If you couldn't tell from all my blurry pictures, my camera was on the fritz. Perhaps it's a testament to the length of me and Ryan's relationship that the camera he gave me for our second Christmas is dead. So this year he got me a new one. That means you get nice clear photos. So instead of a lengthy "what I did on my Christmas vacation," I put together a nice photo essay on Flickr.















And Ryan got me a blue coupon folder, because he knows me too well.

I mayd uh nu lolcat:


Wil let joo no if it maks teh frunt paeg. An doan wury Jen, if it duz mak frunt paeg, wil sai: Foto Bai Jen B


moar funny pictures

My blogging frequency is directly proportional to my mood. For the past little while I was feeling like a zero. So much so that I finally had blood drawn on Thursday to get my thyroid and iron checked like my pdoc recommended last year. The internist said that the test results would be emailed to me that evening or next morning. Still waiting. Maybe they are waiting until after the holidays because they found something else and I only have 3 months to live or something. Oh, and with my crappy student insurance the blood work is going to cost me $200. DO NOT WANT!

I am feeling ambivalent about Christmas. I'm not in a social mood. I told Ryan not to get me anything expensive because we just got the car. I know his mom got me stuff off the registry. And we will be without the kitties.

Tonight we're doing two Atlantic City shops- one is an overnight hotel stay and the other is at a different casino. I have to play roulette for the casino one. It's going to be a lot of work writing up the two reports on Monday, but hopefully I don't blow through money as fast this time. Roulette may be total chance, but that's got to be better odds than those slots last time. I should put all my chips on red because red is the color of Soviet Russia, and in Soviet Russia, casinos pay you.

Think I'll rotate the picture in the top right according to my taste. Now that we're rid of the devil car, how about my girliest cake ever? Hard to believe that someone who made a cake like that is going to have a wedding cake like, well, the one we've got planned. Mwah hah hah.

Somewhere in my Squishycashing and all, I made the mistake of signing up for free baby stuff in exchange for a dollar or something. Mostly just baby junk mail, although sometimes I'm a little paranoid the mailman will start spreading word around the neighborhood that we're expecting, then one of Ryan's parents will be down and the neighbor will be all, "Congratulations about the grandchild on the way!" and it will all go down like some sitcom.

Anyway, last week I got a baby offer that actually looked promising: create a baby registry at a certain store, then they give you a $20 gift card. So that was one of the things Ryan and I did on Sunday :P I think we did a pretty good job of seeming legit... I didn't suck in my gut (heh), asked about if we could edit the registry online, and we added items that made it seem legit (one stroller, one crib, one playpen instead of 3 strollers for example). And we got our $20 gift card :) We also thought about if we created the registry and added a bunch of cat accessories, food, and litter, but thought that might raise a red flag.

I didn't mention how I further "Slickdealt" the car purchase beyond negotiating and Ryan's work discount, did I? We'll be getting a $25 Circuit City gift card just for test driving a new Mazda. You can do this too if you want to see what my car is like and don't care if the salesperson thinks you're a cheapskate (www.mazdaholidaydrive.com). $17,000 car, $25 gift card...not as good a ratio as my CVS deals, but what can ya do?

Let the wooting commence!

Woot, woot, woot!

We bought the Mazda already. Needless to say, we also finalized the Neon sale. We got a pretty good deal on the Mazda, I think. We negotiated quite a bit, then after the price was set and they started running our credit check, the manager came over and said to Ryan, "You work at L0ckheed Mart1n? Mazda has a partnership with them, so you get an extra $300 off." :) I'm glad they didn't learn that until after we'd "set" a price, or else they probably wouldn't have gone as low overall.

We pick it up on Tuesday. It's black (yay!) but has a beige interior (boo). But I was willing to take it because since it was a test drive car, they (at least said they) were willing to negotiate lower. So we got the moonroof and 6 CD for "free"ish, making it worth settling for the beige interior. It's a manual, and the clutch was more forgiving than Ryan's, but still fun to drive. The guy was like, "That's odd. Usually women want an automatic." And of course the car handles somewhere in between the Neon and the RX-8, but closer to the RX-8 end of the spectrum :)

I must give a preliminary woot! I *think* I sold the Neon. That is, a family came and looked at it to buy for their teenage daughter, she loved it, and they gave me a $100 check as a deposit. They're going to the bank in the morning and getting me $4900 cash. I would've preferred to get $5300ish, but as long as they show up with cash in hand tomorrow, it's zoom zoom to the Mazda dealership for me!

The family's dad is a Dodge mechanic, which should come in handy! But the extra funny part is that I had a mystery shop this morning where I got a free oil change at the his dealership! The dad had planned to check out the engine, but when I mentioned I'd been at his dealership this morning, he was like, "oh, I think it was Tom that worked on it! I don't need to look under the hood then, because I know he would've taken a good look at it." So even though I'm just selling the car tomorrow, it was still sort of worth getting the oil change :)

Anyone interested in buying Spiderman 2 or Spiderman 3 from me, brand new in plastic wrap and everything? Make an offer...would make a great gift!

I didn't tell you how the casino mystery shop went, did I? Not according to plan...

We showed up at 4:00 and started evaluating the different people we were supposed to. For the beverage server evaluation, you have to sit and play slots until someone offers to bring you a drink, then you ask them a question, yadda yadda. So we played slots and evaluated 6 of the 8 people we were supposed to. I couldn't believe how terrible the slots were. Let's see, I've gambled at a casino in Washington, one in Montreal, and twice at Turning Stone. All of those times my balance would bounce up and down, usually a little more down, but it kept me busy for a couple hours. On Sunday, I maybe "won" $4 en route to losing $50 (or losing $54, depending on your perspective) in a half hour (the terms of the shop said no penny/nickel slots).

I can't help it, even when they're paying me $75 for the shop, I still felt lousy after throwing away all that money, and so quickly. (btw, we spent $16 round trip on train fare) So although the gambling sucked, we at least figured we'd get a nice (ie expensive) dinner through the shop. The restaurant I was assigned was closed Sunday evenings, though. So we were like: ??? No way to rate the host and server if the restaurant is closed. So then we were even more disappointed. However, when we arrived at the casino and applied for their rewards card, they said that as a special for new members, if I returned after playing slots for a half hour, they'd have some coupons for me. And you know I love coupons, heh. So I went back and they gave me a $10 comp toward any of the casino's restaurants or retail stores. I didn't want to just get a discount on something overpriced; I wanted something absolutely free. The casino had a donut shop, so we got a half dozen donuts and a soda. They were pretty good donuts, like the biggies Wegmans used to have, so I actually left feeling much better about the experience.

And that's the story of how we got comped a half dozen donuts.

Fucking a. Or what is the proper punctuation there? Fucking A. ?

The dealership took apart my car and found that the radiator was busted and the transmission fluid was mixing with the radiator fluid. Sound familiar? This happened in August and I paid $700 to fix it then. This problem is not covered under warranty and is going to cost me $600 this time. WTF? I don't think this is due to poor quality workmanship in August; there has to be some sort of design flaw to have this problem twice in so short a time.

Seriously, I can't get rid of this car soon enough. Dodge has managed to surpass US Airways on my list of most hated companies. A difficult feat, indeed.

The afore-hinted-at car trouble really had pissed off on Thursday and Friday. The transmission gave out. At 47,000 miles?!!? We had to get a rental car for Friday (it was snowy so Ryan's car would have been dangerous). I was expecting I'd be faced with the options to either 1) pay $2000-$3000 to have it fixed or 2) trade the car in as-is and get a lot less than it would otherwise be worth.

However, when the dealership called after looking at it, they said it was covered by the 70,000 miles powertrain warranty. Whew. There's a $100 deductible, but they're taking the whole transmission apart, so I'm very curious to see how much it would have cost otherwise. Serves Dodge right- if they're going to make lemons, they should have to pay the consequences. Curiously enough the car was fine during my first year owning it, while it was still under bumper-to-bumper warranty, but they didn't make the powertrain warranty short enough, it seems, to make a killing on crappy cars.

Considering how much aggravation this car has caused over the last few years, I've decided (with Ryan's input, of course), to get a new one. We're only going brand-brand new if we can get 0% financing, but I think our chances are pretty good. So, the plan is to get the Neon back from the shop and advertise it on Craigslist (and if necessary, the newspaper) to see if we'd get more than it'd be worth as a trade-in (which is highly likely). If the Neon sells, then we'll buy the new car ASAP. If the Neon doesn't sell after a month or so, then we'll just trade it in.

I already know what kind of car I want; the kind I wanted after graduation, but was too poor. More surprising to you may be that I don't want a blue one! My first choice is black so that it'll match Ryan's:














Aren't they a cute couple? 3 and 8, sitting in a tree, k-i-s-s-i-n-g. First comes love, then comes marriage, then comes road salt on the undercarriage.

Just in case you know someone who is:
1) looking for an unreliable used car
2) Catholic priest seeking to build exorcism client base
3) really, really, REALLY stupid and/or gullible


FOR SALE
2002 Dodge Neon. Only 47K miles! Exterior and interior in great condition. "As is." $5000. Model not included.

I got assigned an Atlantic City casino mystery shop for this Sunday! We get a $100 dinner and $75 to play slots (and keep any winnings). This excites me. I get to gamble and am guaranteed to not "lose" $ :)

I ordered all of my seeds and mail-order plants for the coming year. I am really looking forward to spring. We'll have:

2 hazelnut trees (we use a lot of hazelnuts for cooking, and the 2 trees pollinate each other)
1 peach tree (millions of peaches, peaches for free!)
1 apple tree (Granny Smith, my favorite)
lots of strawberries (Jibblin's favorite)
raspberries
onions (not the most glamorous, but we use 3 or 4 per week for cooking)
spinach (yummy bacon spinach salads!)
cucumbers (I like to eat them sliced and tossed with olive oil, vinegar, salt, and pepper)

And those are all in addition to the stuff I ordered a few months ago:
honeydew melon
watermelon
pumpkins
mini lemon tree
mini lime tree
mini blueberry bushes
romaine lettuce
iceberg lettuce
mixed greens/mesculun mix
green beans (the one thing I know I can count on!)
potatoes
carrots
radishes
cauliflower
broccoli
brussels sprouts
turnips

Sounds ambitious, you say? I anticipate having a lot of free time in the spring and summer. More on that later. Ryan's consented to having me install a bunch of raised beds in the backyard. Hopefully all the plants are going strong by the time you see them on June 1st!

We took Jib to Petsmart on his leash last night. It was a laugh riot. Fortunately there was only one dog in at the time, which we managed to avoid. We nearly died laughing when Jib repeatedly tried pouncing and climbing around the bird cages. He seemed to like the rats and hamsters too. I think he also recognized, "Wait a minute, it's an entire wall made out of wet food!"

Then we dropped him off back at home and went to CVS to earn $10 bucks and get free snacks. We're so clever. Sure, call me cheap if you like, but with Ryan's salary and my inclination to save/make money, we're going to millionaires in no time :)

Since all y'alls are probably more interested in certain types of CVS freebies over others (bar soap? um, yeah, thanks...), I'm going to look into charities where they could get the toothpaste, soap, etc to people who really need it. So there. You can stop making fun of me now.

You'll noticed I changed around the toolbar >>>>>>>>>>
It now includes "Cat's deal of the month," which you can use to kick-start your road to millionaire status as well.

We got a Christmas tree yesterday, but not "the Christmas tree." Grumblecakes- I just tried to upload a picture, but we're having USB issues. Anyway, I really wanted a medium-sized potted live tree, but Ryan thought it was a bad idea and would be too much of a hassle to move in and out of the house each year. True, it would be really heavy, but with the appropriate simple machines we could do it. Alas, he would not give in. Sooo, I got a $28 potted dwarf spruce that's about 2 feet tall. It's so cute, like a Grem-sized tree! We're using it as an outdoor decoration this year and probably next year, then it will be big enough to be our main indoor tree (while still potted). Maybe we can get 2 or 3 years out of it until it's too big to move in and out, at which time we'll plant it in the backyard (since it's a dwarf it will only get 6 feet tall). For this year Ryan gets his way and we'll also get a normal cut tree. At least one of us wants to reduce her carbon footprint.

Hmm, is it time to get a different pair of wedding shoes? These would probably be a lot more comfortable...bridal color...fits theme...comes in my size...



















WTF?!? They're $15 in size 9 and $72 in every other size?! Grrr...

We're back from central NY. It snowed there this morning, which made me extremely grateful to not live there anymore. Thanksgiving was pretty miserable. I made 3 delicious pies, but Ryan's mom made a cheesecake and announced to the crowd, "We have pumpkin pie, apple pie, and AUTHENTIC HOMEMADE TRADITIONAL ITALIAN CHEESECAKE!" So everyone had cheesecake, which Ryan said was not very good (I of course had pie). So no one got to be impressed by my pies. Then this morning when I woke up and wanted a slice of apple pie for breakfast, I went downstairs and found that his mom had taken MY apple pie to give away to her coworkers. GRRRR...

Other than the pie frustration (oh yeah, and I had to roll out my pie crust with a wine bottle covered in wax paper because she didn't have a rolling pin because she always buys the cheap prepackaged crusts), I had a stomachache and headache for most of the weekend. I'm pretty sure that it's withdrawl from the old medication that I just tapered off of. I keep cycling through normal, furiously angry, or tearful despondent moods. Poor Ryan. It was overall a pretty sucky Thanksgiving.

Today we drove back home and made a total of 4 CVS trips to "buy" all the Black Friday deals. That's "buy" in quotes because after all our coupons, we made a $27 PROFIT and got all of the stuff below:














So. At the moment I'm in a normal mood and proud of my hoard.

Car bill was $770. I have a great intuition about these sorts of things. My formula? Think about how much it should cost (my feeling: $250), then add $500. Bingo. But at least that included a tune-up in addition to actual repairs.

The reasons for my favorite kitty changing all the time should also include all the reasons NOT to pick a certain kitty:
Grem- peeing outside litterbox 3-4x/week
Choco- knocking food all over floor, jumping on counters
Jib- biting little ones past the point of squealing

Ask me how I saved $360 in ten minutes last Caturday. Go ahead, ask! Ok, since you're prying it out of me... I called Comcast and said I wanted to cancel my cable TV (totally bluffing btw, there's a new season of Project Runway starting!). They asked why, and I said it was just too expensive, especially with the holidays coming up, money is tight and all. Boom, $30 off per month for the next year :) You should try it too if you have Comcast, just make sure you actually ask to cancel first, because from what I've heard, merely threatening to cancel or saying that Dish Network is cheaper doesn't always work. Also, I doubt it would work if you were already on a reduced intro rate.

Ryan beat the Legend of Zelda on the Wii. I've played some but haven't become as interested...I'd rather look for deals on the interwebs while he's playing.

We got a STD for a wedding at Sage Chapel next year. That's Save The Date, get your minds out of the gutter. No sharks, but I always thought that SC was really pretty inside with the stained glass and whatnot. Plus, it's an easy drive and we have free lodging at Ryan's mom's.

Ryan's mom's, which is where we're going for Turkey Day. I think Ryan and I will be cooking everything but the turkey this year. His mom had surgery recently, so that serves as a good excuse to "help" her out a lot. But if you'd tasted the pie last year, you'd know why we want to seize control (help! nut...meg....over...load... *clutches chest*...*keels over*).

So Grem is the chosen kitty, eh? My favorite changes with every silly or cute thing they do every day, including:
Grem meowing while carrying a ball in her mouth around the house
Choco kneading me with his paws (provided I'm not trying to sleep)
Jib head-butting me or weaving through my legs

I'm sticking with the CVS dealings. We're getting Ryan's stepdad's Christmas present essentially for free with our extra bucks. I have plans to put together little gift packages of stuff for select wedding guests, or maybe as door prizes for the afterparty. Sooo...no more scoffing at my deals, lest ye not receive any goodies! I will try to get as much "fun" beauty-type stuff as I can, but we already have more toothpaste than we'll use in a year, with more on the way due to Black Friday deals. I can pass up cheap stuff, but I can't pass up stuff that they're essentially paying me to take!

I have been feeling a little better lately, but my dosages change tomorrow so I'll probably feel like crap for at least a few days. It's surprising how many physical effects there are (mental effects are to be expected). I've learned that "flu-like symptoms" means feeling like I've been run over by a bus.

My car is at the shop right now. I finally took it in to get the work that the mechanic suggested over the summer. He did say that it wasn't urgent, and I don't put many miles on the car during the school year. We are going to use it next week for Thanksgiving, though. So I wonder how much these repairs will cost...my guess is somewhere $750ish. Pleh.

The kittens are sad that you haven't voted for any of them. Just imagine that for some reason I had to get rid of one cat and you had to take it. Which one would you pick? Vote for that one.

Turns out that Sears got a Wii in the day after they called to cancel my order, so they called again to offer it to me. So we have it now, and Ryan likes playing with it. I will have a chance to play it more in the future now that my fellowship application is submitted and this week's homeworks have been graded.

New poll (and ads)----->

Bah. I thought I had awesomely found and ordered a Wii for Ryan, which would have really made his day. Sears called and said their system was having problems and they were refunding my card. They're not getting any soon. Grumblecakes.

Every once in a while you get an interesting post: marriage, house, etc. Well, I guess you're overdue. I'm pregnant!

Right...kidding, of course. Couldn't resist the opportunity.

I guess I'll reveal the "mystery" I alluded to last post. In a nutshell, I have been clinically depressed for about the past four years. For most of the past year I was on an antidepressant that worked like a charm (with a few side effects, but better than being depressed). As happens to a lot of people, though, it just sorta stopped working. At the low point, I ended up sobbing in my advisor's office, in turn made him get teary-eyed, and he postponed my exam until I'm feeling back to myself. I'm now transitioning to a different medication, but it hasn't been long enough to tell if I'll be back to "normal."

At this point you may be thinking, "Aha! It makes sense!" I went from someone who'd stay at PSP parties until the very end to someone who got tired and cranky and needed to go to bed at 9:30. I had to stop going to weekly poker because playing a couple bad hands in a row would make me cry. I was filled with venomous hatred of working at the field station, and now I'm hating school, though last year was okay. Probably the worst symptom is the lack of interest in everything (save Ryan, kitties, and making "free" money). Aside from hating school, I'm not enjoying my free time, either.

In addition to loving Ryan a lot, it's a total no-brainer that I want to marry him because he's shown he's patient and supportive enough to put up with my "moods" for all this time. If he's wanted to stick with me through this, he'll be around through anything. That's why he's the best.

You might guess that I haven't been updating much since I've been super busy doing that big exam thingy that I mentioned a while back. While that would be a good guess, I haven't. I got an extension/delay of the exam, to a date that has not been set as of now. I'm not sure if I want to discuss the circumstances around this yet.

I have a hypothesis that one of me and Ryan's friends is going to get engaged this Christmas or Christmas season. Just had to get that in writing in the public domain, so that if it happens I have proof of my foresight. I can't say who, of course...enough of us don't get surprise engagements as it is :P

We had some lame-ass trick-or-treaters last night. Seriously, these kids but so little effort into the costumes. We gave 1 piece per kid and had a little left over. I did get a kick out of the little kids who said things like:

"look at the kitty cats!"
"what's your cat's name?"... "mom, the cat's name is Jibblies!"
"I like your cats"

Aww.

The latest money-making scheme is "massaging" the rewards system at CVS (drugstore). All completely legal of course, but pretty slick. Through a combination of manufacturer's coupons, CVS coupons, and CVS extra care bucks, we'll pretty much be getting dirt-cheap or profitable non-prescription items. It's a fun little logic puzzle to figure out the best combination of coupons/offers :)

Anyone interested in learning the ropes, I've been reading up here.

If you shop online much, there's a website you should know about where you can earn % back in cash (well... check rebates). And it's FREE! Lots of major retailers, too, although no Amazon. Anyone interested, comment or email and I'll send you a referral email. Yes, I get referral credit there too, but it's definitely a site that's super-useful, especially with the holidays coming up.

We bought 6 bags of candy for Halloween. We'd better get lots of trick-or-treaters or it's all going to my hips :O

I don't know why, but I have this hunch that complaining about school on a once- or twice-weekly basis isn't going to keep my readership up. I don't have much other news to report, so how about some pictures?


The first round of crops from my only unequivocally successful planting. Enough beans for a side dish, plus lots more on the way.



Painfully adorable Choco.



Incorrect spooning technique.



Correct spooning technique.

I require snuggling up on the couch with my kitties and drinking hot cocoa.

Being at school does not satisfy this requirement.

Meh.

School continues to be super-stressful, and on top of that I have to spend the entire day tomorrow (a SATURDAY) listening to seminars at the department retreat.

With that in mind, how'd you like to spend 2 or 3 minutes doing me a little favor? Just register at Squishycash by clicking on the link below (it will automatically know that I sent you), then verify your account by clicking on the email link they send you. That's it. You don't even need to do any offers. Of course I would make even more if you did, but I get a little something for everyone I sign up even if you never go to the site again. Thanks :)

New garden pics are on Flickr.

I'm so proud of my kitties. With over 1000 votes on ICHC, they're maintaining a 4.5+ cheezburger (out of 5) rating. And in the comments many people praised their kyootness :)

I get my questions for my comprehensive exam tomorrow :/ Then I have 8 weeks to write my answers. They're due the Monday AFTER Thanksgiving. Ugh! On one hand it's nice to know that I'll have the extra time if I need it, but I don't want my vacation ruined. I guess I'll try to finish early, but it will be tough considering the exam is on top of all my normal work.

DUDES!

Get your butt over to ICHC ASAP!!! :)

It's even my caption, er, cat-tion. WIN!

Ugh. School is super busy and stressful, and shouldn't improve until Thanksgiving. Blech.

Quick post for my 4 year Ryanniversary. We just got back from our swanky mystery shop dinner. We went over the reimbursement limit: $124! So we spent $9 for our dinner. Oof. Lots of good food, though. Ryan is a huge help when it comes to the shopping. He memorizes times well and I pay attention to what people are saying. We're a good team. Ryan and Cat for ever and ever!

School is busy and yucky, but my money-making schemes are paying off nicely. I'm going to promote myself a little here.



Yes, I've actually made over $100 on the site above. And it was entirely FREE. No credit card signups required at all! Go sign up, just make sure you read the "How To" section first. Most importantly, set up a junk email account and get a free online phone number to give out.

And also yes, I get more $$ for referrals: 10% of what you make, in fact. But if you then go out and get your own referrals, you can get 10% of others' loot as well.

Ryan and I are going out to a $115 dinner in Philly for our anniversary on Friday, and it's entirely paid for, tip and all, through my mystery shopping- yay!

Meh. I like summer better. I had so much less to do then.

I'm surprised that no one commented on the mystery shopping. No one cares that I am participating in HEART-POUNDING, EDGE-OF-YOUR-SEAT ESPIONAGE? As silly as it sounds, I do get a little adrenaline rush from it... the danger of getting "caught." I've completed 4 "shops," as they're referred to: two ice cream shops (same company, different locations), a cell phone shop (major national provider), and an internet service shop (a different major provider). I've also got four more shops scheduled between now and next Monday: two at different locations for a major fast food chain, one at a major pet supply store, and one dinner for Ryan and myself at a "bar and grill" type chain restaurant.

The shops themselves require a little preparation (memorize what you need to notice, learn your "lines") and a good deal of paperwork afterwards (complete detailed survey, scan and email receipts, etc). During the actual shop, it requires a bit of skill to simultaneously make all your observations, talk to the associates, and maintain your front. So it is "work." Still, I think it's just the bee's knees:

• choose your shops; work as much or as little as you want
• for one of my companies, you can literally log on to their website when you're bored, find a shop nearby, and do it right away
  
• reimbursement for purchases
• pay on top of that, unless it's a really sweet reimbursement deal
• edge-of-your-seat espionage, where lying is encouraged

For example, in addition to free ice cream, I get up to $10 in pet supplies this weekend and up to $25 for dinner. For the fast food shops, you get pay plus 2 free meals (walk-in and drive-thru). So, I may have to get a little more exercise to offset the calories of all this free food, but it's substantial enough that our food bill should decrease somewhat.

Anyhow, I'm hooked. I wish I'd discovered this over the summer, though; it's hard to focus on school when there's spying to be done!

Hi all y'alls. I have been blog slacking lately because I've developed yet another obsession- free stuff and get-rich-quick schemes. Well...not quite "quick," but I'm getting some cash and other goodies on the side:

Gift cards. Inspired and reassured by Liz's (several years old) blog entry, I'm completing one of those offers: "Get a $500 Visa gift card, just by filling out a survey and completing offers with some of our partners!" I've had to outlay over $100 for it, as well as starting a Netflix subscription, but if mine works as Liz's did, that will have me in the black by almost $400.

Freebies. Signing up for lots of free samples and coupons. I'm sure I will start getting a lot more junk mail, too, but free stuff is fun. I only sign up for stuff that I will actually use, though, unlike the really crazy people I've seen out on the freebie forums.

Mystery shopping. Yes, they actually exist. No, it's not a scam and I didn't have to pay up front. I also researched the companies on the forums before I picked one. I did my first two "shops" today, but I'm not allowed to say any more; it's a mystery! I'm hoping to rack up credibility so they put me on restaurant assignments, where they reimburse you and your guest for dinners out :) If anyone else is interested in making a few extra bucks and/or scoring free food, I can recommend places to start.

Now that I have classes everyday and am online looking for deals the time is passing quite quickly. I'm behind on garden photos. The peas, beans, and radish plants all look fairly big, but everything else is not very interesting yet. And I think Scruffy the rabbit ate my lettuce and most of the mixed greens, but he doesn't seem to like the pointy variety.

Oh yeah, the bike event was yesterday. It was fun riding the streets of Philly with Ryan and his dad, until I got a flat tire at mile 7. We patched it up, then some kid suddenly stopped right in front of me, causing a 3 bike pileup. My mood went rapidly south and the three of us stopped at the 10 mile mark because it was closest to the car.

Classes start tomorrow. Sigh. I wish summer could last forever.

We've been letting the cats out in the backyard a lot, but always supervised because they're naughty little devils. Jibblin managed to jump on top of the shed (higher than my shoulder), then over the fence into the back neighbor's yard. He walked around a little, then the neighbor's big and outgoing golden retriever ran over and started making a commotion. The dog chased Jibblin around a bit, which hopefully will teach him a lesson. The neighbor had company over for Labor Day and they were out on their back deck, so someone came over and handed Jibblin back over the fence. I apologized profusely for having such a brash cat, but didn't promise that it wouldn't happen again because it probably will.

We did a fair amount of work on the house in the last week or two. More painting (blue stairwell and yellow upstairs hallway), more digging of garden patches (broccoli has been transplanted), and miscellaneous stuff. Ryan's dad is coming down next weekend, so we had that incentive to get things done. Ryan and his dad are competitive about things like that, and I like to impress the future in-laws as well.

His dad is coming down for 1) Ryan's bday and 2) Bike Philly. All 3 of us are doing Bike Philly- basically they shut down a bunch of downtown streets and part of Fairmont Park for us to bike on. It's 20 miles and not a race. But since Ryan's dad is participating, there's the added competitive element with those two, plus I don't want to seem like a total whimp in comparison. So we went for a 15 mile ride yesterday. It wasn't too bad; I was in better shape in the spring, but I'll be fine next week.

Seems the relatives have been using our wedding registries as a housewarming and bday registry as well. His relatives, not mine- mine don't get us anything. His mom got us the big pot and pan set we registered for, and we've already started using it. Someone else got us the 8 setting china set (we should find out who once it arrives). The same sort of thing will probably take place around Christmas. We're going to have to come up with a bunch more stuff to register for. Getting married is awesome :)

Yay! Step one of Jibblies' plan for world domination has been achieved.

http://www.zooplus.co.uk/petofday

All y'alls are so spoiled. New garden and kitty pics on Flickr.

After taking off last week from work, the garden is mostly planted. All that's left is broccoli and cauliflower, which I might just put off until next weekend. I transplanted my corn sprouts yesterday, then when I got home from work today an animal had dug up most of them : / I then sprayed some chemical rabbit/deer repellent around the beds, but I suspect it's actually a cat. There were some cat droppings in a pile of dirt, and I saw some footprints nearby. There are two skittish roaming cats that I see around every couple days. But what would a cat want with corn? Then again, Jibblin does eat corn on the cob. Whatever it was didn't destroy every single sprout, though, so hopefully the chemical can turn things around. If I had more motivation and was willing to spend more money, I'd get some sort of cage to protect them until they're big and strong.

I'll post a pic of my corn and lettuce sprouts soon (it's dark right now or I'd go photograph them).

Know what's fun? Take a clove of garlic, stick it in the ground pointy side up, and water. They grow super fast (mine are 6" tall after a week), and in a couple months I'll have heads of garlic instead of the cloves I planted. And they were just normal garlic from the grocery store. I'll post a pic of the garlic, too.

So I finally went back to the office today and worked on my manuscript. It was actually easy and quite fun- "writing" my discussion section consisted of cutting and pasting sections from my grant proposal and maybe writing a total of 4 or 5 sentences for transitions. I also fussed with my figures a bit. All that's left of my rough draft is an abstract, then I can take another couple days off until my advisor gets back from Maine to read it. I'm torn between feeling like a total slacker and being super proud of my accomplishments of getting the grant proposal and manuscript done. I don't know, it just seems too easy. I like this whole "do the work once, reap the rewards multiple times." And remember, if this gets published, it'll count as a thesis chapter!

Speaking of easy, Ryan stunned his SCUBA instructors by only getting 1 question wrong on his written test yesterday. Seems most of his class got 15-25 wrong. In fact, after one person answered the same (multiple choice) question wrong a couple times, the instructor said, "I'm going to leave the room for a minute. Why don't you ask Ryan about it." Ahh, it's good to be in the 99th percentile. Btw, Ryan and I aren't having kids unless I have a major change of mind. But wouldn't they be smart if we did?

Ryan insulted my cooking last night, so I did what any self-respecting woman would do:

Haha, no. That's the start of my vegetable bed. It finally stopped raining after three days straight of it. No rain all summer except for brief thunderstorms, then 3 days nonstop right when I have the urge to garden. Anyway, rather than removing a large square of the yard, I'm putting a 3' bed around one side of the house (the other side is driveway and the back has a cement patio), then a 10' long bed along the fence in the backyard so my green beans and peas will have something to climb up.

Grem, being a girl and all, obviously wants to help with the wedding planning. Why else would she have borrowed one of my program ribbons?














More cute kittens on Flickr.

I have a fever, and the only prescription is more...

plants! I've been bitten by the gardening bug. Something about those peppers set me off. And harvesting fresh basil and mint has been great, too. The whole idea of eating stuff that you grow yourself is neat. I did go to the Ag school, after all. Now I've got plans to make several more veggie beds in the backyard and side yard. I also ordered a dwarf citrus collection (mini lemon, lime, and orange trees that grow in pots) and 3 mini blueberry plants. Not all of those will fruit next year, but hopefully some will, and the rest will follow in 2009. The citrus trees get brought in during the winter and will make nice part-time houseplants.

Seeds I bought/ordered online:
Sweet Corn
Snap Peas
Lettuce
Spinach
Mixed greens
Carrots
Broccoli
Cauliflower
Brussels Sprouts
Green Beans
Turnips
Garlic
Watermelon
Honeydew

With the exception of the watermelon and honeydew, I'm going to try planting a little of everything else for a fall crop. The melons have a long growing season, so I'll save them for next year. I think it's mild enough here to grow everything else provided I start ASAP. And the cruciferous veggies (broccoli, cauli, brussels) and turnips actually like cold weather and taste best after light frost. So, come end of October/early November, hopefully we'll be eating fresh veggies with dinner every night.

High time I found a hobby, and this one should pay for itself. Pics of my beds once I can get out to make them- it's been rainy the last 2 days.

In other news, I met with the photographers and florist. Both the photographers were awesome and really nice, so I feel bad turning one down, but I'm going with the cheaper one. Actually, ones! We get 2 photographers for the price of one, which is also a plus with the company I selected. They also came to our house for the consultation, which I thought was quite considerate and showed that "personal touch." Sounds like Weggies flowers are going to be reasonably priced as well, although I won't have the $$ quote until tomorrow, probably.

I saw today that US News and World Report has Penn tied for 5th place in their college rankings. For a brief moment I was like, "Yay, moving up in the world! I went from #13 (or whatever Cornell is this year) to #5." But then I was like, "Whoa, what the heck? Cornell is way better than Penn!" College-wide rankings are pretty much useless, but I would be interested to see rankings by department, which might actually mean something. I have a feeling that Wharton and the med school are pulling the rest of Penn up. Oh, and this one bio TA...

There will be no exponential increase in kittens at our house. Choco and Grem have been snipped. Choco recovered very quickly and was back to kneading us in the middle of the night. He weighs over 6 pounds now. Grem, who only weighs 4 lb 9 oz and had the more invasive operation, took it a little harder. She was quite sleepy and disoriented last night and was still not quite herself this morning. I expect she'll be fine by the time we get back from work, though. Poor Grem- they shaved her lower belly. All that fluffy white fur gone and replaced with a bald spot.

That reminds me of a funny conversation that happened about a year ago.
Ryan: "Come here, I think something's wrong with Jibblin. He's got these weird bumps on his stomach."
Cat: "Those would be nipples."
Ryan: "But there's more than two!"

Wedding planning has finally been moving forward. I have appointments with two photographers and one florist (Weggies!) this weekend. Ideally I'll have contracts for both by next week. I also bought supplies to make my own programs since I was in a crafty DIY mood the other day. Of course I won't be able to make them until way in the future when the ceremony plans, officiant, etc have been finalized. But shopping for craft supplies is fun (as I'm sure Liz would agree).

The next two weeks will be me putting together a manuscript for publication. Shouldn't be too painful since I'm just reworking my grant proposal. Getting some of my thesis research published this early will be a big step in the right direction. Then classes start in early September. They shouldn't be too stressful for the first month or so, but then I start my comprehensive exam (3 take-home big essays), which should leave me with very little free time. That's why I'm trying to get the big-ticket wedding planning taken care of soon.

Twas a fairly low-key weekend for me. We saw Bourne on Saturday, after rewatching the first two movies on Thursday and Friday nights. I love love loved the ending. Normally I don't like action movies much, but the Bourne series is great. He's so sneaky smart! Yesterday I painted the banister and did other miscellaneous chores while Ryan was at SCUBA class. His partner is a thin 20-something redhead. Hmph. I do chores while he frolics with his dream girl...not fair. Know what else isn't fair? At present, Ryan only weighs 5 pounds more than me. Boy is 6'1! Hmph. I need to start sneaking bacon grease into his food.

I've started selling my possessions on Craigslist for extra wedding money. My first sale- $90 for the dehumidifier that's just been sitting in the attic since we moved and don't need it anymore. Cha-ching! Next up: me and Ryan's old cell phones (got someone interested in mine for $20) and one old formal dress that is too big. No, I won't be rolling in the dough or anything, but I like tangible gains. Like the $90: boom, just paid for Ryan's ring. He's getting a titanium one- not only are they super cheap, they're durable and a "manly" metal. I've seen plain titanium ones for as cheap as $40, although he wants one with some contrasting-finish insets.

Yet another money-saving scheme- tonight we're going to get a BJ's membership (like Costco, but with pervier name). With only two of us we probably don't need the jumbo sizes of perishable things, but we can freeze some food and can also stock up on nonperishables. I'm one step closer to becoming my mom, hoarding a year's supply of food from Costco in the back room and two years' supply of toiletries in the spare bedroom!

I was in a normal okay mood this morning on my way out the door. I stopped to look at the plants on my way out and noticed lots of blossoms on our bell pepper plant. I went in for a closer look, wondering if we need another pepper plant so it could get pollinated. Then- WHOA! There are four almost full size peppers hiding under the leaves. They blended right in- sneaky! Then I was in a great mood, beaming with pride for my peppers. I think I might incorporate them into dinner this week.

Holy crap! Check out this crazy cat lady!

Oof. Well, the grant proposal is 100% finished. My advisor thinks I have enough data from the summer to get a publication out of it. I said I'm taking a couple days off first. But yeah, what else would I do to keep busy before classes start? Snuggling kittens 24/7 might get a little boring.

Speaking of kittens, they're going in for their "snip-snips" next Wednesday. I hope they don't start hating us afterwards.

I'm picking up on the wedding planning. Next up is finding a photographer. I can't believe how many have "packages starting at $3500" and up. I've seen as high as a $45oo minimum. I realize they put in a lot of time after the event and have expensive equipment, but really, are they making $150K/year? I've found a couple promising websites in a somewhat less stratospheric price range, but have to see if they're available on our date.

Whew. Wrapping up my last Maine trip of the summer, and it's been a busy one. When I last left you, I was eating gooseberry pie and lobster. Ryan and I stayed on the island for another day and a half, going for hikes and seaweed sampling. Then we went off island and camped in Acadia National Park for two nights. It was nice- campfire with s'mores, tent, etc. On the day in between we were very active but ate like kings (or at least I did). In the morning we went on a bike ride on some dirt roads in the park. For lunch I had some very yummy corn and lobster chowder. Then we went for a hike.

Now, if you looked at a map and saw a 1.4 mile trail marked "very difficult," what would you think? Me, I'd think, "They're probably warning old people and families with children that it's not appropriate for them. Anyway, 1.4 miles is nothing, I could handle anything that short."

Well, I did handle it, but it was quite a strenuous affair. It wasn't so much a "trail" as a recommended route up and over boulders and rock faces. I did the math afterwards and calculated that on average it was a 16% grade. That's a little deceiving, though, since it flattened out quite a bit at the top. Parts of it were much worse. So we made it to the top and my face was bright purple, as it usually is after strenuous exercise. There's a road to the top, so most people drive up. Fortunately there's also a concession stand at the top, because those poor people must be so thirsty and hungry after driving all that way! Needless to say, I felt far superior to all of them.

So after that we were quite sweaty and gross, but the campground didn't have showers, so we went for a quick dip in a lake to wash off as best we could. Then we went out for dinner. What do you think I ordered? Think hard! Nom nom nom... lobster! But not just lobster- there was a fixed price special: cup of homemade clam chowder, whole steamed lobster, steamed clams, rice, veggies, blueberry pie, and coffee. I traded most of my pie with Ryan so I could have flourless chocolate torte instead. Blueberry pie is good, but chocolate is better. It was an amazing meal.

The next morning I dropped Ryan off at the bus station in Bangor, then headed back to the island. See, I have this big (13 pages single spaced) grant proposal due in final form by Wednesday. So I worked on that a lot Saturday and Sunday, broken up a little by going out for field work. Woke up early today to work on it more, sent my advisor a draft, then went out for my last field work of the season. More working on it tonight, driving home tomorrow, then going in to the office to finish it up on Wednesday. Whew.

The somewhat awesome thing about this grant proposal, though, is that it counts as my "prelim," or my demonstration of qualification for PhD candidacy. I'm actually way ahead of the game since most people take their "comps" (comprehensive exam) first, then get around to the prelim in the second half of their second year. My comps are this October and November, then I can defend my prelim a few days later if I wish. Then I'm a bona fide candidate instead of just a grad student. The department really likes students to advance to candidacy fast because they don't have to pay our tuition and benefits then (the college does). All that goodness is in addition to the possibility of actually getting the grant, which could potentially support me and all my work for the rest of grad school (awesome to get, of course).

The ol' ball and chain and I made it to Maine okay. When I picked up my car the mechanic recommended I get another transmission flush after driving it for a while, and also pointed out the reason why my car has been especially loud lately (wheel bearing needs replaced). I seriously considered selling my car after those things got fixed so I could cut my losses and replace it with another used (but Japanese this time) compact car, but Ryan vetoed that :( He's right, though, that with just having bought the house and with the wedding coming up, now's not a good time. Maybe the year after the wedding?

Today I made my first pie entirely from scratch- gooseberry! Ryan and I picked the berries from wild plants growing near a secluded beach. The crust turned out excellently, but most of the sugar inside the pie crystallized instead of turning into a gooey berry mixture. It still tasted pretty good, though.

For dinner, we had lobster- two per person and they were free gifts from one of the lobstermen that my adviser has connections with. They were to die for. Kitteh luvs lobstir. Nom nom nom!

My snails are doing very confusing things with their growth. Not a lack of difference between groups, but differences in totally weird directions. Bad snails!

Ryan and I are supposed to be in Po-town en route to Maine, but we're back at home. Halfway up on the Jersey turnpike my car started just revving instead of delivering power to the wheels when I pressed on the gas. It was quite unnerving as I realized I couldn't keep up with the flow of traffic and had to get over two lanes to pull over. Fortunately they have a very wide shoulder. We opened the hood and the coolant cap was off (I had just got my oil changed that morning and bet they failed to put it back on). The engine felt hot, but the coolant compartment was still full. We let the engine cool for a few minutes, then tried driving again with the same problem. We were a mile from an exit so I chugged along the shoulder at 15 mph. We found a garage not too far from the turnpike.

Since it seemed like a transmission problem, yet there was the open coolant cap, it was somewhat confusing. Normally those things are not linked. I was also expecting the worst- transmission problems are expensive. They had a look at it and figured it out: apparently the transmission fluid line runs through the radiator to cool the fluid. They are supposed to be two separate circuits, though. Somehow my radiator busted such that the coolant and transmission fluid started intermingling. And as everyone knows, mixing of fluids is how diseases get around.

So they estimated $600 for repairs and it won't be done until tomorrow. $600 actually doesn't sound that bad compared to "the worst" I had feared ($3000). We rented a car (actually a "God damn minivan") and drove home. We'll drive back the rental car and get the Neon tomorrow, then keep heading north. We're just pushing all our plans back a day, so we'll spend Saturday night in Po-town, then Sunday night in Bangor before getting to the island on Monday.

I don't know if the open coolant cap had to do with the busted radiator- probably. Don't suppose I have any legal grounds to sue Jiffy Lube. Sigh. I thought by getting an oil change before the trip I'd be doing my car a favor.

Rest assured, I check ICHC at least 5 times a day. I need to take more pictures of the kitties in hopes of one day getting them on there and scoring 5 burgers. And I totally am Sad Cookie Cat. I have no willpower when it comes to resisting baked goods, but then I feel totally guilty afterwards. In fact, last fall I bought cookies to bring to my seminar class, but then I ate half the package that morning, so I had to run to the convenience store at lunchtime to buy some Oreos to replace them.

Not only did we meet with the baker on Saturday, but Ryan registered for an August SCUBA class and bought his basic equipment. We decided on cake flavors (our cake: it has a flavors) and basic design, but I'm leaving decisions on the particular decorations until closer to the date, when the other decorative decisions have been made. I hope Ryan enjoys SCUBA. We're thinking Cozumel (best diving in the Caribbean) and Cancun for the honeymoon. I have no idea where the honeymoon money is coming from.

Speaking of money, I'm trying to revive a few of my old cheapskate habits to save up some extra wedding money. Cutting back on snacks, cost effective meals, cheap entertainment, etc. Then Ryan goes and exceeds the food budget by surprising me with a heart-shaped ultimate chocolate cake from the Wegmans by his work. It's hard to get mad at him, though, when there's a cake like that in the fridge. I miss Wegmans so much. The selection! The everyday low prices! The Wokery! Sigh. We tried Genuardi's over the weekend. It seems to be the best of the rest. It's actually the east coast version of Safeway (not that anyone other than Tessa probably knows what Safeway is). I figure that the Safeway execs were probably in a board meeting, trying to decide what to call their new chain on the east coast, then one of them said, "There's a lot of Italians over there. Let's name it something that sounds Italian!" Anyway, the selection was mediocre and the prices weren't as good as Wegmans, but it will have to do, unless Ryan starts shopping immediately after work. I wouldn't be there to enjoy it, though.

One of our hydrangeas is flowering. I should take a picture.

Ryan and I are headed to Maine this weekend. He's staying for a week. We're going to go hiking, mushroom hunting, biking, beachcombing, and sampling. For me it's a working vacation. For us it's a low cost vacation so we can honeymoon next year.

Me:

Your Score: Sad Cookie Cat

71% Affectionate, 48% Excitable, 57% Hungry

You are the classic Shakespearian tragedy of the lolcat universe. The sad story of a baking a cookie, succumbing to gluttony, and in turn consuming the very cookie that was to be offered. Bad grammar ensues.



To see all possible results, checka dis.

Ryan:

Your Score: Lion Warning Cat

67% Affectionate, 63% Excitable, 31% Hungry

You are the good Samaritan of the lolcat world. Protecting others from danger by shouting observations and guidance in cases of imminent threat, you believe in the well-being of everyone.



To see all possible results, checka dis.

I bet lots of people are busy reading their HP books today. Me and Ryan? We're going to a cake tasting with a potential wedding cake baker. It is somewhat on the early side, but I have priorities! Mmmmm....cake! It's going to be tasty, awesome, and a little whimsical, but beyond that, no spoilers. Speaking of spoilers, despite never getting into the HP craze, I am a little curious if he gets killed off. Let me know in the comments. I can't trust one Google-searched spoiler source over another.

Beyond cake, not much in the way of weekend plans. Perhaps some home improvements.

Nope, still wanted to gnaw my arm off. The house is big enough to give myself some space, but the car isn't. The good news from the weekend is that Ryan finished his 100 miles in about 6 hours and his mom bought us a set of patio furniture as a housewarming present.

Back at school, trying to motivate myself to do school-like things...

I'm back in Jersey and sipping a mojito made with mint from our "garden." Ahhh. I worked like a madwoman on Tuesday to finish up in Maine, then drove down yesterday to surprise Ryan. He didn't think I was coming back until Monday. Sneaky me! I've been in a good mood the past couple days; driving 10 hours by myself didn't even seem that bad. Of course I was motivated to see how surprised Ryan would be. He was fairly surprised. He looked at me as if he had no idea who I was!

The kittens are still cute and Choco looks even bigger. Ryan's 100 mile bike ride is Sunday, and my future mother in law and brothers in law are coming down tonight and staying through Sunday. I'm actually slightly looking forward to their visit- this will be their first time seeing the house and the kittens, and I want to see their reactions. Hopefully the house is big enough that I'm not ready to gnaw my arm off by the end of their visit.

Oh, and Ryan was cleaning the bathroom today in preparation for the visitors, and Choco jumped into the toilet! So both the little ones have been "baptized." But again, it was clean water, so we can laugh it off. Normally we keep the lids down to keep them out, so it's rather surprising that both have snuck in.

Ryan took the kittens to the vet yesterday for their last round of shots. Choco weighed 4 lb 10 oz and Grem was 3 lb 8 oz. Choco is a little growing machine! And to think at the beginning of May he was only 1 lb 1 oz! In mid-August they're going in for their little snip-snips, if you know what I mean (shhhh, don't tell them!).

Those painted snails that I showed you? They grew twice as fast on the "seaweed washed ashore" area as compared to a beach that doesn't get much washed up. Helloooooo results! This was an awesome thing to find so early on. To be honest, after a whole school year of planning my dissertation around this topic, I was beginning to worry that maybe the extra seaweed was irrelevant. But no! Science, Nature, here we come! Ok, maybe not. Ecology would be a reach, but the specific marine bio journals would be easy to get this into.

My advisor said today that even if I stopped collecting data now, he'd consider my summer a success. Score! I'm only halfway through my Maine time for the summer. Unless I somehow lose all my data, I'm golden! (knock on wood)

Know what else I discovered today? If you have published articles, you can submit them each as a chapter of your thesis in lieu of writing thesis chapters! I think it is even possible to just submit a stack of journal articles if you had 5-6 good ones, and not have any "thesis" written. This is only in the past decade or so, but the trend is more in that direction. I doubt I'd have enough articles to let them stand alone, but it's nice to know that I don't have to write a several hundred page thesis if I get my act together and publish some papers.

I love love love the ocean: the salty sea air, the view for miles, the weird looking creatures. Why'd it take until I was 22 years old to figure out I should be a marine biologist? Duh! I remind me of the Seinfeld episode where George pretends to be a marine biologist. I even find golf balls!

It's the Fourth and I'm not at a themed birthday party! Sound the trumpets! Hehe, with this Maine thing I might be off the hook for a couple years. Ryan got out of it this year because his day off work is in the middle of the week.

For the Fourth I went to the beach. And the third, and the fifth, and the sixth, seventh, eighth... I worked during the day and then there was a public pig roast/potluck in the evening. Word was that there would be fireworks when it got dark (which would be about now), but it was getting boring after the food was gone because I only knew a couple people.

I believe I failed to note my 4 year blogiversary, which was last Sunday. Happy blogiversary to me, happy blogiversary to me, happy blogiversary dear Cat, happy blogiversary to me!

It makes me sad that so many blogs die out. I may bore you to tears, but I promise my blabber will go on until...well...a long time. I wouldn't go so far as "til death do we part," but how about for now I set a "short" term goal of six more years, to make it an even decade?

Hmm, would marriage constitute "Chapter Four"? I don't expect it to be all that different than living together. I think Chapter Four will have to wait until I'm out of school.

Speaking of marriage, I'm not sure what I want to do with my name. Options:
Cathar1ne El1zabeth H0ffman (unchanged)
Cathar1ne El1zabeth Dickers0n (traditional last name change)
Cathar1ne H0ffman Dickers0n (unhypenated: option to use either)

I have many conflicting thoughts on the subject:
1. I've gotten quite accustomed to it the way it is
2. It's long enough as it is with a 6 letter, 2 syllable last name
3. "Cat D1ckerson" is too many syllables
4. I've always been of the women's lib sort that don't think it's quite fair that the woman is the one who "has to" change
5. Then again, it would be nice to disassociate myself from my birth family as much as possible
6. If I didn't change it at all, I wouldn't have to mess with any paperwork (lazy)

At the moment, I'm actually leaning toward CED. Ryan thinks CHD is silly, like riding the fence instead of choosing a side. If it were as simple as "choosing a side," it'd definitely be CED, but it's weird once you actually think of something as immutable as your name being different than you've known it all your life.

Back in Maine. I figure I'll spend about 2.5 weeks this trip (rather than staying up here til August and just having Ryan come up for a week. It's still gorgeous, though. Not too hot and not humid. I went out at low tide this morning to check on my experiment. I'm going to leave it one more week before taking it down and measuring the snails' growth. I need to set up another experiment or two during this trip so it can run for a month or so.

Word from home is that Gremlin jumped into the toilet last night while it was flushing, then promptly jumped out. Luckily it was the clean water part of the flush. Silly Grem.

The other excitement lately is that I found 21 (vingt-et-un!) golf balls on the beach this morning. I have found one or two previous days, but must have happened upon someone's driving range. I've been collecting them and maybe will buy a cheap driver at goodwill to send them back where I found them.

I may get mocked for not having known this earlier, but I just have to share in case there's someone else I can help:

Attention Comcast subscribers: you can get free movies on demand! There are over 50 to choose from at any given time, and they rotate monthly. Most of them are on the older side (mid-nineties and earlier), but there's no commercials and you can pause, rewind, etc. This is seriously going to reduce the amount of money we spend on movie rentals, plus no hassles of returning on time, etc. And unlike Netflix, it's instantaneously on your TV once you pick it.

I suppose that Comcast advertises this service, but whenever I've heard "On Demand" I tuned out because I assumed it was pay-per-view, and I certainly don't want to make Comcast any richer. With these free movies, however, it's like I'm stealing from the rich. A veritable Robin Hood, I am.

I go back to Maine on Monday. Only three days left of Ryan and kitties :/

The kitty condo is pretty much done! We still need to cover the posts with carpet and rope, but it's functional, at least. With the thickness added from the top and bottom, it's actually 5.5 feet tall- crazy! Pics on Flickr (I don't like how when I insert pics here they get pixelated).

I had a very good weekend. This is mainly due to having fun and different things to do, rather than sitting around and wishing there was something fun and different to do. The things that we did? Exactly what we set out to do.

Friday we bought supplies for and started working on our enormous (3' wide x 2' deep x 5' tall) cat condo. We're copying a model that we saw at Petsmart priced at a whopping $299. Thanks to a ton of carpet scraps that came with our house, we are building our own for roughly $40 in lumber and hardware. It's coming along slowly, but we'll definitely finish by next weekend. Pics of the kitties playing on it when it's done, of course.

Saturday I went grocery shopping and mowed the lawn while Ryan went biking. Then we floated down 6 miles of the Delaware on inner tubes. It took almost 4 hours, including a stop for snacks at the snack boat. There were a few fun little rapids, but it was mostly slow, lazy water that was good for relaxing. In my opinion, an excellent recreational opportunity, as it didn't require much energy but allowed me to be surrounded by scenery, nature, and Ryan. More rapids would have been better, but for once I'm trying to be satisfied with what I got. It was a beautiful sunny day, but we slathered on the SPF 30 so there was no painful aftermath.

Sunday we drove the hour and a half up to North Jersey for Scott and Julie's wedding. The ceremony was outside and they got more of the great weather for it. Which made me think to warn people to bring sunglasses to our wedding. Theirs was at 11:30 facing east, so the sun was mostly overhead but still making people squint if they didn't have sunglasses. Ours will be in the evening, facing west, so the sun's angle will put it in peoples' eyes even more. Anyway, back on topic. It felt a little choked up when the bridal party and couple were walking up the aisle, but fortunately didn't actually cry. I guess of the weddings I've been to it's the one where I knew the participants the best. I know Ryan and myself pretty well...I hope I don't cry at mine and mess up my makeup :/ The ceremony had a very personal vibe to it, with the officiant, soloist, and reader all well known to the couple rather than paid strangers.

There was a ton of food at the cocktail hour, and what I had was pretty good. I also had several glasses of wine (spread out over the hour and dinner), which led me to drag Ryan out on the dance floor multiple times, for both slow and fast songs. He resisted, but I think he ended up enjoying it. The couple did a good job of circulating and making sure they talked to everyone, plus it looked like they had time to eat and dance. The wedding magazines say that you'll be too busy to do it all, but I think they pulled it off. Their cake was beautiful...I wanted to dive headfirst into it :P

We hit some traffic on the way home, so we got back around 7:00. We skipped a real dinner and just grazed because we were still full from the late lunch. Then I baked a snail-shaped cake for my labmate who is defending his dissertation today (and studied snails). It turned out very cute...I'll see if I can get someone to take a picture of it today since I forgot to last night.

I am a bad kitten mommy. Kitten mommies are supposed to love all their kittens equally and not play favorites, but I have a favorite: Jibblies. He's been very affectionate since I've been back, and it seems like he really missed me. And his eyes are so expressive- I can tell what kind of mood he's in and when he needs hugs and pets (to be petted). The little ones are too busy wrestling to show much love. Choco "kneads" me to show affection sometimes, but it seems insincere since it's all or none with the love. Jibblies, on the other hand, is about the little gestures sprinkled in between the cuddle-fests. Perhaps as the little ones get older and mellow out a little, plus have the added advantage of spending more time with me (the mere exposure effect) then my love for the three will be more equal.

Choco hit a big growth spurt while I was gone. His body is somewhat bigger, but his legs are a lot longer so he looks a bit lanky. Grem looks quite a bit smaller at a glance, although she's still growing at a steady, healthy rate.

Big fun planned for the weekend. Tonight we're building a cat condo out of wood and carpet scraps, tomorrow we're inner tubing down the Delaware River, and Sunday we're going to Scott and Julie's wedding. I am excited to see what the wedding is like, especially, since it's the first one I've attended while having wedding-on-the-brain syndrome.

Well, I did make it back about 2:15 hours after the scheduled time, which I guess isn't the end of the world, but I was really impatient to see Ryan and the kitties. Ryan lurrrves me, and so do Jibblies and Choco. Grem is pretty much indifferent.

I stayed home yesterday to spend more time with the kitties and unpack the office, which was still in disarray from the move. Ryan did a good job keeping the rest of the house tidy while I was gone, though. Or rather, I don't know how it was several days ago, but he picked up sufficiently the day before I got back :)

Now I'm back at the office, with lots of ideas for paper topics I'd like to look into after poking around on the beaches.

Just wanted to get another state on my blogging list- New Hampshire. I drove to the Manchester airport, then I'm flying the rest of the way. Turns out it may not have been such a great money-saving idea: long term parking is $10/day and I'm gonna be away (or rather, home) for 13 days :(

CRAP- the flight has already been delayed twice. US Airways fills me with homicidal rage. Every single time with the major problems!!! I keep saying that I'm never flying it again, but then I do. Because 1) I have 19,000 FF miles with them and you need 25,000 to get a free trip, and 2) they dominate the Philly airport. But now I'm putting my foot down- after I redeem my free trip for the miles, I am only flying them if absolutely necessary. It's worth paying $50 more for a better trip. (After $1oo more I might reconsider... at least I'd feel like I was "earning" money to sit in the airport). But for this trip I could've flown Southwest for about the same price- but was trying to earn miles.

So, I dunno if Cymfony is gonna pick up on this and report it to the FAA, but US AIRWAYS IS THE DEVIL!!!

Yay! I'll be reunited with my Ryan and the furry ones tomorrow!

There's a new application on Facebook called Catbook...so you can become friends with the kitties if you want. I understand if you want to meet them in person first.

I forget if I ever mentioned that I have a weak wireless signal from the neighbors on the island. I haven't had to go to the library, although it does cut out from time to time.

I got some very exciting and encouraging results from my experiment in progress today, even though it's a different type of data than I plan to collect at the end. Remember the cages with the old versus new seaweed? Well, the point of the experiment is to see how the snails INSIDE the cages grow on the various diets. Checking up on the cages today, however, there were tons of snails on the OUTSIDE of the old seaweed cages, whereas there were almost none on the new seaweed cages. My hypothesis was that the old seaweed would be preferred because its chemical defenses are breaking down as it decomposes. Makes sense, right? Although as humans we would prefer fresher salad to slimy rotten salad. Anyhow, no one has tested this sort of hypothesis with seaweed (as far as I've read), so with further experiments (i.e. other thesis work) I might have a shot at some good journals and get my name out there for something new. Yay!

Of course I'm jumping years ahead here, but the differences between the treatments were so drastic that there has to be some interesting biology going on. Today just might have been my best day of grad school so far :)

I really miss Ryan and the kitties. It wasn't too bad until yesterday, since last week my advisor, a post-doc, and an undergrad were all in the house with me. They left Sunday, though, and now I'm all by myself for the next week.

Ryan was a sweetie, though, and sent me kitty pics that he took (well, I did have to bug him a little to do it). Get thee to Flickr to bask in the cuteness!

2 Maine pics and 2 leftover Jersey pics up on Flickr.

Other than no Ryan and no kitties, I'm having a great time. It feels good to be out on the beach collecting data. Much better than sitting inside all school year. I am a lot less angsty because I didn't particularly enjoy my classes last year. But now that I'm doing my own research, I feel less tempted to drop out of grad school (not that I actually would, but felt like I'd be happier if I did).

Howdy from the island library! Today I started my field work- yay! This afternoon I'll be painting snails with nail polish, just because I can. Then tomorrow I set up my first experiment: will the snails grow well on a diet of yucky old seaweed or just the fresh stuff? I know, I know, the world is hanging in the balance awaiting the answer to this pressing question!

Blogging from another new state- ME! Get it? Me, Cat, I'm blogging from Maine. ME.

I survived all my driving and now I'm waiting in line for the ferry. I was here in time for the last ferry, but there wasn't enough space for all the cars. With all this time to kill, and the universe being against me and all, I was shocked and amazed that there is free (ie, unsecured) internet from my spot in line. It's surprising considering that this is the middle of nowhere and all.

I left home yesterday at 12:30, after getting watery-eyed when saying goodbye to the kitties...they just looked so sad to see me go! The drive yesterday was surprisingly fast through Jersey (no traffic on the turnpike?!?), then slower through NYC and Conn. I hit the rainstorm halfway through Conn, which slowed me down quite a bit. I got to Liz's around 6:30, and we got Chinese delivered with Kathy, who was also there. Then we pretty much watched the Food Network until it was time for bed.

This morning I had leftovers for breakfast and hit the highway (after driving around circles in Somerville) at 8:30. Arrived at the ferry dock at 1:45. It's a long drive, but splitting it over two days made it not that bad. I don't have to make the entire drive again until the end of the summer- I'm flying back for my break in a couple weeks.

Ryan says the house is empty without me. I think that means he should adopt more kitties to fill it up until I come back, but once I'm back we'd keep those kitties too. :P

The kittens had their second visit to the vet yesterday. They've more than doubled in weight- Choco was 2 lb 10 oz and Grem was 2 lb 1 oz. They spend upwards of 3 hours a day wrestling each other.

The house has been keeping us exceedingly busy. I didn't go into the office at all this week; just stayed home and did house stuff. The porch is now white, as I said I'd do earlier, and there's a flowerbed out front with hydrangeas and herbs (basil, parsley, and mint for mojitos) in between.


























Other than that, it's mostly been interior work. The hallway is halfway painted and we're doing two of the bathrooms today. The big excitement yesterday was that a gallon or two of sewage came up and out of our downstairs toilet (yay!). We had Roto-Rooter come out and $300 later the problem (blocked sewer line) is fixed. And an hour later, the bathroom was clean again. Ah, the joys of home ownership!

There's a couple other new pics on Flickr. I probably won't be updating terribly often in the next couple weeks while I'm in Maine. The only place on the island with internet access is the library, and I don't plan to go there every day. I will take pictures and eventually get them up, though. Back in Jersey around the 19th or 20th maybe?

Good gravy. I finally have internet! We are all moved over, as are the furry ones. They seem to like the house a lot, although the little ones were overwhelmed and shy at first. We are mostly unpacked but still have miscellaneous home repairs and painting to do. I leave for Maine in a week- ack! Pictures of the gussied up house soon, but it's too messy right now.

Another one bites the dust. Jen's engaged too :) Congratulations to the happy couple! People have been getting engaged left and right lately. Until now I've only been to 3 weddings, but I should double that by next year.

Our house is enormous. I'm not bragging- I'm complaining! There are sooooo many walls to paint, and we're doing 2 coats to get full coverage. I've been painting (or prep work for painting) for 6-7 hours for the last three days and we only have the kitchen, 2 bedrooms, and the trim in the third bedroom done. The kitchen is a pale purple, and it looks awesome. The bedrooms are all pale gray/silver, and look nice and dreamy, like sleeping in the clouds. Still on the list: finish last bedroom, living/dining room (huge), 3 bathrooms, hallway, 2 stairwells, and laundry room. And that's just the painting- we still have to move all our stuff. We've been moving things that will fit in my car with each trip over, then Ryan's dad is coming to help us with the furniture next weekend.

It's crazy to think that all the house is ours. I feel like "what did I do to deserve all this?" I finally get the nice house painted all pretty like I wished I had while growing up. It would be a very empty house with just me and Ryan, but the kitties will fill it up nicely with their frantic scurrying around. They're going to be so happy!

We has a housie! And I'm exhausted.

Neither Ryan nor I could fall back asleep this morning when the kittens woke us up at 5:30, so we got up and stayed up, which definitely has something to do with me being exhausted. The closing was at 9am, and since I'd been warned so many times to expect to sign a lot of papers, it didn't feel like that many. In fact, we were done by 10. And Brian awesomely gave us a thank you card with a $50 Home Depot gift card. We'll probably use him again when we sell in 5 years or so.

The one big annoyance was that the previous owner took the refrigerator, washer, and dryer with him, even though in the contract it said those would stay. Turns out he was confused, and he arranged to have them delivered back that day. The fridge has an icemaker, and since the door to the freezer had been off the hinges in transport, the tube for water got pretty beat up. We suspect that it will leak once we hook it up, although we haven't yet because we need to paint the kitchen.

So we went to Home Depot and spent $500 after a 10% discount on everything AND the $50 gift card. AND we purposely didn't get much of our paint (it will be on sale later this week), lawnmower, vacuum, etc. Oy. Then we came back and did painting prep. Our plan is to paint the whole kitchen and the bedrooms' trim tomorrow, plus more prep on other rooms. Pics later.

Gremlin, Choco, and Ryan say hi. Ryan's taken to calling Gremlin "Grem-Grem," whereas I prefer, "Gremlin from the Kremlin." Choco occasionally gets, "Choc-Choc," as his version of Grem-Grem. It's been 2 weeks and they are definitely much larger. Maybe 1.5 lbs instead of 1? Not much poundwise, but a big percentage. Choco is our sweetie pie. He likes to cuddle. Gremlin is always on the go and is too busy to cuddle.

We do a final walk-through of the house Thursday night, then close on Friday morning. After "basking" in the house for a little while, we'll probably jump right in to the painting prep and spend the weekend painting. We'll be back and forth between the house and the apartment for the rest of May. Can't wait!

Observations on Choco and Gremlin:
1. I can't believe how much we have to clean their 2 litterboxes!
2. I can't believe how much they eat! (see also #1)
3. I can tell at a glance that they're getting bigger.
4. Jibblies has attempted to lay the smack down a couple times because the little ones keep bugging him.
5. They are already very affectionate and meow incessantly if they want attention.
6. They purr loudly if you scratch their heads.
7. Gremlin has super-thick fur.
8. With the amount of cat hair we're going to have as they get bigger, someone should get us the Dyson from our wedding registry.
9. Three cats is too many for a 2 bedroom apartment, even if 2 of the cats are tiny.
10. They're cute!

We get the house one week from tomorrow! Yippee! Then I can go all Martha Stewart and paint, garden, and decorate. And the less fun part- move all our stuff. We bought new furniture for the guest room and it's being delivered, so at least we don't have to haul that upstairs. The guest room is going to be nicer than our room, in my opinion. But- we got a queen size for the guest room as well, so we can mix and match the beds/linens/mattresses. One comfy bed is too small for 2 adults and 3 kitties, so the remaining kitties will have a nice spot, too.

We've locked in the wedding date: May 31, 2008! I am seriously considering having Wegmans do our flowers. There's a full service floral department in our store and I loooove the arrangements they have every time we get groceries. In fact, that's where I first fell in love with all the spiky flowers. I practically have the entire wedding planned already. Although it hasn't all been ordered, I know where it's coming from and what it's going to look like. Now that we've got the date for sure, our save the dates will be in the mail soon. With them going out over a year in advance, people are going to think we're crazy, but we want to increase everyone's chances of being able to attend. And Ryan's a planner, plus uncertainty makes me nervous.

More kitty pics are up on Flickr. These ones Jen took. She had much more success getting the little ones to look at the camera. Plus an amazing action shot of Jibblies.

So I took them to the vet yesterday. Turn out that our little bundles of cuteness are also little bundles of FLEAS! Nothing that some Advantage can't take care of, but it cost us a little extra $. Otherwise they're in good health. Like I suspected, Gremlin is a girl and Choco is a boy. She was just under a pound (15 oz.) and he was just over (16.1 oz.). The vet estimated their age at 5 weeks.

3 kitties is quite a lot to keep track of. Maybe Ryan's right that we shouldn't get any more after this. Although once the kittens are more autonomous they won't need such vigilant supervision...

I ordered my dress yesterday! Now if Ryan leaves me I have something to wear when I'm an old lady and have hundreds of kitties roaming my house. It's the one I had my eye on since my first bridal magazine:

























I definitely knew when I tried it on. No hemming and hawing. Ryan went with me to the store, so he's seen me in it. I'm not superstitious like that.

Kittens make me soooooo happy :D They're much less skittish and more adventurous as time goes on. We've even let Jibblies mingle with them while we're around to supervise. Jibblies is a scaredy cat and is very timid around them. I think he's just confused as to where they came from and is getting used to the idea of sharing me and Ryan with other cats. We're not allowing unsupervised mingling yet, just to be on the safe side. I can't say that Jibblies wouldn't hurt a fly because he's been known to eat flies and other bugs :)

Jen visited yesterday on her way to Atlantic City. We had lunch, played with the kitties, looked at wedding magazines, went to try on wedding dresses (well, they only let me since she didn't have a separate appointment), and went to dinner. It was fun to hang out and do the girl talk thing.

Of the dresses yesterday, the one that stood out was this dress. I would definitely get it in white rather than ivory/off-white. I mainly like the plunging back- it was dramatic. The front was very flattering, and I liked that it was a more lightweight fabric. While I do like it a lot, I still haven't had a visceral reaction to any dresses. The only concerning thing is that there's a sale this weekend where I'd get $150 off if I ordered it then. I have an appointment at a different shop tonight (one that carries the va-va-voom dress I showed earlier), and if nothing there strikes a chord then I'll probably bring Ryan to see the above dress this weekend and possibly get it.

Being done with finals, even though they weren't very stressful, has improved my happiness level too. And we close on the house 2 weeks from tomorrow! Life is pretty darn good if my main problem is picking the best dress.

Fantastically wonderful news!!!!!!

The H0ffman-Dickers0n household got a tiny bit bigger last night.

Tiny times two!

Introducing Choco:















And Gremlin:














A couple less blurry pics:


























Ordinarily we'd have adopted adults from the shelter, since kittens at shelters usually have no trouble finding homes. But, I got a mass email from someone at school last night saying that there were cute stray kittens under their porch that needed homes. The rest is history! I'm not 100% sure what their sexes are, but they look different, so I think there's one of each. Probably Gremlin is a she and Choco is a he, but I could be wrong. Choco is short for Chocolate. S/he's a severe cutie with a striped little belly. Gremlin has a weird gray-orange mottled coat with white paws and a white belly. S/he's the "ugly" one but has the more outgoing personality.

They've done some cute pouncing on each other, but for the most part have just been eating and getting settled in. We're keeping them separate from Jibblies for now... when we first brought the cat carrier with them inside, Jibblies peeked in the front and Gremlin got so scared that s/he vomited! And then Choco ate it! That's some combo of gross and cute, which equals funny.

I'm estimating that they're about a month old, but then again I could be wrong. They're going to the vet in a couple days for shots and an exam. Then I'll have a better estimate of the age and a definitive answer on the sexes.

I was surprised- I actually had a pretty good time at the L0ckheed thing. The open bar didn't hurt :) Making small talk with Ryan's former co-workers wasn't too hard with the engagement, house, and Jersey to talk about. We ended up sitting with 3 other couples that were actually pretty cool (despite us being the young 'uns) and turns out they're big Idol fans, so I got to prove to Ryan that I'm not the only intelligent person who got sucked in to watching! Dinner was impressive: bacon-wrapped filet and salmon duo entree. It was pretty clear they don't throw this type of party very often.

Today is Nibblin's birthday! He's 2 years old. We got him a new cat teaser and tub of catnip. Pretty soon he'll be getting some friends, too! We've been visiting the animal shelter and have our eye on these two, if they're still available in three weeks:














Cute, eh?! They're not related, but they need to be adopted together because they've become such good friends. The one on the left is Walker, a 2 year old male, and when we saw him he was very playful. He and Jibblin can get into all sorts of trouble together. The one on the right is Isabelle, an 8 month old female. She was sleepy when we visited but they tell us she's very cuddly. We'd rename them- if Walker really is as mischievous as he seems, he'd be Gremlin. If Isabelle is as cuddly as they say, maybe a name like Cuddles.