Pink Feathers

We finished up a fabulous weekend with glitter and spark and a pink feather boa. My very studly hubby bought me a gift certificate to iTunes and set it up for me with his own credit card for further purchases. I tell you, it's really lovely having a sugar daddy, and that iTunes world is pretty suite. We also grilled out in the sticky July heat and clucked as hens do with our good friends, prevailed in the sun on an adventure to the Dairy Queen, led an expedition through an exhausting spin class without air conditioning (that's right villainous YWCA, I am indestructable), and ate at Chipotle like monsters.

It looks like my naked co-worker is heading out the door in less than three weeks, she will be dearly missed. She leaves amidst chaos; soon we may be taking on Crazy Bow-Tie Man (rotating thusly) and High-Pitched Screaming Woman (joining our lab after a show-down with her previous prof). I personally prefer the naked simplicity of my naked co-worker but I guess I will grimace and bear the potential discomfort of my new environment. My naked co-worker will not leave without making her mark; in addition to urinating all over the lab she has broken most of our equipment, personally offended almost everyone (especially Crazy Bow-Tie Man), and outright refused to be productive for several months. Yet we will all be confused and lost without her; the lab may shut down to lament her loss for at least an afternoon while we go to a St. Paul Saints minor league baseball game. Maybe crazy bow-tie man and high-pitched screaming woman will toss in some of their own new flavor and excitement and we'll all be able to recover somehow.

Meanwhile I continue to sweat through this outrageous heat wave and hope that I will someday make it back to Dairy Queen where the heavenly Crunch Cone prolongs my survival.

Rockin' Out

I did a little research on the White Stripes after my Studly Hubby told me there are only two people in it that are brother and sister yet were married. Intrigued by the possibility of a gross brother-sister/husband-wife story, I googled them and found this very interesting article from some radio station. Apparently Jack and Meg White of the White Stripes are originally from the midwest (Detroit, Michigan IS part of the midwest, see below post). For some reason they did claim to be brother and sister and never quelched rumors that they were which made for good press (hey it made ME look them up), although the marriage and divorce certificates have been widely publicized and are hard to dispute. More interestingly, Meg had never played drums till she met Jack and yet they are revolutionizing rock with their unique stripped down rock flavor. They record only in old-school analog recording studios and have no bass player, which has not been tried successfully since the Doors. Another interesting bit of information: on the album Elephant (i.e. Seven Nation Army - Jack's "Salvation Army" as a kid) Jack plays a vintage "Res-O-Glas" Airline guitar that used to be a cheapo guitar distributed by Montgomery Wards, which he pumps through an octave peddle. Does this remind anyone of what Jimi Hendrix did to the electric guitar in the '60s? Good stuff.

On that same note, we watched a really fascinating movie last night called DIG!, recommended by the Netflix guy on his weekly review a local radio station. DIG! profiles two pretty decent rock bands, The Dandy Warhols and The Brian Jonestown Massacre from the very beginning of their careers, through the rise and fall, and rise again, of their inspiration, the record contracts, tours, drugs, and press, and we just realized that The Dandy Warhols were recently on the soundtrack for the OC. We never figured out what DIG! stands for but the movie was fascinating and very well done. Plus, both bands are pretty good.

Living on the Edge

My Dad says I'm living on the edge, I think that's because I claimed Ohio is not in the midwest against his expert opinion. My naked coworker and several others agree that Ohio is Midwest, however, explain these distinguishably non-midwestern features:

Ohio is in a DIFFERENT TIME ZONE
All the houses in Ohio are very East-Coast
You can drive to the OCEAN from Ohio in under a day

I hereby claim Ohio is Mideast (not to be confused with Middle East).

Midwest: Minnesota, the Dakotas, Iowa, Nebraska, Wisconsin, Indiana, Missourri, Illinois, Kansas, and Michigan.

Unfortunately, the government does not agree with me and considers Ohio part of the midwest (although Kansas is not included on the list on the main page it is include on an official list found elsewhere on the site). I admit this only to prevent an all-out brawl on this thus-far peaceful blog.

From Coast to Coast

You are extremely not like me if you:

Have a real job (and therefore make money)
Do not live in the midwest (Ohio is not the midwest)
Sit at a desk all day
Order fancy bottles of alcohol with dinner

So imagine my delight when a friend of mine from college (let's call her Steve) shot me an email about six months ago and said she has a job (a real desk job, where she makes money!) and does not live in the midwest anymore. Whoa! She has a COOL job, working for the government bossing people around and making sure they follow all their own environmental laws. Steve recently married an equally interesting guy, lets call him Jane, who is in LAW school at STANFORD. Whoa, WHOA!! You know what I always say: Lawyer friends are GOOD friends. We went out to eat, they ordered a fancy bottle of alcohol with dinner, I gawked for a while at them and then drank some of their alcohol. It turns out Steve met Jane when they were on the other coast, in DC, just after Steve and I graduated from college. Since Steve is originally from the midwest, and Jane is originally from the coast, they had really interesting perspectives on where they've lived and where they want to live. The most amazing thing, though, was that even though they seem way different from us, we have all this stuff in common with them: we also just got married and are still renting, we are all going to move again in a year, and we all love snow, Lord of the Rings and iTunes, and drinking alcohol with dinner.

I think Steve and Jane are our alter-ego reverse selves that live opposite lives. It's a really good thing Steve and I met in college, otherwise the Universe may have imploded. Also, coincidentally and kind of unrelated, Steve looks uncannily similar to an esteemed colleague of mine that is now working at Princeton (who also has a real job and makes real money, but his job isn't a desk job). It's possible that Steve is his alter-ego reverse self also, implying that it's possible to live more than one opposite life at once. If that's true, then I must have at least one other alter-ego reverse self as well. I vow to find and destroy all of my alter-ego reverse selves, except Steve and Jane because they're pretty fun.

Ahhhh, the little things

And now I sit back and take pleasure in the little things in life...

- Farting in yoga class (oh yeah!)
- The Blogger T-shirt - this one's a keeper
- Japan's perverted junior high kids - a jewel editorial
- Farting into the fume hood at work (O sweet fume hood how we love thee)
- Co-workers who have the guts to just get naked
- Blueberries!
- Poison Ivy - I will defeat you yet, you bastard you, the war has just begun
- Blogging at work! Wheeee!

ADD and... what?

A relative of mine is getting tested for attention deficit disorder, which is no surprise since I have it and it's genetic. Part of testing means you send out a questionaire to people who know you to fill out so they can answer questions like "does this person get set off easily?" or "does this person have trouble sitting still?" Clearly if you knew the symptoms for ADD and you had good friends you could rig it and get a fake diagnosis, but for those of us who actually do have ADD it's a very interesting wake-up call, especially when someone who knows you well, but is unrelated to you and doesn't have ADD (like perhaps your spouse) fills out the form. My husband is such a creature. Unlike me, neither of his parents have ADD and it was never considered normal in his household to have three separate conversations going on at dinner when only three people are present. For this reason, I had him help me fill out the form to get a better perspective (well sure, this person does fidget a lot but that's normal right?).

ADD in our society is an interesting phenomenon. In primitive times, it was probably really helpful to have a few members of the tribe that had it (they estimate about 4% of adults have it), to keep things interesting and provide a sensitive and creative perspective (article). Why is it suddenly a problem now? I think it's because our society in the late '90's took a swing towards crazy. Education is becoming more necessary for sucess, but is less and less optimal for kids with ADD (and kids in general) to get through (increasing class sizes, longer classes, no PE, recess, or art classes for outlet, etc). We have to be focused more and more and more to make it work, both in school and in our career, thus it's becoming very hard for people with ADD to find ways to make it work. That's why it's important to remember why it stuck around in our society all this time - because it really does benefit the population, and in today's crazy world there are still ways that having ADD can be really helpful. And, if you think really hard, you may realize that a few of the people who have contributed some of the most spectacular ideas to our society may have had ADD.

Are you thinking Einstein, Mozart, and Walt Disney yet?

Zonked

We just got back tonight from a lovely weekend adventure in Iowa - by the end I was thoroughly over-stimulated. Tonight I will get drunk and begin my recovery. Part of the overstimulation was due to some major storms sweeping through that caused problems at my mom's house with the electricity (including the water supply), phone, computer, tv antennae, and her coward dog (who jumped through a window to get IN to her house, have you ever heard of such a thing?). What's up with all these crazy storms this year? It was all very exciting. We went out in the rain to pick some rasberries this morning which is a lot more fun than it sounds, and I got one-on-one time with my horse, who continues to pretend he doesn't miss me but I've seen a few spots of affection leak out now and then (usually when he's been tranquilized by the vet). I'm pretty sure I got poison ivy again too, but what's a weekend trip to Iowa without poison ivy?