the wonders of communication.

i am having some conflict with a woman in my astronomy lab group.

we have to do an oral report/presentation on the planet venus. me and my group all get along well, and it's been a pretty pleasant group presentation experience, overall.
one older woman has sorta wrestled control away from everyone else, delegating and stuff, and she volunteered to write up the written version that'll get turned it.
whenever anyone sends her their section, she very freely edits it, like, puts in things they never found, or writes it entirely for them. no one has really complained yet, because no one really cares and everyone is so busy. except...

i am supposed to create a creature that lives on the planet. so, i did a few hours of research and some imagining, and i came up with a cool creature. i emailed my text to her, to incorporate into the body of the paper. about 20 mins later, she emailed something back to me, said it was the text on the creature, when in fact it bore absolutely no resemblance to the text that i had written, or the creature that i described. then she sent me back a drawing that her coworker had done of the creature, that looks very little like what i had described. on top of that, she told me about these cheesy things she had done, like making a fake model windsheild with splats on it, to look like that's how scientists discovered this creature. this idea, i did not enjoy.

so, i sent her an email, which is the only means i have of contacting her, and told her i was confused and angry, that what she sent me back was not what i had written and that i didn't want her version of my text, i wanted my text in there. i thanked her for all the work she's been doing, but i said that i didn't want to use her ideas, because this is the only part of the project that i am doing. i'd like it to be my work. i liked my creature and i felt good about my write up.

so, she never replied to my email, which was curious to me.

until yesterday, when i got forwarded an email from *another* girl in my group, responding to all of us, to an email that lady had sent to everyone but me, about my 'rant' and her needing to know what to do, because she's put a lot of time into the report, but she's running out of time, she feels like her text and drawing are really close to what i said... etc. my poor group. we all barely know each other, so this must be really embarrassing for them. the girl who emailed me, and everyone, said she felt like this was between me and the crazy lady, basically.

i sent another email to the crazy lady, saying it was not my intention to hurt her feelings, which i had stated numerous times in the first email, but that i was feeling confused again about why she'd send that to everyone but me, and why she wasn't communicating with me. i said i didn't want there to be tension on monday, and that i felt like this didn't need to be such a big deal. i asked her to reply to my email.
this morning i received an email from the crazy lady, sent to everyone in the group (including me) that there was obviously no reason for her to meet us sunday evening for the final run through and that she would see us in class monday.

um... what?

for anyone who doesn't know me well, i am a very careful, precise communicator, in general. i have my fair share of slip ups, no doubt, and i can botch a communication just like the next guy, but i am characterized by my clear, careful communication. i knew the email was going to be a touchy one, so i was very careful to get my point across in a firm, but thoughtful way. i did not call her a crazy woman, or a loser with too much time on her hands, or a control freak, or anything. i repeatedly thanked her for all the work she's done and told her that i genuinely appreciate all the time she's put into everything. i just didn't want her to change my section.

not to be totally cruel, BUT.... no wonder she'd a twice-divorcee. jesus, with communication skills like those, i am surprised she is able to function in the world.
it's been bumming me out, but there's not much i can do about it all. she's using the freeze-out method to deal with this all, which is pretty much impossible to get around.
she's crazy. what the fuck am i supposed to do? i have been in communication with the rest of the group, because we still actually have some stuff to figure out and some of it the crazy lady was supposed to handle.

this has been a weird year so far for communication.

or maybe there are just a lot of super-shitty communicators around.

whatever, right? school is over on wednesday. i can stick out the misery until then.