There's a human in your heart of hearts;
hiding through colors made you fall apart.
In the middle you're a work of art,
but this is real life
real life

- Oh Wonder, Dazzle

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"What do you want for Christmas?"
-- "OMG COLGATE"
"What?  No, that's lame.  What do you actually want for Christmas?"

dammit i love colgate

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“Today is a fan-fuckin’-tastic day.”

This has been my daily mantra for maybe the last two or three weeks, but really, who’s counting? You could tell me it’s been two weeks, you could tell me it’s been months, and I would just shrug and nod with an apathetic, “Yeah, sounds about right.” The days are starting to blur together – I spent much of today muttering, “It’s December 15th?! When did it become December 15th?!”

When I was in college, my friend, Morrell, would sigh at the start of every school day, “Same shit, different day.” I thought it was just the most abysmal attitude to have at the top of the morning. What kind of mentality is that?! That’s no sort of pep talk! I wanted to yowl, “SIEZE THE DAY, BETCH! SIEZE IT!!!!!!”

Today, I kind of get it.

I sat in my desk chair, sipping on a cup of tea. The sunlight was barely peeking through the blinds. My co-worker, Cody, studied for his upcoming final exams at the desk next to me.

With neither small-talk nor segue, I sighed, “Cody, I think I’m starting to burn out.”

He maintained his gaze on his laptop monitor, and he sighed back, “You and me both, Christa.”

If there were ever a moment that I could describe a person as having “brooding shoulders,” Cody epitomized it. I couldn’t help but take a mental snapshot of our mutual stress, our mutual flickering filaments. We were light bulbs hanging from a thin wire.

Not to revel in his pain, but I have to admit, the solidarity helped.

Today is an incredible day in its own right – today was my first 8-hour workday since… god, I can’t even remember. I normally work an 8-hour workday – scheduled to show up at 8 a.m. and leave at 5 p.m. I was good on that for a long time, give or take an hour. I never minded staying an extra hour or so to get my work done. These past few weeks (or months? Whatever, who’s counting) have been a different story, and I’ve been putting in an average 11 or 12 hours a day.

To put it succinctly – as lab manager, I used to be really excited when I got assigned to my first project. I’m now on four (five?), and it can seriously kiss my ass like no one’s business. I’m on two pre-clinical drug studies, a pain study, and a fluorescent probe study. Probably some other buttface project that I can’t remember right now.  Whatever.

Although to be honest, if I were to spell it out for you, it would actually sound kind of exciting. I’m collaborating with a Nobel laureate, and I get to help produce drugs that have serious potential to help a lot of arthritis patients in the future. My work is a necessary step in the pipeline to get these drugs into hospitals and, within as soon as five years, help real patients fighting rheumatoid arthritis. Honestly, some of the results we’ve been yielding have been incredible and exciting, and I feel very truly like we’re making considerable strides in the clinical understanding and treatment of rheumatoid arthritis.

That being said, my projects can still kiss my ass like no one’s business.

I’m used to being assigned to one major project, maybe two, but being on this many has been incredibly draining, both mentally and physically. Two of my projects are hitting their crux at the same time, and are both demanding my full dedication – but good god, there’s only so much Christa to go around!

I usually leave work way after any reasonable dinner time, frantically get something to eat, and then pass out from exhaustion. Lately, I’ve slept more days in my work clothes than I have in my pajamas. I’ll have some fantastic ambition to not even do much, just to lie in bed and watch a few episodes of South Park, maybe blog over a beer. Even then, exhaustion will take over and I’ll instead pass out in bed, only to wake up just in time for work, to start the game all over again.

Today, however, it is 6:48 p.m. as of the writing of this sentence, and I am not at work. It’s a fucking miracle.

I’ve been sick, I’ve been overworked, I’ve gotten rejected, I’m behind on everything, but I don’t even give a shit. It’s 6:48 p.m. and I’m not at work.

I left my lab, breathed in the cool San Diego air, and nodded, “It’s a fan-fuckin’-tastic day.” And I meant the shit out of it.

I’ll take it.

Today, my friends….

today was a win!

One good girl
is worth a thousand bitches.

- Kanye West, Bound 2

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"If something's important to you, it doesn't matter whether you have time.  If you really care about something, you'll make time."

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As you may have noticed, this is my first time writing since September.

I'll tell you all the excuses I have, but point is, I haven't been here since September for pretty much negligible, half-cocked reasons.

The writing stopped, but life didn't.  There's a lot of highs and lows that you missed -- a lot of fun moments and a lot of drama.  I think that's one of the reasons that I didn't want to blog.  I convoluted my blog with so much melodrama and sensationalized commentary that you wouldn't blink at the thought of me writing for Grey's Anatomy.  I felt like I dug myself into an emotional hole of a blog -- not only did it get me stuck in a certain style and topic for my blog posts, but reading over my old blogs would just make me go, "Oh, boo hoo, poor baby."

But enough of that.  I know, I know, write whatever I want to write about, it's my blog, blog like no one's reading.  I know the gig but nobody's perfect, right?

Anyway, I digress.  Let's get to the real business.

I could tell you about Washington, D.C., I could tell you about my love life, my work life, my museum life, but I know what everyone's really eager for...

PRODUCT REVIEWS.

Today, I was shopping for Christmas presents, when a thought suddenly struck me: "I should buy twist balloons to make balloon animals."

For some reason beyond me, the fact that I used to make balloon animals has been coming up in conversation lately more frequently than I'd expect (note: the first time i mentioned it was already 1 time too frequently).

When I was a freshman in college, I went through a brief but enthusiastic phase during which I taught myself and practiced making balloon animals.  Mind you, I didn't get very far.  As I explain to people, I knew how to make a balloon dog, a balloon giraffe (which is essentially a dog with a long neck), and a balloon sword (which is essentially if you only make half of a dog and stop there).  A highlight of my phase is that once, I visited Phuc at UC Davis, and sat in on one of his lectures.  I happened to have my balloon animal materials with me (because why the fuck not?), and when Phuc discovered that I did, he started asking his classmates if they wanted balloon animals -- "You can either get a dog, giraffe, or a sword."  By the time lecture started, there was a small cluster of students in the middle of the lecture hall with various balloon creations.  (Not only was that moment the highlight of my balloon-shaping career, but it's now one of the few anecdotes that made the highlight reel of my entire relationship with Phuc.)

Then, one day, I decided to diverge from my trifecta of dogs/giraffes/swords and learn how to make other balloon creations.  When I learned how to make a swan, I left the little blue swan out in the living room of my dorm.  A mix of amateur technique and Merced heat made my swan lose its initial shape, and a friend of my roommate told us that "it looked like we had a balloon penis in the dorm."  My self-esteem was still severely fragile at the time, so I was so embarrassed that I not only destroyed my balloon swan, but I threw away my balloon-making materials and never made a balloon animal again.  If that same situation happened now, I probably would've giggled and told him that it was indeed a balloon penis, and that it was commissioned by his mom because it was the only thing that could adequately fill her enormous vagina.

Whenever I mention my short-lived balloon animal phase, people always double-take, "So you've never made a balloon animal since then?!" and I would nod.  Sometimes they would ask, "Wow, you were traumatized that badly?" and I would think about it and reply, "Hm, I suppose not, I just never thought about getting back into it.  It's just been so long that it's not on my radar anymore."

Today, that changed.  I had mentioned the balloon animal story so much lately, that when I was walking around the store and saw the sign that said "TOYS," I thought, '...dear god, i wonder if they sell a balloon animal kit?'

Spoiler alert: the answer was yes.  I bought it in a heartbeat, hoping that people would think it was a Christmas gift, but no actually yeah I'm srsly really just waiting in line so I can buy a balloon twisting kit for myself and nothing else.

I had all these great plans to go grocery shopping, to go to the driving range and hit a couple of balls, but as I ran to my car with my balloon twisting kit in hand, I dropped EVERYTHING and rushed home so I could practice making balloon animals.  I know, I have heightened acuity for good priorities.

As I slipped my first balloon onto the balloon pump, the lip of my first balloon tore and I didn't think much of it.  I probably just suck, right?  Then, as I inflated a second balloon and began to twist, that balloon broke.  Alright, so this is starting to suck.  I think it's not just me.  You're supposed to leave a 1/2 inch of balloon uninflated for every twist you're going to make, and either I had to leave a LOT of give for the balloons to not pop, or they would just kamikaze and pop anyway in all defiance of logic and physics.

I flew through maybe a dozen balloons, and only managed to create three creations without popping the balloon halfway.

So I pretty much want to punch the manufacturer of these balloons in the face.  This kit is the kit that you get when you want to troll someone because you really want to discourage them from getting into making balloon animals, and their subsequent failure rate will demotivate them so thoroughly that they'll start having nightmares and lose all enthusiasm for life.  As for me, I want to take a balloon swan, and send it to the manufacturer with a note that says, "This is for your mom's enormous vagina."  But I can't because it'll probably pop as I try to put it in a shipping box anyway.

This product is so terribly fragile that my roommate came home and thought I was murdering a man with a gun from the sound of shots firing off in my room.  It might be vaguely sufficient for practicing new balloon animals (with persistence and patience for a high fragility rate, but I did admittedly manage a 25% success rate), but don't use it for actual "performances" unless you're okay with making a lot of people deaf and angry from the balloons popping everywhere.

I just pray to the good lord almighty that whoever made these balloons never considers going into condom manufacturing, or else our overpopulation problem is going to get a hell of a lot more severe.

Just know that you'll soon see me walking the aisles of Party City or a similar bona fide party supply store, buying twist balloons that, this time, hopefully weren't produced by Satan and his brethren.