WE ARE Penn State

I have a confession to make.  I went to Penn State.  Until last week, this was a positive thing.  I have been very surprised by the benefits I receive due to my Penn State degree.  I got my first job from a former Penn Stater and I now talk to many employers who say they specifically seek Penn State grads in my field.  (I can't speak for other fields, but the engineering program at Penn State is pretty well respected.)  As such, many potential clients and competitors are former Penn Staters, and the most common reactions I get when asked about my alma mater are "Oh, I went there too!", and "Oh, my cousin's nephew's best friend went there, do you know him?"  (By the way, I do not.)

This week, the reactions have been more along the lines of, "Oh, I'm sorry."  As if I had something to do with the terrible news headlines of late.  I even considered not replacing my Penn State magnets on the back of my car after I finished washing it today.  So then I thought, how can I turn this around?  I have no say in whether Penn State decides to donate their ticket sales this week to a charity (though I like the idea).  I have no say in whether the head coach deserves the blame for not doing more.  Do the citizens of Germany during the 1940's deserve blame for the horrors of the concentration camps?  I think there could be debate for either side, but generally, I say they do not deserve the blame, but they should take responsibility for the solution.

This is why I decided to look up a local charity that helps abused children, their parents, and even the abusers.  I made a donation "from a Penn State Alum".  It is not much, but maybe if everyone does just one positive thing, we can rise above the actions of one jackass and become the erudite members of society we think WE ARE.

And for good measure, I finally decided to post my version of the "Where I'm From Poem" which I revised to reflect my experience at Penn State.  (Post your own or add to the comments.  The template can be found here.)

WE ARE…

WE ARE from extra long twin sheets, from Chicken Cosmos and Milwakee’s “Beast” Ice. 

WE ARE from the East Halls parking lot (icy, barren, it seemed it would take a lifetime to cross it on a cold winter morning). 

WE ARE from Mount Nittany, the unhiked state park trails and cornfields surrounding campus.

WE ARE from teapot renditions and dishroom towels, from Louass and Bagg and Boob. 

WE ARE from the work study programs and Caps Tournaments. 

From “when we grow up we’ll go to Penn State” and “that’s where dad wrote his initials in front of Patee Library.” 

WE ARE from “We know god is a Penn State fan because the sky is Blue and White” and using the church next to Beekman’s bagels to point us in the direction of campus.

WE ARE Pittsburgh or Philly, from strip sandwiches, whoopie pies, “Death by Chocolate” and “Peachy Paterno”.

From the stolen block of cheese, and did we mention it was five pounds?, and the racing of the keg across town to Suzanne’s place. 

WE ARE from Brodie’s old photo albums, so young, so thin, not knowing we’d remember the days till we’re 40.

WE ARE.....PENN STATE!

 

No matter how hard I scrubbed, I just couldn't get the spots from those magnets to blend in, so I'm putting them back on.  A testament to the rarity of a car wash?  Shut up, Constant Reader, I'm trying to make a point.

Paranormal Nuerosis

A few weeks ago, we flicked through the choices of movies on the Netflix stream and came across "Paranormal Activity".  Adam had seen it and said it was good, and I astutely noted that "Paranormal Activity 3" is out, so it must have been decent.  (Any sane person, of course, is thinking of "Halloween 14" or whatever they are up to now and realizing the flaw in my logic.  The "Sequel Theory" most definitely does not apply to horror films.)

However, I was in the mood for a mystery, and so we watched the movie.  It is one of those "Blair Witch" or "Cloverfield" types that are filmed as if they are everyday folks with their home videos, and the actors use their real names.  It was pretty good.  Believable, but extraordinary.

It's about a girl who has been haunted by a demon, off and on, for most of her life.  The demon had not shown itself since she was a pre-teen, but had recently returned now that she was an adult, and she was not going to take it anymore.  So she and her fiancee start trying to document the issue.  Let's just say, it does not end well.

I didn't think much of it at the time, but, well, the movie has apparently freaked me out.  You see, it starts as just some bumps and thuds in the night and a door that creaks as it moves by itself.  It only gets worse progressively. 

The other night, the furnace kicked on and made a racket as the baseboards tinked and clinked, and then the cat wedged herself through the slightly open creaky basement door and I nearly had a heart attack.  I tried to laugh at myself as I got up and very quickly shut the door on the dark and noisy furnacey basement with the potential demon lurking in the shadows.

And it has been happening ever since.  I inadvertently brought back a fear of the basement, which I thought I licked in high school.  Different basement, same scary darkness.


Next time, we're watching "Tangled".

Quick Question

Is there a way to tactfully tell a co-worker that his weekly project meeting interferes with your morning poop?  Just wondering...

Queueless

I swear, Netflix is messing with me.  I just went to "My Queue" because it sent us a movie that I wanted to see, but is available for download at any time through the streaming option.  Basically it sent me something I already had for months, and still hadn't bothered to watch.  The thing it sent me before that would have been more at home on my sister's queue.  It was some romantic comedy starring Christina Applegate, and the only possible reason I could conger up for its presence in my home was that I liked "Married With Children" when I was younger.  I have been known to watch a romantic comedy here and there, but generally it is when my mom or sister has some control over the remote control, and I do not recall ever adding it to my queue.

And no, I don't think Sis got on there and rearranged my selections.  I don't even know the password half the time and when I do get through the tight security, I tend to have trouble accessing the Netflix site.

These last two movies were returned after several days of sitting on the counter in limbo.

So I just checked out my queue and there is not a single movie on there that I would like to watch.  I do remember putting these horrible choices on there, and continually moving them to the bottom.  Worse, I cannot think of a recent movie I would like to see.  I am sure there are things out there that I would enjoy. 

I went to the "Suggetions For You" section where, I kid you not, the top choices for me are a cartoon about a boy and his magical dog, a comedy special called "Talking Monkeys in Space", and a Nickelodeon TV show aimed at pre-teenage boys in the mid-nineties.  I am seriously considering the magic dog, and a nature video about Cuttlefish.  You know,  the octopi?  Come on people, cuttlefish!

I don't know.  I did really like "The Adventures of Scott Pilgrim".  Maybe I am a cuttlefish kinda gal.

Me Replacement

OK, I have been watching The Cool TV for hours and apparently it is a channel watched by many many balding men.  The "hair replacement" commercial has been on so many times, I just might be tempted to call.  Why?  You may ask?  Well, my hair follicles seem to be in tact, but:  I have noticed that the hair replacement tends to be supplemented by weight loss, nose jobs, and changes in eye color.  One man in the commercial, and I quote:  "After my hair replacement surgery, I felt like a different person."

Go figure.

Cider House Blues

My apologies, Constant Reader(s).  I had the next topic all thought up - as you probably guessed, a continuation of my ever more desperate attempts to reconcile my inconclusive sleep disorder - but I got writers block again.  So, the sleep story will have to wait until it is ready to be told.  I, apparently, am not in control.

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Last Thursday, I sat at my desk running calculations on a concrete beam, trying to decide how to support an existing structure while this beam is removed and replaced.  Truly, I was deep into it, really focused on my work.  Or not.

Suddenly, I realized.  I forgot the cider that my Dad had brought last Saturday.  This, I surmised, was the explanation for the slightly sweet and slightly sour smell that currently emanated from the interior of my vehicle.  Bummer.

I immediately emailed my Dad to tell him.  Perhaps he would buy more cider and drive two hours to deliver it.  Perhaps we would work out an elaborate Cider Scheme, for I cannot go an entire Fall without this cider.  He gets it from his neighbors, who press the apples, add nothing to them, and put the results in gallon jugs at the end of their driveway.  This is not grocery store cider.  Oh lament, and alas!  Surely, he would be as distraught as I was!

"Bummer," he writes back.  Yeah.
That's what I thought.

I learned some little known facts this week:

Fact #1.  We all know that fermenting cider turns to vinegar.  But, do most of you know that fermenting cider that is alternately heated during the day, then cooled down at night, in a thin plastic jug, will produce enough gas to break the jug?

Fact #2.  We all know that one can attract more flies with honey than with vinegar.  But, it turns out one can attract plenty of flies with vinegar.  As I emptied the now half empty jug, a swarm of fruit flies was disturbed from its breeding ground.  It was at that point that I officially decided the cider was probably better not to drink.

Fact #3.  Breathing in a combination of vinegar and fruit flies is surprisingly less unpleasant than breathing in the smell of the decaying squirrel that got caught under my tire a few years back.

Fact #4.  The smell of decaying squirrel pretty much goes away when said squirrel is hosed out.  The smell of vinegar lingers for much longer.

Fact #5.  The results are inconclusive on the effects of flea and tick shampoo on fruit flies.  I think I eradicated more of them by driving around with all four windows open.

Fact #6.  The smell of vinegar, wafting through the air via open car windows, attracts bees.  Bee #1 will come for an extensive search to find the source of the smell, and finding nothing but a timid human swatting carefully at it with an ice scraper, it will send for a second Bee to aid in the search.


I hate bees.

And I will now have to make a special trip to Pennsylvania, just to get my Cider Fix.

Bummer.

Sleep Study

I have posted a few times about how I wake up a lot at night, which makes me sleepy during the day.  Some days, it is all I can do to get in the door and collapse in my bed when I get home.  I feel like I am missing out on my life, because literally, all I do is work and sleep.

I tried a sleep study to determine what the trouble was.  This was before I was blogging, so I will relate this story here:

I arrived at the appointed location at the appointed time, 9 PM, with pillow in hand.  The website indicated the experience would be similar to a hotel, and I  would be able to watch TV or read until I drifted off, so I had also brought a book.  Several other people lined the hallway with their pillows.

The place was locked.

We waited in the hall, not speaking much, until a technician finally arrived, out of breath and with keys jingling as he ran.  He let us into a waiting room, which, indeed, had a TV.  He went to the reception area and fumbled through papers while we nervously chose seats.  No one turned on the TV.

The technician called a name, and the very large woman across from me spoke up.  He asked her, across the rooms, why she was there.  She looked around and then reluctantly announced that she was there to check for sleep apnea.  (By the way, this is why all the people, except me, were there.  And luckily, I was the last patient to be called, so I did not have to tell everyone and his brother my reason for seeing a doctor.)  I still refused to talk across the room like that and just got up to talk to the guy.  I was there for the night, but also into the day, to check for narcolepsy.  Apparently, his shift would end at 7am, and the lab would be closed again until 9am.  So there was an issue.  Great.

I was the last one called but the first one to be prepped.  They attached about 20 little doo-dads that would monitor my heart rate, breathing rate, brain waves, and a number of other things.  He asked how I normally like to sleep.  I told him I usually fall asleep on my side in a fetal position.

"Well, not tonight, you're not," he said.  "We need patients to sleep on their backs, and not move too much."

He then told me I was all set and I should just call out if I needed anything, because they have an intercom system and a camera in the room.  I asked if I could read my book (no TV in the room), and he said I could for a short bit while he prepped another patient.  Not exactly the "hotel" atmosphere advertised.

I carefully laid on the cheapo mattress with the scratchy sheets and thin quilt which was provided.  I began reading my book, a novel by Stephen King.  The technician left and began talking to the gentleman next door.  He was thin, but a heavy smoker, and, of course, was there to check for sleep apnea.  I heard every word they were saying through the thin walls.

The man next door was complete, and there was relative silence.  Another technician had arrived and prepped the other two people. I was still nervous, trying not to move, and reading my book because I was not sleepy.  Suddenly, the room filled with the booming voice of the technician who asked me to stop reading and turn out the lights.

Obediently, I clicked the light and tried to sleep.  Outside the room, I heard the technicians arguing about who would stay with me until the day shift got in.  They both had obligations after work, and so they called a supervisor.  Apparently, one of them would need to re-arrange a schedule, because they continued to argue.  My pinky finger, which had a sensor clipped to the end like a clothespin, was beginning to throb.  I was afraid to move, and I did not like the idea of calling out to the empty room.  I listened to the sounds of snoring, coming from the room next door.  Faintly, I could hear snores down the hall as well.

I laid in  silence, trying to sleep.  My pinky hurt.  I couldn't move.  The snoring was louder.  My pinky hurt.  Sleep! I tried to will myself.  I wondered what time it was.  My pinky hurt.  The technician was getting a soda from the machine.  I couldn't move.

At one point, boomy voice popped into the room, asking if I needed something.  I told him about the pinky, and he came in to adjust the sensor, scolding me for not speaking up.  He closed the door and I listened to the snoring some more.  Sleep!  (but don't move.) Sleep, goddammmit!  (but stay on your back.)  I wondered again how much time was left.

Eventually, I did fall asleep for about 2 hours.  The technician came in at 5am to "wake" me, and remove the sensors.  He said that since I couldn't sleep, there was no way I had narcolepsy, so I could go home. 

"Now?"  I said.  "I wasn't supposed to be picked up until noon.  I didn't bring my car because I am too cheap to pay for parking for that long."  

"Well, we don't need to see you for the day study."

Ring, ring, ring, ring, ring, ring, ring, and a very sleepy: "Hello?"

"Hi, honey!"  I cheerily said.  "Can you come pick me up?"

I got home and collapsed into bed, even though I had goo in my hair from some of the doo-dads.  I was exhausted after my sleep study, which came back inconclusive due to lack of sleep.