True Baltimorian

My dear Mother has probably been worried about my sleeping habits. It happens, even when you move across the country. If she hasn't been worried, then she didn't read my last blog post, or she just looked at the pics. Well mom, it's Saturday morning, and I just slept in and I should be all caught up. I feel great. I now remember what it's like to not feel tired. The last couple weeks have been excellent though since school is starting up soon. This blog post is now here to tell you everything that I have done in lieu of sleeping. Hopefully. At least whatever I can remember.

Various instances before the boys came out to visit kept me awake. You know, the night before I had to do laundry since I wouldn't have time to do it that weekend. Wednesday night is when I tried to do it. As I've mentioned before...weeknights doing laundry at my place is impossible. I was up late. Then the boys came. (See previous blog post).

While they were here, I had a presentation to prepare for at work that happened on Monday morning. As much as I tried to get done at work the week before, it really surprised me how much more preparation had to be done at home. I was up late Sunday, and up early Monday morning to practice. The presentation went well. I presented a journal article on the effects of the infection of toxoplasma gondii at different stages in a pregnant mouse on its offspring. I was really nervous because I presented it to a lab full of a bunch of people who are smarter than me. MD/PhD, Post Docs...and I'm an undergraduate. I was slightly intimidated. But I did well. My PI even had me forward the article I presented to the division I work for because he thought they could reference it in their research. So, I thought that was a compliment of sorts, meaning I at least found a good article to present and what not.

Monday night was FHE. One of my callings (yes, I have two, it happens in the BYSA ward) is on the FHE/Munch and Mingle Committee. I was put in charge of this FHE, and we had planned a way cool activity. We were going to have an activity on one of the ward member's rooftops that lives downtown a few blocks from me that has really great views of the entire city of Baltimore. However, there was a massive thunderstorm on Monday. We had to change the plans and move the activity to the church. Lame. It still worked though. I could have walked over to the other guy's place where the first activity was where we were going to have the rooftop activity, but I have to take the MTA (public bus) to get the the church. The activity started at 7:30. The bus schedule was such that if I took one bus, I would get there really early, and if I took the next bus, I would be about 5 or 10 min late. I decided to be really early (like 20 or 25 min early) since I was in charge. Normally late could fly though. I was going with Heather who lives in the building next door to me. We went to the bus stop to catch the early bus. As I was walking over, I saw it go up the street. I was at the stop 5 min early. The MTA is KNOWN for being late. What the heck!? They had arrived EARLY!?! Not cool. For me or for anyone else. No one gets to MTA stops on time because they are never there on time in the first place. Ugh. So...we got to wait. 20? min was scheduled for the next bus. Well. We waited 40. The next bus arrived super late. The bus got to the stop around 7:25. It takes half an hour to get to the church that time of day. Super (not!) I tried to get a hold of Emily, because she is my committee leader. No response from Emily. Well. A few stops up the road...Emily gets on the bus! We made the joke that at that point we were TRUE Baltimorians because we could get on the MTA and see our friends on the bus. Not anyone can just do that. And then, we were like the loud white girls the whole time that definitely didn't fit in. It was such a great experience. We arrived to the church 15 min late. Luckily the people that were in charge of activities were ready to go, and all I had to do was conduct and get started. It was a good evening.

On Tuesday I had invited the missionaries in my ward over for dinner. Well, I work all during the day, so I didn't have time to cook on Tuesday after work and before the time they arrived at my place. Therefore, I had to cook food on Monday night. After FHE (and I got home around 9:30 or 10 I think). Megan and I talked a bunch, and set the table and we had lots of fun planning! By the time I actually stated cooking though, and things had to cook for a while...I was up until 1:30. And this was after virtually no sleep the night before. Or any of the nights before that. Our apartment smelled lovely at 1:30 in the morning though.

My friend John from work came home from work with me on Tuesday for the dinner. The dinner was me, my roommate Megan, John, and the Elders. It turned out really well. I'm so glad that I was able to have them come over for dinner.

After cleaning up the dinner that night, I ended up talking on the phone to various people for an hour or so, and then to my oldest brother for about an hour an a half. Which means I went to bed late. Again. Then. I woke up early to do some things for work that had to be done so that I could present my data at the Stanley meeting that day. No sleep. My data presentation went well. Although that specific data was determined to be insignificant at this point, which sucks.

On Thursday I rode the bus to institute. Heather and I took the early bus this time. And it was a couple minutes late, which I will still give it credit for being on schedule. We had to ride the bus home after institute, too. Emily rode it with us also. We waited at our stop. It was a well lit intersection, in a semi-sketchy neighborhood. If there were less than three of us, I would have been scared, especially because we had to wait for 20 min. People driving by stared at us, probably wondering what three white girls were doing at a bus stop in a sketchy neighborhood at 9:30 at night. The bus came, on time. Emily got off earlier than me and Heather. When it came to mine and Heather's stop, we got off on a completely dark sidewalk. Once my night vision quickly adjusted, I could see three benches. One had mostly trash on it, and a man just staring at us. The other had one woman, looking straight down, and another man, looking at us. The last bench had a man sprawled out across it sleeping, likely homeless, with the words "Baltimore, The Greatest City In America" (it's on every bench) above him. The bus behind us moved. I turned around to walk towards my place. I saw my first dead street rat! Emily later told me it was only a mouse. It was really really small. I don't count it as a Bmore street rat by any means, but I think it was just a baby. Not a mouse. I was in flip-flops. And it was less than an inch from my toes. SICK.

I have about three weeks left in Baltimore! Two weeks left at work, and then one week left to play. I do have quite a bit planned.

As far as work goes, I have my final presentation (which is a really big deal, it's what the whole summer has lead up to) on Aug 10. I will present it to the Stanley Division. My last day at work is Aug 15.

Today I am going to Lexington Market (Dad wouldn't even go there it's so sketchy!) with Heather and her dad. Next weekend I'm going to NYC with Emily. Aug 12 I'm going to an Orioles game, and then the week after that, starting Aug 16, I think I might do some solo touring of Bmore before I leave. I'll ask around to see if anyone wants to do stuff with me, but everyone is busy during the week typically, so we'll see what I can figure out. I want to get everything on my bucket list done though! The (tentative) plan is to come home on Aug 22.