this started out as a youtube share and morphed into a full life update

I can't stop listening to these songs.

"Heartbeat" by The New Electric Sound

warning: shirtless man!

Probably because it would make a great (maybe a tad slow?) cha-cha. 

"Suitcase"

Sad that I get into the Provo music scene a year and a half after moving away from Provo. Alas!

Unrelated, but sadly funny (maybe ironic? I'm afraid to label things as ironic): the $100 iTunes giftcard I got when I bought my MacBook a year and a half ago lasted longer than the computer itself. I guess it had had enough after I fell down the stairs with it, and Aaron spilled a full cup of Crystal Light on it. RIP pretty MacBook. 

It's not the end of the world though, because Aaron doesn't really need his laptop anymore, so we stuck my harddrive in it, and now here I am, typing away!

In other news, Aaron is working in the hospital full-time now, and he is doing fantastically. He's there from 7 AM to 7 PM most days lately (weekends too, ugh), and then comes home and studies until midnight-ish. This was not an easy adjustment...but I think we're getting better at it. And by that I mean, I've stopped crying myself to sleep over feeling lonely and freaked out about how much worse residency will be. Woo! Plus, I stay longer on campus and get more done, which is good considering...

...I have my candidacy exam coming up in March, and this determines whether I will be allowed to continue pursuing my PhD. I have to write up a paper giving background on my project, explaining what I've accomplished since I started working in the lab, and telling what future plans I have for my project. I also have to put together a presentation with basically the same information, present it to a committee of 3 professors, and then field tricky questions from them. Ah. AH.

Also in March, Aaron takes his first shelf exam. Guess how much we're looking forward to that month!

pretty words for your sunday

via

"Within"

By Carol Lynn Pearson 

I read a map once
Saying the kingdom of God
Was within me.
But I never trusted
Such unlikely ground.

I went out.
I scoured schools
And libraries
And chapels and temples
And other people’s eyes
And the skies and the rocks.
And I found treasures
From the kingdom’s treasury
But not the kingdom.

Finally I came in quiet
For a rest
And turned on the light.

And there
Just like a surprise party
Was all the smiling royalty–
King, Queen, court.

People have been
Locked up for less, I know.
But I tell you
Something marvelous
Is bordered by this skin:

I am a castle
And the kingdom of God
Is within.

(found here)

a waste of trader joe's white chocolate chips!

It turns out if you add an extra egg* to your oatmeal chocolate chip cookies, not only will they be super crispy and not good, but they will multiply and you will be left with > 30 flat crackly cookies. Mmmmmm. I would also now not recommend white chocolate chips in oatmeal cookies...

You can come and take some off our hands if you want.

*I don't really know how this happened except I got really enthusiastic about cracking eggs?

these pandas brought to you courtesy of jen

This is my first time getting a gif to show up in Blogger. Welcome to the year 2013, Katie!
I don't know how I did it, but I'm quite proud (my knowledge of html is limited to what I learned by playing Neopets as a 14 year old).

Also: PANDAS! I think I need one.

too many scan cycles

A conversation between me and Aaron, just after I'd woken up, having fallen asleep at 9 PM on the couch:

Me (very confused and somewhat angry): Ugh, my neck hurts from sleeping on it for 800 scan cycles.
Aaron: What the heck are you talking about?
Me: I don't understand why you don't understand! A scan cycle!
Aaron: Umm...?
Me: You know, like waiting for it to scan 1 nanometer at a time!
Aaron: You sound like a crazy person right now.
Me (now very angry): Whatever, I'm going to bed.

What can we learn from this?
A. I hate waking up at 11:30 at night. Or actually, I should say that I hate waking up from naps, regardless of when they occur.
B. Apparently I have been using the CD spectrometer too much, because I know that was what I was thinking about when I decided to start using scan cycles as a unit of time (much to Aaron's bewilderment).

(Does this make me a good grad student now? Maybe I can be less stressed about not being stressed enough because science has infiltrated my just-barely-consciousness!)

i am now wondering what laser tag in philly would be like

This year, we spent Christmas with my family, and then headed down to visit Aaron's family until New Year's Eve. As always, it was so wonderful to be home!

Here's a rundown of all the excitement: We saw two movies, "The Hobbit", as blogged about previously, and "Les Mis" (which I liked, but I also fell asleep during it). We shopped, ate too much chocolate, went bowling, made lasagna almost completely from scratch twice (no sheep slaughtering to make sausage), chased Brook around the house much to her delight, watched "Pitch Perfect" which was hilarious, and went to the temple for Zach. That was really neat. Aaron's sisters and I also went to the temple the day before to do some initiatory family names while my mother-in-law was working in the initiatory, and that was also really lovely. We probably don't try hard enough to find the time to go to the temple while we're on the East Coast (though with Aaron working nearly 70 hours a week in the hospital now there's not really time to be found), so it was great to go twice while in Utah. I love the peaceful feeling there. On a less serious and significant note, we played laser tag, and I won. I'm very proud of this because there were at least 6 teenage boys playing + Aaron, so you know. I am pretty hard core right now.

Some photo proof of our adventures:

Merry Christmas! Love, the Pulsiphers in 10 years

 Miracle Bowl- It's a miracle anyone bowls here.

(just kidding, we like Miracle Bowl)

Gingerbread houses and Abby's "museum of things covered in fondant"

See's = Christmas

Aaron's family is severely addicted to Diet Coke. Even Brielle loved playing with the bottle and kept getting mad at Aaron for taking it away.

The baby whisperer

Too cute. Can't say anything else. I'm out.

2012, found in a poem

"The Suitor" by Jane Kenyon

We lie back to back. Curtains
lift and fall,
like the chest of someone sleeping.
Wind moves the leaves of the box elder;
they show their light undersides,
turning all at once
like a school of fish.
Suddenly I understand that I am happy.
For months this feeling
has been coming closer, stopping
for short visits, like a timid suitor.

2012 started out really rough. I remember sobbing in the library multiple times thinking about all the horrors of December 2011. I finally experienced the reality that terrible things happen to good people through Aaron's family and tragedies of close friends, and it shocked me how much it hurt. I think I'm still trying to reconcile myself to that truth. Slowly, though, things have gotten better. "For months this feeling has been coming closer," and 2012 ended up better than expected. Remarkably so, I'd say. We went on fun trips: DC, New York, the Grand Canyon, beach in North Carolina, my lovely Utah. We got busy with school: Aaron finished up the last of his sit-in-a-classroom-all-day-classes, and I started researching full time. We got a new niece: who is unbelievably adorable and beautiful and we love her. And we love Philly and we love each other and 2012 was all right by me.

"Suddenly I understand that I am happy."

I hope that 2013 brings us all happiness, too.