Monday, July 23, 2012

Recipe for happiness


Recipe for happiness

1 container Talenti Double dark chocolate gelato
1 container Cool Whip
1 container Cabot plain Greek yogurt (it must be full fat it cannot be reduced fat yogurt I have put a cruse on this recipe and if you make it with lowfat yogurt you will break both your legs and all your eyelashes will fall out!!!!)

1 tall glass

Start by adding 3/4 in gelato to the bottom of the glass. The glass should be clean so it looks pretty but if your dishwasher leaves crumbs stuck to everything don't sweat it. Add enough yogurt to cover the gelato fully, about 1 in. Then add a little scoop of Cool whip. It doesn't need to be much. You might want to thaw your frozen Cool Whip first; apparently it has a lower freezing point than the gelato and the yogurt, causing it to form a barrier between the layers (stabbing it repeatedly with my spoon, I imagine I felt the same as a 16 year old male trying to break through a chastity belt).

Repeat layering gelato, yogurt, and then C.W. until the top of the glass; you should end with gelato to ensure that your satisfaction is as immediate as possible. This dessert can be served immediately, or let set in the freezer for 10-15 min (but really, why the heck would you want to wait??).

Friday, July 13, 2012

Things to look for when viewing apartments

I've recently moved into a new apartment.  It's slightly smaller and much cheaper than my last residence, and I'm quite pleased with it. However, there are certain things that I wish I had looked at beforehand to possibly negotiate with the landlord before moving in.  These, and other pointers, are included in the following list, and I'll leave it up to the reader to pick out the ones that are from real experiences.

10. Does the front yard contain hermit crabs?

9. Is the building overwhelmingly occupied by grad students that hate their lives and will eventually cease to maintain minimal levels of hygiene?

8. Is the "picture window" made of, cumulatively, more than 3 glass molecules? (Energy conservation may suffer if the answer is no.)

7. Is your apartment actually a basement? (Look for windows, note if you have to walk DOWN stairs from the main level, etc. This is a huge tip for you, guys.)

6. Are previous residents expected to take their belongings when they move out or will each person in the house leave various items so that eventually the current residents will have to navigate the kitchen as if in a maze, through the piles of junk?

5. Does the landlord allow pets up to 20lbs just to accommodate the roaches that live there?
.
4. Do any other tenants actually live in the building or is it mainly a front for extramarital affairs or illegal activities?

3. Have electrical outlets been updated? (Ie, do plugs spontaneously fall out of the wall because the outlets are so worn?)

2. When the landlord says, "It's a new fridge," does he mean new to the world or made in 1959 but new to this specific apartment?

1. Mysterious bloodstains on the inside of cabinets

Wednesday, July 4, 2012

Obstacles to settling in to new apartment

...thus far:

1. New apartment has squeaky spot in floor

2. Weather not amenable to strenuous activities such as cleaning

3. 100% of underwear has gone missing

posted from Bloggeroid

News gives important insights into social psychology

I was at the hospital the other day to get my thyroid checked (normal!!) and while in the waiting room overheard a piece on the news discussing stereotypes linked to a woman's weight. The newscasters stated that thin women are viewed as controlling, demanding, and self-absorbed, whereas women who are overweight are judged to be lazy and apathetic.

This is the perfect example of how scientific findings can be blown completely out of proportion. Perhaps one of the news anchors read a release on the study, or skimmed the abstract.  Both of these sources are abridged and tend to hyperbolize significance and over-extend conclusions.  You need to take a minute to think about what the study actually tested.

For example, in this study subjects were probably merely shown pictures of overweight and underweight women and asked to score their perceived personalities.  I ask you, how relevant is this to real life??  Essentially, this method would measure the opinion of a person that walks by you on the street.  Am I really going to feel bad about myself because that person takes me to be a bitch because I'm in shape?  Um, no!  And to further undermine these findings, am I going to think that some heavyset woman dressed to the nines and walking confidently is lazy??  Again, NO.  When I first read Romeo and Juliet, the teacher stopped the reader after the part where Romeo and Juliet see each other at the party for the first time.  She asked the class to think about "love at first sight" and then polled us to see if we thought that you could tell anything about a person "at first sight."  I remember distinctly that one of the stuck up girly girl bullies (she made fun of my Star Wars pen and I hope she's jobless and still living with her parents) in our class answered that no, you can't tell anything about a person that way!  I bit the bullet and risked being the shallow one by countering that yes, you can know something about a person by seeing them across the room; by observing what they're doing, who they're with and how they're dressed, you can start to get an idea of who they are.  And obviously the more time that you spend with a person, this initial skeletal opinion will be shaped and built upon as you find out who they really are.

So if this study tells us anything, it's how we judge other people without meeting them and with no context whatsoever.  I guess it sometimes happens that this sort of opinion is relevant, but not often.  The issue is that so often when scientific studies, especially those in psychology, are taken out of context the conclusions can lead us to addressing the wrong problems.  Should women now worry that they have to fight these stereotypes?  I don't really think so.  Maybe instead what we should take away is the fact that anyone who judges you on your appearance and not your personality isn't worth your time!  Even if this study reflects innate or socially-driven first responses to our peers, we are not trapped by these feelings and opinions because we are thinking, self-aware beings.  When will newscasters (and for that matter, politicians), start taking this into consideration?

Monday, July 2, 2012

Don't JUST do it

It takes less time to do a thing right than to explain why you did it wrong."

--Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

So take the time and do it right, dammit!!