A long, unaccounted for absence

I am finally home, which should not be something considered entirely pleasant. I have been progressively changing to smaller and smaller garments since my return home and now i am only worrying that the pleather chair in which i am sitting will not be comfortable against bare skin. Despite the heat, and the fact that i am peeling my leg up with a spatula (SMACK!!!), it is nice to be home.
I mean...
I am calling this home, something that i had not considered until i was gone for a weekend away. Before, i think i may have dreaded coming back here. I mean.... not that i don't like the people i am here with, but being exposed to someone's company so consistently allows you to fall into habits of interaction. Now, when i walked through the door and ran across the house to accost Rachel Kreis with a hug, pouting about my absence, i can't help feeling, for the hundredth time, that i am at home.
My absence started with a bike ride. Saturday morning i woke planning to complete a poster for the project i am doing at the experiment station, but i have managed, until today, to procrastinate. I had honestly thought i had rid myself of the horrible habit, but, by the time i needed to leave, i had only managed to buy a mango, make my bed, and sweep the floor of my room.
The fifty mile ride had an endpoint at the apartment of my oh-so-referenced and revered friend Carly from the station. I walked through the door, wobble-kneed, cracked-lipped, and sun-burnt to a smiling hostess that could not be dissuaded from pouring cup after cup of icy water. Eventually, after deciding that we "would" take wine, we started up the hilly terrain of the Cornell Campus towards the Ithaca Shakespeare companies rendition of "A Mid-Summer's Night Dream". The architecture was amazing, and, I can understand why Martha Broderick got red with excitement about my internship here. Everyone looked strangely awkward, though the fit tight-knitly with eachother. I could not describe all the people running around, playing frisbee, But there was something off-putting, as though my own style of intentional awkward dress and a nonchalance for fashion, was the norm there. While i was pulled every where by curiosity, my energetic companion urged me forward and i happily followed. The play was in a grove of trees with the sun behind the stage. When the actors spoke, even in quite supplications, their spit was visible as mist that always drifted onto the bespoken. My exhaustion got the better of me, so that all i can remember with interest is a small girl Carly pointed out, laughing uncontrollably in the front row. I am sure watching her being so happy in her little red dress, leaning forward and screaming with such a jubilation that she may have been trying to collapse the stage, gave me a small burst of energy that permitted me to rise at the end of the play.
Between that and now alot has happened. My poster is finished, I have returned home, and I am so relieved by a break in my monotonous schedule that i could kiss someone.
And now, as i finish, it is starting to rain for the first time in weeks, and though i am not a farmer or a plant, i don't know if much else could make me happier. tomorrow might be as easy and wonderful as these last few days in Ithaca. They have, at least, left me much better than i was before, and that seems a good way to gauge something

Better=Better

Then There Were Two

There are two now! if you look to the right of my blog, there is a list of people who follow it. There are two now! I don't know what will happen if you become a "follower". Perhaps you will get pesky e-mails every time i post something!!!
I was woken this morning from a dream about baseball by what i thought was a group of umpa-lumpas rummaging around. For some reason, the moment was strangely familiar. When i lived with tracy, i would wake up every morning to find that she had creeped down from the loft, already bustling about with breakfast, likely irritated that i was still groggy. I would wake into this hostile environment woken by the floating aroma of latka, or pancakes, or eggs, and every morning i would lie awake and stare out my window at the tree that would eventually fall onto the roof of the cabin, an act that tracy's cat did not hesitate to blame on me. Though only one umpa-lumpa was there then, hunched over an old fashioned coffee grinder, i still layed the same way breathing, somehow anticipating how difficult the day would be to finish.
Luckily, i was not the only one in a less-than-spry mood. Tyler looked like a man fresh back from war, while gussie gave of the persona of an overworked house-wife who, for the thousandth time must take care of the cleaning. Even carly, our stand-behind bastion of cheerfulness, was no better than lachrymose  with irritation. Even i found myself slightly irritable, finding the minute orders or my graduate student searing. I think i could blame my own displeasure on the exhaustion caused by the work party last night. I had sat down to write about it after i sped the five miles from the yacht club at break-neck speed, but found that, once off the bike, i was a little less than focused and rendered unable.
I
 had thought i needed to escape, as if work was a little corner in hell where the walls were lined with protocols and pipetters. I rode my bike back to the house and went swimming. This time, however, i thought i would strip down completely to increase aero(not arrow)dynamics. The train passed once again, out of my reach and once back on the docks, i sat down, patting myself dry with my spandex running shorts (it was not effective). As i pulled my work clothes back on, I looked towards the other end of the beach and noticed the man with the tube (not toob) laying, i am hoping, unalert in the littoral vegetation. I was strartled but feigned a look of determined pride and indifference, knowing that later, it would make some fine material.
"How did the rest of your day go, Bourcard"
"really, you would like to know"
"why, of course. It sounds like a rough day. Did you end up making it back in time for lunch, did you do anything exciting with your research, did you break down and cry in the office because nobody was having fun today?"
well....
I did make it back in time, but just. and the rest of the day dragged along, various experiments finished sloppily, the spilling of chloroform until i find myself here, my incense burned to the handle trying to convince myself that this cannot continue. I bore through it as best as i could and came out average. I feels like worse than average, like average, itself, is worse than average. That is a hope, "tomorrow, I vow to be better than Average".

Person of the day:
I would like to make this short, knowing how long the rest of this post is,  an also knowing that, despite how much i enjoy this part of my day, I must move on to something else. Zvezdo, the romainian post-doc, managed to be the life of the party last night, playing volleyball over a string of lights, instigating water-balloon fights and speaking animatedly with everyone. So i was glad that on my ride to work today, he was mounting his bike on the side walk as i passed. He looks Romanian, tan skin, like a a mix of french and albanian, droopy eyes though not unattractive. He always has something to say and, between him and Kubi (buki, backwards), the Turkish post-doc, i have my hands full with thick-accented socialites.

No Sense in Pouting

Yesterday, i completely forgot there was any hope in the world. I walked into the neighbors house, thinking that i was in a state that was perfect for spending time with people. I thought I was calm and prepared to look at everyone around without hoping to look down, but when i stepped into the house and saw the three women watching television, something snapped, and all the hope washed out of me and looking down was all i could do to prevent myself from bursting into tears. I stepped outside, pitying myself and sat on the neighbor's, neighbor's lawn and cried for a bit, recited a bit of Mary Oliver Poetry i memorized over lunch ("isn't it plain that the moss, except that it has no tongue, could lecture all day if it wanted on spiritual patience") that seemed perfectly fitting ("Everyday i walk like this around the pond thinking: 'if the doors to my heart should ever close i am as good as dead'"). I was immobilized there for twenty minutes, noticing that the porch of my house was currently occupied. I could not use my energy to start a conversation for the fear that i would either start crying in front of that person or be found utterly pitiable, which would be really really irritating. So i continued sitting until Tyler Helman walked up the sidewalk and stopped in front of me.
Believe it or not, i looked up and was not compelled to turn my face at the ground. Instead a huge weight lifted and a insalvable (beautiful spanish word for "insurmountable") loneliness lifted with the happiness of his company ("Everyday, so far, I am alive").

Person of "the day before Yesterday"
I have once again managed to avoid being the creepy guy that hangs out by the docks. I think it may be that i speak in an affected voice (some might call it feminine) or perhaps I simply do not look like a murderer or ex-convict or, even, people can simply see my intentions are wholly benign. I say this because i rode my bike down towards Seneca Lake at break-neck speed in the hope of jumping on  the train i heard rattling by for the first time. I did not make it in time, but, in its place, were a group of people and a dog that looked like a long-haired wishbone or that dog baxter from the movie anchorman. I asked to take some pictures of them and their dog, and, after swimming, remained for a little longer.
It was difficult to ask strangers for their picture and not appear creepy, but "trout" the terrier and his five college friends were the cornerstone of friendliness, and as i walked away, my only fear was that my enthusiasm for reuniting with them was communicated a little crudely and excitably.
I suppose my goal in life, according to a fortune cookie, is to relinquish control and try not to be in the limelight. There are a few times i can think of right now where i allowed myself to relax in the presence of others and wait, like a chess player, for them to make their move. But chess is a game, and, in a game, it does not matter if people think i am creepy or not.

What Happened?

I will be significantly surprised if i find anything to say in this evening post. I am so used to having people of the day or single moments of unfettered fun, but, when presented with a day that was fine throughout, without any embarrassing moments and only a bouquet of mustard plants left in my mailbox, i am oddly at a loss for words.
I can say today is the long awaited return of Daniel Bruzzese, easily the most liked person among the summer scholars. Dan is a fine balance of spontaneous outbursts and shame. leaving just far enough to leave everyone laughing but never offending. I would like to say that my good day is a result of my own doing and perhaps it is monday and i am forced, once again to adhere to my routines. It could also be that I woke early enough to have a bit of a read this morning, but i am a little suspicious that this excitement, which had been absent and at times absurd over the last few days, should return to normal the day of his return.

Side Note:
weather update: it is so muggy right now that my arm is slipping away from me as I type, because the sweat running down my arm is acting as a very effective arm to desk lubricant. no rain for days or even weeks really, save a single thunderstorm the friday before the friday before last. does that qualify as a drought?

Even knowing that i have had a good day, i am still having trouble believing it. I keep looking up to the top right-hand corner of my laptop and seeing that there is less and less time today and there is still so much that i would like to do. I suppose the best thing to do at times when your head is reeling with what i can only now call envy is to breathe and do what i have to do.

What do i have to do?

LIST:
Blog.....check
exercise.....check
relax.......
breathe......
find place to camp for a week.....(oh and that also means i need to find a tent because i am planning to go to a music festival and camp for a few days where i hope not to be trampled by a conga-line of drunken hippies)
read spanish.......
call family......

It all seems doable. (breathe.....check). and look at the bright side, I have a bag full of gigantic gooseberries and breakfast tomorrow (oats and raisons and peanut butter next to coffee and a book...uggghhhhhhhhh). I don't care what buddhists say, minding the future is often the only thing that holds me together and there is always a breakfast in my future

Cool morning

I vowed that i would not use this as a template for poetry, but in waiting for the group to leave for Niagara falls i found that a few hours of solitary idleness have yielded a bit of self indulgence. Too much coffee and old cigarettes that i fished from the ashtray (my own) must make me more inclined to believe that others might care to hear my mind, or perhaps i am just trying to make it so that my posts are equal to the number of days in my stay. So after a failed letter to Dad, which i will not be sending and after a couple hours reading, only interrupted for a bit of rye bread smeared with plum jam and Brie (i think 90% of my calories have come from brie over last few days, yesterday, for example, my only food included Brie and guava past and raw cabbage, which would be no concern to anyone if they new the store of food i had accumulated the night before). so here is a silly bit of poetry that i must say recalls the sensation of sitting in front of south branch waiting for dad to finish making breakfast before a long morning of successful fishing (though, if this weren't a day dream, it would likely be unsuccessful)

To a soft-summer breeze, I concede my tribulations with vernal admiration,
taking stock of rustling leaves playfully exchanging conversation.
The ardent heat quietly rests while my sentiments fall to pleasantries.

This morning be my minor gift, handed stubbornly by chance, and, at last,
it has seized my notice out of simple tranquility.

I imagine to venture from this spot to graze grass between my tender feet
must be the finest of sensations, as one resigned to barren land
stumbles onto an oasis.

This morning's light bears with its gentle supplications, however, some forboding
and a reminder, like a mother's whisper, that it shall not always be so calm.

The struggle is lowly, and it is hardly fair that such a rare gift of life
is accompanied by a persistent struggle that god or who ever holds my destiny
is not yet prepared to release me from the eminent difficulties i will soon endure

For everyday has become so:
A struggle o see that the world needs change, as divine as it seems;
The mystery becomes how i am best designed to perform my duty within it;
most of it awaits my perception, i concede, and in knowledge of the great debt
I do owe and my own vast ignorance, i may venture forth into it, remembering
the stirring gifts laid before me, appreciating the delusion and mourning those
who see it less

The Violin, Among Other Things

I was lazy today!! I sat in the laboratory absentmindedly looking at the same petri dish for nearly two hours. Albeit, microscopic spores are hard to find when they are not plentiful, but it should have been done in twenty minutes rather than one hundred and twenty.
I have always found it weird that the climax of the day often happens when i am describing the rest of my day. On days like this, when at best i could describe how i guiltily glommed (actually a word, "glom") caramelo y pasta de guyaba into myself at coffee break today, only to escape a few seconds earlier for shame that my need for more caramel overrode my want for company. Despite my lack of trust, the day flew by with neither joy or any particular pain, though a small climax occurred after a rogue bit of energy overtook me as i returned from the grass outside the office. The "grass" is really just an ant infested zone between two quince trees that are badly infected with a totally awesome fungus that grows out of the fruit in numerous, bright-orange spires that remind me of the movie alien. It is beaten down permanently because nearly every day at work i sit there to stretch and read spanish, looking, with all my effort, to appear an outsider. Anyways, i came inside feeling slightly light-headed and, which time, i did sing snatches of old tunes while i taught gussie (possibly the most cheerful person in our laboratory, save Chris Smart, the professor, who has the most interesting habit of crossing her eyes as a signal of empathizing exasperation, and who Carly wants to call "cute"... she really is adorable)  how to twirl as done in a contra dance.

Finally i got home, thoroughly disappointed that i never caught my stride while stringing tomatoes with Carly, usually one of the better parts of my day. It was really the first time that my fear of having nothing to say actually left me with nothing to say and i felt so completely foolish.

Cabra, Cabbage and Good Eats

I knew  i would be tired today, when i woke up at quarter to seven, and I meant to write about this when i woke up, but i was so pressed for time and needed to prepare my long-awaited oatmeal. And even now i do not have time to write. Tyler, my intimate, is presently waiting for me to come over after a delicious meal. I am rushing now to cram everything that i would like to in the few minutes i have to waste. We made a delicious alfredo and shrimp pasta dish, followed by soft cheeses, bread and jam. I found myself explaining to Carly, as we took turns passing a quartered cabbage taking bites from the center, that i exert every bit of self control i have to enjoy the moments that are truly mine. These extended into conversations on Tea, and coffee and foreign food, but, today, it all paid off in a meal that consumed over a stick and a half of butter to prepare
 The lack of sleep was not entirely my fault, for i elected for bed at quarter to eleven. I meant to go to bed at this time but instead set-up a bed in the lawn and elected to sleep out there. At 1:00am a pair of police officers came and woke me up. I picked up my head groggily (HAVING BEEN SLEEPING!!!) and was asked if i was alright.
"of course, haven't you ever camped out in the front yard", perhaps i was smiling too much when i said this for they replied with another question:
"have you been drinking?"
"NO! i did just wake up."
Eventually they bullied me into going inside, where i settled on the couch comfortably only to wake later than i expected the next morning
Today was trying. I kept waiting for that burst of energy or spontaneity, but it never came. I almost lost hope or at the very least became embarrassed of my own seeming morosity. All the same, I did not lose hope, and while i am leaving a friend to "die of a food coma" while he waits for me to finish my post, I can't help thinking it is worth it, for it all led to at least these few seconds of happiness. Right?

Gargantuan Gooseberries

in all honesty, I am tired. So tired, in fact, that i hope i can convince myself to keep this post rather short. Luckily for me, my exhaustion did not show its face until 9a.m. this morning while Amara, my graduate student, and I were preparing inoculum plates.

The Inoculum, we took stock of 'em,
Amara and I, using special slides
counted 1, 2, 3, 4,
zoospores 1x10 to the 5
snappy i got in lab
"can't deal with tedium, man i'm mad"
So to the field, we sprayed plants
5ml each, tap, tap tap
that the end of my innocuous inoculum rap

In all seriousness though, i was really tired. I feared at any moment i would collapse, and if i wasn't collapsing, i was quite unengaged and unengaging, dragging my feet, trying to smile but i know it was only a grimace. Even at lunch i could only stretch to prevent my taking a nap, which would certainly disturb my already disturbed sleeping pattern. somehow, in my stupor, I was thrown into a bit of distress when Amara said i would be going to Hang plants with Carly.
My fear was not only at the prospect of reentering the staggering heat, but that i had always enjoyed my time with Carly, and i really feared i would lose her respect in my languid presence. I told her so, hoping i would alleviate some blame from myself. Suddenly, i lost my sense of tiredness as we began speaking bilingually, filling the lulls in the conversation with silly little spanish mini-conversations. My deep exhaustion only showed in a slight lack of cleverness.
Finally we finished and i think we both were pleasantly surprised at our own self-made pleasantries. We excitedly picked giant gooseberries that tasted like plums. We don;t have them in maine because they are black-listed for being the alternative host of a pathogen called white-pine blister rust, and i have only ever seen them on Burnt Island, off the coast of Rockland.
Today should be qualified as a bad day. I was languid and unexacting and clumsy, But i was carried all day long for the excitement of many things. Coming home, reading in the mornings, but above all the prospect of oatmeal in the morning!!!!
it has been such a long time since i have had oatmeal and i think i have seriously underestimated its potential.

Yoga, Yoga, Yoga

I seriously think that god is punishing me sometimes. Why on Earth would he cause me to be possessed with such an insatiable appetite, truly insatiable, and allow me for hours to await dinner, have a a full and healthy and balanced lunch, yet, when it is time for bed, be so consumed by the need to consume that i find myself without sleep and having to skip breakfast the next day so as not to explode from over indulgence. I mean sometimes the next day may still be salvaged, like today, where, luckily, i had the opportunity to nap for two one hour periods at work.
Today was another field day, and we finally began talking about vegetable diseases. I could not tell you exactly where we were or how to get there. I slept there and I slept back, but it took an hour and was in a town called Freeville. We were led by a man named Tom Zitter who was introduced as "one of the best known and most famous plant pathologists alive." You always expect, when someone gets an introduction like that, they will have something extraordinary. Dr. Zitter's extraordinary attribute was his mustache (bigote en español, mustache en français,
ترجمات رئيسية in arabicIt was oddly angular and pointed on the top and complimented his droopy, bull-dog eyes. I was tired enough to be marginally rude in my inattentiveness, and found myself waltzing around a lettuce field while the rest of the group pushed forward with their disease survey. I had three companions: two asain women, i believe both were from china, who kept telling me how delicious certain weeds (like pigweed and lambsquarters) were and how important they were in chinese medicine. the other partner was Carly Summers, whom i always seem to take the pleasure in.

YOGA
So when i said earlier that i think god is punishing me for some strange reason, i failed to mention that he gave me the ability to stretch, and that i often find myself lost for the world until i realize i have forgotten to stretch that day.
I should not forget these little tools that get me through the day because they really do get me through the day.

Thrills!!!

I am having trouble holding my head up today from dancing too enthusiastically last night at an alternative bar... THE HAunT. I honestly came so close to not going in the hope that i might take an early night to rise early and do some writing, and catch up with everyone back home. Once must do what is expected of them and so i went.

The Anxiety for the trip started early in the evening when Jessica Wertschel came down to the house dressed in a puffy dress with make-up galore, and high heels that gave her the appearance of a beverly hills superstar. Secretly, as i pulled my pants about my chest and took on the persona of an unstable epileptic, i felt that fancy sunglasses and colorful dresses would not fit in with the crowd at the haunt, whose sign had a scull and skeleton surrounded by a black back drop. 

My suspicions proved true, for when we got there, there were twenty-people dancing strangely, as if bathing under a waterfall. For me, as soon as i saw the place, i knew i would swallow every bit of self-respect and, knowing that i would never see these people again, began dancing like a maniac. Honestly, i lost myself so completely that i, myself, wondered what drugs i was on (none by the way). Eventually, after being elbowed by a large and awkward man in a black leather vest, i was asked by the bouncer "to tone it down, you are dancing dangerously". I was in pink pants! I was surrounded by a bunch of people dressed in black with teased hair and often managing to look like gothic pirates.

It was really for the best, because today, and even last night i could hardly lift my neck for pain.

While the girls who expected a club were disappointed, i was only exuberant at the opportunity to perform. I know it irritated the others, save Mary (the girl with exercise-induced asthma) who danced as emphatically as I did. Despite how embarassing it must have been, and how much i feel like my mother, it was like being in a David Sedaris Story. 

Dreams:

So as a result of my trip, where i expected that many of the people had a drug addiction, I had one of the most bizarre dreams. It went so, I was told to steal some baking soda in order to make crack-cocaine. I didn't even know that's how you made crack!! but i was at a music festival called grassroots that will take place in a couple of weeks and the announcer mentioned that Jon Haddow would be doing a dance number and suddenly Betty, Noah, Gert, Peter, and Janet jump onstage in skin-tone spandex whipping their hips side to side singing some odd distortion of "The Lion Sleeps Tonight". 

Amphibious RV?

I am back, oh yeah. back, back, back and happy too. I think i am beginning to be redundant with my love of the dock on the lake where i have had numerous adventures with local fisherman. I am starting to see the same people over and over again on my trips down there and also a shift in the populations. Not a new story that young arrogant rich people move in to an area driving out the locals. Now, rather than see my old fishing buddies or the mentally impaired soccer trainer (who, i have heard, is not actually a trainer but brings a beach ball sized soccer ball to every game and plays at mid field with the children at half-time) but a group of noisy twenty-somethings who drink beer and where colorful plastic glasses and lay as if they were expecting a photographer to take their picture for Vogue or a new Cosmo article called "hotties caught off guard: in search of hunks basking in the sun". So, after a trying day, i make my way down and see two of these "studs" laying in front of each other, which time i observed that they must even try to look attractive for each other. On laid sideways propped on his elbow drinking champagne while the other leaned back on one arm, stoking his right nipple region thoughtlessly.
In contrast of my distasteful friends, another group of three inhabited the docks. Two i had seen before and had described in a previous blog as two "not unattractive people", and my memory must have deceived me, for they were much more than marginally attractive. They oozed cool and were even more respectable when i saw that they were accompanied by a very pretty but evidently retarded girl who gleefully taunted the other two to jump in the water properly rather than slink in like an otter.
I spent so much time watching their happy threesome (probably out of a concerted effort to avoid looking at the "bros") that i feared i would be considered slightly creepy. So instead i took pictures of various objects around me, chewed up sticks that the various labradors that visit the dock leave behind, a pen sitting next to me, and most excitingly a party barge that so closely resembled a mobile home/RV, that i wondered if the engineers did not use it as a template.
Thankfully, i avoided appearing creepy.
As the couple left, they said good-bye cheerfully and i, so excited at being thought benign replied a little to affectedly.
my voice nearly broke as i said good-bye.
oh and happy fourth, or third.

I also saw a beautiful little girl as i walked up from the water, with whom i playfully picked half-ripe blackberries. I was convinced that the girl was fibbing when she said they were tasty, but after eating one she handed me, i could not help believing her.

Dear Diary

When i woke up today, i thought the first sentence in my blog would be "I never smile genuinely any more!" They are always so senseless or self-conscious and i find myself perplexed that time is past when i finally straighten my face.
There is plenty to smile about. We have embarked on a true undertaking. something that only the most engaged and creative people ever have accomplished. This, my sole reader, is a horror film. I know, what is your film going to be, you ask. Of course, it hasn't been written, but this is one of my tasks for the weekend.
The whole idea came after we broke into the neighbors basement (to discourage any worry, the neighbors were breaking into their own basement with me), and found a dirt floor. Creepily, a back room with a heavy door of molding wood with a top and bottom flap, led to a room with no lights that screamed "dead things". despite my age and experience (nothing has yet jumped out of a dark room and tried to eat me) my imagination got the better of me and a slightly exciting anxiety about going into the room forced me to make a "deal" out of it. I grapped a phone from the Texan girl Jessica, who yelled, "oh my god Y'all, i am not going in there", and filmed Dan, the running man, walking slowly towards the dark room that smelled like an old musty fort. In my imagination, he would stare straight ahead without blinking, as if possessed by the spirit of the dark place. disappointingly, my attempt at telepathically transferring my image to dan's mind was proved futile when he spoke in his slightly effeminate and affected voice about something much more benign like "Bhuki, what the hell are you doing".
I was holding a camera practically under his nose, muttering incantations in the hope of realizing my imagined scene.

Oh well, things don't ever turn out the way you hoped. Nevertheless, they can always end up being pleasant, and if you do ever want anything to turn out the way you had planned, you must make it up yourself and be prepared to contend with the real world, which is never as obliging as you had imagined

see i am excited

No me Quiero Quejar

It was a day like any other. I wake without enough sleep, totally lost for sleep and time, only enough for a shared breakfast and hastily writing down my dreams. This final part, i am hoping, will give significance to the 1/3 of my life i spend with my eyes closed.

But look at me know

Really...it is 11:14, and i am getting up at six tomorrow to garden at seven so that i will have time to isolate plant disease before the start of my 8:30 class. I ask, is it difficult? no, but try to go to bed when you are happy for the first time since getting home. It is like being given a gift, exactly what you wanted (say a giraffe, how cool would that be to ride down main st.) and having to put that giraffe right back in its 30' crate and say, "i know it took a long time to get here, but, monsieur Giraffe, i really must be going, andaré mañana.

Like my blog title says, though, i do not want to complain, and I really shouldn't. today was a day where i could not have changed anything for the better.

List of good things that happened today that remind me not to be negative:


1. Dan and I have both shaved to show off our mustaches. All part of a scheme involving short, cut-off jean shorts and a field trip.

2. I went Cherry picking. They really grow on trees.

3. learned the spanish word for diarrhea (chorrillo)

I also spent the entire day pounding in tomato stakes with Carly, whose is now also my friend on facebook. It was the first time, i think, that we have really enjoyed each other's company without speaking exclusively in spanish. It is so nice to spend time with anyone who has something to offer. Whether you respect them for music, or their great knowledge of literature, or simply their ability to speak a language, there is always that one great strength you can rely on when things could be strained.

I guess hard work pays off.

to bed... it is like being kidnapped every night, but only the "-napping" part

Good night

You Can Always Run From Your Problems

I think this will be my thirtieth post, and i have learned that sometimes it is really hard to draw an interesting picture of your day. Often it does not depend on how the day went, but how it was ended. There were so many times that i was not enjoying myself until the moment when i returned home and found nothing before me, and aaaahhhhh (i actually sighed as i wrote that!!!) relaxation just happens. You can look at your friends, who seem to multiply when this mood strikes, without fear of expressing your self honestly.
For example, Rachel Daniels, a.k.a. little rachel (for she is quite tiny, and i decided to make an eggplant plarmesan pizza. while she grilled, i busied with the crust. Somewhere in the middle of the operation, i felt relaxation as a distant sensation. I sat on the ground like an exasperated mother, unable to express that, FINALLY, i was content.
The reason for the title was that i went for a run, a crucial step towards my relaxation. I frantically departed the house, stretched for a short while in front of the house and departed for the graveyard. Running through the large, glenwood cemetery, where many times i have wondered if i could get away with digging up a grave. It is an intense curiosity, to see dead people. Not morbid, but in the name of science; The name of experience, and, for the first time, i realized why vincentta would not be afraid to perform an autopsy on a human being. This, however, did not cross my mind. For some reason, all i could think about was betsy smith and her novel A Tree Grows In Brooklyn. It was one of the most beautiful books and the most intimate where i was able to spend 500 pages in the minutiae of a young girls life at the start of this century. I just look at all the graves and dream of the past (Mennonites give me a different but highly similar sensation) and how little Fannie Nolan from A Tree Grows In Brooklyn is only immortal in her fiction, and betsy smith, who is actually Fannie, will die.
So will I.
Can't really run from that any more than i can from mom.
HA

Former Person of the Day:
Ran into little Lattrell and his dad today as i finished skinny-dipping after my run. I was clothed but the poor father, who looked hardly younger than I, had six fishing youngsters around him. I know they must have been hell, but a little coaxing made them quite adorable in their little indignation.

Take Life at Swollen-Face Value

So sunday seemed a promising day, just as saturday seemed a promising day. Saturday, we went on a day long trip to the Corning Museum of glass, and corning glass company is the producer of what we call "pyrex" and optic fiber. Quite a museum, and quite a large group of highly pushy Asian who believe, just because they came thousands of miles to explore the museum, and likely do not know how to say "sorry" or "excuse me", that they can leave elbow shaped bruises in my ribs. I ish i could talk more about the museum, but all i can truly remember is being so tired that i went to the café section and slept for an hour while everybody else explored the art and ancient glass displays. I could not have been jealous, i needed sleep else i may have collapsed into a glass display case, filled with glass.
SO sunday rolls around, and i had finally caught up on sleep. I ran for 7 miles, made a curry, had a high intensity washing, played violin in my courtyard, and finally did yoga before bed. My mouth had been sore for much of the afternoon, but the pain became searing and i could feel a small army of microbes blowing my mouth up like a ballon. By the morning i appeared bedraggled, having slept an accumulative two-and-a-half hours, and as if someone had applied a local anesthetic, making me drool uncontrollably. I took the first part of the day to find ibuprofen, which as soon as its delightful magic relieved the smallest pain, I was out like a light, having procured a dentist appointment for thursday.
I could not wait for thursday, so, when i slouched into work around 1:00, i arranged, after calling 3 separate dentists, an appointment for 3:00. I got a prescription, the swelling is down, and, if the pain is too severe to sleep, i have readied myself with two metric tons of Advil and a couple bags of sleepy-time tea (with valerian root).

thank-you "person of the day"
I would like to thank Rachel Daniels for looking more concerned for me than anyone else. really excellent to feel pitied when you feel so pitiable. also to Carly for finding me another magazine in spanish, who i must send videos to on Facebook,

Fortune Cookies & Self-Reliance

I have lately, during my weaker moments, been seeking advice from fortune cookies. Everyday, i open one, hoping that they will encourage my good behavior. This, I suppose, is a result of being a few hundred miles away from home, and very limited means of communication, and, while I am here, my entire family is gathering for Statia's second or repeated wedding, getting good advice from each other, hugging and laughing.
Do fortune cookies hug?
only if you wrap the fortune in around your finger.
I just opened my desk drawer to see ten such fortune cookies that say "if you chase two rabbits, both will escape". This has significance, in that, there are a pair of rabbits that hang out regularly around the house, and i just walked back from the neighbors and strolled less than three feet past the nearly time slightly spotted rodent (rodent, right?). to answer my own question, rabbits' epiglottis is engaged over the soft palate,  making them obligate nasal breathers. This is the difference between rodents and rabbits, which, though previously thought to be examples of convergent evolution, actually share a common ancestor. The discovery allowed them the be grouped into a superclass called Glires. Another example is today, while cleaning, i tore open two fortune cookies, "reorganization is crucial at this time" and "redecorating will be in your plans." both of these were opened while my bed was freshly repositioned in my room to allow my current sitting place to be accessible. I have honestly been believing these things, like neck hair standing up every time my fortune cookie bespeaks something relevant to my situation.
I have to guess that reading fortune cookies for life advice does not assure anyone that i am finding life pleasurable. It is indeed agreeable most of the time, but no amount of fortune cookie opening, nor blogging is going to help me talk to everyone back home. It is not going to make it easier to express to the people here how much i dread leaving and how badly i want to go. it will not help me speak spanish, unless the fortune cookies were, of course, in spanish.

All is well in Northern New York, the birds are singing like it was morning, the rabbits are too tame to be called wild, and one incredible procrastinator is smiling and looking forward to tomorrow so badly.

Crnk

Crank:
.

1. A device for transmitting rotary motion, consisting of a handle or arm attached at right angles to a shaft.

2. A clever turn of speech; a verbal conceit: quips and cranks.

3. A peculiar or eccentric idea or action.

4. Informal

a. A grouchy person.

b. An eccentric person, especially one who is unduly zealous.

5. Slang Methamphetamine.

Crank Also a movie made by a William Smith and Hobart College Graduate that I watched with the neighbors. After a long night of hearing my roommates make noises like feral cats in heat, i did not expect to have the day i did. I suppose it started last night in bed when i smiled at the fun they were obviously having, making noises i supposed were reminiscent of drunk men in a strip club, but with far greater pheromones. With that, i woke in the middle of the night, the tumult down to a murmur from the upstairs and proceeded to stretch and take my dirty sheet and my pillowcase-less pillow to the couch, and slept like a baby.

Since then, my day has been a combination of anxious cheerfulness and a few moments, like doing yoga in the front lawn while the neighbors ate dinner, when the stress was lifted.

But now, as the clock reads 11 exactly,  i simply wish that i could talk to everybody. I know i am far from home, i know that i love the people I am with, I know that i am doing great things with my own time, but something about home seems particularly appealing. I wish i could see Dad and Mel, talk to Vinni, hablar con mama, swim in more familiar and more polluted waters. I wish Mary would be well, as i am sure she is now. Everything, Grandma, Abuela, Gert, Sam, Betty, Anders. While i am sure i will lament the moment i leave this wonderful place and have the task of maintaining contact with the people i have grown to love, even those i love inappropriately, I look forward to clean sheets and misbehaving dogs.

I imagine the slow pace of maine will speed ever so slightly on my return.

What an ego, right? 

But if you are reading this, i miss you terribly, and while my phone has been left for dead, i hope you can dig through my convoluted sentiments and know how much i miss and think of everybody back home.

eww, right? too sappy?

probably too much sun and too much crank for one day.

Proof of the Pink Fish

today, i spent the first part of my morning, i.e. 6:45-7:50, digging trenches reminiscent of those used in World War I. Why, you ask? I willingly had volunteered myself to aid the students at the Agricultural experimental station with their garden, and despite last night's heavy rain, we decided to build raised beds. Mine snaked from left to right, only done intentionally after realizing my initial mispattern. The bed next to me, dug by John Gottula, a well spoken, slightly lisp-laden and curly haired virus researcher, veered left. Mary, a fellow summer scholar plagued by a variety of chronic problems including exercise induced asthma, built the third. Hers was by far the smallest and while the rows John and I were devastating would grow ten feet, her row would only grow one. I am glad that we do not do actual farming. they were very ugly rows.

Today was also spent in a variety of head-nodding (as in sleep not affirmation) safety training sessions. The first was presented by a large man with a sleeveless shirt that managed to accentuate rather than obscure his tremendous farms tan and prolific bodily hair. While my friend tyler described his skin as "hide"or "like leather" i was thinking absent-mindedly of a rhinoceros and which aspect of his body was most impressive. Before the end of the training session i had managed to challenge this man to a fight, which my professor asserted i would lose. The afternoon was spent with a peculiar asian man who gave us cookies talking about lab and chemical safety. I had to bear the embarrassment of falling asleep a total of 40 times during the talk, and found, yet again, that i was being ridiculed by the presenter.

I am honestly having trouble about what to say. I lost my phone; I look forward everyday to seeing Carly and seizing the opportunity to speak more. I am so pleased to have my roomates, though one, Nick (we had previously battled over a mysterious tomato) insists on not speaking to me and sigh, actually quite like a rhinoceros, every morning. and exclaiming "jesus Christ"every morning, perpetually disturbing my morning "thinking hour". I could talk about my running, or the beautiful asain couple i saw down by the lake that gave me butterflies as i said good-bye to them. I could talk about alot of things. I, of course, must go on to something else, but you would have trouble finding someone who finds it such a pleasure to have so many wondrous moments to draw from and even when they are absent, having people like Vinni or Mom having them in my place

Beautiful strange day

I should be in bed, but i am am once again surprised by my happiness.
Too much food and the longest day of lab work i have ever done leaves me a little less than confident.
But i am still surrounded by lovely people that surprise me with their kindness and authenticity.

It is nice to be surprised.

It is not nice to lose a bet to anyone less than ten years old.

here is the evidence
(pictures courtesy of Gussie Williams, my piano-playing, sight-reading, child instigating side-kick)

Early Morning

Sitting, having recently lost my phone. i thought i would post a short and silly poem. it is as inoffensive as possible, so those who hate creative people can say, "how simple", and be unoffended. and those who believe poetry is the height of achievement can say, "how intimate", and be unoffended.\
or so i would hope

Sunday Fishing


I see them down here all the time:
Large Black men, catching small fish.
They take their tiny barbed hook and
Their tiny worms. Who knew they were so gentle

All the time they are fishing, working too, I suppose.
I cannot know what they actually do
I have only seen them nimbly replace a worm
or seem a giant to a flotation or depth exacting device

At the end, their buckets usually full,
these black men trundle home.
Do they have Children? Wives?
Do they paint the coast of Maine?
I cannot know, I only see them fishing.

Father's Day

Happy Father's day to everyone who is a father and is reading this, so happy father's day dad. this only really applies to you.
I do not want to write much now. I has been a long day, or at least an up and down day. Starting out with Zima Junction and Gabriel García Márquez and ending with a 5/6 mile run. Considering i did nine miles yesterday evening (a personal high), these were truly fought out. I am starting a competition, without competitiveness or either party actually aware that it is going on. This is actually what i would call positive reinforcement. You see somebody you admire (like my neighbor) and you see that they are happy. Connect two and two together and you get happiness, right?
So it seems.
I do not want to say much tonight, especially when there is a bottle of water and a book so near by.

Person of the day:
Today i lost a bet to a small black boy named casey, who, after snagging at least five horn-pout (bull heads or Ameiurus nebulosus or Ameiurus spp.)  by dragging a three hooked hook (also called a treble hook) and piercing their sides (this is likely Illegal).  I bet him a dollar that he could not do it again. While his little cousin Lattrell kicked me in the nose, slapped me in the face with gloves covered in fish slime and performed voodoo on me by pressing my gloves between his pliers, causing me to cry out in mock pain and beg for mercy, Casey, who was likely nine years of age considering how carelessly he waved his hook around, nearly catching me rather than the fish (Lattrell, not to be confused with the Chartell of the possum incident, was probably five) finally caught his fish. ***that was what any professor would call a run-on sentence*** I having lost the bet i turned to a trick played by a dancing group called the Afrobats (rather than Acrobats) I saw in Central Park. Rather than give up my nasty, germy, crumpled old ugly dollar bill, i gave him a choice between two pretty, long-lasting, shiny, and commemorative quaters.
Choosing the dollar with a indignant air that said "you whack cracker", casey commenced up the hill with his uncle who was hardly older than I, with a dollar and a net full of fish 

Watkins Glen

Last night, for the first time, i found Angelina Jolie attractive. Her body is fit and thin and she was a surprisingly good match for Johnny Depp in the Movie.
I also recently read an article about a Fox breeding program at a university in Siberia. The research team started in the sixties and has been selecting foxes (zorro en espanñol) based on their affinity to humans. In the beginning, the aggressive animals were shot while the friendlier ones were bred. within seven years, the foxes not only would seek out human contact but showed drastic changes in traits (rasgo en español) like floppy ears, grey and mottled coats, curly tails, larger eyes and shorter noses. As the genetics for domesticity changes they become cuter and more baby like.
Angelina Jolie has: large eyes; small snout; an extremely stout muzzle (wide or fat also applies). she was designed to be cute, all her features, everything. does this mean that she is also highly tame and people friendly? are the genes for cuteness connected to friendliness? i don't know.
The night ended shortly before the movie ended when two glasses of wine put me in a state of foolish nonchalance as i walked the four houses dow from the neighbor's.

Today i woke rather meekly at 7. I had a sense of possibility though i did not know how to pursue it.
Decidedly,  i went and played violin in a courtyard where i happened upon an old woman walking her dog. People always take it upon themselves to talk to musicians in courtyards. she was old, but well kept, a fine antique, and was accompanied by a pug that, used to being on a leash in Manhattan, was noticeably pleased to be walking around William Smith and Hobart. I was surprised how long winded she was and foolish. She advised me to knock on the door of the President of the College (former head of the Peace Corp.) and introduce myself. She also suggested i try and work with the local Opera house in an upcoming production of "Into the Woods". The former seemed a little illogical.
"Mr. President? hello, I was sent here by Mary Lee while i was playing violin in a courtyard. would you care to let me in? What is your dogs name? Oh no, i would like the red and could you rub my feet, i was playing barefoot and they are killing me!"
After pancakes we went to Watkins glen where a beautiful gorge (a common pun here is "The Finger Lakes are Gorges"). A deep ravine with a cascade of waterfalls. I was slightly inundated by pancakes, so our decision to go out to eat was not welcome. The restaurant was freezing and, since i could not hold back the urge to immerse myself in a waterfall, i began getting goose-bumbs while waiting for the food.
Now i am finally home, exhausted though enthused from the day. a bit of Yevtushenko and avocado ice cream, i think.

Major  realizations:
Filling a watermelon, though seemingly already saturated with water (hence "water"-melon"), can actually be filled with alcohol. I think it shall be attempted tonight. but really, who knew

"Every Day Lies Like a Fresh Shirt on Our Bed-

This incomparably fine woven tissue of pure prediction fits us perfectly." Walter Benjamin said that and, after out free lunch today, my professor, Chris Smart, bought me a shirt. On the inside tag read that quote. My beloved professor, David Gross, holds Walter Benjamin, a modernist german essayist, as his main intellectual influence, i could not help being stirred to think of him when i got this shirt with "the best of american style with an American Sensibility".
I woke today and followed my typical morning routine. Rouse, boil water for coffee, neurotically put away dishes (I am not kidding when i say i twitch without touching them... i can't help it!), used water for coffee and retired to my room for a morning read...
Oh happy routines...
Without you i would collapse in a heap of neuroticism, melting into a heaping ball of burnt hair and viscous fluid bubbling with escaping "stress-bubbles". I have started to reinvigorate my routine. It is funny that my old routines seem so boring and rigid but then I realize that over my many years of being alive, my routine is the climax of my knowledge and is best followed. After my reassertion of happiness, it was off to work, where, i was intermittently exposed to large amounts of food. First, at 10, was break, a friday routine that included coffee, homemade ice cream, cheesecake, cookies, cheese plates, and cookies. I tried my best to resist, but the look i always get from my graduate student is so scathing that i am always forced to eat at these free events. People hate people who don't eat free food, and being one who dislikes dislike, i was "forced" to consume the ice cream and a small sampling of the other items. I must say it was a surprise, as it always is, to find that my legs still moved and that i was able to think after the mid-morning soiree (i did spell that correctly the first time). The second event, a free lunch, i was able to elope with my reading a little more easily, which time i did collect my Benjamin (pronounced Ben-jah-meen). and finally, after that, at 1 p.m. was the lab meeting which included more free ice cream. This ice cream offered under the direct scrutiny of my superiors could not be avoided. I found through all this strict stoic self-denialism, i was still able to smile as i completed my lab work. it was not hard to enjoy, for as i tried to concentrate on completing my work, my professor was depleting the supply of microcentrifuge Tubes i needed for my isolates by blowing them up with dry ice and pure ethanol. This is a really hard place not to enjoy myself. Though often on the verge of ridiculous; a problem i certainly do not help to curtail.

exciting person of the day:
I went to the natural foodstore to collect some deodarant and found myself scouring the store and my mind, seizing on any excuse to purchase something. With only ten minutes to clossing when i entered, this was a rather rude place to be. I said at least three times i will be out any moment. Suddenly after telling them i had collected my last item i spotted cashews and said DAMMIT! The ladies behind the counter giggled and said they were pure out of dammit but "do have groats and bulgur wheat"
Well done bespectacled ladies i suspect of being lesbians, well done. I will be back to honor your clever sauciness.

A Day Split Three Ways

I did not feel myself when i woke today. It was a day, i thought, that you concede to depression and the sensation that even if you had the opportunity to be happy presented itself that you would, out of guilt, not pursue it (who knew that eating way, way, way too much pizza can do that to you the next day). I stepped out of my room to see 5 people walking up the steps towards the house. They were cleaning people, though the only trace that had previously proved their existence was the sudden absence of all our returnables. This was a surprisingly large disappointment because we had agreed, as a group, to invest the money from retunalbles into lottery tickets/scratch tickets in the hope that they would lead to the creation of yet more returnables. They sounded, as they approached the door, like a group of young people who had drank a few beers and were now going to retire to play a board game. I never expected a group of five people to appear so jovial (a word that finds it's root in the Greek god Jove, also called Jupiter in Rome) yet appear as though they were born with a cigarette and a hairy protruding beer belly which sluggishly sags below their belt.

I quickly ran past them so as to throw myself into the lake in a vain hope of changing my outlook of the day. All i found in the lake was a muddy bottom and an overwhelming urge to get back out as quickly as possible. I was not enchanted until walking back up i began to explore the wild garlic i had discovered earlier in the week. I was once told that wild garlic is best found following your nose, but here it was so abundant, that it was mistaken as a hay like grass. I spent 5-10 minutes picking scapes and, though i only scratched the surface of what was available, I came home with at least a pound.

I was quite late to work

We spent the entire day working on laying down weed cloth and once again i was in the presence of the graduate student Carli and once again i could not help succumbing to the joy of her company. It was slow coming and I would hardly say it reached a peak, but we spoke in spanish and I found that if i was asked to if  there were anything else I'd rather be doing i would have said "No".
The day at work got exciting after lunch. Though my compatriots, gussie and Nathan, were quite wearied with the task of digesting and working at the same time, and gussie looked like she had been punched in the right eye (actually allergies), we were forced to scramble to finish as the impending storm tore across the landscape. I felt, for a moment, the exhilaration of the frontier prairie life (casa pequeña en la pradera). Calling in the children and collecting the animals, taking in the clothes from the line as the whip my wife in the face.
Though my life will not be as hard as the frontiersmen i hope it will be as exciting.

too weeks, twoday

Cooking, for the last few days has been my sole activity. Pancakes on sunday morning, preceded by sushi the night before. Pie on sunday also, fish on saturday. And now, as if i was not tired of so much cooking, I am making pizza dough. Normally, in an ideal world, all this energy i am currently using on cooking would be invested into much better things, but for the last few days i have had a tick. So here, 2weeks into my internship and all i have to say is that i am cooking too much, I need to talk to my family more, and that i am so sick of pepper plants that I will soon devour their progeny, not out of joy of the fruit (a true berry) but out of spite for the intense work their parents require.
New Resolution:
I am doing my best right now to convince myself to leave my detestably familiar room for the beautiful sunny day. Finally, i am not planting peppers and the neighbors are walking around outside. I am being forced by myself to stop now and say something heartfelt  at the end of my shortest post thus far.

I am looking forward to tomorrow
Pizza dough is rising
There, profound, concise, finished

Three Important Things

If we must talk about numbers, for what seems like the hundredth time, i have just broken into my house feeling entirely content with life as it is. I must clamber up the surprisingly and frighteningly light bike rack in front of my window and show off my flexibility by stretching my leg outward over the precariously hung window box. Also on the bike rack, lays a pair of gloves belong to Dr. Mark Fuchs, which were taken to hold freshly caught fish from Seneca Lake. Said fish i held closely behind my left leg as i walked down Main St., hoping that nobody would think that the man in pink pants rubbing fish mucus all over his ass in a vain attempt at concealment that renders his pants, his favorite pants, in dire need of a wash, would go unnoticed. I did.
Important thing Numbah 1:
I can't remember quite honestly, that was quite a tangent
Important thing Numbah 2: 
Though this is very much for their pleasure, I stopped by some coworkers place as a last moment in my day. I spent my entire day unable to engage anybody, let alone myself. Even in my novel, when two lovers reunited, I did not shed a tear or even squint my eyes and smile. Though now, suddenly that is what i am doing. perhaps the novel in my head has some interesting plot unfolding. I went over to their house, dubbed the cooking house ( I live in the german house, Dan, Tyler and Halli: the writing house), and just before seeing my lab-cohabitator, Gussie, i got the feeling for the first time today that something unexpected (like me enjoying myself) might occur. I walked in and saw two women brooding over what looked like a Cosmo magazine. I sat down on the floor and looked up at the three people in the room. Gussie to the left, kevin, who was battling a very hot piece of cobbler in the middle, and Nathan to the right.
I left surprisingly resolute that tomorrow can only be better, and patience and stuff is a virtue

While three important things was really only one thing. And that one thing was really no-thing but an anecdote, I do insist on the importance of trusting others to bring you joy.


Oh... I remembered the 1st of the three things: don't eat out of boredom...REALLY

Back Again

Everyday I try to convince myself that I am either too Tired to write this, or that I have nothing to say. I must not believe that voice. I know i could say it and contentedly go on about my evening, napping (as now i wish i was doing) or reading. Today, however, was a blur. So much so that during the day i remember exclaiming to myself how difficult it is to focus at all. I was not excited, patient, happy, sad, efficient, witty... i could go on, but let us just say my shoulders are resting on my desk and I can hardly hold them up. An example, you say, fair reader. well, as i hope he will see, Nathan and i sat down to lunch.  A lunch trifecta, actually. There was I, who ateth of Chic pea tandori, Nathan, who had consum'd stuffed red peppers, and John Gotulla, who i head of the Students Association at the Geneva Experimental Station (now the second group called SAGEs that i am part of). John, who i saw walking towards the lunch room, appeared to be carrying a bag of trash that turned out to be a 5 course meal including steamed vegetables, gravy, roast beef, apples, rice, and a drink. We ended up sitting together with our lunches that would make all mothers smile with self-satisfied contentment. I do not remember this meal. I mean I do, but unlike other moments when i was magically saved by a single honest moment, nothing came. We sat wondering, wishing that we had lunch by ourselves, tired, and wishing even more that we could say something interesting. alas, a single failure among many victories.

One Follower Thus Far

Whoever would like to tell me that Field research in Agriculture is an easy task, I implore you to inspect my fingernails as they would at a girls school before dinner. When my nail is not only pitch black where there is an possible space for dirt, but so full of soil that it is pressed upward an entire inch so that, if i scraped away a small portion from my thumb nail, it would easily serve as a storage device<
"hey bourcard, did you pack a lunch today?"
"yeah man, i carry it with me wherever i go"
I shake my hand aggressively towards the other and out falls a peanut butter and jelly sandwich, slightly flattened so that the crust is taller than the center and small bits of PB&J push their way out the sides, adding some interesting color to the usual black underside of my nails.
No it was hard work today, we planted ~3500 peppers by hand, that is 6 peppers 586 times (and a bit) or planting 100 peppers 35 times or planting 1/2 a pepper 7000 times, and all for the purpose of killing them.

I should now elaborate on the purport of these 3500 1/1 peppers or 14,000 1/4 peppers. It is because I am working for monsanto. we are trying to kill them with a water mold/ Oomycete called Phytophthera capsici, which is identified most easily by its long-lived stage called an Oospore (an Oh-no-spore if you get it in your field). Hopefully these freshly bred peppers will die as a result of the disease and we can rate how quickly and how complete the infection was.


Looking back at my day, it was not one that had any special moments, nothing that wasn't forced by a resolution to be interested,  anyway. today was a day I got through, that is all. There is something to be said about that. I, of course, wish it to be better, but there are plenty of unoteworthy, yet reassuring moments throughout the day. I think about it and know that those people who believe that they need to stock the basement with non-perishable food and keep handguns hidden in flowerpots for when russians or Arabs invade, end they day ignorant of their naivete and believe that because they were busy that they are worthwhile and maybe, just maybe they are happy.

I have worked hard all day, turn right before reaching the kitchen, sit down to my computer and occupy myself with this blog that i doubt anyone reads.
am i happier:
i hope so. at least i think i am clever

STOLEN: How French Kissing is Destroying the English Language

Earlier today, i was thinking of something to write. I was recovering from my night of kudos bars and gummie snacks that kept me occupied past 2a.m.
All i could come up with was the idea that french kissing is destroying the English language. Thinking harder on the subject, i think it quite true, though i find it hard to focus on any one thing. I can hardly hold back the fact that my room looks like it is strewed with the carcasses of a hundred underwear. They are hanging on the end of the bed, all the draws in the room are open, in a terraced style, to accommodate my rooms cotton humidifier. I am also having trouble holding back the urge to discuss my time down at my o-so-focused upon swimming dock. It is easy enough to say that it will soon be my fishing dock. While down there today, at least 25 catfish visible and countable with any glance at the water, i watch people pull them out repeatedly. They were so abundant that one was caught in the pocket of a pair of pants that i saw swimming by, propelled by the trapped fish. The only men that were not fishing for horn-pout were two black men that i have seen down there before. They had two full five gallon buckets of what pan fish that liberal shepherds do call a grosser name, but our cold maids do sunfish. They plan to have a cook-out on the sabbath. So, i got excited... excited enough to buy a fishing pole. Of course, being here for 7 more weeks, you could not expect me to buy any old fishing pole, and most certainly not anything that didn't have a disney princess smiling from the pink fishing reel. While i did have to suppress the romantic image of my sitting next to the large black men catching pan fish with my Ariel or my Sleeping beauty 3 and 1/2 fishing rod, talking about sports, and women, and what we had at the bar, and how the bugs and water temperature are influencing how the Lepomis macrochirus are feeding, I instead invested into a rod with no reel and a single eye at the end. It is telescoping and essentially the modern version of the green alder branch with a string tied to the end. I remember a picture in the hall of Dad's house with a boy on a rock bearing a straw hat with ample holes in the brim, falling asleep as a fish began to pull his bobber under water and he remaining oblivious to the fish at the end of the line.


Like him i hope to fish the old fashioned way, no reel just a stick and a string.


Disclaimer: Mercury levels in the fish of Seneca lake peaked in 1910 and steadily declined to 1977 where they reached steady and harmless levels. there is no need to worry about losing me to lead poisoning as Dan insisted would be the consequence of my antique thriftiness 

Wishing for the fall of Facebook

I have decided today that facebook is an evil. I know, everybody seems to think that facebook is the worst thing, but what i do not hear are a set of solid revolutionary ideas that would justify destroying it. I would also like to say that, like all things evil, facebook, like crack, can be used moderately to great advantage. But here is my manifesto: Facebooking is an interruptive action. The possibility that someone might want to think on us, despite our lack of effort to maintain any real contact, brings us to the site, and rather than engage in healthy activity (reading, writing, exercise) and ignoring that excited impulse to be creative, we absent-mindedly peruse its repetitiveness.

Enough, i could not speak of these things if i was not in a good enough humor to think what i am saying is comical.

Special developement: bailed on planting in the student food garden this morning, though i did manage to do laundry and read for a fair few minutes from Wuthering Heights. all is repaired between Nick and I though a strange stress hangs over our interactions. Nick, i will remind you, is from Philadelphia and a football lineman. I always seem to develop poor relations with star football athletes and, being quite petite in comparison to them, i think i should start picking fights with Horse jockies or female golfers.

The heat seems to offer plenty of energy, especially considering the chill i got yesterday after going swimming. It could be the coffee and espresso. i must talk to someone in spanish, anyone reading who cares to speak in said language call me! (207)290-4909

Where Have All the Crazy People Gone

It has now been three days, maybe four since my interaction with "the Tubester", and, in the absence of my own outrageous behavior, i find i am in need of someone else to make life seem less predictable. What i did not expect is to be cold, and i am most certainly in need of a blanket. Being a utilitarian, i believe these are the moments when a lover is most helpful: "Honey, come hither and wrap thyself around mine own bodice, do remove thine own bodice, for thou art cold." A seemly thing to do, but as long as she did not expect any affection in return, I should find it a most desirable sentiment.

So, i do not wish for anyone to take this seriously, but i was writing a poem about crows and urinating at five in the morning, a most publishable piece, and heard an outcry from the kitchen "jesus cristo, jesus cristo". I, of course, knew that my roommate nick had spent several days in a perpetually building foul mood and had prepared myself for the imminent expulsion, not knowing, however, that i was going to be the brunt of it. I went to the kitchen, determinedly cheerful, and was blamed, quite starkly, of my guilt in steal tomatoes. I of course steal many things: tea bags, bulk pignoli from shop n' save's(which is not proper italian, in italy they art called "pignolo"), the occasional fancy cheese. I do not, though, eat my roommates tomatoes without facing up to it. alas, it was the first time i wanted to fight someone, exciting!!! I did catch myself though and went from the angry faced, fist-clenching, eager-to-fight, aggressor to the puppy-faced and deeply hurt though still righteously angry innocent man. I went to the fridge to discover two things, the first was that my knees were shaking (rather like a dog that is not used to being angry) and second that I could not stand the thought of food. I left, frantically.

This leg trembling thing happens far too often. I am not typically a fan, but i am always happy to have something happen to me that is not completely within my control. I am not hoping to be put into slavery, disemboweled, stabbed or anything (all things that i would "tremble" over) but i should not like confrontation so much.

Today was fantastic, spoke for about an hour with Carli, the grad student, in spanish. Learned the word for hose "manguera". I must call abuela and papá to complete the day.

Today, Tea, Timothy, and Alfalfa Mosaic Virus

I am still recovering after last night five mile run in 92 degree heat. I don't remember most of it, but i do remember almost crying to myself for it to stop.

This was the point in which i jumped into the "Lake Trout Capital of the World"

This morning yielded our third field course, allowing me to avoid any significant labor. The ride into work was fantastic. I rode along Seneca Lake, down the side-by-side brick houses in Main st. Geneva. They remind me of San Fransisco. I was imbued with excited energy. The kind of energy that yields thoughts like "i haven't done anything stupid enough to hurt myself in a while". It inevitably leads to riding over mulched horticultural beds and speeding through intersections.

Once arrived i was forced to wait for the rest of the student to arrive to go on the field crops field course. If you don't yet know what field crops are, they are the crops, which, by themselves, fill acres and acres and acres Aka corn, soybeans, wheat. Lucky for me i got to ride with a female named Jessica from texas that, though nice, likes listening to modern music. I do not mean to be dissin' on T-pain but i am sure the Norwegian PHD in the back and the chinese PHD candidate have little interest in hearing the word shotz in quick succession. The trip eventually ended in a flour mill that is known for having the world's largest buckwheat pancake, picture provided on facebook.

tonight feels nice, i know i must send myself to bed in the next six minutes, despite the happily provided noise from my roommates. Played violin in a grove of apple trees. These things are good and while little immediately comes to me as noteworthy, i must sit quietly waiting for something. like small bursts of forgetfulness or nostalgia or just having fun, which seems to happen less and less of late

This is Chartell, throwing a rock at the possom

                                       This is the group of scholars, some aren't looking yet
                                        They looked up eventually

ME and mary, i feel that i fit the part of the lumber-yard worker

92.9 Farenheit Degrees, Cooling of with Rising Possibilities

I did not post yesterday, and dearly regret it. I found that consistency in a few things. I do not being regular in the time that you poop, not in the time you go to bed, not in the way you kick dogs in the street, but in the things that consistently make you happy. Yesterday, i did not post, a thing that forces me to take store of the days better moments and rethink their less meritorious ones. Yesterday, i had to endure what should have been an exceptional second field day. This time we went to a very large lumber yard. provided with hard hats, safety googles and ear plugs, we certainly alleviated the stress of talking to eachother. I would say i took nearly 200 pictures, which reminds me, i have pictures on my computer, so i will be posting pictures on somewhat consistent basis. However, i have to complain. I can't help it. I posted early about genuine interest in a subject being trumped by utter exhaustion; well, I could barely talk on this trip, unable to feel any excitement except for the opportunity to take a single picture that i will post. The only moment during the entire day that i felt myself relax was when Carli asked me "estas tan feliz para ser volviendo" or something like that, and i was able to speak, even if only in a rushed and fleeting interaction, with some gusto.

Today was a day of recovery from my frantic behavior in the evening. most of it was good. walking down the street toward the other scholar house, carrying pizza dough, toppings and wine, i got a very welcome sensation, one that was very familiar to the one i had floating in seneca lake on this +90 degree day: feeling like a child but completely void of nostalgia, just momentarily worry free. It was that there is no reason to feel that any engagement is pressing. I have in found that books used to be this source of hope, knowing that at any moment obligations could end and that i would always have something to look forward to.

Anyways all is good. I feel back to normal.
and damn keurig, i hate those machines

6% Left on my Battery

Only six percent left on my battery and I almost decided that I wasn't going to post anything tonight. I guess i left myself go a little tonight.
I know. What do you mean "let yourself go"?
I consider it eating humus with a spoon, there, it is.
So today we laid down black plastic in the phytophthera field. A grad student, Carli, and I spoke spanish intermittently throughout the day. I do not necessarily think of her as a scientist, for she has an incredible ability to smile and speak as though the next moment her joy and excitement will burst forth, rendering coherent speach impossible. It is unexpected but refreshing.

I just killed a mosiquito.

Interesting person of the Day:
Besides my fantastic partner in self humilitation, Dan, who dressed in woman's pants with me yesterday and went out for ice cream, where we both pretended, far too convincingly, to be quite british and quite promiscuous, leaving the poor people in timmy-ho-ho's and cold stone creamery wondering what drugs we had been taking. He is not who i would like to talk about. IN the salvation army, i met an incredible woman working behind the counter. I was buying pink shorts (3.99), 2 kitchen appliances (2.99 each) and wine glasses (3 @ .99). She was having trouble working the cash register. She looked normal and would certainly be thought pretty by some. Each second she whimpered, i mean she really whined each time she exhaled with the stress of the task. Yes it was her first day, but it was one of the most difficult things i have had to endure. Damn conventions for not letting me jump over the counter and giving this woman a giant hug, assuring her that i care much more about her than how fast i can get my toaster that smell of burning rubber when in use. She was lovely, in the same way one would find a person snuggled with a dog next to a fire place. It is much easier to be calm that we make it seem, and is truly foolish to make a big deal out of little things. Hence why i will not let a little heavily spooned hummus put me under! 0% bye

Down by the Docks

I have realized that i love this certain place down by seneca lake.
This is, if you read my earlier post, where i saw chartell throwing rocks at the drowned possum. Today, however, I met an entirely separate group of people. On the way there, wearing my polarized glasses, i could see bands of green in the giant blue lake, bands that, to the naked eye are nearly invisible. Though i am embarrassed, typically, to have nice things (save my camera) the world seems a little more beautiful through these. Things that you previously took to be all white are tinged with pink.

Once down by the water, i met a man named timothy. He had a mouth full of snagle teeth, and seemed to talk endlessly. Though the last few days seemed to yield infinite energy for me, i felt oddly distant from Tim. It may have been the slurred manner in which he repeatedly encouraged me to eat my vegetables (he is the trainer for the Hobart College soccer team). "vechhhstibles. He, however, had some interesting thoughts. He hates fishing, for they kill the fish and he is a modest vegetarian. He also had a surprising ability to name arbitrary dates as quickly as one would call to their best friend, and an even more uncanny affinity for naming a large number of states in succession. We were talking about inclement weather and he mentioned the great snow storm of 1993 (if anyone could affirm that there was an ice-storm in this year i am genuinely curious) and succeeded in naming all the states on the eastern seaboard: Florida, Georgia, North and South Carolina, North and West Virginia, Washington D.C., Pennsylvania, Massachusetts, Maine, New York, New Jersey Delaware etc. Apparently they were all shut down for an entire week and subjected to 5+ feet of snow. Though i could hardly sit still and listen to Timothy, also self proclaimed "tubester" for his habit of floating in a round red inner tube underneath the docks, scaring small children and grabbing the ankles of couples looking out on the lake (the last two things are fictional), I am still glad that he has given me something to write about. Despite that i did not enjoy directly my time with him, he still offered me something to think about.

Also met a bunch of puertoriqueños at the lake, taught me the meaning of diseño, which apparently means "design".

Things You Learn From the Back of Soap Containers

The first being that Glycerine soja and Helianthus annuus are the scientific names for soybean and sunflower, respectively. The second is that almost everything has the same first ingredient (water) and the same second ingredient (sodium laureth Sulfate, or something like that).

These things are not so important, for they are the last thing i did after a long, long day.
THe other house, 139 Saint Claire street, and I went to Ithaca for a day spent at the Ithaca Festival, a Festival that is paid for completely by "t-shirt and button sales". an entire portion of the downtown area was devoted to artisan pottery makers, t-shirt shops, musicians, metal and wood workers. I felt, after a long night of making a fool of myself (my lips began to go numb after 1 1/2 beers), that my day could not possibly be good, but o contraire. It was excellent.

Special Moment of the Day: I was standing and listening to music with the group when a collapsing sound followed by the sound of the sidewalk being spattered with bottles and cans caught my attention. Being me, and especially being the me i was today, completely out of control and foolish (I was a scene making machine), I went to help pick them up. After pretending to steal them i returned the four bottles in my hand to the freshly repaired cardboard trolly. As a man lazily kicked the bottles into a smaller circle, I noticed that the person who had dropped everything was a squat, deep voiced transvestite. a very liberal moment. All of us picking up bottles, throwing them back into the box, all the while never noticing this woman was not so womanly. It was funny then, but when i think about it, it was really quite a nice thing.

Very tired, but i have decided that I have never felt "in". in my head, in the right place, in with the good crowd. Of course, right now i do not feel much, just the valerian root tea i poured starting to take effect and the hope, and indeed it is very strong, to continue with the opportunity to experience the world as i have for these last 4 days. totally free and totally conscious. such is luck i suppose.

Peace

Déjá vu?

I have just had a sensation of déjá vu.
Today has not been the best of days.
I have finished a story and am at a loss as to what to do next.
it was the reason i woke in the morning and wanted to be in bed at night.
Anyways the feeling comes from leaving this post and having the sensation that there was something that i really did not feel like doing but i did because i thought it would calm me down.
It worked.
I will keep this short and to the point.
Today i woke and planted cucurbits and tomato with a transplanter. If you have not seen one it is a frame with a wheel which has ~6 ^-shaped spikes which plung into a plastic mulch and drops down fertilized water. Two people sitting behind, on the same machine, place seedlings into the holes. All the planting is for a rugged and highly assertive woman named holly. Holly is a former dairy farmerette who was described to me as "industrious". I would agree and will say she is very well respected. She reminds me of Deb Balloud, who, in my current absence, i cannot see. nostalgia....ahhh

Later in the day, after being served yet another lunch, in which i really only sat down and about the new term "ANTROPOCINO"in National Geographic (en español). It is all about how the geological society does not know whether to consider this the Human era because of our influence on the environment may not translate to the geological sciences. THe interesting thing is that a geologist does not necessarily find changes to their research the same way an ecologist would with urbanization. Cities are built on rock, but do not necessarily destroy it. The interesting thing is that the Presedent of the Geological society, Jan  Zalasiewicz, who studies sediment says it does. The pollen of corn, soy, and wheat will be dominant in the soil pollen-bank, and in the increased sediments due to dams (presas en español) and erosion. I am starting to take interest in these things, not in a righteous way, for i fear this is little i will do to impact it, but in my short time here i get to leave at least a little mark, even if it is a bit of cucumber or tomato pollen.

Finally started lab work today. I really enjoy the lab environment. it requires such meticulous attention to detail and sanitation that one may lose themselves in the work. It will not replace reading a good novel. Weekend ahead, it is ithaca week here (Martha, Mark Weatherbee, Sue Johnson). That means that all the alumni should come visit me here (martha, Mark Weatherbee, Sue Johnson). Thanks everybody, I hope you are all well

First Field Day

I was up again at 6:00 am today, though i was awoken around four by the cold air coming in through my window. me desperté and made coffee, returning to my room to pass an hour in relaxation.
If you have read my other posts will have seen that i have found a bicycle, albeit, a woman's bicycle but a bicycle all the same. So today i rode into work, where they hosted a breakfast for experimental station workers who choose to ride or walk to work. I just realized that i love calling this place "the experimental station". It reminds me of Lyra Belacqua and pantalaimon.

It was lovely to be served breakfast, which was not your typical morning fast breaking elements. Homemade sweet breads and frittata, sausage and pancakes. I felt at home, calm and confident.
I am still contending with the sensation that i feel both completely at home and that i am in completely new place. yes the downtown is a bit like bangor mixed with the low roofs of an antiquated mid-western town, and the same trees and plants are there. I half expect the rocks to glow green when you shut the lights out, i wish they would.

After breakfast the scholars and some graduate students took the first class of the summer field course in plant pathology. we went to a country club whose membership is $15,000 plus greens fees. what is the point of the membership if only to pay to play later on. some people in the world starve while we pay 50,000 dollars to apply to pay $150,000 for a country club membership. I am not distressed by this, but perturbed. We were fed lunch. only a small awkward moment where, choosing to assert my vegetarianism, i asked if they had any non burger/steak quesadilla/grilled chicken items. It was a delicious wrap, but i had to suffer as everyone self consciously ordered meaty entreés. all i could do was laugh and start a different conversation. I enjoyed myself, though one can grow wary of company. I did grow wary, not because i was not capable but that i did not want to. but as soon as that attention is gone i am certainly morose. As abuela told me todos seremos lo mejor que podemos.

Fun note: TODAY i saw marsh birds mating. I will upload the pictures of the trip as soon as i am able.
spoke alot of spanish today, started thinking in spanish for a little while.... progress