The Vulcan Hand Salute Enactment Effect

I honestly have the most awesome best friend in the entire world.  Although she's never watched a single episode of Star Trek (the horror!), she indulges my love of the show and on my birthday last month, spent hours letting me tell her to live long and prosper while giving her a Vulcan hand salute repeatedly.  (Side track: my other close friend made me a birthday cake in the shape of a Vulcan hand salute.  See? Awesome, awesome friends).

The other day was just so full of win that I begged her to let me mention the conversation on my blog, which she agreed to do (I *love* her!).

I was raised Catholic.  My best friend, however, is not at all religious and up until last week she had never been to a Catholic mass in her life:

'I was supposed to wish peace to the people around me,' she said, 'and instead I turned to my husband with my Spock hand up and told him to live long and prosper...'

Again, this is from somebody who has never seen a Star Trek episode or movie in her life.  Do I have my friends well trained or what!? And, as stated previously - I am totally going to make this, as well as Spock Five a thing.  Soon all my friends and family will be doing it.

The Website Theme Preoccupation

I need some toothpicks to keep my eyes open today.  The reason?  My website; or more accurately, my website theme.  I needed something perfect, and it's pretty much all I've thought about the entire week. 

I became obsessed.  Bec-style obsessed.  Think Gollum in a purple dressing gown obsessed. 

The menus in particular were an issue. 

"No! It needs to be clean!"
"It's a menu..."
"It's the most important thing!"
"Okaaaay then..."

The same thing happened with the author boxes at the bottom of the posts.

The same thing happened with the colours.

And everything else.

Finally, finally I found a solution in the form of a website theme builder.  Perfect!  And I was up until 5am playing with it.

I wonder what the next thing I'll obsess over will be.

You can check out the website here: MillarPress.com

The service station exit inadequacy

Winston Churchill once said 'To improve is to change; to be perfect is to change often".  Clearly, I am about as far from perfect as you can get.

I hate change.  I loathe it with every molecule of my being.  It makes me uneasy, it makes my brain implode and, to be frank, it makes me bitchy too. 

So you can imagine my delight at discovering road works on the main road adjoining my own street. 

And you can probably imagine what went down when I needed to drive down the accursed road tonight.  I was stomping around like an angry lunatic...err, I mean 'validly upset person', until I realised something.  My sister recently moved in with me.  Excellent.

'Dude! Dude!' I called out.
'What?'
'I need you to drive me to the end of the street'
'Are you f**king serious? Why can't you drive yourself?'
'Because there are roadworks.  Roadworks, dude! And the traffic lights are all stupid, and ROADWORKS...' I was just about to launch into a long winded rant about why this was The End Of The World, when she spotted the danger signs and promptly agreed to take me.  Kudos to you, sister.  You saved yourself at least twenty minutes of my ranting.

So she drove me down there, muttering about how I'm a pain in the ass the whole way.  Until we went to exit the service station on way home...

'You SEE!  I am not crazy! There is no freaking exit there! Now how are we going to get out?'
'Oh crap, you're right.  I guess we just go back the way we came?'
'But that's not what we do.  We do not go back the way we came, we go out that exit there.  On the right road.  The way we came is the wrong road'.

To her credit she managed to not rise to this, and we did indeed go back the way we came.

'You know that I would have flipped it if I encountered that on my own,' I remarked.
'Yeah, I think you would have,' she agreed.

It's so nice when people just play along with my particular brand of crazy.  

Don't tell me Wrath of Khan is on tv then expect me NOT to quote it!

It's been a Star Trek kind of day today (but then again, when is it ever not a Star Trek kind of day when I'm around?).  First, this popped up in my facebook newsfeed:

Well played, facebook.  Well played.

And of course, I couldn't let this go without being lame and commenting on my own status update in relation to this image "I have been... and always shall be... your friend... live long and prosper.  RESISTANCE WAS FUTILE!".

And then there was this conversation later on:

Mum: Bec, Wrath of Khan is on tv followed by The Search for Spock.
Me: He tasks me! He tasks me and I shall have him! I'll chase him 'round the moons of Nibia and 'round the Antares Maelstrom and 'round perdition's flames before I give him up!
Mum: What the fu...
Me: FROM HELL'S HEART I STAB AT THEE! FOR HATE'S SAKE I SPIT MY LAST BREATH AT THEE!
Mum: Exactly how many times have you seen Wrath of Khan?
Me: I dunno, like three? That's all from Moby Dick.
Mum: And how many times have you read that?
Me: Once. Hey mum? I have been...and always shall be... your friend.

At which point she walks off in disgust while I yell out 'live long and prosper' at her.

But honestly, she was the fool who brought up Wrath of Khan.  She should know that it's all she's going to hear for the next week or so!

When maths meets marketing

When most people work out a business or marketing plan, I'm sure they brainstorm then methodically work out the best ways to get what they want for the lowest cost possible.  The difference between myself and those people is that I have a fondness for reducing every possible thing to pure math.  I suck at business, I suck even more at marketing.  And I've spent the last four months working out how I can outsource both, or at least make it less painful for me to tackle on my own.  And then today it hit me:

Reduce it to a basic mathematical formula.

So I did:

Believe it or not, that is a marketing plan; one which (when implemented) is going to generate me massive amounts of website traffic and hopefully sales.

To paraphrase xkcd: Math! It works, b*tches!

As for what it says...well, if I tell you that then I'll have to exterminate you <--to be said in Dalek voice ;)

Why scientists should not catch colds...

When I'm not busy writing, I'm busy being a scientist. Microbiology is a special favourite for me, and normally this is great...

Except when I get sick.

Scientists, and microbiologists in particular, should never get sick. Ever. My thought process/facebook statuses look a little something like this over the past 72 hours:

Thursday: My nose is running and I have a slight headache. It's probably just hayfever -insert grossness here about analysing the colour of bodily fluids Sheldon Cooper style-. It's fine, really... I'm sure it is...

Friday: I'm dying. I have a fever. That's good though, a fever is a non-specific immune defense. It'll burn those germs up in no time... but a fever is also one of the first sign of ebola. Or the plague. OH MY GOD I HAVE THE PLAGUE!!!! No, I'm being ridiculous. Of course I don't have the plague! It's just a headache and fever and runny nose, a normal head cold... Except that's how ebola starts. Oh good lord, I'll be bleeding out of my eyeballs within the week! Noooo! But WHERE would I have contracted ebola? Where was I ten days ago? Who could have infected me with a rare hemorrhagic fever that is usually only found in or near rain forests in remote parts of Western Africa?! You're being ridiculous, it's just a cold!

Saturday: I'm coughing. It's official, I have the pneumonic plague. Farewell cruel world!


....And that, my friends, is why if you know somebody who is a scientist you should avoid them like the *ahem* plague when they are sick. (I HAD to make the lame pun, it was necessary!).

And if you ARE a scientist and you get sick, I'm about to go all 'Madagascar' on the joint and dig myself a dying hole, Melman style. You're welcome to join me. We can play exotic pathogenic bingo!