Thank you God for AC!

So I get the opportunity (must think positive) to take Organic Chemistry, yes again, this semester. Yes, I did have to take it to graduate undergrad but I don't remember anything and since I am teaching the lab this semester I thought it was good. However, the AC wasn't working in the classroom this morning. It was 29C in there, which is almost 85F. It was very hot, enough that I was sweating by the end of class. It took me forever to cool down afterward. The good news was the class was at 8am, not 2pm. That room gets hot anyway, ouch!

Yesterday I bought my plane ticket to fly from Frankfurt to Anchorage over Christmas. I still need to get a ticket to fly from Doha to Frankfurt but I am getting there. I am excited about going home but not about sitting on a plane that long. (Since I am paying for it I am flying coach.) Mom already asked me what I wanted for Christmas, isn't that a bit early?

Classes started this week. I am teaching 2 sections of organic chemistry lab and creating the homework for the organic lecture course. Should be a learning experience for me but I'm not thrilled with going to organic lecture again. I slept through most of the classes the first time I took it so hopefully I can stay awake this time.

Hope all of you are doing well!

There is a Cold Stone in the desert.

I tried something new today. Cold Stone opened in one of the malls today and a coworker and I went to go try it. Not bad, the workers are funny. However, they don’t have Reese’s Peanut Butter Cups and their cookie dough is made from very granulated sugar. The ice cream artist did put caramel on top of the ice cream as well though, so that was good.

Larry the Lizard

My parents taught me a lot of things when I was a kid. One thing that they failed to teach me was how to catch a lizard. I know we don’t have a lot of lizards in Alaska but still. Learning how to catch a lizard would have been pretty helpful. Before I learn how to do that, let me tell you the story of Larry.

Larry is a little gecko-type lizard that is white and green and may be poisonous. This type of lizard will come into homes to find food, shelter, TV, DVDs, and other forms of entertainment. The other weekend Larry came in my house. I saw him, thought about how to catch him, and then lost him. Since I didn’t see him I figured he went back to his lizard family and I was lizard free. I was wrong; Larry was looking for a home. On Sunday night I was making pink lemonade from knitting and the proceeded to spill an entire pitcher of the sticky stuff down the back of my fridge and onto my floor. I grabbed a bucket and started to dump water on the floor so I could mop it. I dumped some soapy water and saw something wiggling at the other end of the kitchen. IT WAS LARRY!! Trying to drown him, I don’t like freeloaders, I dumped more water on the floor and Larry swam over to and then crawled underneath the stove. So I pushed bucket after bucket of warm, ok hot, water underneath the stove. No Larry.

Well, I figured the floor wasn’t sticky anymore so I went to bed. I got up late the next morning to find out 2 things. The first thing is that the floor was still sticky and something gross and sticky had pooled and dried underneath the front right corner of the fridge. I was late so I figured I would clean it up after work. I got off late from work and didn’t have time to clean it up before people came for knitting. Knitting was fine and then cleaning up I saw something in the goo, IT WAS LARRY!! Not knowing how to clean up a dead lizard I went to bed to deal with it tomorrow. The next night after work I decided, with some advice from some friends, that I should try to scrape Larry of the goo. Well, the goo was too sticky so I figured I would dissolve the goo with water and then sweep dead Larry into the dust pan to through him out. Pretty smart says I. So, I got some soapy Clorox water and poured it on the mess. That wasn’t working so I took a bucket of water, 2 cups of Clorox, and poured it on the mess. That was when I figured out something. LARRY WASN”T DEAD!!! So, I did what any Alaskan would do, I called a friend.

My friend from IT who lives just a little bit down the road was home so I called her and asked her to come catch Larry. Which she did do and I was very grateful. So, that is the story of Larry. Larry is outside, I think, and maybe even alive after being stuck to the floor and drowned in Clorox water.

Next time, I try straight Clorox.

Comments

Mom has commented a few times about how hard it is to leave comments on my blog, so I have chagned the settings. It is now open to all comments but I will be monitoring them to see which ones get posted. This monitoring will allow me to block comments that aren't in English or other such stuff.

Hope all are doing well.

The kindness of a Qatari

This blew me away yesterday. Qatari people are not known for being nice when they are in vehicles, or really out of them. They will cut in front of you in line when you are in a store, ride your butt when you are on the road while flashing their lights, you name it, they will do it. Yesterday I went to the Al Meera store, it is convenience store but it has the best deals on stuff. Anyway, I was going to my car, pulled out my keys, put my groceries in and got in the car. I looked behind me to back up and there was a Land Cruiser behind me. The driver, a Qatari, was getting out so I just waited. He walked over by the front of my car, picked a 1 riyal note and gave it to me. He got out of the car to give me back the equivalent of 30 US cents. I was blown away. I still am blown away. What really makes this impressive is that it was REALLY hot and REALLY REALLY humid yesterday, like a sauna, and he got out of the car! Thank you Qatari man, I am blown away by your kindness.

July Pictures

This is the entrance to the pedestrian area in Munich. This portion of it is known as Karsplatz, or Karl's plaza. This area feeds into Marienplatz and everything in that area.
Me and my Beer. That was about all I drank, I smashed my finger and didn't want any more after that. Also, Beer+vegetable soup isn't as good as you would think. Next time I'll go for the pork.
This is on top of Cannon Hill above Rowlesburg, West Virginia the day of the reunion. Dad came out to see me and so we were the family representatives of the Chuck Shaver family, lots of fun.

My July trip

Ok, so it has been a long time since I posted, but that it ok cause I haven’t been near a computer. So let me update the masses.

Munich, Germany- I had a great time here. I was a little frustrated at the railway stations in Frankfurt cause nobody had signs up explaining what was happening. Of course I don’t speak or read German so that wouldn’t have mattered so much. A very nice lady was also on her way to Munich and helped me get there without getting lost or really confused. I did learn that ‘glies’ means track in German, handy piece of information to have when riding the train in Germany. Anyway, found my hotel in Munich and then slept for about 1.5 hours. I didn’t sleep much on the train or plane and was REALLY tired. I then took a 1 hour bus tour of Munich which turned out to be very helpful for planning the rest of my stay. I found my way to Karlsplatz and Marienplatz and did a little bit of shopping, got dinner, and then drug myself back to the hotel. The next morning I just walked around the city taking pictures and enjoying Munich. I had lunch at the Hofbrauhous and then proceeded to smash my figure on a chair in the beer garden (hey, beer gardens are dangerous places.). I wasn’t hungry after that but I had a little more of my soup, pretzel, and beer. I couldn’t finish my beer, it was ½ liter and I know that all of my Sarvela ancestors are turning over in their graves. I went into a cathedral and when I came out it was pouring down rain. I waited in the awning for about 20 minutes with a man from southern part of Eastern Europe who spoke no English. Interesting time there, but when the tourist gets rained on, the tourist will knit. I found a store that had yarn and needles and made it back to my hotel for a nap and some knitting. That evening I went to the Oktoberfest grounds, Julyfest is not so exciting, and then found dinner to repack up stuff for the train back to Frankfurt. The train to Frankfurt left at 5:23am, yes in the morning, and I made it just fine. Then back to the airport and on to Atlanta.

Atlanta, Georgia-I did a lot of shopping and went to a wonderful teacher training. I enjoyed Mexican food, Target, T-mobile, and a bookstore that was closing. Shopping is good in Atlanta and got even better when I found the REI store.

West Virginia-I GOT TO SEE DAD! That was probably the highlight of the trip was having Dad fly out to see me. We went to the Shaver family reunion, I won furthest traveled, and just did a lot of talking and eating and eating and eating…. I was able to see cousins that I hadn’t seen in a very long time which was nice. Dad went home after the reunion weekend and I stayed on for another week. I also managed to get a cold which turned into an upper repertory infection. Before bed and my Great Aunt’s house we would take our pills together, kind of funny. Since I wasn’t feeling well I stayed in the Kingwood area and rested. I found out that Claritin D is my new best friend for flying. I would take pill about 1 hour before landing so my ears would clear.

Back to Doha-I made it back to Doha just fine if not tired. On the plane leaving Doha I sat next to a man who was going to Oregon and we talked about Oregon since my sister is there. When I boarded the plane to go back to Doha from Frankfurt I was sitting next to the same man! Funny funny.

Well, I hope you have enjoyed the brief update, I’ll try to post pictures later today.