Happy World Backup Day everyone.
I do 50G harddrive at home for personal files (total backup around once every 3-6 months, synched once a year), 500G harddrive at work for research files / data (all new files once every 2-4 weeks, synched twice a year), most of music duplicated either in mp3 player or CDs, and really a few really important documents, such as my research posters and presentations that I might need to be able to load impromptu ANYWHERE with internet, in clouds, mostly via Google Docs since I have a google account.
I use Ivy, an Acer netbook, at work. Currently I'm keeping it stateless, since the hardware is still unstable and sometimes doesn't function like it's supposed to and I like the statelessness as a whole so much that I think I may keep doing this for my work computer.
I am researching Dropbox and Crashplan. I'll report back once I try them. (Think Crashplan will install on Daemon?)
20110331
20110329
You can't plot all 240 points -- you'll get craziness
The title of today's post is brought to you by a collaborator of mine, who is also a PI and on my thesis committee. He is my living proof that PIs are capable of talking normally (for my definition of normal, which means no convoluted sentence structure reminiscent of rhetoric of Cicero). Though I suppose my PI also has his moments -- for all his tendencies to sound like a GRE verbal study guide and loquaciousness (and painstaking levels of finickiness when it comes to accurate word usage --I wasn't allowed to say "purely cytoplasmic" because he pointed out that there can't be "impurely cytoplasmic" for the point I was making), he will occasionally say things like "the paragraph is too listy" or "you can put it on things and it does stuff".
Right.
Have tried French onion soup, which was far too salty but in general kind of lackluster, and hearty pot roast soup, which tasted exactly like the beef stew I made a few months ago except it's...less hearty (I suppose in store-brought soups "hearty" is more along the lines of "can see distinguishable chunks of food" than "has lots of chunks of chewable food")
Lucy bore the brunt of my "OMG my life is horrible I wish my neighbor would pass out NOW" these few weeks, but the debacle is finally drawing to a close. The short version is that I got a new neighbor, of the angry and violent when drunk variety. He likes to get drunk on weekdays, never weekends, and then he'd proceed to scream out obscenities, punch walls, bang around, play music far too loud and sing very badly off key (he's not too bad when he's sober). I have talked to him twice to try to solve it, one of these was when he was drunk, and called the landlady one to complain about it. After each time there will be a four-seven day grace period, he'd apologize and I'd think "Thank God, I think it worked."
It was obviously to lure me into a false sense of security.
Last night was the worst one yet. Apparently other people in the neighborhood can hear him too (and I was on the bed that was against our shared wall, so it was all kinds of horrible). At one point he was banging around so much I can hear the windows rattling and I called the landlady right then and there, where she can at least share my pains since she could hear him over the phone as well. Complete with the atrocious music. The sum of it all (which included a very useless appeal to the police) is that he will be moving out this Thursday and I am refusing to feel guilty about any of it. I am going to do self-defense / martial arts though (did a quarter of it when I was in Davis), for my peace of mind, if nothing else.
On a happier note: past weekend was fun. Lucy came over and she has photographic evidence of the giant human sized hamster ball. We watched TANGLED, which was adorable if overly saccharine at certain points (I understand the name was meant to appeal to boys, but what's the point if the entire story is more romantic comedy than adventure?).
The talk last Friday was...a blur for me, to be honest. But other people told me I did fine, despite of my inability to understand the question of one of the post-docs at the end. (In my defense, he was very heavily accented.) There was also one man who was convinced that everything is caused by dopamine. Which isn't impossible, I'll admit, but a bit improbable given the evidence. He cornered me before I could get to my chair afterwards and told me I should give my mice levodopa.
On the whole the audience were VERY nice, which may or may not have anything to do with the fact that I was the last speaker before the break, so they need me to finish answering all the questions before they can get to the food.
Went "shopping" on campus today for special types of paint pens, D-cell batteries, and Frootloops. Was amused by the thought that all these things are for my project but most people probably would think I'm joking.
There was something else but I can't remember at the moment. I am starting to crash. Despite of the tea.
Right.
Have tried French onion soup, which was far too salty but in general kind of lackluster, and hearty pot roast soup, which tasted exactly like the beef stew I made a few months ago except it's...less hearty (I suppose in store-brought soups "hearty" is more along the lines of "can see distinguishable chunks of food" than "has lots of chunks of chewable food")
Lucy bore the brunt of my "OMG my life is horrible I wish my neighbor would pass out NOW" these few weeks, but the debacle is finally drawing to a close. The short version is that I got a new neighbor, of the angry and violent when drunk variety. He likes to get drunk on weekdays, never weekends, and then he'd proceed to scream out obscenities, punch walls, bang around, play music far too loud and sing very badly off key (he's not too bad when he's sober). I have talked to him twice to try to solve it, one of these was when he was drunk, and called the landlady one to complain about it. After each time there will be a four-seven day grace period, he'd apologize and I'd think "Thank God, I think it worked."
It was obviously to lure me into a false sense of security.
Last night was the worst one yet. Apparently other people in the neighborhood can hear him too (and I was on the bed that was against our shared wall, so it was all kinds of horrible). At one point he was banging around so much I can hear the windows rattling and I called the landlady right then and there, where she can at least share my pains since she could hear him over the phone as well. Complete with the atrocious music. The sum of it all (which included a very useless appeal to the police) is that he will be moving out this Thursday and I am refusing to feel guilty about any of it. I am going to do self-defense / martial arts though (did a quarter of it when I was in Davis), for my peace of mind, if nothing else.
On a happier note: past weekend was fun. Lucy came over and she has photographic evidence of the giant human sized hamster ball. We watched TANGLED, which was adorable if overly saccharine at certain points (I understand the name was meant to appeal to boys, but what's the point if the entire story is more romantic comedy than adventure?).
The talk last Friday was...a blur for me, to be honest. But other people told me I did fine, despite of my inability to understand the question of one of the post-docs at the end. (In my defense, he was very heavily accented.) There was also one man who was convinced that everything is caused by dopamine. Which isn't impossible, I'll admit, but a bit improbable given the evidence. He cornered me before I could get to my chair afterwards and told me I should give my mice levodopa.
On the whole the audience were VERY nice, which may or may not have anything to do with the fact that I was the last speaker before the break, so they need me to finish answering all the questions before they can get to the food.
Went "shopping" on campus today for special types of paint pens, D-cell batteries, and Frootloops. Was amused by the thought that all these things are for my project but most people probably would think I'm joking.
There was something else but I can't remember at the moment. I am starting to crash. Despite of the tea.
20110319
Another useless skill
I have discovered that I can now match up my pairs of socks, even the all white ones. They can be distinguished from other white ones by their particular shade of white (the newer the socks, the more blindingly white they are -- the older ones look more greyish by comparison) and the fuzziness (older = less fuzzy). I have no idea how this skill will ever be useful except, possibly, as yet another indicator that my years of training to be detailed in my observation have driven me around the bent. (Also one of my pairs of black jeans' dye is running, apparently the dampness of walking through grass is enough for that to happen. I wonder if this is the type of dye that will give up on escaping after six month or the kind that will keep on coloring things no matter how often it's washed? I had a sweater like that. "Had" being the key word.)
Seriously, I am sure no one else will notice the difference. People generally don't pay much attention to each other's socks for one thing. It's difficult to do that when they've all got their shoes on, for another. Given that for most of the year I only wear socks when I'm wearing shoes (have tried sneakers without socks and that was unpleasant, lab requires close toed shoes that cover top of feet).
Have also found a tailor and discovered that tailors are v. expensive. I brought in a dress shirt that needs the sleeves shortened as a trial to see the craftsmanship ("tailormanship" doesn't seem to be a word) and, if it's decent, I'll need to get my suite altered (it's currently still with my impromptu stitches). It costs 12$ to shorten sleeves. The shirt was one of the expensive ones but still not worth that much. I am currently pondering the usefulness in learning how to tailor things (did experiment that in seventh grade. Anna was in my sewing class, where I learned how to operate sewing machines and do cross-stitch)and investing in a sewing machine somewhere down the line. Trying to reinforce seams by hand is painful, and painfully boring (I think I have burned out all my interest in house-wifeliness by the start of high school, as I've tried to pick up knitting again fairly recently, after Annie got really into it...and I was bored out of my mind after two rows and decided to go draw things instead). Both my grandma and my aunt are excellent at making clothing for themselves, so if there's a genetic component at all there's a chance I might be halfway decent, and then the trade off will then be based on my trade off in time. (I guess it seems more expensive now because of my relatively low -- as compared to the local living cost -- hourly wage? Perhaps at some time when my time is worth more it will be more economical to go to tailors than to do it myself.)
(Seems like possible investment in sewing machine may depend on my future career choice. Hmm.)
Italian wedding soup is atrocious, and so is the cashew-carrot-ginger horror from the health food store. Though the latter tastes like the sauce that the vegetables from the Bombay-Indian place are cooked in, so I might save the rest of to try to cook some vegetables in. There were no artichokes to be found, so that particular experience will have to wait another day.
There appears to be no ferry between Crete and Corinth (on Peloponnese) but there is one to Athens and it is eight hours. Eight hours, on a boat. I will try not to drop anything into the water.
Seriously, I am sure no one else will notice the difference. People generally don't pay much attention to each other's socks for one thing. It's difficult to do that when they've all got their shoes on, for another. Given that for most of the year I only wear socks when I'm wearing shoes (have tried sneakers without socks and that was unpleasant, lab requires close toed shoes that cover top of feet).
Have also found a tailor and discovered that tailors are v. expensive. I brought in a dress shirt that needs the sleeves shortened as a trial to see the craftsmanship ("tailormanship" doesn't seem to be a word) and, if it's decent, I'll need to get my suite altered (it's currently still with my impromptu stitches). It costs 12$ to shorten sleeves. The shirt was one of the expensive ones but still not worth that much. I am currently pondering the usefulness in learning how to tailor things (did experiment that in seventh grade. Anna was in my sewing class, where I learned how to operate sewing machines and do cross-stitch)and investing in a sewing machine somewhere down the line. Trying to reinforce seams by hand is painful, and painfully boring (I think I have burned out all my interest in house-wifeliness by the start of high school, as I've tried to pick up knitting again fairly recently, after Annie got really into it...and I was bored out of my mind after two rows and decided to go draw things instead). Both my grandma and my aunt are excellent at making clothing for themselves, so if there's a genetic component at all there's a chance I might be halfway decent, and then the trade off will then be based on my trade off in time. (I guess it seems more expensive now because of my relatively low -- as compared to the local living cost -- hourly wage? Perhaps at some time when my time is worth more it will be more economical to go to tailors than to do it myself.)
(Seems like possible investment in sewing machine may depend on my future career choice. Hmm.)
Italian wedding soup is atrocious, and so is the cashew-carrot-ginger horror from the health food store. Though the latter tastes like the sauce that the vegetables from the Bombay-Indian place are cooked in, so I might save the rest of to try to cook some vegetables in. There were no artichokes to be found, so that particular experience will have to wait another day.
There appears to be no ferry between Crete and Corinth (on Peloponnese) but there is one to Athens and it is eight hours. Eight hours, on a boat. I will try not to drop anything into the water.
20110318
Giant hamser balls
Right, so my first "official" talk as a grad student will be next Friday. The schedule for the day was sent out this week and seeing my name listed there gave me approximately 30 seconds worth of nausea. My lab mates assured me that I will be fine. My collaborators assured me I will be fine. I may even be able to believe that I will be fine provided that I somehow stop forgetting to cite random facts on slides two and eighteen. (Chromosome 11, it's on chromosome 11. There are 100-103 sequences in 92 species which are poorly annotated and required hand curation.)
Wendy continued on as before, post graduation. Now that the quarter is over she will be listed as a post-doc, until she leaves for either UCLA or UCSF almost a year from now. We went by the student offices building the other day for food, at which point she suddenly said something along the lines of "Look! A turtle!" Despite of the fact that we are surrounded by concrete and there is no logical reason of why there should be a turtle, I turned to look automatically anyway, and immediately suffered a pang of sympathy for Kowalski, who got pushed out of an airplane for doing the same thing. (Maybe it's just turtles. Or possibly unlikely animals. Or maybe just animals will do? This requires experimentation.) However, in my case, there was indeed a turtle picture posted, randomly, on the giant glass wall of the registrar's office, and no one was pushed off of any moving vehicle, so I counted it as a win.
For those who haven't heard yet: Annie and I will be going to Greece this summer! I got a guidebook and she'll get a different guidebook and we spent a lot of time researching (there was a lot of me typing "BUT WHAT DOES THIS MEAN??" and her typing "IDK") and mutually agreeing that banging out the logistics is pretty darn painful (though I have discovered that there are apparently lots of Laundromats on Crete). Tentative plan is to fly out near the end of June for 10 day trip, after which she will get shipped off to field school on one of the islands and I'll fly back from Athens directly to the vivarium, grad school, where I will no doubt have mice waiting for me.
Comic con is sold out already. One of these next few years I will remember to order tickets in...December or something. See that, Lucy? ONE OF THESE YEARS. I WILL.
...I did find time this year to volunteer for the SD Science Festival again and my God, it just gets more and MORE elaborate each year. Orientation was last weekend and the festival's next weekend. We're expecting 30k+ people on Expo Day and I am stationed right by what they have projected will be the busiest gate. Drop by and say 'hi' if you come and I haven't gone crazy from the crowd yet -- will be in a yellow volunteer shirt under a red tent in a sea of white tents. There will be pools. With water. And a human sized hamster ball. The week long events start this weekend though and there is liquid nitrogen ice cream somewhere. Google if you want the schedule.
Wedding album have arrived and have given it to Ashley. She was here last Sunday for a "quick" visit which eventually turned into something where I am prepping food for the week in the kitchen and she's playing scrabble on her phone on the living room floor and we tried to figure out where we are going with our lives. It felt oddly domestic. Have tried to share my experimentation in food with her and got her to try tea (which she normally hated but she will accept the Caribbean Breeze one from Teavana), papaya (which she didn't like) and chayote (and the jury is still out on that one).
Speaking of food, my recent trials are with soup. I have been picking out a different type of canned soup every time to try. Tomato bisque is very good, corn chowder was kind of disgusting. Creme of mushroom was okay. Chicken tortilla should be less spicy and the "hearty" potato one was good. The chicken wild rice tastes just like chicken noodle, if you ignore the texture of the soup, which was frankly strange. Wendy's been attempting to explain artichoke to me, so I might try that next.
Oh and my parents want to come visit, so they'll probably be by some time early April. Have I mentioned that my cousin (five years older) got married? We don't keep in touch, really, but given she's been worrying about getting married since when I was just existing high school, I'm going to say good for her. (If what you want was to be married then marriage is more likely to suite you, right? Right?) My mom forwarded me the photos.
There are loads of other things that happened but this post is getting too long as it is. I'll mention that I tried the "text to donate" thing on my phone and for some reason it didn't work, so I'll have to do it online when I find the time tomorrow. For those who are wondering: no, the amount of supplementary iodine in salt will not protect you -- there is no point in hoarding salt.
Wendy continued on as before, post graduation. Now that the quarter is over she will be listed as a post-doc, until she leaves for either UCLA or UCSF almost a year from now. We went by the student offices building the other day for food, at which point she suddenly said something along the lines of "Look! A turtle!" Despite of the fact that we are surrounded by concrete and there is no logical reason of why there should be a turtle, I turned to look automatically anyway, and immediately suffered a pang of sympathy for Kowalski, who got pushed out of an airplane for doing the same thing. (Maybe it's just turtles. Or possibly unlikely animals. Or maybe just animals will do? This requires experimentation.) However, in my case, there was indeed a turtle picture posted, randomly, on the giant glass wall of the registrar's office, and no one was pushed off of any moving vehicle, so I counted it as a win.
For those who haven't heard yet: Annie and I will be going to Greece this summer! I got a guidebook and she'll get a different guidebook and we spent a lot of time researching (there was a lot of me typing "BUT WHAT DOES THIS MEAN??" and her typing "IDK") and mutually agreeing that banging out the logistics is pretty darn painful (though I have discovered that there are apparently lots of Laundromats on Crete). Tentative plan is to fly out near the end of June for 10 day trip, after which she will get shipped off to field school on one of the islands and I'll fly back from Athens directly to the vivarium, grad school, where I will no doubt have mice waiting for me.
Comic con is sold out already. One of these next few years I will remember to order tickets in...December or something. See that, Lucy? ONE OF THESE YEARS. I WILL.
...I did find time this year to volunteer for the SD Science Festival again and my God, it just gets more and MORE elaborate each year. Orientation was last weekend and the festival's next weekend. We're expecting 30k+ people on Expo Day and I am stationed right by what they have projected will be the busiest gate. Drop by and say 'hi' if you come and I haven't gone crazy from the crowd yet -- will be in a yellow volunteer shirt under a red tent in a sea of white tents. There will be pools. With water. And a human sized hamster ball. The week long events start this weekend though and there is liquid nitrogen ice cream somewhere. Google if you want the schedule.
Wedding album have arrived and have given it to Ashley. She was here last Sunday for a "quick" visit which eventually turned into something where I am prepping food for the week in the kitchen and she's playing scrabble on her phone on the living room floor and we tried to figure out where we are going with our lives. It felt oddly domestic. Have tried to share my experimentation in food with her and got her to try tea (which she normally hated but she will accept the Caribbean Breeze one from Teavana), papaya (which she didn't like) and chayote (and the jury is still out on that one).
Speaking of food, my recent trials are with soup. I have been picking out a different type of canned soup every time to try. Tomato bisque is very good, corn chowder was kind of disgusting. Creme of mushroom was okay. Chicken tortilla should be less spicy and the "hearty" potato one was good. The chicken wild rice tastes just like chicken noodle, if you ignore the texture of the soup, which was frankly strange. Wendy's been attempting to explain artichoke to me, so I might try that next.
Oh and my parents want to come visit, so they'll probably be by some time early April. Have I mentioned that my cousin (five years older) got married? We don't keep in touch, really, but given she's been worrying about getting married since when I was just existing high school, I'm going to say good for her. (If what you want was to be married then marriage is more likely to suite you, right? Right?) My mom forwarded me the photos.
There are loads of other things that happened but this post is getting too long as it is. I'll mention that I tried the "text to donate" thing on my phone and for some reason it didn't work, so I'll have to do it online when I find the time tomorrow. For those who are wondering: no, the amount of supplementary iodine in salt will not protect you -- there is no point in hoarding salt.
20110311
Received tsunami warning at 6:55ish this morning. Wave supposed to have hit now. Everything's fine. Weather's lovely. But my God-- those poor people in Japan....
[edit 9:44]
Found out that the reason I got a warning is because I live in PB. La Jolla's safe. Apparently it's at a much higher elevation. Huh.
[edit 9:44]
Found out that the reason I got a warning is because I live in PB. La Jolla's safe. Apparently it's at a much higher elevation. Huh.
20110305
But why can't there be flying roombas?
Filling tax return when part of your income is from the the PI's university whatever-you-call-it and part of it is part of a NRSA training grant that's not included on W2s while your university also includes its tuition and the fee it has paid for those tuition also as a scholarship/grant (but it's not your actual income) is a nightmare from hell.
[edit 21:18]
Which means I'm done! Done!
[edit 21:18]
However, if you were a degree candidate, include on line 1 only the amounts you used for expenses other than tuition and course-related expenses. For example, amounts used for room, board, and travel must be
reported on line 1.
Which means I'm done! Done!
20110301
Dear Diary,
I think I may have accidentally traumatized an undergrad today, of the biology department. From the expression of horror you would've thought I told her that grad students are ritualistically tortured at the bi-quarterly PI meeting or something, and not that it takes, on average, 5.5 years to graduate. I didn't volunteer the information for how many others a week I work. She might swoon.
I also told her that it's worth it if you like it. She looked dubious but well, not everyone would be happy as grad students.
I am up to sea urchin now. One of the post-docs in my lab told me (jokingly) to let him know if I get to dinosaurs.
Sincerely,
-S
I think I may have accidentally traumatized an undergrad today, of the biology department. From the expression of horror you would've thought I told her that grad students are ritualistically tortured at the bi-quarterly PI meeting or something, and not that it takes, on average, 5.5 years to graduate. I didn't volunteer the information for how many others a week I work. She might swoon.
I also told her that it's worth it if you like it. She looked dubious but well, not everyone would be happy as grad students.
I am up to sea urchin now. One of the post-docs in my lab told me (jokingly) to let him know if I get to dinosaurs.
Sincerely,
-S
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