Today I had an appointment set up for my two cats at the low cost spay/neuter/vaccination clinic to get some essential vaccines and to get them fixed. I took them there and Bickle--the poor cat--shat in the carrier because he is not used to that at all.

Despite his accident, Bickle passed his pre-op checkup, so I have to pick him up this evening. Snugglebum, however, did not pass his checkup. The vet tech who brought him back out said that he had some unusual lung noises and that I had to take him to the vet to try to get that sorted out.

So I called the vet a few minutes ago and set up an appointment for tomorrow for Snugglebum. $54, that will cost me. But I want these cats healthy so I guess I'll have to pay for it. And when Snugglebum is all better, I have to repeat this whole lengthy process all over again.

I wonder if he'll willingly go into the carrier ever again...

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Living on the equator would be so much simpler because when the sun rises, you know it's 6:00 am, and when it sets, you know it's 6:00 pm. It bothers me to hell that the sun is still up and trying to trick my brain into thinking that there's a lot of time left to do my work before bedtime when in reality, there really isn't. It's just the cruel tilt in the axis of the Earth teasing you with sunlight.

It was also hot today, which made sitting at this desk in a leather chair a very sticky experience.

Fuck this warm weather. If we could tone it down to "average", I'd be fine with that.

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Be it extremely emotional, controversial, messed up, or whatever, this entry has been password protected.

If you know it, enter it; or, ask me for it.

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WARNING: Long, arguably pointless entry ahead.

Aren't weekends supposed to be for resting?

On Saturday morning, on a whim, I decided to empty out my closet and begin paring down my assortment of clothing. I have had enough of the bottoms of my drawers dislodging from the volume of clothes I attempt to stuff into each one. Somehow I always end up with not enough space to store everything anyway. It's not like I actually wear every piece of clothing, either. I've just grown accustomed to having them; some of these things I've had since high school.

I systematically and unceremoniously dumped the contents of each dresser drawer--and of the closet as a whole--onto the floor of my room into two giant piles. By the time I was done doing the rough sort, there was barely enough room to walk through, despite my efforts to maintain a tiny pass between the mountains. I probably would have failed as a pioneer, although to be fair, landslides were not an uncommon occurrence.

Midway through folding the unwanted clothes and putting them into a box, my dad enlisted my help in loading cargo boxes into the car to ship to the Philippines. On the way to the drop-off point, we bought a bright green umbrella from Kohl's for the patio set in the backyard (it looks stunning set against the green of the trees!). We also stopped by my grandfather's house to pick up what I was led to believe was "a few plants" that he had dug up from the backyard to give to us. I guess estimation is not one of my family's fortes, because it took us a good half hour to relocated all the plants into the back of the SUV. We even didn't have space for my deceased grandmother's nearly 40-year-old long-stem rose bushes (which we definitely will have to return for later), although somehow we managed to dig up and cram a few 8-foot-tall bamboos into the car length-wise. The ride home was interesting.

Of course, what goes in must come out, so we spent another half hour moving all the plants around again. By this time, it was getting late, and I hadn't yet purchased my baking supplies. On Sunday, my friend held a fundraiser for her dad who's running for the county board of supervisors, and she had asked me to bake something for a bake sale. I bought everything I needed and started preparing to bake around 10:30. I wasn't completely done until around midnight. I fell asleep on the couch waiting for the hazelnut brownies to cool down. I woke up at 3:00 in the morning to cut the brownies to size and to clean up after myself, which was a soul-crushing experience. There is nothing more depressing than waking up at 3:00 am and seeing a pile of chocolate-covered bowls and saucepans and miscellaneous utensils staring you in the face.

I eventually made it back to my room, where I tripped several times on the way to the bed. I slept for only a few hours before waking up to take care of Sunday stuff, which included cooking breakfast, picking up my cousin's car from his apartment while he's on a trip, and quickly doing some homework. I also managed to stuff more things into boxes, but the task is still far from over and as I type, clothes and other odds and ends are still strewn across the floor.

At around 1:00 this afternoon, I dropped off the baked goods at the fundraiser and stayed to catch up with my friends and help out a little bit. I ended up staying for around six hours, most of which I spent standing which is a hard thing to do when your back, legs, and feet hurt like hell. I don't think it's any surprise that, when I got home, I plopped down on my bed and passed out. I promised myself that it would only be a short nap, and that I'd get up and finish the spring cleaning that I already started, but I completely broke that promise. It will have to wait until probably this evening, although I will be at school/work from 8:00 am-7:00 pm tomorrow, which means I won't get home until 7:30ish. I think it would be safer to say that everything won't be picked up off the floor and organized into my closet/dresser until at LEAST Tuesday night. That's a lot of tripping and slipping and--my least favorite part--falling to look forward to. As for now...

...back to sleep.

OH. Update on my kitty. I called the vet and told her what I thought happened. I visually confirmed it as a bite and she didn't feel it was completely necessary to bring him in, so rather than spend the money for the vet visit, I'm just saving up for more vaccines and licensing. Because apparently, you have to license any cat or dog over the age of four months. Oops. Things I didn't know.

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Today, I picked up one of my cats and pet him while he was lying down on my chest, as per usual. I went to smooth over Snugglebum's tail when all of a sudden he let out a pathetic meow...of pain.

I checked it out and his tail was a little crooked.

I'm not going to lie: I panicked, and then I started to tear up.

Tomorrow, I'm calling the vet (a free phone consultation) about whether or not to bring Snugglebum in.

If I freak out this much--i.e. if I have THIS much of an emotional investment in a fucking CAT--then there is NO way I will be able to function with a child.

Plus, children are more expensive than cats and MUCH needier. I can't live like that.

Lesson for me: just say no to kids.

P.S. I checked around online (because that's what I do when I freak out) and now it doesn't seem like such a big deal. He probably got bitten by his brother or something. But still--I'm calling just in case.


This picture was taken a few months ago. Snugglebum's the one on top; on the bottom is Bickle.

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The crest of the wave of happiness has long crashed upon the shores of uncertainty. While I am fairly confident I will end up going to SDSU for graduate school (I would be stupid to turn down a spot at the #1 small research university in the US with a nationally-ranked cell/molecular biology graduate program), I now have to deal with the actual logistics of the move. Where would I live? When do I need to move in by? How much would I need to take out in student loans to cover two, maybe three years of education? What would my yearly budget look like? How will I cover all these expenses if I'm working towards that degree full-time?

Thoughts like that make my head hurt.

But I have to keep telling myself that no matter how much it sucks to go through all of this crap, in the long run, it will be worth it. When my other friends are off making money and saving for retirement, and I'm still living in an underfurnished 400 square foot studio apartment two blocks away from campus, it won't seem that way. But I have to keep my mind set on the ultimate goal of completing a graduate education:

Intellectual satisfaction. Scientific advancement. Whoring myself out to biopharma and making my money through employment in a sometimes ethically-questionable industry, and then possibly fleeing to the ivy-covered halls of Academia as soon as my loans are paid off and I have my one year of frivolous fun jetsetting around the world.

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I GOT INTO THE M.S. CELL/MOLECULAR BIOLOGY AND MICROBIOLOGY PROGRAM AT SAN DIEGO STATE UNIVERSITY!

Suck it, self-doubt!

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