I'm going to be writing only in my other blog for an indefinite period of time. This way my friend(s) without myspace can comment, and let's be honest, that's what I care about most. I'll probably still post here on occasion, but don't hold your breath.

http://unmeat.blogdrive.com

I know this because my fellow classmates are living proof. Today is the third class (fortunately, not in a row) that I have missed because I've slept in, rationalizing the frantic sounds my phone made (twice, I set TWO alarms) to some cockamamie event in whatever I was dreaming. And yet, I am doing significantly better in that class than all of my group-mates. I got an 82% on the midterm while they got 76% or lower. I knock the tri-monthly quizzes out of the park. It's like money for nothing.

The sleeping in is not something I'm proud of, either. As someone who gets incensed when another classmate is in attendance but on facebook the whole time, I obviously take class time very seriously. Missing so many classes in just as many weeks is really starting to irk me.

The way in which I miss my alarm (at least the way I missed it today) is an unusual phenomena that is becoming more and more usual. I will wake up roughly one hour before I am supposed to, get up, go to the bathroom or get a drink of water, and then go back to sleep. The starting of a new sleep cycle puts me into a deeper sleep than normal--in theory--and I then wake up when there is only 25 minutes left in my class and no memory of my alarms ever going off, even though they clearly did.

Maybe what I need is A) a louder, more obnoxious alarm and/or B) three different alarm clocks strewn about my apartment set to go off a minute apart.

Guys, the drive on I-5 between Salem and Eugene is mind-numbing! I have spent the past 6 to 8 (or more) weekends driving up for one thing or another and then back down Sunday night. While the traffic is pleasant and clear at night, the darkness can lead quickly to highway hypnosis. So does the boredom.

You don't pass through any cities but merely skirt around the stinking, outside edge of Albany. There are a lot of fields and hills that all look alike, and the road is almost a totally straight line for 60 miles. All you do is drive drive drive, pass a truck, drive drive drive, repeat. On the way up during the day it's drive drive drive, get stuck behind a long line of cars in the fast lane, pass a truck, repeat.

Nothing to see, very rarely anyone to talk to, music is boring me. I'm so very tired of driving back and forth. All I want is to stay in one place for awhile, just to settle my soul.

As I'm typing this, my father is pacing around outside, angrily looking where his McCain/Palin signs used to be. In the long run, it doesn't really matter that the signs are gone, since Dad has already voted, but it really does matter.

Last night, someone took the signs and did who knows what with them, sending a clear message that the owners of the sign do not have the right to either voice their opinion via lawn signs or vote for someone other than Obama. I am not voting for McCain, and being young, I disagree with my dad politically, a lot. I still believe that the point to even having an election is giving everyone the right to pick the person they want, and it's not my call to tell them who that is or try to change their mind.

Whoever did this, whether they were trying to change my dad's mind or not, only succeeded in being hateful, and making their "side" look back. I can only assume that they're voting for Obama, since our neighbor's sign was left untouched. I can only further assume that they were from Aumsville, since the road my folks live on leads straight to it. I can only continue to assume that they are extremely ignorant at least to the repercussions of this act.

Nobody wins.

Here are the four dogs that are a part of my family and the awards I have given them.

SMOKEY

Winner of "Smartest Dog" for being able to successfully open his and any kennel door that remains unlocked. Because of him, everything is locked. He is also the lead dog when hitched up to the sled or cart.
Winner of "Sickest Dog" and not in the cool way. He has had a constant string of ailments that have led to him losing a large amount of weight and hair. He is always requiring pills, but never really *acts* sick.

SHADOW

Winner of "Grossest Dog" and subsequently "Least Likely to be Missed by Anyone." His bark is really loud and obnoxious (more like a hoarse wail than a bark), he is impossible to keep clean, and will eat anything's poop. I may secretly miss him because we had some good times when he was a puppy.

RAVEN

Winner of "Biggest Little Man" for his extremely aggressive attempts to look tough. He is always seen with a piece of firewood in his mouth and acts like everyone wants to take it from him (no one cares). His canines are worn flat from carrying it (or one like it) around since he was big enough.
Winner of almost every staring contest.
Winner of "Lamest Tail Wag." He wags his tail for no one, and when he does, it's very insincere.
Winner of the "Secretly a Happy Dog" award.

BERING

Winner of "Happiest, Friendliest, Sweetest Dog." Also "Largest Dog." Also "Oldest Dog."
He may not always jump out of his box to greet me but he always wags tail when I call his name. He may have a funny way of being playful when he grabs onto you (aka Libby) with his mouth and pulls you around, but his heart is in the right place. He may not be the smartest dog, but he's my favorite. He always gives me kisses and when he was younger just scratching him on the rump would wind him up enough to send him running full-speed around the yard.

Bering just turned 12, and practically on the same day developed spinal arthritis. Now he can barely bring himself to lie down; the pain in his back is so great that he stands for hours, his head hanging low and his tail half-heartedly wagging only rarely. I made him a wear-able blanket to help stave off the cold and ease his arthritis pain, but Raven ate it. I can't pet him anymore because everything hurts him. He doesn't kiss anymore. It was just a couple weeks ago that we were marveling at how well he was doing for his age, because these problems manifested just overnight it seems. It will probably be another week or two before we have to put him down, barring any improvements. I'm not ready for him to go.

For my Hormones & Behavior class, I am part of a mandatory study group (we turn in collective assignments to give it a reason to be). I am really regretting joining this group. Sure, I know ONE person from a previous term, and she knows one other person in our group who knows two other people, but that assumed camaraderie is not sustaining my need for class-related info each time we meet.

Last Thursday I walked to school to attend a group meeting that lasted about 30 minutes. I sat in silence while the group leader bitched about how hard the test was going to be, bragged that she got a C- in an earlier class she had taken with this same professor, and then talked about her cheating boyfriend. One member was absent, another left as soon as I got there, and we never once actually talked seriously about the upcoming midterm.

One guy was dragged into our group because "he's REALLY smart." He has yet to prove this, and so has everyone else. I will be skipping our next group meeting.

Ingredients:

One Emily, thoroughly antsy.
?? ounces of alcohol
Shoop by Salt-N-Pepa on repeat
A dash of dancing like and idiot to the above song

Mix well in a well-greased 80s night at John Henry's, saving some of the alcohol on the side for later. Serve piping hot.

This is going to be a big blog because I'm going to talk about several things. The first of which is weather. Again.

There's a lot of overlap between seasons in Oregon. Last week, the temperature change from the previous week (from 60s and 70s to 40s and 50s) was so drastic that I felt like I was going to freeze to death. If I were a weather-person, my forecast would be "Actual temp: 49 degrees; feels like: WHY GOD WHY?!" Now, it's just past sundown and 69 degrees? Oregon is saying its final farewell to Summer. Bye Summer! You ended almost a month ago, but here's some beautiful weather just to keep the S.A.D. folks happy for another week. Not that I'm complaining. Today and all this weekend the weather was gorgeous, and even, dare I say, "sparkly." I attribute this to the recent rains and cold weather, knocking the pollution out of the sky and making it too cold to want to go outside.

Topic 2: TRAFFIC RULES: YOU'RE SUPPOSED TO BOTH KNOW AND FOLLOW THEM. There is something intensely irritating about people being in such a hurry to drive two blocks that they can't wait 10 seconds at a red light before turning right (or left, if you happen to be in a one-way grid), especially if this maneuver means pulling out in front of me (or anyone else) and not accelerating to at least the speed limit within 2 seconds. Increasing the irritation is the all-too-often instance of no one being behind me. Look at all that room behind me! Pull out when you DON'T have to risk getting rear-ended and then sucker punched in the throat by me.

Back to turning right at a red light. It's no secret that it's perfectly legal to do in Oregon and probably several other states, but only if you STOP first. I see people just coast on through a red light, justifying it because they're turning right and proceed to get called a douche bag under my breath. For anyone (and yet hopefully no one who reads this blog/is a friend of mine) who is confused about why this isn't ok, think of turning right on a red like turning right at a stop sign. Rarely have I seen anyone with the huevos big enough to deliberately zip through a stop sign, especially with other cars waiting, because it just isn't safe. If I didn't have to worry about all the other risks involved, I would become a traffic cop and pull people over allll the time for stuff like this. I would be a dick.

Topic 3: Today, because I am a woman with womanly needs, I bought a large box of Jr. Mints while grocery shopping and finished them before I was a mile away from the store. I think I made the right choice with Jr. Mints because the large box has relatively few pieces of candy, and it was something I could finish in one sitting without feeling sick, just satisfied. This would not be the case if I had caved and purchased a large bag of Kissables or worse: a tub of macaroons. My desperate chocolate cravings typically last a couple of hours, and despite eating no small amount of sugar in record time without actually just eating straight sugar by the spoonful*, I saved myself the trouble of having left over junk food I would be tempted to eat. Plus, I "evened" it out by eating a lot of veggies for dinner.

* -- I like to think I got my massive sweet tooth from years of Mom withholding delicious desserts from us as kids. We only ever had soda once a year during camping season (which I don't regret because I don't drink it now), and cake only on our birthdays, and only the cheapest ice cream WinCo had to offer ("Quality Checked": I've checked, there's no quality). Halloween hauls were strictly regulated. When I got home from school during my elementary years, I would eat a spoonful of cocoa mix, powdered sugar, chocolate almond bark, or straight sugar. When we went to Grandma's house, Ethan would often throw up from eating too many sweets which I blame on having to baseline for comparison. We did not know what to do with ourselves when given candy. I only practice self control (in moderation) NOW because it directly correlates to how well my pants fit.

I *do* have a six-pack!



All that working out finally paid off!

This blog's title is incorrect. Because upon deep reflection I find that my father is something of a superhero, it is impossible for me to rattle off a list of things that scare my dad. I can think of maybe two, and that's only if I count Democrats, which don't frighten him so much as they enrage him. And if we're going down this route, so do Republicans, but that's for a different blog in an alternate universe where I write constantly about my dad. End digression.

There is only one thing that Dad has ever admitted to being scared of, and that's the 1960 movie "Black Sunday: The Mask of Satan." If I do my math correctly, Dad was 12 when he saw this flick and he claims to have been fairly traumatized by it at the time (being well into "over-the-hill" territory, he is no longer afraid of this movie, which makes me realize there may be nothing that scares my dad). After he told me this story for the fifth time, I decided to Netflix it and embark on an empathetic journey into the film that ruined Dad's childhood.

For a movie that I had written off as no more than a B-movie, I was surprisingly creeped out. This ain't your run-of-the-mill Ed Wood flick. This movie had a budget. This movie had a lot of squirty sound effects as masks with spikes on the inside were hammered on and pulled out of faces. This movie had this lady and a whole lot of Satan. I am right there with you, 12-year-old version of my dad.