leaving us to walk carrying god knows how much in *glances out window* all sorts of weather.

Thanks for nothing, LTC. I just hope the weather stays merely dreary.

So, we kept getting sidetracked at group meeting yesterday when I was practicing my seminar by pronunciation. I'm talking about polymer vesicles, and I commented that I was going to endeavour to say veh-sicle instead of vee-sicle.

That's when Kim asked what was wrong with vee-sicle. And I said the rest of the group had been making fun of me for two weeks over it.

So naturally I'm putting it to an LJ poll!

Poll #1484668 Vesicles!
Open to: All, detailed results viewable to: All, participants: 28

How do you pronounce vesicle?

No poll is complete without...

I have a desk! It is desky and wonderful and holds my computer! I also found a backpack that can hold my laptop. It was a little pricier than I would have liked for a purchase I'm making under duress, but I don't exactly have a choice. The laptop is three kilograms and the buses go on strike next Monday. (Remind me again why they're allowed to do that? The people who are counting on transit to get to work or school don't control the contract, and we're the ones getting screwed over. That's just not fair.) Even with a backpack, there's no way carrying it to campus (about a forty minute walk when not weighed down) is going to even come close to not sucking.

Also, I totally never posted pictures of our Halloween costumes!

( So I shall remedy that )

You know what's awesome? Dishwashers. I used ours for the first time last night. I have CLEAN BOWLS without having to scrub! I pushed a button and walked away and the dishes did themselves. This is the GREATEST THING EVER!

Not so great? A screw popping out of my glasses. So first I had to find my repair kit. Then I had to use the tiny screwdriver with the bitty screw. Without my glasses. Yep, this is brilliant. :p

Also, the Halloween Buffy ripoff event in Glaxcin is awesome. Any even that makes Admiral Bill Adama say "Arr, there be no crackers in this here cell" is made of win. :p

So, I bought The Plan last Tuesday. Today I finally watched it. :p

( And thus there are spoilers )

We are in the new place! It was... quite the adventure. Ryan left to get the UHaul at 7:30 AM because we only had it from 8 until noon. The depot is downtown, so half an hour seemed wisest. Paul and Jiacheng arrived at eight and we started carrying furniture into the lobby while we waited for Ryan. Around 8:20 there was a call to Ryan's cellphone, but it was packed and we couldn't find it. Around 8:30 I started to wonder where Ryan was. We tried calling the depot but they kept not answering... and then the battery on the cellphone ran out. Paul and Jiacheng took a load of boxes to Laura's (the new place) in Paul's car while I continued trying to contact the depot. By the time they got back it was almost nine and I was starting to worry Ryan had gotten into an accident or something. Paul went off to try to borrow his parents' minivan.

Ryan showed up at nine, explaining that the guy at the depot was half an hour late showing up because he... overslept. And no, we didn't get a half hour extension on the UHaul rental.

Fortunately, those boys are AMAZING and we managed to get everything done in time. We wound up setting it up so that they would drive the UHaul to Laura's and unload everything onto the main floor except bedroom furniture that definitely went upstairs. We managed to get the UHaul back to the depot on the stroke of noon. We totally owe those boys pizza, there's no WAY we could have done it without them. Especially since heavy lifting and I don't get along.

There were still a few things left to bring over in the car after we returned the UHaul, and of course I had to clean the apartment once it was empty. But that didn't take too long. We got the last load, including one terrified kitty in at two... exactly when the phone/internet/cable guy showed up.

As for the state of unpacking... the kitchen is more or less unpacked, the bathroom is more or less unpacked and the computer network is up and running. Our priorities are very much in order. I'm currently sitting on the floor, but I have internet! Books/DVDs and clothing are staying in boxes/suitcases until we decide where we want the furniture. :p

Trufa'ax.

It took hours and I hit my thumb with a hammer more times than I care to count (there was a big purple bump. Then I hit it again and it started bleeding :p), but my Halloween costume now laces up!

And the cat decided that the ribbon was a toy. :p

QotD

Tess: also, man, the voices in my head freaked me out the first time I heard them


She really ought to know better than to say things like that. They always get quoted out of context!

Happy Mole Day everyone!