June 2005 Archives

I'm a bit stressed out right now, a bit. I have waited way too long to move my saltwater tank to the house, and now I only have tomorrow to do so. My sand bed has become pretty infested with cyanobacteria, so I'm planning on replacing the majority of it (I've tried cleaning it out numerous times, changing lighting, moving powerheads, and it just isn't going away). So today I'm going to stop by Aquatic Technology and buy some live sand with the money I don't have (aka my credit card). I also need to get a filler sand, but I don't know where yet. From what I've been reading, not many places sell play sand that is aragonite based anymore, so I will have to go looking at local hardware stores, Wal-Mart, Kmart, etc and do the vinegar test (silica based sand will not dissolve, aragonite will). I've already checked Home Depot and Lowe's, and they only have Quikrete, which is silica based and not what I want to deal with.

I keep forgetting that I'm going to have to sift through the old sand for any critters! They're very beneficial and I really don't want to kill them. I also have to scrub all the junk off my live rock, yuck. This is going to be quite a job. Not to mention that there is not a level surface in the house, so I have to figure out how to level the tank (after I find where I want to put it and move all the unpacked boxes out of the way). Does anybody want to move this tank for me?

Kory and I took RolyPoly and Chiyo outside to romp around in the backyard today. Roly just walks around and eats grass, and Chiyo only goes in the grass if you put him there. And then he realizes there's a huge bed of mulch ten feet away and he's off! I would have thought he'd rather lay in the grass, but I guess he'd rather be in the dirty mulch. We eventually blocked off the missing boards in the fence and took Chiyo's leash off, which he seemed to like. We took the blocks away when we went inside though because the neighbor's cats (which we now have seen at least four!) use the holes to travel between yards. So here are some photos.

I also posted a few more photos from today over on Flickr.

Why is it that I don't realize just how disgustingly dry my legs are until I get out into public? I get out of the shower and get dressed thinking my legs are just fine, and then I get to some place where there are other human beings around (work, stores, etc) and the horror that is my white flaky legs becomes visible. I know, gross. Must be the lighting! I thought summer would allow me to skip putting lotion on every morning, but apparently not.

Anyway, I'm super tired and I don't know why. This seems to happen every summer. I take Kory to work at 11:00pm, go to sleep around 11:30pm, wake up to get ready at 5:30am, and by the time I get home at around 6:30pm I am completely exhausted. I know five hours of sleep doesn't sound like much, but it's actually not that bad. During school, there are many nights when I sleep only a couple hours and can function just fine. Maybe it's all the driving that makes me tired, or just sitting in front of a computer all day. I don't know, but I had to call Kory this morning on my drive to work so I would stay awake.

How coincidental. As I was typing "had to call Kory", Kory called me! Honestly.

Kory: "Guess where I'm sitting. It's somewhere outside."
Me: "I have no idea, the school?"
Kory: "No, on the bench!"

"The bench" being this sad little bench on the side of a very busy state route that no one in their right mind would ever sit on. It's in a very inaccessible spot where no pedestrians ever wander, except Kory. I pointed it out one day and told him jokingly that we'd have to go hang out there sometime, and so when he told me he was sitting on the bench I started cracking up. Apparently we were wrong about this magical bench because he rattled off a long list of interesting items surrounding it, which included a frog and a hat. At least he seemed amused. What is he doing out sitting on random benches on his day off? Shouldn't he be at home doing the dishes?

Here are some photos we've taken around the house in the past week or so.

• I really love our new house. I actually like waking up in the morning and taking a shower because I love our claw foot tub. I like going downstairs and eating breakfast in a room filled with natural light. Goodbye small claustrophobic showers and dark kitchens with no windows! I love having a washer and dryer. I really love having a dishwasher.
• Frank came over to see how things were going on Saturday, and we introduced him to all the animals, even the tarantula. He was too scared to hold her.
• There are two cats that I think belong to our neighbor, but they are always hanging out all over the place and I love them. We've named the black and white one Thomas Bartholomew and the big fluffy lion-ish one Teddy Roosevelt. They walk around like they own the neighborhood and I love it. Thomas was sitting at my screen door the other day and every time I would walk by he would meow at me. Teddy was sitting on top of my car this morning when I left for work. Cutest ever. RolyPoly is so jealous.
• Even though school doesn't start for two months or so, I'm pretty excited for it. My Environmental Physiology teacher is going to be the same teacher I had for Embryology, and he's a really good easy teacher. And I'm really excited for Wetlands Ecology so Leigh and I can catch invertebrates and swoon over Ferenc.

• I've had what I think is a sinus infection for the past two weeks. Fever, aches everywhere, facial pain, headaches, runny nose, congested nose, sore throat. This is the first time I've had one of these, and it doesn't seem as bad as most people make it out to be, except for having a fever and hurting all over. The facial pain is annoying, and having your head hurt when you bend over is also annoying, but other than that it's not too bad.
• At work, I accidentally wrote in 8 hours on the wrong day, which happened to be a holiday, and instead of asking me whether or not I made a mistake they just decided to not pay me for it at all. Thankfully I talked to my boss, and it should show up on my next check.

My mom and Shaun came down today to bring me a bunch of furniture. They couldn't stay very long because Shaun had to get back home to spend time with his girlfriend. I know, lame! Luckily he agreed to having lunch, so we all went out to Rockne's and ate yummy fries.

My mom also brought down my Aunt Diane's old engagement and wedding ring (fused together) for me to have. If you click on the picture it will take you to a larger image. Kory and I haven't bought any rings yet, but we were planning on just buying some nice bands eventually. I'm actually really surprised how much I like this ring, and very surprised at how well it fits! It fits perfectly. Although I do like how the ring looks, I'm much happier just to have a ring so people will know we're married.

Moving seems like such a hassle this time. We started on Friday and still don't have everything moved over. I don't even have all the animals moved yet! The past couple days Kory's been working from 11:00 pm to 3:30 pm, so by the time he gets home he just goes to sleep. I don't think he's even unpacked a single thing.

I moved RolyPoly over on Sunday I think, and she absolutely loves it! She's like a totally different cat now. She has so many windows to sit in, so many animals outside to watch, a dark scary basement to hide in when visitors come over. BUT, we're trying to keep her from going upstairs because the birds are up there. Jumping over the baby gate I put up was no problem for her, so I put one of Kory's paintings behind it. The painting is probably about 4 feet high. I was upstairs and I heard something, so I turned around and and there she was, walking up the stairs. I was completely shocked because I never thought she'd be able to jump over that painting. So I walked over to send her back down the steps and she ran down them as fast as she could and FLEW over the painting and gate. It was the funniest and craziest thing I've ever seen. She really looked like she flew over the painting. Since that painting didn't work, I had to get the tallest one I could find, which is a few inches shorter than I am, and just happens to weigh a ton! And it's much wider than the door frame, so it's always getting knocked down. It's a huge pain moving it out of the way every time I want to go upstairs. And after I've passed that "gate" I have to climb over the baby gate further up, which is incredibly tricky to get over because the steps are so narrow there's barely any space left to put your foot down. This is also horrible when I'm unpacking things and need to bring them up! I usually get a lot of stuff together to bring up, put Roly in the bathroom, and then take the gates down and run it upstairs. Oh, bother.

Needless to say, we're going to have to find/build another solution because it's just too inconvenient and dangerous the way it is.

So this will definitely be a busy week. I should try to get everything moved over since it's supposed to be a little cooler. Moving when it's 90 degrees outside is not fun!

My mom and Shaun are coming down on Thursday with furniture and a new washer and dryer for me. Yay! It's the first time she'll see Wally and Winky since she left them with me, so that's exciting.

Hopefully I'll have some more photos to put up soon.

Kory and I went over to our new house yesterday to let the water guy in. The old tenants had just finished moving out this past weekend, and they left the place a complete mess. Frank is having professional cleaners come in today, and the carpets cleaned tomorrow, but it was quite a shock seeing the place so dirty. But I took pictures anyways, and you can barely tell that it's still a mess. So here they are. There are a couple rooms that don't have any pictures because they just didn't turn out good.

Why My Birds are the Best

• Winky is really really ornery, and every time you do something that he doesn't like, he squawks at you and throws his head around and pretends he's going to bite you. So when I'm getting up from the computer, I pick him up, lower him to the floor, and as he hops off my finger he squawks, shakes his head back and forth and pretends to bite me. It's the cutest thing ever. He usually does this before you try to pick him up too.
• When all three of the cockatiels are together (which they are now) they are really like a little flock. They run around on the floor together, they all sit underneath the computer chair together like it's a little tree, they go to sleep at the same time together, when one bird flies off and calls out, the other two start calling out to him until he's safely back with them.
• They act totally weird when I'm running the shop vac, which I do A LOT. They all jump off the legs of the computer chair (their usual resting spot) and start running around the room together, much faster than they would normally walk around, and they always run over by me even though I'm the one holding the the big tube that could suck them up. I don't think they're scared of the noise because sometimes they will go sit right next to the base, and I mean literally right next to it. I don't get it. But it's super cute when they all run around on the floor together really fast.
• Wally is really shy and gentle. He'll fly onto the bed when you're sleeping and sleep right next to your head, behind your back, or behind your knee if your knee is bent. Cutest ever.
• Eleanor is the only one who has all her flight feathers, and she is the best flyer ever. She whips around the room with lightning speed and always lands perfectly, even if it happens to be on your head, the keyboard when you're typing, or on a glass or bowl sitting on your desk. She amazingly never knocks anything over when she lands.
• Winky is the only one brave enough to get on the floor when the rabbits are out, and when they come near him he flings his wings open and opens up his mouth to scare them away. When they don't run away he flies away. Ha.
• All three of them get along with Chiyo, the best rabbit in the world, so when he's out I put cereal on the floor and all four of them eat cereal together. Bunnies + birds eating together = the cutest thing ever.

I feel even worse today. I still have a horrible cold AND an earache! A horrible earache that I wish would just go away. I have no appetite, I'm not thirsty, and it's nearly impossible to get to sleep. I even missed services this morning.

My room is hotter than hot. I haven't cleaned out any of the animals and my apartment is a disaster! I'm so behind now, who knows what I'm going to do. And I've packed so much already and everything still looks the same. I just sit here and look at my stuff and think "What can I pack?" And even though there is a ton of stuff lying around, I just don't see anything I can pack.

I can't even remember ever having an earache. It's terrible. There is always a constant aching and then when I swallow and yawn it aches really bad. And every once in a while I just get these crazy sharp pains in it that make me twitch.

The birds want attention and I just want to be left alone. Winky is sitting on my knee right now (as he does to anyone who sits at the computer) and he keeps trying to climb up my shirt, which is thin, and his nails are piercing into my stomach. Ha, after about twenty times of me pushing him off my stomach, he just finally got the clue and walked up the back of the computer chair and has now found his way to my shoulder where he can try to attack my bobby pins (which are practically holding on by one hair after a couple hours of rolling around trying to fall asleep.)

Ok, I'm going to go force myself to drink something and then later I'm going to write a post about how super cute my cockatiels are. I bet you can't wait.

Yuck, I'm really sick right now. I think I've sneezed about a million times and by the end of the night the whole roll of toilet paper sitting in front of me will be gone. It started yesterday at work. I was freezing and I started getting that thing where all of my skin is really sensitive, so it pretty much hurts to move at all. When I got up to leave, I knew for sure I was sick and probably had a fever. My body didn't seem to want to move at all. The hour plus fifteen minute drive home was terrible. I was so cold that I had all but one window rolled up even though it was 75 out and it was probably 90 in my car. By the time I got home I was burning up and I just went and laid down under the covers. Eventually I took some Aleve and my fever broke, but it took forever! I had crazy hot flashes for almost a half an hour! It was horrible, I would have rather had a fever.

Anyway, that mess has gone away, but today I have a cold. Sore throat, runny nose, sneezing every minute. And guess what? Kory is not here to take care of me! That's why I'm complaining here. He went on a canoeing trip yesterday in Pennsylvania and won't be back until tomorrow.

Friday is normally grocery shopping day, but there's no way I'm driving out to Krieger's when I feel so terrible. There's nothing to eat, so I think I'll just run up to Giant Eagle later tonight or tomorrow morning. I actually had some energy today though, so I just cleaned up everything and I've been spending the rest of my time with the monsters birds. John mailed me a copy of the new 9 and a Half Left, so I've also been reading that trying to keep it out of the birds' beaks.

Ok, I am going to finish washing the dishes.

I almost ran into a deer this morning! It was the scariest thing ever. I had just left at 6:30 and was on my way to work and all of a sudden there's a deer in front of my car and I stared it right in the eye! I slammed on my breaks of course, causing everything on my back seat (a whole lot of junk) to throw itself onto the floor. I was so freaked out that I started crying, partly because I was so happy that I didn't take his life and partly because I was tired, the sun was in my eyes, and I had almost killed a deer!

I am refraining from saying something because I know it will jinx me, but here are two accounts of seeing other people run over poor helpless animals who should not have to cross a street to get from one tree to another:

Happy Story I was driving down a road, speed limit is 35, but everyone goes 55, and a rabbit ran out in front of the car ahead of me. She slammed on her breaks, but still hit the rabbit, and I actually saw the poor thing tumbling over and over underneath her car! I also slammed on my breaks because as she finally got all the way past the rabbit, it had rolled out and into a sitting position! I sat there stopped for like five seconds, and then the rabbit scampered away! Even though most animals that run away after being hit usually die, we will pretend that the rabbit lived happily ever after and had many cute rabbit babies.

Sad Story I was driving on the turnpike and way ahead I saw a squirrel run out. I did the "I hope I hope I hope I see that squirrel make it all the way to the other side" deal, but I never saw him get across. As I got closer to where I saw him run out, I saw him lying there right in the middle of my lane, and I had to pass straight over him. And right before I did so, I saw the poor thing jerking and shaking around and now I am scarred for life.

For the first time ever, I have decided to honestly try to exercise every day. Not because I think I'm overweight or anything, but because I practically have no muscles and I just think I'm generally very out of shape. For the longest time I was under the impression that I was healthy because I was eating healthy, but that's only part of it. I know everyone constantly hears that you need to eat well AND exercise, but for some reason it just never really clicked for me. I think I always looked at exercise as being used to build muscle and lose weight, but duh, it's not. So guys, I am starting to exercise and pretty soon I will have a higher stroke volume and a higher cardiac output and hopefully I will be able to dish out stir fry without almost dropping the pan!