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Diversity meeting over ham and cheese; Hillary

2005-11-23 - 9:26 p.m.

I've just been a neglectful son of a bitch to this thing lately. Don't have a particularly good excuse either. I've felt jack all of motivation, guess since I've been taking my relaxing hour (yeah, all the one) seriously.

So where the fuck were we?

I forget, so I'll summarize.

My cognitive neuropsych class ended about 3 weeks ago. The revision of my paper was fan-fucking-tastic. I read through the thing and thought, "this is all coming from the biggest hard-ass in the department." Well actually Brad is a good guy, he's just very scrutinizing. Come to think about it, that revision was about the only time I've really been academically challenged here.

So another class down, and my GPA stays the same--right where I want it to be.

Since then I finished that fellowship application, did some more data collection of shit I'd just filed, re-organized about 6 months worth of blood work results for subjects, registered for classes (or a class, remains to be seen)...blah blah blah.

Stats is about the same as usual. We'd been ending early for the last 3-4 lectures, but this last one went overtime. It was a theory class on factor analysis, though, so nothing I haven't covered before on my own.

About the only thing that's changed recently involves a meeting I had today. See, my university recently got a grant from the nat'l science foundation. They picked 5 of the departments on campus to use about 15k each worth of funds to increase their grad student diversity. Translated: they want more minorities, because M-Town approaches albino on the race composition scale. I'd gotten stopped in the hall by Colleen, the grad advisor/grant coordinator and my old stats prof. Naturally she wanted me to show because I'm American Indian. She said we'd probably be the only two people there.

And so we were: the sunroom cafe breakfast hour. My mood had soured because I'd been a fucking idiot, overdrawn on my debit card, and had 120 bucks worth of fees. Here I thought they'd be like my old bank or like any good bartender: cut you off when you can't take it.

So sporting an ache in my head (and my ass from the fees), she and I sat down and started talking recruitment and retention ideas. Couple ideas included:

*Getting back in touch with my old undergrad research program, and see if I can network around and find some universities with a lot of minorities in psych departments.

*Set up a school chapter of a diversity-oriented advacement organization I've been a part of for awhile. I mean fuck, I've included the idea of founding a chapter in my fellowships for the past two years. Colleen really liked the idea. I guess that means actually trying to implement it.

*Get people to lobby for the psych department at graduate student fairs or at universities. In particular I went to one way back in the day. It was the one I never bothered to write about, because I seem to do that with major one time things.

*Get all minority folk on this community e-mail list that all incoming minority fellowship people get put on. Basically as it is, you have to get this fellowship to get access to support resources. I'm thinking that any incoming minority grad student, regardless of whether they got a minority fellowship, should be able to use those resources. I sure as fuck didn't: I was too busy and getting my hermit lifestyle on.

So we agreed on some immediate things to be done, and stuff to be done for the future. I got the felling she wanted me to be the point-man (or point-person) for this initiative of spending 15k.

The perk to this is that there's 3k USD set aside for the person who decides to spearhead this use of diversity funding. Like I told my adviser today, that'd really help out when summer comes, since I'm gonna have jack and shit for funding and I really don't want to take out a loan.

Like he said and what I thought, I need a better idea of how many hours this thing'll take. As is, I can't take on 20 hours a week when I'm TAing classes, taking classes, doing research, and analyzing shit. Fucking Republicans. I should be paid enough so I can save for the summer. Like reverse hibernation nut storing.

Only other thing I can think of academic-wise is the push to get my first paper out. I want to be finished with the whole thing by the end of december, and turn a manuscript in. It doesn't help that writing about 4 experiments with physiological and behavioral measures is gonna take a lot of time. Given that I have all of december, though, so I'm confident I can do it. I mean hell, I have to for my career and all.

My advisor isn't pushing me much on it, but he figured I'd be busy. Even if I was still the type of busy I used to be, I'd still be trying to write the thing up. I can't really get started with that until I'm done with analyses though. And I can't start on analyses until we've finally looked at how inflammation plays into all of the behaviors and physiology we've so far looked at. This project really was way more huge than I ever intended. And I can't split it up into two papers either, so it'll end up being this huge thing.

I guess that's ok.

* * *

Happy horseshit aside, I actually have something to do for Turkey Day tomorrow. Hillary invited me to be with her and her family over in middletown, which is about 30 min. from here. It's a huge family, too. She's got 3 or 4 sisters, a few brothers, mom and dad, whomever the fuck else, and people are bringing their pets. A noise smorgasbord. I'm not sure if Hill's husband, Sven, is gonna be there or not. This'll be the first thanksgiving I've spent with other people for a few years now. Back when I was in college I did chinese food. Then I switched to italian here.

Which brings up Hillary. What to say except I completely didn't expect finding a friend like her. We met, instantly liked each other, and struck a friendship quickly. Basically we have dinner out and watch a movie at her place or mine once or twice a week. She's comfortable with me and we trust going on, so she'll cuddle up to me sometimes. It'd been a long time since I got to touch someone like that, and it was just nice.

Not to say she's nice all the time. The welcome thing about her is that she speaks her mind, likes to poke fun or otherwise give me shit for the sake of affection, and is independent. She just says she's a 'bitch' usually. I think Erin still claims the champion title on that count. Hill just likes giving me shit with varying degrees of mercifulness. She likes to keep up a good offensive, partly because (I think) she can get to feeling fragile in some cases. Well, that and she likes it.

We share a fascination for the darker things in life. She isn't a goth, for instance, but occasionally goes out to the only goth club in town, sporting what I must say are some delicious outfits. Vampire movies, post-apocalyptic shit, that sort of thing.

I've known her for a month and, in that time, we've gotten very close. She actually wanted to know who I was, instead of whatever she wanted me to be. The intensity of her probing was uncharacteristic from damn near everyone. Most people just sense I'm withdrawn, that I keep to myself mostly. But she didn't let it slide, and instead asked me questions about most everything in my life. I told her about some parts of my past related to the occult deal, some relationship stuff I usually try to forget...most anything. Partly this happened by e-mail, partly in person. And I tell ya, I felt grilled at some points..and at first a little defensive.

In time, though, I saw she just wanted to really know about me and let her in. And I began to trust her enough. I'd half expected in the beginning that she had a sadistic wish to get to know all about me, then somehow turn that against me. Old programming.

So who'da thought: I randomly meet a chick at a party that I think is totally hot, and we end up being great friends. The sexual attraction deal makes things...interesting. I haven't nor will I have sex with her, on account of: 1) she's married; 2) been there, done that, bought the t-shirt with other engaged or attached women; 3) she's married. Would I like to be with her? Yeah, I've told her as much. No point in hiding anything I think or feel from her. But I know she's adamant about staying with Sven. That doesn't bother me, because more than anything--at this twilight bus-stop of my life--I just wanted a close-by friend like her.

Only thing I've occasionally worried about is falling in love or getting romantic. I don't have any feelings on that end. We love each other as friends, but beyond that I'm fine leaving it at just that. I figure if Jen and I could have sex, get close, and I never felt anything, might just go the same with Hill--minus the sex part.

Like I say to her on occasion: above anything I just want her around in my life. Friends, lovers, doesn't matter the personal relationship. And so it goes.

* * *

I gotta get back to work. This took longer than I thought.

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