Please vote for my entry in the Brickfish Photo contest to help me win a scholarship!
</td></tr><tr><td align="center" valign="middle" style="padding: 0px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);" colspan="2"></td></tr><tr><td colspan="2">My Favorite Photo (I've Ever Taken)
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Nights like these, when I'm studying my ass off for classes that tie together everything I've learned make me appreciate everything that teachers do to help their students learn.

I'm still actively using things that I learned from my biology teacher in high school. That alone should show how much of an impact she made on my life.

Teachers are incredible. They deserve so many honors and salutes for the good they do.

how do you know when you've found what you love to do?

is it when you can happily while away the hours working, without tiring once or wishing you were elsewhere?

is it when each new task to tackle is never a chore?

if so, i think i found it.

things never get old. one patient done, there's always another waiting, for food, for IV fluids, or an injection... or a spay pack that needs cleaning, or prescriptions to fill... poop to pick up, a parvo test to evaluate.. a dog to shave, or walk. a cat to cuddle...

i think i found it.

So. I'm doing my current internship at my local Humane Society. The good thing is that it's a public facility, which means it's busy, which means there's a lot to do, which means i don't get bored. which is good.

There are a lot of great animals there (and a few not-so-great ones, like the cutest little kitten i ever saw and wanted to take home... who also happens to be ferral and under observation for rabies....  ._.;;) just waiting to be adopted.

The problem is that not all of them will find homes. And I'm worried that with the economic downturn, people are less likely to be able to afford keeping a pet. They're also less likely to go out and get a new one. Which would mean less pets are leaving the shelter, and it's likely that there'll be an increase in arrivals. Like cancer, the increase of something bad, and the decrease of something good, will eventually add up to something very bad. In this case, euthanasia.

Euthanasia's nothing new. Especially not to the IVHS, or any other Humane Society. A few years ago, I took a tour of the facility prior to what was going to be a volunteering stint. One of the rather unfortunate things I learned is that so many pets have to be euthanized that the cadavers are placed into metal barrels for storage, until they can be removed from the premisis. It's sick, but I really can't hold it against them. They just can't afford to do anything else.

Today I happened to walk by the cylinders. One was open. I got all the way up to three feet from it before I felt all icy cold inside and just walked away before I was enough of an idiot to peek inside. Later on, I was moving laundry around, and had to go to the "Green Room". I'd never been there before, and so someone had to guide me. She said "Maybe you should just leave the sheets outside the door... They're working on the euthanasia list right now."

I think she could see the jumble of emotions on my face. Shock, sadness, helplessness, embarrassment. I know how to make myself get over euthanasia. I know the cold facts about it, I know that sometimes, it's just the only option left, whether it be a terminally sick pet, or an unadoptable animal that needs to be rotated out so that others can have their chance at a new life. That still doesn't make it any easier, and it doesn't mean I didn't have the impulse to lunge and cry "Wait! No! I'll take him!" Every time I saw someone leading a dog, or carrying a cat to the Green Room. And i saw that a lot today. I even accidentally caught a glimpse of an animal on a table, probably about to be injected. I kept imagining them working through the list routinely, finishing one, tossing it into the aforementioned barrel, and moving on.

I can't lie and say it doesn't chill me. And I can't lie and say I think it'll get easier with time. I really don't think it will.

I don't know what it is, but I feel more sensitive about pet deaths than human deaths. When Katrina struck, I felt more heartbroken when I heard about a cat found trapped in a flooded house on top of a refrigerator, or a lost dog waiting to be claimed by its family.

More than anything, I'm shocked at how sensitive to death I really am sometimes. Sometimes I feel very numbed, and can hardly care. But death is death, regardless of whether it is human or otherwise. And there is still a tiny part of me that fears it, the way all other living beings do.

this seems to be the clue i needed that i should take the triathalon seriously. i think until now, i had felt that i wasn't really going to train for the triathalon... but my neighbor donated his old street bike to me.. it's a good bike. old, but in good condition... hardly used... once the dust was off, and we got new tires and a new seat on it, it was great. it was incredibly generous and kind, and i've named the bike after him--Nicholas.

a cake is on its way as a thank you.

once S has a tad of free time, we'll be going to PCH to ride from Newport to Laguna (admittedly, not far), to  try and start getting in shape. cuz i havent been working out consistently for three months. and it's bad....

it's been a while since i posted, hasn't it...

i guess there's not really much to say though. what's my life?
studying, drinking, going to raves, studying, sleeping...

nothing's really changed.

still the same old depressed me. just busier now so no one really has to put up with me bitching about it =D

oh well. hopefully everyone's future is looking promising..

i am not going to be able to live without you in my life.

i don't know why i've done what i've done, why i'm doing what i'm doing..

but now i know exactly how much i love you

and how much i need you..

and how much you're the only reason i'm still alive...

Happy Hollows!
May your season be bountiful ;-)

this entry was originally going to be dedicated to the plasticness of my relationship with everyone around me including myself, with the exception of the only person who seems to genuinely care about what i have to say, even though three fourths of the time, what i have to say is "i want to kill myself, please let me kill myself."

but on account of how everything is plastic, it will probably be more productive to dedicate this entry to complaining about parasitology.

i feel like my brain is about to leak out my ears.

i can't have a moment of quiet, there's so much buzzing and every time i close my eyes i see Nematocera and am trying to remember the name of the suborder under which the stable fly is found and wishing i could remember more than just its genus (Stomoxys). I spend who knows how many hours sitting in a starbucks with four people i don't know, playing "name that parasite", tracing the scientific classifications and transmittable diseases of arthoropod after arthropod. trying to keep straight which ones have complete life cycles and which ones are simple. trying to remember what the was the insect whose hosts were differentiated by the number of joints found on its antennae (those whose antennae have 5 joints prefer to parasitize mammals, those with three prefer birds.

.... or was it the other way around?)


my brain is leaking out my ears and i have to run again tomorrow and i have to beat my current record and then i have another shit day of push your increasingly weak body around campus on your bike and hope that tonight you have the courage to take the pills.

yeah. as far as birthdays go, this one seemed to be made almost entirely of suck. *sigh* it consistently felt like one of the worst days of my life. so. that sucks.

i'm about to enter one of the shittiest times of my life. this will be interesting.

yah..... i've sooo been MIA.

and this is really the worst time possible to be making a post. I need to get myself ready, nag my mom to lend me money for my textbooks, load my bike onto my truck, rush down to beatthebookstore, see what books they have that i need, buy those, rush to cal poly for class, sit and listen to what will hopefully be a short genetics lecture, rush to the calpoly bookstore and get the rest of my books, then rush to chino for my appt. with Dr. Fultz.

yeah. really not the best time to be posting.

Still keeping an eye out for Ilya. I could really use a friend on campus other than my fellow AHSTA officers.

i logged out of myspace and this ad popped up.

how do you calculate a name?

... that really annoys me.

it's 3:30 am. i still feel high as a kite (i don't think i am).. but i woke up momentarily with a mad craving for pizza and watermellon.. so while i munch on that, i'm gonna tell you about a dream i just had.

it was basically down a trip to memory lane, with a lot of beloved guest stars.
I think i had gone back to St. Lucy's to visit. It was lunch time, and for some reason, the cafetaria was an actual dining hall that reminded me of a modern, less huge Great Hall. without the gryffindor banners. I worked my way from the back, where i was sitting on my truck's cargo bed (don't ask, it's a dream), and talking to people like Mitchell and Steph, who i know from childhood. Other people, like Gloria and Alex, began to crop up at random.

Eric was there, and I got mad when he wouldn't share his candy, so i went to get some of my own, strolling through a liquor store-type candy isle. As i went, I bumped into people at their respective cafeteria tables; among them were Zuley, and I caught a glimpse of Francis Gil and Chris and Jack, who shouldn't have been there, but it was funny to see them anyways. The only memories I have of them are as mean junior high boys, so that was who they were in my dream.

After I decided on a four-pack of Rocher Hazelnut Chocolates, ostensibly one of my favorite candies, I proceeded to what seemed to be a check-out stand, not unlike the Snack Window at St. Margaret Mary School, being run not by Mrs. Mooney, but by none other than Mr. Bencomo. There are a lot of teachers I wanted to be loved by in High School. The only ones who ever showed any above-average liking for me were Mrs. Shibuya, and Mrs. Charles.

Mr. Bencomo was one of the ones i desperately wanted to be liked by.

As I arrive at the check-out stand, I pass Co, in a dressing room, which was exciting, because we talked a lot in high school. I commented to her that i had recently been institutionalized for a suicide attempt, because that's the type of thing we would share with one another. Mostly, I was elated that she seemed happy to see me.

Mr. Bencomo seemed pleased, but then distracted by Whee (Kristine), who came to turn in a beautiful (and i mean BEAUTIFUL) drawing that she had just completed for his class. i bought my chocolates and settled at the nearest table, with a handful of blonde, christian strangers. I automatically was intimidated by them, but they also seemed weary of me. Mr. Bencomo sat down and asked about my recent hospitalization (he knew about my first, thanks to the St. Lucy's faculty forest-fire rumors).

I began to tell him, but then he got distracted by talking to a cheerleader, which was his way, as he had been coach for so many years. That was, by far, the biggest reminder of how i felt in high school--second class, and unremarkable. not worth paying attention to. So my attention turned to the girls at the table. I can't remember how we started talking, but it had something to do with my colorful language, which seemed to make them incredibly tense.

I tried to explain that I wasn't a bad person--I'm technically pretty shy. But around people like them, I come off as a bit of a Kara Thrace. It probably didn't help that I said the only difference between us was that "I think the whole 'jesus is lord' and 'no sex before marriage' things are totally silly". That seemed to tense them and put them at ease all at once. I got lucky-they were relatively open to the idea of people having different beliefs. not all christians are like that.

we somehow rolled around to the most painful topic yet. We overheard Mr. Bencomo talking about Russians. Apparently they were incoming freshmen to Cal Poly, because as soon as i mentioned Ilya, they knew who I was talking about. I was about to launch into the story of Bio, Spring Quarter, when they interrupted. They told me he had shitty toenails, but conceded that everything above that was great. It seemed to put me back to where I was at the beginning of the summer, missing him for no reason I could discern.

I ended up walking away toward a strange, modern type of patio--the type you would see on the UC Davis campus, with those giant stone heads.. I saw myself smiling at various faculty members as they passed--no one recognized me, letting me know i was not a regular on their campus. Eventually i stumbled upon a type of vendor's fair--someone was advertising a sort of backpack that expanded to accomodate your traveling needs. The dream ended with me asking the vendor what made their product special--how was it different from any other backpack that expanded with a zipper, what material was it made of ("what if i'm hiking and it starts raining? is it waterproof? what if i have my last change of clothes in there and they're about to get soaked?") i was amazed at how efficient a buyer my dream-self was.

I woke up around then, craving pizza, unable to walk straight.. enough time has passed that i think the meds have run their course, but having relieved the pressure of getting this dream out on paper (so to speak), i'm ready to throw my pizza up and lay down for a few more hours of sleep.

g'night

one of the egg-heads on the UC Davis campus. I couldn't find a picture of my favorite, so here's my second favorite--Book Head.

i feel like the very last bits of me have been snipped into bits.

life is such a stupid, stupid thing. empty and meaningless.

i hate being here and being so alone..

wait... i thought this was just a game. i'm not supposed to be special, i'm a toy! when did we start caring?

this just got a hell of a lot more serious in a completely silly way.

but there's no way around it.

i am officially "Doll".

Yeah. I did just have coffee at Nick's. I did just walk around the Claremont village and colleges for three hours. I did just spend another three hours sitting in a Denny's parking lot learning about chakra and talking about relationships. Yeah. I just came home at 4 in the morning.

But I told myself I would have adventures this summer. I want it to happen, so I'm making it happen.

And i have no regrets.

Tomorrow? Sci Vs Spy. Honestly, the theme of that protest makes no sense to me whatsoever, and I'm not sure I'll go because of that.
Sunday? Leaving to Laguna Art Festival.

Adventures.

My favorite adventure, still, is being Doll.

To say that I had an interesting night would be an understatement....



Yep. I'm the one tied down on the bed. Yep. Stephen did eventually put the pillow over my face. Yep. I think it was pretty funny.

There's been so much drama going on lately and I'm getting so bogged down by trying to mediate it all that last night relieved worlds of stress.
We threw water balloons, rode around in shopping carts through wal*mart, drank a lot, ate burritos, finally got to be a proper Sub, got tied up, watched Boondock Saints, and fell asleep amongst friends. All in all, I feel like summer started. Now, once Eric gets here, Summer will actually get GOOD.
One more week to go!

    WHY ARE YOU SO GOOD AT HOLDING YOUR ALCOHOL?!!!!

why is it that S and his friends can rack up a tab of over $400 at a bar, and walk out fine, but I can't handle six shots?

BUT NOTICE!!

MY GRAMMAR IS UNSULLIED! HAH!

oh dear gods this is horrible....

my face feels like its on fire.

BUT DID YOU KNOW THAT I HAVE A WITCH HUNTER ROBIN SHOT GLASS???????? IT'S TRUE!!!!