Joanna’s posterous

I mentioned before that I was at work listening to Weezer's Red Album on loop. While it's no longer on repeat I'm still completely in love with the album. There's really only one song on the whole album I don't enjoy. The album takes me back to the Blue Album, one of my all time favorites and the first Weezer album I ever listened to. For those that care that song I don't really like on the new album is 'The Spider'. I have a lot of favorites, though. My absolute favorite being 'Ms. Sweeney'. The lyrics are clever and sung as if he's actually speaking to Ms. Sweeney about work related stuff and then during the chorus he confesses his undying love to her. After the chorus he apologizes for his outburst and continues into the next verse. It's definitely a good song to drive to and then scream along to at the top of your lungs.

Besides, who hasn't experienced wanting someone like that? Everyone should take advice from Weezer and go sing their undying love to whoever they're crushing on right now.

Click here to download:

11 Miss Sweeney.mp3 (9494 KB)

Everything has been awesome lately. I'm about to go on vacation onFriday. I'm just  heading to Ocean City, MD with the family but it'llbe time to just relax, read, knit, play with Amaya, and hopefully layon the beach. I'm reading Snow Crashright now. It's got a lot to do with religion, computer viruses,hackers, things like that. The religion part is confusing me a little.It seems a bit complicated, unnecessarily. But we'll see how that turnsout. I'm hoping to finish it before the beach so I can finally read One Hundred Years of Solitude. Any book recommendations are more than welcome. I'd like to follow thelead from my friend Christa and compile a list of 50 books to read. Idoubt I could do it in a year so I think my time frame would be 50 asclose to a year as possible.

Other big news: I found a newapartment and roommate. I'm really excited about it all. I'm living ina brand new complex with lots of amenities and different thingsincluded in the rent. My roommate's name is Merissa and seems reallynice so far. We haven't exactly picked our move in date but it'll bemid to late August. I have to be out of Seven Springs by the 31st, sodefinitely before then.

Even work is exciting. I actually havecrap to do. I've been working on AVHRR satellite data for the last twodays. Yesterday I defined headers and today I'm compiling a ppt out ofthe images so we can see which can be used to generate further data.Barely any of them are usable. Most are covered with clouds. These areall images from when I went to Oklahoma last summer. I took a screenshot of what my work desktop looks like this afternoon.

I wonder if my new roommate worries if I'm a loser or not? haha... because I totally am.

I'm also slightly addicted to MGMT right now. Yesterday I listened to their album Oracular Spectacular on repeat for a couple of hours at work. That's generally how I listen to music at work. Someone should make me a mix. For real. But this band is a good one. I heard about them maybe a month before they started to blow up. Now their song ' Time to Pretend' is a huge hit. 'Kids' and 'Electric Feel' are two of my favorites. Also, Alex gave their live performance at Bonnaroo two very big thumbs up. Hope to see them live myself one day. Too bad I'm a slacker and their show at 9:30 already sold out.

Click here to download:

05-kids.mp3 (8272 KB)

I'm feeling incredibly productive so far today at work. So far I've killed a bug, ate some breakfast (finished a whole ginger ale), fiddled with some Excel files, and listened to Weezer's Red Album about 3 times. Surely you are thinking 'This girl lives an amazing life... one I am quite jealous of'. Well. You should be. I get to do cool things like go to Chickasha, Oklahoma and Bushland, Texas.

I never did share pictures of the field where I was working in Texas. It was windy, flat, a little muddy the first day but really a wonderful experience. I've never hocked that many loogies in my life. And it also knocked another state off of my 'To Visit' list. I got to spend about 8 hours in the car driving back and forth between Oklahoma City and Amarillo, TX which was actually quite boring but I'm not even kidding when I say the land was so flat in Texas it humbled me. There's nothing like realizing how small you are in comparison to the rest of this gigantic world. I've only felt that small a few times before. Once when visiting Bermuda in the middle of the Atlantic. Not even the middle. I don't even want to think about what the actual middle looks like. Eep. Either way. I got to do two days of field work in two cotton fields, one irrigated one not. I'm kind of a nerd and think irrigation rigs are the coolest things ever. There were also two windmills right on the edge of our wet field. Those things are COOLER than cool. I saw at least 3 wind farms on the long drive I mentioned.

Anyway, these pictures we're taken by another person in my lab. I'm just stealing them off our server because my cell phone pictures don't really get the point across.

             

So I realized a couple of weeks ago how poorly the bathrooms at work are designed. Firstly, I don't understand people and the whole toilet bowl cover thing. I don't like the feel of tissue paper on my ass. I also couldn't ever get them to stay put. They usually fall down inside the toilet... what a waste. Secondly if you're going to put those shitty toilet bowl cover things in the stalls, maybe cutting a giant hole between the two stalls isn't the best way to store them for use. Like I said... poorly designed. I'm sitting there taking a tinkle a week or so ago and I realize I can see STRAIGHT THROUGH into the other stall. Someone had used enough toilet seat covers so that they needed to be replaced and I could then see through into the next stall.

Maybe that's just me. Maybe germs have never bugged me that badly. Maybe I just make sure there isn't pee on the seat before I sit down. Whatever. Either way... I am anti-toilet seat cover. And I'm certainly anti-people-having-the-ability-to-look-at-me-when-I-pee.

Britney is so stupid. Not that the album was a flop, but Blackout could've been huuuuge. I hadn't even heard this song till I saw Fanny Pack tear it up on America's Best Dance Crew.

Click here to download:

Britney Spears - Toy Solider.mp3 (5377 KB)

You know it makes you want to dance. Even if just a little.

I received this garden in-a-bag from a swap partner. She knows how much I love the smell of lavender and it also works as a natural insect repellent (moths are a knitter's worst enemy). So I brought it to work where I have a sunny little window sill and planted them. They took about 2 weeks to sprout and that's still all they are now. Either way I'm excited because I normally kill all plants. I had an orchid sophomore year and over watered it. I had a fern when I moved into my apartment last year and somehow killed that. Hopefully I can make these little lavender sprouts flourish. I did just break one (maybe) when cleaning the dirt off of it for the picture. They're still quite tiny and delicate and there are only about 5 so far (two are barely peeking through the soil).

I spent the holiday and this past weekend with my family. In the morning, my niece, sister and I put a blanket out in the yard and relaxed while watching mom pick some veggies from the garden. She recently decided to try canning and jam making and I was around this weekend to document her first try. These are just a few of my favorite pictures from the morning. I didn't get to see any fireworks this 4th of July but it was a very much needed long weekend spent enjoying my family and friends.

       

I've started using posterous with my girlfriends. We're doing a photo blog where each of us takes pictures at around the same time every day. Anyway, I got the great idea to switch on over to posterous instead of livejournal now. I never update much anymore anyway and this is a good way to post something short and sweet or just a photo of what's going on in life. 

Expect some awesome pictures considering I have a new camera!