I told myself I was going to write a few posts this week, and have a backlog of them so I could just post them weekly and not have to think about it for a while. That explains why I'm sitting here on Saturday night staring at a blank page, thinking "Remind me again why I committed to this blog thing?" I don't know how to write anymore. That's probably because I don't read anymore. I'm not actually sure I even know how to read anymore. But I think my Netflix-watching skill has plateaued. You can't get any better at watching TV than I am right now. I figured if I'm going to be a literate human being, and have this silly blog that forces me to get words out of my brain and into writing, maybe I should be putting some written words into my brain first. Reading is docusate sodium for the brain. Generally works in 12-72 hours. The easier, softer way. So I picked up a book the other day. (I'm using "picked up" as a metaphor. I mean I downloaded some books from iBooks, on my iPad. Because who actually "picks up" books anymore. I'm not Amish. Not that I have anything against Amish people. Really. I grew up in a tiny town in central Ohio, a few miles from Amish Country, and, when I was in high school and we had nothing better to do, which was often, we'd go to the mall and watch Amish people try on shoes at Payless. I mean, if shoes were the only part of your wardrobe you really had any choice in, you'd get excited about them, too. And yes, mom, I do know that Amish and Mennonite are not the same thing. I just don't care very much, sorry. You raised me better than this. And just for the record I do still like real books with real paper, and I'm not just saying that because my dad runs a publishing company and I have to say that.) Where was I? I started reading some books. Electronically. Funny memoirs, so I can learn how other people write about their lives in a serious-but-I-don't-take-myself-too-seriously sort of way that does not waste other people's time. The problem with this is that the funniest of funny memoirists have had terribly tragic and/or totally bizarre events happen in their lives, and that's part of what makes them so funny, and gives them so much insight into life. It would be easier to write if I had something absolutely unbelievably appalling to write about. Or at least if I had supernatural wisdom or the secret to making millions of dollars. But really, my life is pretty mundane, I don't know anything much about much of anything, and I promise that absolutely zero of the numbers on the Powerball tickets my coworkers forced me to go in on are going to win us anything. Doesn't mean I won't spend a lot of minutes typing all those numbers into the Texas Powerball website. So, this is awkward. Stop reading now, if you want. You've already clicked on the link to this page, so you have already incremented my pageviews by one, which has already made me feel better about myself. Thanks.
For anyone still reading: Since I haven't had a blog in a while, I guess I can just say what happened since then. So this is what happened, sort of. I graduated from UT with my Master's in Arabic in the fall of 2014 (which was kind of miraculous and also vaguely kind of pointless, given what happened next. And no, I won't "say something in Arabic" for you, especially if you ask me in that tone of voice. You know what I'm talking about.) This degree has done me a whole lot of good: a few months after graduating (that's about how long I could be unemployed before my self-hatred outweighed my fear of job interviews) I got a job in a toxicology lab, using that chemistry degree I swore on my life I'd never use again. (Still working on the "never say never" thing. My "never"s always. fucking. happen.) On my first day in the lab, I met a coworker who grew up in the Arab world. He recited poetry to me, and he wanted to know all about my thesis. He knew all the technical terms for syntactic vowel markers and everything. It was great. We were going to be friends. And we were, for two whole days - my second day was his last day. A few months later, there was somebody else there who spoke Arabic. That was great. We were going to speak Arabic to each other. And we did, and then that person got fired. But it's still good that I know Arabic, because the other day, someone asked me about the word "ra's." As in "Ra's al-Ghul," the supervillain from Arrow. And I got excited for a second and I was like "Oh! That means "Demon's Head" and here's how you say it!" Turns out he didn't actually care about that, he just wanted to know the closest pronunciation in actual English. We decided on "Roz," which makes me cringe a little bit, but I guess that's the best we can do, since... I mean, you try explaining what a "glottal stop" is to someone who only speaks English.
See? I can't even say what has happened to me in the last year and a half in a linear and non-parenthetical fashion. And it's only been like four things. So anyway. This job. When people ask me where I work, I usually say "I work in a toxicology lab in South Austin. We do drug testing for pain management clinics." That way, they respond with "Oh, that's nice. The weather's nice today, huh?" and everyone can just move on. But what is really going on here is I work in a pee lab. I deal with hundreds of different people's piss. Every single day. Sometimes we find things in the cups. There have been worm-looking things. There has been slimy stuff. One time there was a piece of jewelry. Just chillin'. In a cup of pee. I don't want to speculate about what body part that thing was originally attached to or what kind of person lets things get to that point. But I guess it's possible to be on enough drugs that you don't actually notice and/or care if your genital piercing falls out when you're peeing. But I said I wasn't going to speculate. Ummm ok. So. I've learned a lot at this job. I've learned that there is aquamarine pee, lime green pee, lilac pee, cornflower blue pee. We are actually required to take colorblindness tests at this job. Not a joke. I've learned that sometimes people have so much alcohol in their pee that it makes your nose burn, from a couple yards away. And you can't un-smell that. I've learned that when you go to the doctor and have to pee in a cup, you don't actually need to fill it to anywhere near the "fill line." And it's less gross if you don't. Really, you guys, it only takes a few milliliters. So just fill it like halfway and call it a day. And please, tighten the lid down all the way.
When I first started there, all I did was pour pee out of cups and into plastic tubes, put stickers on some other tubes, and type a lot of information into computers. That's what eight years of higher education gets you, kids. Then after a while they let me learn how to operate LC-MS/MS instruments (liquid chromatography - tandem mass spectrometry in case that acronym isn't part of your daily vocabulary), which is neat. Then they made me do actual lab coat science, like with repeater pipets and graduated cylinders and pH meters and potassium hydroxide and acetonitrile. I kind of suck at this part because it's not spreadsheets or data, but I've managed not to screw anything up too badly so far. These days, they let me review LC-MS/MS data, like the final results you get after you've scienced the shit out of all the pee, and report it out to the doctors. Which is also kind of neat, I think, and also easier than the test tube part (but that's probably just because I'm good at numbers and bad at actual objects) and less gross than the pouring pee part, and also you get paid more. But then there's the part where if I make a mistake and I accidentally tell a doctor that a 72-year-old woman is using heroin and she's really not, that's a pretty bad thing. Thank God I haven't done that yet. Because that's probably someone's grandma. So it's a little bit of responsibility, and I have to pay a lot of attention. But still, I hope this is how the rest of life and jobs works, that every time you get promoted, you just get paid progressively more to do progressively easier work, and touch progressively less pee. But I suspect I'm just lucky right now (except for the pee part - I think better jobs should always involve less pee), so I'll take it while I can get it.
I've decided this is long enough for one post. Surely anyone who was reading at the beginning started skimming somewhere around the fourth set of parentheses and won't possibly ready any more after this. So, stay tuned for the other half of what happened. If you want.
For anyone still reading: Since I haven't had a blog in a while, I guess I can just say what happened since then. So this is what happened, sort of. I graduated from UT with my Master's in Arabic in the fall of 2014 (which was kind of miraculous and also vaguely kind of pointless, given what happened next. And no, I won't "say something in Arabic" for you, especially if you ask me in that tone of voice. You know what I'm talking about.) This degree has done me a whole lot of good: a few months after graduating (that's about how long I could be unemployed before my self-hatred outweighed my fear of job interviews) I got a job in a toxicology lab, using that chemistry degree I swore on my life I'd never use again. (Still working on the "never say never" thing. My "never"s always. fucking. happen.) On my first day in the lab, I met a coworker who grew up in the Arab world. He recited poetry to me, and he wanted to know all about my thesis. He knew all the technical terms for syntactic vowel markers and everything. It was great. We were going to be friends. And we were, for two whole days - my second day was his last day. A few months later, there was somebody else there who spoke Arabic. That was great. We were going to speak Arabic to each other. And we did, and then that person got fired. But it's still good that I know Arabic, because the other day, someone asked me about the word "ra's." As in "Ra's al-Ghul," the supervillain from Arrow. And I got excited for a second and I was like "Oh! That means "Demon's Head" and here's how you say it!" Turns out he didn't actually care about that, he just wanted to know the closest pronunciation in actual English. We decided on "Roz," which makes me cringe a little bit, but I guess that's the best we can do, since... I mean, you try explaining what a "glottal stop" is to someone who only speaks English.
See? I can't even say what has happened to me in the last year and a half in a linear and non-parenthetical fashion. And it's only been like four things. So anyway. This job. When people ask me where I work, I usually say "I work in a toxicology lab in South Austin. We do drug testing for pain management clinics." That way, they respond with "Oh, that's nice. The weather's nice today, huh?" and everyone can just move on. But what is really going on here is I work in a pee lab. I deal with hundreds of different people's piss. Every single day. Sometimes we find things in the cups. There have been worm-looking things. There has been slimy stuff. One time there was a piece of jewelry. Just chillin'. In a cup of pee. I don't want to speculate about what body part that thing was originally attached to or what kind of person lets things get to that point. But I guess it's possible to be on enough drugs that you don't actually notice and/or care if your genital piercing falls out when you're peeing. But I said I wasn't going to speculate. Ummm ok. So. I've learned a lot at this job. I've learned that there is aquamarine pee, lime green pee, lilac pee, cornflower blue pee. We are actually required to take colorblindness tests at this job. Not a joke. I've learned that sometimes people have so much alcohol in their pee that it makes your nose burn, from a couple yards away. And you can't un-smell that. I've learned that when you go to the doctor and have to pee in a cup, you don't actually need to fill it to anywhere near the "fill line." And it's less gross if you don't. Really, you guys, it only takes a few milliliters. So just fill it like halfway and call it a day. And please, tighten the lid down all the way.
When I first started there, all I did was pour pee out of cups and into plastic tubes, put stickers on some other tubes, and type a lot of information into computers. That's what eight years of higher education gets you, kids. Then after a while they let me learn how to operate LC-MS/MS instruments (liquid chromatography - tandem mass spectrometry in case that acronym isn't part of your daily vocabulary), which is neat. Then they made me do actual lab coat science, like with repeater pipets and graduated cylinders and pH meters and potassium hydroxide and acetonitrile. I kind of suck at this part because it's not spreadsheets or data, but I've managed not to screw anything up too badly so far. These days, they let me review LC-MS/MS data, like the final results you get after you've scienced the shit out of all the pee, and report it out to the doctors. Which is also kind of neat, I think, and also easier than the test tube part (but that's probably just because I'm good at numbers and bad at actual objects) and less gross than the pouring pee part, and also you get paid more. But then there's the part where if I make a mistake and I accidentally tell a doctor that a 72-year-old woman is using heroin and she's really not, that's a pretty bad thing. Thank God I haven't done that yet. Because that's probably someone's grandma. So it's a little bit of responsibility, and I have to pay a lot of attention. But still, I hope this is how the rest of life and jobs works, that every time you get promoted, you just get paid progressively more to do progressively easier work, and touch progressively less pee. But I suspect I'm just lucky right now (except for the pee part - I think better jobs should always involve less pee), so I'll take it while I can get it.
I've decided this is long enough for one post. Surely anyone who was reading at the beginning started skimming somewhere around the fourth set of parentheses and won't possibly ready any more after this. So, stay tuned for the other half of what happened. If you want.
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