Once again, my college is doing its annual Thanksgiving food drive, and once again, the same question comes into my head. What is the point of a food drive? Wouldn't it be better for the food bank to receive cash donations, rather than a mix of assorted cans? With cash, they could order what they need, and they could buy it in bulk at a lower cost. If 100 people separately buy a can of, lets say, snake lips, at $1 each, in theory the food bank could get 100 cans in bulk at 95 cents each, and have left over funds with which to buy some eye of newt.
Granted, people are more likely to grab an extra can of something from home and donate it than they are to take the time to donate cash, but that's besides the point. Stupid people.

I'm sick.
Tired, headache. Don't think I have a fever, but I'll check when I get home and can find my thermometer (ah, the fun of moving. I'm sure I packed it in one of these boxes...)

But I signed up for the swine flu shot tomorrow. Its rather hard to find, so I feel fortunate to get it, especially as I'm fairly sure my sister had swine flu last May. And here's the thing with the vaccine. To combat the standard problem of college students signing up for things and not showing up, we were informed that once we were charged the $15 for the shot (which happened automatically when we signed up), we would always be charged, even if we didn't show up. My budget is in pretty sorry shape now, so I really really don't want to waste the $15. Plus I have to drive down to LI for a wedding this weekend, so in theory I need to be well enough to drive, not sick + swine flu shot reactions.
Yesterday I left work early to try and nap, but that failed. Perhaps nyquill will be of some use.

In my new place, I now have natural gas heating and a natural gas stovetop (and a natural gas dryer, which I didn't know existed). Which means that it is now significantly easier for me to accidentally cause my house to explode. Hurrah.

Among the next parts of my move, getting internet.  My first try, I found the time warner albany site, they want $50 per month regular internet, $20 per month ultra-slow.  Fine, I'll get the slow one.  First available install, 10/23... wow.  That's a long time.  Fine.  Then I find out, $39 install fee.  I called up to cancel, hoping that in order to keep me, they'd drop the fee.  Nope.  Oh well.

Well, I did more searching, and found on another place on their site, $34.95 a month regular internet for the first 12 months, $29 install fee.  That's much better.  And to top things off, the install will be this coming Thursday.  Wow.  Awesome on all accounts.

Now I just have to call up the power company to make sure that they don't cut off my electricity.  Internet isn't much use without electricity.

got home last night, and as usual checked the traps.
electronic one, empty.  snap one... moved.  i find it, and its empty.  the little bugger ate the bait and physically moved the trap without setting it off.  at least it was bait mixed with mouse poison, though.
sigh.
just have to keep saying to myself, i'm moving in two weeks, i'm moving in two weeks, i'm moving in two weeks....  (a few miles down the road, not a major change, but i asked and they only had one mouse like 5 years ago, and with all the younguns running about, tis not a spic and span place)

Current Music: Paradise by the dashboard light

Tonight I concluded my five month treatment of accutane.  I should have been finished earlier, but over the course of five months, you're bound to forget a pill here and there. 

My face is quite clear now and my back is mostly clear.  Not that things have been consistently bad since high school, its just been periodic annoying flare-ups for the past six years or so, typically centered around a family event (so my grandmother could ask me why I still had acne at my age).  But I haven't had a flare up for the past few months, and soon I'll see how the next few months go.

Hopefully in a few days, my eyes and lips will start getting back to normal.  This medicine really dries you out.  My eyes are rather dry and to say my lips have been cracked is a severe understatement.  But soon the stuff will begin to filter out of my system.

In one month, I can donate blood again.  Of course the summer when Friendly's gives a free pint of ice cream for each pint that you donate is the one when I cannot donate at all.  I think I want to try and donate five times in 2010.  Six is the most you can donate, so I should be able to do five.  I haven't donated blood since mid-March, and not being able to donate has been one of the hardest parts about being on the accutane... but its done!  

Callooh, callay, oh frabjous day.
I'm chortling in my joy.

This past Sunday I headed up to Saratoga Springs.
It was the first time I had real water from a spring.  It was... interesting.  When they take water from a spring, it must get really really filtered before going to a tap or getting bottled, because it tasted really really different than any water that I've had before.
Up in Saratoga, it was a really really nice area, lots of good ol' familiar red brick, and it looked really historical.  So I looked around.  And it turned out, that this wasn't some estate built back in the 1700s or something... it was essentially a tourist trap built back in the 1800s to bring tourists to the spring!  Lame.

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On Monday, I stopped in for my periodic allergy shot.  As I walked in, a man wearing a suit and carrying a large bag walked out.  I tried not to scowl.  After I was given my shot, I was talking to the nurse and said, I know without the drug reps, we wouldn't get the free samples (I got an inhaler and a nasal spray) but that I still hated them.  The nurse pauses, looks at me.  "Two of my kids are in pharmaceuticals."  
Luckily I said this after she had stabbed me in the arm with a needle.
I tried to save face "Certainly its the corporate heads who are the problem, not the salesmen.  The salesmen aren't the ones who lobby against making generic medicines available and who make medicines that cost so much that some people can't keep their homes."  Of course, I'd argue that that is just like saying, It's not the hitmen that are to blame, just the mafia heads.  Then there's this article, which was both enlightening and enraging.  http://www.nytimes.com/2007/11/25/magazine/25memoir-t.html

Yesterday I did something social, with people.  That doesn't happen much.  The nanotech gso group got a bunch of people together for paintball.  First off, I'd never gone paintballing before, and it sounded fun.  Second off, it was an event that they didn't plan for a Saturday, so I figured I'd give it a shot. 
Highlights include....
- I am not good at paintball
- I think I actually shot two people successfully in four hours of play
- I was shot in the head within 5 seconds of the first match starting
- I got about 9 welts (I counted right before I took a shower)
- I got my first bug bite in at least two or three years
-  My legs are really hurting right now.  Its not the fact that I got shot repeatedly, its the fact that I'm not in shape and I was running around for almost four hours. I'm doing some squats, it seems to be helping, but otherwise, I do find it somewhat difficult to go up and down stairs.
I'm not going to go again any time soon, especially considering that I spent over $30 for one day's activity plus gas and tolls.  But come fall, when it's chilly enough to wear a sweatshirt to cushion the blows, and I won't (in theory) get as drenched in sweat, I'd definitely be up for another shot.

From:
Hyattsville Branch
6530 Adelphi Road
HYATTSVILLE, MD 20782
301-985-4690

To:
ARON J CEPLER
6903 PREINKERT DR
#5113B
COLLEGE PARK, MD 20740


Your library membership will expire in 10 day(s). You can renew your membership by calling the library during business hours.

Home Address: 6903 PREINKERT DR
#5113B
COLLEGE PARK, MD 20740
Phone Number: 1 301 226-8044
E-mail Address: acepler@yahoo.com

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Wow.  It's been a long time since most of that information was accurate.

So I'm sitting at the dinner table on Friday night, and my host shows me an article that he printed out, which he thought was highly amusing.
I read the caption under the picture, and see how both the bride and groom had swine flu, and wore masks during the wedding.
Then I read the story.  More specifically, I read the names of the bride and groom.