November 13, 2010 1:30 PM

Good afternoon!

OK, let's break down the past week for you!

Saturday after work, I went over with the pre-fishies and some friends over to Catherine's house for dinner and games. We played mafia (I got to be God - apparently I am really good at it.) Then I went home and went to bed.

Sunday, I didn't go to church (this is becoming a bad trend, and I've gotten emails from people asking me if my faith is deteriorating). I worked on homework and even did some real cooking (as in making rice instead of ordering it from a Chinese restaurant). My food was very good, and I was very satisfied with myself for actually taking the time out of my day to treat myself right. My meal was three courses - soup, main dish with rice, and dessert. Everything was made in the kitchen and quickly devoured by yours truly. I also finished that silly lab.

Monday, I went to my classes and got to work on more homework! I started work on the next lab that was due on Thursday and sold tickets for the Winter Gala that will take place on December 4th! I met with one of my professors about a presentation I had done, and we went over what people had said about my presentation. Most of the feedback was good, and I appreciated it.

Then she started asking me if I had a learning disability. Allow me to fill you in on some background information: during people's presentations, we were supposed to take notes on how they were doing. I took these notes, but I also took count of how many times they said the word "umm" during their presentation. I organized it in a column on the left side of the page and kept tally. The right side of the page was notes/interesting things about their presentation. At the top of the page by my name, I kept track of how many times the professor said "umm" as well, since it was easier to keep track of all of them. This had been going on for about three weeks.

She was offended, of course, that I counted her "umms", but she also said that students thought it was rude and inattentive of me to judge them so superficially. She had told them I had a disability, like being ADD, that prevented me from concentrating (false). She also suggested to them that I might me hard of hearing (false and irrelevant to the situation). She did not tell me any of this until we met now (three weeks later). She didn't reveal my name to any students, but several of them knew it was me.

So when I walked into her office to discuss my presentation, I had this in mind since I had heard from Jersey on Friday (when she met with him and told him this) what she was telling other students about me. After we discussed the presentation, she directly asked me if I was disabled and/or what the meaning behind this was. I explained that I was not judging the students in any way - this concept of 'counting "umms"' had been brought up by my other professors when they noted on how many times I said the word 'like' during my presentations. I said that I did this in my other classes as well, and my Philosophy class loves it. They all ask for their counts at the end of our group discussions, and we all work together to improve.

She suggested medication.

She then proceeded to tell me about all the medication she has ever been on (including meds for her menstrual cycle in high school), her parents' medical history, and how 'we like to think we can survive and keep ourselves in check, but we really can't'. I didn't need to know any of this.

Oh, and I had a meeting at 3pm I had to go to (which she knew) but she continued talking right through. So at 3:10pm, I picked up my backpack, said goodbye, and walked out while she continued to talk. I went to my next meeting and apologized for being late.

On Tuesday, I had a class with this professor, and during all the presentations, I took notes and wrote down the "umm" count. I also wrote a note about how standing up fidgeting in the back of the room (like she was doing) was distracting and seemed to make the presenters more nervous. They also avoided looking at the class, probably due to her hovering, but I didn't say that.

I got an email response on Wednesday about how her feet hurt too much to sit for too long.

Tuesday night, I went over to the boys' place and studied with Jersey for our Advanced Organic exam. When we took it on Wednesday, we were both done in fifteen minutes, and not because we were exceptionally prepared. She just made the exam really short.

On Wednesday, I worked like crazy on another lab report (due Thursday) that I would have worked on before except I was studying for that exam. I finished most of it with my lab partners by around eleven o'clock. I went to bed.

On Thursday at work, I finished the lab and printed it out. I handed it in to her that night and got back last week's lab - a 66. Next time I work so hard on a 35 page lab, I'll remember this. But she said she's going to give a ten point curve for doing some non-linear regression stuff in the lab. I don't know if that is ten points to my final grade or ten points to a lab, but either way I'll appreciate it.

Then I went to girls night out - which ended up being "buy Wegmans sushi and watch a movie". It was lots of fun, but I kinda missed Shiki sushi (which is much more expensive). On the bright side, I had never seen "the History of the World Part One", and I laughed a lot. Half of what I ate was vegan, and the rest was fish. However, I took a small bite of some cheddar cheese and ate two inari (which have some egg in the batter-stuff). So I wasn't pesca-vegan either.

When I woke up on Friday, my whole room smelled like all the cheddar cheese in the world.

Friday morning, I veganized 'dirt pudding' since it was three people's birthdays (including Joanna's, you lucky girl!). However, I was much too cheap to buy vegan gummy worms, so I used regular ones and had several servings without the worms. It was super-sugary, and I felt like a terrible 'foodie', especially since I'm normally so healthy.

Friday evening, I signed up for work hours for next quarter, and here another issue arose. Previously this quarter, I was still new at being a supervisor at the library. I would hug other students, etc, and some of this got a little out of hand. As the quarter progressed, my behavior would only get 'touchy' when I was tired or had been at work for seven or eight hours already that day. But this was unprofessional, and my boss noticed.

So now I have a one-on-one meeting with him to go over my behavior and discuss how a proper supervisor should behave. I've met with the people that I normally am affectionate with, and we have agreed to switch to high-fives. And no, I wasn't just attacking random people: I only hug my friends and they are reciprocated 90% of the time. That's just a problem with working with your friends, I guess. Also, we always hug outside of work, so I guess it didn't really occur to me that this was inappropriate in the way my boss says it is.

I hardly ever get on Facebook during work, and I thought I was being friendly. I'm kinda crushed a little, mostly because there were only two or three hugs during a nine and a half hour shift. And I don't work with my hugging friends on my other shift (this one).

And I'll be working with them next quarter, so it's a good thing we have this "conversation" scheduled because this really worries me. I don't want to be fired when I only have two quarters left with this job.

But right now, I really should be working on my Philosophy paper (due Sunday at midnight), my take-home exam (due Monday), my Inorganic notes and studying (due Tuesday at 4pm), and my Chemical Literature paper (due Wednesday at noon).

So I bid you farewell! Don't forget to wear socks when wearing sneakers!