Random clips from my day:

"This looks... hrm. It doesn't really look specific at all...I've never seen anything like this" - Veronica, on the staining of my in situs. Also why I virtually get to take today and tomorrow 'off', since I can't begin another protocol until I finish the other protocol (wednesday and thursday) and see what results it gives. All I can do is culture bacteria and miniprep, then prepare a sequencing reaction - and there's plenty of down time there for reading and errands.

Reading Emma in a nice, air-conditioned Starbucks lounge instead of writing my SURF report... -sheepish look- Hooray for Jane Austen! I'd like to see that movie again, once I finish the book. And I'd like to find the book Sense and Sensibility sometime soon... need to check the library.

An elderly gentleman commenting on my analog Timex watch while I was reading in Starbucks - he had the same one. Funny, that. Then again, analog will always be superior to digital (as long as we aren't talking about alarm clocks, that is). ;)

Discovering that Julia Seltz won't be teaching lessons regularly anymore.
:( TES just lost one of its most inspirational instructors; she's one of the reasons this summer was so awesome. At least Davee Hallinan's still around for Wednesday nights...

Our new Monday night instructor, Kandice, giving us the leg torture workout of the summer. "Post at the walk without stirrups... sitting trot without stirrups... post at the trot without stirrups... stop, reach down and touch your toe *without* having your feet move... again... back to post at walk without stirrups...(20 minutes go by)... Ok, NOW pick up your stirrups and post" Oh, I'm gonna feel that tomorrow.

Causing someone to respond to a pun in my away message :) Because it's been a few days since the last one. Yup, no matter how narrow-minded and opposed to the humanities a biologist is, you can't say he's ignorant of culture. ;)

"Like soap in an oil spill" - Elaine, referring to herself coming back to tech. At first this puzzled me - then she explained that she'd seen this Mr. Wizard episode where he had a bowl of water with a slick of oil on top. When the soap was placed in the water/oil mixture, the oil immediately zoomed out to the edges of the bowl, as far from the soap as possible. In this case, it was anyone and everyone immediately leaving right after Elaine got back from Cambridge, Massachusetts. Awww...

Speaking of which, Jeff Blackburne just left. :( Vatican's losing all its inhabitants! Noooo...

And to top it all off, getting Mike D's extra key. I now have an Ath spot! I don't have to walk more than 100 feet to my truck! Hooray! -grins-

And now, I'm going to go practice flute. For a day that began poorly with the in situ problems, today hasn't been half bad. =^) Night all.
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Almost forgot: Seeing the fire glimmering along the mountain ridge while riding in Burbank... so much smoke. And it looks awfully close to the Equestrian Center... it's a little worrisome.

Night falls
Silhouettes of the mountains fade to dusky sky
Selene's crown, a thin sliver of moon, rises
Not a pure silver, but a smoky harvest-orange
Mirrored across the valley by glimmering, malevolent reds