Home from the holidays

Merry belated Christmas, mes chers who celebrate. I only have to go two generations or so back to find ones that celebrated Orthodox (aka Russian) Christmas, so I'm not really that late. Les parents were overgenerous as usual, and I now have a TV less than 15 years old. I only asked for a giftcard toward one, so. Whoa. Hopefully my gifts were as well-received (among other things, I got tickets to the Baltimore Grand Prix for le père & frère, and le frère & I finally got my mom the Terrible Towel autographed by Jack Lambert).

The brats are happy to be home, the Steelers are playoff bound, I thoroughly enjoyed NHL 24/7 (I don't have HBO, so I took full advantage of my parents' cable) and am SO PUMPED for the Winter Classic now (if I only had a spare $500 burning a hole in my pocket for tickets). And I totally lucked out-- the predicted 6-10" of snow didn't materialize at all and the drive back was far, far smoother than the ride up. Alas, back to reality and work tomorrow. I think I'm going to make popcorn and watch some MNF on my new TV.

Home(ish) for the holidays

Facebook status posted late yesterday afternoon: It's 233 miles to Delmont, I got a full tank of gas, two cats the back, it's getting dark, and I'm wearing sunglasses. Hit it.

Damn typo ruined the effect. Bleh. Blame my haste to get on my way and minimize the feline trauma. They officially do not travel well-- poor FatCat yacked and (here's a first) peed in the carrier. Well, one doesn't. DamnCat screeched, but ultimately resigned herself to her fate. Mostly. It's probably because FatCat still associates long car rides with being dumped at a shelter on some level, even though it's been three years (roughly half his life). Poor baby.

On a happier note, Steelers singing carols!! Yeah, they really shouldn't quit their day jobs, but it's pretty funny watching them try to sing harmony on Silver Bells.

As a stereotypical government employee, I have Veterans day off. Actually, it's not completely inappropriate given the incredibly large-- about 25%-- portion of federal employees that are veterans. So, serious business first. From Breakfast of Champions:

I will come to a time in my backwards trip when November eleventh, accidentally my birthday, was a sacred day called Armistice Day. When I was a boy, and when Dwayne Hoover was a boy, all the people of all the nations which had fought in the First World War were silent during the eleventh minute of the eleventh hour of Armistice Day, which was the eleventh day of the eleventh month.

It was during that minute in nineteen hundred and eighteen, that millions upon millions of human beings stopped butchering one another. I have talked to old men who were on battlefields during that minute. They have told me in one way or another that the sudden silence was the Voice of God. So we still have among us some men who can remember when God spoke clearly to mankind.

Armistice Day has become Veterans' Day. Armistice Day was sacred. Veterans' Day is not.

So I will throw Veterans' Day over my shoulder. Armistice Day I will keep. I don't want to throw away any sacred things.

What else is sacred? Oh, Romeo and Juliet, for instance.

And all music is.

Of course, the number of verified WWI vets still living has dwindled to three (four, if you count "era" vets) since BoC was published in '73. Vonnegut (a WWII veteran, lest we forget) himself has been gone for three and a half years.

In less SRS BZNS, I finally read the new issue of Bon Appetit and I have a confession to make. I really can't wait to actually host Thanksgiving. I mean, I know it would drive Le Père just fou (he prefers his Thanksgivings ubertraditional-- I've been banned from seasoning the stuffing in the past because I might put "weird shit" like rosemary in it... of course, then my mom turns around and puts it in when he's not looking). But seriously? It would be awesome. And I'd invite just about everyone that could possibly come, because I am incapable of cooking just a little for a holiday.

In even less SRS BZNS, how freaking bummed am I about Max Starks? I know that the core is getting older, but the injuries are just piling up. And I don't think the Pats are going to make the same mistakes they did last week against the Browns. This is going to be a rough week.

Happy Easter, or as is said in our church: Хрїстóсъ воскрéсе! Воистину воскресе!

Or if you go old school: Χριστός ἀνέστη! Ἀληθῶς ἀνέστη!

My miserable cold of three weeks and counting turns out to be a persistent sinus infection spreading to the chest. So, for those of you counting at home, this month has featured almost going blind/ essentially not being able to use my right eye for a week and a half, a three week and counting nasty sinus infection that didn't want to stay in my sinuses, and a grievously ill (to the point where we thought he was dying) doggie. Among other things. Is it any wonder that I feel a little... cursed? Of course, none of these things is terribly conducive to work and I'm desperately behind, which is why I left for the library on a Sunday morning instead of doing Easter things as I'd prefer. Except, in keeping with the cursed theme, the med school library is on an unannounced holiday schedule and isn't opening until noon. If there weren't paper materials in this library I need to see, I would have gone elsewhere. As it is, by the time I went elsewhere, this library would be open. So I've been killing time in a school with which I'm not entirely familiar, on an uncomfortable little couch stuck between elevators and escalators. There's no room to spread out and start doing real work, and everything I've got is in full view of every random person walking past (yes, I know you're reading over my shoulder as I type, random girl).

Sigh.

Anyway, back to the holiday. Easter is actually my favorite religious holiday, and I'm really tired of the whole "Look at how irreverent I am" crap I see from certain quarters. Look, it's fine if you're not religious, but "ironic" hipster offensiveness is still plain offensive. Yes, I know that there are a frightening number of nutjobs that use religion as an excuse for everything from asshattery to murder, but clearly I'm not one of them, and I hardly think it's appropriate to be an ass to someone you know (or even "know") as a way of striking back or something at those nutjobs.

Fifteen more minutes until the library opens. Fricking finally.

have you seen the ether bunny?

Behold the Ether Bunny and tremble.

Nothing like a little chemistry humor. Chemists as a class have a unique appreciation for awful jokes, especially visual puns.  I haven't lost mine.

On a more serious note, I'm just not feeling Easter this year. I got a Leemar pysanky kit with the full intention of making a few. It sits unopened on a shelf. Last year, I got fed up with my family's noncommittal attitude. I went ahead and bought a ham and kielbassi and baked the paska and nut rolls out of frustration (if the majority of the food was there, there was little "work" for them to complain about). This year, I don't know. It's been a shitty school year, a shitty year so far, and a really shitty month. A spiritual holiday might under other circumstances be a nice opportunity for reflection and all that good stuff. But I'm just not feeling it. I'm too irritated with the Church as an institution to use it as a place of reflection, too frustrated with the parade of bullshit that has characterized my life since last August, too worried about my bad eye's seeming inability to focus at the present time.  I'm just not feeling Easter-y or church-y or holiday-y or celebratory-y, you know?  It's kind of pathetic.  Easter was usually one of my favorite holidays.