Running behind...as usual.

I have lots of Wisconsin pictures, videos and stories to share. I have a brief recap of 2009 to cover, as well as my hopes for 2010. But, as always, I am woefully behind today.

I still need to shower, figure out what to do with my makeup, paint my fingernails, fix a botched pedicure, pick up my shoes from the repair shop, and change the broken tail light on my car (wouldn't want to take any chances of being pulled over for stupid sh*t tonight).

See, we're headed to a shindig in San Francisco hosted by JC, creator of Netmusique.com. Last time I went to one of JC's parties, I ended up sandwiched between two queens at 2:30am singing "Toxic" by Britney Spears on the karaoke machine. Upon finishing the single worst karaoke performance of my life, I was escorted to the punch bowl, where I proceeded to drink directly from the ladle. Good times!

So, hopefully its no biggie that I have to put off the Wisconsin recap until later...

I wish you all the best in 2010. You're all excellent people and you deserve amazing things in the new year. Cheers! =)

Jack Frost is nipping at my patience...

Am I the only one who HATES Christmas music? Like really hates it? Its just that at this time of year, I can't get away from it. Everywhere I go, its playing...Starbucks, Trader Joe's, The Gap, Kragan Auto Parts, TACO BELL. Damn it! I can only handle so much of "Its Beginning to Look A Lot Like Christmas" before I start to lose it.

I woke up this morning with "Have a Holly Jolly Christmas" stuck in my head. Have a fucking HOLLY JOLLY CHRISTMAS! Seriously! And I can't make it stop!!

There used to be one exception to this...and it was the Peanuts Christmas CD. My dad loves the music and played it every year during the entire month of December. He did this for years, but now that my parents are living far, far away, hearing this CD only reminds me of how much I miss them and how I won't be seeing them for the holidays. Consequently, this CD's out, too. Can't listen to it without getting sad.

In a nutshell, I'm over Christmas music and wish every establishment I walked in to would give it a freaking rest already! Yes, some may say that I am a Scrooge, but you have to remember that Scrooge came around at the end of the story and found the Christmas spirit in his heart.

I'm not as open to change. Fa-la-la-la-la....la-la-la-la.

My current stream of consciousness...

Finals. Stress. More arithmetic than I ever thought I'd have to do after leaving 4th grade...sans calculator. Stress. Headache. Sore shoulders and neck. 3 hours of hell and no time left over to check my math. Divot in my finger from holding the pencil too tightly. Hardest class I will probably ever have to take...even when I get into nursing school. Whether I feel good about my efforts or not, its over. Hope I passed. Not gonna lie...I hated every single moment of this class. Don't want to take it again. Ever. For any reason.

Now, Anthony Bourdain in Sardinia. Delicious looking foods. Fire-roasted cheeses. Fresh pastas and sauces. Cured meats. Mouth watering. Bubble bath soon. Sleep...perhaps soundly. Hopefully soundly. Dream of fire-roasted cheeses and house wines. Mmmm...

Tomorrow, the feverish studying will resume for Thursday's exam. Multiple choice. Infinitely comforting multiple choice. The answer's there somewhere. When it doubt, you've got a one-in-four chance. Pick C. Always C. Almost finished. Light at the end of the tunnel is almost visible. One more Starbuck's caramel brulee latte and one more lecture before the exam. Remember to buy two Scan-trons! Hang in there!

After finals, off to Wisconsin. Hellishly cold Wisconsin. Fun. Not. I'll blog if I can. Ugh.

Gaga-rific

Ok, I'll admit it. I've got a deep-seeded love for pop music that I try my best to hide sometimes. Nevertheless, I just couldn't get on board with the whole Lady Gaga craze. I mean, yes, she is quite an exhibitionist, and who doesn't love a good exhibitionist, really. But I've always felt that she was...I don't know...trying a little too hard. Case in point:

I mean, whoa. Holy shit on a stick, woman. That is one hell of a get-up. I find it interesting that her facial features are almost completely indistinguishable, while her bare breasts are only covered by one single layer of thin red lace. Thank goodness she decided to wear underwear that day! I look at this and I can't help but think, "Can she SEE through that...thing?! Because if she could, she might have second guessed leaving the house." Really.

Regardless of the authenticity of her shock-value schtick, I can't deny that she is actually pretty talented and had a few songs out there that I found catchy and *gulp* cool (minus that "Pokerface" monstrosity that gets stuck in my head for days on end. Hate that one.). And she's definitely one hell of an entertainer with a very strong point of view. But I never really got it...until today. What changed? I finally saw her video for "Paparazzi". Here...devour it:

See what I mean? Its...beautiful. And God bless her for putting Alexander Skarsgard in it (yum!). I don't know why this is what finally brought me around, but I totally understand why people are nuts for this chick now. Quite simply, she might be WAAAAY out there, but you can't front on the fact that she's turning heads and getting people to talk about her unique "work". Thank god she's not another cookie-cutter pop star churning out low budget, generic, mediocre Miley Sirus Selena Gomez crap. Her videos, her music, her look...provocative genius.

"My pee smells like Cheerios!"

Today was the renal lab in physiology class. This involved peeing in a cup and dipping a number of strips into it to test for various things. No big deal, right? Every physiology lab I've ever been in has done this very same lab. I expected nothing out of the ordinary.

Imagine my surprise when several members of the class launched into a barrage of questions about drinking one's own urine. Literally, like 12 questions! You would think that it goes without saying that drinking one's own urine is TOTALLY unacceptable unless stuck in one of three following scenarios...

1. If you find yourself stranded in the desert, urine could be used to sustain life for a VERY brief period of time
2. If you find yourself lost at sea with no fresh water in site, urine could be used to sustain life for a VERY brief period of time
3. You wake up one day to find that you've become Bear Grylls and you're required to do so for your asinine TV show where you actually sleep in hotels instead of the "wild".

...but you'd be wrong. My classmates wanted to know ALL about drinking their own pee. I had to ask myself, "What the FUCK is wrong with people?!?!?!". My poor professor fielded the questions as seriously as he could for a little while, but then literally threw up his hands and stated that the lecture needed to move on. Seriously. SO strange.

But the strangest things were yet to come. Of all the immature mutterings about urine I heard during the course of the lab, my favorite was "Hey, my pee smells like Cheerios!". This caught my attention because I have often thought that very same thing. Interesting.

Even stranger yet, one of the tests we performed on our cups of wee today was for the presence of blood. As soon as I dipped my test strip in, it turned a deep, deep shade of green, indicating I have quite a large amount of blood in my urine. Hmmm. I don't feel sick, and usually a UTI isn't asymptomatic. Usually, they REALLY suck. My professor quickly called everyone over to see what a positive test looked like. Not gonna lie...I was pretty embarrassed. He did this again for someone in the class that had a large amount of glucose in their urine, but no one owned up to the positive test tube.

All in all, it was a most bizarre day. Just when I expected nothing remarkable, I'm forced to admit this has been the most interesting and weird urinary lab I've ever taken part in.