A Half Melted Ice Cream Cone

I am a firm believer that bad things happen in threes. So far, 2 incredibly bad things happened today. I guess not incredibly bad. Just, you know, the route of my future that I had planned for myself is currently in a state of warfare and I am losing. Badly.


People told me for a while that I was aiming too high for my plans in life. To these people I said: F You! Really, who honestly says that to another human being? I don't care if you are thinking it. But you sure don't say it.

I was blasted for months about this. But me, being an idiot, thought to myself: I have worked insanely hard for YEARS. I had jobs that were supposed to get me places. I networked with people. I did good in my classes. I sacrificed a lot of time with friends and I blew off relationships with people because I knew my future was important. I knew I was going places. Much bigger than I could accomplish in this town. I put happiness aside at times for things that I thought would make me happy in the future.

Turns out, those people were right. After all of that hard work I have absolutely nothing to show for it. I feel like I have wasted the past 11 years of my life. I could have been doing something I love. I could have been caring less and have been happy and had fun. I could have been baking and cooking and drinking wine but instead I chose this path.

Why? Because I had these preconceived notions that if you are an incredibly hard worker and you do things that are aimed to push you to a good future you are going to get some place with your life. Nope. Not true people! Life doesn't work like this.

Life couldn't give a crap about hard work. It's all about politics and name brands and money. It really is quite horrible.

Sorry for the Debby Downer talk over here. I thought 2 hours at the gym would alleviate my anger and stress but it hasn't. I'm just angry at the whole world right now including myself. To top it off, I am very very sore.

So... here I am, currently waiting for bad thing number 3 to happen. And then the universe will be like:

Oh. Hey Kaitlyn. I really couldn't help but notice your life is going down the toilet. I mean really, I tried not to notice but hey I just couldn't resist watching. It's like a train wreck. You know something bad is coming but you just can't seem to take your eyes off of it. Here is one thing that I thought would cheer you up!

And then the universe will hand me a half melted ice cream cone and be on its way planning for another set of 3 really bad things.

I PROMISE I won't be this mopey and whiny again. It's annoying. I'm starting to get annoyed with myself too. I need to start packing bags for my future in Italy anyway. That is a much more productive use of my time.

On the most happy of things... because really, all I have to look forward to is alcohol - I am starting a new weekly post entitled A Day at the Vineyard where I shall chat about my adventures in wine tasting and maybe you can pick up a few winerific tips along the way.

This is some good advice right here



...Life doesn't have to suck. Be happy. Be happy now. Not later. This I have learned first hand... and take frequent naps. It makes for a better outlook on your currently sucky life!

The Clash of the Sheep

As you know by now (or if you don't you should probably read some of these: sheep and more sheepy,  ), I work with animals. As of late, a lot of sheep. Each with their own quirks and personalities. Each of which drive me insane, besides Big because he is just so sweet and never makes trouble.

At work, we have this excellent routine down to get out of the barn and up in the lab as soon as possible so we can start the days work of sampling and centrifuging and weighing out incredibly smelly things like rumen fluid, duodenal fluid, and even dried ground feces. I know, you can't even imagine most of these smells and I urge you not to. It isn't pleasant, but once you are around it for long enough you don't smell it anymore. But that doesn't stop every single person from smelling you unfortunately. One hour in the barn and you are officially tainted. You can change your clothes, you can put on apple smelly spray, you can change out of your boots but the smell lingers there until you take a shower. It kind of seeps into your hair and you smell like a fresh ball of hay!

That isn't what I wanted to talk to you about at all! So... we have this routine. We dump/weigh the orts (just a pointless fancy word used to describe the food they left over). Weigh out new food accordingly. Dump the water buckets and refill them. Clean the pens and put fresh shavings down. If there are two of us doing this we can usually get 16 animals done in 1-1.5 hours. If it is just me, then it takes closer to 2.

On this particular Tuesday, as Melanie was running around trying to get their feed together because they have been stubborn and not wanting to eat what we have to give them, I was left to clean by myself. I get to Pen 9, more formally known as Stompy because he gets angry with me and stomps his feet a lot in a show of his extreme disapproval of me being there. He has fresh water, a particularly clean pen, and I am now giving him a light, fluffy and dry bed of shaving to sleep on.

I don't see why this is a problem. I particularly like sleeping on a dry warm bed and drinking water that isn't filled with dirt and other hay particles. You would think sheep would like this too. The other 15 fellows I deal with seem to quite enjoy it.

But not Stompy. Oh no. These accommodations are not up to his golden standard and he is peeved by the fact he isn't staying at the Ritz. I think this has slowly been stirring inside him for some time. I think he has been plotting his revenge on me for quite a while. After seeing that stomping was getting him nowhere, he had to plan greater and bigger things! Therefore, the next obvious thing for him to do is 1. Ram me. 2. Bite a large chunk of my hair out of my head.

I wish I was kidding. I wish I could say I didn't look up in complete and utter surprise at Stompy's smug expression as he was holding a mouthful of my hair. I wish my head didn't start bleeding down the side of my face. And I wish that he was a person so I could have smacked that stupid, arrogant expression off of his face. You wouldn't think sheep could be arrogant. Oh, but they can. They really really can.

But we don't all get what we wish for do we? Nope. Not this girl who now has hair matted with blood.

Stompy: 1
Kaitlyn: 0

The Top 10 Moments of Spring Semester... Thus Far

The beginning of school has been particularly interesting. And by interesting I mean: Absolutely horrible (with few minor exceptions) and I wish to fast forward to May and never think on these past few days again. 

For your information/enjoyment/knowing-that-your-semester-is-probably-way-better-than-mine-and-can-feel-good-knowing-that-somebody-may-just-have-it-worse (Though I know people have it way worse than I do and this doesn't make me in the slightest happy. But hey, whatever floats your canoe) I have made a list of the top 10 moments that have occurred with school starting. Which, I kind of think is a huge feat seeing as how we are only 4 days in to the semester.

1. I had to drop my statistics class. This is a HUGE problem. No statistics = no graduation. Who really wants to graduate anyway? Not me. So why exactly did I have to drop it? In short, because my teacher was an insane crazy person (I realize insane and crazy describe the same thing. But really, she needs both of these adjectives) who has absolutely no respect for the school's scheduling system. She declared that all of her tests were on Thursday nights and not during our scheduled class time of 8:55-10:10 on Tuesday and Thursday mornings. Well, one of the tests is on a day I am heading to Michigan for an interview. After class, the teacher blatantly told me she didn't care that I had an interview and I would indeed fail her class. I think this is illegal. The ONLY reason I am in college is so I can go to graduate school and now you're telling me that because I am actually striving for that I will fail your class. Which in turn would not cause me to graduate thus meaning no graduate school. Well, you are an awesome teacher. As a matter of fact, your awesomeness was so incredible that I just couldn't handle it and I had to drop the class.

2. Obviously, I had to find another statistics class. I did. The only one available: from 4-6:30 at night on Tuesdays. So now, I leave my house at 6:15 am and don't get home until 6:15 at night which makes for a very exhausting day.

3. My new statistics teacher uses a different book than the old teacher. I already have my book from the old class which I bought from somebody on amazon and cannot return it. So, I had to spend an additional $70 on another statistics book. Both of which cover the exact same things. It's ok. I like to throw away money every chance I get. It's actually a hobby of mine.

4. I received my first rejection letter from a graduate school and felt officially defeated by my last first day of school. I knew they had to come but it doesn't make seeing them any less hard.

5. In my fluster of a horrible first day of school, I thought my new statistics class was on Thursdays and not Tuesdays so I stayed at school till 4 and found out I was indeed wrong and I had just wasted the last 2 hours of my life waiting for class to start. Did I mention I also forgot my wallet AND lunch so after having a 300 calorie smoothie at 6 in the morning I didn't get to eat again until I finally got home at 4:30. Apparently, eating is overrated anyway.


6. Found out one of the universities I applied for grad school to received my GRE scores... then lost them through a computer glitch or whatever. And never reviewed my application. As this was the last thing that happened on my very horrible first day of the semester, I had a complete meltdown in the middle of the dirt parking lot after walking all the way back from my class that was never actually scheduled to be on Thursday. 

5. I had an interview with a professor from Duke which was amazing. His work is exactly the type of science I am looking to get in to. But, I won't hear back from them till March and thus the continuation of the waiting game!

7. My sister's guinea pig, Nutmeg, passed away on Friday morning. Her other guinea pig, Lola, passed away two weeks ago so this was a very hard time for her and my mom. And my dogs who keep going in the pigs' room and crying/sleeping under where their house used to be. It really is quite depressing.

8. WINE CLASS. Spectacular... 7 wines in one night with snacks and actual learning going on. In 14 weeks, I plan to be a wine connoisseur. You can forward me your pressing wine questions then!

9. I got to sleep in on Sunday. It was the absolute best gift somebody could have given me. The first day in about 3-4 weeks that I have slept past 5:30. Granted, I only slept till about 7:15 but it was splendid. And guess what... I get this WHOLE upcoming weekend off.

10. I got sick :(

I am a little concerned for how this semester is going to turn out... You shouldn't be. It'll make for some good stories.