cerulean13

"Hear the loud alarum bells -
Brazen bells!
What a tale of terror, now, their turbulency tells!
In the startled ear of night
How they scream out their affright!
Too much horrified to speak,
They can only shriek, shriek,
Out of tune,
In a clamorous appealing to the mercy of the fire,
In a mad expostulation with the deaf and frantic fire,
Leaping higher, higher, higher,
With a desperate desire,
And a resolute endeavor
Now - now to sit, or never,
By the side of the pale - faced moon.
Oh, the bells, bells, bells!
What a tale their terror tells
Of Despair!
How they clang, and clash and roar!
What a horror they outpour
On the bosom of the palpitating air!
Yet the ear, it fully knows,
By the twanging,
And the clanging,
How the danger ebbs and flows;
Yet the ear distinctly tells,
In the jangling,
And the wrangling,
How the danger sinks and swells,
By the sinking or the swelling in the anger of the bells -
Of the bells -
Of the bells, bells, bells, bells,
Bells, bells, bells -
In the clamor and the clanging of the bells!"

-Edgar Allen Poe


Aka being woken up first thing in the morning on a Saturday by a false fire alarm that they couldn't seem to get shut off. 

I love my friends. They are wonderful people: the way they chatter, rant, their opinions, descriptions and outlook on life - they compose the whole of such phenomenal conscious beings!  I love being blessed with the opportunity to be observer, recipient, and interchanger for their sporadic, silky, liquid-cool torrent of thoughts and words, knowing how rare dialog of that timbre and caliber can be and how much I appreciate such things. Sadly, they are also all currently in different cities/states, but thanks to the wonders of technology, I can still converse with them in written and spoken word.  I wish I could bring them all out here to be with me, but then I suppose I might risk taking the situation for granted. :-)
Anyhow: Temperatures near-perfect year-round for the majority of Homo sapiens! Balmy beaches! Cerulean skies streaked with wispy white clouds! Occasional miasmas of creeping fog! Stunning fuschia sunsets! Miles of rolling hills/waves and open vistas! Come visit!!

Just returned from the Wilhelm lab barbeque - Jim and his wife live in an incredibly elegant and beautiful complex with a pleasant poolside grill where one can host an idyllic gathering. There was a surfeit of spectacularly delicious consumables there - burgers, tandori chicken, and veggies grilled by Jim, potatoes, isreali couscous, chips, salsa, dip, bean salad by his lovely wife, homemade Thai food (noodle mix and chicken kebobs with coconut peanut sauce) by a lab member from there and then a bakery coffee/chocolate thin layer cake and brownies for dessert. Everyone left thoroughly stuffed.  They are definitely a pleasant and friendly lab group. Additional positive factor for feeling like a better fit: Jim also passed up Berkeley for UCSD. 
Thoroughly satiated in calories, I think I will perhaps now try to catch up on sleep, even though I should be writing up a practice NSF grant for extra credit, working on my genetics problem set, planning a welcome back party for Katie, catching up with my parents/friends back home, doing my laundry and practicing the recorder parts my sister so diligently composed for mom's birthday CD...