she sings and sighs as the shuttle flies

This...
this...
this is the best thing I have seen in a long time. 

How can one person have so much talent in such a tiny body? How to even describe the wonder of this video? 
I will try with "tiny but supremely talented musical genius rocks the hell out of the ukulele, even though he does not appear to have mastered many basic language skills."
<3<3<3


PS Sorry gavagai  I appear to have stolen your 'green wing quote for post title' schtick, because, well, because that's the kind of mood I'm in today

 Things that make me happy today:

- This adjustable pipette
OMG it promises to help me 'conquer new horizons in multichannel pipetting'. I literally screamed for joy when I saw that it existed.

- I drew phyllogenetic trees using data it has taken me months to accumulate. There are trees! They say stuff! I did science!

- Stephen Mangan as Dirk Gently. Tonight. I have no words for the happiness of this.

- Finally, exactlyhalf is coming home tomorrow. We will go for carols with the master. It will be wonderful

 Calling all aubreyad fangirls! You must check out these amazing aubrey-maturin as steam-punk heroine pictures by fayhe and friends. They are utterly amazing.

(Also, I totally want one of those medical gadget holding armbands. Ebay, do you think?)

For less than £2 each, today I acquired
- A 1935 copy of Murder Must Advertise. It smells like an old book and makes me happy
- An object that I probably bought JUST for the joy of mathoming it. All I'll say is that it's long, pink and hard, and everyone will say 'ooh' and 'ah' about what comes out of it. 

A satisfying morning indeed.

 My favourite new tool in the lab is the 'fast prep'. You put your bacteria into a tube full of sand and tiny ceramic beads and load it on the machine, which literally shakes it up to smash the cells open and free your DNA. Magic!

I was thinking of naming it 'Hulk' and drawing some purple shorts on it, but possibly no-one will get the joke. So now I just smile as I use it, thinking, in pronoun-free capslock, about the joys of smash.

I seem to have scored a month of dreamwidth paid time, and more icons. I've been celebrating by pretending I know how to make icons. 

This is my anti-impostor syndrome icon. Because in my last minute exam freak-out, a friend told me the exam technique she used: to believe the examiner's questions are stupid. Because you know the answer. Because you're smart and you know this stuff. I took this to mean I needed to channel my inner Yang, and it did seem to work. 

 Back to exam mode, in a good way today. I worked as a 'helper' at the medical student final exams, ushering nervous finalists from examiner to examiner. This was with the ulterior motive of knowing that the exam meant many many patients with physical signs to observe. I was hoping to get a chance to examine some. Turns out I got to examine ALL OF THEM.

I had forgotten what it was like to enjoy a proper med-nerd frenzy. I diagnosed yellow nail syndrome. YELLOW NAIL SYNDROME DUDES! I diagnosed murmurs and complications, pneumonectomies, tremors. Dudes, I even found optic discs, and noted that they were pale. (Fundoscopy is the scary bete noir that I am petrified will come up on the exam.)  And consultants in sub-fusc magical words to me like 'yes, that would be a pass in PACES' <3<3<3<3) 

So this leads to happy feelings of growing competence and stuff. I guess liking being good at what you're doing is a good sign that you're where you should be.

Also happy making are the whisky tasting notes that were restored to us recently when exactlyhalf's winter coat was found. I think they are *extremely* illuminating, but mainly about the volume of wine that we drank before the whisky.

Dalwhinnie
Me: "Nice" "Tasty, nice, good, honey" "*particularly* nice"
EH: "Very warm, high-pitched"
Highland Park
Me: "Tasty Whisky!"
EH: "It' fine"
Singleton
Me: "Ooh, that's tasty!"
EH: "Interestingly different in a good way"
Talisker 10
Me: "Tastes like drinking bacon"
EH: "Indeed it does"

Work has had some nice moments recently. I have acquired the skill of placing central venous catheters into femoral veins. What I find hilarious is that, after years of being told (and also knowing) that I am co-ordinationally challenged, to have a registrar say 'wow, you really have an aptitude for that'. Nice, but also hilarious. I'd love to hear my family's response to that one. I guess there are some things you really can learn.

So now I am enjoying a glass of red (and yes, it's both tasty AND nice), and preparing for bed. Night night.

TIM MINCHIN WAS TOTALLY TOTALLY AWESOME!!!

What a rockstar - combining as he does, the hair, the eyeliner, the frenetic piano playing with talk of meta-analyses and bell-curves. At one point he talked about reading a paper, and paused. 'Do any of you like reading papers?' - cheers ensued. 'Oh, I knew I'd love Oxford. It's like coming home.' <3 (How many comedians involve the phrase 'post hoc ergo propter hoc' in explaining their songs?)

One of the best moments was 'White Wine in the Sun' - all about Australian Christmas and having your family so far away. Little teary ex-pat moment there. Also brilliant was during a rather edgy moment (well, if you were trying to get a crowd to sing 'i love jesus, I hate faggots' to prove a point, you'd probably be on edge too), an usher started rushing down the aisle. This clearly put him off, at which point he suggested she should 'ush the fuck up'. But it's OK, after the show she explained, he apologised and they hugged. Awww.

So we totally stood in the cold waiting for a chance to meet Mr Tim, and we DID and he hugged us, and signed our bits of stuff, and was generally lovely. On learning I was from Melbourne, we had the following exchange
Tim: 'We're going to be in Melbourne in January, for about 6 weeks'
Me: 'Oh, but in January it's too hot - it's all humid and horrible'
Tim: *looks thoughtful*
Me: 'That's how I get through January over here'
Tim: 'Yeah, but you're just lying to yourself!'
Me: *hangs head*

Totally awesome gig. 

 I have
- my coffee
- The Age Saturday crossword, airmailed from Australia by my sister in law
- really yummy blood orange juice
- The whole weekend filled with plans to see nice people

This is good stuff.

Maybe it's because it's late, or because of the glass of Bailey's I had to help me sleep, or that this song was one that had particular resonance with me for many years when England was where my heart wanted to be. Or maybe it's that Lewis and Hathaway's love is true and pure, but this video is very very sweet:

 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d6H17inC0bQ