We're leaving again for Key Largo on Sunday (at 5am!) to tear down an old experiment. 9 people in 2 vehicles and in a 2-bedroom apartment. I need some serious prayer for sanity and good relationships with people because that is not an all-encompassing definition of "environment where I do not thrive", but it is certainly close. I'll also be more tired than most of them because - hooray!! - my advisor's letting me finish up some work there that I started last year, so I can work on wrapping that up and publishing it and it should end up being a thesis chapter. I'm very much looking forward to finishing something for once with my research.
It's been a long week, and I'm exhausted (I think I've been in the lab past 11pm at least 3-4 out of the last 14 days? And lots of things going wrong), but I should be ready to go on this trip, and it's Friday, which means I need to find things to rejoice about.
1) I made a sweet penetrometer yesterday with the help of a friend in mechanical engineering. I can't find any pictures online, but it's basically a tool to measure leaf "toughness" (not a physicist's "toughness"...it's a combination of a few forces...if done better could measure real forces), made of two plates bolted together with a leaf sandwiched in the middle. There's a small hole going through the middle of the two plates over which the leaf is centered. You take a cup with a needle glued perpindicular to the bottom (cup faces up, needle faces down), put it in the hole resting on the leaf, then fill it with water, sand, (in my case, lead shot) until the needle pierces through the leaf. So it's a relative measure of "how hard is it to pierce the leaf. Using this for my research. Made it out of thick plexiglas plates I ordered, and a friend helped me drill it out. It's about the most professional-looking penetrometer I've seen (though I've admittedly seen few simple ones like this), and the see through plexiglas looks awesome with a leaf/seaweed in it and at angles things look all distorted and it's just great.
2) Women's Bible study started again. Though I won't get to go as much as I'd like, I'm very excited to have community and study again where I feel safe and fed.
3) I'm super thankful for labmates who offer to help me even though my head's spinning so fast I can't think and probably am not pleasant to be around, there's no reason for them to help me, and I'm not even around for the helping (I had to go to Bible study and someone offered to pack for the trip for me and watched one of my chemical things I had going on, and then someone who was going to Home Depot found things I needed but didn't even know exactly what I was looking for). It's very calming and a good foundation for good relationships on a stressful trip (reminds me that I can't be judgmental & tired & grouchy all the time because it's never warranted).
4) This week was stressful because I didn't know if I'd even have the permit necessary to do my work in Florida; finally found out this afternoon that it'll likely come in early next week. This is very good news.
5) My old roommate is back in town for a brief visit. Huzzah!! I'm really enjoying hanging out with her.
Friday, August 27, 2010
Thursday, August 19, 2010
Not-quite-Friday-5
I haven't posted on here in a looong, looong, time. I don't know that anyone will even read this now - If someone posts anew on the internet, and no one's around to see it, does it even exist? But I'm going to pretend, for a few weeks at least.
The last year+ has been insane. Lots of travel & lots of work, mixed with passing my qualifying exams and some good but tough spiritual refining, though more in the midst of the latter (and therefore feeling backsliding) than seeing its end product.
But that's not the point of this post. Talking to a dear friend earlier this week reminded me that my perspective (& relationship with the God who's more in control & loving than I think) will likely improve if I start focusing on "what's going good" instead of what's going poorly. She also does this Friday Fave Five thing (http://www.jaeyde.blogspot.com/) and I'm thinking maybe it'd be a good thing to start as well, so I HAVE to look for good things throughout the week. Though I may not stick to Fridays, 'cause, well...I don't want to today.
So the good things from this week:
1. The most AMAZING honeydew melon I've ever eaten. Oh. my. goodness. Honeydew's usually the kinda bland, overly sweet, unsettling-'cause-it's-green melon that's only used in fruit salads and Bath & Body Works products. But this week the grocery store had King of the West Honeydews on sale, and I'd even put off eating it for a few days because I wasn't super excited, but I had some tonight and it was deeeeeelicious. Best melon I've ever eaten, the first time in quite a while that I've really really really enjoyed what I was eating (probably first time since papaya + lime in Fiji). So good, I wish I could post some on here that you could taste.
2. I got to hang out with friends a bit this week; lunch with a friend from church, and then today taking a semi-boring research ethics course with friends from the department (mandatory course). It was nice with the friend from church to find she's struggling in some of the same ways with connecting at our church, and just talk in a meaningful way with someone here in Atlanta. Meaningful conversation seems hard to come by, though occassional phone calls with college/camp friends helps that a lot. And then hanging out with friends today (& tomorrow) during class helped with a bit of the loneliness I've been dealing with lately post-Fiji.
3. Because I was sitting still in a very chilly classroom today, I got to wear jeans and my purple high-top chucks. Just a little it-made-my-day thing :)
4. Similarly, it's been slightly cooler the last couple of days because the sun's been hiding a little bit more. So nice! Can't wait for good sleeping weather in a month!
5. My parents are awesome. A problem came up last night with roommate logistics (not terrible in and of itself...but the last straw of a pile of small things that have been breaking me down lately)...and my parents fielded a very tearful phone call home, helped me think things through a little and calm down, and offered to help with it however they could. I feel a little stupid being not-totally-independent at my age...but I'm very thankful for how great my parents are. There may be a feasible solution to this problem, too, at least in the short term...we'll see.
That's 5! Maybe tomorrow God will give me a cool bug to play with to round out the week :) (here's hoping!)
The last year+ has been insane. Lots of travel & lots of work, mixed with passing my qualifying exams and some good but tough spiritual refining, though more in the midst of the latter (and therefore feeling backsliding) than seeing its end product.
But that's not the point of this post. Talking to a dear friend earlier this week reminded me that my perspective (& relationship with the God who's more in control & loving than I think) will likely improve if I start focusing on "what's going good" instead of what's going poorly. She also does this Friday Fave Five thing (http://www.jaeyde.blogspot.com/) and I'm thinking maybe it'd be a good thing to start as well, so I HAVE to look for good things throughout the week. Though I may not stick to Fridays, 'cause, well...I don't want to today.
So the good things from this week:
1. The most AMAZING honeydew melon I've ever eaten. Oh. my. goodness. Honeydew's usually the kinda bland, overly sweet, unsettling-'cause-it's-green melon that's only used in fruit salads and Bath & Body Works products. But this week the grocery store had King of the West Honeydews on sale, and I'd even put off eating it for a few days because I wasn't super excited, but I had some tonight and it was deeeeeelicious. Best melon I've ever eaten, the first time in quite a while that I've really really really enjoyed what I was eating (probably first time since papaya + lime in Fiji). So good, I wish I could post some on here that you could taste.
2. I got to hang out with friends a bit this week; lunch with a friend from church, and then today taking a semi-boring research ethics course with friends from the department (mandatory course). It was nice with the friend from church to find she's struggling in some of the same ways with connecting at our church, and just talk in a meaningful way with someone here in Atlanta. Meaningful conversation seems hard to come by, though occassional phone calls with college/camp friends helps that a lot. And then hanging out with friends today (& tomorrow) during class helped with a bit of the loneliness I've been dealing with lately post-Fiji.
3. Because I was sitting still in a very chilly classroom today, I got to wear jeans and my purple high-top chucks. Just a little it-made-my-day thing :)
4. Similarly, it's been slightly cooler the last couple of days because the sun's been hiding a little bit more. So nice! Can't wait for good sleeping weather in a month!
5. My parents are awesome. A problem came up last night with roommate logistics (not terrible in and of itself...but the last straw of a pile of small things that have been breaking me down lately)...and my parents fielded a very tearful phone call home, helped me think things through a little and calm down, and offered to help with it however they could. I feel a little stupid being not-totally-independent at my age...but I'm very thankful for how great my parents are. There may be a feasible solution to this problem, too, at least in the short term...we'll see.
That's 5! Maybe tomorrow God will give me a cool bug to play with to round out the week :) (here's hoping!)
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