shadowclaw

You're welcome! By the way, if you get the chance to explore Bethlehem at all, I highly recommend eating at Brew Works on Main Street. I've never actually tried their beer (I don't like beer), but several people have told me it's pretty good. I go for the food, and the menu is pretty diverse and they have several good vegetarian and vegan options.

Hahaha that made my day. If my husband could have it his way, he would eat taco bell for every meal. He believes every meal should consist of meat and cheese, and for some variety, there can be an "edible spoon." He really likes tortillas for this purpose because it creates the perfect bread to meat ratio.

I recently made vegetarian chili (well, almost... I used some chicken broth), and my husband was quite upset about it. He ended up eating a small bowl of it and then drove to Burger King afterwards. I'm not kidding. I've gotten him to try all sorts of vegetarian food, and he always says it's gross. I've tried just not mentioning what food is, but he always figures out if there's meat or not. The only thing I can get past him is substituting ground turkey for beef.

You won't find a train to Bethlehem. Despite Pennsylvania's railroad heritage, there isn't much in thy line of passenger service outside of the biggest cities. There is, however, a bus route to and from Bethlehem. Here's a link: http://www.transbridgelines.com/daily.htm

Fried brains

Life would be cheaper and easier if I knew how to cook vegan. I've used beans and nuts in many dishes as the main source of protein, but quite often I want something that mimics meat (like lunchmeat or a burger). I can do a burger from scratch, but some things (like the lunchmeat) I have no idea. I wish Quorn was cheaper, because it really tastes like meat and I think a lot of people converting to vegetarianism or veganism would have an easier time of it eating Quorn. Trying to eat vegetarian is also made more difficult by the fact that my husband is a meat eater for life. I can rarely get him to eat vegetarian food or even seafood, so cooking two meals gets to be a real pain.

OMG! I'm going to be checking my phone for emails non stop now. Not that I wasn't going to be doing that anyway. Since the last two weeks were a bust, I was feeling certain that this was the last week UNC and UTK would have to send out invites if they hadn't already. On a related note, I just had a heart attack when I got an email from OSU. The email started off with, "We appreciate your interest in our program" and I was sure it was a rejection. Then I read a little further and it was just confirmation that they have all of my materials and were sending an email to my POI to give them access to my file.

Dead world

Oh man, almost the same thing just happened to me! I got an email from one of my programs that doesn't do interviews, so first I was like, "Oh my gosh, they made their decision already? It's only been 2 weeks since the deadline!" Then I started reading, and it said, "We appreciate your interest in our program..." My heart just sank, because I was sure it was a rejection. Then I read a little farther... "We have received all of your application materials and have sent an email to the major professors listed in your application to invite them to review your file." That was the worst fake our EVER.

I used to have food budgeting problems after I got married. We were spending over $400 per month on groceries alone. Part of it was because we bought lots of snacks, and the other part was that I decided to try being a pescetarian, which meant buying seafood (which is super expensive). I was also trying a lot of vegetarian meat substitutes, which are also pricey. So when I returned to eating meat, that reduced the grocery bill by a lot (plus chicken and ground beef are periodically on sale, and I stock up and freeze). We also stopped buying as many snacks. If you have time to make your own, it's easy and cheap to make things like chips, soft pretzels, cookies, etc. You can even make your own pitas, tortilla shells, and bread fairly easily if you have some free time on an afternoon. I admit, though, I only make my own bread products if I've overspent on food, because I don't care much for waiting around for dough to rise. So now we spend around $50 to $75 each week on groceries for the two of us. We don't eat out too often. Usually not every week, so that frees up money for other things.

Insect repellent

First class

That's good to know. I was really impressed with Babylon 5, and I thought the ending was really quite satisfying. In fact, it's probably my new standard for how a series should end. I think I will give Firefly a go before Battlestar. Interestingly, I came across a list of the best sci-fi shows (maybe the top 25), and the new Battlestar was placed at number 1. I don't think I know anyone who has that one as an all-time favorite.

I almost have a masters. I'll be getting mine in May. You can apply for the NSF GRFP if you have pursued less than 12 months of full-time graduate study as of August, or less than 24 credit hours if part-time. Basically, when you enter your second year of grad school it's your last opportunity.

Yay! Congratulations! I think that you've got the first ecology acceptance of the application cycle. It must really take some of weight off knowing that you do have somewhere to go.

Snow days may seem like a great benefit, but my department has a course policy that if a lab section is cancelled due to bad weather, the lab will be made up on the weekend. That means whoever is teaching the lab has to come in on the weekend, and whoever is doing setup for the lab also has to come in and tear everything down and get it set up for Monday in a very short period of time.

Green arrow

Avoid Ohio. I drove through on I-80 to and from Indiana, and it snowed maybe two inches over the course of the day. Traffic was stopped or moving at 10 mph across the entire state and every few miles, there was a car on its roof our nose down in a ditch.

I watched the first season of game of thrones. It was a slow start, but it got better as the season progressed. Seasons 2 and 3 have been sitting around for months, but I just haven't had the desire to watch them. I prefer the books, which I've only read 2.5 of because I have a hard time reading chapters that are from the point of view of annoying characters. I am genuinely interested in what happens to some, but others I wish would just die already (and there's a good chance of it happening eventually). I sometimes feel like the draw is the copious amounts of violence and sex rather than the actual story, so people who aren't into that will have a difficult time getting into it. That's probably why I like the books better. Also, while I'm not sure it falls under the popular category, I really don't like the channel Syfy. There's never anything good on, mostly just cruddy B-movies. Back when the channel was called Sci-Fi, there were a lot of cool show on (Farscape, Eureka, etc) and good miniseries and movies. Plus reruns of old science fiction shows.

Tuning fork

Yes, the local meteorologists have been trying to decide if we will be hit by the edge of this storm. The general consensus so far is that only the eastern counties of PA will be hit... which means me! Thank God that only means 6 inches or so, not the 2+ feet I've seen predicted for NYC and Boston. I'm still hoping that it will stay in Jersey, because I have things to do at school tomorrow and I don't want to be stuck home.

Hot pants

I'm so sick of snow. I used to like it when I had an SUV with 4-wheel drive, but since switching to a car, snow has become my enemy. There's always way more snow at my house than at any of the jobs I've had as well as at school. I live at a higher elevation. Worse yet is that I'm over an hour away from my current school, and sufficiently farther north that there are days where it's a blizzard at home and raining at school. I just want to move south already. But I know I'll miss this place, even with all its stupid snow.

Poster board

Huge watermelon