Yay!  I put my first piece on Etsy!
http://www.etsy.com/shop/curiouspigeon

Here are some pics I thought I'd share of the projects I've worked on recently.  I'm thinking of starting a store on Etsy to sell my beadwork.

I've been really into my beadwork lately. 

I've been looking at beaders' and artists' blogs and webpages to get inspired, and I found this one: Sand Fibers http://sandfibers.blogspot.com/

They are having a give-away, in case anyone wants to enter for a chance to win a nice beaded triangle pendant.  By posting a comment on the blog, or commenting on Twitter/Facebook/your own blog about it (like I did here), you get entered. 

I have way too many pictures of the kittens to share on LJ, so I made a Flickr account.  I already met my monthly upload limit, and only put up half the pictures and videos I wanted. 

http://www.flickr.com/photos/42801339@N03/

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That's totally  the kitten laying on the keyboard just now.  I think it translates into something like "What is this infernal contraption that takes your attention away from me?  I shall slay it."

Bath time



Finally dry and all worn out

P.S. 

If anyone who happens to read this knows someone who would want to adopt an adorable little boy kitten, please let me know. 

I want the three little guys to find good homes too.  We took the two girls, but it was hard to leave the boys behind, since I love animals and it doesn't take much for me to get attached to them.  If they don't get homes soon, I'm going to volunteer to take them to the Humane Society, where their cuteness should hopefully go a long way to getting them nice new homes. 

KITTENS!!!!!!!!
I have KITTENS!!!!!!!
Plural - 2!

I have it on good authority that they are in fact the cutest things on the planet.  It's my authority, but that's good enough for me. 

The country stray at Paul's parents' had her kittens under their porch - 5 of them, all incredibly cute and healthy-looking for being outdoor babies.  I think they are somewhere between 4-6 weeks old.  Clear, beautiful eyes, curious and playful, and surprisingly docile.  Even Paul thinks they are cute, which is saying something.  Even though he has the allergy, he said I could have one.  I fenagled for 2, arguing that it will be good for them to be buddies.  We went last night and picked out the two girls - who were not too thrilled with being bathed in baby shampoo, put in a tub and driven away from mama. 

But once we got them in the house, ten minutes later we had them nuzzling and purring and front-paw kneading.  They enjoy being petted, and even combed.  I only found 1 flea, so I think they either had only a few, or that Johnson's Baby Shampoo really did the trick.  They seem to be pretty happy, if a little bewildered at times when a new object or noise draws their attention.    They took right to the litter box too, with no accidents on the carpet.  And a well-placed yardstick keeps them from going under the stove again.

Right now they're laying on their little pet-bed, tuckered out from playing and pouncing on each other.  We have them sequestered in the kitchen/dining area/front hallway, and after I've cleaned a little more and kitten-proofed, I'll start letting them out into the rest of the apartment.  But we're keeping them out of the bedroom, for Paul's allergy.  I'm going to vacuum daily, and when the get old enough for it, I can bathe them more regularly with cat shampoos.  We're also going to buy an air filter for the living room.  Hopefully, it will help. 

I was an only child with cats all my life, so these college years without one were hard, especially since I thought I could never have one with Paul's allergy.  So I'm very happy right now. 

I turned in my history thesis this afternoon, and it's like the universe's gift to me for finishing is Jim Butcher at Borders! Yay!

Whoa.  I check my bank balance to see if my federal refund was in, and it showed a pending deposit of $300 more dollars than I was expecting!  They must have made a mistake, I thought.  Cue moral quandry, right?  WRONG.  Apparently I made the mistake, because the irs.gov page said they recalculated my rebate somethingorother for me, and it means I get $300 more than I thought I did.  YAY!!!!

I just sniped someone at the last second on eBay, and I feel kinda bad.  But I really wanted those antique 22/0 beads!  They're so hard to find.

So it turns out I was supposed to meet with my advisor tomorrow, not today at 3:45, and I spent the entire afternoon hanging out on campus for no reason.  Oh well, if I hadn't, I wouldn't have gone to Borders to occupy my time and wouldn't have bought/read Flatland: A Romance of Many Dimensions.

Very awesome little text.  I love it.

I don't think I've ever gotten so sick so fast before.  In the span of yesterday afternoon to evening, I went from feeling fine to having a terrible headache, sore throat and fever.  I just wrapped up in a blanket and tried not to move, because my limbs felt weak and the fever made my skin especially sensitive to anything touching it, particularly in my lower back.  Sleeping was difficult because I couldn't be comfortable.  My headache never went away - it was so bad at one point that it made me dream my head was being smashed between two sliding doors. 

I skipped class to watch Obama being sworn in.  I think his speech was wonderful.  It wasn't epiphanic, but I didn't want it to be.  It was moving, though.  He was strong, and confident, but also realistic.  He seemed to say what he meant, and mean what he said.  And I think that everything he said sounds good for America.  It feels good to be a young voter at this moment, someone who can have genuine hope in the leader they chose.  I don't think he'll swoop in and save the day, but I do think that if he keeps going and sticks to what he said today (if not the exact plans, at least the sentiments underlying them), he'll do us some good.  I hope.

I am very angry right now.  And very stressed.  And very frustrated.  I know I'm biased, and am probably at fault at least to some extent, but...STUPIDMOTHERF*CKINGWHATTHEHELLWHYAREYOUSODUMB?!?!?! 

In the Psychology Department's Student Affairs Office, where the advisors are, there is a kiosk of various pamphlets and handouts regarding the department and its concentrations - this includes a worksheet that lists all the concentration requirements for Psychology majors, so that students can plot out their schedule to meet the requirements.  I declared for Psychology in December 2006.   The department has recently changed the requirements for Psychology majors who declare(d) after 9/2/08.  So now there are two different forms in that kiosk: the concentration worksheet for prior to 9/2/08 and the worksheet for after.  It's the same for the online list of requirements, with a separate link for those who declared prior to 9/08.  Since I declared, I've been using that worksheet to plan out which requirements I've needed to meet and therefore which courses I need to take.  Using that form, I thought I met every requirement, and with the completion of my Psych Honors Thesis this term, I would have everything needed for my Psychology degree.  Because of this, I let myself schedule easy, fun courses for this term, since I thought I had everything else I needed (and for the general 120 credits for LS&A, as well as everything including my second Honors Thesis in MEMS, I do have every requirement settled).  That way, my easy courses would be fun and wouldn't take much attention away from working on my theses.  Efficient, huh?  I thought so. 

Apparently, not so much.  Thinking I had everthing settled based on the concentration worksheets provided for student use by the department, I didn't meet with an advisor until now to deal with my concentration audit for graduation.  Said advisor told me that I still need 3 credits, because right now only 6 of the 34 credits I have for the degree are upper-level lecture/seminar based, instead of the 9 I apparently need.  And when I said "whah..." she said that they know it's not listed anywhere, but it's still been a requirement.  What...the...hell.  Why would they have a requirement but not f*cking list it on the supposedly-available-for-students'-aid concentration worksheet or the webpage that lists all the requirements?  WHY!??! Don't you think that would be something, oh I don't know, important and valuable to make known to students?  To top it off, the advisor said that they know it's not listed on the form, so they made sure to list on the new form for after 9/08 - but they still have the forms for prior to 9/08 available, which is why I've used that one.  If they knew this requirement wasn't on the older worksheet, and so consciously added it to the new one, why would they leave the old worksheet in the same format and not just update it too?  Then I would have caught this a year ago and been fine.

I added it up.  I have taken 42 Psychology credits.  4 don't count because they were a prerequisite for declaring, and another 4 don't count because they were credit/no-credit instead of graded - but they still show effort and work on my part.  Otherwise I've taken 34 countable credits, which I thought I had used to meet the requirements and the 34 total required concentration credits.  I'm not lazy.  I may not be an overachiever in terms of the effort I put in, but I'll admit that I don't have to be.  I get A's and have a good GPA.  I've nearly completed two Honors degrees in just 4 years, which even the Director of the whole Honors department for LS&A thought was admirable.  So if this stupid error messes things up for me, I'm going to be incredibly upset.

 Would people mind taking my survey?  I need at least 8 people to take it for a Psychology assignment.  The questions are posted below. If you do answer the questions, you can either email it to me at ajrobins@umich.edu, or post it as comments to this entry (you can post them anonymously if you want too; and I'll keep all responses anonymous anyway, so the data will be confidential).  I would really appreciate it!

Think about your own habits when you have an important task to complete and use this scale to answer the following 10 questions as honestly as possible:

Not like me at all                                                                        Very much like me

1                        2                        3                        4                        5

1. I often procrastinate by leaving tasks until the last minute.

2. When I procrastinate, I often don’t finish the task on time.

3. When I procrastinate, I feel that the quality of my work suffers.

4. Procrastinating causes me to feel anxiety. 

5. If I didn’t procrastinate, I would feel less anxiety.

6. In the past, procrastinating has had negative effects, but I still continue to do it. 

7. I procrastinate because I choose to do more fun things instead of working on the task.

8. When I do start to work on a task I left to the last minute, I often have to rush because I didn’t leave myself enough time. 

9. While working on tasks I left to the last minute, I often lose confidence in my ability to achieve satisfactory results. 

10. I would describe myself as someone who works well under pressure.

 

Rhino the Hamster seriously made me laugh to the point of tears.