We sent our 2000 lbs of books today via the USPS to Hawaii. They ran many hours late because the person in charge did not pay attention to the fact that we were shipping 2000 lbs. So, we had to wait until the carriers were done with their routes and could then pick-up our boxes.

When they were two hours late, we called them many times and no one seems to know the difference between the two types of pick-up (carrier vs. on demand). We explained that we were given a two hour window and that we are paying so we want them picked up today. Then they send a letter carrier over to pick it up, yeah right, I guess he is going to put all 2000 lbs in the front seat with him. …that is what the person Brian spoke to on the phone thought the carrier would do until Brian informed this individual that the carrier could not take 2000 lbs in his little mail van much less the front seat. These people had time to plan and they knew how much we were shipping. After all, they DO ask how much the total weight of the shipment is as well as the total number of packages. They do have the tools in place to run efficiently, unfortunately, they have no clue how to use them or even what products they offer. This is just ridiculous and pathetic…

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How sad is this… We have a smoker above our new bedroom in our new apartment. Brian is now over at the new apartment moving all of our clothes, bed, and other stuff out of the bedroom and into another part of the apartment. Geez. These Ohioans are absolutely disgusting. They are walking smokestacks!

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We are nearly finished packing up our stuff in our old apartment. It is bare looking and the only things in the room are essentially the bottom part of our desk which is going to be disassembled tomorrow and some random furniture that we are waiting for charity or buyers to pick-up. We are SO glad that we moved. The smell has only gotten worse and it keeps going higher and higher up in the building.

In other news, we are trying to find a car online. So far, we have had some success so that is good…

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We are moving to a new 3 bedroom apartment today. The smoke smell was too much to take. Fun…moving in 20 degree weather.

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Since Brian is notoriously bad about withholding information from his parents that he does not deem to be important (although he mentions to them that I have my period - weirdo) I know that Pa relies on me and my blog to relay information!

Here is the story: On dissertation orals day, Brian was waiting in the meeting room for the committee to come in. They came in one by one and basically told him to leave the room while they discussed some things. They shut the door and he sat outside. The room is supposed to be soundproof and has no windows. This was a remodeled room in Lazenby. In case Brian did not tell you, Lazenby had a fire earlier in the year that caused some pretty severe smoke and fire damage. I think Brian said that one of Marilynn’s labs was ruined. So, these rooms had to be remodeled. Back to the story… So, Brian thought he heard the doorknob move but not turn so he stood by the door. It never budged. He didn’t know what was going on until Marilynn told him the door would not budge and they couldn’t get out. She told him to get the facilities people to come open the door. He tried to find a facilities person, they called the campus police, and other campus people to come get them out. He asks a graduate student in the office next to the meeting room if he could help. He says sure and tries his key…It gets caught in the lock. Now they are *really* stuck. He finally finds a facilities person who is leaving in 15 minutes to have surgery. He tries to get them out but says he has to leave because he is having surgery. Brian hears the graduate school representative say, “What effect will this have on Brian” and hears Marilynn say “Oh Brian will be fine, he is tough!” The facilities guy gives Brian a phone number to call if they are still stuck later. Brian has tried to find the guy in the building that he knows that could potentially help get them out but he is not in his office and no one has seen him. Brian finally finds him after his dissertation committee has been stuck in the room for 30 minutes and he comes up to the meeting room. He opens the door but tells Brian not to let them out until the outcome is a good one. The dissertation committee then calls him in and closes the door, this time using a pencil eraser so the door would not close all the way. After being questioned for an hour and a half or so they tell him to leave the room again while they decide whether or not he is going to be Dr. Brian. They tell him to come back and tell him congratulations and that this dissertation orals was very memorable and oh yeah, so was your actual dissertation. But he only has little tiny spelling errors and grammar errors to correct which is really unheard of…

Also, we have been having issues with the cigarette smoke next door. I got my first migraine in over a year yesterday from the smoke wafting into our apartment. Brian sent a letter to management today and he called yesterday. He basically said we would move out of the apartment for the next 26 days into a new apartment. We have taped up electrical outlets, all moulding along the floor on the adjoining walls, taped up his old closet, the front door, and any place on the floor we could smell smoke coming through. We both have been getting rather ill from the smoke. Brian woke up coughing up phlegm and I have been doing the same today. My head is still aching from the migraine and neither one of us can sleep very well with the apartment being so cold. The radiator is under the window so we never really are able to get any heat into the apartment because it just gets sucked right back out. Since we haven’t sent our books to JoAnns yet, we still have 2000 lbs of books that we would have to move in addition to all of our furniture that we’re trying to get rid of… Also, today the high here is in the 20’s and it is windy and snowing right now. Now you know the whole story, Pa!

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I want a Chihuahua.

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You have gone from “Hey You” to “Dr. U” - Yay for you!

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Congress, Sports, and Steroids - Give me a break. I think Congress has more important things to do than sit around and talk about how bad it that some sports goons like to take steroids. They have spent more time yapping about steroids than they have on the war gone wrong in Iraq. They want to bark about how dangerous steroids are and how they will kill people. Here is a news flash: The war in Iraq is not only costing the US government more money than steroids but it is killing a heck of a lot more people too. Not to mention the fact that no one wants to kill Americans because they use steroids. This is more taxpayer waste and stupidity from the US government.

Congress presses Bush for answers - I am sure all they will get out of Bush is some incoherent babble. With his approval rating dropping so low I doubt he cares anymore about what anyone has to say to him. And why should he care he is in his second term and has no need to be nice or do anything to make anyone happy. Any individual that cannot chew his food and becomes incapacitated as a result of eating should not be made president of this country. The “guy next door” does not make a great president, he makes a great neighbor. But frankly, I would not want Bush as a neighbor. He probably throws beer cans on his front lawn…

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I am so full. We ate lunch at Chipotle earlier when we had to go to the post office, bank, and Target. We never eat out but decided we needed to have a pre-oral defense stress relief celebration. So, we celebrated by eating 2-3 lb. (they were HUGE) vegetarian burritos. That was at about 12:30 and I am *still* full. This is a miracle. I usually get so hungry that I have to eat every 2-3 hours but this is great. I am going on 4 hours now and I am not even a bit hungry yet! I need to learn to make giant Chipotle-like burritos at home. But where can I find 8 foot long tortillas? I would make them myself but I don’t have a pan large enough to make a Chipotle size tortilla.

I am selling a bunch of stuff on eBay currently. At any given time I seem to have at least 25-30 auctions going. It is really easy to run an eBay business once you get into the swing of things, I think. The moving preparations are moving along and we are on schedule. We are still a bit puzzled about the car issue though. We don’t want to have to rent a car when we get to Hawaii, we want to be able to buy a car right away or have a purchased car waiting for us upon arrival. We will figure it out though…

We are a one laptop family now. I am planning on getting another laptop soon after we arrive in Hawaii so that I can have my own. We have decided to go solely with laptops only from now on so that we can lower our power consumption. We are going to utilize solar power so we can only use/store so much energy.

Our next 5K is coming up next week. I really have not been running that much because I have been doing low impact things like the elliptical trainer because my knees felt stressed for a while because of the leg plyometrics and then my period. Also, I have just been tired from the weight training so I often don’t feel like doing much cardio. Not only is it boring but it makes me hungrier and I have to eat more. Eating more is bad because it is expensive and time consuming! But we will see how we do in the race. Brian has been better about his training than I have. He runs every week but I have only run several times since the last race. No matter how we do it will be really fun.

I made reservations for Brian’s graduation dinner party at the Melting Pot. He’s very excited about fonduing again. I hope the waiters sing “Happy Graduation to you” to him. That would be hilarious…

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Oh yes, I forgot to post about this several days ago. I was going through the apartment and throwing things away and getting them ready to pack up. I moved our 15 lb. medicine ball that was sitting on this big blue wizard popcorn can. I decided that I would put Brian’s old wizard popcorn tin in the trashpile. He has always said not to throw it away even though he said it was old and dented and we were not taking it to Hawaii. I figured that I could ask him about throwing it away when he got home. But then I noticed that the popcorn tin was a bit heavy. I knew it did not have popcorn in it because Brian would never leave food untouched. I opened it. This was mistake number one. Inside the popcorn tin, I discovered that my husband had been using it as a filing cabinet for over 6 years! In this popcorn tin, I found IRS documents, his acceptance letter to graduate school along with his congratulatory letter on his fellowship, several official transcripts, and a myriad of other very important documents. I had to laugh. When he came home I asked him if they really give PhDs to people who keep filing systems in a popcorn tin. He laughed at me and told me that graduate schools are always looking for creative people! I had to continue laughing at him… But I also had to take a picture for the sake of posterity.

In addition, he is demanding that everyone call him Dr. Brian except he insists that I begin calling him Dr. Love. lol

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We have a shower drain clog. Usually, that means that a bunch of my hair and Brian’s razor covers are caught in the shower. Not this time. This time, by the end of the shower we are ankle deep in grey water (or more) and the shower drains very slowly. Brian said we should just ignore it because it is our grey water but I think it is less than savory to stand in my own grey water whilst I am attempting to get clean. So, we decided to work on the drain. We tried a plunger, coat hanger, and a snake - but they did not work. Then we remembered that we had a half bottle of Draino under the kitchen sink. I hate using Draino because those nasty chemicals are just going to end up back in the river around here. Hopefully, as nasty as that stuff is, it will actually work… We shall see.

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I am not sure why this just randomly occurred to me but Brian and I *really* did get married right on the dot of the winter solstice last year. We got married on Dec. 21 at or around 12:41 PM when the solstice occurred. Weird.

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I am utterly exhausted and I still have a bunch of stuff to list on eBay. Also, some guy is supposed to come look at our bookcases this evening but it is edging towards 9 PM. Also, Brian is asleep on the bed in the room where the bookcases are. I would rather the guy not come tonight so Brian can get some sleep (and me too, I am exhausted mentally and physically). He is stressed out and exhausted from all the work he has been doing and the awful hours he has been keeping. I am just glad that it will all end soon for both of us…

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I have my period. I also have a very understanding husband that listens and contributes to discussions about the menses and even encourages writing about it. He does not think it is dirty, disgusting, unmentionable, or “my problem.” He even gets me books from the library because I seem to read a plethora of menstrual related reading material during my period.

It is interesting that I talk to my husband and not my mother or a close female friend about menstruating. I do not have any female friends and my mother tends to think that menstruation is awful, gross, necessary, and “the curse.” I was never told that it was special to have my period only that I could “look forward” to it for many decades to come. Women seem to have rather horrifying attitudes towards their own bodies and what they do. Menstruating is completely normal and healthy. This is not a bad thing and it is most certainly not unclean or disgusting.

I am currently writing a paper (encouraged by Brian) about the effects of the patriarchy on the menarche and the subsequent effects on the whole menstrual process all the way through menopause. It may end up as three different papers…we shall see.

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Frump McGrump has stooped to all new humorous yet pathetic levels of stupidity. This time, in order to really “get us” she has thrown leaves all around the entryway to make it seem as though the wind blew in a ton of leaves. She’s so stupid and lazy she threw them all into big piles and essentially proved it was a stunt because she did not put any where she was standing when she threw them. In addition, we don’t even have any leaves on the ground on this entire side of the building and all of the leaves on the other side of the building blew in the opposite direction. She’s such a phony and a fraud. If it was not so silly and funny it would really be sad. Actually, it is sad because she is just that pathetic… We feel rather sorry for her given that she is such an angry, bitter, pathetic individual.

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