You turned me into somebody loved

~The Weepies (Somebody Loved - my favorite song right now)

It’s been a week since the wedding event of 2007. My brother Alan and my new sister Leah got married after a very fast 4 month engagement last Saturday. The past three months of my life have been extremely stressful for many reasons which I may blog about in the future, but suffice to say, I’m starting to feel like I’m getting my life back somewhat, just in time to realize that summer is on it's way out. At least with the wedding done and the marriage off to a good start, I feel that all the wedding craziness was well worth it. After all, Leah is awesome and I love my only brother very much.

I took seven days off of work to see my brother race (he got first in one race and qualified for nationals!) and help out as much as I could with the last-minute wedding stuff, and while I came back more tired than I was when I left Bend, it was still a great trip. I got to see many family members and old family friends I hadn’t seen in a long time, had a lot of fun hanging out with all my brother’s friends (who are extremely amazing people), and most importantly, I got to know my new sister a lot better, even in the midst of the insanity (not hers, just the whole crazy week!).

With wedding on the brain the last 3 months especially, I couldn’t help but think about what I would do if I got married, who I would invite, and all that annoying stuff I never want to think about, but just enters the brain involuntarily. After the whole experience, I have to say that eloping has moved to the top of the list! It’s amazing to me how one day of celebration can get so complicated, expensive and stressful even when most people can step outside the situation and acknowledge that the little things (and maybe some of the bigger ones) don’t and won’t matter in the long run. I have so many friends who have gotten married or have been involved with weddings and tell me the unbelievably terrible experiences they’ve had. One of my coworkers feels so negatively about weddings that she refuses to be a bridesmaid anymore and eloped with her husband to Hawaii were the law does not require witnesses at the ceremony (pretty extreme, but they were SO happy). Why do we, as Americans obsessed with putting on the best wedding and party, following silly traditions and one-upping others’ ceremonies, get so completely crazy? It’s inexplicable to me.

Regardless of the “wedding norm” and the busyness that comes with involvement in any event, I couldn’t be happier that Leah and Alan asked me to be in their wedding – it was wonderful to stand up there with them, during what was the best wedding ceremony I’ve ever been to, bar none. Even though I haven’t been around the two of them much while they’ve been together, I can tell that they love each other deeply and have such similar personalities and senses of humor that they do seem a perfect match!

A week has passed, and I’m starting to recover and get my life in order...just in time to hop a plane to Santa Barbara for my first business trip on Monday! It’s time to enjoy the rest of the summer in Bend....so I’m going to go climb 20 miles up a mountain on my bike. I’ll let you know how that goes.

Here’s to Alan and Leah and many many years of happiness and adventure!

It's beginning to look a lot like Christmas

It’s May. I’ve been at my job for four months. You wouldn’t guess it, though. This morning I awoke and found that the rooftops in my neighborhood had a significant amount of snow on them. I always thought that spring weather in Seattle was manic, but it’s nothing compared to living in a desert! It was 76 last Friday, and it’s been snowing/raining/hailing/sunny/windy all this week.

In many ways, however, this weather suits me in my current mood and place in life. I’m up and down lately more than the Dow. I can’t explain it at all. In the last few years I have learned that I’m a person who thrives on change and new things to get excited about. So, am I reaching a point where my current state isn’t good enough any more? Most of all, I guess, I don’t want to feel like I’m wasting my life. I feel like my blog is a broken record, and certainly my time in Eugene, while short, showed me how much loneliness affects me. So, you’d think I’d love the fact that I have roommates and people to talk to at night. I do a lot of times, but usually I come home exhausted and just want to be quiet, watch the Colbert Report (my new favorite show), sleep or just think. Ah, the old adage: you always want what you can’t have.

In the last month I’ve started to go to a church that's close to home. I’m hopeful that I can get involved there and ideally it will be a place I can feel at home and make some new friends. I have to keep reminding myself that while I have started hanging out with a few people at work and am slowing starting to see more of Bend by bike and outings, moving to a new place where you don’t know anyone is a slow transition. How hard it can be. I sometimes wonder why I left a good group of friends and family in the first place. I took so much for granted in college – especially built-in friends all in similar places in life and all needing each other. I know it can be better than this, and maybe I’m getting there. I just need patience. And courage.

Coincidentally, today I was offered a real job at Bend Research! I guess I don’t have too much to complain about, except this terrible dichotomy of feeling like I’m working way too hard, but having a huge desire to “make data” as my cubicle-mate Steve puts it. I can’t believe they’re doing this, but they offered to pay me a real bachelor’s level salary for the next 5 months until I get my Master’s Degree, at which point they’ll pump up the compensation pretty awesomely! I had no idea that everyone at work thought I was doing so well, but this speaks volumes to the fact that working hard does indeed pay off. This is pretty cool and feels largely undeserved since I feel like I only know what I’m doing about 60% of the time and totally messed something up today J I never thought I’d stay on at my internship, but in keeping with my MO, I normally throw up my arms and say, “let’s see what happens!” and this is no exception. BRI is a fantastic place to be professionally and personally, and I have a feeling that’s extremely rare in the science realm. I feel like I’ve grown up so much in the last4 months, but I don’t know if I’m ready for 401Ks, health insurance and crazy taxes quite yet. Regardless, it’ll be a great chance to grow up more and learn how to be an adult no matter how long this chapter in my life lasts. I think in the back of my head, I always thought my mom would be sending me my health insurance card and my dad would send my car insurance cards. Oh, and then there’s the new idea of paying for all my living expenses. Budget, here I come! Maybe.

So, there have definitely been changes recently. I’m thankful that I’m starting to pull my shit together a little better and focus more on what really matters. Who knows what the next few years or even months holds for me, but I am pleased with the fact that things fall into place for me in spite of myself oftentimes. For that, I owe all the credit to God.

Oh we like sheep have gone astray

~Handel’s Messiah

What does a normally dedicated blogger do when she hasn’t blogged in 2 months? Make excuses? Talk about how busy and tired she’s been? Catch everyone up on all the crazy things that have happened in the last 8 weeks? Start from scratch? Ask a bunch of annoying questions? A little bit of everything?

The last two months have been a blur, but when I stop and try to pick out items of note, I realize that although I’m still lonely at times and feel like I do nothing but work and exercise, things are on a definite upswing. So, here we go, in rapid-fire incomplete sentences:

Worked a lot of overtime, played bball on a city league team, Kellie and Elizabeth came to visit me in Bend - awesome! (that’s about all I can remember about February), flew to Seattle for my cousin Megan’s wedding and grandpa’s 90th birthday, the next weekend drove to Seattle to fly to MAUI with my family for a glorious week-long vacation, drove back down to Bend, watched as much of March Madness as was humanly possible, had a dinner party with some friends from work, went up to Portland last weekend for cousin Chris’ 30th birthday and to see the family I spent time with in China, and last but not least, my brother and Leah got engaged on Wednesday (!!!!!)


Congrats, you two! I love ya.

So, you see...March has not been without its craziness, but I like that in a lot of ways.

Strangely, I’ve been doing a lot of thinking (I know, weird, isn’t it?) this last week, and while I can’t say I’ve had tons of epiphanies, I do feel like I’m growing up and learning things daily. Some highlights:

1) gossip at work can get out of control: enough said
2) being the only single girl in my entire company is a recipe for disaster
3) my plans and ideas of what a successful, rational, fun life looks like are (and should be) much different from those I’m close to
4) I care way too much about how I look even though I don’t wear makeup
5) If this dating thing ever actually happens to me, I’m going to be terrible at it and awkward at all times
6) God is the most patient entity in existence and always will be

I have been astray for a pretty solid year now, yet God quietly waits for me to seek him with a new, fresh and dedicated passion. What is it about Lent and Easter that makes me feel such a sense of obligation and at the same time, desire, to “get right with God”? I’m not even sure if I’ve ever experienced being “right” with Him, the one whom I’ve associated my whole identity with for almost 15 years. But, do I really know Him? Good Friday has always been my yearly wake-up call, which is why I count it as the most significant day every year in my life. There are no presents, no family get-togethers, no special meals to overeat at. Just a time for me to cut through all the crap and realize how little I allow God into my life, and even knowing that would be the case almost 2000 years later in Bend, Oregon, He was tortured for hours and suffered pain worse than I will ever feel. For ME. For YOU.

I’ve been reading the gospel of John this Lenten season, and because he was an eye-witness of Jesus’ crucifixion, his account really struck me today while I read it. Mostly, chapter 17 of John just blows me away. Jesus, in all his fear and anxiety about what is about to happen to him, spends a long time praying for his disciples and believers in the future. That’s me and you again. Selflessness, humility, unconditional love. That’s Jesus, and that’s a tough act to follow.

In this time of Easter celebration and remembrance, may you, no matter who you are or what you believe, realize how much Jesus loved you back when he died for you 2000 years ago and felt every crappy and horrible thing that has ever happened in your life. That’s a God worth giving my whole life to, and even though He knows and I know I’ll never be perfect, the desire to seek, learn and love is what He asks me for.

“’[I pray] for those who believe in Me...I in them and You in Me, that they may be perfected in unity, so that the world may know that You sent Me, and loved them, even as You have loved Me.’” ~John 17:20-23

I’d do almost anything that you want me to do....but I can’t go for that - no can do

~Hall and Oates

For some unknown reason, I found myself singing this wonderful Hall and Oates song while in lab today. Then, I thought: perfect title for my next blog!

It’s February. How’d that happen? I just finished my first full month as a working girl and I’m exhausted. How do people do this their whole lives?! At the same time, I’ve got to be one of the luckiest people to be working and living where I am, so I just need to ramp up on the energy...maybe when it warms up and I shake this little cold.

This whirlwind of a month has taught me a ton about Chemistry, life and the working world. In a measly 4 weeks, I have been taught to basically do everything that my fundamentals group does (which encompasses about a third of the 120 employees at my site). I guess that makes me valuable, right? It is a cool feeling to know how to do things that most of my coworkers don’t know, but then I’m always put in my place by those blasted “intern” comments. “You’re an intern, Katie...that means you’re dispensable” said Jeff the NMR specialist today at work with a big grin. I think I’m starting to get some respect and thus gain some independence in all I do, but it’s made for a BUSY last two weeks when I do a little bit of 5 or 6 other people’s jobs. I did get my own desk this week, which has been a great change and a way to get to know some awesome people!

What do I do at Bend Research, you may wonder? Or actually, you may not. Pharmaceutical research is more confidential than I expected, so I can’t say much, but I will say that other than synthesizing drug delivery system polymer components, I do a lot of drinking free beverages from work, applying and reapplying lotion 35 times a day, wishing that all my very attractive male coworkers weren’t married, hauling 3 1-gallon bottles of hazardous waste to the outdoor shed over and over again (real fun on days when it’s sub-20 F in Bend), joking around with coworkers, breaking glassware in lab (a 4-L beaker and two grad cylinders this week...whoopsie), doing dishes in an extremely scary anomaly called a ‘base bath’ (pH 14 bath that will dissolve virtually anything but the glass itself), wondering if the guy who re-stocks our beverage fridges has a crush on me, and apparently garnering a reputation for calling the newest hire a douche bag...

It’s been a great experience so far, but I have found that the whole corporate-world really bothers me. Kissing-ass and saying the right things at the right time (what the boss wants to hear) have never been my strong points, and always make me feel like a greasy businessperson. I prefer honesty and questions in meetings rather than pretending that everything is great and you aren’t wasting your time. But, at the same time, I’m hoping I get offered a job in 8 months, so maybe I should just shut my mouth unless I have a damn good idea. This could be difficult. :)

Interestingly, my group is known as the harcore beer-drinking crew, and I went along last week and had an amazing stout that even my mother could have handled (coffee and chocolate flavors), so maybe I can even learn to like beer! It’s a stretch, but I’m game for pretty much anything...

But Bud Light? I can’t go for that – no can do.

I can't complain

~Nickel Creek ("Can't Complain")

(written January 12, 2007)

Temperature reading on my car at 7:30am: 0°F
Temperature at lunchtime for the outdoor workout: 22°F

I never knew what it felt like to have my nostril hairs freeze....until today. Now that’s one of the strangest feelings ever. My first week in Bend has been full of fun, new life experiences, nice people, early mornings, even more beautiful scenery than Seattle, and some intense workouts!

In a week, I have become a semi-saavy snow and ice driver...something I never thought would happen. The drive from Eugene was fairly epic. For some reason, the designer of my car thought: “let’s see how small I can make the clearance between the tires and the wheel well,” making it nearly impossible to put the chains on the car. But that’s not all. At the second pass on the way to Bend, we were forced to stop and chain up. Dad jumps out in his shorts and has his chains on the suburban before I can even get all layered up. I was feeling good because I was totally going to do this on my own. I get the chains out and layed behind the tire...and I can’t fit my fingers under the wheel well. Turns out that 300 pounds of books and other most likely unneeded shit in your car weighs it down a little....who knew? So, after unloading the trunk and using the jack, my chains were on and things were looking great. It was actually fun (and beautiful) driving over to Bend.



So now, I live in a house that my roommate, Jinn, owns. We also have another roommate, Beth. So far, we are having fun and doing more than I thought I would in my first week here. Jinn and I went running on Saturday, which was an interesting experience when I started to slip on the ice and contemplate how badly injured I would get if I bit the dust. Supposedly they have these things called Yak tracks which are basically strap-on snow shoes to run in....I might have to invest. Jinn played D1 basketball at Montana State and has already recruited me to play post on their way-better- than-me city league team, which could be fun or frustrating...I’m not sure yet.

Work went amazingly well this week. I wasn’t as exhausted as I usually am the first week of a real job, the snow and ice were hardly ever a problem, I love all of my coworkers, and as far as I know at this point, I really like what I’m doing in lab. Bend Research, Inc. is an awesome place to work. I’ve already been invited out for beers twice, we get free food and drinks all the time, I can see about 6 mountains from our parking lot, we have really awesome outdoor workouts with a personal trainer a bunch of times a week, and then there’s the holiday party tomorrow. Hm. This should be interesting since I swear 98% of my coworkers, although they’re mostly only in their late 20s to late 30s are friggin married. Lots of cute guys...all with rings. Blast. That’s worse than all ugly guys by a long shot!

So far I’ve made a couple freshman mistakes in lab, and I don’t feel like I’m getting the respect I deserve quite yet, but there’s time for that. I made three different polymers, and started getting trained on some equipment too. There is also, apparently, time for like 6 meetings a day. Not including my first day, which was all meetings, I’ve been to 5 in the last 4 days. Not too shabby for a first week intern. Of course, don’t ask me whether I understand what they’re saying or not.

So there we have it. I’m alive and loving Bend so far. Even the crazy-ass coldness isn’t that bad, and I will be going through a bottle of lotion every day. Did I mention I got paid today? Things are definitely looking up. Oh, and this is my view from work:

So, this is the New Year...and I don’t feel any different (written Jan 3)

~Death Cab for Cutie (The New Year)

At least not quite yet.

In retrospect, 2006 was a year I could never have predicted. Even just in December: the “northwest windstorm 2006” hit with a no-holds-barred attitude (it will probably be remembered even more than the Inaugural Day storm in 1993), James Brown died on Christmas, I set a record for most Christmas cookies eaten in one week, Sadaam was noosed a couple days following, it snowed in Seattle twice, Gerald Ford passed away last week, and I had a lovely liquid New Years Eve following a day of driving in pretty much every district of Seattle to see friends. For me, some of 2006 was good, a lot of it was mediocre, and a small portion I’d rather not recall. Oh, it also rained an insane amount.

Driving home last night from Seattle to Eugene to prepare for the big move across the mountains to Bend this Friday, I hydroplaned enough to make me eligible for the Seafair races this summer. White-knuckling for 6 hours straight and streaming profanity at trucks is not my favorite activity. Now I get to prepare for some snow driving this week...yee haw!



This past month while I was at home, even though I was often busy knitting, baking cookies, cooking dinner for my parents, wrapping gifts, watching TV or sleeping, I made some pivotal realizations. First, I finally had to understand that I don’t have money. Any. Not working for 6 months really can stick it to ya. Perhaps I’ll have to take a stab at (gasp) budgeting in the near future. Secondly, Christmas wasn’t as magical this year. I’m not fully certain I can explain why, but things just seemed different, less joyful and rushed this year. Plus, apparently I’m “growing up”? It was still fun, and having some new additions to the family was certainly a treat. At Quest Church on Sunday, we had time to talk about the past year and share with each other. It’s so easy to say that I was busy this year and just didn’t prioritize time with the Lord, like I could say every year. But, I can pinpoint it a little more this year: the word for 2006 was distraction. The first six months, when I was loving my senior year even in the midst of some health problems, I allowed myself to be involved in seemingly everything, yet left some of the most important goals at the curb. Then, of course, when I moved to Eugene, I had a ton of time to exercise, read the Bible and other books, pray, et cetera. But, did I, you ask? Of course not. I allowed my perceived fatigue, knitting, classes, crippling loneliness (just kidding), incessant movie watching, slacking and zombie internet-surfing to squeeze out most of the time I could have spent doing more valuable activities.

So, as I look forward to 2007, I have a lot of hopes. Sure, you may call them resolutions, but whatever the nomenclature, I have lofty goals for what will happen in the next 12 months. I will be going to an insane amount of weddings, which is all good, as well as a much anticipated family trip to Hawaii and hopefully lots of outdoor fun in Bend and wherever I can afford to go. But more than doing, I hope this year is a year of thinking, prioritizing, reading, renewed commitment to health and being active, and most of all, putting my relationships first. I also have committed to flossing and doing 30 pushups a day. We’ll see how long that lasts...although, I shouldn’t jinx it on January 3rd.

Will Katie (and her coworkers) live through her first “real” job as a Chemistry researcher? Is there romance in her future? How about friends? Can she ski without breaking a bone for the first time? Will she freeze to death? How will the BMW fare in the snow and craziness? Will Katie meet and marry John Krasinski? How radical will her knitting skills get?

Stay tuned as Katie’s 23rd years unfolds and probably surprises even her at most moments...

Lady in Red is dancing with me, cheek to cheek

~Chris De Burgh

I should be packing my apartment up, sleeping, or exercising, but instead I had to make you laugh.

What a week it has been. I started studying for my inorganic test 3 hours before it commenced, and it went fine (disaster averted there). My other finals responsibilities I treated with about the same level of procrastination, and turns out I did the exact right amount of work. There's something about that last-minute rush of adrenaline that I love. So I am officially done with classwork for my master's degree - how odd, especially when you consider I graduated less than 6 months ago!

This week has made me slightly sad to be leaving because I finally made friends! Rachael, my back-row buddy in inorganic, is awesome, and just today we went to the holiday market together with her son and got some fun presents. The best part of this week, however, was Thursday night at the Chemistry Christmas Party! Every year, the Chemistry department sees it appropriate to wine and dine the grad students with our tuition money in a beautiful holiday banquet. It was great, my friend Marie and I were 2 hours late, and there was still tons of food because 90% of the people there go straight for the free booze. Ah, what a lifestyle.

The polymer girls decided to get all gussied up, so we felt extremely overdressed, but it was fun to actually look nice once while living in Eugene since I wore my gym clothes to class everyday and completely stopped wearing makeup when I moved down here! We had fun at the party, and then most of the students from the lab I worked in last summer and many of the students in my program went to a bar to hear my friend Jen (also in the DT lab) play at an open mike night. Commence the ridiculousness.

Before the huge crowd arrived, a few people went hog-wild with my new digital camera and took some hysterical pictures (picasaweb.google.com/katiebugk). We listened to painful guitar "artists" for what seemed like hours until the rest of the group showed up. And boy, did they show up. Plastered, that is. When Jen and Garrett finally played, I got to see my first drunken dancing and was dragged into it by my good friend Justin. Their set of covers was awesome and people were having a great time. I took some video to highlight the evening. Even sober I still had a blast!



Then, the night took a turn for the interesting. All night I had noticed a little bit of attention on me by lots of older guys. I always chock it up to my height, especially since I was wearing 3" heels, but Thursday night, I think it also had something to do with the red dress I had on. Now, to preface the coming story you must understand I had never been truly asked out or "hit on" until I moved to Eugene. For the story of my first experience, read my blog from this summer (or don't). So, while Jen was getting sick in the bathroom, all the guys started to descend upon me. All of a sudden I hear: "Miss, I just wanted to tell you that you're super beautiful." It took me a second to realize he was talking to me and then, of course, I tried to dissuade him by telling him I was moving this weekend. He said he'd commute. I was stuck. So, taking the advice of magazines and much more knowledgeable friends over the years, I told him he could give me his number. Big mistake. He then proceeds to introduce me to his GRANDFATHER who came to the bar too, and then sit down with me and write his number on a powerball ticket (because, he said, "love is like the lotto") .

This piece of work is 34, lives with his grandpa, doesn't work, lives off "investments", "will be a millionaire in 3 years", and "cooks lots of organic meals." I couldn't even think of anything sarcastic to say back, I was just completely blown away. He wouldn't go away or stop telling me how pretty I was, so when he started to argue with a guy sitting next to him, I got up quickly to go talk to Justin. At the end of the night, this dude comes back to say goodnight and says (I'm not kidding you here): "I just want you to know that it's unanimous. I asked every guy in here, and they all think you're gorgeous." OH MY LORD. Luckily, my friend Jen was sitting next to me and was so drunk that she quickly chimed in and said "too bad she's with me."

The rest of the evening (which lasted until 3:30am, and also included a trip to Burrito Boy and of course, fulfillment of my Designated Driver duties) was filled with lots of attention from a certain guy that I really liked last summer and haven't talked to since. When he had had enough to drink, he got up the courage to come talk to me and then stuck around and got a little friendly. It was, again, very interesting. There really isn't another word to describe this evening.

So what have we learned here? Don’t say the guy can give you his number if you’re totally freaked out by him. Give him the simple truth: dude, I’m not interested. Also, if I'm feeling blue, all I need to do is sport that red dress, some heels and hit up a bar in Eugene. If I don't want guys rubbing my leg or trying to hold my hand, I should probably stick to my normal guy-repellent of no makeup, hairy legs and sweats. It works like a charm.