Saturday

Well Thursday wasn't too bad. I was on campus, did what needed doing, and got my tooth filled. Turns out I have another filling due next week - gah. But hey, fillings and not root canals, so there's a bright side.

On the down side, I've been feeling like shit lately. I mean physically. I don't post too much about that stuff here anymore but weeks like this one make it impossible to write about me without this coming into it. I am in pain and feel sick every frikkin time I eat. Aside from losing weight again (yeah, this is why I dread buying expensive clothing...the yo-yoing weight issue), I'm feeling drained and angry. The anger come from exasperation, a lack of validation, and too many limitations. This anger is potent and it's in the form of a blank check, just waiting for some fool to stumble across it and write his or her name in the "Pay to the order of" line. Currently, I'm fighting to keep my primary care's office out of that line because I don't need to be any more surly with them if I want to maintain functionality of my relationships there. But it's not easy. I had an ultrasound on Thursday and was told by the tech they'd have results that day. No calls. No calls on Friday either. I had planned to give them most of Friday and then call around 4:00 but I forgot about it until about 20 minutes after I ate dinner Friday night.

Ok, enough of that. Thursday was good. I was energetic despite eating so little (no food for two hours after the filling and only being able to chew on one side of my mouth kept my food intake, and thus pain and nausea, down). One of the prof's whose house we were at offered for A___ and me to get married there. They have a nice place and it was a nice offer. But knowing him, I told him he should make sure that weekend works with his wife. Come to find out that no, it does not. So we're back to the justice of the peace at someplace pretty and then out for dinner/lunch somewhere plan. This isn't too bad, not just because it was what we had originally figured we'd do but because having it at the faculty home was starting to put it into the more formal category. I wanted to avoid that for some good reasons that will nonetheless sound jaundiced and jaded to some. Then again, most of that kind of person doesn't read my blog so fuck it. The reasons have to do with the fact that once you open that door, it's like you invite in all the expectations about "real weddings". E.g., my brother's reaction after I told him we might have this at the faculty house, which he's been to and knows is pretty and a slightly more formal venue.
"Do you have a theme?"
"Ah, a theme? Well we were thinking everyone could wear hats."
"..."
"You know, like I was going to get one of those ridiculous sun hats they sell at the drug stores in the summertime and A____ can wear this plastic party hat bowler thing because it will go with his tuxedo t-shirt."
"Oh no no no. He needs to wear a suit. We'll go shopping."
"We don't have money for that. Plus, A____'s wearing the tux T, we already bought it. He wanted to get one for you but I said you wouldn't wear it.
"I'm wearing my Calvin Klein suit."
"Go right ahead."
"What about cake? Are you doing cake?"
"I was thinking of asking our sister to make one."
"No. No no no. I'll go to my bakery (my brother has a bakery?). We'll get something, I won't say wedding but lots of flowers and a cake topper. You're having a cake topper."
"If you must put something on top, can it be a unicorn?"
"..."
"A___ would love a unicorn."
"A unicorn?"
"Yeah...oh and rainbows. Put a unicorn leaping over a rainbow on it."

ass kicking

We have a unicorn in my lab. And as everyone knows, unicorns kick ass. Wait, apparently not everyone knows that.

A and I got the unicorn a while ago from a toy store in a strip mall near campus. It's a unicorn on a stick, like the old fashioned, perplexing child's toy "horse on a stick" (seems it's called a "stick horse" because "horse stick" could sound bad).

Our unicorn stick has sound effects. This is what made A and I buy it. I mean, we were playing with it anyhow, giggling like idiots in the store. When we realized that pressing the unicorn's ear results in a few moments of galloping noises which end in a series of whinnies, we had to get it.

And so now we have a unicorn. We brought it to school because it is often a toxic place and having a unicorn to look at and play with sometimes is helpful. We have many nice happy memories of people on the unicorn either in celebration or for cheering up. Today, it was for cheering up. I've been trying to fight off a first class bad mood all week.

I went over to the box where the unicorn stands. Justin, named after the unicorn in the Scrubs episode since it seems that the makers of that show understand the usefulness of having a comfort unicorn one can go to when one needs to. I went over and took Justin for a short spin. The other grads cheered us on, happy for the unicorn moment. The undergrad, however, was not impressed.

This is the undergrad who sits at the desk my officemates and I had set aside for a fellow grad student. The fellow grad student had transfered to our advisor but doesn't personally use the space we went out of our way (way out of) to make for him in our advisor's lab because he doesn't want to offend his former advisor by leaving the one remaining student his former advisor has in a lab by herself. It's politics and it's about sparing the professor's "feelings" (this professor has the range of feelings of a very small child - "cranky" and "full") at the cost of the feelings of us, the grads who moved all this shit around because we were told "hey guys, ____ is coming to the lab so let's make some space for him!"

This is the undergrad who works for the politically absent fellow grad student, collecting his data for him, and so this is the undergrad who sits at the desk we set up for our fellow grad in our office, who ignores her subjects when they show up, ignores them in that sort of bored receptionist ignoring way. This is the undergrad who, when she finally does recognize their presence, advises the subjects she is running for our politically absent fellow grad student to throw their shit "where ever" in our office without regard for doorways, walkways, or other people's space in this small area. This is the undergrad who quite often seems to be very put upon by things like us wanting to use our lab space for data collection on a day when she usually runs for our politically absent fellow grad student, by our coming and going through our office, by our eating lunch in our office, and by our sometimes talking with each other or meeting with our students in our office.

In my book, everyone can be put upon for no apparent reason at all. It's life, it's hard, you feel like huffing and puffing sometimes. I understand, truly. But the frequency of this undergrad's put uponness over things being done by people who are much more graciously putting up with the not terribly convenient circumstance of her working from our office (at best an irksome reminder of her boss's choice to be absent) is far too high, even for me.

This is the undergrad who was annoyed that I was playing with my unicorn, in my office.

"Ummmm, why do you have a unicorn in your office?" she asked in those tones which say "I'm saying 'why do you have a unicorn' but really, what I mean is 'that is like so stupid, it's totally gay. My gohhd, if I were getting my PhD, I wouldn't waste my time riding a unicorn around an office that has rainbow cut outs on the walls (gay!). I'd wear glasses and put my hair in a bun and I'd look very smart while I squinted at computer screens and pressed a pencil to my lip nearly chewing it but not quite. My office key and flash drive would be on a color coordinated cord around my neck, and I might also carry a clipboard, at least when I am running subjects...which is so totally beneath me' Now please stop fooling around for 5 minutes. I know it's your office and you're sharing your space with me simply out of misguided respect and concern for your peer who I am doing data collection for, but I simply must get back to squinting over and highlighting every second line of my reading for my Dysfunctional Personalities Types class."

I haven't touched the unicorn all semester, hell, I think not since I finished my first time teaching as an instructor last semester. It's not like we're always fucking off in there. Usually it's largely headphones and laptops. But now, I'm thinking of riding that unicorn every day she's in there. It's my office. I can ride a unicorn in it if I want to.

Got unicorns?