Random Procrastination Worthy Thoughts

I am so thankful that I don't have any allergies. I was recently talking with someone from another lab who said that she is allergic to mice (not very good since she is the primary care person for the mice in her lab). She has to put on a labcoat, gloves, mask, and the works before handling the mice. If a mouse were to run up her unprotected arm for instance, she would break out in hives all over. yikes. Yet she chooses to stay in this profession. There are many others in my lab and in town who have terrible allergies to tree pollen. Every now and then it kind of hits them out of the blue. My labmate even sneezed so hard and often that he had to be given a neck collar. Again, I am thankful I don't have any allergies. Actually, everyone should be thankful for that. I am a pretty grumpy and miserable person even with a common cold. :)

I am actually taking a break from writing my thesis proposal right now. I am also writing this on my not-so-new, new laptop. As you remember, my previous laptop was crushed in a recent bike accident. Well, some guy outside of my department heard about my mishap and offered to give me an indefinite loan of a laptop he had that was just sitting around. It isn't the newest or the fastest, but it is certainly functional. It is most convenient right now for writing my thesis proposal. Speaking of my thesis proposal, I have decided that it is a pain in the rear end. I more-or-less figured that it would be a pain, but now I really know that it is. It is a good learning experience though, and a good challenge despite the added stress of having to complete this far sooner than I am really ready to complete it by.

You may notice that I have modified the comments section. It has been rather annoying to find that spammers were leaving there comments on my blog (ie: computer programs whose sole purpose is to advertise). Now, you will have to complete one more step to post your comment. It really shouldn't be that much harder for anyone to do so.

Ah, now I remember what I really logged on to blog about in the first place. This past weekend Jori and I did something that we would never normally do--especially on a Saturday here in PA. We went to our first PSU football game. Our landlords normally purchase extra tickets that they give away to clients or employees, but there was a late cancellation, and they gave us two extra tickets ~$45 each. We sat right on the 50 yard line a few rows up. Absolutely great seats. We could see everything from the game to the crowd very clearly. The crowd, by-the-way was nearly 107,000 strong, and I can now tell you that that many people can make a lot of noise. There were organized cheers that the WHOLE stadium would participate in. The sound of that many people shouting "lets--go--p--s--u" would reverberate through the stadium and our ear drums. The crowd would also stand up and cheer the loudest when the opposing QB would be trying to communicate last minute instructions to his teammates. It must have worked because PSU shalacked the Minnesota Golden Gophers 44-14. The offense was good, the defense was good, and the crowd was a heck of a lot of fun--much better than watching on TV.

I have to admit, I have never really had much of an appreciation for the football fans who buy season tickets to games and then tailgate and plan important family events like weddings around football games. However, now I think that I can at least understand. I'm not sure I would plan my life around a football game, but at least I can understand why others might.

OK, back to thesis writing now. Please pray for Jori and I as we are both writing our thesis proposals right now, and are both on the busy side of things, and at times almost unbearably so. Pray that we may have diligence to complete our work, but also patience with one another and others as patience seems to be the first things to go when I am stressed/busy.