Why hello blog, we meet again. I'm currently camped out at San Jose International Airport drinking coffee-flavored chocolate milk (iced caffe mocha from Peet's) utilizing the complementary wi-fi provided by this fine establishment. It's worth noting I'm typing this on my ancient iPhone.

Trip Highlights:

#1, always, is seeing my boyfriend :)
#2, California sunshine. I'm rocking a slight hint of color without looking used & abused. Horray for vitamin D!
#3, Santa Cruz & UCSC. We stayed a skip away from UCSC -- which offers one of the only science writing programs in the country. Given that it was Memorial holiday I didn't have time to check it out. Santa Cruz is full of awesome spots to chill and shop but it's extremely bum-friendly. Seriously -- while seeking out a bar downtown, I overheard two floaters having a scuff because, allegedly, one pulled switchblade on the other in a church parking lot. I digress.
#4, Firefly mango black iced tea.

**Ugh, my phone is giving me troubles, will update with more later.**

I see you baby, shakin'

This is too funny.

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I'm not a huge drinker but...

I imbibed the most delicious beer last night, Magic Hat's Vinyl Lager. The label is a neo-1960's work of art as well! I hung out in my kitchen last night, drinking vinyl and making bracelets for the Orphan Outreach project. You pretty much make bracelets, send them to Grand Rapids and they will send them to orphanages in Russia. I guess Russia has tons of orphans that end up on the wrong side of the tracks and a little handmade hope never hurt anybody! I chose colors off the label's color scheme -- I'm stoked to send them out!

"buck melanoma, moley russell's wart"

I'm exhausted! Week one is over and I've got gnarly shin splints. School is stressful and since the weather broke I have no excuses. I  have too many lazy, duldrumy days during winter. I pack on ten lb's while chillaxing in my warm living room watching Wife Swap marathons. I get it but then again my grades tend to dip during this time. The classic combo of winter funk and seasonal depression. Does ash tray gray snow lumped up on the curb make anyone feel good? No, I don't think so.

~*~*~*~

I wrote the above yesterday but fell asleep before finishing. My first math quiz was a buzz kill. I'M NOT RAIN MAN and given I'm taking a 'remedial course' for math non-geniuses, I CANNOT DO SIX PROBLEMS IN A COOL 15 MINUTES. My test taking skills fall short and I believe slow and steady wins the race when it comes to double checking. It's not beyond me to bubble in the wrong column on a standardized test (see my ACT) because I easily fluster. On a high note, yesterday's Japanese quiz went swimmingly.

Welp, I'm at a loss for words because I don't understand the correlation between beauty and skin resembling the nommy, crusty deep fried bits found in a bucket of KFC's finest. My youngest cousins are hypnotized by tanning beds and no matter how much I drill into them that 'exposure to UV light increases your chances of developing skin cancer' they don't seem to give (excuse my cuss) a flying fuck. Is my approach wrong? Probably, but I'm extremely moved by this video I watched courtesy of reddit created by the David Cornfield Memorial Fund (dcmf.ca). This message is one worth spreading!

I'm off to work on my my mother's day gift. It's a surprise! Catch ya later. 

hajimemashite!

SURGES! ...of ideas hit me for this blog while driving home from Oakland yesterday. Seventy percent were complaints but that's life I suppose.

pandushi? yeahh boy.

Summer semester has commenced! I'm plagued with making meaningful connections of a bunch of arbitrary facts, figures, letters, words and nonsense. Letters and words? Yep. In a much needed escape from microbiology I enrolled in Japanese. Watashi wa S desu! I didn't feel like pissing away summer daylight waiting for micro to roll around so delving into the culture of my su-shay gobbling counterparts was option two!

I'm getting algebraic in MTH 062! COLLEGE TEXTBOOK SCAMMAGE ALERT!

$150 for my school's looseleaf textbook, wtf? It's only half of the official book, mind you. I don't have time for intense amazon-half.com-ebay-chegg searches because summer session is brief (and uh, I'm broke). All is well though -- I bought a used copy and luscious lavender binder to boot.

 

Photo credits:

Sushi

Adventure time!

Chianti anybody?

Y'know what are beautiful and get smushed into powder far too often? Moths. Sweltering summer nights are ahead and my mother, the saint that she is, will lock me out of the house with the porch light on. I can see it now -- after imbibing one too many vodka + fill the the blank here a battle of epic proportions goes down: me vs. my house key vs. the moths. Ahh...summer.

160,000 species of moth exist on our fair planet! The Smithsonian offers a brief overview of moths on their Bug Info page (check it out here).

fava beans!

Now, a reference to The Silence of the Lambs is in order because I dig macabre stuff. The Death's Head Hawkmoth (genus Acherontia) are charming creatures and thanks to evolution's sense of irony, a tiny human skull pattern is found on the thorax (see right). Our favorite villain Buffalo Bill raised these kinds of moths in the film. In actuality, the cocoons were made from tootsie rolls and gummy bears (thanks imdb). A new morbid treat in the works? I think so.


It's also quite ironic I stumbled upon these moths during my plight to save the bees. These moths are known to attack beehives!

However, slight variations exist between this moth and the one famously featured on the poster. Salvador Dali's In Voluptas Mors was substituted for the organic skull found in nature (see left).

Three species of DHH moth are found in Europe and Asia including the Acherontia Styx Styx picture below.

Photo Credits:

Silence of the Lambs movie poster found here 

Death's head hawkmoth thanks to wiki

Dali image

Amazing natural artwork courtesy of this exceptionally cool moth enthusiast website

I'm not sure how many practice problems I completed today but it has to be near 9,000. It's to the point where I don't care because my brain cannot possibly comprehend any more information tonight. With that, I keep singing  my own version of the Black Eyed Peas hit I just can't get enough but y'know with the words "I just don't give a fuck." There is so much to know! Blehhhhhh, another potential retake in my future.

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