georion23

the stargazing event went well last night. i got out there a bit early so i caught a nice sunset. i only had one problem person out of 50. she was drunk and couldn't see anything in the telescope and kept telling me i didn't have it on anything and i was bullshitting her, even when other people told her there was indeed something in the eyepiece. she was just so drunk she couldn't get her head at the right angle to see anything so she was viewing the side of the eyepiece. but the rest of the crowd was very impressed. i showed them jupiter (and all four of the galilean satellites were visible), the hercules globular cluster, the ring nebula, and the andromeda galaxy. pointed out some stars and constellations and you could even see the milky way a little bit. the only problem was the people putting on the thing (it was a huge ordeal with hummer tours of the desert and a cookout.) had giant bright lights so it was really hard to see things (see the telescope to the left? that was AFTER they turned some of them off.). the guests had to put their hands up to their eyes to shield them from the lights. ugh. they come all the way out to the desert (some from england, some from holland, some from the northeast, some from texas!) because of the dark, clear skies. and then they can't see them because of the bloody lights. frustrating. oh well. they still seemed to enjoy it.

i was feeling like shit after i got home because it had been such a long and stressful day, so i ate some food, did NOT set an alarm, and went to bed. slept pretty soundly until 5am when my lovely aunt dana called me. actually, my 7(? 8?)-year-old cousin katy called me. so i had this nice high-pitched voice in my ear after being awakened from a dead sleep telling me about seeing the international space station fly over. uh huh, that's good katy. is your mom around? then dana gets on and says, "that was the most amazing thing i've ever seen!" good...it's 5am, dana. "right, but it was so awesome!" uh huh. then she realizes i'm REALLY not awake and will not be coherent for a conversation at the moment so she tells me to call her later and we hang up. i had given her the website where you can look up when it will be flying over your location. it's especially bright now since the latest shuttle mission deployed more solar panels. so it's quite impressive and they were so excited they had to call me at 5am to tell me all about it. at least i was able to go back to sleep.

think i got my mom to get off the "you don't have enough money to fly home for thanksgiving" thing because i'll be getting a check in the next couple weeks for $250 for the last two stargazing events i've run so that will cover the cost of a plane ticket and then some. so that's good.

going to put my run up soon. then happy hour at four peaks and then the grey's anatomy season premiere. woo!

it's 82 degrees outside. check this out. 60s at night and high 80s to low 90s in the day. hell yes. it feels wonderful outside. about damn time, too. i love weather like this. makes me happy.

kepler decided last night to make himself comfortable in my bed. had to kick him out so i could go to sleep. silly cat.

sent sara and todd their birthday presents earlier this week so they should get there in the next day or two. maybe even today. fun. they're going to like them.

need to fill out the form so i can vote by absentee ballot for the texas elections in november. i like their directions: "You may open this form (PDF, 38kb), print the application, fill in the information, sign and date it. You will then put it in an envelope, add postage, and mail to the Early Voting Clerk in your county." you know, in case you've never used the mail system before. and you WILL put it in an envelope, etc. you have no choice. do it. do it now.

time to go put my run in. yay!

longhorns won! 40-29. crazy game. i was afraid we'd lose for awhile there. the aggies gave us quite a run, especially considering they're unranked and the 'horns are #2 in the country. still undefeated though and on our way to the rose bowl.

sfa did not do so well in football this year. they ended the season last in the conference with only 1 conference win and a 5-6 record overall. sigh.

arizona state is tied with arizona 20-20 in the 4th quarter. i do enjoy asu football. it's fun because i'm so close to the stadium i can hear the fireworks they shoot off when asu scores. just heard more fireworks. looks like it's 23-20 asu with 6 seconds left. LOTS more fireworks. shaking my apt. i guess we won. yay! woo sun devils.

my kitchen is clean now. i think i used half the dishes and utensils i own making food for thanksgiving and made all of my appliances dirty. everything's clean and put away now. much better.

i decided it was christmas time now so i went to get out some decorations. found a little tree that has lights on it and some candles but chris had told me he had a box of my decorations at his apt. turns out it's the box that has all my ornaments and another tree and lights and stuff in it. damnit. i wonder how much it would cost for him to send it to me. my little naked tree is looking a little pathetic. i found (okay, kepler found) a little toy mousie in a closet when i was getting out my decorations and he's been chasing it around the house all afternoon. so cute.

sweet!! james just called and i'm going to get paid for helping him out at a stargazing event tomorrow night. it's going to be the two of us with his 8" and 11" telescopes and 69 PEOPLE. insane. should be fun though! and it's money! woohoo!

okay, going back to making nighttime ir themis mosaic. weee...

recap: longhorns won, i love football, kitchen's clean, it's christmas, need my decorations, get money for showing people stars tomorrow, time for more fun with work. woo.