Ding Dong Dell

I'm feeling very frustrated and low at the moment. A combination, I think, of lifestyle and my job. Don't misunderstand, I enjoy my job most of the time. The Uni is a great place to work, there are lots of good coffee shops, I can go to the gym at lunch time and most importantly the people I work with are fantastic. My struggle is that I have worked in labs for over 14 years, I am not junior staff. As far as the Biacore goes I was an expert - my name is recognised at international conferences. Same story with cell culture, I have the magic touch with mammalian cells – a red thumb so to speak. But in this lab I am out of my field, I don't know or understand a lot of what goes on. I am learning and I am getting better, but it's slow and frustrating. Not to mention how badly battered my ego is when an honours student can make an experiment work and I can't.
I have also decided to give up dieting. I have been on a diet for most of my adult life. A chronic yo-yo dieter: diet – lose weight, stop dieting – put it all (and then some) back on again. It's a common story. I turn 40 next year and my metabolism is shot to hell and I have no-one to blame but myself. So my new goal is to just eat well, get plenty of exercise and hope my poor addled body can sort out where it is supposed to be. But part of me feels like I have failed. This has been a life long struggle with the expectation that ONE DAY (soon) I will be thinner. It has been a constant expectation that I have put on myself and now I am trying to take it away. I will no longer diet, I will not count calories or use diet shakes to replace meals or take weight loss pills or eat nothing but salad for months on end. Stop the insanity: live my life. I should feel liberated, but I feel sad. It's like giving in. No doubt I will put on more weight at first when I go through the glee of eating "forbidden" foods, but hopefully with perseverance at the gym I will get fitter and find some balance.
I bought a new computer. It was recommended to me to buy from an online company, as it would be the best deal. And it was a good price. Ordering wasn't that easy: I had to call India a couple of times because I didn't want a monitor (we just bought a new one last year) or a printer. I also paid an extra $50 for after hours delivery and so they could take away the old computer. I organised finance so we could lease the computer and return it and upgrade in a few years – it seemed sensible. So I faxed in the paperwork, they lost it. I sent it again. It all seemed good. About a week later the courier company called to say they would be delivering the computer between 5 and 8pm on Monday, which was fine. The next day I got an email from India telling me that after hours delivery wasn't available where I live so they would refund my $50. This is where I fucked up – I said "OK". I should have been honest but I was sick of their incompetence by then and decided to get the money back.
So Monday morning at about 10 past 7 in the morning (all still asleep) there is a knocking at the door – the computer has arrived. I asked if he was going to take the old one for recycling and he said "no, it's not on my paper work". Mysteriously there were two boxes. That day I got a phone call asking if I had completed the paperwork for the finance yet. That night I unpacked one of the boxes: tower, keyboard, mouse as ordered. The second box contained a printer. Well, I thought, better to get something extra than have something missing. So I set it up and began the process of installing software and configuring the system. I had ordered dual optical drives to facilitate burning. Once I had everything ready I popped a CD into the drive, the computer said "please insert a disk into the drive". I explained to it that there was one there already, I argued, I tried different disk types, I tried the other drive. Eventually I got the second drive to see a disk. I mucked around a bit more, it seemed OK. The next day it was the same story – it could not see the disks. So on the phone to India. Now all of the advertising and sales pitch for this company refers to their help line as being a real bonus. OK, where is the phone number for said help line? It took me about 20 minuted of searching to find it, then another 20 minutes on hold. At this point the 5 year old lost the plot and I had to hang up.
The next day I tried again and after 45 minutes on hold I got through to someone who then transferred me and put me on hold. Another 15 minutes later I finally got to speak to a girl about the problem. She did a remote access to the computer, deleted some filters in the set up and it seemed to work.
Two days later the drives went blind again. Another call, another hour on hold, another distraught and screaming 5 year old that I just ignored so I could speak to the Indian man. Half an hour later of mucking around he informs me that the problem is that the new drives are very sensitive and won't read inferior disks. "But the disk in there is a brand new TDK CD-ROM", "It must be poor quality" was the reply. So I have a new stack of blank CDs that I can't use? I explained that my 10 year old computer never had this problem and how can an upgraded system be less reliable than an old one? He was very nice about it and suggested that I wait a month or so until new drivers are released and see if that helps. I was furious. The small child was, by this stage, collapsed on the floor in the kitchen sobbing and was probably permanently psychologically scarred. My bad karma for taking the $50 back.
I have finally worked out that Windows Vista is fucking up the software, that iTunes doesn't run properly in Vista and that may be all the problem is. So I decided to delete Vista and reinstall XP. I searched the net for "how to" pages, found plenty (apparently Vista sucks and a lot of people are desperate to get rid of it) and tried to fix things. I couldn't. I couldn't work out how to make a boot disk with a CD. I was defeated. Again I was foiled by my own limitations; I just don't have enough computer savvy. Apparently the new version of iTunes will be Vista compatible, so I'll wait until then and see if it fixes things.
So my week has been a mish mash of failures, disappointments, frustrations and non-achievement. I'm getting my hair done tomorrow, so at least I'll look good in my despair. Read more!

Old and New

This is the last blog I will write on my old computer. My new computer arrives tomorrow. This computer has been dying a slow and painful death for a few months now. I thought of paying to get it fixed/rebuilt, but its 8 years old and probably not worth it. This is one of those times when I am reminded of my never ending sentimentalisation of inanimate objects - my love of stuff. As on object, this computer is ugly, of the horrid bone, beigey colour that was popular for computers back then. So it's not an aesthetic thing. I bought this computer for X to use while he was doing his Dip Ed; he set it up and put himself as administrator so I see his name every time I use the computer and it shits me. So it's not that, in fact I'll be glad to be rid of that aspect.
If I think about this clearly, it's been about the things I have written on this computer. I have written long and heartfelt letters, emails and blogs. I have, at the lowest, drunkest, most depressed points in my life, written stuff on this computer. So if I had used a pen, would I be sentimental about said pen? No. Obviously I am being totally illogical. This struggle with materialism is one I fight every day.
While I am writing this, I am transferring files to the external hard drive, making sure nothing is lost. Ah, that's it – the fear of losing something. Something I may need one day. Somehow my grandparents managed to instill their life-during-the-depression mentality in me. Save everything – you never know when you might need it. Certain aspects of this are good: recycling etc. I save the elastic bands off vegetables, I save corks and I save jars. Why? I'm not sure; because I have to, it's how I was raised. You just do. Why throw something away when it has value? Any value? No matter how small, if it's not actual rubbish. Just because I haven't used it for 6 years doesn't mean I won't one day. One day I will wear all those size 10 clothes I have (yeah, if I contract a terminal disease and loose 30% of my body weight).
There have been things I have thrown away and will regret forever: the nude portrait my boyfriend did of me when I was 20 (at the time I thought "I can't put a nude picture of me on the wall!" Now, 20 years later, I would love to. I'll never look that good again.), the suede mini-skirt that matches the jacket I kept (I can't believe I broke up a set), photographs of people I never wanted to see again but now wouldn't mind. Parts of my life that have slipped away.
This is an uncomfortable aspect of my personality: unless I have a tangible reminder of an incident, a time span, a relationship, I feel like I don't have any memories. I keep THIS because it's the first present he ever gave me, I keep THIS because it's the last present he ever gave me, I keep THIS because it's what I wore to my high school formal, I keep THIS because I made it when I was 8 years old, I keep THIS because – oh, what is THIS? I've forgotten. Now it's safe to throw it away.
Let it go, let it go, let it go. Move on. Move with the times. Go forward. Onward and upward. Forward – march!
My new computer isn't purchased - it's leased. After 3 years I will return it and get a new one. Perhaps that will prevent me from attaching ridiculous associations with it. Perhaps.
Perhaps I'll make some jam, then I'll need jars! Read more!

The house in the city

We have the final plans for the renovations of my house in the city. It will be totally different, double storey, open plan at the back and a big balcony over the back yard. I don't like open plan, I never wanted a house with combined eating/living areas. I like rooms with doors. Unfortunately the house just isn't big enough to accommodate my need for isolation.
The architect looked at the sketch I had done of what I wanted and then drew up something completely different. At first I was angry that he had disregarded my wishes, but on reflection, what he had done was actually much better. His plan utilised the space more efficiently and makes the house more liveable. I guess that's what a good architect does. We have kept the style as original Victorian as possible and from the drawings it almost looks like it could have always been that way. I am pleased with our plans. The cost is another story.
My little house has been a significant home for me. I have never lived anywhere as long as I have lived in that house. It is truly my home, I feel comfortable and safe there. Over the years I have put a lot of work into making it mine, using colour and features that reflect my tastes and style. I have never considered "resale value" and have probably devalued the house with my eccentric tastes. I don't care.....
Now we are about to begin a new phase. The husband is making a substantial financial and design contribution to the house; it will no longer be mine but ours. It is time for me to move on and integrate my house and my sense of independence into my marriage and be a couple. It's what I want. I actually thought I would find it harder to let go and give my home to somebody else, but it's been easy.
I miss the city. I always thought I was a country girl living in the city. No, I am a city girl who grew up in the country. I can't stand the suburbaness of Blandberra, there is no sense of this place being a big city - it has no dynamics. I saw the Sex in the City movie last night, the closing scene of a city street at night made my heart leap – I want to be there! Not New York in particular, but the city. Things happen in the city. I always thought I would like to live in the country, I realise now that I don't really. It's the energy and spark of a city that I miss; this place is almost comatose.
The girl is away for 8 days, gone south. We are going out tonight with the people from my lab for pizza to celebrate a birthday. Then on Friday night the husband and I have tickets to see Lenny Henry, he is playing here, which is weird. I have seen touring guides for various bands and they seem to avoid this place intentionally. One band I saw was heading to Nhulunbuy in northern Arnhem Land, but still weren't coming here.
We haven't decided what to do for Saturday night. Probably stay home and watch a movie, maybe dress up and cook a posh dinner. You learn to appreciate simpler things when you have a small child ruling your life. The last time she went away the husband and I sat in the garden and had beer and chips for dinner, it was lovely. So as much as I whine about the lack of things to do in this place, we actually couldn't do them anyway.
Right now I'd like to be back in the bar we frequented in Venice, sipping a spritzer and eating deep fried cheese on a stick. Read more!

Belonging

Today, as I walked through the Uni campus carrying my dog's head in a chiller bag, I started to understand somewhat why some people think I'm a bit weird.
I loved my dog and I'm sad to part with her. It seems natural to me to want to keep a part of her. Skulls are beautiful things, the shape and the structure is stunningly beautiful. To turn her skull into an ornament to keep as a memento seems perfectly rational. The process of getting the clean, white, polished skull however is quite gruesome and a tad disturbing. I haven't reveled in the process. I cried my eyes out as I held her frozen body while my husband (bless him) hacked her head off with a meat cleaver. I was quite rattled as I left the home this morning carrying a small chiller bag with a dog's head in it.
One of the joys of my new job has been returning to a world of science in which my pragmatic nature is accepted without hesitation. When I asked my colleagues how one would go about stripping the flesh from a skull they instantly offered several suggestions, none of them being that I seek psychiatric help. In fact, the mortuary manager offered to do a large part of the process for me. Hence the chiller bag and the walk across campus to the medical school.
When I asked the mortuary manager's advice on my project he instantly told me exactly what I had to do and then offered to do it for me. He is going to remove the skin and flesh then boil the skull in hydroxide to break down the connective tissue. I will be left with some cleaning to do, then the bleaching. He said once I had the skull as I wanted, to bring it back and he will coat it with a preservative varnish. He did not once ask me why I wanted to do this.
Acceptance and a sense of belonging is an inherent need in humans. When you belong to a subculture, like Goth, you make a conscious decision to live outside the norm. But belonging to a subculture means that even your rebellion is orthodox. We still want to belong.
I don't associate with many other Goths; my husband is my main source of comfort. At a dinner party some time ago I asked if anyone thought Tim Burton had modeled Sweeny Todd's look on David Vanian. I was met with blank stares. It was an uncomfortable reminder that my friends aren't Goths, that I don't quite belong there. My life the past year has been very much a reminder that I am different. The women I met at the gym, the other mothers at school that I got to know – many of them I like very much – but I don't think I could ask their opinion on the new Bauhaus album. My isolation has been on many levels. So to go to work and confront a bunch of people I hardly know with the question of how to strip a skull and be met with nothing but suggestions and offers of help is a multiple joy. Firstly that they can help me in my quest, but also that they don't judge me and possibly even understand why I want to do this. I belong in that environment.
My little dog belongs with me; I don't want to leave her in the ground of a random rental home in Blandberra. I will keep her skull with me and I will treasure it forever.

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Mollie

On Friday night when I got home from work my little dog was collapsed on the floor. She seemed to be unconscious so I grabbed the phone and hoped the vet was still working. He was about to go home, but I exclaimed "she's just gone into a fit!" so he said "bring her straight over". I picked up her spasming little body and she went limp, I put her in the car on the seat next to me and was I probably breaking the speed limit before I got to the end of the driveway. About halfway to the clinic she sat up, looked around then looked at me as if to say "are we going somewhere?".
The vet met us at the door and smiled "so she got better then?" he asked. He had the green dream and syringe ready, which he quickly put out of sight. He checked her over, couldn't really find anything wrong. He explained that when dogs get old they can develop a form of false epilepsy, that the excitement of me coming home may have been enough to trigger her into a fit. We discussed options and I took her home.
The husband and I had a reservation at a posh restaurant and we considered canceling, but it had been so long since we had been out somewhere nice that I insisted we go.
When we got home little Mollie wasn't at the door as usual. She wasn't in her bed; we searched around the house then grabbed torches and headed into the back yard. The husband eventually found her, hidden behind some pots. I put my hand on her, she was still warm but wasn't breathing. The husband grabbed her and started hitting her on the chest and yelling "Mollie! Come on Mollie!" but she was definitely gone.
We bundled her into a garbage bag and put her in the bottom drawer of the freezer, lit some candles and opened a bottle of sparkling shiraz. We made a toast to Mollie: she was deaf, blind, senile, incontinent, smelly, annoying, constantly underfoot, stubborn and difficult to groom. We loved her. We were going to the big city the next day so I was ready to put her in my suitcase and take her home, bury her with my other dog. But the husband pointed out that we couldn't a) travel with a dead dog in our luggage and b) turn up on somebody's doorstep and say "Hi, we're here to bury our dog".
So she's still in the freezer until I decide what to do.
So now we can open cupboards or the fridge without having to move a small dog, we can walk across a room without tripping over, there are no puddles in the hallway and no disgusting smells in the lounge room. There's also no little dog on my lap when I'm watching telly. I miss the scrofulous little mutt.

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Microtomes and Madness

Well, I'm into my second week of my new life as a biologist. So far I have dissected a couple of pigeon eyes, embedded them in paraffin and attempted to section them on a microtome. The first two parts of the process I think I have under control, but the microtome is doing my head in. Who would have thought handling a 10μm thin slice of wax could be so difficult? Just looking at the damn thing makes it either curl up and collapse or crumble into a thousand pieces. I guess I shouldn't beat myself up too much, I am new to this gig, but I get so frustrated with myself when I am faced with my own ineptitude. I expect to be good at something instantly and when I'm not I go through the Kübler-Ross five stages of grief:
Denial (there must be something wrong with the machine),
Anger (you idiot! Get it right!),
Bargaining (OK, if you get this right you can have cake for afternoon tea)
Depression (I am so useless, I can't do anything!)
Acceptance (I'm not infallible, I need help)
Eventually I got one of my supervisors to have a go and she couldn't get it to work either, it was a bad prep – so not my fault.
Otherwise I have been pre-occupied with the Uni's Body Donation Program, i.e. compiling paperwork and forms for people who wish to leave their bodies to science. A weird concept, ultimately valuable, but weird. I wonder if I'm the right person for the job. I certainly wouldn't donate my body, or that of my child, for a bunch of med students to chop up; but then I wouldn't hesitate to donate organs. I understand the importance of such donations – med students and surgical trainees need to learn – but it just doesn't sit right with me. I can't understand or explain it - it is illogical. A dead body is just a hunk of flesh isn't it? But if my beautiful little girl died there is no way on Earth I would allow a bunch of spotty, over privileged, pretentious twerps to slice her up. This is one of those instances where my ethics and my ideals are totally over-ridden by my heart. Perhaps even in death the parental protective instinct is just too strong.
But, apart from ethical dilemmas, work itself goes well. I am happy.

This morning I had to drive the girl to school; the husband (who usually takes her) had an early meeting. I didn't arrive on campus until 9:10am – all of the parking near my building was taken. I drove from car park to car park for over 20 minutes before I found a spot. The car park I found was staff parking, but it also had a large sign saying "changed parking conditions". I pondered on the meaning of this cryptic sign. Was the "changed conditions" the mud that has resulted from that day's downpour? Or was it something less obvious? I figured if I got a parking ticket I could contest it on the grounds of their vagueness. I parked, stepped out of the car into the rain and trudged off in what I thought was the direction of my building. I walked for about 15 minutes before I ended up back at the same car park. At the moment I realised where I was I also realised, or perhaps allowed myself to admit, that Blandberra IS in the Twilight Zone. You try to go in a straight line, but end up going in circles. Nothing makes sense. At 9:50am I made it into my lab, soaking wet, frustrated and confused as to why my umbrella was no longer in my car and convinced that the city I live in does not conform to the laws of physics. A Dark City indeed.
The husband and I experienced similar dis-orientation whilst in Italy last year on our honeymoon. After a few days in fabulous Venice we became convinced that during the night all of the buildings shuffled themselves around. No matter how carefully we plotted our course, what landmarks we noted (turn left at the beggar with the funny hat) we were never able to retrace our steps to find that cute shop/bar/pizza place we had spotted the previous day. That, of course, is the only time ANYONE will ever compare the mysterious and stunningly beautiful city of Venice to the life-sucking, vacuous city of Blandberra.
So I sit here, glass of wine at my side, typing my little self-indulgent blog, while the husband cleans the kitchen, and I think that being a working mother isn't that bad when you have the support of your husband and your job doesn't suck.
I may have, at the risk of typing too soon, the best of both worlds. Read more!

Eyes and Hamburgers

Great things are afoot! I am about to become gainfully employed. I have been offered a job in a research group at one of the universities that is involved with the anatomy and diseases of the eye.They study all manner of eyes – birds, fish, rodents, primates…of course the only way to study said eyeballs are to remove them from the animal. OK, I won't have to kill anything and what's the difference between digging an eyeball out of a pigeon and skinning a chicken leg before cooking it for dinner? I have no problem with removing the eyes from dead animals…but can I dig an eyeball out of a dead human? I THINK I can, I'm almost sure I can, but I guess I won't know until I actually try. Of course the idea of working in a mortuary goes with the whole Goth thing and I don't have a problem with it at all; but can I stick a scalpel in somebody's eye socket and dig out their eye? It's a weird one. Anyway, I damn well better be able to because I've accepted the job and will probably be starting next week.

This means the girl goes into after school care, I will no longer have the luxury of going to the gym whenever I feel like it and going for coffee with the girls afterwards, no more sleeping until 8am then coming home for a nap after dropping the girl at school. But – I will get my brain back online and in full use, I will be able to pay off my credit card, get the brakes done on my car, get my hair and nails done whenever I want (as long as it's on a Saturday). It's mostly good. I'm looking forward to it and the husband is now on a mission to find every song ever written about eyes.

Last weekend we hired a little Toyota corolla and drove to central Victoria to attend my cousin's 21st birthday party. What a lark! It was great to catch up with family I haven't seen for ages, mildly embarrassing when a cousin from the other side of the country who I have only met once turned out to have the same hair-do as me (I thought I was unique!!) and the husband and I got terribly inebriated and ran around like idiots until 4am. Not our smartest move. The 6-hour drive is bad enough, combine it with a hangover and a small child who talks non-stop the whole way and you have something akin to living hell. We were so bad we didn't change the CD until we were an hour away from home.

An interesting thing occurred: At Gundagai we stopped at McDonalds for lunch. Now I hate the evil empire, I refused to buy their food until I became a parent and they started serving salad and real coffee. It became a place we could go for a special treat for the child and I could eat lunch in peace while she ran amok on the playground. We have indulged maybe half a dozen times over the 5 years of her life. But I had never eaten a McDonalds burger, and I did so on Sunday. It was tasty, in a weird plasticy, artificial sort of way. The texture was weird, not like food – more like some sort of artificial polymer and what is with the colour of the stuff I assumed to be cheese? It looked like it had ethidium bromide in it. Does it actually glow under UV light? Anyway, I viewed it as an interesting anthropological experiment and didn't dwell on it for too long. Here's the interesting thing – I was driving along yesterday and suddenly I was overwhelmed by a craving for a McDonalds burger and I think if there had been a Maccas nearby I would have driven in, the craving was THAT strong.
How do they do that? What is IN those things? It's weird and disturbing. I hate them even more now. Insidious, malevolent, amoral, evil bastards.

In other news, I'm still sick. Moving into week three of my illness and into my second lot of antibiotics. Hopefully I will be fully recovered before I start work. Read more!