And now for something completely different.

Oklahoma LGBT pride in front of the capitol building. I am astonished.

1. A raccoon chewed two huge holes in one of my panniers.
2. Biking down Westlake, someone grabbed my arm and said "Hey! What the hell?!" It was my friend Andre. I run into him all the time at bars and coffee shops.... in Oklahoma City.
3. Went up the space needle in the evening. The person in front of me in line was my high school prom date. Haven't seen him for at least six years.
4. Dreamed that Obama came to class with me and gave everyone hugs.

I may have just developed a huge crush on Rachel Maddow.

S-bear and I are leaving for Peru veeeeery early in the morning. I'll post travel stories to the other blog when I have the time. See you kids back here in nine days or so :).

Yaaaaay!
We've been trying to start a recycling program at school all year, and this was in my inbox today:

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Director of OUHSC General Services, has agreed to try the aluminum and plastic recycling plan we discussed. Because this requires additional work for the housekeeping staff, we must make it as “painless” as possible for them. We understand the following:

1. You will provide appropriate containers for each module [divided so one side will be for aluminum and one side for plastic]
2. Housekeeping will place plastic bags in each container
3. When bags are full (or as needed), housekeeping will take bags and combine them into a large plastic bag and take the large bag to the basement (we have given them permission to keep the aluminum cans if they choose to do so)
4. They also will take the bags from the East & West Lecture Halls.
5. You will provide my staff with the telephone number of the recycling company so they can call for pick up when we have at least 6 large bags of recyclables.

I also spoke with our Environmental Health and Safety Officer. She tells me that if the cost is reasonable, they hope to include aluminum and plastic in the next contract (July 1). She must get some pricing info from the bidding companies and see if the administration will pay for it.

I hope this works out; however, please understand that they are willing to try this but if there are any problems they will stop.

…and I am very proud of all of you for working so hard on this project all year.

Want fertility help? Go to a Catholic obstetrician. The woman I'm shadowing right now is committed to helping people get pregnant. I've never met anyone so convinced that everyone should have babies, lots of babies, and damned if she'll let any fertility problem at all get in the way of those babies.

Stem-cell transplant wipes out HIV

"A man may have been cured of both HIV and leukaemia after receiving a stem-cell transplant from a donor who is genetically resistant to HIV." - From today's Nature News

To recreate the experience of 'being in' an Oklahoma tornado, set off a large siren somewhere in your house, then watch this video of my local afternoon weather.

It's February.

My morning ride - 70 degrees F and sunny with a 20 mph tailwind.

So amazing.

"The concept of a bicycle race across America can be traced back to newspaperman George Nellis, who in 1887 crossed the USA on a 45-pound iron high-wheel bicycle with no gears and with pedals attached directly to the front wheel. Following the railroad routes across the country, he made the crossing in just under 80 days."

From the Race Across America Website

On this day a few years ago, something very important happened.


<3 <3 <#

A brief rant, brought to you by physiology lecture:

The fact that doctors are not, as a general rule, scientists, is incredibly frustrating sometimes. I'm going through the section of our syllabus on blood flow through peripheral circulation, and there ARE NO UNITS. For anything. What the hell does a velocity of '2' even mean?

The squirrel who lives outside my window has snow and little icicles in its fur!

From WikiAnswers: "About the only sure way to tell the sex of a squirrel is to turn it over and look."

I just spilled an entire bottle of pancake syrup on the brick floor in the kitchen.

Some things in life are difficult to undo.

ounepaltrip.webs.com

Today, I learned that biking when it's 20 F (not counting windchill) is really painful, that I need thicker gloves, and that balaclavas are awesome but sort of hard to breathe through sometimes.

Zoom!

Really good hangover breakfasts are incredibly comforting. I think it's partly because the frowzy, vaguely headachey state is similar enough, across hangovers, that once I'm contentedly munching something tasty and no longer feel like death, the hangoveriness brings back a parade of hangover breakfasts past, and I get to remember trips out for pho or vegan biscuits and gravy, slow walks to school from the essential baking co. with coffee and croissants, and various attempts to scramble everything left in the fridge and cover it with cheese (or would it be better on a pancake?), all conducted in excellent company.

Let me tell you what I think of bicycling. I think it has done more to emancipate women than anything else in the world. It gives women a feeling of freedom and self-reliance. I stand and rejoice every time I see a woman ride by on a wheel...the picture of free, untrammeled womanhood.

—Susan B. Anthony