The great divide (between grad students and non-grad students.)

The last guest post in this wonderful series is from one of my favourites, in blogging and real life, Distracted Spunk. This post hits a little close to home...

***

Non-grad students say, "It's just school. Why can't you come out on Friday night?"

Grad students respond, "It's Friday? Shit. I thought it was Tuesday. Wait, which week is this?"

Non-grad students gasp and say, "Oh my god, you wrote 82 pages?"

Grad students exclaim, "Is 82 pages enough? I knew it wasn't enough. I have to go write some more."

Non-grad students are secretly thinking, "She used to be so much more interesting before she went to grad school."

Grad students are secretly thinking, "I wonder if that paragraph works in the context of the larger argument. Is my argument clear enough?"

Non-grad students point out, "You used to blog frequently."

Grad students say, "I have a blog? Oh crap, I have a blog!"

Non-grad students talk about all the sex and relationships and adventures they're having.

Grad students talk about their latest conversation with their advisor and whether or not they might be able to publish an article based on their work.

Non-grad students roll their eyes when they come across a faction of grad students.

Grad students nod and shake their heads in shared understanding when they come across a faction of grad students.

If only we mere grad students had a secret handshake. Then our lives would be infinitely more interesting. Or lame.

The Audacity of Hope

Hi there, I'm Hope. I can usually be found writing navel grazing posts about love (or you know, the lack thereof), relationships and singledom over at Hope Dies Last. When I asked Princess to suggest topics for my guest post she sent me a whole bunch. And I loved them all but as the day approached for me to send her my post, all the subjects I chose felt wrong. This was too depressing, that one was too boring, that one required a complete back story to understand.

Instead, I decided to write about a subject that is close to Princess’ heart.

Psychology.

That was far too broad. It needed to be narrowed. As I drummed my fingers on my desk, I remembered a very brave confession Princess had made recently.

“I have not read any of the following: The Rules, He's Just not That Into You, anything by Dr. Phil, aka. the Devil, or, in fact, any self-help book ever. It is against my psychologist's pride”

This post is in support of that one sentiment.

My background is in psychology; I have a Bachelor of Arts in Social Psychology and a Master of Science in Applied Psychology. I would have pursued a PhD was it not for the fact that I could not make up my mind about an area of research. That, plus you need to have cajones to continue studying for that length of time.

And I really don’t.

But I am also perpetually single. And like most perpetually single women in their 20s, my book shelf contains a number of books.

Why Men Love Bitches and the follow up to that Why Men Marry Bitches

He’s Just Not That Into You

Quirkyalone

I keep them as far away as my serious books as possible. Books like:

The Psychology of Criminal Conduct

Social Cognition

Abnormal Psychology

I keep them as far away as possible because my mind, trained to dissect every piece of research in order to find its weaknesses, wants to laugh at them. But my heart, my heart longs for simple answers, for tried and tested ways to find a man.

The thing is, though, that they haven’t been tried. And they haven’t been tested. Not in the psychological sense anyway. They haven’t been put through rigorous experiments. They don’t have control groups. They don’t account for individual differences. So how can they be generalized to the rest of the population?

Simple answer? They can’t.

These self-help books simply fill in a gap. They are almost like religions. There is no proof of God’s or Allah’s existence. Yet, millions and millions and millions of people believe. They believe because they need a simple answer that will comfort them.

And this is the same gap that titles of books like, “He’s Just Not That Into” fill.

Now they’re not all bad. In fact, overall, the message that they hold in their pages is something I can get on board with. In a nutshell, they all seem to be saying “Be who you are. Enjoy your life to its fullest. Be complete in yourself. Then? Love? It will come.”

It’s the details that I have a problem with. If he does not call within 4 days? He’s just not that into you. If he’s got a girlfriend? He’s just not that into you. Except we ALL know cases where he didn’t call within the allotted time and HE WAS INTO HER. We all know cases he did have a girlfriend. HE WAS INTO HER and it did work out.

It’s the comments that I get on my blog sometimes that irritate me. “Hope, you really need to read He’s Just Not That Into You. Because The Man Friend? HE’S JUST NOT THAT INTO YOU.”

I never reply to those comments. I don’t reply because I refuse to accept an argument that is based on an OVERHYPED book that has generalized human behavior into about 11 neat categories. Let’s not forget that the authors—Greg Berhendt and Liz Tuccillo—are American. I am not American. The men that I come into contact with are NOT American. There is such a thing as cultural differences, you know?

My point is that all those books should be taken with a very large grain (think mountain-size) of salt. People are different. Every situation is different. Sure, they have similarities and it’s probably NOT a good idea to expect a man with a girlfriend to be your soul mate, but what if he is?

Moreover, it’s like I once wrote on my own blog:

“Perhaps, I do not pick up on those apparently obvious ‘he’s just not that into you’ signals. Perhaps, I choose to ignore them because of hope. Perhaps, I choose to ignore them because I am stubborn and proud. Because, why the hell should he not be into me?”

So, my fellow Hijinkers, what do you think? Have you read these books? Do you like them? Dislike them? Have they helped you at all? Have I misunderstood them? Been too harsh? Lets talk about it.

Popcorn FAIL

Hi folks! This guest post comes from one of the sweetest bloggers I've had the fortune to get to know, Gemma of Closets are for Clothes (aka. the blogger formerly known as Libby).

***

Great. One month in to my new job and already I’ve got an incident under my belt that I’m not going to live down anytime soon.

I burnt the popcorn. As in smoked it. As in smoke literally ballooning up in greyish clouds when I opened the microwave door and wafting out the kitchenette doors. As is my eyes were watering and I was coughing.

NOT. COOL. I wanted to melt into the ground, I was so embarrassed.

I mean, it’s not like it’s never been done before, right?! It happens all the time! I mean, it’s practically a fact of life I tell you. But it never fails that no matter how common a boo-boo it is…everyone and their mother will comment about it (my internal retorts to each comment in parentheses):

“WHAT is that SMELL?” (Do I really have to tell you?)

“WHO burned popcorn?” (It was meee ok? IT WAS ME!)

“GAWD can someone open a DOOR or something?” (I don’t even KNOW, I’ve been here a month, if there is one please, do the honours and open it)

“You KNOW that smell is gonna stick to everything in here for, like, a WEEK” (Yeah, thanks for rubbing it in)

“Stop bringing popcorn here, ok?” (UMMM, pretty sure the dozen other times I’ve brought it and popped it perfectly, you were ALL salivating and more than happy to take some.)

_____________________________________________

So yeah, I get it. I’m sure I would have reacted in a similar way if someone else had burned their afternoon snack. I’m extremely embarrassed, but, as I relive it in writing this post, I’m a little indignant as well. Seriously, it was no worse than a “I was just sitting around the campfire” smell. But I apologized. I cleaned the microwave. And now, all we need to do is give time some time and the smell will be gone on its own. I’m crossing my fingers such a trivial incident won’t void the headway I’ve made in terms of working to earn the respect of these people I have to work with. Maybe it’s silly of me, but the worry is really there. So as not to dwell on that, here are some of the ‘positives’ of my popcorn FAIL:

• I have the day off tomorrow so I don’t have to deal with people still harping about it until they’ve hopefully cooled off and the smell has hopefully dissipated by Monday.
• I’m super grateful to the guys who (in my mind, anyway) seemed to get that I was already embarrassed beyond measure and who played the incident off with jokes of their own (i.e. when asked “how can you stand to go IN [the smoky kitchen]?”, responding “because I’m a MAN.”; or when people were exclaiming WHAT IS THAT SMELL, saying “Oh that? It was me,” rather than singling me out)
• My boss had already left when in the incident happened, and may still be absent tomorrow. This is the best case scenario so that he doesn’t smell the strong odour tomorrow. If he IS in…well, at least I’m not, HOWEVER, this also means I won’t be there to be on rumour patrol about me ‘intentionally’ setting the timer to 21:00 minutes…(bugger.)
• At least the popcorn didn’t catch fire/blow up/set off any alarms with the smoke. THAT would have been disastrous.

All in all, I’ve learned my lesson.

Notes to self:

• TRIPLE-CHECK that the timer on the microwave says 2:10 and not 21:00 minutes before you turn your back on it. Better yet, don’t turn your back on it.
• When a tiny voice at the back of your head wonders “Shouldn’t the timer have gone off by now?”, LISTEN TO IT. Do not (I repeat, do NOT) wait until the acrid smell starts to permeate the air. It will be too late.

This truly is the first time this has ever happened to me to this extreme extent when popping popcorn. I think I’m going to stop bringing it to work, or get my own microwave or something. I’ve still got half a giant Costco box to go…

Why Princess of the Universe Is More Qualified for the Spa than Graduate School

So my darling Princess Pointful asked me to do a post for her while she was away. Of course I view this as more of a favour to me than to her, since all her readers are le fab.

Of course there’s always the dilemma of what to write about on someone else’s space. In my little world? Which is not nearly as well-written as this blog? Well, it ranges from the spa, to chocolate, to my dreams of marrying Jensen Ackles. However! My redemption here today lies in the fact that I can actually write something that borderline relates to this blog.

School. More specifically? My honours Psych thesis.

Ahh my thesis. Until very recently, it was my proudest accomplishment. And since I work in a university now, you’d better believe I talked it up in my interview last summer. That thing caused me so much pain, it better pay me back by getting me a job with a decent salary and awesome benefits. I mean I gave birth to that thing. And labour? Was a bitch.
With all that build-up, I know you’re all DYING to know what my thesis was about. So the oh-so-inspiring title: (uh hold on a sec- as if I remember something that I wrote 11 years ago) Crap. I can’t find it. It was something along the lines of: “Religiosity and Neuroticism’s Effects on Death Anxiety.”
Cool huh? I did a thesis on death. Cause I’m all deep and stuff. Yeah. Until you have every Psychologist in the place asking you very worriedly why you want to write about death, and is there anything you’d like to talk about? It was almost as great as the time that I casually mentioned how stressed I was and it was making me want to slit my wrists.
You know what you don’t say to a Psychologist? That.

I didn’t say I was a brilliant 22 year old.

Anyhow. After several well-meaning and concerned conversations, I was well on my way to studying the D-word.
But to do so? I would have to pass the dreaded 4100. Honours stats. In my defence, I did in fact pass it the first time. But only because I was curved up. And since I was an honours student and all, getting a C or D or whatever I got just wasn’t good enough.

Less in my defense? The fact that I spent the first time around composing stories in class about how I was a princess cursed by the wicked stats fairy at birth, and that was why I just didn’t get it. The second time around I did marginally better, but I suspect that it’s only because I re-copied my assignments from the previous year, and not because I learned so much more.
So after two years of that torture it was time to put it all to good use. I had finally reached the show. So I questioned poor innocent first-years all about how freaked out they were at the concept of death, and how neuroticism was the cause, and how they turned to religion for comfort. And after all that data was collected? Then I had to put that 4100 class to good use. Surely they had tutors to assist right? Oh wait. I had already tried that, to no avail. Oh well, it’s only data analysis – how hard can it really be, right?

As it turns out, not hard at all. Cause all that dos-based programming that they had been training me to do in the SPSS from the dinosaur-age the past two years? Apparently no one actually uses that. Everyone actually uses SPSS for windows. All you have to do is click “analyze” (or some other statistic-y word that I don’t remember at all anymore) and it does it for you.

??!!!??
Ahem. So anyways, after I got over that painful revelation – I carried on with the analyzing. And found that my hypothesis? Wrong. Dead wrong.

Now I know that this is still valuable information, and at least I’ve learned that the opposite of what I conjectured is true. Blah blah blah… But it’s kinda hard not to feel like a failure you know?

It didn’t matter so much by then anyhow. By that point I’d decided that the thought of getting my PhD and listening to people whine about their problems all day was more pain than it was worth. So I accepted my mediocre B+, convocated under duress (University Graduations? Le dull.) and carried on with my life.

And given the chance to do it over? I’d totally do it the same. Well…except I’d maybe pay some nerd to do my Stats homework for me. Cause taking it twice? Phenomenal waste of my valuable undergrad partying time.

I've got a secret...

... and so do 76 others.

Today, I am participating in the first ever BlogSecret. Put together by the amazing Nilsa, this involves a group of people writing about their biggest secrets. These are then anonymously distributed. As such, one of the other participants is posting a secret that (unknown to them) belongs to me, and I am posting another blogger's (no idea who!) secret below. Visit Nilsa's site to see a list of all the participating blogs!

***

I've struggled a bit to come up with something to share on the great Blog Secret. Well, here's what I have. Take it or leave it.

Sometimes I find it hard to relate to some of my friends because I haven't had a lot of the same experiences as them. I'm not trying to say I'm perfect and they're not, it's just that in some respects we are very different.
First of all, I feel like I've got it all (not trying to sound braggy). I have a job I really like. I've found my other half. I have a great family, who I get along with really well. I own my own home. I'm not struggling financially. I consider myself attractive, and so is my guy. I've never really had any weight issues (except I could stand to loose 10-15 pounds and tighten up). I always made good grades. My parents paid for college so I'm not in debt. I'm not in debt at all really...I pay off my credit cards every month. I'm responsible. I'm happy with my life and who I am. I considered myself blessed and lucky.

A lot of my friends aren't quite in this same boat, not that, that bothers me one bit. I don't judge them at all. But it can make it hard to relate. First of all, I've always been confident, except in those awkward middle school/early high school days. But who wasn't uncomfortable then? During those times I was a little unsure of myself - I was gangly, tall and skinny, not to mention clumsy. I had bad hair and hadn't grown into all of my features. Add flat-chested to that list. I used to be so concerned about what others thought of me. Was I cool? Was I pretty? You know the drill. Then one day I just stopped caring. I figured if people didn't like me for who I was or how I looked, then I didn't need them anyway. I was 14. I think that is a fairly young age to find your self-esteem. And I did that, and I am proud that I had the strength to realize something so vital at that point in my life.
As I've grown older, I've had friends who obviously have not had that revelation, and it's hard to watch. People can smell insecurity and they feed on it. If you can't love yourself, how can you expect others to love you? It pains me when I see smart, good-looking, funny people beat themselves up for minor imperfections. We all have them. And on that note, I can't relate. I haven't felt like I need to crawl inside myself because I'm not comfortable in my own skin since I was a pre-teen/teenager. I am happy to say that I am not insecure.

A decent amount of my friends' families have gone through divorce, which I know was so hard. Most of them were fairly young at the time that it happened. I couldn't imagine having to try to figure out who you are while your family is crumbling in front of your eyes. I can listen and be sympathetic, but not relate. My parents have been married for almost 30 years. They still love each other and get along well. They are a team and will be till the end, and I can never picture them any other way.

In a financial sense, I'm doing well too. My husband and I make a decent chunk of money for our age. We have money in savings and don't have to live paycheck to paycheck. If we want to go to a nice dinner or buy something expensive, we don't have to feel overly guilty doing it. And we won't have to put it on a credit card to pay it off little by little, month by month. My parents taught me to be financially responsible at an early age. I didn't always get the designer clothes or the coolest gadgets, instead they saved money for me. Upon graduation from college, it became mine. They lectured me on blowing it on useless junk and reminded me what it could do for me in the future. For the most part, I listened. And maybe that's why I'm doing ok now.

I am absolutely no help in relationship land. I've been with my guy for years. I haven't had to date around or look online to find a relationship. I think this is one of the hardest things. I have friends who so desperately want to find the right person and be happy, and when that goes wrong and they are crushed, I feel hypocritical giving advice. What do I know? I've never really been in their situation. I can give them my perspective, but it comes from someone who hasn't been in those shoes. I've had some drama, but I found my person. And it didn't really take me too many tries. From very early on, I knew that we'd be together till we were old and gray, even through the rough patches.

Sometimes I feel guilty, because in my mind I feel like I have it all. What more do I need? Nothing that I can immediately think of. Are there things I want? Sure, but I can make do without them. I have great friends and family, I'm healthy, I'm happy, and I'm secure in my life. Most people I meet like me from the start, and I really don't think I have any enemies. I'm loved and love the people around me. And I will be your friend, through anything, as long as you don't double cross me. Then all bets are off, unless you are extremely regretful. Then I may give you another chance.

Again, I don't want to sound full of myself or better than anyone, but I do have these thoughts sometimes. Then I wonder if any of the people around me ever resent me for these things. I've never spoken these thoughts out loud. And even when other people mention my "perfect life," though it's not, I always try to downplay what they say, so I don't make them sad. Is that wrong?

I am in no way perfect, but maybe I'm just really lucky (knock on wood).

Inspiration and fast food

I don't know if there is much that I can say about last night that won't have been already spoken.

I joked around on the phone with an American friend that the little election pizza, beer and CNN party was merely us being "just another group of opinionated Canadians". However, despite the fact that this is not my election, I will be damned if I didn't feel a swell of pride as Barack Obama stood before a crowd, uttering the words "Yes we can" with utter conviction. People had real hope in their eyes again.

I'm sure we all heard the cliche that tonight, history was made. However, I received an email from a Black friend today that really drove this home-- he said that he woke up this morning, and the thought that there may actually be an African-American president made him want to cry, as ten years ago, he would have never expected this to even be a possibility in his lifetime. How phenomenal for this to have been proven wrong.

(I also learned today that my mega-crush, Jon Stewart, has hairier knuckles than expected. I would just make him wear gloves.)

Rather than belabour the point any further (and, as I write this, I am still anxiously awaiting the results of Proposition 8, the results of which may diminish some of rose colours on my glasses), I will direct you to a delightfully non-political and comical post I wrote over in the land of Libby of In This Skin about why your job is nowhere near as horrible as my first (fast-food) job. It has tales of grease, polyester and maltreatment. You know you want to click.

Clicking for royalty!

I know, I know, I keep on sending you away from my blog this week.

But, I promise, it is so worth it.... because I'm guest posting for fellow royalty today.

So come visit me in the Kingdom of Princess of the Universe, where you can read all about my fierce lust for Joe Hardy and my career as an amateur sleuth.

PS. Congrats to Crushed and arguably Yoda (I suppose I may be showing the most leg) and Nilsa (I am technically wearing orange, but maybe it looks pink) for choosing the correct legs!

Guest Posts R Us and a Sprinkle of Babbling

I've officially stuck my toe into the guest blogging pool! I'm writing today over at Good Things Come to Those Who Whine for the fabulous Arielle, who is gallivanting in Israel, while my biggest drama of the day is whether I feel like making burritos or not.

(Who am I kidding-- the answer is always yes when it comes to burritos.)

So hop on over and say hi!

However, if you all know we well enough, I am hardly one for brevity. As such, I decided to use this opportunity to touch on a smattering of things that you may or may not care about.

(Trust me, the guest post is better. Update posts still feel dirty to me.)

• I'm still a bad blogger. Despite my best efforts, I seem unable to keep my reader below the 200 mark. Just to reiterate... this is not due to lack of bloggie love, but rather lack of bloggie time.
• Following on the bad Blogger theme (note the capitalization)-- I have been unable to update my blogroll for over a month because the scroll bar has gone AWOL in Blogger's edit layout page. I will show some love to my new favourites soon, I promise!
• I just found out yesterday that my presentation was accepted for a conference in Chicago at the end of June-- so I'm going to be stalking several of you in the Windy City!
• Since I have a low stalking tolerance, and need a more immediate payoff, I was thrilled that it appears as though the lovely Distracted Spunk and I will be taking Seattle by storm in May!
• To top it off, the fabulous Surfergrrl is coming my way in August, and there are also rumours of a certain member of the breakfast food family.
• Due to more regular assessments at the prison, I now have both an inmate and a correctional officer with crushes on me. I don't know what is creepier-- the fact that the inmate pretended to be someone else to get in a room with me (remind me to tell this story in a future post) or the fact that I busted the correctional officer reading my change of address paper stuck to the back of my driver's license (why do you need to know where I live?).
• TG and C have now moved in together after a whopping 3 months of dating.
• What on earth possesses landlords to think that people who can afford $1500 a month in rent would rather have a flowered couch than their own furniture? Furnished apartments are some weird plot to charge the tenant more for the landlord to have extra storage.
• Dexter is the greatest show in the universe. For serious.

Mmmm... burritos. Methinks it's time for dinner.

Edit- Harumph. Sour cream went bad 10 days early and now my burritos are merely sub par.