Yeah. Blog post. I got nothin'.

Kids, this has not been a good self-esteem week for Katy.

Let us observe a moment of silence for your hopes that this would be a funny blog post.

So. I decided to make a list of things that I do well to shore up my flagging happy.

Item #1: I am really good at being amused.

"Katy," you say as you tap your pipe thoughtfully against your cheek whilst reclining in your wingback chair next to the fire, "I'm not so sure that the ability to be amused is a skill, per se." Well, friend-who-I'm-now-imagining-with-a-lush-mustache, I am a pro. When I find something that makes me laugh, it makes me laugh for DAYS, generally at inopportune moments like while sitting in the middle of lecture.

This gem tickled my humerus (humorous; funny bone; OH THE PUNS) last week and thinking about it still makes me giggle:

Y'know, you should really quit smoking that pipe. It's detrimental to your health and makes you smell like a re-hydrated squirrel mummy.

I also am prone to take something that I think it funny way too far. MOVING ON.

Item #2: I taught my dog to shake.

I've been trying off and on (mostly unsuccessfully) to teach Tess this for most of the semester. BOO YAH Y'ALL.

Okay, we're still working on it. But progress has been made!

Item #3: I'm super nerdy.

Dear friends, I have a confession. I am a nerd of brobdingnagian proportions. Example: I know the meaning of the word "brobdingnagian," where it comes from, and have used it in every day conversation. I am also excited for "The Secret World of Arietty" even though it is dubbed (boo times infinity) because I loved The Borrowers growing up and the movie is being released by Studio Ghibli.

Don't know what the frigamarole I'm talking about? Wikipedia is your friend. Also, reading Howl's Moving Castle was much better than watching the movie.

That wasn't really a confession; I wear my nerdiness on my sleeve for the most part. I'm proud of this one because, to paraphrase John Green, I am allowed to be uninhibitedly enthusiastic about stuff I like which is pretty much the best thing ever.

Item #4: I'm good at making up words.

Frigamarole: it's a mash-up of "frick" and "rigamarole." I'm not sure that that makes sense at all, but I'm easily amused, remember?

Item #5: I make delicious stews.

I was looking back on all of the things I've tried to make over the past year, and most of the things I've put into the "I'm-burning-my-mouth-but-don't-care-because-it's-so-damn-good" category are stews or stew-like things.

Also? Tomatillos are awesome. Who knew?

Item #6: I can read.

I'm stealing this one (thanks Mr. Green). I can read, and I enjoy reading. What's more, I enjoy talking about what I've read and listening to what other people think about those same books. The written word is an amazing thing; some stories have persisted in print form, essentially unchanged, for hundreds of years.

I'll just let the enormity of that sink in AND BLOW YOUR MIND.

The funny has been revived! Maybe? A little bit? If all efforts at resuscitating the humor failed, you should watch this. And then decide what size coffin humor needs. He was a rotund sort of fellow.

DABDA. See? I paid attention in psych lecture.

The Kubler-Ross model as applied to studying for pulmonary physiology:

1. Denial

"I'll study pulmonary later. The concepts aren't THAT difficult."

2. Anger

"I'M GOING TO KILL THIS PROBLEM SET WITH A RUSTY SPORK AND SET IT ON FIRE."

3. Bargaining

"Alright, after I get through this lecture I'm going to spend just five minutes on Pinterest."
*An hour passes*

"Well, shit."

4. Depression

"I am the worst. Vet student. Ever. If I don't learn these equations, I'm going to kill my patients. Probably as soon as they walk into the exam room. DOOOOOOOOM."

5. Acceptance (or more accurately, apathy)

"Whatever. I'm going to write a blog post."

Yes, master.

I would be limping around the room while hunched over with one eye squinched up if I weren't sitting in a large lecture hall full of people.

Bad news: I deleted the mummified squirrel picture at some point. Good news: the development of the lungs and subsequent indentation of the coelomic cavity in a developing mammal looks like Darth Vader's fighter from Star Wars.

Aaand dog lung.

Update: I thought that I remembered where I tossed the squirrel mummy; turns out I was right, but thanks to the amount of rain we've gotten since the time I tossed it out there it is no longer a mummy. It looks like dirty wet leather with bits of fur and some bones sticking out.

It was pretty gross. So I took a picture and set it on top of a fence post to dry out a bit and serve as a warning to all of the other squirrels.

YOU'RE WELCOME.

I'm freezing me bits off! Y'know, if I had bits.

Do you ever suddenly realize that you are a far stranger person than you originally thought? I certainly do. Quite often. I keep running across these funny little blips of post ideas that I've written down. None of them have come to fruition (obviously), but they make me tilt my head a bit.

"Things that make me feel old - flipping my mattress (haven't done it yet, but I've though about it and thinking about flipping a mattress... well I just don't know)"

"A lemming has taken up residence in my sinuses. When it rains the little bastard breaks out his hammer and chisel and starts working on my turbinates. I think he's probably recreated some of the greats - Michaelangelo's David, the Venus de Milo, the Thinker, etc. I bet he could make some pretty sweet nose hair topiaries too."

"Over break, I proved to myself that I could tell the difference between an ostrich and a goose as well as the differences between a walrus and a rhinocerous. I think I'm ready for my DVM now. (So close, Amy. You were so close.)"

I vote the middle as the strangest. To be fair, I was probably in pain and on large amounts of decongestants at the time.

Moving on.

Check this out.

What IS that, you say? Well, friends and neighbors, that would be my thermometer ma-jigger that lets me know what the ambient temperature is both outside and inside my house. Yep, it is 55 degrees inside. This is something that won't be fixed until tomorrow morning.

So I'm making cookies. Because the oven is basically a space heater that can produce tasty nommables. And baking is way more fun than studying pharmacology.

Procrastination is sweet. It tastes like chocolate-and-butterscotch chips.

My dog, in addition to being my fuzzy spaceheater, has taken it upon herself to be the finder of random sort-of-edible things in the backyard (for a dog, I mean; I wouldn't want to ingest anything she finds).

INSERT CUTE DOG PICTURE HERE. Oh wait, that's what I just did.

The first was a mummified squirrel earlier this year. I have a picture because I thought it was kind of neat, but I am trying to remember that not everyone is as thrilled with animal carcasses as I am. I also have a video of a fresh dog lung being inflated that I took last week which was TOTALLY WICKED but would also probably gross most people out.

But really, you should see it. Who needs a desert for natural mummification? Not squirrels, apparently.

Today Tess brought me two bones.

The first is what I think is part of a sacrum (yesssss, I am totally on my way to being a learned doctor). The second is a long bone from a bird since it is hollow, but I'm not sure which one. I'm thinking humerus and the attached bones are a rib and the coracoid.

I am a nerd.

Also, I don't know if you've noticed but this post, like so many others, really has no point and has gone on for far too long. The witty and somewhat humorous (humerus? PUNS) posts have gone bye bye for the time being. Sorry, kids. 


P.S. Steven Moffat, you are on my list. YOU KNOW WHAT YOU DID.

P.P.S. For context, Steven Moffat is the creator of Sherlock. "The Reichenbach Fall" simultaneously made me want to cheer and to stab someone with a rusty fork.