Not forever just for now

I'm taking a short break from blogging. I'm not sure how long, probably just a week or so, but I have way too much going on right now both personally and professionally, and I'm not dealing with any of it very well.

I'll let you know when I'm back.

Purple toupee will show the way when summer brings you down

Friend 1: Your hair is getting really gray. I haven't seen you for almost a month, and I can definitely tell the difference.

Me: I know. It's been doing that for a long time. I think it's just accelerating now.

Friend 1: Must be stress. Have you considered dying it? You should dye it.

Me: I'm not going to dye it. I've pretty much resigned myself to the fact that I'm going to have a full head of white hair within the next five years. I just hope that girls are serious when they say they dig the look of a distinguished gentleman.

Friend 2: You can't start dying your hair. You're only 34. What are you going to do, dye it for the next forty years?

Me: I know, right? Doing that would be the equivalent of a guy who is going bald resorting to the comb-over to try and hide it. Only losers try the comb-over for forty years. I'm not dying my hair.

Like watching newborn babies crack from work related stress

I am an evil, evil man. Here is just another reason why you can all be assured that I am soulless. My last exam made a girl cry. I'm not talking about eyes just swimming with tears either, but the kind of crying that involves a wavering voice and tears full on streaming down both cheeks.

I didn't feel bad.

I actually found it kind of pathetic.

And laughed about it with several of my friends afterward.

The following day a professor from the department asked me about my class at a party.

Him: So how's the most well liked [introductory biology] instructor doing?
Me: I'm doing good. Although I'm not so sure I'm the 'most well liked' these days.
Him: Why not?
Me: Apparently I'm turning out to be just as mean as the rest of you. My exam yesterday made a girl cry.
Him: Just one? You've got a long way to go.

I want to swim away but don't know how

I'm on the verge of having a nervous breakdown. Maybe I'm already having one, who knows. I've never actually had one before (or have I?) so it's difficult to say exactly what qualifies, but I'm not sleeping through the night anymore so there's definitely something going on.

As you know, I'm under a HUGE amount of pressure with stuff that needs to be done for school, yet, the more I think about what needs to be done, the less I'm able to actually get done. It's very counterintuitive as you'd think that as time kept ticking away I'd be able to kick things into high gear and start producing some results.

Sadly, that's not the case and I'm largely accomplishmentless.

I'm supposed to be working on a research proposal, but all I've done for the past several days is sit here staring at a blank page on my computer screen. Literally. I've only written three paragraphs in the past week. That's certainly not a good pace for someone with a February deadline.

Anyway, I'm leaving sometime tomorrow to visit my family for Christmas. I don't have the time or the money to go, but I can't miss Christmas with my kids (especially since I have half their presents). I'd like to think that the break is just what I need to come back rejuvenated to finish this proposal off, but I've been doing this too long to honestly believe that'll happen.

(Speaking of struggling, my heart goes out to this guy and his recent troubles. I'd like to help him out, but I'm about two weeks away from clearing out my savings account to cover next semester's tuition, so I don't have any extra cash. However, I thought I'd link in case any of you are in the position to help, and are in a giving spirit. I'm sure he'd appreciate it greatly.)

Lying on my back staring up at heaven, hoping that Jesus might save a place for me, but I'm not askin'

I went camping last night. We went to the Valley of Fire again, but this time there were fewer people and no fireworks (oh wait, we didn't do that last time either, because that would be wrong). I figured it might be a good way to take my mind off things, and it was, for a while. We got there later than we'd planned because traffic was bad. Something big was going on at the Las Vegas Speedway and I'm guessing it was Nascar related (I've never understood why people can stand to watch that stuff, but now that it's been proven that I'm stupid, maybe I should give it a try). It took us over two hours to get there when it's normally only about a 40 minute drive. Even so, we lucked into getting the last available site at the campground, and were able to get everything set up before dark, so things turned out fine.

We got a nice fire going, and grilled some garden burgers and sausages (what a combination, eh?) and had a good time just sitting and talking. A couple of my friends had a better time than the rest of us though. They downed an entire bottle of whiskey between the two of them, but I'm sure they regretted downing said bottle of whiskey when they woke up this morning. As usual, I was offered my share, but declined. I'm still not ready to take up drinking, but I guarantee that if I did, I could get all my drinks free for at least a month.

Sometime after midnight I had the job of making sure everyone got to bed safely, then turned in myself. I was out fairly quickly, but unfortunately that only lasted until around 3 a.m. Then I got to lie there for the next 3 hours just staring at the sky. The stars were beautiful, but I would have preferred to sleep. I decided then that it would sure be easier to take my mind off things if I just had a pretty girl to make out with. I saw a few shooting stars, and kept wishing for Scarlett Johansson to appear so I could do just that, but she didn't (she was on t.v. when I got home though, I wonder if it's a sign). I eventually drifted off again, but only made it until the sun came up. I had a headache (and still do), but I'm sure it's not as bad as what at least two of my friends had.

We packed up camp and headed back to town, but this time the freeway was completely shut down. Traffic was stopped for as far as we could see, so we had to turn around and go the super long way home. This time it took us over three hours. I don't know what was going on, but I'm hoping that God decided to smite the Nascar fans that were at the speedway, and ended up damaging the freeway in the process. Oh wait, no, He wouldn't do that, not to some of his biggest fans.

Don't worry, I'm almost done moping around.

Give in to the failure that's inside you

For those of you who haven't been checking in, or don't read the comments, I didn't pass my comps. Of course, they're too nice to come out and say that I "failed." Instead, they're putting their decision "in suspension" until I revise everything and we meet again in a few months, but that's just a nice way of saying "you're a dumbfuck." So much for my earlier statement that "one way or another it's going to be over with tomorrow." Obviously I'm upset about it. Not upset enough to go suck on a shotgun lollipop (I learned a long time ago that I wouldn't have the balls to end it all even if I wanted to), but upset enough that I'm posting this at an ungodly hour because I've got nothing else to do but sleep, and that's just not going to happen. Not right now anyway.

One thing that really bothers me about it is that I did know the answers to some of the questions they were asking, it's just that I couldn't think of them when they were asking them. It's a problem with me. I'm never very good at reacting to things when I'm put on the spot because my brain just kind of shuts down any time I demand information from it. (I go through the same thing when playing at trivia night. Sure, I can sing you all the lyrics to a Skid Row song that I haven't heard since I was 14 (and frankly, am quite embarrassed that I ever listened to such crappy music), but if you ask me the title of the album, and need to know it RIGHT THEN, I'm not the guy to come through.) In fact, it occurred to me that I was more nervous standing in front of my committee trying to answer questions than I was the time I was trespassing in northern Nevada and a guy came out with a loaded shotgun in one hand and a beer in the other.

The other thing that kills me is my pride. I didn't go to work yesterday, and probably won't on Monday. Everyone knows that I took my comps, so that means that everyone's going to be asking me how it went, and I'm going to have to explain to them that I'm the only fucking grad student in the recent history of our department to not pass his comprehensive exams. And that says a LOT because there are some really stupid people around here (note - if you're reading this, you're probably not included in that statement). I just didn't think I was one of them until now.

On another note, one of my friends was coming down with a cold the other day, so on our way back to the office from lunch he asked if I'd mind stopping at CVS so he could buy some cold medicine. Since all it required was that I turn into a parking lot right then I did, because I'm cool like that.

When we walked in the door he said "I'll take one of all the ingredients necessary to make meth."

Me: "Well, I guarantee at least one person in this store would be able to tell you what those are."

Just then a woman with greasy hair, sunken cheeks, and sores all over her face walked by.

Me: "In fact, just look in that lady's basket and buy one of everything that she's getting. That ought to do it."

Why am I bringing this up? Because, in the event that this whole Ph D thing doesn't work out (a prospect that's looking more and more likely as time goes on) I've devised a back up plan that should make me filthy rich. I'm going to start marketing the tweaker-on-the-go meth pack, just grab one box off the shelf for all your meth cooking needs.

(It's my way of heeding the words of King Missile "Failure doesn't want to fuck you. Failure wants you to fuck it.")

(Unfortunately, the site is acting up again, so you'll have to wait until it's working properly to see a picture of my new idea)

My life it seems has taken a turn
Why in the name of God would I ever want to return?
Peel off our skin we're gonna burn what we were to the ground
Fuck in the fire and we'll spread all the ashes around
I want to kill away the rest of what's left and I do, yes I do

-NIN

All we ask of you is to break both his legs

Tomorrow is the moment of truth. I have to go in for 'the beatdown,' otherwise known as my comprehensive examination. It ought to be a great time. My nerves have been getting worse and worse all day long, and I'm sure that's not going to improve over the next 15 hours. The good thing is that one way or another it's going to be over with tomorrow.

All I ask is that when you see me on the street in the ghetto that you leave some money in my cup. Who knows, by that time maybe I could even tell you where to score some rocks.

And I'm losing all those stupid games that I swore I'd never play

This weekend was not the most productive weekend I've ever had, that much is certain. I started it off with the best intentions, but got sidetracked along the way. Right around lunch time on Saturday I decided to buy a new television set for my bedroom. It wasn't a spur of the moment decision per se, but let's just say I didn't do a whole lot of price comparisons before making my purchase.

Allow me to give you a little background as to why I deemed this to be so important at this point in time. When I first moved into the house in which I now live, my roommate only had a small 13" TV/VCR combo in the living room. Since my TV was a lot bigger we decided to hook it up downstairs (call me crazy, but I actually like to be able to see the picture from across the room). I was fine with it, especially since he told me to take his smaller TV into my room because we were using mine downstairs. This worked out perfectly because it gave my kids an out of the way place to play X-Box when they came to visit, plus I could watch DVDs in my room if I wanted some privacy.

Now, therein lies the problem. It was a good set-up until his son moved in with us and I made the mistake of telling him that he could play my X-Box if he wanted to. It started off being ok, but then it evolved into him playing my games all the time, and once he passed those he started renting and even buying games of his own. It got to the point where I could hardly even go into my own bedroom without having to tell a 15 year old boy to leave so I could change my clothes or read. I'm normally pretty easy to get along with, but I think that was a bit too much.

Last week my roommate's son bought an X-Box 360, and hooked it up in my bedroom. That was kind of the last straw, so I told him to take the TV and hook it up in his room because I was going to buy a new one. He still didn't do it because "He didn't want to take the TV out of my room in case I wanted to watch some of my DVDs." Hence, I bought a TV so that could no longer be an excuse (later I found out the real reason he didn't want to move it was because he didn't want to have to rearrange his bedroom to fit a TV in there).

Needless to say, shopping for (and the hooking up of) my new TV took more of my day than I had anticipated, so I didn't get as much reading done as I would have liked. But at least I got my room back, and that's definitely worth it.

Yesterday I actually did get a lot done. I finished up a new draft of my research proposal, and I'm starting to be happy with it, but I had to go home before 6 o'clock so I could catch the season finales of Deadwood and Entourage (two of my favorite shows right now). Once those were over I went up to my room to try and get some reading done. Here's what transpired:
















Maybe I should have held off on buying the TV until after my comps.

I used to burn candles at both ends, now I just throw the whole damn thing right in*

My comprehensive exam is coming up in about a month. I've been incredibly stressed out about it, and have been trying to read as much as possible between now and then, in addition to writing a decent grant proposal. I feel like I've made a lot of progress toward being ready, but I also realize that I have a long way to go before I'm there.

That being said, I took Sunday completely off. I realized sometime last week that I haven't taken a full day off since July 4. There's something inherently wrong when one goes five weeks without taking a bit of a break, and feels guilty about only putting in 7 or 8 hours a day on weekends during that time. I didn't do much, just watched a few movies, spent an hour or so at the pool, then had dinner with a friend, but I think it might have worked as far as feeling rejuvenated. I came in yesterday and was able to plow my way through 230 pages of population genetics, and comprehend almost everything. Of course, I did have a headache by the end of the day, but that's to be expected. It's nothing a few Tylenol and a 10 o'clock bedtime couldn't get rid of.

But now break time is over. I suppose I should get back to working my way through some more reading.

*This post has been brought to you by The Wallflowers, 4 Hershey's kisses, 2 Rolos and a Reese's peanut butter cup.

A filler post

Ok, so I don't really have anything to say, but judging by the comments, some people don't like looking at my last post when they visit this site. I'm not taking it off, but thought I'd add this real quick to bump it down a little.

A little while ago I talked about how I don't really work hard enough at what I do to be successful (according to E.O. Wilson), and that was reinforced today by another leader in my field - Dr. Stephen P. Hubbell talked to our research group about his 'neutral theory of biodiversity.' He's a really smart guy, and cool to talk to, but some of the things he said about what it takes to be successful in my field have me discouraged (plus the fact that a lot of his 'neutral theory' went right over my head).

The main points were as follows:

• The last faculty position they filled in his department, they didn't even look at anyone with fewer than 12 publications. I have 3 so far.
• Graduate students in their department have a high success rate of getting dissertation improvement grants from the National Science Foundation. According to his timeline, I should have already gotten one - I haven't even applied yet.
• Funding for the kind of work I do is getting harder and harder to come by (thanks in large part to our president) so the competition is really intense.

There were a few others, but I'm too tired to try and think of them right now. Plus I need to study. I hope you guys are happy that the pig has been bumped further on down the page.

Stress Management

Everyone has their own way of dealing with stress, but I think my way might be the worst way possible short of drug or alcohol abuse. I have a million things I should be working on, all school related, but can't seem to focus long enough to start working on any of it. I meant to make some progress last night, but instead baked cookies, watched t.v. and screwed around online.

This morning I woke up early with an upset stomach (a common symptom of stress for me), and thought I should start reading something. Instead, I started messing around with my new camera, and now I'm blogging. Can anyone say ADD? Quick, someone prescribe me some Ritalin.