HA

It's hard to make friends when you're old.

Duh

Disconnected

I feel so disconnected.
Disconnected from others.
From life
from reality.

I could float away as there is nothing holding me.

When

did science and atheism become the same thing?  Or that you had to be an atheist to be a scientist?

Frozen

I'm losing my job on August 10.  I have no prospects for afters.  I've applied for a few and have a couple more applications to send out.

A social media friend has been harassing me about finding a job for the last month.

Every time I start thinking about a new job waves of panic hit me and I'm frozen with indecision.

I don't know what I want to do.  Should I try an academic job, a non-profit, or give it up and go into corporate America?

I don't know where to live.  Do I look for local jobs or do I move away.  I'd like to move far away but I have a very thin support structure as it is.  I'd have nothing if I'd move away.  But if I stay, there may not be any jobs.  My parents are getting older.  I should be responsible and stay and help them.

I think about the jobs I've had and how I've wrecked every one in some way.

All of this going on while trying to write letters selling myself and I just freak out and retreat.

Not a Whirlwind of Despair

Normally, when I read the blog Seraphic Singles I am thrown into a whirlwind of despair.  It seems I've done everything wrong and that's why I'm still single with no prospects.

This morning's post was different.  For some reason, this morning's post made me feel hopeful.

No idea why.  But it is such a remarkable feeling I thought I'd remark on it.

Movie Fest

I have plans to cope with my first Monday of being unemployed by watching movies and drinking wine.  I need movie suggestions though...

Lost

Movie Buddy loves the TV show Lost.  It's alright I guess.  I'm rooting for the dog.

Anyway, one of the characters seems very aimless in the beginning.  He then gets it together.  When asked he's like I have PURPOSE now.  I had no PURPOSE before, but I have it now.

I'm intrigued by this.  I think about my own life.  I think that is why I've been so sad lately.

I have no purpose.  My life has no meaning.

And I haven't the foggiest idea on how to get it.

Needs

a vacation.

Not a stay-cation either.

I need a beach.  I need to lie on a beach doing absolutely nothing and freaking out cause I'm not doing anything.

My Next Position

So, I'm facing unemployment in the next month.
Everyone asks me what I'm going to do.  Where I'm going to get a job.  What my plans are.
I know they are trying to be nice but it is driving me nuts.
So now when they ask, I tell them the truth:  the unemployment office :p

Scenes from the Dentist

Hygenist:  Have you been flossing?
Me:  Do you really want me to answer that?
Hygenist:  Yes.
Me:  Thinks you already know the answer.

Me:  My teeth look like feet.
Dentist:  Everyone says that.  I see teeth.
Me:  You are a dentist.

Dentist:  (He's picked up my iPad...) Taize?  You listen to that??!!
Me:  Yeah well it was supposed to help calm me down while writing my dissertation.
Dentist:  Did it?
Me:  Not really.
Dentist:  What worked?
Me:  Rum.

Hygenist; (Very excited) Don't you just love coming here?
Me:  (deadpan) Not really.

Dentist:  (laughing at his own joke)  I'm so funny!
Me:  How much laughing gas have you had?  You need to cut back dude.

Summer

is not going how I had hoped.

I was supposed to be planning a trip to the beach, not the unemployment office.

I was supposed to chillax not scramble to get in every single doctor visit before my health insurance ends.

I'm supposed to be exercising and losing weight.  I'm too stressed to eat.

I'm supposed to be going out on adventures.  Except it's too hot and now money is starting to be a concern.

This isn't how I hoped summer would go.

Nightmare

is back.

I am riding in an open top Land Rover through the African savannah.  The wind is blowing.  There is a guitar and a huge rifle in the back seat.  It smells clean and fresh.  I am laughing.

The wind changes.  The smell changes to something faintly sickly sweet.  There is a tree in the distance.  It looks wrong.

We get closer.  I see black cloth on the tree.

Lord Have Mercy

We get close enough to see the tree.  There are things hanging from the branches.  As we get closer, I scream.  There are 12 priests hanging from the branches.  Swaying in the breeze.  From the looks of the cassocks, they are Jesuits.  Sometimes in the dream they are beaten; other times they have the faces of angels, dead angels.

My guide drives the Jeep under the tree and we cut them down.  There is no where to go with them.  We decide to bury them.  I have Holy Water.  I sprinkle it on the soon to be graves.

My guide begins to dig.  He digs with an efficiency that he has done this thousands upon thousands of times.

Christ Have Mercy

I wash the priests and prepare them for burial as best I can.  There are sheets in the jeep.  I wrap them in the sheets.

As we work, we sing and chant Lamentations and the Office of the Dead.  I do not know what these are in real life, but in the dream, I know them all.  We chant the Litany of the Saints except all the saints are marytrs.

It is hot.  There is a sense of urgency.

We bury them.  I am sad they are not getting proper funerals but yet I am detatched.

Lord Have Mercy

I mistakenly told someone this dream.  She indicated that this was indicative of my anger with the Catholic Church and that I had 12 months to make a change.

But I am not convinced.  There was nothing in that field, that savannah to indicate that it was actually in Africa.  It could easily be the Kansas or Illinois prairies.

I wonder if I'm dreaming of things to come.

I am chilled to the bone thinking of it.

Wonders

how I'm supposed to lose weight via exercise when it is 100 out?

Especially since I've managed to get sick from the heat 3x this summer....

What Dreams May Come

I've noticed over the past few months that I've been dreaming a great deal about me.  In the past, I would never dream about myself.  Well, maybe I did, but I certainly didn't remember it.

This morning, I wasn't feeling well so I ended up taking an afternoon nap.  And had a very vivid dream.

The dream started out at my wedding.  It was a very small wedding.  I don't remember much of that part of the dream except I bowed to my husband's wishes.  There was colored light which makes me think it was in a Catholic Church of some sort.

The wedding reception was outside.  I don't remember much of that either, except it was very green.  And I danced with my husband.  Which isn't very logical given it was outside and there was grass but it was a dream.

The honeymoon was camping.  I vaguely remember smelling salt so we must have gone to the ocean.

Then I moved into his house which was our house now.  And we had a long discussion about my quilting room.  I wanted it in his office or at least on the same floor as his office but he insisted there was no room.  And then I was like well your office is going to have to move anyway and he was like why?  it's my office!  And I responded well your office is going to be the baby's room.  He moved his office that day.

OH!  How could I forget!  When we got back from the honeymoon, my husband gave me my wedding present:  a basset hound named Petey.

I remember lots of warmth and feelings of safety.

And then my sister woke me up with cold hands.

The annoying thing is I did not see what my husband looked like or if I even knew him.  Highly annoying given I feel like I'm running out time.  Nor did I see what the baby looked like.  Baby had a lovely bright colored puppy quilt.

These dreams are so lovely yet so heartbreaking.  I can't even put into words why.

Tie Dye Has Always Been Cool

I was at St. Joseph when Mass Buddy directed my attention to this window...

His head wrap is tie-dye!!!

AWESOME!

What a wonderful world...

the original

A not too bad hybrid

If only I knew

I have been asked if I am doing God's Will.

I can't answer the question.  I don't know what God's Will is for me.

I have the sinking suspicion I am not however.

Show Me How To Live

"You gave me life, now show me how to live"

Inspired by a discussion on God and why He made me.

Yeah, just guess where I fall...

I find the timing of this rather hysterical given conversations I've recently had....

States of Drunkenness

Drinking Buddy and I went to Happy Hour last night.  We had an ulterior motive, Photo Buddy's picture was on the wall in the place (very very nice) and we wanted to see it.

The purpose of Happy Hour of course is to get cheap drinks and cheap food.  I'm sure that's not the real reason but that's what I think so there you have it.

I've only been drinking for roughly 2 years.  I blame my last semester of doctoral coursework.  I specifically blame discourse analysis.  Lovely course; I learned a great deal.  It just drove me to drink.  Which is really saying something considering I was in doctoral studies in physics.  You know, come to think of it, drinking might have made that go better.  Alas, I was a different person then.

So what happens when I drink?  It doesn't take me very much to get buzzed and then drunk.  A bottle of hard cider will get me seriously buzzed, usually by drinking half of it.  Two rum and cokes and I'm ready to dance on tables.

Here's how it usually progresses:

1. Giggling.  Not just any giggling, giggling with some deep breathing issues.  Almost like snorting but ladies don't snort.  Ladies also don't drink in excess but that's another post.
2. Crazy Idea stage.  Can overlap with giggling.  Starts having crazy ideas or think other people's crazy ideas are awesome.  
3. Snuggling.  I just want to curl up with someone and rest my head on a chest and be all cuddly.
4. Anxious.  Sometimes I just start at this stage.  I was in the Apple Store and there were all these people and they were so close and I had to run away.  The best is when Drinking Buddy leaves to go to the restroom.  If he's gone more than 2 minutes I start freaking out.  
5. Sobriety.  A sad state of affairs.
6. Very Very Hyper!!

So there you have it.  Of course there is the usual slurring of words (starts between 1 and 2) and the room spinning and rocking.  

I do usually stop when my stomach starts rebelling BTW.

Stuck

There is a job that I think I'm a good fit for open in Colorado.  The application requires the standard CV and cover letter.  It also requires:

• A statement of my philosophy of science education.
• My most interesting research experience.

Needless to say, I'm dragging my feet.  I just don't have a clue about what I need to write.  I do know I need to write it well and it needs to show the depth of my knowledge, which is rather shallow in some parts.

I suppose for the philosophy statement, I will need to go back over some of my old classwork.  I'm almost positive I've had to generate similar statements.  

When I get one of them done, I'll post them and you can ridicule them ;)

Study of Beached Canoe

I'm not sure which of these I like best. I took a bunch of pictures of this canoe from many angles. One problem is that for some reason I didn't plug in the remote shutter that lets me take photos with the shutter open for more than 30 seconds. So the images get very very dark very very fast. The other problem is that in the dark, it's hard to see the canoe to even take a picture of it. So I have lots of pictures with bits of the canoe missing.

Study of Lone Tree in Foggy Water Channel

I think this is my favorite...


This is the same image brightened. I think I like the darker image better. Seems creepier.


A different orientation


In the distance

When A Good Photo Goes Bad

I went out to the Garden to take pictures of the lotus blossoms.  I forgot my 70-300 mm telephoto, so I couldn't really get the nice blossoms far away.

Here's one:

The problem with this is that the blossom is nice but the image is too soft.  I think the focus was on a leaf that was slightly in front of it.  So what do you do with an image that is lovely, but not technically lovely?

That's when the awesome photoshop filters come in....

It's a light painting!  See can't tell it is blurry in this image...

This is the watercolor filter.  It's a little on the dark side but still...it's a nice effect.

Job Hunting

is rough when your self-esteem is in the basement.  How am I supposed to sell myself when I think I'm worthless?

Lotuses

if you want to see the lotuses....go here
http://snupsphotos.blogspot.com/2012/07/lotus-study.html