A cold little chickadee

As I left work at Ferdinand’s yesterday, I came across this little guy in my path. I’ve always been fond of chickadees as they’re adorable. Their name is fun to say, they’re adorably small, and they are pretty quiet – no obnoxious sounds. I decided I wanted to take a picture. I took one from a reasonable distance, then moved closer and closer, seeing how close I could get before it flew away. But it never flew away. So I couldn’t help myself. I tried to pick it up.

And it let me. It didn’t struggle or chirp. It just let me scoop it up, which meant something was wrong. And now I had involved myself. I felt bad for the little guy, but what are you supposed to do with a sick chickadee?

Back in the newsroom

I have returned to the Evergreen, kind of and only temporarily. I started last week helping at the News desk. This week I filled in as copy editor two nights and News editor on Thursday. I am amazed at how quickly and easily it is to get sucked back in.

Other than dropping in to meet Rikki before going to a class we both have, I’ve pretty much stayed away from the newsroom. I thought it would seem mocking to hang out there without having any work related to the paper to do. But it still seems so natural to be back in the newsroom, even with my previous absence.

A lot of the faces are different, and Dom and Rikki did do a pretty good job of cleaning the newsroom out. I was happy to discover a few of my things left though. One the quotes I chose is still hanging by the news desk. Also, a sticky note is still on a news desk drawer warning people not to throw away anything inside the drawer. I put it there the summer before I became news editor because I didn’t trust the summer  news editor with my documents.

What I’ve been up to

Two weekends ago, my room flooded while I was out for the weekend. Apparently a pipe between two of the suites got clogged, and so grayish sewer water came up through the drains. My roommates were kind enough to move my stuff in my room so everything survived.

This is Hubie, my de-humidifier. We had three of these monsters in the suite for more than a week trying to dry everything out. Our rooms hummed. Environmental Health & Safety kept taking wall and floor samples too. Now they want to entirely replace my carpet.

Last weekend, I drove out to Palouse to do a story on Haunted Palouse for one of my classes. I also ended up giving it to the Evergreen. How did I not know that Palouse was home to a printing museum?

I also got a tour of the whole town, which unsurprisingly, didn’t take very long. It was quite interesting though. The event is adding a Haunted Hay Ride this year. It’s going to run through Shady Lane (actual name of a wide walking path behind town). Shady Lane was Palouse’s red light district back when it was near a stagecoach stop, according to townspeople.

In addition to those adventures, I had my first CUB Advisory Board meeting, first President’s Student Advisory Board meeting (which I’m coordinating), Student Conduct training, two papers due, another article, a class debate and work at Ferdinand’s.

September was a very busy month. But now that I have survived, I hopefully won’t have to do another catch up post for a while.

To click or not to click

I have only recently started reading my news online. There is an abundance of newspapers on campus, so even working at the Evergreen, instead of surfing the internets for my news I would just walk to a nearby building and grab a paper. In part it may be that I hoped my resistance to internet news would somehow save the print industry.

But because all my efforts to resist advances in technology have proved fruitless, and because internet news is nothing if not convenient, I have started reading the news on my computer before I leave for class in the morning. One of the problems I have discovered, however, is that there’s no way to fool myself. I can’t pretend to be an intellectual who forgoes reading entertainment news and instead keeps up to date on real, actually important issues. I have to consciously pick the links I want to read, making what news I am interested in undeniable. It’s not like reading the paper where you glance at every page and can pretend to be interested in the third health care reform story from that day’s paper.

Still, being forced to admit to what I actually want to read and what I don’t care to hasn’t bothered me too much until today. The darn New York Times just had to have the link Baby Mongooses!.  Nevermind world and U.S. news, there were baby animals. I tried to resist and continued reading about Gabon, China and North Korea, but then I gave in. I included Baby Mongooses in my precious amount of news reading time this morning. Completely worth it, but I am slightly ashamed and worried that some day this interest in not real news will lead me to USA Today.

I made the front page

The photo below is from the front page of Monday’s Daily Evergreen. Can you find me?

A forgotten overheard

Idaho bartender upon seeing my temporary, vertical, enhanced license: “Wtf is this.”

So I begin to explain. I get about four words in, “It’s a new enhanced,” and the bartender cuts me off. “Never mind. I don’t care.” He hands me my drink.

Overheard at CLR

I spent this weekend in Post Falls, Idaho at the Cougar Leadership Retreat. I got invited Wednesday afternoon and left Friday morning so it all happened pretty quickly. I didn’t have any weekend plans and thought it would be a good opportunity to network. It was your typical leadership camp, not particularly useful for anything except networking, but mostly enjoyable and a good time.

And just for fun, I have some overheards from this weekend. It was very obviously a camp full of college students.

“It’s like he roofies me for my flag.” – Oh the joy of camp games.

“Have you ever been blobbed? You totally have to be blobbed.” –  The camp promised to have a blob on the water for our enjoyment. Sadly, upon our arrival, we learned it had recently popped.

“Our administration is very receptacle to students.” – This is why one shouldn’t try to use words outside one’s vocabulary.

Person 1 – “Do you guys have an odd number of balls over there?” Person 2 – “Nope, that’s just you.” – I was person No. 2 in this scenario by the way. No. 1 was the student government vice president. In retrospect, probably not the best kind of response to someone whom it would probably be useful to be on positive terms with. The conversation occurred because there was a strange game at the camp. We dubbed it carpet ball. There were two tables, but sometime during the weekend a ball went missing, thus leaving one table with an odd number.

A smaller pink purse

I got a hot pink clutch for my birthday from Lisa’s relatives. I love it because my regular bag has begun feeling inappropriate for everyday occasions (even if it does usually match my outfits). Lisa has shared similar feelings. While I too like carrying everything I might need, it is kind of a hassle to drag my big bag around places. With the clutch, which fits conveniently inside my larger bag, I can grab only the essentials and leave all the extras in my car or at my desk at work when I go out for a few minutes.

Since I got the clutch, I’ve been meaning to clean out my larger bag to make room. I have been avoiding the task for a while, but today I felt suddenly inspired to copy Lisa’s idea. She didn’t care too much when I got the same bag as her, so hopefully she won’t mind too much that I copied her post as well. I did use a different picture.

What I’ve got in my bag below

My final year in Pullman begins

It’s been a pretty busy last few days. I turned 21 and went from Spokane to Pullman to home to Pullman in five days. I arrived in Pullman for the second time yesterday and moved into my room.  I have unpacked some, but I hate unpacking because I know in less than a year I have to pack it all back up again. It seems inefficient. Perhaps it is because I am not fully unpacked that I cannot seem to locate any of my dishes, other than coffee mugs. I do love coffee, but forks, spoons, and bowls are usually pretty useful too.

I returned to work at Ferdinand’s today. I’m going to work through the fall and probably through the spring too. It won’t be many hours though, so I’m trying to figure out what I’m going to do with all my free time. I guess I’ll read more and there’s always my thesis. My work on that will seriously begin this semester too.

I’m still working on finding other activities for this school year, which officially begins Monday, as well. One suggestion was to become a certain student government’s “Press Release Person.” I know I’m not exactly in a position to be picky, but I think I’m going to keep looking. I do have a few pretty good other leads so I’m hopeful.

Last random thought for now – I will make my second appearance in the Lentil Festival as a cheese-hander-outer on Saturday. After an unpaid internship this summer, I’m not in any kind of situation to turn down work, even if it means I will again have to wear a lab coat that is four times too big for me and run after a truck painted like a cow while carrying cheese in my pockets.

Out at Fernan Range*

I went to the shooting range with Bill on Monday. He felt bad that after living at his house all summer, I’d only watched him shoot and hadn’t had the opportunity myself. He took a few photos while I focused on the targets. They were placed out to 400 yards. I’m not great or even really good, but decent enough that I hit them all.

We shot a few different rifles and pistols. The photos above are with a DPMS Panther 308. I have no idea what that means, but that was the name Bill gave me. Before I left, he had to have me try a shotgun. He chose his Benelli S-90. It wasn’t too bad. Only bruised me in the shoulder a little bit.

*This post is supposed to serve as discouragement to all who think it might be funny to get me to wear a sombrero or indulge in any other ridiculousness tomorrow. Don’t do it. Thanks.