Friday, October 24, 2008

bragging rights and the serious talk

It’s going to be a quick thing here. I thought I would be more efficient at work today but it has been brewing for awhile and I have failed to write.

I have bragging rights!! For the second week in a row!!! Over here !
Thanks Cath!! I at least say something fun to someone. (end self depreciation)

And that brings me to the second thing. Since we are a team of hockey interested scientists [Scienctistmother, Okham and Cath] funny enough we all seem to be Canadian (apart from me, who isn’t a real Canadian) and maybe one who is in the works of becoming a little more Canadian, we have been exchanging words over the last couple of weeks (months? years?)

Anyhow, I have received a bunch of scorn from some since my heart is given to the Maple Leafs. They haven’t done a terrific job so far, but I have been a loyal fan for a number of years so I have trouble quitting now… although the t-shirt has not been worn for awhile, more about that further down.

Granted, I am not “one team girl”. (If you find this disturbing, well go with the analogy of children. You can have several and you love them all equal, or so they all claim… you get the picture. If that doesn’t work for you, well – then I am a sort of small cheating or at least ‘spicing it up” woman. Deal with it.) In fact I have another two teams in my heart since the first crush established itself like 17 years ago. The Canucks are there, after I lived in the city and breathed the air and skied the hills and rode my bike on the other hills…. How could I not be infatuated?!

And then, as of this last year the only US team I think we be possible; the Red Wings. Why? Well, the team is practicly Swedish – wouldn’t you agree? ;) (I will forget that little short desperate fix I needed to have when I got my only hockey game IRL so far in the South, but one does not talk about personal indiscretions so let’s leave that.)

So, with this all should be fine? Right?! I have one major team, and two on the side. One in the East, one in the West and one in the US. All should be fine and dandy. One thinks.

The problem? Well, I would say that the last couple of weeks I have turned into a fan of signs. Like, if you are interested in hockey why don’t you wear a sign of that team on your lapel so I can know that we… well, let’s say, won’t match!?!

Otherwise it can happen that you find, in the middle of an otherwise lovely conversation, that the other person happens to be an old fan of the… Frogs… one of the “other old teams who started the Cup”… the really “we don’t like anything from Toronto so why don’t you crawl back under that rock” (right back at you!*) “well, we’ve won the Cup more times and by the way** when was the last time you won?***

And if the conversation happen to take place during the first meeting between Maple Leafs and The Canadiens (which the Leafs lost with like 1-6) you quickly realize that there will be no repetition of this during the hockey year. Well, not unless you want to have a very sulky person who someone else is prodding and fails to realize exactly how bad mood one can get into. (I am just saying that mocking the loosing team is not, I repeat, not a _safe_ thing to do if you want to still be on the plus side…which for some would be breathing... others be able to eat proper food. I'd better stop now before it turns PG13-rated.)

So, I have six evenings for sure this coming year that I know who I won’t be spending them with. I know that the taunting will end in blood shed, or at least very bruised egos and maybe a remote thrown through the TV. (And that would be a shame since it is such a nice TV.) By the way, no one ever said you had to agree did they? And no one ever said that it was ok to goad or taunt without repercussions, right?

With that note I will leave to do all the things that I have procrastinated about. And dream about three weekends from now when the Talks are over and I am gone from the city and work for a whopping five days!! Schheezz… I can hardly wait. And then I can start planning the vacation home trip in January/Feb/whenever it will be.

*I kind of found the architecture of the city intriguing… but now we were talking about hockey. And that’s serious.
**well, duh. Are we really going to measure it that way? Really?
*** I know. Awhile back.. .like… ehh… 1967? But this is what I mean, you stick with your team anyway. Because they are, your team.

Wednesday, October 22, 2008

that meme about 6 things/quirks

Since Cath was so kind to tag indirectly ;) and I am procrastinating a presentation and somewhat big lab book entry.

1. I hum to myself – mostly when I am concentrating and doing things like pipetting/the dishes or just reading in general. [These things would make me one of the typical people that Ford Prefect talks about in THHGTTG – “people talk so their brain knows they are still alive”] I have also been known to have a tip of my tongue out the side of my mouth when I am focusing on something specifically hard.

2. I blurt out questions at random some times, without explaining my line of thoughts or even warning that I have a question. This can be a bit embarrassing at times, since people don’t see how I got to that question or how on earth did I think of that?! And some would even compare me to the three year old with “how does that work?” and “Why do people do those things?”.

3. I have a certain thing for “sappy movies with no real story” (think Lifetime Movie Network and Lifetime etc). There is something with those college movies and the “look like normal people” thing and some love on the side. Instead of reading Nora Roberts, one can now see like a thousand of the movies. I nearly ended up as a stable/horse girl on a ranch in Montana after one “Nora Roberts marathon weekend” on Lifetime last spring :)

4. I check doors/lights/stove before I leave the house… and the gas in the lab before locking the doors at night. _if_ something were to happen…

5. I love playing strategy boardgames, especially Risk and Britannia that have a secure place in my heart. Nowadays though, it’s mainly Diplomacy online that lures me into the deep trenches… it is easier to play online when you are on the other side of the planet from your former game friends.

6. I can not shower with the bath room door closed if I am alone in the apartment/house since I am too scared that someone will sneak up on me. That also means that the shower curtain will never be completely closed, and that I will see the door way from where I am. Oh, and I never leave the shower curtain completely closed when no one is in the bath/shower either. Surely you have seen “the Shining”?

I don’t like force tagging people… and “random people” wouldn’t be random if they all were people I read blogs from so… following the example; any blogger who reads this who has cats!