(it’s the longest or shortest day of the year)

Just a few things today, as it’s already bedtime.

–I aced the quiz. Good for me. I feel the same mild shame that I felt as I aced my way through everything during the paralegal program: this is incredibly easy and I don’t deserve the pleasing feeling that I get from seeing “A” for it.

–First thing Monday morning as I got in my car, I smelled a horrendous scorchy kind of smell coming out of the vents. It occurred with both heat and cold blowing, and with the internal-air-only filter on as well. It smelled badly wrong, and possibly as if it was not healthy to breathe as I sat in a closed car. It was so strong that I determined, as I drove home with it on Monday afternoon, that I would take my car to the dealership 30 seconds away from my job after work on Tuesday. First thing Tuesday morning as I got in my car, I moved my nose into the stream of air coming out of the vents and smelled…nothing. It was completely gone. Has been gone since. I amused myself by thinking my car was all like “Nooooooo, I don’t wanna go to the vet! I’m all better, see?”

–During some of tonight’s class we talked about DNA, its structure, and its function. I was completely lost. DNA is really fucking complicated, composed of only certain kinds of molecules in specific sets of variations, arranged in this perfect mathematic system, and its functions are so basic and essential as to be difficult to explain adequately, like the meaning of the word ironic. I was sitting there looking at the wonderful and helpfully labeled diagram in my book, totally not comprehending what I was seeing, and I was amazed to realize that as I sat there and struggled, every cell in my body contained and was performing what was laid out on the page. Every second, DNA is doing what it does to keep me alive. And I don’t even understand it. How remarkable is that?

–If you think I am stupid for not understanding DNA, please keep it to yourself. I am not science-minded and have never claimed to be. But I was able to tell the teacher the correct spelling of “turnstile” as he was explaining cell membranes.

–That reminds me of something else that happened today. One of my coworkers often has random questions about the world, from how to spell words to what a solstice is. These are answers I almost always know, and if I hear them properly (she’s a few cubicles away), I tell her the answers. Today she didn’t know how to spell jiu jitsu, so I spelled it for her. She said I had the most random collection of knowledge of anyone she’d ever met. I thought up a smartassed reply that was also the truth, thought about saying it, thought about not saying it, and decided to say it anyway: “Nah, I’m just smart.”

–Even though I still haven’t (re)learned what mitochondria are. Cell biology, oh dread and horror, is next week.