Too much information....

This has been a busy week for me, school-wise. Not only did I get my ACT scores back, but I had 3 tests. Next week looks to be a bit easier as far as due dates are concerned, but I do have a big Anatomy test on Tuesday.

And it's on the reproductive system.



You know. Wieners and v-jay jays. Twig and berries and whoo-hoos.

And their plumbing. And their functions.



Seriously, this is too much information! Aside form the near pornographic diagrams (and I spared you the worse ones!), I really don't feel the need to follow all of the plumbing up and over and around all the other bits! And know all the names of "things."

We better not have to look at cadavers' junk. And I hope there isn't a show and tell portion of the test!

Let me just say that you'll never find me working in a urologist's office. Or a gynecologist's either.

So, to avoid studying for this test, I started prepping the pears I picked... oh, forever ago. I am going to bottle them up to eat later in the winter. But first comes peeling and slicing.



I had a whole basket of pears sitting in the garage, waiting for me to do something with them!



So, I peeled, and sliced, and treated them to prevent browning.



I am actually going to can them tomorrow (maybe) so for now, I just put them in a couple of Ziploc bags to keep in the fridge. I prepped enough for 7 quart jars, the maximum that will fit in my canning kettle.



The aftermath,including a sack full of fermenting pears. May I just say... peee-yew?




And I still have pears left!

But now, I cannot put off the inevitable.

Got to study for the penis test.

Kinda takes the mystery out of sex, you know?

Inquiring minds want to know...

For those of you dying to know how I did on those hateful ACT tests I took last week, well, my scores arrived today.

Just to remind you... maximum score on any one test section is 36. The last group of students admitted to the nursing program here scored 23+ points each on the Composite, Reading, and Science Reasoning sections, the only sections the program cares about.

So here are my scores. Drum roll, please!




Pay no attention to that pesky Math score. My edition of the test was all about the geometry... angles, arcs, tangents and other bogus stuff! Give me a good ole' algebra or trigonometry question any day!

Not to toot my own horn (okay, I will!) but take a look at the score for reading! That's like totally awesome, far out, and bitchin'ly cool, man!!

Come next semester, I guess I will be wearing that funny folded white hat and sensible shoes!

I said... GO AWAY!!

Enough already! I am officially tired of the rain. It has precipitated on me and mine for over two weeks now, and rain is forecasted until some time next week.

Poor Steve is barely visible!

All the trees in the forest are putting on their water-wings. A few of the short ones have inner tubes as well.



My decorative dry creek bed ain't so dry anymore!



In fact, it is over-flowing on to the front walkway.



The garage downspouts can't keep up.



And the backyard is flooded. Whatever isn't completely under water is sprouting mushrooms.

I think I'm starting to mold. And there may be fungus between my toes. I'm not sure.

*Sigh*

Steal Deal of the Day

I have been burning through notebooks this semester, so while I was on an infrequent visit to Target this morning, I thought to see if they had any on clearance.

First I spotted some single notebooks, in college rule, marked down to $.12 each. I thought that was pretty darn good. But then Stud Muffin hit the mother lode!



Multi-packs of 4 notebooks. When he scanned the price for me, they came up as $.15 for the set of 4!! So what, about 3 1/2 cents a piece? (I'm soooo good at math, eh?)



I got a total of 24 notebooks for $.90, but I think I may have to go back for some more!

If you have kids in school, are in school yourself, or just like to write a zillion notes, get thee to a Target store and see if they have some of these multi-packs! Your pocketbook won't be sorry!

*Sigh* I just love me a good clearance sale!!

Rain, rain, go away....

It has rained for the last week. And it will rain for the next 6 days. It has been a nice break, but enough already. All outdoor activities have come to a halt, with the exception of running the dogs down the road between showers. We will be harvesting mushrooms soon, me thinks!

Today was a red-letter day, as my grandmother would say. This was the day that I had to take my ACTs. These are a requirement of my back-up plan of getting into the nursing program in the Spring. You know, in case I try for the Radiography program again in June and STILL don't get in! Got to have a plan B!



So, anyway, today was the day. And I knew it was going to be a long day, because the start time wasn't until 12:30 PM. That gave me plenty of time to worry about getting there in time (Did I mention that it has been raining? Hard?), or remembering to bring my ID and pencils and a calculator.

But I did get there in time and joined the line with 50 or so other people. Who knew it would take 30 minutes to show IDs and fill in little bubble to spell out your name? Seemed that the actual test would never start, and if you don't start, you can't finish!

All in all, I think I did pretty well. Certainly Hopefully, well enough for admission into the nursing program. I only had to out-and-out guess on a handful of questions, otherwise I could at least pretend to know how to eliminate some of options.

I'll get the results in a week or so.

Other than that, all I do is school work. Oh, and dry off wet dogs. Just ask my neglected husband. He'll confirm that.

On the plus side, I am all but finished with the Math class. I just need to take the mid-term and final, which aren't available yet. I found that this class had a lot of the geometry that I needed to review for the ACT, so it made sense to power through it.



Also, I finished that ice cube experiment and am now on to a nuclear reactor simulation. Unfortunately, I keep having a meltdown (literally) but I will conquer this experiment and make cheap electricity available to the masses!

So, there you go. To recap: Rain, rain, and more rain to come. ACTs taken, Math almost finished, and the world still safe from my handling of nuclear fission!

A little of this and that

Just a few random things to share.

First up, Sassy caught a snake yesterday when we took her out for a run down to Stud Muffin's favorite field. She likes to leap into the shrubs at various spots, boinging like a deer with her front paws curled in. Very funny to watch. Anyway, on the way back to the house, she dove into a stand of trees and scampered around a couple in a circle. She emerged holding a large black snake by the middle and shaking the begeezers out of it. The thing must have been at least 4 feet long, since both its head and tail touched the ground as she held it.

We started to drive the buggy up the hill (you didn't think I ran down there, did you?) and she raced ahead with the snake still in her mouth. We'd stop, tell her to drop it, which she did, but as we'd starting driving again, she pick it up and race ahead of us!

We finally got her to drop it and leave it. I haven't been back down to see if she actually killed it, or if it was playing possum while she bashed its head into the ground!

**********



I have cleared out 3 of the 6 raised beds and decided I needed to kill off all the nasties in the soil before the next planting season. Most of the tomato plants I got, and that ran away with me, were volunteers from last season. That meant that the seeds over-wintered in the soil. But some of these plants got blight, and the eggplants had a terrible bug problem. I don't want that again next year.

So, I covered the empty beds with a double layer of clear plastic, held down with bricks and boards, to "solarize" the soil. Better than black plastic, this will not only heat the soil up underneath to kill seeds, but the UV rays that come in through the clear plastic will get rid of a lot of soil borne fungi and stuff.




Last year, remember, I had a problem with dodder in my spaghetti squash. I tried this same treatment on that bed after I pulled the squash, and this year planted the strawberries in that same bed. No dodder!

Pretty strawberry plants!

I still need to clean out 1 1/2 more beds. This one held last winter's lettuces and some Swiss Chard that didn't germinate until quite late.



The tomatoes are volunteers and unfortunately, the chard has gotten bitter. I also need to move the arched support for the winter cover over to the strawberry bed to protect them from frost.

**********

Lastly, I made some apple muffins yesterday and used one of my very own grown apples. I had ripped the recipe out of Veggie Life magazine years ago, but never made them until now.

Good Morning Apple Muffins

1 c unbleached white flour (I used All Purpose)
1 c whole-wheat flour
2/3 c packed light brown sugar
1 Tbsp baking powder
1/2 tsp baking soda
1 tsp ground cinnamon
1/2 tsp salt
1/4 tsp ground nutmeg

1 large tart apple, peeled, cored, finely chopped (about 1 cup)
1/2 c raisons
1/2 c chopped walnuts, toasted (I omitted these)

1 c regular soy milk or low-fat milk
1/2 cup canola oil
2 large egg whites (I used 1 whole egg, but then I 'm a rebel that way)

Cooking spray.

Preheat oven to 400 degrees F. Spray 12 standard muffin cups.

In a large bowl, mix the first 8 ingredients (flours through nutmeg) until blended. stir in chopped apple, raisons, and nuts if using.

In a medium bowl, whisk together milk, oil and egg whites. Add all at once to dry ingredients and mix gently just until evenly moistened. Divide batter between prepared muffin cups, filling them nearly full.

Bake muffins until tops are lightly browned, and a toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean - 20 to 25 minutes. Transfer pan to wire rack and cool completely before removing muffins from pan.

Of course, I couldn't wait until they were completely cool, so Studly and I had warm ones with a bit of butter. Extra yummy. I always expect that I am gong to have to modify a recipe if it is too bland or too sweet. This was perfect! Great with a cup of coffee.

For the advancement of my ejumacation

I can't believe what I had to do today for school. Specifically, for Chemistry.

No really, it is too horrible to repeat.

Okay, I will tell you.

I had to watch an ice cube in a glass of water.



For one hour. ONE. HOUR!

And use my five senses to observe it.

And take copious notes.

Five senses?? Most people would say I have no sense at all!

Have you EVER stared at an ice cube floating in a water glass for more than a couple of seconds? It's excruciating!

It's like watching paint dry... or golf on television!!




The dang thing just floats there! Does it put on a show? NO. Does it change into pretty colors? Again NO. Send up smoke? A thousand times NO.

What it does is give off little, teeny, tiny air bubbles which float to the top and burst. Sometimes the bubbles make a little hissing noise. Like a leaking tire on an ant's car.

And it gets smaller. Silently. Tastelessly. Touchlessly.



Until eventually, even it can't stand it anymore and it just fades away.

Of course, I HAD to watch this stoopid show for an entire hour (counting the minutes in agony) so I had to keep replacing the disappearing frozen water thingie 6 times!!

I'm just convinced this is really a Psychology experiment to see if I would actually do this for ONE WHOLE HOUR without strangling the cube and drinking down all the water.

Maybe my professors are in cahoots! Yeah... that's got to be it! Well, two (or three) can play at this game. Ha! I'l show them, I'll actually write up this dang report and send it to all of their in boxes! That'll get 'em good!

But not today. I'm exhausted. Had to do an important chemistry experiment, you know.

So... how was your Sunday???