That’s what I’ve been working on recently.  Thanks for looking!

Several views on my new Etsy shop, but no purchases yet.  No worries, as the place is so damned tiny anyway.  Maybe one day it will explode into a full-blown e-conglomerate!  But until then… WTB Customers pst.

In other news, WHY CAN’T PEOPLE READ?!  I don’t know how many problems and issues and “wah, I can’t get your website to work, it’s stupid, waaaah!” shit that I deal with every day would be solved if people could just read a fucking sentence!  Here is a reenactment for your reading pleasure.  Only slightly paraphrased.

Author: I attached everything it says but a bunch of the items are highlighted in red and it won’t let me build the PDF what’s going on?

Me: May I call your attention to the sentence immediately preceding the highlighted items which says, “Highlighted items are required.  There will be an error message if you are missing any of these items.”  Is there an error message?

Author: Um… no.

Me: Did you try to build the PDF?

Authors: Um… yes… Yes of course I did… *frantic sounds of typing*  Oh, look it’s working now.

Me: Imagine that.

Oh the glamorous life in publishing…  It’s so foolish of me to think that the people with MDs and PhDs and MPHs and OMGWTFBBQs could read or write a complete, grammatically correct English sentence.

I had some serious fun crafting yesterday.  Beginning to seriously consider an Etsy store… 

I’m also starting to browse The Ring Lord for the materials to make that commissioned work I have.  All told, the order will likely take me over 15 hours of weaving to complete.  Very excited for my first big project!

Handmade chainmaille jewelry

So I finally got around to taking some pictures of the jewelry I enjoy making in my spare time.  Here’s a quick shot of a necklace and earring set that I made my aunt for her birthday.  Bright aluminum rings with turquoise glass beads. 

Now if I can only find somewhere to sell this stuff, I’ll be doing alright.  Though on a side note, I do have my first paying chainmaille gig– complete jewelry sets for a friend’s wedding.

Worth that and more!  Neil Patrick Harris and Nathan Fillion are fabulous in this unique musical.  Support Joss Whedon and his Master Plan– download Dr. Horrible from iTunes!

A morality tale about The Importance of Grammar

“No women in houston”

This is the phrase written to me by my editor-in-chief. Clearly, it requires some deciphering. Surely “houston” must refer to Houston, Texas. This is known by the fact that I was asked only a few moments before to locate the email address of a specific person at Baylor College of Medicine which is, in fact, located in Houston, Texas. So we can thus adjust the phrase to be “No women in Houston.” But could there really be no women in Houston? Women are roughly half of the general population… There must certainly be women in a place as large as Houston, Texas!

Through a bit of creative navigating, I managed to figure out that the name of the individual that I was asked to locate was spelled incorrectly. It was not Mallady as my editor-in-chief had written, nor Malladi (which was the only approximation I could find at Baylor), but Malety. Ah, slight difference in spelling there. So when I had located a Malladi, his response had been the miraculously confusing, “No women in houston.” So now I had the correct spelling of the name I was looking for, yet that still does not shed any additional light on the mysteriously emailed phrase haunting my inbox.

But what’s this? Dr. Malety is actually a woman?

Ah… suddenly things are looking a bit clearer. The phrase was not, “No women in houston,” as had been written, but was actually:

“No, (she’s a) woman in Houston.”

Apparently the Malladi that I had found originally was a man. My mistake. For a while there I was unclear as to whether or not there were any women currently working for Baylor, considering I had been informed that there weren’t any women anywhere in Houston, Texas.

This just goes to show that even gastroenterologists (who I spend a good amount of time working with and for) need grammar, too. It makes things so much easier for me (the support staff) when I can understand what you’re talking about the first time around.

Also, while we’re on the topic, stop writing your entire email sans punctuation in the subject line. It does not facilitate communication, goodwill, nor a timely response on my part. And don’t respond to one email while actually physically hitting the Reply button to another completely unrelated one. It makes me unhappy. I don’t ask for much, really. Just some punctuation every once in a while. Maybe a correctly spelled name when you ask me to look up someone’s email address. I mean, for fuck’s sake! Just take an extra 10 seconds on your emails and we’ll all be a lot happier.

4. Can you tell me how to use this phone card? (do I look like I work for Sprint?)

3. (Asked indoors, in front of a very large set of windows) What’s todays weather? Rainy or cloudy?

2. Have you seen my rubber glove?

And lastly, the number one question is…

1. (Asked inside the San Diego convention center) Where is the convention center?

I swear, sometimes I wonder how these people got their pants on in the morning, never mind how they managed to get a license to practice medicine! On a side note, there was a bit of interesting news while we were in San Diego: under-construction hotel explodes. If you look at the Google Map they provide, you can see how close the convention center is to the explosion. It was a pretty crazy afternoon as everyone tried to figure out what had happened while keeping all of the attendees calm and indoors.

Otherwise, I finally got to take a couple days off from work (mostly because I was pretty sure my brain was starting to ooze from my ears). And they have been two very pleasantly relaxing days at the end of a very pleasant weekend. Ain’t nothing wrong with that!

Panic.

One single word, pure and beautiful in its simplicity.

Of course there’s also confusion, disorientation, and exhaustion.

It’s known as DDW (Digestive Disease Week) and it is the largest (as far as this lowly DDW employee knows) convention for gastroenterologists and hepatologists. Also of note is that it is being held in San Diego this year.

Basically, I’ll get to wave at the Zoo as I ride the trolley on my way to work…

It’s too quiet here without you.

Did I tell you I’ve been sleeping on your side of the bed?

Now it’s my side that looks empty.

Did I tell you the cat’s been keeping me company?

I think she’s getting tired of my conversation.

Did I tell you you’re my other half?

I’m just not the same when you’re gone.