Finals are over!

My Meteorology final was last Friday, so for this week that left Physics, Calculus II, and Computer Programming. Physics was Monday night from 5:15-7:30pm. I am not a night person. By that time I'm usually getting ready for bed. I've also had a cold.

I packed a sensible lunch to eat just before my final and headed off to school to get settled before the test. When I got to campus I realized I had left my lunch on the couch. Booo!!!

More than anything else, food is my most important value. More than good studying, more than a good cheat card of notes, more than coffee. Food is most important. More than sleep really. I would have to get Jamba Juice and hope for the best.

Also I have a cold.

I took Sudafed, Tylenol, and Motrin and headed off to the Jamba Juice on campus. I had two tissues in my pocket. After ordering a smoothie with whole grain boost (more filling), I turned around and eyed the Peet's Coffee behind me. Sure, why not? I ordered a double shot of espresso while I waited for my smoothie.

Off I headed through the rain to my Physics exam. I slurped the smoothie as I waited for my espresso to cool, downed the espresso and continued on the smoothie. Finished it off, peed for the last time before the exam and settled in.

Not even halfway through the exam my tissues were used up and unable to be re-used. It was cold in there, so I had a jacket on and therefore could not access my sleeves. Ugh. I sniffled out of control until the end of the exam.

I went home, blew my nose, had dinner and took a hot bath. I splashed the hot water on my face to soothe my sinuses and said loudly "Mushy brain, mushy brain! Ugh!"

And then remembered how thin my walls are. I wonder what my neighbors think of me sometimes.

Tuesday I was off. I went to the gym and came home to tackle studying for Calculus and Programming. They would be back to back Wednesday morning, starting with a 2 hour calculus exam and then on to a 2 hour programming exam.

My friend in the other section of calculus texted me after he had taken the exam and told me it was on rocket science. The whole thing. I'm a spaceman with a rocket ship. Ready go. Crap.

I studied as much as I could of the other stuff we were supposed to know, made an epic cheat sheet and left room on there for rocket science.

I googled calculus and rocket science. I pulled up NASA's webpage and a couple others and proceeded to dive into a crash course on rocket propulsion. Exhaust velocity, thrust, varying masses, air drag. Just to name a few. I walked through their equations on a launch as well as flying a rocket at constant velocity on earth and then in space. I put the equations on to my cheat sheet and then attempted to study for Programming.

Nope.

Wasn't going to happen. Oh well. Tomorrow morning.

I got a good lunch all pulled together and went to bed.

I got up this morning and studied for Programming, ate a good breakfast, packed my lunch (and remembered to bring it with me). I was prepared. I had a protein shake, a pear, rice and beans, sweet potato with cottage cheese, cheese curds for if I needed a snack during the calc exam, a small thermos of coffee, a bottle of water, a roll of toilet paper for my nose, a small bag to throw used toilet paper in, my calculator, cheat sheets, pencils, erasers, and an attitude that at this point, I have done what I can. I can do no more.

I took no Sudafed, only Tylenol and Motrin. I didn't need to unnecessarily get my nose going. It's already raw.

No joke. The calc test was on rocket science. How did I do? Who knows. Here's the interesting thing about my calculus class. No one knows where they're at. The average test grades for both mid terms were F's. Apparently he grades on a large curve. I also failed both mid-terms, but the second one I didn't fail as badly as most people, which is the important part. Just gotta stay ahead of that curve.

I finished the exam 20 minutes early which gave me plenty of time to eat and pee before my next exam. The girls were happy to see me walk in as they all wanted my notecard to copy-which was crappy anyway. I talked them through a few examples I had written down. I downed some coffee, blew my nose, set up snacks, tissue and my trash bag around my desk.

Off we went. We had a written part that was slightly more challenging than I expected. Then we had a programming part. Parenthesis got the best of me today. In two different programs I struggled and tried to work around errors. In the second program there was no working around it. Something was wrong with my code and it wouldn't run. Why can't the operands be used for this case?!

The computer likes to give vague errors for your program but not any suggestions on how to fix it. The instructor announced there were ten minutes left. And I had no idea how to get my code to run.

Aaarrghh!!!!! I wanted to yell. I was so frustrated.

I clicked back and forth between different codes.

Then....

Wait....

How many parenthesis are there....

Oh geez. I added a couple more and it fixed everything. My plot popped up and I almost yelled out loud. I may have jumped silently in my seat, I don't remember. I made a legend, saved it, and copied it to my instructor's folder.

Now I'm home. I've taken out the trash. Beside me sits a cup of hot chocolate with a few shots if Irish Cream in it. We get our grades on Christmas Eve. Nice. That's when I will know whether or not I failed calculus. Great Christmas present.

Finals Week

Finals week is in full bloom...even though it's Sunday. I survived one final already- Meteorology was on Friday. I'm now attempting to write our final essay where I describe how the different sections of the class has enhanced my knowledge of climate change. There were three sections basically and I have to say that the second section did not enhance my knowledge of much at all. Mostly because I didn't understand it. What happened during that time is somewhat of a blur to me. I know the topic was thermodynamics, but that's about all I can say on that.

I'm trying to get over a wicked cold I've had for a week now. I feel like it's coming to an end but the sinuses are still bugging me, and since I wore my retainer last night for the first time in weeks, I can't tell where the sinus pain ends and the teeth pain starts. The tylenol is starting to kick in, although something happened during a neti-pot session and now my ear hurts.

My foot is still giving me trouble after taking a week off running and then trying to ease back into it. My January marathon is now up in the air. Time to get back on the bike.

I have a Physics final tomorrow. My Calculus and Computer Programming finals are back to back on Wednesday. Wednesday afternoon I will come home, curl up in a ball on the floor, and have a nervous breakdown. I think if you make time in your schedule for such things, you're less likely to have one randomly, say in the middle of a calculus final.

I might also consume a large amount of sweets before and during that time. Nothing comforts tragedy quite like 12 servings of brownies in one sitting.

Resting

A ball of Trader Joe's pizza dough is sitting on the counter in my kitchen, "resting", as if it had a hard day. I can almost guarantee it did not. Per instructions, I very gently removed it from the bag and laid it on a lightly floured surface (my cutting board that I actually need right now) to "rest".

I've always been squeamish of yeast. Plenty of people use it and some of them do so successfully. But I've heard a lot about how picky yeast can be so I've made it a rule to just stay away from it. Judging from Jason's reaction to my homemade pizza crust without yeast (whole wheat no less), it's time to ease into a life of yeast. What better way than with a pre-made dough that I hold no responsibility for except to ensure it receives adequate rest and massaging. Sounds fairly prissy to me.

I have a week left of regular class meetings and then on to finals. I have never longed so badly for finals week in my entire life. I crave it. I dream about it. It's all I can think about. We're still getting new information thrown at us but all I can think about is my study plan for finals.

Today I had a crazy craving for sweets (what's new?) and managed to make it through Sprouts without buying any. But I had to stop by Trader Joe's for pizza dough and knew I was doomed. All in all I think it could've been worse. I don't know how many of you have been in a Trader Joe's but there is so much scrumptious stuff in there that is very hard to resist. The worst I came out with was a container of "Smashing Smores". Little bite size chocolate covered smores bits. Yum!

Tonight I'm catching up on all the cooking and food prep I did not do this weekend since Jason and I were in San Diego. Also laundry. And homework. Which of course is why I'm blogging. So I can procrastinate everything else.

My apartment will be so incredibly clean come finals week.....and then so incredibly filthy the week after.

Weather

Weather has such a big impact on my moods. I often wonder how anyone else gets anything accomplished on gloomy days or when the days get shorter. Doesn't anyone else want to just hibernate all winter?

I'm not even in that much of a winter area these days. Although, the other morning it was 44 degrees and I had to go out in it. It was awful.

Today it's rainy and I'm pretty much done with being productive. I just want to lay around and do nothing. Thankfully my workout is done for the day, but unfortunately, my homework is not. Ugh.

Forget being a meteorologist, I want to be a groundhog.

Crawl out of my hole, look around, if I don't like what I see I'll just crawl back in until it's a more pleasant day. People can feed me and parade me around on tv. I like it.

This morning I found myself driving to the gym, staring through the darkness at the street lights and wondering how on earth I got myself there. I didn't want to go, but there I was, halfway to the gym with a green light in front of me. Amazing.

I warmed up on the stationary bike and then went over to the squat rack. I moved some things around so I could do step-ups. Then I switched to straight legged dead-lifts. Bah, I'm not going to do squats. I'm kinda over it.

Next thing I knew I was doing squats.

I normally do abs on upper body days, so I figured I was off the hook today.

You only ran yesterday. You didn't go to the gym and you didn't do abs. And you ate a ton of cookies at the seminar yesterday.

And then I was doing abs.

I've come to realize that I'm that girl that goes to seminars where they serve a couple snacks of chips, cookies, fruit, cheese and crackers....where everyone puts a couple little tid-bits on their plate.... and mine is full like I'm at an all-you- can-eat buffet. I sat down with my plate next to my friend.

"Dang!" she exclaimed.

Maybe I have a problem. Anyway, I was hungry. I was just coming out of calculus and my lunch was upstairs, and we had a guy from the National Weather Service giving a talk on the forecasting challenges in California. If his presentation from a couple weeks ago for the career panel seminar was any indication, we would not be getting out of there in the allotted hour. I needed food.

So in any case, today I'm pretty burned out on pretty much everything. After the gym I was moseying around the kitchen, making breakfast, thinking of maybe showering, maybe having some more coffee....I looked at the coffee pot and realized- holy crap I have class this morning! No time to shower. Eat and go.

We have a break in between a couple classes and I usually get some work done during that time. Not today. Not interested. Over it.

Today was laundry day. Almost at emergency rations here. Nope. Not happening either.

Sooooo much homework......nope.

Couch and a blankie it is. Goodness. I hope this disappears by finals. 

Caffeinated. And other not so short stories.

Sometimes I'm hesitant to pick up my computer since it seems these days all I do is sit at a computer. Such is my new life though. I'm one of those now. But I cherish the times I can pick up my computer and speak English to it, and "use my words" as opposed to code. Sometimes I don't want to have to tell my computer that for i in arange(len(x)/4): N.mean([T,0]).

I was just laying on my living room floor as I like to do sometimes to gain perspective. Try it some time. Just lay down on the floor. No pillows or anything. Maybe because it grounds me, I don't know. When I'm doing a homework problem I just can't get a handle on, I pull my notebook down to the floor and it's solved within minutes. When life throws more at me than I feel able to handle, I lay on the floor and stare at the ceiling. Straightens me right out.

Today I noticed that I've been talking to myself out loud in public a little more than usual. I think talking to one's self is fairly normal, but for some reason society has deemed it unacceptable in public. Call me crazy, but...well actually you might call me crazy. I think it's the stress.

Tuesday was just one small incident. Not a big deal really, but it started me thinking.

I was overwhelmed. I took a horrible, terrible, nightmarish calculus exam on Monday and then had a surprise quiz Tuesday morning. My headlight decided to pick that day to burn out. I had to pick up a prescription at Rite Aid so I figured after that I'd go in search of an auto parts store.

As I pulled into the Rite Aid parking lot, I saw an O'Reilly's Auto Parts sign. It was in the same exact parking lot!

"The gods are smiling down on me!" I shouted.

Oops. I looked around. I'd like to think no one heard. But what on earth was that?

Also noted was the very small amount of luck that made such a huge difference in my day. I was having that kind of week where any tiny amount of help from the gods was just a brilliant light at the end of a long dark tunnel (maybe from an oncoming train?).

I got my prescription and my headlight and went home and installed the thing. A little tricky but no big deal. Trying to shove a headlight and hands into a tiny area was slightly challenging, but I did it and it worked. Time to study for the next day's physics exam and get some of my meteorology homework done.

Yesterday I woke up at 4:30am, went to the gym and did leg weights and then went for a 5 mile run. I showered, ate, packed my lunch and headed off to school. I finished my notecard for my physics test and did some more studying. Off I went to calculus.

I had to leave calculus early to go to a career panel seminar in the meteorology department. That was almost two hours long. I went back upstairs to my new office to finish my meteorology homework before my physics exam. I didn't quite get it done and the calculations were getting scary.

My physics exam was even scarier. A bullet of mass m is fired into a steel block of mass M and remains embedded and they both slide 6 meters. The coefficient of kinetic friction between the block and the table is .200. What was the bullet's initial velocity?

I remembered doing a problem like that for homework but I'm pretty sure it involved more information. In any case, I think I got halfway to solving it. I found the velocity of the block upon being hit by (and joining with) the bullet but didn't realize that that was what I got. I guess after that I had to repeat my cycle of knowledge and logic and find the speed of the bullet before it hit the block. Bah. Anyway.

However, it turns out that if the potential energy (U) for a pair of atoms is (a/r)-(b/r^2) where r is their separation, then it can be said that those atoms repel each other. So that's good.

I was so exhausted coming home from my physics exam, but I still had work to do.

I got home and pulled out my homework and as I stared down out the equations for calculating vapor pressure and dew point temperatures, my eyes watered and burned. I couldn't keep them open. I went to bed and decided to cancel my workout for this morning so I could get to school early and finish my homework.

4:30am came early this morning. My coffee pot gurgled and sputtered as I tried to pry my eyes open and pull myself out of bed. I grabbed a cup, put it on my end table and curled up under the blankets, waiting for it to cool down enough to drink. I had two cups and managed to get to my office/school before 7am. We were low on water for coffee. I went two floors down and hauled a large jug of water up two flights of stairs and started a pot.

I managed to finish my meteorology homework and entered class just before 9 am partway through my 5th cup of coffee. I thought about Debbie's old blog "It's a Three Cup Day".  I should change mine to "It's a 12 cup day."

About halfway through cup 5 I decided I should not have any more coffee. But I didn't want it to spill and I'm pretty sure it's a crime to dump coffee, so I downed it while furiously scribbling notes on adiabatic lapse rates.

Then our meteorology lab started. I knew there were leftover cupcakes in the grad room (I forgot how awesome cupcakes taste! I love sugar!!!). I kept dreaming of them. I tried to grasp the difference between mid latitude and tropical cyclones while my body tried to handle too much caffeine and fatigue.

Cupcaaakes.......

I kept taking notes. A couple of the girls fell behind in the notes and the instructor had to repeat them. I already had them down. I was highly caffeinated. Now would be a good time to go get that whole thing of cupcakes and bring them in for everyone. Most of the people in the class are undergrads who are afraid to venture into the grad room.

I turned in my chair to eyeball the door. One of the guys had snuck out and was coming back in with a cupcake.

"Seriously?" I said. "You didn't bring any for everyone else?"

The whole class turned around and gave him hell. Suddenly all anyone could think about was cupcakes. Who could focus on warm and cold core lows when this was going on? I stood up and started walking out. One of the girls leaned over and grabbed my arm.

"Are you really going? Are you?" She raised her eyebrows a couple times. "Are you bringing some back for the rest of us? Really?"

I think we were all a little strung out. Most of us are also in the same physics and calculus classes together. A couple hours earlier they had stared blankly at me while I tried to explain how I had gotten the answer to one of the homework problems.

I came back in the room with a box of cupcakes and two boxes of cookies. I put them down in front of the pre-diabetic guy. Oops. Everyone dug in and he asked how they tasted.

Back to cyclones. Three of us girls huddled around a computer now high on caffeine and sugar, watching the paths of cyclones and computing the energy they put out just from latent heat of condensation alone. More than some Soviet bomb that happened some time ago.

But then there was Katrina and Catarina and we were supposed to compare them. Apparently our excited buzzing about which hurricanes or cyclones we were supposed to be comparing was drawing a lot of attention. All three of us were so out of it we didn't even notice.

"Wait, who are we comparing?"

"George and Isabel."

"We didn't see Isabel."

"Yes we did, back at the beginning, look."

"No, that was Wilma."

"No, it's Isabel. Look....oh wait. Hmm. That's Wilma."

"So we're comparing George and Wilma."

"I think we're supposed to get it out of the text."

"What text?"

"George and Katrina."

"Wait, what was that video on?"

"That was George."

"Hmmm...wait, let's see what it says right here. Hmm...comparing side by side."

I should note at this point we had been staring at two cyclones sitting side by side on our computer screens for quite some time now. None of us picked up on the fact that what we were supposed to be comparing were literally staring us straight in the face.

"Hey, look at this! What is this?" I clicked on the photo of Katrina. I clicked on the photo of Catarina. "Look! Catarina, Katrina, Catarina, Katrina, Catarina, Katrina (as I clicked back and forth between the tabs, highly fascinated). This one says Katrina, but this one says Catarina. Is that a typo? Look at that."

"That's two different cyclones I think."

"Really? Oh, that's dumb. Who would give names like that?"

We stared at the screen a little longer.

"Comparing side by side. Hey, I think we're supposed to compare these two....let's see....oh yeah! It says so right here. Compare Catarina and Katrina!"

We turned around when we heard chuckling behind us. Two instructors and the rest of the class were all sitting, listening and observing. We might have been pretty loud. We were pretty spun up.

We finished the lab and I set about trying to pick my classes for next semester (or rather which sections of my classes to take as my classes are decided for me). My meteorology classes are set in stone and I have to figure out how to fit physics and calculus around those.

Ahhh....tricky situation though as calculus III (yeah, the third semester of calculus if I ever get through this one) only has 8 sections, 3 of which are out of the question because they butt up with meteorology (you know what? It sucks trying to spell meteorology all the time....from hence forth it shall be MET and you will either understand it or you will not. I quit. Right now.....anyway) classes.

The calculus classes are filling up already and as a grad student I can't add an undergrad class until the first day of classes when they're all full anyway.... unless I can schmooze an add code from an instructor. Turns out I can do it for physics. It has yet to work for the math department. Jerks.

I came crashing down from my coffee/sugar high about the same time that I realized there's a possibility that I won't be able to get the classes I need due to some retarded rule no one has bothered to fix.

I went up to my desk upstairs to sulk over my salad for awhile.

And....as it turns out, when you replace a headlight on your vehicle, you're not supposed to touch the glass with your hands. I guess the oils on your hands heat up more than the glass, which causes the glass to heat up unusually...which causes the damn bulb inside to explode. Who designs these things and why is this warning not printed on the box? Seriously?

So I replaced the headlight again today....

I started this blog to discuss my talking to myself in public habit and apparently got off topic. Today I caught myself having a full on conversation out loud up in the lab, which fortunately I was the only one there. The thing is, when I'm in these little, well, I don't know...moments? I just don't even realize I'm doing it until I snap out of it and realize I'm doing it out loud. It's not just in my head anymore. Should've stopped the voices while they were still in my head, "harmless".

Yesterday walking to my physics test I was kind of doing it but not really out loud....except that I was making all the facial expressions (and possibly hand motions) of being in a conversation. My eyes focused on a girl coming at me who was looking right at me. Shit. I smiled and said hi, she smiled back.

Eeek. I wondered how much she saw. I also wonder how much the 200 other people walking by me in between classes saw. How is this happening? Am I schizophrenic? And now that I think about it, does the "phrenic" part of schizophrenic have anything to do with the phrenic nerve? Hmmm....is there a phrenic nerve or am I making this up?

Oooh! Ha! There is a phrenic nerve. Googled it. It's important. It's in your cervical spine. Keeps you breathing. Probably has nothing to do with schizophrenia.

I had so much studying to do today when I got home from class......

Nope.

It's almost Friday. I need to breathe.

Wednesday Ramblings

Once again, the reason you all are hearing from me is because I have a ton of studying to do and have learned ways to distract myself from doing so. Apparently something is going well with the World Series...or the gangs of San Jose are rising up. Why not? Tonight is just a good a night as any for a gang uprising I suppose.

Anyway, so here's the news:

I have moved my office from the grad room to the lab on the 8th floor. Now that I spend a lot more time on campus trying to study, I have come to realize that other than the wee hours of the morning and the late hours of the night, the grad room can become very loud and distracting. I am not getting any studying done in there.

So here's my new desk.

It came complete with plenty of sunshine and half a bottle of Tennessee Whiskey. What a deal!

Also, the other morning I took these photos from the roof of the lab as the sun was coming up:

Oooh, aahhh.

Anyway, where was I?

So the lab is a nice quiet place to study. Not a whole lot of distractions. The only thing is that the nearest bathroom is two floors down a tower-like stairwell (no elevator). I guess it's good exercise.

There's also an issue with not being able to close the blinds (it's complicated) but I got two of them closed today, and they're actually adjustable. The other one that I'd really like to close is a bit more of a problem.

Computer programming is suddenly going ok, but actually no different than before. Sometimes my code works and I'm not sure why, and other times it doesn't work and I'm not sure why. Right now apparently my latest code works beautifully in a parallel universe, but I am not in that universe. I can't get it to run but my instructor can (and all you do is hit "run" strangely enough). She says it's beautiful. When I hit run I get an ugly red code that starts with "Warning!" and then some other gibberish I can't understand. That's a new error message to me. I should compile these error messages and make a little booklet. Terms of endearment as said by my computer. Like a couple weeks ago when it was lining out its expectations of me. Complete and utter baloney.

So somewhere out there, my computer code works which I suppose is a good thing.

Last night I went to bed, unable to get my code to work (in case you're wondering, computer code is all the things behind the scenes that our computers do in order to make all this stuff we want to see work) and had crazy frustrating dreams about trying different codes. I woke up around midnight with a couple ideas of how to make the code work. I got up and jotted them down, then went pee. This is where bad went to worse.

My eyeballs felt sticky. I realized I had forgotten to take my contacts out. I guess in my attempt to grab the contact case, I somehow knocked it into the toilet...that I had not flushed. I had to fish it out. Thankfully I was with it enough to remember exactly where another case was and tossed out the other one. I don't remember whether or not I washed my hands.

So tomorrow I have to figure out what is up with (or not up with) my code, take a quiz, go to a few classes, and study for next weeks Calculus and Physics exams. It's almost Friday. I can make it.

The Storm With No Name

Now that I am good and liquored up, I feel ok to talk about my day with you. It's been a little rough. But I have noticed that lowering my expectations helps a little with having days. We all have days. Lower your expectations of said day, and it actually turns out ok.

Today was the midterm for my computer programming for atmospheric sciences, or whatever the hell it's called. I actually do not know what the class is called except METR50. I was actually pretty excited to take this class and to learn computer programming. In general I am excited to become smart. Smart is cool, smart is fun. You draw weird squiggly lines and Greek letters on paper with or without numbers, you "write code" on a computer. You know what a derivative and an integral are. I mean, how cool, right?

Enter METR50 to put me in my place.

I'm no longer a fan of METR50 (computer programming). I still would love to be a great computer programmer. Write my own programs, debug existing programs, yadda yadda. Just not by way of this class. This class blows. Whether or not that phrase sounds intelligent, it is, alas, true.

I had no great expectations for today's midterm. As a matter of fact, I just assumed the entire class would fail it and we'd have some spectacular grading curve that landed me with a C. Awesome. I didn't even know how to study for this thing. We would have a written part, worth 60% of the grade that would be much like our quizzes that everyone keeps failing (including me) and then a programming part worth 40% where we would write code (computer code, in computer language, to make the computer do stuff)...which everyone has been doing semi-ok at, given that we're given a lab with a task and not taught how to do it...and then we're staring down a cursor on a black computer screen that only replies in sarcastic tone, saying things like "Syntax error" or "Float encountered when integer was expected".

Excuse me for a minute here. But who is the computer to "expect" anything? That damn thing can't anticipate my needs! It can't read my mind! If it could, this class wouldn't be the lowest grade this semester. I don't give a damn what you were expecting, if I give you a damn float, I expect you to take it and say thank you ma'am!

For crying out loud. Who does this computer think he is? You'll take what I give you and you will like it.

What does this have to do with a storm? I'll get there. There was damage in my apartment. Today.

Anyway, so I anticipated doing poorly on the written part of this test but figured I could pull it together in the actual programming portion.

And of course the written part stunk. What will the following code produce? Blah blah blah.....? What? How the hell should I know? I don't speak Python!! Ugh, anyway, totally expected. Let it go. On to the programming portion.

I did well for the first part. Now that I've had a full bottle of sake I have no recollection of what the first part was, but whatever.

The second part though. The second part was a nightmare. It was open book for the programming part, as well as open note, and open internet. But really, when asked to write a program that will calculate the atmospheric pressure at a certain altitude given a surface pressure, and then have that program print out a table (neat, in line table) of your altitude versus your pressure... I just don't even know where to start in asking Google or Jeeves or Yahoo or whoever the hell might be willing to help me on my midterm.

I typed in the function and confirmed it would give me an output. Check.

Now I had to get that function to loop through over 50 different altitudes without me typing in those altitudes, and give me an atmospheric pressure for each of those altitudes in a neat table.

What did it give me?

"Syntax error"

"Float encountered, integer expected"

Like I said, I don't care what the hell you expected, I gave you a float and I expect you to work with a float. Damnitt. 

"5000 data-blogger-escaped-1x089045ksjdfn.="" data-blogger-escaped-at="" data-blogger-escaped-function="" data-blogger-escaped-p="" data-blogger-escaped-pressure="  What? Really?

I looked at the clock. I had 2 more hours to figure this last problem out. But time wasn't the problem. The problem was I had no idea how to tackle this. I scanned my notes. I flipped half heartedly through the stack of books at my desk. I had to pee. Bad. Should I give up? No way. I can figure this out in 2 hours.

I asked for permission to leave to pee. Granted. I came back with slightly (ok, not really) more hope.

People around me sighed in frustration. The girl a few seats over dropped her head onto her desk. I had had several cookies and brownies and a few gulps of coffee before this exam. I tried a few more things. I tried a FOR loop and a WHILE loop. I tried for n in range (0,5100, 100). I tried return this and return that. In return I got:

5000 [834832.,m 9030u53ioj5 opiu390u5iojf vpwiuiowjflm e u3msv kjkioewutu qwpu903259 -93589-  858 835-98-885-   8 85858- -85-8 85-8358-358   85-24=09-68 ]
..........or something very similar.

I got error after error. I was collapsing. I buried my face in my hands. My eyes filled with tears. Yes. I am a grown woman and an exam was bringing me to tears. Literally.

I pulled another book out and flipped absentmindedly through the pages. I tried different things I came across.

Suddenly.....it worked!!!! I had a table with altitude and corresponding pressures!!!

I spruced it up a bit, gave it a heading, made sure they were spaced evenly, made sure the units were attached to the output, sent my program in to the instructor, had her check to be sure she got it, gathered my things and skipped off to the grad room.

Everyone asked how it went. One girl told me the final for that class brought her to tears. No joke!! That midterm brought me to tears. I ate several more cookies. I think I ate maybe 8 sugar cookies with super sweet frosting over a several hour period. They were so good. I didn't have alcohol so the sugar was going to have to do it. Just a few more things to button down before I could go hit the grocery store, then go home to make enchiladas and Mexican rice.

The wind was howling and the sky was dark. A storm was brewing. (Really, just the tail end of a front was about to hit us, so we were getting its outflow gusts of wind).

When I finally got home (accidents on the freeway, groceries, etc), I saw that everything on my kitchen windowsill had been knocked over, and one of the terrarium thingys had been shattered. The bonsai tree was tipped on its side and there was no sign of Mr. Spud. Ugh. Really? And no alcohol on board (or anything other than cookies). Ok, no big deal, I can handle this.

I cleaned up the glass, soil, rocks, plants, etc. I just threw out the plants. It occurred to me that I could just replant them somewhere but I had no "where" to plant them. I was not up to going back out and buying pots.

(The windowsill, once covered by knick-knacks and plants, had been swept clean when a strong gust of wind had pushed the blinds into everything, toppling everything in its path.)

I found Mr. Spud in the sink and brushed him off and put him aside. I brought out the vacuum cleaner so that I wouldn't have to brush up against any glass. Dishes, the counters, Mr. Spud, everything, got a good vacuuming to ensure I would not later come in to contact with glass.

Oh Mr. Spud. If only I had paid more attention. If only I had thought of your wellbeing instead of getting the crap cleaned up and the groceries put away.

As I vacuumed over Mr. Spud, removing soil and small glass remnants, I heard the vacuum cleaner suck up something larger. I took a good look at Mr. Spud and gasped. Oh my god his eyes!!!!

Oh it just sickens me. I thought about going through the contents of the vacuum cleaner, but I was well beyond my means...actually....the contents are still there. So when I sober up in the morning I can pick through the vacuum cleaner and find his eyes.

So Mr. Spud is a potato and vegetable scrubber. He has a brush on his back. He grins at me and makes googley eyes as I wash dishes or cook. Well. Not currently. Now Mr. Spud sits and grins blindly out at the world.

So I poured sake into a shot glass as I cooked. A bottle of sake, 3 enchiladas and two helpings of Mexican rice later, I am fairly content.

My bonsai might live. Maybe I'll search for Mr. Spud's eyes tomorrow. The succulents are dead. The vintage salt and pepper shakers are fine. The wind has settled and there is no sign of rain at the moment. But maybe tonight.

I'm still over an hour away from bedtime and too intoxicated to finish writing up my physics lab report, or calculate the molecular weight of air on Venus, so maybe I'll just peruse Pinterest.


Moral of the story? Simply lower your expectations, eat lots of sugar and drink plenty of coffee, eat good food and wash it down with alcohol. It'll all be ok in the morning.

Oh, and Queso Anejo is just simply amazing.

One more!

Found this one this morning...and it's local. Kind of.

Moo-nlight half marathon in Davis. The cow glows in the dark. It's a night run. During the summer.

Just for the medals.....

The other day I was thinking about how I was going to retire from running marathons after I qualify for, and then run, the New York City Marathon. Marathon training can be ridiculous some times. I mean, who does this? I actually know plenty of people who do. As a matter of fact, one of my friends just ran a 50 mile race (I think she won?) and then two weeks later ran the Chicago Marathon (just today).

I used to dream of doing the Canadian Death Race. I've let that go for now. It's a 125km (77.67 mile) race over several summits. I was enticed because of the lore. It has a theme based on Greek or Roman Mythology, I don't remember which. Anyhow, you're given a coin at the start of the race in which you are to pay the ferryman at a river crossing to get you across. If you lose the coin (at least back in the day when I first saw this) the ferryman will take you across but you're disqualified and will be escorted to the finish. So the mythology follows that of having to pay the ferryman of the dead to get you across the river Styx. That's why they put coins on peoples eyelids when they died. If they did not have the coins, they were forever doomed to walk the river bank....which is purgatory. So you give the man your coin and continue on your way. After finishing (the limit is 24 hrs I think) you're awarded with this cool coin...you might have to buy the plaque part.

Super cool.

Anyway, so I was just thinking about cool marathon medals (mine came crashing down last night after hanging them on one of those non-damaging wall hook things that didn't have a weight rating on it). My Boston medal is my proudest at this moment in time, but when I get a NYC one, that one will take its place, mostly due to the much harder work I'm going to have to go through to qualify and get a spot.

But there are such cool medals out there to be had!! And thankfully not all of them are full marathons, so that helps. But it does require some travel which makes it all a little more difficult. So I think after NYC, I'm just going to pick out the races with the coolest bling and go run them. Here we go, in no particular order, the races I want to run just for the cool medals.

Bird in Hand Half Marathon
Amish Country, Pennsylvania.

The Amish use old horse shoes, paint them all nice (or not I guess, depending on the year maybe?) and make a medal of it. Then they hand them to you at the finish line.

Also of note, Amish people are handing out water at aid stations.

I think this medal is super cool because it's hand made.







Richmond Marathon
Richmond, (Virginia I suppose)

Because I think it's pretty.











The Cowtown
Ft. Worth, Texas

Now here is something interesting that I just noticed. This is 5 different medals. I saw another cool one like this that was two medals. The problem with that is to get this whole design, I would have to run a half marathon in Texas 5 times. I'm not a big fan of Texas. Soooo.... I don't know about this one.













Rock and Roll Virginia Beach
Virginia Beach...Virginia I assume? I'm terrible at geography.

Ooooh. Look how pretty!!! I mean, just look at it! And it's only a half!














Rev3 Triathlon
Somewhere in Maine

You gotta admit, they're pretty cool.















A1A Half Marathon
Ft. Lauderdale, FL

Dude. Super sweet. That thing opens and closes I think. I also believe they were voted one of the best medals out there.

This is the A1A medal for a different year. Also pretty cool.



Gasparilla Half Marathon
Tampa, FL

My personal favorite. Coolest race medal ever. This one is a must-do. Who wouldn't run a half marathon to get that bad boy?










Spooktacular Half Marathon
San Dimas, CA

I'm a big fan of Day of the Dead stuff. One day I would like to go to Mexico and observe the celebration. So I think this medal is really cool.














Running for the Bay Marathon
Apalachicola, FL

 Again, another pretty medal. Although I have to say I'm a little skeptical about running in Florida. I've been to Florida. In the Winter/Spring. I wouldn't run in it. So I don't know. But at least the Gasparilla one. Totally worth 13.1 miles of misery. I'm not sure this one is worth 26.2 miles of misery.












Wineglass Marathon
Finger Lakes, NY

The finishers "medals" are made of glass. Maybe from bottles, I don't know. Also, there is a wine party post race. You can also do a half marathon.








There's all sorts of boring medals out there. I own a few. But I'm still proud of them and all the hard work and suffering that went into each and every one of them. Each one comes with its own story. Some of them funnier than others.

So if any of these interest you.....Debbie.....Jen..... anyone else....hit me up. We'll plan it.

My Own Worst Enemy

Sometimes I get really great ideas. These ideas usually undo any great things I've done for myself. I hurdle my own roadblocks with the speed and grace of an olympian.

I don't keep sugar in the house. Or junk food. The only chocolate in the house is baking cocoa. For sweeteners I have honey, pure maple syrup and agave nectar. No cake, ice cream or brownies. If I want sweets, I have to go out and get them. And that requires effort. So really I don't eat sweets all that much. Except on Tuesdays when Kelly brings homemade treats in for all the grad students. This week it was homemade peanut butter cup things about the size of a small cheeseburger. They were in tiny pie tins, with a crust, peanut butter, melted chocolate, whip cream and crumbled peanut butter cups on top. Just sinful.

Oh yeah, and one of the professors also brought in two cakes (one chocolate and one carrot cake) because they had a potluck birthday party for his friend and 9 people brought cake. So I may have had one giant piece of chocolate cake. And then later in the week a small piece of carrot cake. I don't really like carrot cake but I had this really nasty taste in my mouth from a Cold Ease lozenge (to ease my cold) and had to get rid of it somehow.

And then maybe some pop tarts yesterday.

But really, I try to stay away from sweets. Maybe I should keep a journal of my junk intake. I might be surprised.

I'm getting over a cold. And today I traded my cold for cramps. Aaarrghh!!!!

I took the trash out and on the way up the stairs, they struck. Wooooo!!!! Breathe. Breathe. Wooooooo.

I made it back inside where I doubled over for a minute until they subsided. Then went to go prep a meatloaf.

Woooooo!!! Breathe, breathe, woooooo. I doubled over again as the pain sent a flush of warmth through my body.

If it is not one thing, it's another.

I breathed it away.

I got the meatloaf in the oven and opened the fridge. A bunch of lonely celery sat on the bottom shelf. Hmm. What can I do with celery? I decided to pair it with the all natural cashew butter on the second shelf. It was a little stiff. How can I soften this?

Ooh! Maybe add some honey, heat it up a little...maybe a dash of cinnamon?

Wait......hang on. Maybe some cocoa powder? And a little agave? Would that be like Nutella? Nutella is bad for you by the way, contrary to popular belief. So you should not sit there and eat it with a spoon. Everything in moderation.

So I mixed up the cashew butter, a little agave, some cocoa powder and a little soy milk to make it creamy. Then I dipped the celery in it.

The celery was like blasphemy. So I finished the celery and tried the chocolate cashew butter with a spoon. Much better. After a few spoonfuls, I got this image in my head, which I found on Pinterest:

Fortunately after a few days off, I'm back to running tomorrow. Meanwhile, the remainder sits in my fridge for emergencies.

When Great Trees Fall

When Great Trees Fall
by Maya Angelou

When great trees fall,
rocks on distant hills shudder,
lions hunker down
in tall grasses,
and even elephants
lumber after safety.

When great trees fall
in forests,
small things recoil into silence,
their senses
eroded beyond fear.

When great souls die,
the air around us becomes
light, rare, sterile.
We breathe, briefly.
Our eyes, briefly,
see with
a hurtful clarity.
Our memory, suddenly sharpened,
examines,
gnaws on kind words
unsaid,
promised walks
never taken.

Great souls die and
our reality, bound to
them, takes leave of us.
Our souls,
dependent upon their
nurture,
now shrink, wizened.
Our minds, formed
and informed by their
radiance,
fall away.
We are not so much maddened
as reduced to the unutterable ignorance
of dark, cold
caves.

And when great souls die,
after a period peace blooms,
slowly and always
irregularly.  Spaces fill
with a kind of
soothing electric vibration.
Our senses, restored, never
to be the same, whisper to us.
They existed.  They existed.
We can be.  Be and be
better.  For they existed.
****************************************

Christa showed me that poem when Dad died, someone had shown it to her. And I could never believe how incredibly well it described losing someone close to you. I made a copy for Corey and her mom and they felt the same way.

Today, because it's becoming fall, because the air is cool and clean in the morning, because we just said goodbye to Ron, because we spent a weekend talking about all of our dads we had lost, I feel that light, sterile air. I feel the first couple weeks after Dad died when everything had a subdued silence and I longed for something to comfort me.

I made chicken and rice soup to help with a cold and considered going for a run. But the cool air made me want to hunker down and remember how to breathe. I feel the need for something I don't remember, a past comfort that's always brought on by the fall and I can never quite put my finger on it. I bought a couple scented candles and a couple plants to try to find whatever it was. There's something familiar here in the morning fog and short days. Sterile I guess explains it as well as anything else. But it's so far into the past that I can never quite get a handle on it.

Fairy Trees

Mondays are overwhelming by themselves. I'm thrown back in to a world of incompetent drivers and tight schedules. Monday is my longest and toughest day. Calculus lecture, a short break, then a long frustrating physics lab, after which I race off to physics lecture- grabbing Pop Tarts out of the vending machine on my way. It's almost dark as I gather my belongings from the grad room and drive home.

But yesterday as I drove home from Corey's house, I thought about the fairy tree in Ireland that we saw on a tour. Legend has it, if you tie a white object to the tree, you may make a wish on someone else's behalf. I rummaged in my purse for something white and found a scrap of paper. A piece of my journal or a receipt perhaps. As I fixed it to a branch, I made a wish that Corey's dad would be ok. Because I knew the pain of losing a dad and felt that she had too good a heart for it to be broken that way.

But a wish is just wishful thinking, or maybe a strong wind blew my wish from the tree, or the fairies don't like tourists. In any case, we all gathered atop Mt. Pinos to say goodbye and pay our respects and wait for the reality to sink in.

It comes in waves and I let out a quick short sob as I rounded the corner a half hour from San Jose and got a glimpse of the purple and pink clouds of the sunset.

When I got home I had to pull myself together to finish my physics homework but was too tired to grasp friction forces and centripetal acceleration.

This morning my eyes are puffy but the day is full of responsibility and the world doesn't stop no matter how much you ask it to, and I think I was blessed that when it was my dad's time I had several months to pull myself together since I was laid off for the winter. The girls are all now back at work as they try to figure out their new normal.

I guess it's too much to ask- to not suffer, to not feel pain, to not be stripped completely raw by reality. Being in a room with a group of women- all of whom had lost their fathers, some more recently than others, put me in awe at the sharpness of grief as well as the bond that loss forms. We relate by pain. We see little pieces of ourselves in the scars of others. Maybe it's easier to share ourselves if we're already broken into little pieces- perfect sizes for handing out to others to take home.

Dropping a photo

Photos are up from the CityTrail run last Sunday. They're always a gruesome sight. Sometimes I envy the people who look good in those things. Their faces are normal colors, they're smiling, hands in the air. Overall fairly happy. I think it's the same way I envy the walkers with their cups of coffee when I see them out on my runs. At that moment I'd rather be them. Peaceful with their lattes and conversation, a stroll along the creek.

But alas, I am not that person. I am the person in photos with a bright red face, cheeks jerking downward from the shear force of my body hitting the ground with each step, the boob on my impact leg plunging toward the ground despite a suffocatingly tight sports bra, and suddenly displaying 3 extra chins I didn't know I had. Sometimes, mercifully, I have sunglasses on and it hides some of the anguish. I hate my running photos. And since they usually cost around $30 just to download one, I rarely get them. I have one from my first marathon, with Debbie running next to me.

This time I found one I like. And it's got a gorgeous background. And it was only $7 for a high resolution download.

They've got a ton of speed style photos where if you click through them fast enough, you can see me running, especially at the beginning. I always analyze these things for my foot placement when it hits the ground, my arm swing, are my quads sticking out nicely? I also look in them for clues on why on earth people stare at me when I run. I don't get it. Some smile or nod, others just stare like they can't tell I can see them staring because I have sunglasses on. Are they looking at my misery? Is my scar super noticeable? Is it the red RoadID on my left wrist? Is it the fact that I'm so small and yet you can hear my footsteps a mile away?

Jason says it's because I look mean when I run. Why on earth would you blatantly stare at someone who looks mean? That's just asking for it.

Are they wondering how such small boobs can run amok so easily in a tight sports bra? Well...me too. I am truly amazed with one of my photos from the Carlsbad Marathon in January of 2013. Since then I have purchased tighter bras. I mean shocking. I won't post that. I just didn't know they could travel so far without causing injury. They should have passports for that sort of thing. Now I pull on my sports bra and wonder how on earth I'm going to breathe.

Anyway, so here's a fairly decent photo of me running. Maybe one day I'll do a montage of bad ones....my misery and despair out for the world to see.

CityTrail Half Marathon

In order to get inspired to get my head in the game from a long summer of laziness, I signed up for the CityTrail Half Marathon in San Francisco, which is the same one I ran back in February, just days before my fateful hamstring injury. They ran it again, with a few more sponsors this time, so it drew a bigger crowd. A slightly faster crowd.

I'm in a little better shape than I was for the AFC Half in San Diego a month ago... a whole month of training better shape to be exact. I did not forget how punishing this course was. As a matter of fact, it's possible that I remember it to be worse than it actually was. Let me remind you of the race elevation:

That's an 1120ft elevation gain...and loss, but never mind that. A lot of that gain is stairs. Trail stairs. Although less so than I remember. Turns out there was also crazy hills without stairs. Who knew.

I started out way to fast for my current physical abilities. It's hard when it's super flat to begin with and you know it's going to get crazy steep. It kinda makes you want to take the fast where you can.

Right away some fast girls passed me, which didn't happen last time with the smaller and slower crowd. Although a few of them ended up falling back.

Just after the turn around at about mile 7.5, I started closing the gap between myself and a girl I met right before the race. A lot of peoples' quads give out on this route. It's pretty brutal. Up and down stairs and steep hills are just rough.

Coming down the hill towards a small stretch of soft sand (and an aid station), my left calf started to cramp up. I gasped each time it did and did somewhat of a hobble mid stride. I have never had my calf cramp during a race and I was unsure of how to handle it. I tore off my second GU that was pinned to the side of my shorts and got it ready to take it right before the aid station. Every few seconds my calf would spasm, threatening to clench into an all out cramp.

I came down the stairs to the beach right behind Claire, the girl I had met, and had been listening to a pair of footsteps behind me for the last couple miles. We spilled out onto the beach and I got right up behind her as we approached the aid station. I think she was tired of me tagging behind so close because she said something about passing her. I made a half-hearted attempt at a reply but it only came out as a grunt. I needed a few cups of water at the aid station. I took my GU and stopped at the aid station with Claire and the guy who was behind me. I drank a small cup of electrolyte beverage and one of water. I took off.

I heard a few shouts behind me, and Claire shouted "Up the hill!" I looked up and saw I was headed straight toward the ocean, the faceless voices behind me encouraged me the opposite way. Claire pulled ahead again.

Every once in awhile my calf would still spasm, and I kept trying to pull it tight by pulling my toes up so it wouldn't ball up completely. The worst part of the run was over, we had made it up the worst set of stairs.

We turned a corner and I watched Claire head up a hill I had totally forgotten coming down. As she jumped a small chasm in the path, I followed suit and remembered. Against all my most preciously held values, rules, and judgment, for the first time in possibly my entire racing career and working as a hotshot.... I whimpered out loud. I'm pretty sure Claire heard me. You just don't do that. It's wrong. Showing weakness in the middle of a race when you're right next to a competitor is just wrong. And I am ashamed.

Regardless, I completely closed the gap on Claire on that hill, left the footsteps of that guy behind and did my best to use my hill climbing ability to my advantage, and passed Claire on the way up. One thing I've learned as a hotshot, when you pass someone on the way down a hill or on the flats, that's despicable. When you pass them on the uphill, you earned that hill and you take it. I took it. And strode on.

Three more miles to go. Very little hill left. I crossed under the Golden Gate Bridge and did a minor hill- the last of the route, and down the last flight of stairs to the flat. That flat is always longer than I remember. Two more miles to go. How can it still be two more miles?

My calf spasmed for several strides in a row and I thought that was it. I was going to go down just 2 miles from the finish line. I pulled my toes up and ran rigid for a few seconds. It faded. I tried to breathe in to it. Maybe it needed more oxygen. I didn't know how far back Claire was and if she could see me stumble. I wanted to cry. I wanted it to be over. You can handle anything for two miles. 

I developed that mantra during the Boston Marathon. I've never been much for mantras as I tend to be more harsh on myself and less encouraging. None of that "You can do this, you're so strong" baloney. It usually comes out something like "Suck it up and quit being a wimp!". I do have one that I use on my long runs sometimes. "Run easy". When the run gets tough and I'm almost home, part of me wants to push harder to get there sooner, but that's not the point of the run. I tell myself "Run easy" to open up my stride and get easy speed instead of putting a lot of energy into it.

I was hurting so bad during Boston, with my IT band flaring up so badly that my quad was spasming, my feet hurting from new shoes that weren't correct for my running form, and just overall pain and discomfort from not being able to train during my injury. I wasn't going to walk. You can handle anything for three miles became you can handle anything for two miles and then finally one. And then there was the finish line. After the finish line you get to stop. That's all I wanted, was to stop.

Today that was all I wanted. I wanted to be done, but running faster would risk my calf cramping up so bad that I would be done. I had to keep it from cramping until I crossed that finish line. You can handle anything for two miles.

I tried to relax my face muscles, so no one could read my misery. I wondered if Claire would stride out that last mile and pass me, wondering why I had slowed down on the flat.

I could see the finish line. It looked so far away. I looked at my gps, it was only a half mile.

So far. Ten feet would be too far.

You are not stopping until you cross that finish line.

It got closer. I managed to keep myself from whimpering out loud again, but that in itself was a struggle. I tried to relax my face again and then noticed the photographer at the finish line. I probably had not relaxed in time and a beautiful photo of me and all my misery will be available for the world to see.

I crossed two sets of timing mats. I meant to walk around for awhile, loosen up the legs. Instead I bent over with my hands on my knees. I needed water.

I hobbled to the aid station and got water and some pretzels. I collected my finishers medal and my medal for 2nd place in my division (females 30-39). I was the fourth girl overall.

Against my better judgment I also collected my free beer from the beer garden and bbq with coleslaw.

 After eating for a bit and stretching out in the sun, I walked over to sit on the beach wall, enjoy the breeze and the view, and get rested up for the hour drive home.

Hicks Road and South San Jose Traffic

These days because of a tight school and running schedule, I'm only riding once a week. Saturdays are currently my ride days. I've been avoiding Hicks Road lately since I'm not in the shape I used to be (just 6 months ago) and Hicks Road and I have a hate/hate relationship. Also this morning, my left ovary was in the process of strangling itself and I almost decided to can the ride and just lay on the floor curled up in a ball for awhile. I took two ibuprofen and told myself, they say exercise helps with this sort of thing. They lied.

I got all geared up and crawled out the door. I had quite a few miles before I made it to Hicks Road, so plenty of time to decide to turn around and come home. I found a shorter way to get to Hicks Road in order to conserve my energy for one of the most intense climbs in San Jose. Unfortunately, the short way also brings me through a dangerous intersection. More on that later (obviously I'm alive to write this).

Hicks Road is feared by many a cyclist. I personally have never made it up without taking a few breathing breaks. When you're on your lowest gear and your bike is going so slow it almost tips over, you know it's time to pull over and take a short rest. I love the looks you get while standing on the side of the road with your bike. Some are sympathy looks, some are looks that simply say "What's wrong with you?". Those looks usually come from motorists.

My left leg has been taking me up Hicks Road for months now. I say that like it's a regular route for me. It's not. Not by a long shot. But every time I've gone up, it's been my left leg doing all the work. And it let me know today that it didn't appreciate it. Actually my first time up Hicks was with a torn hamstring. My right one of course. I've been working on strengthening my right leg, so I don't know what the problem is, but my entire left side was unhappy with the whole situation today.

Hicks Road is a winding mountain road. That of course goes up a mountain. It peaks in a saddle, so it never really goes up to a summit (that's another road for another lifetime). It has a "warm-up" climb that sucks the gears off my bike so fast I'm out in a matter of seconds. After that is a leisurely stroll until reaching the real climb. Honestly the real climb is only about 1.3 miles long, which in theory is not that bad. But just like the warm up climb, you run out of gears and breath pretty quickly. It's also steep enough that you have to be strategic about your rest stops or you won't be very successful in getting back on the bike to continue up the hill.

I was taking a break just before the last tough corner, when another cyclist came down the hill towards me. "You're almost there!" "Yeah...." I replied. Cyclists are always happier on the way down. I clipped back in for the last push.

Slightly before reaching the top, I tried giving myself a pep talk and it went something like this: Hey, there's a grilled cheese sandwich waiting for you at the top, you just have to get there and it's yours.

Now I'm no fool. There's no store or cafe up there, just a parking lot, bathroom and trail head. The sandwich was in the back pocket of my jersey. Duh. If I wanted my sandwich I could just pull over and eat it. I don't have to make it to the top. Not the point. You'd probably puke it up anyway.

I watched the tiny rocks in the asphalt move slowly past my churning tires.

On the last little pitch, there's a sign that always renews my hope. "Stop ahead".

If you don't know, they put stop signs in roads just before you go back downhill. The stop sign is where I get my grilled cheese sandwich. As I eased toward the stop sign, I shifted to the larger chain ring in the front to prepare for the ride down, took a picture of the road sign for Jen, and pulled into a shady spot to eat my sandwich.

Other cyclists came down Mt. Umunum and parked in front of me, nodding and saying good morning. Then they continued to discuss the overheating of their rims from braking on the way down. I hear that's even steeper than Hicks. As more guys in their group joined them, one said "Touch your rim!" The guy did and immediately withdrew his hand with an "Ouch!". I've heard when you overheat your rims it can explode your tires....which would be tragic at high speeds going down a steep hill.

I finished my sandwich and headed down the other side of Hicks Road. I don't do downhills often enough, although after taking a bike handling class, I do a little better. I survived the descent and passed by a guy pretending to be very interested in something off the side of the road. He was on his way up. Pretty sure he was just resting.

I rode past the reservoir, through New Almaden past the old quicksilver mine, and out onto the traffic filled streets of San Jose.

Camden Road is undergoing some sort of construction around a freeway on ramp/ off ramp intersection. So what was once a hectic intersection with stoplights is now a crazy intersection with stop signs. People do not know how to handle busy intersections with stop signs. There's just too much going on.

I approached the intersection and started to come to a stop. Two lanes were going straight. Right of way at that moment was for the car next to me also going straight. I decided to use it as a blocker and go through when that car did. Unfortunately, that car was much faster than I was and cleared the intersection rather quickly (sporty little guy).

I was now the only one in the middle of the intersection. Cross traffic to my right included a left turn lane, a straight lane, and a right lane.

Just this morning I updated the emergency information on my RoadID and had decided to carry my insurance card with me. As I did so, I wondered if it was some sort of premonition.

The car turning left started to go just as I approached it's front bumper, it halted. The guy turning right just about went, and hit the brakes and said "Whoa!" Which left the guy in the middle lane who could not see or understand why the two guys on either side of him were not going. It was too late, I was in front of the vehicle and could only hope for the best. As the car started for me, I braced myself and said out loud "STOP STOP STOP! JESUS!". Hands over the brakes I nearly closed my eyes but instead pressed down harder on the pedals. I made it through the intersection and took a couple deep breaths.

I approached another busy intersection and stopped at the light. Lights are nice. They tell people when to go and when to stop. Very few judgment calls required. When the light turned green, I cautiously went through and turned on to Leigh, a much more peaceful road. I breathed a sigh of relief. Should've taken Meridian and gotten yourself a bundt cake. 

I stopped at another red light and watched an old woman pull up next to me, texting as she came to a stop. She was set to go straight, so was I. The left turn light turned green for both sides of traffic. Just as I expected, when she saw the left turning traffic move out of the corner of her eye, still texting, she moved straight into the intersection as another vehicle was turning left (with a green light) right in front of her. Fortunately, partway into the intersection, she looked up and stopped. And then just sat and finished her message. What if a small child had been in the intersection?! Crazy people! Put down your damn phones! It's not important enough to kill somebody over.

After another near miss with a guy turning right (vehicles turning right do not like to come to a stop and look around), I pulled onto the small side street that takes me home and could finally relax. With or without a bundt cake.

I'm safely home. I finished the other half of my grilled cheese and had an espresso. Maybe I'll have another. Then go get new running shoes and frozen yogurt. I will drive. Safely mind you.

Another Friday

It's another Friday afternoon and I'm ready for a nap. But the rule for today was no naps and no coffee after 2 pm. That probably means I should guzzle some now since I'm nearly dozing off, but my stomach is upset and guzzling coffee doesn't ordinarily help with that situation.

When I left you last, I had just had 3 shots of espresso and was trying to decide what to study next. I picked up my meteorology book and started to read...but then decided I could focus better if I had popcorn.

I didn't have popcorn and I wasn't going out to get any. I looked around the room and tried to figure out what else could make my studying more efficient. The breakfast table, covered in piles of junk, would make an awesome place to study.... if it wasn't covered in junk.

Somehow that turned in to cleaning and rearranging the house a bit. Hours later my house was clean, the breakfast table was cleared off, and I could sit and study. Or my espresso had finally worn off and I could now handle sitting still again.

Fridays are especially nice because.... well, they're Fridays. I'm sure you all have your reasons why Fridays are nice. Fridays are short for me, and I don't have class until noon, so I can have a real breakfast after my two morning workouts instead of a protein shake on the run and a bowl of cold oatmeal when I get to the grad room.

Fridays I have Calculus II, which makes me think I have Chemistry. I'm not sure why. There are a bunch of chemistry labs in the building, so maybe that's why.

In the calculus lecture hall, the chairs are old upholstery and the folding desks are covered in graffiti and have gum stuck to the bottom. It's always hot, with very stagnant air. The professor doesn't like the fan. The clock on the wall always reads 12 minutes to 3 and seems to melt in the stuffy room like a Dali painting. This one in particular:

No matter how many times I look at my watch, or the clock on the wall, nothing seems to move. I practice my integral signs on my notebook and marvel at the fact that I am now in Calculus II, and years ago I thought only geniuses did that.

I chug my coffee out of my hydro-flask if it is cool enough to do so. I think people assume it's water. It's coffee.

I might break my nap rule. I'm supposed to be doing homework. Not sure how that's going to work out.

Catch-up day

I can't find my yellow highlighter that I swear I set aside for home use only. Maybe it's in my desk in the grad room. I had so many of them in my little accessories case that my aunt and uncle got me for Christmas that I decided I'd start pulling them out and staging them in strategic places. I could have a couple in my desk, one at home and two in my case that I have with me all the time.

I have the same issue with pens (and highlighters) as I do with chapstick. The guys at the lab have nicknamed me Chapstick. I own at least 9 or 10 tubes of it but can never find any. I own 5 or 6 yellow highlighters but don't really know where they are. I know where 4 orange ones are but those don't help. I only highlight with yellow. Other colors are for multi-coding notes. I won't even bother to explain that.

What's funny about all this is that last week I could not find a pen. Yesterday I pulled 6 pens off my living room table and put them back in my "office supply" drawer. Where did all those things come from? Pens are everywhere right now. And 3 pencils! There were 3 pencils on my living room table as well.

My living room is currently overrun with books. I'm also doing shots... of espresso. I'm on number two. It's fun, you should try it.

Each of my four classes comes with 2-3 books each. Three of my classes also come with "...For Dummies" books because...well, because I need them. I also had to buy a special engineering pad for Meteorology and that's about the size of a book. There are books to the left and right of me. Books by my feet on the coffee table, books on the floor, books on the couch, and a couple I left at school on my desk (although for the life of me I could not tell you which ones).

I have completely mixed up my calculus and physics classes. Last week I got an email about adding a class from what turned out to be the physics department. So I took my add code and tried to add calculus. I got an error so I responded to the email that the add code didn't work. Almost immediately I got an email from someone else with a different add code and successfully used it to add calculus...although I have no clue where that code came from. Then later in the week I received a response back from the original lady worried that I was not able to add physics. I thought we were talking about calculus so I told her I was able to add it and everything was ok. Earlier this week I realized I was conversing with two different departments. I had added physics long before either of the two conversations.

When I try to access my calculus professor's webpage to look for assignments, I go to the physics department website. Daily. This has to stop.

Shot number three. Why all the espresso? I'm trying to catch up on all my homework and studying that I started out behind in. Because as a grad student, I can only crash undergrad classes and therefore cannot get book and reading info until the first day of class...which automatically puts me behind. Then you add an awesome holiday weekend in San Diego in which nearly nothing got done, and you have three shots of espresso and half a dozen chapters to read before Monday.

I just finished a tough physics assignment that required the emergency learning of several math topics. Our assignment that's due tomorrow night includes two topics in physics that we haven't covered yet. It also included some hectic math.

My choices of what to study next were: calculus, the next chapter of physics, meteorology, or computer programming. Being as I just burned myself out on math and physics, that leaves meteorology and computer programming. My "Unix For Dummies" book sits on my coffee table in front of me, "Using Python in the Atmospheric and Oceanic Sciences" (no, Python is not a snake...ok it is, but that's not the python we're talking about here) sits next to me on the couch. I thumbed through that one. Nope nope nope.

Meteorology it is. My meteorology book is currently buried under: engineering pad, a massive physics book, the newest edition of Bicycling magazine, and my accessories case....which I brought out of my backpack in order to find a yellow highlighter.

Which brings me here. Procrastinating. Three shots of espresso later.

Notes From Calculus II

I'm just starting my first class of the day and I'm ready for a nap. On the desk under my notebook are various obscene sketches and engravings. Also is a sketch of the chemical structure of meth. In the upper left corner it says "should've been a comm major".

The temperature in the science building where I am now is oppressive. There are no windows and I'm pretty sure the heat is on even though it's in the 80's outside. Apparently the building was condemned years ago, but when the school suddenly lost the funding to replace it, the building was magically healed and able to be inhabited again. There is no air conditioning. There are no windows. It is a hot dungeon. Hell above ground so to speak. I downed what was left of my coffee and continued to nod off in between proofs of summations.

The building in which I work and somewhat reside on campus (Duncan Hall School of Science....not to be confused with the science building) is always too cold. The hotter it is outside, the more layers I have to bring on days I have lecture in DH or will be working. It's Wednesday so I wore shorts. Tomorrow is Thursday so I have to wear jeans. A sweatshirt sits on my desk in the grad room for use on days too hot to actually wear one to school, but it's freezing in the building.

I'm back to starting my days at 4:30 am, so by noon, my first class on Wednesday, I'm ready for bed. Somehow I only made it out the door this morning with half a mug of coffee. Classes go until 6:45 pm on Mon/Wed. Long days. Bedtime is at 8 pm. It's never enough.