It just felt wrong to be interviewing for a second lab without telling my first lab, so I talked to my boss about it yesterday.

The first lab understands that they just can't give me the commitment I need (I still don't know if I'll be employed in January), and that some of my needs aren't being met (it's a really lonely job), so they don't mind if I start seeing another lab.

The second lab understands the nature of my relationship with the first lab, but still wants to talk to them about it before committing. They know that I am very interested in them for unique reasons, and they share my affections. It's a different sort of situation for them; they're not used to wanting to hire RAs who are already.. involved.

I just emailed my first lab telling them that the second lab wants to talk to them, and reassuring them that I really value my involvement with the lab, and I'm not trying to replace them.

I promised both labs to make it work through careful time management, and shared my gmail calender with the first lab to demonstrate.

I'm thinking I'll send them both flowers to help smooth things over.

Sometimes I forget to laugh, and then I re-find these things on random
pagan websites (no credit because I lost the link years ago, but still
have the passage):

I dreamed that I was walking down the beach with the Goddess. And I
looked back and saw footprints in the sand.

But sometimes there were two pairs of footprints, and sometimes there
was only one. And the times when there was only one pair of
footprints, those were my times of greatest trouble.

So I asked the Goddess, "Why, in my greatest need, did you abandon me?"

She replied, "I never left you. Those were the times when we both
hopped on one foot."

Today, in this order, the following things happened:

I woke up with a sore throat
I stepped on my cat while getting out of bed
I began experiencing extreme cramps
I ripped my favorite sweater
I realized I'm out of clean underwear
And shirts
And socks
My knees started aching from the weather
My umbrella bit me
Then it broke on the way to the bus
I arrived at work to an empty office
Then the computer I was on exploded with viruses
Viruses that open porn at amazingly fast rates
I disconnected it and called IT

At that point, I decided the day was going so badly that it was
comical, and started laughing. I guess I'm feeling better now.

I am so distressed to find that my beloved Orville 100 calorie popcorn
packs are full of palm oil. I was already excusing the fact that
they're wrapped in plastic because they are also delicious and handy,
but I cannot forgive them for being environmentally unfriendly in two
ways.

First Cliff Power Bars, now this... Why do all good things in life
have palm oil?

The first one is about nobody in particular, I just wrote it. The second one is about somebody in particular.

- I wish we were organic -
I found God in an orange today
neatly divided into eight
juicy segments.
Pith so thin that
those sweet drippings overwhelmed
the bitterness, creeping in
the wormholes nature left.
I found Us in an orange today
but the pesticides had
ruined it and
we were dry
and bitter
and not very pleasant
to eat.

- Swinging on the branches of that memory -
We were clothed apes on that
chain-link fence
The cars zipped by and
your body leaned
heavy
on mine, reaching
for those tender
fruits.
You fed me a mulberry from
your stained fingers;
This moment
is miles away
from civilization.

Desire to be lazy + sadness about moving out of this house that I love = one day of packing work extended over a week and a half.



In good news, I am employed. :D

Please note, this image is taken from a journal published by the American Chemical Society.



http://pubs.acs.org/doi/abs/10.1021/nl901380u

I ache as I remember
your kisses, planted
firmly against my lips.
Those ethereal memories
are sand in
my hands;
No more real or
less perfect
than myth.

In Pearl this weekend, I did a tarot spread about change: what I need to release to allow change to happen, what will be changing, how I'll feel about the change, what I should nurture for more stability, etc etc.

At the center of the spread was "What remains unchanged." I did this spread with two decks: My familiar and happy Fae Oracle deck, and a borrowed traditional tarot deck. And in both, that center card was a trickster- Wheel of Fortune on the traditional tarot, Hobgob (a trickster fey) in the oracles. Both of these cards indicate change and general disorder.

I don't know how to feel about this. My unchanged pillar of stability is the fact that everything in it is changing constantly? Hmmmm..... A paradox, to be sure.

I had to put more weight on my dumbells today, and I'm up to 15lbs!

I'm bringing Beefcake back, baby! 25 lbs by the end of the summer or BUST.

I am on a huge sustainability kick right now. I'm not sure what triggered this, but I'm clustering away supplies for my indoor compost bin, whispering promises of fresh soil to my plants, quitting dying my hair because it's unfriendly to the environment, and organizing sustainability events in the area (the initial contact has been made = I am now beginning to crank the organizing gears, whooooo!).

While a piece of me feels a little like a fraud, as I am not very sustainable (although, I am car-free and mostly eat local..), I realize that my strength as an activist lies in my comfort with organizing and teaching. I lecture for two upper level psych courses every year, dispelling myths and challenging people's truths. I'm comfortable saying hard things to hear. I'm happy organizing. I love to teach. I'm learning how to use my voice, and it's a beautiful thing.. and I think raising awareness can be potent and vital in changing things.

In other activist news, I am reviving my Male Survivor Awareness for Healthcare Professionals project, which went in to hibernation during last semester. :)

I'm having a struggle between Spirituality and Self Care right now. A week ago, I had a sudden inspiration that what I really, really need to do is watch the sun rise in the mornings, and start my day in mindful meditation and prayer.

I also am realizing that so much travel is EXHAUSTING, and I really should sleep as much as my body wants to right now, so I can recuperate while I have the chance.

I don't know how to balance the needs of the Body with the needs of the Soul, though right now the body is winning through brute force.

July 10th - July 12th: Pearl Intensive in Detroit
July 19th - July 22ed: Visit Chicago loves
July 22ed - July 24th: Visit Daddy in Indianapolis
July 25th: High school best friend's wedding
July 26th: serpent_dreamer's birthday
July 27th - July 31st: Visit Hekate et al in Seattle
July 31st - August 7th: FAWC- Activist Camp Time!
August 8th - August 10th: Visit Hekate et al some more
August 14th: Move out of house

+ GREs
+ Grad school apps
+ The Best Summer Of My Life

Today, I found my old good luck pants from high school. I covered them in poems, small phrases, pictures, drawings by loved ones, snarky comments, runes, and things I had witnessed or experienced. I credit several good fortunes to them, and would save them for when I needed their luck- like on dates. Following, some writings from the pants that had meaning to me in my teenage years, and pictures (yes, I still fit in to my high school pants.. go me.)

Risk by William Arthur Ward
To laugh is to risk appearing the fool.
To weep is to risk appearing sentimental.
To reach out to another is to risk involvement.
To expose feelings is to risk exposing your True Self.
To place your ideas, your dreams before the crowd is to risk their loss.
To love is to risk not being loved in return.
To live is to risk dying.
To hope is to risk despair.
To try is to risk failure.

But risks must be taken because the greatest hazard in life is to risk nothing.
The person who risks nothing, does nothing, has nothing, is nothing.
He may avoid suffering and sorrow, but he simply cannot learn, feel, change, grow, love, live.
Chained to his certitudes, he is a slave. He has forfeited freedom.
Only a person who risks is free.

"Clothes make the man. Naked people have little to no influence on society."

A poem by Emerson
This morn I clumbed the misty hill,
And roamed the pastures through;
How danced thy form before my path,
Amid the deep-eyed dew!

When the redbird spread his sable wing,
And showed his side of flame;
When the rosebud ripened to a rose,
In both I read thy name.

"You can't wait for inspiration. You have to go after it with a club.:

Little Jack Horner by Amanda W.
Little Jack Horner
Was put in a corner
and left there to die
with his pie.

Today, I decided to do some spellwork for a witchy friend who is traveling to a rough country. I'm sending him my money belt to borrow, and thought I'd embroider some symbols on to it or something. I also thought, "gee, maybe I can find some prewritten, nice little prayer," as I'm feeling wiped and exhausted and not capable of thinking today.

Oops.

I forgot that "protection spells" are about as prolific and silly as "healing spells" and "love spells" in some parts of the greater pagan community. After 15 minutes of reading about the "powerful" "dark" and "high level" magic, I decided to go back to my roots and do what I normally do: make shit up. On the way to this conclusion, I ran in to some spell that was supposed to... conjure a bunch of dead knights... to protect you. Strange enough as it was (I guess I shouldn't judge, but really? leave the dead alone, people) I was must surprised by the vocab. It was all "I command you" and "I bid you" etc etc. Who commands magical allies? Maybe I'm being a witchy snob here, but I feel like allies should be respected and loved like family members or friends.

I've been dreaming about witch camp and fellow campers lately. I've been struck by a flood of pleasant memories. I smell amber and honey, and I am pleased to note that my life is so full of sweetness. This is a good feeling, and it's motivating me to get back to my daily meditation practice.

Technically, I have time to write a long post.... But I'm accessing the internet from a gaming center, and have a deep, dark desire to play video games. It's hot outside.

Rome, Italy: There were many old things.. We visited the colluseum, ate a lot of delicious, delicious pasta and pizza, visited the pope and the vatican museum, and otherwise kept very busy for a few days. We had a fancy dinner on our last night in town, and went to a place reviewed by our "Let's Go Europe" travel book. Despite being our "fancy", multiple course dinner of the trip, it was still relatively inexpensive- 50EUR total for home made pasta and the most delicious chicken in the world.

Pompeii, Italy: Alex went ahead of Molly and I to Brindisi, due to his pass expiring a few days before ours did. He got to spend the afternoon in Pompeii, while Molly and I spent our time trying to find our hostel. It was mysteriously hidden behind a large metal door in an ally that smelled like fish, but once we entered the tiny door, it was a paradise of clean beds, comfortable common spaces, and clean bathrooms. Pompeii was BEAUTIFUL, we were surprised to find that the ruins did not consist of a few buildings, but an entire preserved city. Original wall paintings and mosaics were still relatively intact, and many preservation efforts had been made to restore the gardens to their original states. The city was beautiful, in an incredibly sad way- such exquisite preservation came at the cost of hundreds of people's lives, who all died in a rather terrifying way. It was ominious, exploring the city with the shadow of Vesuvius right next to us. The next day we went up to Vesuvius, but unfortunately did not have enough time to climb to it's crater.
Our only night in Pompeii, we went to Pizza University for some fresh made, AMAZING pizza. We returned to the hostel with it, noting on our way the hoard of noisy 8 year olds that had rented out a party room next to the hostel for some party. We ate our pizza with beer while watching the Red Wings gamel. Half way through the game, loud clubbinb music started coming from next door. Given that it was 11:00 pm, we assumed that the children had left, and the bar had resorted to it's normal status as a bar- but no, the children were still there, having a dance party. Our room-mates, Jay and Bled, were really cool- despite everyones exhaustion, we stayed up until midnight talking. They took a similar route of travel as we did, and had similar interests and life pursuits. We were ready for a sturdy night's rest, and all fell asleep quickly...... Until at 2AM, I was awakened to the sound of things whizzing through the air and exploding, paired with ominious flashing outside of our window. I quickly came to the conclusion that Pompeii was under attack for some reason, and we were being bombed, and started shaking Molly to wake her up. Paniced, I went to close the window, as the smell of smoke and gunpowder was beginning to get overwhelming.. Only to find that no, we weren't being bombed, some idiot was setting off fireworks on the roof above us. Half an hour later, the noise and light ceased, and two hours later, my adrenaline wore off and I fell back asleep.
The next morning, we found posters of apology at the hostel desk- apparently, the children's party was the one setting off the fireworks, which had not been cleared by the staff. The best part of this story? The childrens party was to celebrate a First Communion! 

Brindisii, Italy: We were only in Brindisii long enough to eat a crappy breakfast of twinkies and a squishy apple (but at least the espresso was good). My highlight of the city was stepping in a huge pile of smelly red mud, which splattered all over my legs, past my knees. I jumped in to a fountain to rinse off, then realized the fountain was full of rotting garbage. I walked urgently and longingly along the coast full of ports, trying to find a way to access the marginally cleaner sea water. I ended up dangling my legs off of a concrete step, holding on to Molly so I didn't fall in to the questionably deep, murky water.

The Boat, Italy -> Greece: To our surprise, our ferry to greece was actually kind of a cruise boat. We had a private cabin with our own shower. The boat had a pool, several lounges, a casino, a few coffee shops, and a fancy eatery. We stayed up late standing out on the deck, looking at the stars, talking aout life, and drinking lemoncello. It was pretty perfect.

Ambelokipi, Athens, Greece: My uncle Kyriakos picked us up at the train station, and we made our way to my cousin Evina's apartment. Aunt Anne had made some delicious stuffed tomatoes and peppers, as well as chicken and okra... mmm! It was really nice to see Evina for a little while :) She and her boyfriend Kosta took us out for souvlaki, the night prior, Kosta took us out to the beach north of Athens. We went to see the Acropolis, and spent some time in Monosteraki, the tourist area.

Evangglistria, Korinthos, Greece: My uncle Kyriakos is such an amazing host! He gave us his house in Evangglistria, a tiny village near Korinthos, to hang out in for the weekend. He came out every morning to take us to the beach. Our first day there, we swam for a while, then had delicious calamari, octopothia (octopus), fishes, and shrimp things for lunch, before taking a nap under the sun. After the beach, we went to visit my papou and yaya- grandfather and grandmother- in a small graveyard surrounded by olive trees  and mountains. We then went back to the house and made a delicious dinner, consisting of more fish and calamari, tzaziki, salads, etc etc. We ate very well. The next morning, we had a breakfast of yogurt and visinada (cherries in syrup that my aunt makes... delicious!), with fresh bread and marmalade made from bergamont and oranges from my uncle's garden. We also had some fresh squeezed orange juice. We went back to the sea, which was much calmer on our second day, and swam for several hours. We made a lunch/dinner consisting of all of our leftovers from the past two days, plus some fresh fried potatoes and a salad garnished with dill picked on our walk home from the graveyard. Over dinner, we crossed language barriers (I finally know enough greek to effectively communicate with my uncle) and told jokes. Uncle Kyriakos, with the help of the dictionary, expressed his sadness that we couldn't stay at the house for a week or two. I am also sad that we couldn't stay longer. My uncle went to pick some apricots somewhere while we packed our bags, and we left for Athens.

Aggios Antonios, Athens, Greece: We pulled in to Aunt Kiki's last night around 11. I talked on the phone with my cousin Natasha, who is studying far away, and we had a snack meal thing of yogurt, salad, and potatoes. I was happy to catch up with my cousin Kosta (Yes, that is two Kosta's so far... Kosta is short for Konstantine, which is possibly the most popular name in Greece)! We haven't talked in about three years, and our lives have changed a lot. Today we slept in late, and now we are at a gaming center, using the internet. I come home in 3 days... I'm excited to go home, but sad to leave Greece.

Sorry it's been so long!! We have been travelling like a pack of rabid monkeys these past few weeks, it's been nonstop action! I will come back to elaborate, but for now I only have about 20 minutes - we need to be up early tomorrow to get to the Vatican before lines start.

Paris, France: A lovely time, we saw the major tourist sites and ate a ton of crèpes. I do love crèpes. We went to the catacombs, which were full of dead things. Alex and I had a half year anniversary date, which was also very nice, but involved a lot of napping due to general exhaustion due to our pace of travel. In bad news, Alex's rail pass went missing, and we had to deal with the French police, who are kind of dicks.

Here are some photos from france: http://www.flickr.com/photos/irisi/tags/france/

Freiburg, Germany: Molly and Alex have a friend studying abroad in Freiburg, who kindly allowed us to come stay in his dorm. We explored the Black Forest for a day, which was very nice, and mostly enjoyed being able to recharge in a smaller city for a day.

Stuttgart, Germany: This city is full of cockroaches and dissapointment. We arranged for an overnight train to Amsterdam, but discovered that DBahn (the German rail system) kind of screwed us over, and the train was leaving the next day. We learned this at 1am, around the same time that we learned that the city is FULL of GIANT cockroaches. Squeamish, upset, and tired, we found our way to a hostel.

Amsterdam, The Netherlands: This city is full of pot and potheads, I found. We spent our first night walking around the red light district. It's shrunk drastically in the past few years: Holland has been going through a period of social conservatism, and it is affecting the sex and drug industry heavily. I think this is very unfortunate. The legalization of pot and prostitution has allowed more government regulation and kept the suppliers and users of goods and services safer and healthier. I decided to try pot, since I was in a city where it was legal, and it was pretty unimpressive. A space cake (something to eat) just made me very tired. The pot by itself made me feel disoriented and not in control of my thoughts, which I didn't like. I don't think I'd like to repeat that experience. We later ate indonesian food, which was tasty. We also went to the zoo. Alex accidentally devoted his life to Jesus Christ while in the middle of a debate with a street preacher.

Fussen, Germany: We just loved Germany so much, we kept going back! Fussen is at the end of the Romantic Road, a part of Bavaria where a lot of kings built their castles. The castle that inspired the classic disney castle is located in Fussen, as well as the less elaborate home of the king who directed it's construction. The hostel here had an amazing breakfast. The lakes were all a white turquoise kind of color, they had some deposit in them that literally made them look like something out of a fairy tale. I took a day to play in the lake and watercolor using it's water while Alex and Molly hiked to the summit of a mountain.

Interlocken, Switzerland: We arrived in town to the sound of some traditional Swiss music being played in a bar. A very helpful young lady walked us to our hostel, because we were lost and confused. Interlocken is in the heart of the Swiss Alps, and we greatly enjoyed climbing some of them... Molly, using her magic Alpine Goat Powers, was able to climb more of them than Alex and I, who decided to go eat pizza instead of reaching a summit. I saw alpine glaciers, and later drank some alpine glaciers (Molly brought back a bottle full of runoff, which we then boiled for 20 minutes and then drank).

Venice, Italy: This city is ridiculously beautiful, the canals are gorgeous, the buildings are old and in just enough disrepair to be lovely, and the masks are amazing. I enjoyed wandering it's winding streets. One day was kind of enough, though- it was expensive, and I would prefer to leave it with it's magical glamor of prettiness than explore it too thoroughly and find it boring.

Rome, Italy: This is where we are now. Other than some major problems with our hostel (arg), the city is warm and full of delicious food and old things. I approve. Tomorrow, we will visit the pope for a while.

Next up: The rest of Rome, Pompeii, Brindisi, an overnight ferry to Patras, Athens, Eggonomisi, back to Athens, USA.
Also, I will bring more details and photos... someday soon I hope.

I will post, promise.

I am on an overnight train from amsterdam to fussen, germany right now. We have been to Paris, France, freiburg, Germany, and Amsterdam in the past week. The trip is going fabulously well!!

<3

Sent from my iPhone

Ireland was amazing! Despite being there for several days, it felt like we whirlwinded through it. It was very cold, I was thankful for my mother's insistence that I take a windbreaker and leggings. It also rained the whole time we were there.



On our first day there, Molly and Alex went to Dublinia while went to church and explored the Jameson Distillery. Church service was lovely, I'm finding that churches, even though I'm not Christian, are lovely places to meditate when I'm on-the-go. At the distillery, I learned all about whiskey making (such as what malting is, and why some whiskeys taste smokier than others, etc). I really enjoy learning about these sorts of things, because it helps me recognize the subtleties of flavor when I know what creates them. I was selected to become a "certified whiskey taster," which resulted in me drinking approximately four shots of whiskey. I was supposed to meet Molly and Alex back at the Dublin Castle, across town. I ended up wandering the streets of Dublin, mildly inebriated, looking for a castle at noon on a Sunday. Eventually Alex found me, and I explored the castle while smelling quite like whiskey, and found myself enamored with the light fixtures.



On our second day, we decided to explore the cliffs of Ireland. It was BEAUTIFUL. We hiked for several hours. On the way back, it began to rain, which was a little less pleasant. The wind inverted our umbrellas, and we all returned to the hostel damp, cold, but happy about our adventures. The shower was incredibly slow to drain, so we turned it into a foot bath and stood in it while soaking our tender toes.



We left Dublin at 3 in the morning, and flew to Paris.

Here are some more pictures: http://www.flickr.com/photos/irisi/tags/ireland/