oh oh i am a scientist.

there is a song by the dandy warhols... i believe it's called "i am a scientist." it so funny and so me. anyway, i saw this on another blog, and i just had to do it. it was pretty fun and i love the concept. :] and it just makes me think of the dandy warhols song.

Read my VisualDNA™     Get your own VisualDNA™

also. that page i posted last night... there is a little tip that i used on there. are you running out of your favorite letters? cut out the negative space, or i suppose you could call it the template, and use that. i did it for two of the letters that i was out of. i think it looks perfectly fine and adds a little something different to the page. plus you can get a little more for you money. :]

what else. i did really well on my last cell bio test. [i guess that makes up for doing badly on molecular biology. maybe?] so as long as i do well on my paper and the final, i'll get an A in there. that's making me happy because i thought i was going to get a B. on the other hand, i was hoping to pull out an A in molecular, but i'll most likely get an A- or a B+ [i hate when professors use +/- grading.] so it's a trade off, i guess.

so yeah. this weekend is all about papers. i have my molecular paper due monday and my cell paper due thursday. i'm going to try to start tonight, but my head hurts super bad, and i've just been feeling crappy all day. in fact, i took a 4 hour nap today. eeek. didn't help much though. :[

oh and when i got home from class today, my camera was here! i am so excited about it. i just need to find a good bag for it now. we have a really cool old nikon bag, but it's for the film cameras. they fit well together in there. so i'm going to look for a new one for my new baby.

tomorrow i might go to virginia city. it would be a good place to take photos, and i have a ton of film to still shoot. so it's an option. i need to make sure i get my papers done though.

i hope everyone is having a happy friday. enjoy the weekend! :]

:[

honey don't you weep.

i watched this video a few times last night. helped me feel a little better for whatever reason [maybe just because i think he's a genius, and the fact that he writes on glass backwards so that the viewer can read it is amazing. ha.]


this is from his newest album. i love this song. :] he played it at the last show i went to, which was a few days before the new album came out. i was in awe. the violinist is actually from san francisco, and he was totally amazing live.


also, i got a little dose of retail therapy today. my dad bought me the D80. it will be here on friday, so i am a happy girl.

and. one of my favorite bands, minus the bear, is playing here on sunday night. i have a paper due monday morning, so this will give me some motivation to get it done early. [i hope.]

so yeah, i'm feeling better. not better about anything to do with the previous post, but just in a happier mood and not thinking about that stuff for now.

i hope everyone has a good day.
:] [:

ETA: i also just bought this kit: http://www.lisabearnson.com/kotm/
if you hurry hurry you can still get one.
i wasn't going to buy one, but i just made the impulse decision to go for it.

let go.

maybe this will be my first "real" blog post.

every once in a while, i have to remind myself to let go, refocus, and move forward.

but can you ever really forget someone?

can you ever completely let go?

i don't know. i just know it's really hard, if it's even possible at all. i am so happy in my current relationship. people who see me now always comment on how happy i appear to be. and i am really happy. i feel like my relationship is fabulous.

but sometimes i can't help but look back. sometimes i can't get him out of my mind, and in a way i can't get him out of my heart. people tell me... "he will always be in your heart, and that's ok." but i let it haunt me. the bottom line is, i am crying right now, and i know why in a general sense, but i don't really know why. i don't know why i am feeling so hurt or sad or whatever right now. i am happy where i am, so why the tears?

[for the record, i'm definitely not talking about dave.]

i wish it was possible to completely let go. but for me it's just not. [i know so many people who have totally been able to let go, and that makes it all the more frustrating.]

i guess in a way, i want him to be happy too, and i know he's just not. and maybe what's worse is that i want to help him be happy and he won't let me help in any form i can offer right now. he won't let anyone help him. it's so frustrating. i hate seeing him be so angry and knowing that he attributes a lot of his anger to me. i guess in a way, i wish i could go back and do it over and make it better. i just have no idea how it could have been done differently.

i don't even know what to say really. i'm just very confused right now. i thought it would help to write, but i don't even know what to say. ugh.

so.

things went well for me in the darkroom tonight. i have a test tomorrow, but i really don't want to study. i have this sense of accomplishment right now, and it's not making me feel the need to sit down and learn some cell bio. grrr.

heroes was new tonight, but i missed it. i recorded it, so i really just want to go watch it. eeek. [and the gpa continues its exponential decay.]

and i bought a canon digital rebel xti, but i think i am going to return it and get a nikon d80. my film cameras are nikons, so i think i should stick with it. i have a couple really good lenses that will most likely work on a new digital, just no autofocus, which is no big deal to me.

oh. i registered for my classes today. i just decided tonight that i want to register for one more, but the website was already "closed". i find it so strange that a website can close. tomorrow is when the seniors start registering, so it would have been better to register for it today, but hopefully if i register in the morning, it will be ok. it's another photography class, and i know it's going to fill up super fast. i get to register the day before registration officially starts because i am in the honors program. it's been a helpful perk. so right now my classes for summer are: edu 202 [intro to secondary ed], tennis, art 245 [digital media], and some independent study biochem credits during which i will work on my thesis. and for next semester they are: bch 407 [thesis], bch 417 [metabolic regulation], bch 420 [proseminar], art 235 [photography ii], ansc 415 [ethics of biotech], ch 202 [required humanities class, this one has to do with "the modern world"], and edu 204 [education technology or something like that.] so i'm probably going to have to drop a class for fall semester. that seems like a lot, and i know i will need to have a good amount of time to work on my thesis. i'm just not sure what i want to drop yet. and i might pick up the other photography class in the summer, in which case i would probably drop digital media. there aren't any classes during summer that i can take towards my major aside from just getting credit to work on my thesis, so it's kind of a time to take other fun classes. :]

yeah. so that's all really. i just wanted to waste some time by blogging. i hope you all have a happy week.

dos mas.

here are two more that i just finished tonight. :]

this one is a lift from heidi swapp's new idea book.
















this one is for fun. i used lots of my favorite night time photos from san francisco.

:] [:

these pages make me happy.

this one is my take on the latest scrapjack. i love those new heidi swapp ghost butterflies... those were the last touch to go onto this page. [the photo is me when i was a little one holding a jar with a newly "hatched" butterfly in it. it's totally out of focus, but i just love it.]

this one is for a fiskateer challenge. it was to do a journaling style that you have never done. well, i have never journaled on an 8x10 photo before. ha. i've actually only scrapped one other 8x10, and i cut it into pieces... so i guess this is the first real 8x10 photo i've scrapped. i've doodled one other time on a photo, but i've never written my journaling on a photo before. this page was SO fun. i want to make a million more just like it. :] maybe i will make a whole album with 8x10 photos. that could be fun.

well.

they arrested that guy last night. so i guess that's good. it still feels pretty weird though.

i've had a headache all day that i can't get rid of. it's not fun at all. i took a shower thinking that would help, but it made it worse.

i calculated my grade in molecular bio and i would need 100% on the last test to get an A. so it looks like it will be an A- or a B+ for me. sad sad sad about that.

i finished my scrapjack page. so that's one fun thing. well i almost finished it the day it was posted, but i was waiting to see if it needed something else. i figured out what to add, and i think it's done now. so i'll have to scan it later on.

mmm. i don't know what else i can say. i wish i was in vegas so i could have some gelato right now. i think i'm going to settle for some TCBY or maybe cold stone. hopefully that will help my headache. then i think i might just go to barnes and noble and look at photography books, scrapbook magazines, and grad school books. for some reason, i've started thinking about grad school. it's not on the top of my list, but it's getting higher. i'm going to see how next year goes with my thesis. i think that will really help me see if research is what i want to do. otherwise. who knows.

i want to go to the city tomorrow. i really need to take tons and tons more photos for my class. i'm stressing about it. so maybe i'll try to go tomorrow.

anyway. i hope everyone has a good weekend. :]

unbelievable.

classes on my campus were canceled tonight. someone is making threatening remarks regarding the Virginia Tech incident. i can't even believe this.

there is supposed to be an update tomorrow at 7am, but even then... i don't know if i will feel safe going to campus. again, i am totally sad. it's horrific enough that it's happened once, but now with all the copycats it's feeling even worse. why would someone look at something so awful and think it's something they should replicate!? i will probably never understand.

i just hope everyone stays safe tonight, and that things are ok tomorrow.
ugh.

just for fun.

james and i can't get enough of this song. this guy made a cover of the outkast song and it is SO pretty. it almost makes me forget how the real outkast version sounds. and somehow, he makes the song have completely differnt feel to it, yet the lyrics are the same. so anyway. enjoy. :]

ooooh.

ahh. i just checked the message board a twopeas, and i saw that heidi swapp is the new scrapjack target! maybe i'll go try to find my mojo. her products are definitely some of my forever faves. [have you seen how much i use those chipboard alphas!?] this could be fun, and my mood for the day just improved like 100x.

goodbye.

today i had a lab lunch to say goodbye to a few people from my lab. well my old lab, since i don't really work there anymore either. aihua, pronounced like iowa, who is one of the post docs is going to virginia tech. weird timing, right? it's very strange to me that the whole lab is pretty much going to be dissolved, for lack of a better word, by the summer. i guess that's how science goes though, you can only work on a project until it's done. :]

the photoshoot was pretty good. my friend only had a zoom lens for his camera, so it was kind of impossible to get some of the shots i wanted to take. he couldn't really answer all my questions about how to use his camera either, so it was a little hard to get the hang of things. i'm probably going to do some more once the summer comes, and i have more time. they have a lot of funny ideas for "press photos" which are like staged group photos that every band tends to have.

otherwise not a whole lot to talk about. i've completely lost my scrapbooking mojo. i was working on this mini album, which i now want to call a STUPID mini album, and it just wasn't going how i wanted it to go. so it drained me, and i haven't been able to go back to my desk since. plus, i entered this contest at the scrapbook store up the street from my house, and when i went in to see what page number mine was so that i could tell people to vote for it, i got so mad at where they had put my page. ha. i know it's such a dumb thing to get mad about, right? but my page has a lot of watermarking on it, which is pretty subtle and they put my page in a place where the lighting is horrible, so you can't really see any of the details. grr. they have another challenge for this month, but i don't even know if i want to do it now. :[

right now, i just feel like i need a break from everything. i need to sleep for a whole day and then have a whole day to watch movies, eat ice cream, and do nothing. i'm just worn out from everything... even things that are supposed to be fun to me. i guess i just need to stick it out though. summer will be here soon enough.

on a good note, i've really been wanting that little camera that carol's sister brought over from korea for the longest time now. they've had some on ebay, but i'm too much of a skeptic to buy it from there. well james' parents are going to korea like next week, and he said they will probably be able to get the camera for me. :] i am so excited to get that little baby in my hands.

oh any my brother and sister-in-law are coming to visit tomorrow. so that will be nice. today is actually their one-year anniversary. :] how fun.

anyway. i hope everyone is having a good day.

heart.

ugh. my heart goes out to all those affected by the VA tech tragedy. this whole thing is just terribly sad.

to me, school is supposed to be a place where i feel safe. i'm sure all of those students felt the same way. and i'm sure all of the parents never thought they were sending their children off into this mess. it really brings everything into perspective when things like this happen. makes me just want to tell everyone close to me how much i love them. [i love you guys.]

tomorrow is going to be a busy day. i am doing a photo shoot for my friend's band. i hope it goes ok. i am using his digital slr camera since i don't have one yet. i'm pretty nervous about using a camera that i've never used before. i guess in another way, it will help me decide if that's the camera i want because a digital slr is on the top of my wishlist.

otherwise. not much going on. there is a candlelight vigil tomorrow night on my campus. i think i'll probably go.

molecular biology.

hmm. sometimes it's my friend and sometimes it's not. well. i love love love learning about all this stuff... DNA, RNA, transcription, translation, regulation... it's all so fascinating to me. but i hate hate hate being tested on it.

i'm a bad test taker.

i have awful test anxiety. i always have. i remember in 4th grade i used to get sick over tests. but now. in college. it's really bad. i don't know what my deal is. i stress out too much about my grades. i feel like i HAVE to get an A or else it's the end of the world. one of my professors told me that grades really are not a good measure of how smart you are, but still i can't help it. i love getting As.

if you can't tell, my test today wasn't the best test i've ever taken. i reinvented a few of the eukaryotic translational mechanisms. blah.

well now i have to finish up my grant proposal. it's due sunday. i have it almost done, i'm just waiting for my professor to get back to me about my proposal draft. just because i think alyssa might be interested... i'll give a little explanation of my project. i'm going to look at various species of bark beetles... isolate gDNA and cDNA, analyze/compare the gene sequences from each species, examine molecular divergence relative to phylogeny, and transfer the genes into baculoviral expression vectors for functional assays. ok. so basically i'm going to try to identify a molecular target in these beetles that could be "knocked out" so they can't damage timber and kill the forests anymore. woo hoo. science saves the world. :]

ok. i'm going to go scrapbook now. :] yay for friday after a long, hard, yucky week.

pretty.

my head hurts and i've been too busy to blog. but i wanted to give you a little something to listen to. something pretty.

http://www.col.k12.co.us/summertechconference/penelope.mp3

the band is called pinback. the song is called penelope.
[it's amazing.]

fabulous.

here is what i have so far of the mini. it's called "life is fabulous". [i'm totally in love with that stamp.] it's lots of heidi swapp stuff... that stamp, the green frame, all the chipboard letters. there is some new hambly paper and transparency. and the new felt ribbon from queen and co. on the cover is totally fun. i'm not done with it yet. i'm going to add more pages and spice up the pages you see here some more. so it's a work in progress. it's going to be fun to work on here and there though. :]

working.

i've been working on the most random little mini lately. i bought a mini and it came with a piece of cardboard around the pages inside. well. instead of using the actual mini, i've ended up using the cardboard to make my own. ha. i tested a stamp on it and the rest is history. [i guess i'm always scared to work with actual minis because i don't want to mess them up. but with this... it was basically trash anyway, so if i make something pretty from it... it's a fun bonus.]

james had a paper due today, but the teacher emailed them giving them an extra week. seriously? lucky boy.

i have a headache today that i can't seem to get rid of. it's really annoying though.

what else... i have a big lab report and a test next week. so some stress ahead. my parents are gone this weekend and my sister randomly decided to go to the bay area yesterday. so i'm all alone this weekend. it makes it feel like i'm not having a weekend when no one is around. i don't really like it.

i hope you are all enjoying the weekend and have a happy easter!

ugh.

add me to the list of sick people.

it happened to my in molecular bio this morning. i woke up feeling fine and left the class feeling yuckie.
i'm just going to pretend it's not happening. i think if i ignore it, maybe it will just go away. ha. probably not, but you never know.

my test went pretty well. i didn't study as much as i should have, but considering that... i think it was pretty good. i'm going to start bringing my book to class with me and take my own notes from the book. that is what i did this time and it was much better than trying to use his lectures. i hate that it takes me so long to figure out how to do well with some professors. this guy was really a struggle though.

today, my friend mike talked to the same professor that i am doing my thesis under. so he is going to do his thesis in that lab too. i am excited... labs can be a little mundane at times, so it will be good to have a friend there with me. the only problem is that he'll be gone this summer, so i'll be working alone. [well not alone alone, but without a friend alone.] i'll just bring my iPod. :]

ok. well i need to get some things done today. lab reports and whatnot. i hope everyone is having a good week.

bleh.

it's almost 2am. i've been studying all night. i just want to get in bed and fall asleep now.
but i still have another chapter to go over.
blah. bleh. blewy.
time for a break.

james is sick today. it was one of those things that happens to me sometimes... you are sitting in class and you can literally feel yourself descend into sickness. i hadn't ever had that happen until college. the first time was at a review for an organic chem test and the second was earlier this semester in molecular bio. seriously, it's so strange. you arrive feeling ok, tired and unmotivated maybe, but otherwise fine. and then BAM... you just feel it come over you. i know it doesn't sound that odd, but trust me it's different than the normal descent.

i feel kind of bad because i made him go to photography tonight and it turned out to be a really long [and boring] class. he kept whispering "i hate you" to me. haha.

otherwise, i really don't have much to write about. my parents are going to vegas later this week. i don't even like vegas all that much, but i am really jealous of them. ha. i just want to be anywhere but here. plus they will get to see my brother and sister-in-law and i miss them a lot.

another thing i really miss is disneyland. i've been wanting to go there for the longest time now. we just went in january, but i've been wanting to go back for some reason. i guess it's just that whole needing to get away thing, and at disneyland i really feel like i am away... since it's kind of surreal.

ok. well i am blabbing here. so i guess i'll get back to work now. :-/

time.

i'm afraid it's time to give up scrapping again, until summer. i really need to focus on school. but i can't help myself.

this one is for the pencil lines sketch #25. i had lots of fun with it. i haven't scrapped any photos from my brithday yet, so i decided it was time. :]

ok. i'm off to read some cell bio now. grr.