Silver Porpoise Cub

Nothing will change- all my entries have been Friends-Only for months now. If you're a friend already, no worries. If you want to be added, comment, and I'll see about adding you.

The new Cirque du Soleil show LOVE about the Beatles will be on the Jay Leno show tonight! The show starts at 11:30pm, but the CdS parts are always at the very end. Martha and Karen and Megan, I hope you catch it!

*sigh* I was wandering around AnimationArchive.net checking what's been updated for new Disney movies coming out soon. Some things I'm a little excited about. Some others, really not so much...

*In Theatres:
December 15, 2006: Meet The Robinsons. Eeh...

Summer 2008: The American Dog. A little excited about this, but only because it's written (and directed?) by Chris Sanders, the creator of Lilo and Stitch. Otherwise, not too sure.

2010: I guess The Frog Princess got the greenlight to go ahead as the next 2D hand-drawn animated feature film by Disney. I'm keeping my fingers crossed that it does well, and brings 2D back in force... not holding my breath for that, though... Lotsa details here.

*Direct To Video: I find this the most disappointing page to keep checking, but what can I do?

Soon: The For and The Hound 2: Friends Forever. Sadness. I think it looks awful, and even though I've crumbled and seem Bambi 2, and Brother Bear 2, I am not going to crumble and see this one. Nope. Refuse...

Spring 2007: Tinkerbelle movie. Okay, could be interesting. Especially if they use some things from the original Peter Pan story, they could make it good. However, I have no hope for this either, seeing as Tinkerbelle has recently been protrayed as a spoiled rotten brat character (IMO)- granted, she's really not a very nice character in the first place... And there are *3* more scheduled for the future!!

2007: *sadness* Cinderella 3. I didn't even know there had been a *2*! This is aparentally something like "What if the Magic never happened?", but I dunno...

2007: Dumbo 2. Can't we just leave well enough alone? They'll probably make Dumbo talk, which will kill it right there. I know they made Bambi more chatty to make the sequel more interesting, and a lot of people frowned on that, but at least he talked in the first place... :(

*In Development for Direct to Video:

Little Mermaid 3

Oliver And Company 2: Oh, WHY?! PLEASE, keep it pristine. Please don't kill it, like you did with Brother Bear 2. If you must make it, PLEASE PLEASE make it good! Oliver and COmpany has always been one of my favorite Disney movies. I'm going to see the sequel if it's made: I feel obligated to see what they do to it, so please make it good!

*(Thankfully) Canceled:

The Aristocats 2: YESSSSS! Thank YOU!

Chicken Little 2

Hercules 2: The Trojan War

Finding Nemo 2: Thank GOODNESS!

Monsters, Inc. 2

Mulan 3

Pete's Dragon 2: HOORAY! I was worried about this one...

Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs 2: Yes, please keep the ORIGIINAL pristine. You can't touch the original. You're already doing what you wish with the others, at least leave the orignal alone...

Treasure Planet 2: Eeh. I actually wouldn't mind seeing a sequel for this one, but then I remember what the other sequels have been like, and I change my mind.

Toy Story 3 (Now being produced by Pixar Studios)

Toy Story 4

*sigh* We'll see how it goes...

You Organic chem folks can answer this for me: Dr. Chang announced that after a meeting of all three CEM 251 lecturers, they have decided to leave Chapter 15 (Benzene & Aromaticity) out of the semester lesson plan. Good news? Or am I missing something fun? =)

Oh, yeah. New Icon. Cute, ne? *squiggles Julian*

I haven't uploaded any of them yet, but I'm storing up! Hearing Richasi talk about making new ones inspired me to scour the 'net looking for some silly Star Trek ones. Boy, did I find some. I have some great Tribble ones. Because I am a complete dork. But I'll start rotaing them though soon enough... now I have to go see Richasi's new Garak one!

I've been getting spam mail "selling" Viagra from someone named "Cernunnos", which kind of amuses me. These spammers certainly are inventive. Cernunnos, "The Horned One" is a Celtic deity of fertility and virility, and some people think that his name is where we get the term "horny". Creative, spammers. Creative...

I had the greatest 80's music "experience" one night a while ago, and I forgot to post it until now.

I was listening to a Saturday Night 80's radio block while driving back from the zoo, and I heard Der Kommisar by After the Fire. Which is good, because I love that song! And right after, came Rock Me Amadeus by Falco! And I cheered! Because...

Can anyone tell me why? =)

(Not you, Richasi, because I think I told you about it already!)

It's amazing what you find while wandering aimlessly around DeviantArt...

Steve Irwin Tribute- This one's funny!

Steve Irwin Tribute II- This one's just cute. And appropriate, I think.

Tigers- Some people draw too well for their own good.. *sulk*

Fauns- Okay, he's a *little* creepy looking, but still adorable enough!"

Harry Potter- Maybe HPMeg will be better at figuring out who is who than I am...

Chronicles of Narnia- Okay, so Lucy's the wrong age- still cute!"

Lion King- Carl the Wildebeest. Don't you just wanna pick up Simba and cuddle him until he starts to feel better? :(

CATS- dancing Munkustrap...

TLK- Mortal Kombat style

Pirates of the Caribbean

Please do not ride the gemsbok...

TLK and Brother Bear- Of all the weird crosses...

This is VERY cute, and very well drawn and colored.. ...But then I noticed the voodoo doll in the background. What's a cute little blue-eyed fairy-tale-reading cuddly critter doing with a voodoo doll? *shrug*

Because I am *reeeally* a primate geek nowadays, looky here! The Official Chimpanzees of Gombe BLOG! Sometimes Jane Goodall herself even drops by to post! Wheeeeee!


In other news, I actually *talked* with someone on the bus today. I saw that she had the same practice sheet for the evil evil chem quiz we have today, and we got to chatting about it. For Becca, Rob, and Matt: It's on R&S configuration and reactions of alkynes (compounds with triple bonds). Aah! (Though, I do like R&S configuration.)

You scored as Deep Space Nine (Star Trek). You have entered the dark side of the Star Trek universe. The paradise of Earth is far from you and you must survive despite having enemies on all fronts. But you wouldnâ??t have it any other way because you thrive in conflict and will know what needs to be done to take care of those around you. Now if only the Founders would quit trying to take over the galaxy. </td> Deep Space Nine (Star Trek) 81% Millennium Falcon (Star Wars) 75% Moya (Farscape) 69% Nebuchadnezzar (The Matrix) 56% Bebop (Cowboy Bebop) 50% Andromeda Ascendant (Andromeda) 50% FBI's X-Files Division (The X-Files) 44% Enterprise D (Star Trek) 38% Serenity (Firefly) 38% Babylon 5 (Babylon 5) 31% Galactica (Battlestar: Galactica) 31% SG-1 (Stargate) 25% Your Ultimate Sci-Fi Profile II: which sci-fi crew would you best fit in? (pics) created with QuizFarm.com

For some reason, a lot of the keys on the right side of my keyboard: Home, PgUp, PgDn, End, my Apostrophe and quotation marks key, and all of my arrow keys: have stopped working. Any ideas, computer folks?

Also, Rachel, my zookeeper, was married at 2:00 Saturday afternoon. Beth, another keeper who was helping her get ready the night before, said to me that Rachel was all worried the evening before, but not for the reasons you might think: She apparentally said "So, when I get to Jamaica for my Honeymoon, I couldnt decide whether I wanted to get a drink in a coconut first, or in a pineapple first. But then I remembered that I have two hands, so I can do one of each!"

If thats all she has to worry about on the eve of her wedding, good for her! =)

I forgot! I had the BEST dream last night! It was nice, and normal, with very few "freaky" parts to it. You know how some normal dreams have some weird parts thatmake absolutely NO sense, but seem to fit into the dream? This dream had very few of those, and left me with a very nice feeling. I dreamed that my favorite Mystere character. La Puce, (for some reason) visited me at my house, of all the weird places. He was nice and cute and shy and sweet- the exact personality I pictured for his character. It was cute little dream, and left me feeling that I actually HAD met him, as if I had run into him in Vegas after one of the shows. *purrrrrr*

Richasi, however, wasn't too thrilled to hear about the dream. *grin* No Worries, My Richasi. You're my ABSOLUTE favorite.

Also, you guys HAVE to see where I went last weekend with Richasi! Best Corn Maze. It's HUGE, and very fun. Look at the photo- it's a pirate themed maze, and it's TOUGH. We had a good time though. It's very much fun. I recommend everyone trying to go sometime this fall. It'll be a good half-day road trip!

I am feeling very Aquinas Homesick. I miss walking around campus, enjoying the weather. I miss enjoying the sun, breeze, squirrels. I miss walking in the snow, watching the snow on the leaves... I miss the Fall on campus, and then waiting impatiently for Spring- watching as every day more leaves appear and more plants grow. Now it's just sidewalk, kamikaze bikers, cigarettes, crowded buses, the same loud, stupid people yapping into their cell phones and having their iPods turned up too loud. I would give anything to be back on campus, familiar, and happy, with friends I could visit, a job I loved, classes I enjoyed, a campus that was enjoyable to just walk around. I miss shopping, making dinner and taking walks with Liz this summer. I miss seeing Monica at work in the mornings. I miss seeing people at Wege, though I can't say I actually miss Wege itself... I miss The Moose, the Corner Cafe, the Holmdene pond.

MSU just makes me ANGRY. The whole campus is so congested, frustrating, stressful, that I'm there for 5 minutes and I'm bitter, sour, mean, nasty, and negative. I think such awful things about people, because they get in my way, or they are inconsiderate, or unhelpful. It's just easier to be very negative, and think mean, negative things, which in turn makes me even more angry and frazzled. I just want people to leave me alone. Don't bother me, don't sit near me, just let me come in, sit in the same seat, take my notes, and leave. I had always sat in the same seat in psychology class- 2nd row, seat 109. After a few weeks, I would arrive at the same time, and suddenly find some kid in my seat. So I moved back one row- row 3, seat 109. The next day, my original seat would be free, and someone would be in my 3rd row seat. So I'd sit in the second row. Next day, 2nd row seat is taken by the same kid, so I sit in the 3rd row. The 3rd row seat was open consistantly for about a week, so I sat there, figuring that this would be my "new" seat. Yesterday, I come into class, and find BOTH my 2nd row AND 3rd row seat taken. GoodNESS kids! We're creatures of habit- howabout a little consistancy here?! Now I'm ANOTHER row back, slowly being scootched right back into the back of the class, where I DON'T want to be, because that's where all the noisemakers sit. Why can't I just have the same seat I'd been sitting in for the first several weeks of school? I don't bother anyone, I don't sit next to anyone... I know it's a stupid little thing, but it really bothers me. I wish people would just give me my space.

I always have my guard up. I must project an aure of aloofness, but I'm sure it comes across as all out "bitchiness". I don't talk, laugh, smile. I plod to class, dodging bikers, silently go to the same row and the same seat, at the far right front of the classroom, against the wall, near the door, away from everyone... I don't have any friends here, and I don't really WANT any friends here. It's too hard to maintain friendships when you're a commuter, and I'm not willing to put in the effort... There's no ne there I think I would want to spend any time with anyway...

Sorry for a down entry... I'm just tired, frustrated, and cranky...

Heyla, how does one make and manage a Friends-Only journal? I've considered making mine Friends-Only for a while; no reason, no one's harassing me, I just don't like having that much information out and free (as anonymous as it is), and hey, no one but my Friends read it anyway... but it seems tricky to set up if you haven't set it up right from the get-go. Anyone know?

So this episode, a girl is abducted by a man from online. Interesting, but I wish the main suspect's name wasn't "Richard". :/

I got to see Kermit the Frog! He came by in the parade, perched on the top of the back seat of a convertible, waving and cheering to the crowd who was just there to see him. Yeah, the MSU Homecoming parade was nice, but come on; it was 100% Kermit-Fest. =) Everyone was wearing Kermit-green hats and clothes, and waving little Kermit dolls. I snapped a picture, but because some moron in a long raccoon coat walked in front of me, I only got one good one; only a profile shot. But it was Kermit! I'll see if I can post it soon.

I went garage-saleing today around the neighborhood next to ours. I got there a few hours late, so I am sure 80% of all the good stuff was already picked over, but I made some good purchases: 3 pretty ceramic flowerpots for $1.25, a copy of The Count Of Monte Cristo (that's already nicely beat-up, so I don't have to drag my nice copy around if I want to read it somewhere other than at home) for $.50, and a plushie of Charlie B. Barkin from All Dogs Go To Heaven. A little girl was wandering around with her mom or grandma, helping run the garage sale, and she was SO excited that I had picked up her "puppy" and was going to buy him. She had to be 4-5 years old, so ADGTH is WAY before her time, and I don't know if she really even knew who he was (it was a *sorry* representation of Charlie- I however, in my coolness, managed to identify him from the CAR as we drovw by, launched out, and honed right in!) But she was so excited, saying over and over to her grandma, "She's gonna buy my doggie! She's gonna buy my puppy! She likes him! Look, she's got him! She's gonna buy him!", in an excited, happy way. Not in a crazed, heartbroken way, like I would act if I ever sold any of my beloved stuffed animals. So I was happy too, and gladly handed her 75 cents for Charlie, and thanked her. And Charlie's home, on my bed. Looking happy. =)

Oh, and I got a 90 on my biology test. Yay. But I bombed my psych test. Badly. I shall have to speak with my prof and see what he recommends.

*purr* Vegas. I don't know how I'm going to get all this into on LJ entry, but I will surely try! All in all I had a blast. The weekend had it's ups and downs, but I'm not going to let a few little "downs" ruin the whole experience.

( Thursday; Arrive, Ka Special Events, Cirque Party, <<O>> )

( Friday; Up early, out and about, Mystere Special Events, Gregger, LOVE Beatles Show, Mystere, and Group Photo )

( Saturday; More free time, Star Trek, Tribbles, Zumanity, KA )

4 hours and counting till I'm off to Vegas!

... must.. sleep...

Biology: Organisms and Populations; Custon Edition. Unit 3, Chapter 13: Mendel and the Gene.

These are ACTUALLY in my bio textbook. *squee*

22. Mr. Spock's father came from the planet Vulcan, and his mother was from planet Earth. A Vulcan has pointed ears and a heart located on the right side of the chest. Mr. Spock has both these traits, which are known to be determined by two different genes, each with 2 alleles. Suppose that Mr. Spock married an Earth woman and that they had many children. About half of their children have pointed ears and a right-sided heart, and about half have rounded ears and a left-sided heart, like their mother.
- What would Mendel predict the progeny phenotypes and ratios to be? Explain your answers using formal genetic terminology.
- How do you explain the actual results?

Answer: Presumably, Vulcans and earthlings are homozygous for both traits. Spock, then, should be heterozygous at both loci. Because he has the Vulcan phenotype, though, we can infer that pointed ears and right-sided heart are dominant to rounded ears and left-sided heart. Let P be the allele for pointed ears and p be the allele for rounded ears; let R be the allele for a right-sided heart and r be the allele for a left-sided heart. Spock is PpRr; his earthling wife is pprr. Mendel would predict that their offspring would have the genotypes PpRr, Pprr, ppRr, and pprr in equal porportions. Thus a quarter of their children should have pointed ears and left-sided hearts or rounded ears and right-sided hearts. The only logical explaination for the actual results is that the two genes are closely linked. If so, then Spock's gametes are either PR or pr, and his wife's gametes are all pr.

23. In Klingons, one gene determines hair texture; another gene determines whether the individual will have a sagittal crest (a protrusion on the forehead). The two genes are not linked.

K = curly Klingon hair (dominant)
k = silky earthling-like hair (recessive)
S = large sagittal crest (dominant)
s = smooth, flat, earthling-like forehead (recessive)

Kayless is a half-human, half-Klingon with genotype KkSs He mates with an individual who is also heterozygous for both genes.
- Set up a Punnett square for this dihybrid cross.
- What are four possible phenotypes that may result from this mating? Include a description of both hair and forehead for each phenotype?
- What is the expected phenotypic ratio from the dihybrid cross?
- What fraction of the progeny are expected to be heterozygous for both genes?
- What fraction are expected to be homozygous for both genes?
- Are Kayless and his mate more likely to see an actual ratio close to the predicted value if they have 16 children or 160? Why? Explain why sample size does or does not affect observed phenotypic ratios.

Answer: Four phenotypes should be observed in the ratio 9:3:3:1, as follows: curly and large: curly and smooth: silky and large: silky and smooth. One-quarter of the progeny should be heterozygous for both traits. One-quarter should be homozygous for both traits. They are more likely to see the predicted ratios with a large family, because there would be fewer fluctuations due to chance.


*Right. So this completely set me off geeking all through class. Although A) talking about Mr. Spock's gametes is only *vaguely creepy*, and B) wow... 160 children seems like a lot, even for Kayless and his mate.

The other kids in lab laugh at me and make fun of me because I get excited about biology, know Japanese, read comics, and like Star Trek. They say that I'm "the funniest girl they've ever met", and say they're going to call me "Psycho Girl" from now on because I'm so weird. They laugh and tease when I get excited about amoebas and daphnia and planaria, or finding a really good example of telophase on my hand-made slide of an onion-root-tip cells that I stained and prepared myself. One of them had the balls (impressively, she was a female too...) to ask me if I was homeschooled. She said that a friend of hers, who also goes to AQ, and just won the Last Comic Standing thing there did part of his routine on homeschooled kids. About how smart they are, but how socially inept thay are. Something about "not being able to find all their orifices" she claimed he had said? I think... I can't remember if I heard her right or not. I was kind of in shock that she stooped THAT low to make that comment. But I'm *certainly* sure I know where they all are...

So what if I'm unique, ecclectic, a newly-discovered Trekkie, likes comic books, loves biology, gets excited over houseplants and rotifers, and doesn't like to work in a group? *sigh*

I think I'll sit by myself next time. And pray that no one sits next to me... Is telling some girl (who will undoubtedly try to sit next to me) that "I work better alone" too blunt?