February 14, 2007

• Happy Valentine's Day!

  Well, I've had a mostly crap day today.  It has nearly nothing to do
  with the fact that it's V-Day, even though I generally despise the
  holiday.  There are some good things about today, though:

  1) It gives me an excuse to send people mail!  I love sending mail! 
  This is also an excuse to go to Hallmark.  I know Hallmark gets blamed
  for Valentines hoopla (I'm one of the blamers, too, don't worry), but I
  really do like Hallmark.  Their cards are hilarious, and their stickers
  are super cute.  I consistently spend large amounts of money there. 
  2) It has inspired people to work to end violence against women, which is always a great cause.
  3) It also inspired the Red Scarf Project.  I didn't learn about it early enough this year to participate, but I plan to do so next year.

  I love what the Harlot had to say about today.  Some excerpts are:

  Don't get me wrong...I wholeheartedly
  agree with love. Especially love of family, love of friends and love of
  ethics and fairness, but on careful reflection it seems to me that
  romantic love, given completely free rein and allowed to run wild
  through civilization, has been responsible for more poor decision
  making, wars, kidnapping, obsession, suicide, low self-esteem and
  generalized rack and ruin than any other human emotion in the whole
  world...and this belief has led me to a significant level of caution
  around the sort of love that Valentines day sells wholesale.
  ...
  All I'm trying to do around here is to make sure that someday, when (my
  daughters) gaze into their lovers eyes and the lacy and ruffled world
  of romantic love unfurls around them, that somewhere in the back of
  their heads, a little voice (it will probably be mine) says "Don't
  forget to have a bank account in your own name, cupcake."

  Today, I've been studying all day, and it's far slower and more
  difficult than anticipated.  I really like abstract algebra, but it's
  gotten quite hard lately.  Also, I knocked a plate off my desk in my
  room onto the base of my chair, and it shattered everywhere.  Shards
  went 6 feet in each direction (!)
  - into my yarn stash, into the suitcase from Nebraska that I haven't
  quite unpacked yet, towards my bathroom door, and even out into the
  living room!  I spent almost 20 minutes (of good study time) picking up
  shards off the floor, out of places they'd landed (including into a
  pair of shoes...my room is really messy right now...), and attempting
  to vacuum them up.  Add to that coldness outside (I know 31 degrees
  doesn't compare to what's happening north of here, but that's really
  cold for us!), more sleep issues, and general Valentines grumpiness,
  and you get a pretty blah day.

  And now, I really really need to get back to work.  This has been a nice study break.   I leave you with today's XKCD:

  

  • 11:54 pm
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