Nov 08 2008

Twilight by Stephanie Meyer

Category: Uncategorized — podrey @ 4:04 pm

Stephanie Meyer is the author of a recent book club select, The Host, which i loved. I wanted to read more of this author’s work. I had heard a little about The Twilight Saga, but i have to admit i became determined to give it a shot when my mom told me that they were “like Harry Potter for girls.” You see, my mom doesn’t like Harry Potter, despite never having read the books. And since i loved the Harry Potter books, hey, why not give Twilight a try?  Just for spite.

Twilight is the first book in the Twilight Saga, which currently has four books. It tells how Bella, a 17-year old junior in high school, transfers to Forks, Washington to live with her dad. There, she meets the mysterious Edward Cullen. He is more beautiful than normal, his eyes change color, and he frequently misses school without seeming to suffer consequences from the administration or to is grades. His family is also equally strange. It turns out, he is a vampire! Bella is not phased, and Twilight describes their budding relationship. It is a new twist on love. Meyer does a superb job describing high school emotions and insecurities, as well as capturing the euphoria of new love.

The storyline is so romantic and yet also so tragic. No wonder the hearts of women everywhere have been captured. So much so, that many Twilight fans invade the real Forks, Washington on Bella’s birthday to celebrate.

Maybe next year i’ll join them. I am very much in love with the characters after just one book. I’m ready for more!

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Nov 08 2008

Goodbye, Beetle Baby

Category: Uncategorized — podrey @ 11:59 am

Beetlejuice is 13 years old. I guess i should say was, because he was put to sleep last week.

Beetlejuice was my cat. My cow cat, i liked to call him, b/c he was black and white calico. He was a gift from my then-boyfriend John at the end of my junior year of high school. Beetlejuice had a brother, too – Tigger, who died several years ago. I loved those kitties.

Tigger was orange, and it seemed the only appropriate name for him. Beetlejuice was named after the red star in the Orion constellation, Betelgeuse. Alas, the vet spelled it the more obvious way so Beetlejuice he became.

They were only “mine” for a little over a year. And then i went to college, and pets were not allowed in the dorms. And then i had a series of apartments, and all of my roommates were allergic to cats. It seemed that i would never get to claim those cats as “mine” again.

But they were always mine, in a way. It was one of the joys of going home to visit my parents, to get to see my kitties. To hold them, and have them purr appreciatively at my throat.

Beetlejuice was a scared-y cat. When new people came into the house, you wouldn’t see him for an hour, until he was sure everything was alright. But, when he was sure, he’d come out, and climb onto your lap whether you wanted him to or not.

My favorite story about Beetlejuice occured when i was away at school. My brother Adam wanted Beetlejuice to sleep in his room, so he brought the cat inside and shut the doors, away from his litter box. In the early morning, Beetlejuice was saying “meow! meow! meow!” but Adam did not want to wake up. Adam finally awoke to the feeling of heavy body on his chest (Beetle was no lithe kitty – he was a fat cat). And he was thinking “aww how sweet” and opened his eyes. As soon as he did, Beetle looked right at him, and then Adam felt something very warm all around him. Yes, Beetlejuice peed on him. Gross. But funny! (if it wasn’t you.)

Despite this incident, Adam took Beetlejuice in a few years ago, and then Beetlejuice was only 30 miles away instead of 230. I enjoyed seeing him when i could visit. A few months ago, Adam & Nora moved to Chicago, and couldn’t take Beetlejuice with them. He stayed with their roommate Lizzie, who took great care of him.

About a month ago, Beetlejuice stopped eating suddenly. Lizzie took him to the vet, and we found out he had cancer. After a biopsy, they determined there wasn’t anything they could do. It was very sad. He was kept on medication and out of pain until Wednesday of last week.

It’s awful, losing pets. They add so much joy to your life. I will miss Beetlejuice. But i am glad i got to know him.

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Nov 05 2008

When You are Engulfed in Flames by David Sedaris

Category: Uncategorized — podrey @ 1:20 pm

When You are Engulfed in Flames was my book club’s choice for September, and i only recently got around to finishing it. It was in high demand at the library.

I read Dress Your Family in Corduroy and Denim before i read this latest book, and i liked the earlier book much better. I liked reading about his youth in NC and about his family. Flames is primarily about Sedaris’ adult life living in France. It was still good, and the stories were still interesting; they just did not capture me the way Dress Your Family did.

I did get a very large kick out of the chapter where he was mistaken for an exotic house cleaner, and also the chapter about April the spider.

I may pick up another of Sedaris’ books one day, but i’m going to take a break from him for awhile.

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Nov 04 2008

Weird Day at Work

Category: Uncategorized — podrey @ 11:59 pm

Last week i loved my job. I like my job most of the time, actually, and i know that makes me one of the lucky ones.

Monday i hated it. It was a day with a difficult problem, and i didn’t know what was wrong, but was fairly confidant i had done my part correctly. And yet there was still a blame game email thread going around, and very public CYA maneuvers being perpetrated by the other party involved. It was assumed i had fucked up. It was stressful.

Yesterday was simply strange. I was absolved of any blame from Monday’s email fight when the main person i was arguing with was revealed to have neglected two very routine tasks. Very routine. I am relieved in a way, since it wasn’t my fault. But also pretty mad, that someone could be SO confidently wrong that he asked me to RE-DO a three-day task, and he was the one who had messed up.

Another strange thing that happened. I was asked to do a task, which i had completed Monday, and informed the interested party that i was done. But yesterday he asked me three times if i was still working on it. Each time i said no, you can start your part now, but he kept asking. How is one supposed to react to that? Twilight zone.

I’m hopeful that the job will soon turn back into the one that i love. Bad days and weird days aren’t doing it for me.

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Nov 04 2008

Cloning Woolly Mammoths?

Category: Uncategorized — podrey @ 1:18 pm

I recently read this article about how scientists were able to clone mice that had been frozen for 16 years. Apparently, cloning is difficult using frozen tissue, unless it has been injected with chemicals to prevent the cells from bursting.

Wakayama’s team dug out some mice that had been kept frozen for years and whose cells were indisputably damaged. Freezing causes cells to burst and can damage the DNA inside. Chemicals called cryoprotectants can prevent this but they must be used before the cells are frozen.

They tried using cells from several places and discovered that the brains worked best. This is a bit of a mystery, as no one has yet cloned any living mouse from a brain cell.

However, now that they have successfully cloned some frozen mice, the scientists have set their sights on possibly cloning woolly mammoths.

Mammoths may be the extinct animals that scientists would be most likely to try to clone, as many of the animals have been found preserved in ice.

In July 2007 Russian scientists discovered the body of a baby mammoth frozen in the Arctic Yamalo-Nenetsk region for as long as 40,000 years.

“It remains to be shown whether nuclei can be collected from whole bodies frozen without cryoprotectants and whether they will be viable for use in generating offspring following nuclear transfer,” Wakayama’s team wrote.

OK, so obviously it is not yet known if this is even possible. But it sounds like they’re going to try.

I’m not sure i think that is a good idea! Cloning is already a very touchy topic, so i won’t go into that. But even if you agree with cloning, natural selection chose to eliminate the woolly mammoth. Who are we to play God and bring back an extinct species? And where do you draw the line? I can easily see a Jurassic Park scenario taking place if, for example, they could figure out how to clone dinosaurs. It would be a huge moneymaking opportunity. Are the woolly mammoths any different? What would be the purpose in cloning them – would they be put in a zoo and exist only for people to gawk at?

I’m all in favor of science and experiments, but for some reason, this just seems wrong to me.

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