Sports are ruining my f***ing life ... and other angst

Before really getting to the root of this post ... I just wanted to comment on the word "angst" ... i looked it up on Wikipeida to make sure the spelling was correct and I just learned that angst is a German, Danish, Norwegian and Dutch word for fear and anxiety ... words are so cool :)

On another note ... sports are ruining my life ... or maybe just the fact that everyone I know is obsessed with sports and I just really DONT CARE. I get extremely frustrated that every single conversation I have with my friends here seems to turn towards sports (and depending on who is around ... the conversation might actually stay on sports until I get fed up and leave). Oh and when I say the conversation is almost always about sports ... I don't mean that people talk about the game they watched last night or this really upsetting play that happened recently ... I mean people start talking about baseball players and football players like they are friends ... and they talk about football stats (as if this knowledge is somehow useful to me) and they name drop like nobodies business ... and don't even get me started with fantasy football.

I realize that I didn't grow up in a "sports enthusiasts" house hold (to be honest I am not sure my dad even knows the difference between baseball and football) so maybe I just wasn't trained at an early age to love these sports ... however I do enjoy going to football games and baseball games (however this might be because I really just love sporting event food ... hotdogs, ice cream, cotton candy, lemonade). What I want to know is when did it become "exciting" or even "interesting" to spend your time talking about blah blah blah player on this team that you don't even like (or wont even end up playing against your favorite team because they are in different leagues). Truthfully ... if the only think you seem to be able to talk about is sports ... then I think you must be a extremely boring person. Now I must admit that most of my friends are extremely interesting people ... and they tend to talk about a myriad of things ... however at the moment it is playoff season in baseball ... and football season is up and running, so it seems all that anyone has time to talk about is freaking stupid sports.

So back to why I think sports is ruining my life ... it turns out if you want to be social and actually have conversation throughout the day ... you have to either learn how to talk sports, or at least learn how to turn your brain off when the conversation inevitably turns towards famous people you have never heard of. I have been trying to be more proactive with these sports conversations (by at least trying to turn the conversations toward Rockies baseball, since I kinda sorta know about the Rockies) ... however now that the Rockies suck and they are out of the playoffs ... I will probably not be able to attend events such as "coffee hour" unless I want to spend an hour of my day talking about sports.

This post is getting long and rambly (notice a trend??) ... so on to "other angst" ... I just realized that it is October 13 AND I am never going to finish my prospectus or my qualifying exams ... and I am starting to feel a bit panicky. anxious

ALSO ... it decided to be winter (we freaking skipped Fall) ... and I already feel depressed and about the fact that its going to be cold/wet/windy until March ... ahhhhh

ALSO ALSO (instead of PPS) ... I applied for this meeting in Costa Rica (which is going to be held in both english and spanish) ... so I have to start re-learning spanish (so that I can speak/understand) ... and I want to get something like Rosetta Stone etc ... however this software is CRAZY expensive, and stupid, and doesnt work on my Mac or blah blah blah other issues

haha, ok well back to the grind I guess (I am going to get some coffee!!!)

sunday ... sunday

To start ... I am rather hungover today ... Amy's wedding was fun, but the open bar was more fun/dangerous.  I managed to drink a TON of water throughout the night, but my stomach just does not appreciate alcohol anymore :( ... I am starting to wonder of my inability to feel OK after drinking has something to do with out much coffee i drink throughout the day (who knows, I just thought of this this morning as I drank three cups of coffee at The Red Table)

I decided to try out this new cafe today (well new to me, not new to FC) ... Its called "The Red Table" and I had been there once before ... but I don't remember it being soo cool!  Lost of light, good coffee and an avocado burrito!  The only downside is that it closes at 1 on Sundays (maybe every day???) Anyway, it had an amazing (non pretentious) atmosphere AND they were playing some of my favorite music ... for instance "Those to Come"  by the Shins was playing when I first got there ... and well its one of my favorite songs :)

Well anyway ... the amazing lighting and good vibe was much much more conducive to working than lets say the funny smelling dark bean cycle (where I am currently sitting and not-enjoying a rather perfumey iced tea :( )

I've been struck lately with a complete lack of motivation for accomplishing anything other than working out and reading Harry Potter (I am on the 5th book right now, and I can't seem to put it down!) ... this is of course problematic because well ... I have to take my prelims and not fail out of gradschool (hmm ...)

Ok well this post is getting rambling ... and I can't remember why I started it in the first place ..?? who knows!

Hope all of you who are reading this have had a good weekend!!

couple-ish things

Can anyone explain to me why you would ever have a joint email account with your spouse/significant other?  

Things I need to do ...

Drink more water ...

I've started a new "work out regime" ... or whatever ... and now I am sore all the time, which is one indication that I need to drink more water.

Why is it so hard to remember to drink more water ... I am always thirsty ... but somehow I can't be bothered to drink water??? WTF?

My favorite things...

So last weekend (or well two weekends ago) ... I kinda sorta had a panic attack at 8:30 am Saturday morning and started crying in my shower because I hate my life and I hate gradschool ... So I made a whole plan for quitting gradschool ... how I was going to tell my advisor (and make him feel real bad about it) and find a job sell my car to live my life etc. ... but then well I went down to denver to see my friend Mimi and I realized that this was stupid and what I really wanted to do was study something in Africa ... and well my research/school life is a whole lot better :)

Ok ... but the point of this post is really this ... when I realized how completely and utterly unhappy I am here I started to think about what makes me "happy" ... and while none of the things I thought of will really help me figure out what I want to do with my life ... I have realized that there are a few things out there that I really do enjoy

1) I get super happy/excited when I am driving in my car when the following are on the radio

a) This American Life

b) Car Talk

c) Wait Wait Don't tell Me

Last night I was heading home from Denver and This American Life came on ... I was so excited that I got to spend an hour in my car listening :)

2) I love reading for fun ... Its been a very very long time since I actively read books just for fun, but this year I've been reading a ton ... my new favorite things are to

a) read a book in the bath tub

b) read a book in a coffee shop in a comfy chair while drinking coffee

c) read a book on my new balcony :)

3) So this one is probably not super healthy ... but I love buying new things ... especially clothes which make me feel good/cute/hot/amazing. There is nothing like buying a new shirt/pair of pants and feeling like a million dollars...I recently bought this jacket and I feel great every time I wear it :)

4) I love it when I randomly start talking to someone ... and they dont look at me like I am a crazy person ... I swear I am just nice and chatty ... and some people really respond well to my complete and total weirdness ... I do not feel happy when people act all uncomfortable when I try to talk to them ... case in point that stupid lady in Israel to who totally fed me to the dogs at the airport she was a BITCH

5) I have started working out in the mornings ... and while I hate waking up early ... I really love the fact that I now have time to cook/eat/clean when I get home in the evenings, having free time in the evening is AMAZING :)

6) I also love to daydream about traveling ... more on that later!

funny emails

So today I got this email at work

From: Bill Jack

Sales,

I am Bill Jack, I am mailing you to order some of your products and I will want it shipped to our place as follows :


Shipping Address:
341-45, Dangni-dong,
Saha-gu, Busan 604-831
Republic of Korea


So i hope to hear from you soon regarding my inquiry and to know where i can view your products you have presently in stock and if there is any special pricing i need to know about. Lastly

regarding payment i will be sending you my credit card to charge for my order to avoid delays but can you let me know the type of credit cards you accept?

I hope to hear from you as soon as possible.
Regards.

NOTE IN TERMS OF SHIPPING THAT CAN BE ARRANGED WITH THE RIGHT SHIPPING COMPANY AND PAPER WORK

Since I clearly don't have anything better to do ... i looked up the address and it turns out to be a real place ... at a university. So I can't figure out what the scam is ... they are going to send me their credit card info ... so that I can send them "supplies"???

What is going on???

The home stretch

I am *almost* done with my paper.

I have officially spent approximately 12-15 hrs a day in my office for the past two weeks ... not only is it a disaster but I think it is starting to smell funny (that probably means that I am starting to smell funny).

Last week, while frantically trying to remember how to write a coherent sentence, I also gave a few lectures at a week long summer course we offer for local K-12 teachers ... the class is called "Weather and Climate for Teachers" ... so you know we teach them about weather and climate. This is my third year working with the summer course ... and for the first time ever I was not nervous to talk in front of a room full of 40 wide eyed teachers. Maybe I am finally getting the hang of this whole teaching thing!!

After my lectures, one of the teachers came up to me and told me that I am a "natural" and that I should really consider going into teaching ... this comment pretty much made my day :)

Back to the home stretch ... I am turning in my paper and my responses to the reviewers tomorrow ... then I am going to get stinking drunk with Michelle :)

Tuesday starts the Gradstudent colloquium ... where I have to give a talk about my "current research" ... I am thinking about showing some pictures of the new purse I want to buy from this site ... http://www.1154lill.com/home/ ... because this is the only interesting research I have been doing lately :)