Football and Thanksgiving review

Well, is everyone feeling fat and sassy?? I certainly am!!

I'm also feeling conflicted....conflicted because at this moment UVa is loosing miserably to VaTech in football.  That's right, my alma mater is loosing to my...er...current mater?  I'm not a huge football fan, but I can get into college football sometimes and this game hits close to home on many levels.  Where do my allegiances lie now?  Totally split.   I have so many fond memories of UVa and there are some fabulous things about that school (like the 11 amazing libraries, or the gorgeous buildings and gardens)....but there are also some sucky things.  For example, how the Wahoo fans leave the stadium in the third quarter to go drinking when their team is down 28-0.  Tech fans would be frothing at the mouth, channeling every decibel they could at the field.  Unfortunately, I find rooting for a dominant team boring, but I have to respect the Hokie fans for their dedication.  Like tailgating before 9am for an 8pm Thursday game (witnessed while on my way to class).  While I knew Tech would probably win today, I had hoped the game would at least be close.  There's something about a hard-fought win that is sweeter for the champion and more noble for the defeated.  There's always next year......

Thanksgiving in Blacksburg was a nice, simple affair.  Good food, good company.  I got to give my Dad a tour of B'burg today - including the new lab!  He was a trooper (I know seeing new biosafety hoods isn't as exciting for the non-lab folk).  He even went with me to visit the pony, who is back out to pasture though we're still fighting the nasty skin infection.

Not surprisingly I have managed to not get as much done before the coming week as I had hoped.  Ergo tomorrow is slated to be spent in seclusion, working.  I'm too easily distracted at home, so it's off to the lab or library with some caffeine early tomorrow.  I'll have to warn everyone, please don't be surprised if I don't get a post in for the next week or so....but I'll try to squeeze one in as a study break :-)
 
On a different note:

In musing about the holiday and on being thankful, something stuck in my head.  I was listening to an old episode of Radiolab about "the self".  Literally, it was a radio show about the neurological and psychological basis of the perception of "self".  Within the larger show, there was a story about a woman who suffered a significant brain aneurysm and upon recovery had a very different "self".  The woman's daughter told the story from her perspective, and ended with the following thoughts:

"My mother's illness, like a death or an accident, was one of those moments when time stops.  When normal disappears.  When you marvel that everyone else in the world can still laugh and go to the movies and complain about the weather.  That's an explosion.  In those moments, you can see life happen.  It has clarity and meaning and purpose in the midst of its horror and pain.  But then those moments pass and you're consumed by the trivia of daily life once again.  Sometimes, when I'm overwhelmed by the task of making my way through the world, I try to focus on the fact that the electric bill does no matter.  The idiot driver glued to their cell phone does not matter.  The mind numbing day job truly does not matter.  But welcoming the strange and the different, being open and available for my husband, my friends, my family, experiencing love and laughter as often as possible; that's what matters.  Because it can all be taken away in one, brilliant flash."
Hannah Palin

I love Thanksgiving more than any other holiday because it is meant as this reminder - to set aside the frustrating minutiae of daily life and be thankful for the good things we have.  To open our arms and hearts to those around us and to celebrate.  To appreciate what is here, now.

I loose sight of these things often.  If I only had a larger house, if I only had a sound horse, if I only had smaller thighs, if I was only more active, if I only focused harder...Nothing is 100% good (no matter what the ads say), but we need to remember to embrace what we have.

Somehow, I need to find that balance between embracing my here/now while also planning/hoping for the future.

That lesson is soooo much harder than grad school!