Tesla Anomaly

Off to San Antonio!

I'm having serious motivation problems at work. Work makes me tired just thinking about it. I'm frustrated that I'm not getting more done, but discouraged by the lack of satisfaction return on my emotional investments here.

It was a relief to take a few hours off the last couple of mornings. Yesterday was my PT check-up. The Amazing Mary assures me that my alignment issues are fixed (this has become a point of paranoia during my runs) and has given me a new fleet of far more strenuous exercises to do. I've also been told to focus on core strength cross-training, which means rock-climbing and swimming are back on my list. :D :D :D ....now I just have to make time for those things to happen. My next six weeks are insane.

This morning I took Casper to the vet. I've found a little dried blood on one of his forelegs a couple of times - which could be nothing, but at his age and given that his new hobby is accruing problems, I wanted it looked at. The vet agreed with my approach, though to his frustration, he couldn't find anything notably wrong. I'll keep watching it. The visit was still worthwhile, because I had the vet check his eyes (Casper's having some issues with the pollen) and he recommended some eyedrops to use. We also discussed his hyperesthesia, which has been worse this past week, and increasing his dosage of gabapentin a little. So I can make my boy a little more comfortable.

Fizgig is my spirit animal right now. I just find myself wanting to stomp and wave my hands at people a lot.

I think even if I keep a few things on LJ for friends, this is going to be my new journaling site.

I have shamelessly borrowed maruah's LJ icon for this post. I hope she does not mind. ♥

So yesterday, I worked twelve and a half hours. (Somewhere in the middle was the smelliest lunch break ever.) We left the lab at 7:30, got home at 7, and worked till 9.

( This is why. (Image-heavy) )

I found a treasure today: An empty gopher tortoise shell. (Well, mostly empty. There was a vertebra inside! Cool!) This pretty much trumps every turtle shell I ever found as a kid, being over a foot in length. GIANT TURTLE SHELL FTW.

...Unfortunately it belonged to a threatened species, which means I'd need a permit to take it home. ;_; I brought it in anyway and gave it to the Education Department; hopefully they can make good use of it.

In other news, I killed the Ziziphus! :(

Technically it was not my fault. But C____ left me in charge of the Ziziphus celata seedlings growing in the greenhouse to be used for a restoration planting, with the instructions that they had aphids and whiteflies, and I should spray all the plants every day with the soapy water mixture he left me, and that I couldn't possibly overspray or hurt them in any way.

Two days after he left, the Ziziphus all started to brown, and their leaves have all fallen off. Turns out he did not tell me that every time they've sprayed the plants with soap before, this has happened. Perhaps he forgot to mention that very important point? We looked up the soap-mixture proportions, and the mixture he made is a ridiculously high concentration, so -- really, really not my fault the plants got soapburnt. But this still means when he gets back from his vacation, we're going to have to tell him that his Ziziphus are naked. In the past when this has happened, they've regrown their leaves, but you have to figure at some point the plants are just going to say, "Oh, for fuck's sake," and decide not to resprout. *crosses fingers* Come back to us, Ziziphus! We love yoooou~.

I got a lot done today! This morning I set up the rest of my torpedograss plots. In the afternoon, I finished a monstrous data entry project. So despite the dead endangered plants and the dead threatened tortoise, I am personally alive and happy.

...And at the end of the day, that's a good thing to be able to say.

Reposting from demonlet's LJ, because everyone in the world should see this. (I don't care how stupid you think the lyrics are, you cannot deny a seven-year-old who tells her composer-dad that her favorite part is the key change. ♥ ♥ ♥) This arrangement is absolutely stunning.





(Do want: A man with hands like that.)



Also: Moooooooooooooon. I wish I had a better camera to really do it justice, but at least I got to enjoy the moment.

I met up with rabidlemur and troutqueen, along with the Tiny Tremur, at Downtown Disney today. We terrified the Tremur with lunch at the T-Rex restaurant, though by the end of the meal he was waving hi to all the nice dinosaurs.

Things for the quote book:

"I know this is going to sound like the stupidest question ever, but how is this dinosaur wearing a leopard print dress?" - Rabidlemur

It was great to see a couple of familiar faces. Note to self: Tremurs are heavy. I'm in awe of the Trout's upper arm strength. Moms must train up to carrying their kids around, getting stronger as they grow.

I had a rematch with the prickly pear cacti this morning. Today's sampling included measurements of several target species. One of them grew profusely within THIS bed of cactus:





Every yellow flag marks a plant.

The spines on the cactus aren't really a problem, but the glochids are a BITCH and they seem to magically appear in your skin when your arm is still three or four inches away from the plant. How does it do that?

I believe the cactus thought to mock me after yesterday's encounter. Bahahahaha. You can't scare me away, Opuntia humifusa! I depart triumphant! VICTORY!