Sequoia National Park

Here are a few pics from the recent Sequoia trip. Note - I did not take these pics, they are a mixture of pics from Jen, Mahru, Ravi, Adam, and Katie.

The first day we went to Crystal Cave. There were some cool formations there.

Later that night, Jen provided us all with glow sticks and the creative juices started to flow...

The second day we hiked a 11 mile round trip hike along the Lake Trail. This near the end - Heather Lake. It was incredible.

Group shot at the Watchtower - part of the Lake Trail.






Here we are hiking back from the Lake Trail. Look how high up we are.

Hiking back along the Lake Trail. Notice how we're going downhill. That means the whole way there we were going UPhill!

Along the trail we came across a Yellow Bellied Marmot! He was cool :)

Sunset at the campground the second night. It really looked that red!

Last, but not least we took a group shot by General Sherman Tree. The largest living thing on earth by volume!

All in all it was a fantastic trip!

Granite Rocks

Since my last post things continue to go well with the guy. He's been in a couple social situations with my friends now. They so far all think he's great. My sister was in town this past week and he met her as well. So far so good! Hopefully I pass similar tests with his friends...

My sis was in town recently and it was a lot of fun having her around. We got to go to the zoo, check out some good restaurants, went shopping, went to the beach, went to Shout House with Justin, and last but not least went to Sequoia National Park with a group of friends. I'll have to post pics shortly.

Sequoia was awesome. I was a bit unsure about going there as I felt it wouldn't compare to Yosemite. Well I was wrong. They are definitely comparable. Yosemite has more impressive waterfalls, but Sequoia is much less populated and still has the incredible granite formations and crazy vistas with trees going for miles and miles. Because it's less populated there's more opportunity to see wildlife. We saw quite a few brown bears - including bear cubs! There were quite a few pretty birds and we also saw a yellow bellied marmot. The highlight of the trip had to have been Heather Lake. We took a 11 mile round trip hike into the sierras and came across this beautiful, pristine, magical lake. Even better, there was a bear there! Fortunately he was across the lake so we didn't have to worry about him. After a grueling constant uphill hike the lake was a welcome resting spot. Well worth the effort!!

I'm really glad I've been missing out on work! In my absence, the lab was flooded! A pipe under the sink broke. The office floors were soaked and there were blowers and dehumidifiers making a whole lot of noise. People are working, but it's chaos and highly annoying! Glad I've been gone!

Fleeting brilliance

I just had my committee meeting yesterday. Should be my last until it's time to defend my thesis! It's nice to not feel like I completely suck at what I'm doing. I still don't want to touch it with a 10 foot pole once I'm out.

On a separate note. One minute I'm brilliant, then next I'm a dumbass. Things continue to go well with the guy. He met my roommate the other day. Then yesterday he asked if he got the roommate approval. I said yes. I also said "I'm glad because it would suck if my roommate didn't like my boyfriend". FOOT - ENTER - Mouth. In my defense I had been drinking at the time that I said this. I didn't *really* mean it that way either. More like 'boyfriend' is easier to say than 'guy I'm seeing'. And if I did have a bf, it would suck if my roomie didn't like him. Anyway I apologized profusely (which probably made it worse). Luckily, he didn't flinch at it. He brushed it off jokingly that I was trying to put a 'label' on him. So probably not a big deal. I just wanted to kick myself.

WOOT!

Things are going awesome.

I'm stoked!

It's all good..

I was originally disappointed that I hadn't heard from Ecology guy after he got back into the states. I had thought he had returned, was in town for a day, and headed back out to Mexico. He called me this morning. He arrived to LA late last night and the Mexico trip was canceled and he invited me to spend the day with him and his friends in LA. I had to decline cuz I'm too friggin busy with my committee meeting. But I'm glad/relieved that he ended up calling as soon as he got back.

It made me realize that what was missing was security. I don't know enough about what he feels/thinks about me to be confident that he'll call when he gets back. The confidence however is building. It's hard to deal with unknowns. Especially when I've been burned in a similar way several times in the past. (The past couple years and 3 failed relationships have led me to believe that trips are the kiss of death for an early relationship, then again the trips were always mine).

Anyway I'm glad that he's back and that he called. Looks like we'll try to get together this week if I can get away from working on my important meeting next week. (maybe if i stopped blogging...)

Too busy!

Ecology guy has been overseas and I haven't heard from him. I'm guessing he's email deprived in some remote location. Kind of a bummer, but what can you do...

On the other hand, I've been way too busy to emotionally worry about the above thankfully. A good friend is leaving San Diego permanently tonight so there's been several 'good-bye' events in her honor. I've had my extracurricular responsibilities, friends birthdays, cat sitting, and last but not least I've been stressing out over my thesis committee meeting. I found out about a week ago that I'm going to have it on July 6th. This will be the meeting that tells me what I need to do in order to graduate! Yikes. So high stress all around.

In the meantime at one of the going away party my lab mates and I went to the top of the Ivy Hotel to this rooftop bar called Eden. Here's a pic from that night. Don't we look fabulous?!

Yum!

I just came back from a fabulous dinner. One of my cousins graduated with his MBA today (congrats!!) so afterwards we celebrated by going out to dinner at La Bastide Bistro.
Despite being in a strip mall it had a great atmosphere and tasty food. It's a bit pricey, but the quality is great. One thing I have to rave about was the salad I had:

Goat Cheese Croutons, Apple, Lavender Honey, Pine Nuts, Walnut, Truffle Dressing $13

The goat cheese croutons were actually covered in the lavender honey. They honey sort of hardened over it and there were a few crushed nuts over it. And the croutons were really just slices of bread. The lavender honey covered goat cheese was one of the best things I've ever tasted. It was a perfect complement of sweet and salty and the crouton provided a bit of crunch to the creamy cheese. To die for. I've since checked the internet for how to recreate this at home and have found that the combination is fairly common. Additionally I've found that lavender honey is made by honeybees that feed on lavender! Neat.

The other thing worth noting was my cousin's dessert. He had a raspberry sorbet which I was fortunate enough to taste. Typically I find sorbets boring. This was certainly an exception. Each bite tasted like 1000 raspberries exploding with flavor in your mouth. Not to mention it was nice cold and creamy too.

I haven't come home that satisfied by a meal in a long time. Yum.

Going with the flow...

Since my last post things have been going really well between this guy and I. He even met a couple of my friends (who thought he was great). Not sure where things are headed, but so far things are good and I'm having fun. Things will have to progress somewhat slowly because he's once again out of town. This time for about a month - yikes! It's fine because I've got a ton on my plate with work and other activities. I'm a little bummed about it, but I'm mostly excited that he gets to check out somewhere new and then tell me all about it when he gets back. (assuming things are where they left off...)

In other news - I recently got a great career opportunity. I had an informational interview last week with someone who does PR. We got along really well. She understood how tough grad school can be on a person who doesn't want to do research any more. So she offered me an opportunity to work on a project with her company. This will be a great foot in the door for me. Not to mention I'll get some real life experience with PR and make sure it's what I really want to do. From what I can tell this project will involve me helping to plan a party and facilitate a relationship between this company and a non-profit I already volunteer with. I'm excited to see where this goes!

Success!

I thought that my blogs about my experiences on eHarmony would be about bad dates, weird-o guys, stupid things guys have said, amusing anecdotes, and possibly even reviews of where we went.

Obviously that has not been the case. Unlike my previous experience on yahoo personals, where I went out on multiple dates with multiple guys, my experience on eHarmony has been different. I've been out with only one guy and all the other options have kind of sucked.

Fortunately the one guy has been great! We went out again last night (3rd date). My positive outlook after our 2nd date has been reconfirmed. Honestly it's refreshing and I'm pretty stoked on it. What's really cool is that I'm not wondering what he's thinking. He's pretty open which helps me feel comfortable enough to be open as well. What was obvious from last nights date was that something is there and it's mutual.

Who knows, things could fizzle out in a few weeks, we could get to know each other better and realize we don't really like each other all that much and that he's not who I thought he was and vice versa. But maybe that won't happen...

finally...

Date tonight! Woot!

update...

I've become like every other blogger. All gung-ho in the beginning, writing an entry every day only to become sporadic at best. Oh well...

Honestly I've been feeling somewhat negative lately so I don't really feel like imposing my self pity on my readers. School of course is the main culprit (re the previous 2 posts).

Things have been slow with ecology guy. Still haven't seen him since our last date. However, we've made plans to get together this Thursday. Woo hoo! Hopefully things are still good. I'm not really sure what I should be thinking at this point.

One thing I've been excited about lately is the Women in bioScience conference I'm helping to organize with AWIS (the Association for Women in Science). After quite a few months it's finally going to happen this Saturday. I've really enjoyed learning how something like this is put together and working with different people to get it done. It's nice to see your own contributions towards something in place and recognized. I've helped put together the brochure that every attendee will receive and I've helped get the word out about the event. I'm psyched to see the culmination of every one's hard work.

On a lighter note I got my hair cut. I went to this place in Hillcrest called Gila Rut. My roommate recommended it to me. For the price of a standard salon hair cut you also get a quick massage and facial! Pretty sweet if you ask me. Since it was my first time the make up artist did my make up for free as well. It was a good experience! I recommend it...

drama

Sorry. Sometimes a person feels overly dramatic.
The issues still exist, but I'm less upset by them.
Taking the day off and sitting at the beach in 80F weather helps.

Piled Higher and Deeper. It's true what they say.

This post has nothing to do with boys.

It's 9:22AM and I am dreading going back there.
The only thing that really gets me going back are the people.
Fortunately I don't have to worry about tensions with coworkers.
That's the one upside.

Imagine going to a place where you have to fight to keep your head above water.
Where you try and try and try and still fail.
Where the only way out is to keep on trying.
Where the thing you're trying to accomplish isn't even all that exciting or interesting.
Where even IF you were to one day succeed you would never think that it was all worth it.
I feel like the mythological guy who has to keep pushing a boulder up a hill only to have it roll back down on him as soon as he gets close.

How important is it really to finish getting this damn Ph.D.? Really the only reasons I stick with it is because I don't have a well formulated Plan B. Once I leave there's no turning back. If I go on without it I'm afraid I'll discover I really needed it. I fear limiting myself. Then again in some ways I'm limiting myself by proceeding with it.

Even if I do finish it, I don't think my thesis will be particularly good. I'm afraid of facing all my friends, colleagues, and committee in my thesis defense and having them all talk behind my back about how I don't really deserve it (they do it to others, I don't feel I'm immune). I know I've worked at it, have had bad luck, and don't want to be a scientist anyway. That doesn't make it all better. I'd lie if I said I didn't care. It's an awful feeling to put years of your life towards something to have it not respected by anyone, not even yourself. To have it feel like it's for nothing (or at least not 6-7 years of ones life worth). I'm so incredibly tired of trying to figure out what I want to do next with or without the Ph.D. I hate being 30 and having such little direction.

And now I have to somehow find the motivation to go back there and do it another day.

the waiting game & TOOL!!

So I decided to make the next move and email him. I felt like the ball was in my court. We went out Sunday and I emailed him Wednesday afternoon and basically said I had a good time, told him what I was up to this week, and asked if he wanted to get together over the weekend. Now I wait... While I wait I wonder if I should have been more general and say 'get together sometime' instead of 'this weekend'. I wonder if this weekend is too soon... Guess I'll find out!

Last night I went to see TOOL last night at Cox Arena. DAMN they're amazing. Everything was awesome about it - the set list, the visuals, the music, the crowd energy. The concert was originally supposed to be held a couple months ago, but the drummer injured his arm and they rescheduled it for May. Last night he stopped to ice his arm for a little while and then went right back into drumming. Despite the injury he was still incredible.

Honestly I didn't realize how much I liked the new album until I heard it live. I liked it fine, but I felt it was missing something I used to experience listening to previous Tool albums. I think I'm over that now :)

next move?

After the first date it was easy to know what to do next. His birthday was 2 days later so it was obvious that I should send him a happy birthday message. Then he left for a foreign land for a few weeks so it was obvious that the next move would be his upon his return. Now we've been on date #2 and I'm not sure what to do.

Who contacts who first? How long should we wait to hang out next?

I had a date this past sunday...

So since my last post he canceled on me Saturday night b/c he had to finish up some work stuff, however he did ask to see if I was free on Sunday. So I said that was fine and suggested doing something during the day vs. at night. This was my original intent from the beginning - I figure doing something outdoorsy would lead to more easy conversation and be somewhat different than our first date (which was dinner). He wanted me to call him Saturday so we could solidify plans. I HATE the phone!! I can do the in person thing alright, but on the phone I always feel like a blubbering idiot. ugh.

Anyway Justin told me to "grow a pair" so I called and it was fine. He sounded equally bad on the phone as I did so it probably sounded like 2 geeks trying to communicate.

Sunday we went to Cabrillo to check out the tide pools. I thought I was all smart checking that low tide was at 2:20 and figured we should meet up around 2 to check them out. What I didn't realize that it's better to go a little earlier and watch the tide go out vs. having the tide come back in. Oh well - spring/summer isn't exactly the best time for tide pooling anyway. Fortunately we made the best of it. We saw some sea lions out in the ocean catching fish, and in the tide pools we saw a variety of different organisms (which he was able to name, since he used to work at a children's museum). Conversation flowed fairly easily. We both were a little cautious about the slippery rocks joking about who would be the first to fall on their ass. I saw an interesting puddle. I knelt down to get a closer look. Next thing I knew I was in the f'n puddle. It was excellent comedy...

Afterwards he was hungry so asked if I wanted to go get some food. (For future reference, cabrillo tide pools close at 4:30 and the whole park closes at 5!) So we drove around, ended up in OB and got some food there. It was good, I didn't feel like a total moron every time I opened my mouth to speak. He found out I liked heavy metal and had a somewhat adventurous time in college. He was surprised and had previously thought I was a nice demure girl. HA! I think he was ok with it. Likewise he surprised me. I had assumed he was kind of too goody-goody for me and turns out he also had a somewhat adventurous time in college. He actually does drink at times (likely more than 'several times a year' as he wrote in his profile). We actually both had a couple beers with dinner. Relief!

Anyway all in all I think things went well. I left in a good mood and willing to see him again. We didn't set plans per se, but I would be surprised if there wasn't a date #3 in our future.

update...

Woah, I just realized it's been 10 days since my last post! Yikes. I'm becoming like everyone else who can't keep up with their blogs.

Mostly I haven't been writing because not too much has been happening. How many times can I write about eHarmony sending me lame matches?

Ecology guy is back from India. I think we have a date on Saturday. Here's how the events have so far unfolded.
-he wrote me back when he got back saying he was back and asked if I wanted to get together this week.
-I responded saying yes and told him when I was free, asking when was good for him
-He wrote me back and said Saturday night.
-I responded saying yes, and suggested going to an improv comedy club followed by a bar.

I wrote him last Wednesday morning I think. It's Friday morning now. Hopefully I hear from him soon so we can finalize plans.

Of course everything sounds ok, but I still get anxious about this kind of stuff. I'm not obsessing over it, but I'm still kind of affected. I wonder about stuff like whether or not the slow email communication means things are going to fizzle out.

eHarmony has finally improved somewhat. After about 3 weeks of one sucky match every 3-4 days I got about 5 matches today! What the hell? I wrote to one of them. The others were okay (except for one with a kid), but I wasn't that moved by what they had to day.

An email from India?!

Get this - I just got an email from ecology guy today. So if you remember he went to India for ~3 weeks and said he'd contact me when he got back. I figured if all was well I'd hear from him within a week of his return. So imagine how surprised I was when I got an email from New Delhi today! The email was totally appropriate. Basically saying he was having a good time, would be heading back in a couple days, asked me how i was, and said he'd tell me all about his trip when he sees me.

Cool right?!

Maybe it's a good thing everyone else on eHarmony is being lame...

Getting discouraged...

So the "awesome" guy I was talking about in the previous post never wrote. So he's not so awesome after all.

I feel like the majority of the matches I'm being sent are:
- sappy romantics (the kind that make me fear crappy poetry)
- men with children
- really short men - I'm 5'2", so finding a man taller than me should not be that much to ask.
- profiles with no pictures (I mean seriously, low lame is that?)
- older men. Age doesn't *really* matter, but if they're looking like they could be my father.....

I guess I've already gone through all their good options and now I'm left with who ever they pull out of their ass. I guess I have to wait until someone new signs up and gets sent my way. I sort of had a similar problem with yahoo personals when I did it a few years back. In the beginning there were tons of options. I went out with a few guys, it was fun. Then after a while there'd be no one new to choose from. With online dating if you don't find someone awesome in the first month, the odds you'll find someone go down dramatically.

I have my current subscription until June 4th. If things don't improve I doubt I'll bother renewing it...

New matches - finally!

eHarmony sent me 3 new matches today. Two looked about 10 years older than they actually were. I closed those out. Judge me if you like. The third was AWESOME. Reasonably attractive, close to my age, and he had the best comments on his page. He doesn't have straight answers to questions (I know I'm a freak for liking this). I like this because I don't have straight answers to any of eHarmony's dumb ass questions. I end up coming up with something, but what I really think is an over analyzed version of whatever I wrote. He just wrote the over-analyzed version - but it's not an annoying over analysis. Wow that must make no sense to anyone normal.

Here's the kicker. He shares the same name as ecology guy and also studies wildlife! Yikes. I hope they don't know each other/work together. This guy put he was an environmental consultant, so I'm thinking they don't work together.

Anyway I wrote to him, hopefully he writes me back.

Today I will spend the day crushing frog eggs. Life is good.