Taking a short break.

I'm working on research - right now, preparing God knows how many pod's worth of milkweed seeds for stratification treatments - it involves counting out 15 seeds per bag, making a little marker for the bag, putting them in, and stapling it shut.

(and, incidentally, I MADE the bags. Over Christmas break. Took a whole freakin' day. As I've said before, I will never ever sew "bridal illusion" again unless I have to.)

It's driving me batty. I've often told students considering grad school that it's not so much smarts that paves the way to success, as simple dogged determination. Not knowing when you're beat. And being able to put up with repetetive, mindless, horrible tasks that make you want to scream because you feel like you're stuck in some fairy tale where you've been, for some obscure reason - like maybe you p*ssed off the wrong faery - you're sentenced to be locked in a dungeon or a tower and repeat some simple task infinitely.

So that's how MY day's going.

I will say the only way I make it through this stuff is with serious self-bribage. I broke down after beginning the process yesterday afternoon (2.5 hours straight of seed-bagging) and ordered some of the new KnitPicks yarns. You know, the ones I unfavorably compared to Sav's-U-Mor brand 90%-floorsweepings teabags?

I figured, well, if I'm talking about the yarn and speculating, I should actually try it. So I ordered some of the silk blend for another pair of armwarmers, and some of the dk weight blend for a scarf/throw thing (the Fern Leaf one in the Little Box of Scarves) and some pink alpaca for the balloon scarf in Scarf Style. So we'll see. Maybe I'll like it after all. Maybe it's from the same mill where Elann gets their stuff. Which is nice enough, even if the Peruvian Highland Wool pills like a B.

So, back to work. The only bribe I have left now is that if I actually get this done today, I can do my grading tomorrow. And write my exam tomorrow. And then put the seeds down for their sand-nap on Monday. Sigh.