Dear all,
After discussing with Wendy last week regarding the flu season, or the approaching thereof, during which I was convinced it couldn't be arriving this early, it looks like I'm coming down with something. The irony is not lost on me.
Showing posts with label PI lolz. Show all posts
Showing posts with label PI lolz. Show all posts
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.
20110118
A is A
First off, regarding ATLAS SHRUGGED: I have finished it. It gets even MORE preachy at the end (pages and pages of nothing but philosophy -- the character who spoke it said it took three hours on radio, and I believe him). As a sci-fi it's got the dystopia grittiness that I'm so fond of, but there isn't enough interesting sciency bits to hold my attention and the parts regarding agriculture can only lead me to believe that the author knew very little about plants & environmental sciences and didn't think it was important enough to do further research. As a mystery it sets up the premises for solving both mysteries -- the person and the conspiracy, very well. However, a bit like how the BBC Sherlock mini-series, in their first episode, beats you to death with all the clues Holmes used to figure out who was the killer, there was so much clue given about the solution to both mysteries that I spent most of the following hundreds of pages (oh yes it was hundreds of pages) thinking, "Com'on, com'on, how SLOW can you get?" Then there's also the fact that the climax of the mystery-solving part does not achieve the level of climax and drama that any decent mystery stories should, and that, where usual mystery stories wrap up fairly quickly after the mystery is solved, this particular books limps doggedly on, resolutely carrying on until all the philosophical lectures are dotted, filed, marked "done". As a work of propaganda -- because that's what this reads like, at times -- like an ode to capitalism...well, I've read propaganda novels before, and this isn't that great at it either. It lacks a certain something in terms of subtlety and sympathetic characters (both characters that I found vaguely sympathetic died -- well presumably the other one died as well, the story was a bit vague, preferring to cut to a paragraph about piano music instead).
Okay, and then I went online to look up this book, and I'll admit to being impressed by the fact that Rand managed to create a new branch of philosophy with a novel. There are certain aspects, such as reason and logic being one of the virtues of man, that I agree with. There are other aspects, on how any government regulations in trade is Evil and that there's no such thing as a "great good" outside of the realms of Machiavellian manipulations, that I disagree with. I am not a philosopher, I am a scientist by training and by choice. I don't profess to be familiar with any of the Aristotle-inspired schools of thought, but I do feel a bit put out by the insistence that contradiction does not exist in nature (wave-particle duality, hello?).
The verdict: ATLAS SHRUGGED crosses the genre of mystery, sci-fi, and social commentary (I am going to pretend the romance component doesn't exist, because b the end of the novel it frankly makes me want to gag), but does not excel in any of those categories. However, it does offer a different system of thinking. It challenges the way I perceive the world and makes me want to take apart the novel, idea by idea, to try to understand why I will agree with some but abhor others. It makes me think. For that alone it was worth reading at least once.
And now back to our scheduled presentation:
Quest for the Meaning of Life continues. I want to share the bit yesterday when, having thought about academia vs industry some more, I decided to ask my PI about what it's like being a PI. Specifically, I said something along the lines of "There is either something else about being a PI that's really enjoyable that the rest of us (the grad students) have missed, or that all PIs are extremely masochistic."
His answer? "It's not an 'or' question." With a huge grin. (It makes him look manic. I should not be as fond of it as I am.)
That's not all of it, but the entire rest of the conversation would take too long to describe.
There's a pinworm infestation discovered in my collaborator's vivarium, where I ship my mice to be tested at a specific age. Currently the place's under lock down and all important and export of animals are halted. If it's not lifted soon my animals will be past the age when they can be tested, I would lose an entire cohort, and have to figure out some way to make up for it without pushing back my experimental schedule too much. Don't ask me what my schedule for spring break is like. I no longer know. I'm still waiting for some sort of pathology report.
Okay, and then I went online to look up this book, and I'll admit to being impressed by the fact that Rand managed to create a new branch of philosophy with a novel. There are certain aspects, such as reason and logic being one of the virtues of man, that I agree with. There are other aspects, on how any government regulations in trade is Evil and that there's no such thing as a "great good" outside of the realms of Machiavellian manipulations, that I disagree with. I am not a philosopher, I am a scientist by training and by choice. I don't profess to be familiar with any of the Aristotle-inspired schools of thought, but I do feel a bit put out by the insistence that contradiction does not exist in nature (wave-particle duality, hello?).
The verdict: ATLAS SHRUGGED crosses the genre of mystery, sci-fi, and social commentary (I am going to pretend the romance component doesn't exist, because b the end of the novel it frankly makes me want to gag), but does not excel in any of those categories. However, it does offer a different system of thinking. It challenges the way I perceive the world and makes me want to take apart the novel, idea by idea, to try to understand why I will agree with some but abhor others. It makes me think. For that alone it was worth reading at least once.
And now back to our scheduled presentation:
Quest for the Meaning of Life continues. I want to share the bit yesterday when, having thought about academia vs industry some more, I decided to ask my PI about what it's like being a PI. Specifically, I said something along the lines of "There is either something else about being a PI that's really enjoyable that the rest of us (the grad students) have missed, or that all PIs are extremely masochistic."
His answer? "It's not an 'or' question." With a huge grin. (It makes him look manic. I should not be as fond of it as I am.)
That's not all of it, but the entire rest of the conversation would take too long to describe.
There's a pinworm infestation discovered in my collaborator's vivarium, where I ship my mice to be tested at a specific age. Currently the place's under lock down and all important and export of animals are halted. If it's not lifted soon my animals will be past the age when they can be tested, I would lose an entire cohort, and have to figure out some way to make up for it without pushing back my experimental schedule too much. Don't ask me what my schedule for spring break is like. I no longer know. I'm still waiting for some sort of pathology report.
20110111
My day, summarized:
1) trying to get heat block to get to exactly the right temperature is excruciating. As in boring. As in checking it every 30 seconds for half an hour kind of painful when you can't do anything because the metal thing was not yet at 80C.
2) being confused by PI: today's event included a discussion on the definition and types of juggling. According to him people do juggle chainsaws. Out side of cartoon. I don't know whether this was more or less strange than random quotations of Russian literature or even more randoms to teenage card games, but do know that I no longer cared.
3) Street and building (but thankfully not the indoor outlets for unit lighting) lights have all gone out at my end of the block. It makes this end of the street appear even more ghetto than usual. I spent an inordinate amount of time trying to find the keyhole in the dark. It was unexpectedly difficult.
4) I really, really despise the new e-bill layout from ATT, especially the pop-up windows. I wonder if it looks better for people using browsers other than Firefox.
5) ATLAS SHRUGGED is ...amazing. That courtroom scene made me realize that what a crowning moment of awesome really is, what with the 200+ pages of build up.
1) trying to get heat block to get to exactly the right temperature is excruciating. As in boring. As in checking it every 30 seconds for half an hour kind of painful when you can't do anything because the metal thing was not yet at 80C.
2) being confused by PI: today's event included a discussion on the definition and types of juggling. According to him people do juggle chainsaws. Out side of cartoon. I don't know whether this was more or less strange than random quotations of Russian literature or even more randoms to teenage card games, but do know that I no longer cared.
3) Street and building (but thankfully not the indoor outlets for unit lighting) lights have all gone out at my end of the block. It makes this end of the street appear even more ghetto than usual. I spent an inordinate amount of time trying to find the keyhole in the dark. It was unexpectedly difficult.
4) I really, really despise the new e-bill layout from ATT, especially the pop-up windows. I wonder if it looks better for people using browsers other than Firefox.
5) ATLAS SHRUGGED is ...amazing. That courtroom scene made me realize that what a crowning moment of awesome really is, what with the 200+ pages of build up.
20110105
Alas
For the few people who haven't heard yet, I made the drive from bay area to San Diego this past Sunday. I started the trip at 7:45am and arrived at the Grapevine about an hour after they closed it. Talk about frustrating. Since the highway was closed off by two patrol cars physically blocking the highway, all the traffic from the four-lanes had to be funneled to the nearest stop -- so, major traffic jam. After we managed to pull off the highway into the rest area, we braved very strong wind and stinging snow to find that all the gas stations and such in that area were closed due to weather. This meant that when the highway patrol told us that the highway was closed "indefinitely" and we should take an "alternative route", we had no one to ask for an alternative route, or place to fuel up for it.
Given that the road was closed indefinitely and that I was in no way prepared to spend an indefinite amount of time in a place with no food, restroom, or even spare blankets, I turned the car around and headed north again, tuning in, as the posted signs suggested, to the radio for road conditions. The highway patrol radio advised detour to Bakersfield, and then coming down south via 58, then 14 (i.e. detour through Tehapachi via Mojave, Palmdale, approaching LA through Santa Clarita). The rest stops closest to the last pre-Grapevine off ramp, where we were blocked off, were closed as well. At Bakersfield off ramp I pulled off to let Lucy and my parents know of the development (the Grapevine area's network was so busy that I couldn't call anyway at all) and then again before leaving downtown Bakersfield, where I called Lucy (early afternoon at that point) to double check directions and filled up on gas again, because I was paranoid.
It was a good thing I was paranoid.
58-14 was in no way equipped to handle the traffic flow from I5. This was before it started snowing. Unlike I5, there was no 90mph winds (around 40mph by my estimate at the worst places), so the road stayed open. However, many of the drivers, like myself, were planning to head to SOUTHERN CALIFORNIAS and so was not prepared to drive through snow. This meant no one had tire chains or snow tired. This meant far too many traffic accidents. This meant that from the 58-99 junction, all the way through Santa Clarita, the road was one long traffic jam with occasional areas where we can cautiously creep up to 40mph.
There were essentially no rest stops for me from that point forward. Which made sense, given that we were traveling at around 3mph in most places, and even if the stops were not closed because of the weather, highways don't usually have stops spaced every five miles. I was hoping to get through the area before dark, before the temperature dropped and the slush on the road froze -- no such luck. With the snow build up the only marker to distinguish between the lanes, we crawled on through the mountains, in the dark.
By the time I got through Santa Clarita, I was so close to Lucy's that there was really no point in taking a rest stop -- no to mention that navigating more highway ramps that I absolutely had to seemed awfully daunting. I ended up parking next to Lucy's building in an exhausted haze around...between ten to eleven pm, probably, called her and said something along the lines of, "Hi. I'm here. Can I come in and pass out now?" and she said something along the lines of "Ohmigod. Yes."
My memory of that point was a little sketchy. I did remember all of Lucy's family crowding around the door to watch me stagger in. I was fed and given hot tea and asleep, I think, within an hour of crossing her threshold. (I know, I'm such a great guest.) I emailed my PI something about being stuck in the snow and called my parents, who told me to go to sleep already, and I think Lucy made sure that all my friends can stop freaking out. I remember talking to Kate. I don't remember what I said, exactly, but I think I mentioned snow. I was traumatized by it that day.
The next morning I made my way down to LA, where, despite of Google's prediction that there's nothing worse than flooded lanes and a few local malfunctioning traffic lights, I hit traffic both as the usual spots and also in some not so usual spots. It was raining buckets in place and we had to drive at around 50mph, so the trip also took far longer than expected. Then I got to SD around noon (total trip took nearly twenty hours at this point) and saw blue skies. My mind, guys -- it boggled.
By the time I ate something, unpacked, and showered, it was close to three pm and I was so tired I was having trouble pouring water. Given that public transit to lab is two hours and I was in no shape to work late that day, I opted instead to stay home and work on the comp bio portion of my project, specifically the sequence annotation part. (Apparently you don't need to be 100% awake for pattern recognition.) Then I microwaved something for dinner, did dishes, fell into bed and slept for about twelve hours. The next day (yesterday) I was able to do my normal full day work hours, and at some point the PI came by and said, "Welcome back! How was the Tehapachi?" To which I was able to reply, deadpan, "Snowy." And then the cricket that had moved in behind the chromatography fridge during my absence began to chirp and I reflected how this was the more exhausting misadventure that I've ever had the misfortune of not being able to avoid having. Then the PI made some sort of comment about publishing manuscript and how things are published in high impact journals not so much for accuracy or rigor but for sexiness.
...I...yeah. There's not a whole lot a grad student can say to a comment like that from her PI.
Given that the road was closed indefinitely and that I was in no way prepared to spend an indefinite amount of time in a place with no food, restroom, or even spare blankets, I turned the car around and headed north again, tuning in, as the posted signs suggested, to the radio for road conditions. The highway patrol radio advised detour to Bakersfield, and then coming down south via 58, then 14 (i.e. detour through Tehapachi via Mojave, Palmdale, approaching LA through Santa Clarita). The rest stops closest to the last pre-Grapevine off ramp, where we were blocked off, were closed as well. At Bakersfield off ramp I pulled off to let Lucy and my parents know of the development (the Grapevine area's network was so busy that I couldn't call anyway at all) and then again before leaving downtown Bakersfield, where I called Lucy (early afternoon at that point) to double check directions and filled up on gas again, because I was paranoid.
It was a good thing I was paranoid.
58-14 was in no way equipped to handle the traffic flow from I5. This was before it started snowing. Unlike I5, there was no 90mph winds (around 40mph by my estimate at the worst places), so the road stayed open. However, many of the drivers, like myself, were planning to head to SOUTHERN CALIFORNIAS and so was not prepared to drive through snow. This meant no one had tire chains or snow tired. This meant far too many traffic accidents. This meant that from the 58-99 junction, all the way through Santa Clarita, the road was one long traffic jam with occasional areas where we can cautiously creep up to 40mph.
There were essentially no rest stops for me from that point forward. Which made sense, given that we were traveling at around 3mph in most places, and even if the stops were not closed because of the weather, highways don't usually have stops spaced every five miles. I was hoping to get through the area before dark, before the temperature dropped and the slush on the road froze -- no such luck. With the snow build up the only marker to distinguish between the lanes, we crawled on through the mountains, in the dark.
By the time I got through Santa Clarita, I was so close to Lucy's that there was really no point in taking a rest stop -- no to mention that navigating more highway ramps that I absolutely had to seemed awfully daunting. I ended up parking next to Lucy's building in an exhausted haze around...between ten to eleven pm, probably, called her and said something along the lines of, "Hi. I'm here. Can I come in and pass out now?" and she said something along the lines of "Ohmigod. Yes."
My memory of that point was a little sketchy. I did remember all of Lucy's family crowding around the door to watch me stagger in. I was fed and given hot tea and asleep, I think, within an hour of crossing her threshold. (I know, I'm such a great guest.) I emailed my PI something about being stuck in the snow and called my parents, who told me to go to sleep already, and I think Lucy made sure that all my friends can stop freaking out. I remember talking to Kate. I don't remember what I said, exactly, but I think I mentioned snow. I was traumatized by it that day.
The next morning I made my way down to LA, where, despite of Google's prediction that there's nothing worse than flooded lanes and a few local malfunctioning traffic lights, I hit traffic both as the usual spots and also in some not so usual spots. It was raining buckets in place and we had to drive at around 50mph, so the trip also took far longer than expected. Then I got to SD around noon (total trip took nearly twenty hours at this point) and saw blue skies. My mind, guys -- it boggled.
By the time I ate something, unpacked, and showered, it was close to three pm and I was so tired I was having trouble pouring water. Given that public transit to lab is two hours and I was in no shape to work late that day, I opted instead to stay home and work on the comp bio portion of my project, specifically the sequence annotation part. (Apparently you don't need to be 100% awake for pattern recognition.) Then I microwaved something for dinner, did dishes, fell into bed and slept for about twelve hours. The next day (yesterday) I was able to do my normal full day work hours, and at some point the PI came by and said, "Welcome back! How was the Tehapachi?" To which I was able to reply, deadpan, "Snowy." And then the cricket that had moved in behind the chromatography fridge during my absence began to chirp and I reflected how this was the more exhausting misadventure that I've ever had the misfortune of not being able to avoid having. Then the PI made some sort of comment about publishing manuscript and how things are published in high impact journals not so much for accuracy or rigor but for sexiness.
...I...yeah. There's not a whole lot a grad student can say to a comment like that from her PI.
20101221
This is apparently my life
The mp3 music player system in Onyx is fairly good in terms of sound quality, and the navigation was simple enough that I've been able to figure out everything I wanted to do thus far without reading the manual (me not reading a manual = shocking, yes). However, what is a disadvantageous compared to the other mp3 players I've had so far is the delay. There is an inevitable three second delay between when I press a button and when the task starts and I have no idea why. It is annoying, though not debilitating, I suppose. Or at least not yet. It is possible that with more usage it will be the thing that will drive me insane.
I have also discovered a Roomba in a corner of the room. What appears to have happened is that dad inherited from one of his friends, and that it doesn't work, in the sense that it fails to charge. It's a Roomba Discovery and I'm currently recharging it, after a battery reset, to see if that works. Meanwhile I can't help but think of the Questionable Content comic. (OhmigodwherecanIfindmini-jet-engines?)
Have installed mp3 plugin support on Fedora 14. Apparently all I needed to do was to su to root and then type:
Flash plugin support was a bit longer and I did it while at Lucy's, before we watched THE MATRIX. I'm pretty sure this is what I did, as root:
Firefox theme and personnas are excellent in Linux, I still prefer QuickJava to NoScript. I got QuickProxy but haven't set it up yet because I haven't needed to access any sciency journals yet. The issue with gmail that I noticed while at Lucy's went away by itself. (??) But the lack of UK-based spell checker in Firefox right now is apparently because there's no working spellchecker, despite of the fact that that option is checked under preferences, so I'll have to sort that out because my spelling is rather atrocious and having something underlined in red at least narrows down the range of things I have to check over, even when I'm typing made-up works such as "sciency" and "phosphorylation".
(The Roomba makes such cute little noises.)
In an earlier discussion with my parents on my life in grad school, mother wanted to know whether or not my thesis advisor is still enthusiastic about my thesis. I was able to reply, with complete honesty, that he is more enthusiastic than I am. My parents were reassured by this. I was trying not to laugh.
Does Smurfs merchandise induce the feeling of nostalgia in anyone besides me?
I have also discovered a Roomba in a corner of the room. What appears to have happened is that dad inherited from one of his friends, and that it doesn't work, in the sense that it fails to charge. It's a Roomba Discovery and I'm currently recharging it, after a battery reset, to see if that works. Meanwhile I can't help but think of the Questionable Content comic. (OhmigodwherecanIfindmini-jet-engines?)
Have installed mp3 plugin support on Fedora 14. Apparently all I needed to do was to su to root and then type:
and viola.
rpm -ivh http://download1.rpmfusion.org/free/fedora/rpmfusion-free-release-stable.noarch.rpm
yum install gstreamer-plugins-bad gstreamer-ffmpeg gstreamer-plugins-ugly -y
Flash plugin support was a bit longer and I did it while at Lucy's, before we watched THE MATRIX. I'm pretty sure this is what I did, as root:
rpm -ivh http://linuxdownload.adobe.com/adobe-release/adobe-release-i386-1.0-1.noarch.rpm
rpm --import /etc/pki/rpm-gpg/RPM-GPG-KEY-adobe-linux
yum check-update
yum install flash-plugin nspluginwrapper.x86_64 \
nspluginwrapper.i686 alsa-plugins-pulseaudio.i686 libcurl.i686
Firefox theme and personnas are excellent in Linux, I still prefer QuickJava to NoScript. I got QuickProxy but haven't set it up yet because I haven't needed to access any sciency journals yet. The issue with gmail that I noticed while at Lucy's went away by itself. (??) But the lack of UK-based spell checker in Firefox right now is apparently because there's no working spellchecker, despite of the fact that that option is checked under preferences, so I'll have to sort that out because my spelling is rather atrocious and having something underlined in red at least narrows down the range of things I have to check over, even when I'm typing made-up works such as "sciency" and "phosphorylation".
(The Roomba makes such cute little noises.)
In an earlier discussion with my parents on my life in grad school, mother wanted to know whether or not my thesis advisor is still enthusiastic about my thesis. I was able to reply, with complete honesty, that he is more enthusiastic than I am. My parents were reassured by this. I was trying not to laugh.
Does Smurfs merchandise induce the feeling of nostalgia in anyone besides me?
20101012
PI-isms
PI came by to congratulate me on the exam thing this morning and see how I was doing. He always comes by at least once per week and it never ceases to amuse me because a) he teaches one of my classes and b) I see him every day in lab. But those points aside, today I pointed out to him something that the staff in the vivarium did that didn't make sense. His comment was that I was assuming that other people besides me were actually thinking, and whiles this "better be true" in his lab, generally speaking this assumption may be....faulty. I gaped at him for a bit then remarked that was a really very cynical view, to which he replied, "I'm relapsing." For some reason I found this hilarious.
Aside from his apparent bout of recidivism to skepticism (wow that's a lot of "ism"), there was also the part where he reminded me that should I feel uncomfortable talking to him (a laughable notion, since up till now he's the only PI I ever felt comfortable enough to make these sort of commentaries on, sometimes to his face), there are other PIs that I can talk to who are obligated to help me. This particular bit of PI-ism goes, I believe, "If they have the title of "professor", they'd better be professing!" (And then afterwards I of course went to google the term because I've never heard the word "profess" being used that way.)
Now I have the strongest urge to go up to the PIs I know and ask, "Have you professed today?" (And then probably giggle hysterically and blame my PI for the whole thing.)
Aside from his apparent bout of recidivism to skepticism (wow that's a lot of "ism"), there was also the part where he reminded me that should I feel uncomfortable talking to him (a laughable notion, since up till now he's the only PI I ever felt comfortable enough to make these sort of commentaries on, sometimes to his face), there are other PIs that I can talk to who are obligated to help me. This particular bit of PI-ism goes, I believe, "If they have the title of "professor", they'd better be professing!" (And then afterwards I of course went to google the term because I've never heard the word "profess" being used that way.)
Now I have the strongest urge to go up to the PIs I know and ask, "Have you professed today?" (And then probably giggle hysterically and blame my PI for the whole thing.)
20100904
I believe in updates, I do, I do
Another insane (quite) week has passed. In lab we sorted through stuff in the freezer, tried to figure out what to do with the sodium acetate (trihydrate) that's solidified into a chunk, and watched the PI pretend to be a handyman. (He screwed back in a part of the autoclave and failed to fix a chair. The first few moments of watching him come by and methodically flip chairs over -- with no explanation--was very surreal.) There was also the moment when PI Dearest compared my metazoa-wide cloning attempts to collecting Pokemon cards (i.e. "gotta catch'em all" and that one of them might be "magical"), which resulted in the moment where both Wendy and I stared at him like he was insane (aside from the undergrads who weren't there, and the tech who away doing something else, we were the only ones young enough to get the reference) (the lab tech was the other person besides the PI with kids who might be old enough to get the reference). Magic clones. Right. I think I'll go back to my miniprep now. (He also managed to wheedle me into presenting during orientation. How does he do it? I hate public presentations.)
I've twisted my ankle a while ago and, although it didn't seem that bad after the hell that was day two, for some reason I'm still limping a little. This is the main reason (the other one being the gloomy weather) why I had to keep slashing my plans to go visit the beach. Instead I've been puttering around a lot indoors and re-organized all my music files. Sadly, this also led to my discovery that A) I have more music than I thought because for some reason my mp3 player just doesn't play some of the mp3 files (the entire folder of the DW fanmix will play on my computer by not the mp3 player and I haven't the slightest clue why) and B) my mp3 player eats files, and then spit out versions that NOTHING will play (I have no idea why this is either). I've managed to figure out what's missing and what's usable though, for the most part, and that I have at least three copies of "Watch the Sky" in different folders. (It's one of my favorite songs but yeah, that's waaay too much.)
In the progression of the week I've also gotten a parking ticket for forgetting to move my car during the Wednesday every month where I can't park on the street (always inconvenient since I leave / return at a time where all the cars are parked and there is no free spot), received my copy of DS CDs that I ordered in the mail, and discovered that all the worms in the worm bin have perished out of neglect (read: further proof of why I should not be allowed to have pets during grad school).
Lastly I should mention I submitted my first draft of my advancement to candidacy exam to my PI yesterday and he has given me his blessings to schedule the exam in October (also introducing me to Doodle, whose name first made me think that he was making some kind of weird joke again). Given that no one from my little protein group has asked me for a copy of the presentation that I've promised them two weeks ago, does anyone want to volunteer their time some time within the next three weekends to hear me present a much longer version (30-40 minutes), so that I can polish my presentation enough to withstand the 50 minutes (I kid you not) of verbal grilling during the exam? Putting together this bit of fun has been what I spent all my spare time doing this week during lab, and then it's onwards to carrying on the tradition of being twitchy and mad every fall....
Well, time to hit the list of chores.
I've twisted my ankle a while ago and, although it didn't seem that bad after the hell that was day two, for some reason I'm still limping a little. This is the main reason (the other one being the gloomy weather) why I had to keep slashing my plans to go visit the beach. Instead I've been puttering around a lot indoors and re-organized all my music files. Sadly, this also led to my discovery that A) I have more music than I thought because for some reason my mp3 player just doesn't play some of the mp3 files (the entire folder of the DW fanmix will play on my computer by not the mp3 player and I haven't the slightest clue why) and B) my mp3 player eats files, and then spit out versions that NOTHING will play (I have no idea why this is either). I've managed to figure out what's missing and what's usable though, for the most part, and that I have at least three copies of "Watch the Sky" in different folders. (It's one of my favorite songs but yeah, that's waaay too much.)
In the progression of the week I've also gotten a parking ticket for forgetting to move my car during the Wednesday every month where I can't park on the street (always inconvenient since I leave / return at a time where all the cars are parked and there is no free spot), received my copy of DS CDs that I ordered in the mail, and discovered that all the worms in the worm bin have perished out of neglect (read: further proof of why I should not be allowed to have pets during grad school).
Lastly I should mention I submitted my first draft of my advancement to candidacy exam to my PI yesterday and he has given me his blessings to schedule the exam in October (also introducing me to Doodle, whose name first made me think that he was making some kind of weird joke again). Given that no one from my little protein group has asked me for a copy of the presentation that I've promised them two weeks ago, does anyone want to volunteer their time some time within the next three weekends to hear me present a much longer version (30-40 minutes), so that I can polish my presentation enough to withstand the 50 minutes (I kid you not) of verbal grilling during the exam? Putting together this bit of fun has been what I spent all my spare time doing this week during lab, and then it's onwards to carrying on the tradition of being twitchy and mad every fall....
Well, time to hit the list of chores.
20100828
Developing a healthy case of neurosis, among other things
There was a few rounds of email exchange with a PI who is a collaborator of mine (in the sense that I work directly with him in the other vivarium and not someone in his lab), who also happened to be on my thesis committee, that went something like this:
Me: "...and so given this has happened in the past, I'd appreciate it if all the vivarium can set up a system for double-checking the animals as they are being transferred."
PI replied: "Paranoia is a very, very important trait to cultivate, I'm happy to do the checking in this vivarium...."
Me, post the second shipping mix-up this week: "If unjustified anxiety is paranoia, what's justified anxiety?"
PI, after apologizing for the mix-up: "Woody Allen said that paranoia is having all the facts...."
I cannot even begin to count the number of times the various post-docs / students I've worked with have cracked jokes about certain parts of the protocol being "probably unnecessary" but how it's better to be safe and paranoia's useful. (Doing it with a PI is a definite first, though.) This is one of the oft overlooked facts of doing research in biology, I think -- the development of paranoia and patience, by sheer force of necessity.
...
I have finished the Avatar cartoons and, amazingly, found it to be as wonderful as everyone kept saying. It manages to cover a lot of important issues without making either the main characters, who are kids, less child-like, or dumbing down the concepts. The art / music / style is amazing and I've never seen a western production of anything Asian-based that got so many of the cultural details exactly right. Also? The sense of humor. Oh the humor. It wins at life.
My favorite character is Toph, I ship Zuko / Mai, and I'm heartily thankful I never saw the action movie. Of course I'm not going to let that stop me from enjoying the comments made by people who poke fun of it, the Macarena video being a key example. (It gave me a good laugh, especially the bit near the end with the group earth-bending dance because..."Go Little Rock go!" And then I got the hiccups.) Then there's, of course, Deviant Art, where I was inspired enough by Rufftoon's tea comic to make a new lj icon from it. (For those of you who haven't seen Avatar, the spiky guy in there is Zuko, who, for 99% of the cartoon, seems to be very very allergic of things such as zen, being well-adjusted, and tea.)
Speaking of tea, the dark blue honey stick is the one that I think should be blueberry, though it tasted like grapes. Given that it's blue, however, "grape" doesn't make much sense and I always thought that dried blueberries tasted like raisins anyway, so: blueberry.
And while I'm typing about food, I caved in to my curiosity and brought a dragon fruit (also known as red pitaya, I think).
It tastes, to me, like a strange cross between daikon radish and honeydew melon, with tiny black seeds that crunch between your teeth like the kiwi fruit. Maybe it's just the one that I happened to get, but it was pretty bland.
Lastly, since I have a phone that allows me to upload photos, I'm going to share a random plant photo of the rose I got a while back (yes the one that I insisted on getting because of the flower color, even though the plant looked like it was dying). First rose of the season?
Me: "...and so given this has happened in the past, I'd appreciate it if all the vivarium can set up a system for double-checking the animals as they are being transferred."
PI replied: "Paranoia is a very, very important trait to cultivate, I'm happy to do the checking in this vivarium...."
Me, post the second shipping mix-up this week: "If unjustified anxiety is paranoia, what's justified anxiety?"
PI, after apologizing for the mix-up: "Woody Allen said that paranoia is having all the facts...."
I cannot even begin to count the number of times the various post-docs / students I've worked with have cracked jokes about certain parts of the protocol being "probably unnecessary" but how it's better to be safe and paranoia's useful. (Doing it with a PI is a definite first, though.) This is one of the oft overlooked facts of doing research in biology, I think -- the development of paranoia and patience, by sheer force of necessity.
...
I have finished the Avatar cartoons and, amazingly, found it to be as wonderful as everyone kept saying. It manages to cover a lot of important issues without making either the main characters, who are kids, less child-like, or dumbing down the concepts. The art / music / style is amazing and I've never seen a western production of anything Asian-based that got so many of the cultural details exactly right. Also? The sense of humor. Oh the humor. It wins at life.
My favorite character is Toph, I ship Zuko / Mai, and I'm heartily thankful I never saw the action movie. Of course I'm not going to let that stop me from enjoying the comments made by people who poke fun of it, the Macarena video being a key example. (It gave me a good laugh, especially the bit near the end with the group earth-bending dance because..."Go Little Rock go!" And then I got the hiccups.) Then there's, of course, Deviant Art, where I was inspired enough by Rufftoon's tea comic to make a new lj icon from it. (For those of you who haven't seen Avatar, the spiky guy in there is Zuko, who, for 99% of the cartoon, seems to be very very allergic of things such as zen, being well-adjusted, and tea.)
Speaking of tea, the dark blue honey stick is the one that I think should be blueberry, though it tasted like grapes. Given that it's blue, however, "grape" doesn't make much sense and I always thought that dried blueberries tasted like raisins anyway, so: blueberry.
And while I'm typing about food, I caved in to my curiosity and brought a dragon fruit (also known as red pitaya, I think).
It tastes, to me, like a strange cross between daikon radish and honeydew melon, with tiny black seeds that crunch between your teeth like the kiwi fruit. Maybe it's just the one that I happened to get, but it was pretty bland.
Lastly, since I have a phone that allows me to upload photos, I'm going to share a random plant photo of the rose I got a while back (yes the one that I insisted on getting because of the flower color, even though the plant looked like it was dying). First rose of the season?
20100518
In which life stabilizes, and I confuse the PI
After the insanity the past week I arrived at Saturday evening with the dumbfounding discovery that I have finished all my "must do" items and that the weekend wasn't over yet. In fact, Saturday wasn't over yet. I hope this will be what it's like once the quarter is over. Life will be wonderful. My tablet will no longer be gather dust. I will get a chance to read something fun that doesn't include words like "minor allele frequency".
I don't think I've gone out since the last time Lucy and I went, before quarter started. I miss fries. I cannot understand why the professor didn't pass out the paper that's due on Friday until this afternoon (but at least my presentation is over, I just have to write a review for it).
Nevertheless, the lack of immediate and time-consuming sources of stress means that I'm feeling pretty cheerful today (despite of our UV box breaking yesterday). A lot of weird little things that happen in life that otherwise would've amplified my stress on a bad day merely amused me today, to the point that when the PI asked me how I was doing, I answered, "Pretty good!" and then when he remarked that I was smiling I replied something about how odd things are happening and they're amusing and left him standing in the lobby, looking like he can't make up his mind whether to be amused or confused.
(Eventually he did try to come and find out what on earth is the matter with his grad student. I used the opportunity to try to get him to explain my partial copy of the polytene map since the lecturer utterly failed to cover it. My PI's handy that way. For certain things he's like a walking encyclopedia that likes to wander by with his mug of tea, though he is easily distracted. Which may not be a good thing.)
Other than that, I have a bruise on my knuckle and I have no clue how I got it. The street in front of my apartment is being re-paved. My mice DID get shipped last week (yay!), the person in charge just forgot the email me. My classmate has created a new acronym that I will use diligently in my studies now, called YFDO (Your Favorite Diploid Organism).
Over and out.
I don't think I've gone out since the last time Lucy and I went, before quarter started. I miss fries. I cannot understand why the professor didn't pass out the paper that's due on Friday until this afternoon (but at least my presentation is over, I just have to write a review for it).
Nevertheless, the lack of immediate and time-consuming sources of stress means that I'm feeling pretty cheerful today (despite of our UV box breaking yesterday). A lot of weird little things that happen in life that otherwise would've amplified my stress on a bad day merely amused me today, to the point that when the PI asked me how I was doing, I answered, "Pretty good!" and then when he remarked that I was smiling I replied something about how odd things are happening and they're amusing and left him standing in the lobby, looking like he can't make up his mind whether to be amused or confused.
(Eventually he did try to come and find out what on earth is the matter with his grad student. I used the opportunity to try to get him to explain my partial copy of the polytene map since the lecturer utterly failed to cover it. My PI's handy that way. For certain things he's like a walking encyclopedia that likes to wander by with his mug of tea, though he is easily distracted. Which may not be a good thing.)
Other than that, I have a bruise on my knuckle and I have no clue how I got it. The street in front of my apartment is being re-paved. My mice DID get shipped last week (yay!), the person in charge just forgot the email me. My classmate has created a new acronym that I will use diligently in my studies now, called YFDO (Your Favorite Diploid Organism).
Over and out.
20100503
Um.
Dear Diary,
Today my PI compared a microsome to a "small New England farming town". And then it spiraled out from there to cell-specific protein functions and bells in belfries and support beams. I couldn't help it. I laughed.
Seriously, though. Small New England farming town? How does he come up with these things?
Sincerely,
-S
Today my PI compared a microsome to a "small New England farming town". And then it spiraled out from there to cell-specific protein functions and bells in belfries and support beams. I couldn't help it. I laughed.
Seriously, though. Small New England farming town? How does he come up with these things?
Sincerely,
-S
20100419
Not cool. NOT COOL at all.
Came into lab at 8ish this morning and discovered that my wireless internet was not working. Subsequent checks told me the LAN connection's up, I can connect to other non-protected networks, and that other people can connect to the protected networks just fine. (This is discovered, of course, in the 5 minute interval between my experiment.) It finally came about that the certificate for authentication, which was not supposed to expire until October, expired/got corrupted and so I had to went through the whole setup/config part again. (Not cool.)
What with the actual experiments I have to get done this morning, I finally got internet just at 10:25am. Then the PI came out to talk (well mostly to wonder where Wendy is and for that I can't help), and I think I mentioned this, but he's such a dork. Lucy, you'd love him. He just made a reference about book1 of HP and how Hermione was saying (in the scene of Logic with all of Snape's potions) how a lot of wizards are very bad at logic and how that's like people taking genetics for the first time-- a lot of smart people just can't do it, since a lot of the genetics problem is very logic based (well more of the analysis part than the molecular part).
What with the actual experiments I have to get done this morning, I finally got internet just at 10:25am. Then the PI came out to talk (well mostly to wonder where Wendy is and for that I can't help), and I think I mentioned this, but he's such a dork. Lucy, you'd love him. He just made a reference about book1 of HP and how Hermione was saying (in the scene of Logic with all of Snape's potions) how a lot of wizards are very bad at logic and how that's like people taking genetics for the first time-- a lot of smart people just can't do it, since a lot of the genetics problem is very logic based (well more of the analysis part than the molecular part).
20100303
Second recruitment weekend starts tomorrow (the recruits will be arriving throughout the day tomorrow). I didn't get an email with the necessary information, so I assume I will not be involved this time. I did get an email for the social events concluding each evening though, but since I don't drink alcohol and loud music plus crowd is a sure-fire way of giving myself a migraine, I probably won't be attending.
Watching recruits wander through lab on Friday should be entertaining, though. It's my other source of excitement aside from living vicariously through my friends who are going through the interviews these weeks.
Speaking of schools: I had an enlightening conversation with my PI about schools today (it stemmed from neuroanatomical atlases -- just don't ask me how). I have been told that switching to a different state at some point in my academic career is a good career move, because it shows potential employers that you're not just fixed in California and they have to be more competitive in terms of recruiting you (as opposed to knowing that you're limited to the choices in Cal anyway, I suppose). Today I found out that my PI will be happy with just a change of institution. And that it can even be one of the research institutes right up the street. I also found out that Cal Tech is apparently a very small school and very "spotty", and that Boston has a good academics environment. I am currently going to take his words for it, since he went to Cal Tech for grad school and then did post doc at, I think, MIT. Given what kind of person he is, if he thinks Cal Tech is spotty, I should probably be avoiding the place.
Today one of my classmates helped me carry stuff. Without even saying anything (e.g. asking me if I need help, or have me ask for help). It was very nice. Apparently guys like that still exist.
Watching recruits wander through lab on Friday should be entertaining, though. It's my other source of excitement aside from living vicariously through my friends who are going through the interviews these weeks.
Speaking of schools: I had an enlightening conversation with my PI about schools today (it stemmed from neuroanatomical atlases -- just don't ask me how). I have been told that switching to a different state at some point in my academic career is a good career move, because it shows potential employers that you're not just fixed in California and they have to be more competitive in terms of recruiting you (as opposed to knowing that you're limited to the choices in Cal anyway, I suppose). Today I found out that my PI will be happy with just a change of institution. And that it can even be one of the research institutes right up the street. I also found out that Cal Tech is apparently a very small school and very "spotty", and that Boston has a good academics environment. I am currently going to take his words for it, since he went to Cal Tech for grad school and then did post doc at, I think, MIT. Given what kind of person he is, if he thinks Cal Tech is spotty, I should probably be avoiding the place.
Today one of my classmates helped me carry stuff. Without even saying anything (e.g. asking me if I need help, or have me ask for help). It was very nice. Apparently guys like that still exist.
20100105
In which there is fake-math
Or at least, that is what Mike has always called statistics.
My first class of the quarter is a combination of biomedical statistics (one of the reading material is hugely entertaining because it's sort of "stats for dummies" except the target audience are physicians; it's published in a journal for emergency medicine) and, well, bioinformatics for dummies. Or at least for biologists. I expect that the people who do this for a living will look at the material we're reading and feel the same way about it that I did for the "biology for computer scientists" thing that was in the BMI course material Victoria sent me a while ago. (This is an allele, and this is a gene &c.)
Today's course is taught by my PI, who whilst talking to a student during our ten minute break, was heard exclaiming "jumping Jesus on a pogo-stick!". The students in the class who knew him already just gave each other a knowing look, so it looks like that the fact that my PI is strange (and entertaining) is general knowledge.
Also, he tried to draw for us today, for the mutagenesis screen in mice portion. He tried to draw mice, which when he looked at it, he decided could be a mouse, a rat, or any rodent we wanted. At that point someone said, "Whale!" and everyone started laughing while my PI challenged the student to "grab a pen". I have to agree though: my first thought when he started drawing was also "whale". (I'll leave you to conclude what the mouse that he drew looked like.)
It's hard to do three-day-long experiments with three days of class a week, I've concluded. I think I need to re-think my schedule for next quarter. Or go insane, but that would not be very productive.
My first class of the quarter is a combination of biomedical statistics (one of the reading material is hugely entertaining because it's sort of "stats for dummies" except the target audience are physicians; it's published in a journal for emergency medicine) and, well, bioinformatics for dummies. Or at least for biologists. I expect that the people who do this for a living will look at the material we're reading and feel the same way about it that I did for the "biology for computer scientists" thing that was in the BMI course material Victoria sent me a while ago. (This is an allele, and this is a gene &c.)
Today's course is taught by my PI, who whilst talking to a student during our ten minute break, was heard exclaiming "jumping Jesus on a pogo-stick!". The students in the class who knew him already just gave each other a knowing look, so it looks like that the fact that my PI is strange (and entertaining) is general knowledge.
Also, he tried to draw for us today, for the mutagenesis screen in mice portion. He tried to draw mice, which when he looked at it, he decided could be a mouse, a rat, or any rodent we wanted. At that point someone said, "Whale!" and everyone started laughing while my PI challenged the student to "grab a pen". I have to agree though: my first thought when he started drawing was also "whale". (I'll leave you to conclude what the mouse that he drew looked like.)
It's hard to do three-day-long experiments with three days of class a week, I've concluded. I think I need to re-think my schedule for next quarter. Or go insane, but that would not be very productive.
20091115
I drink from the keg of glory
Or at least the keg of geekdom. I've finished configuring Fedora and this time around with Linux I've managed to add in the configurations for my tablet including pressure sensitivity. Everything works! I have wireless! Also, Fedora continues to be super shiny and very much faster than my xp system.
That just makes my day.
My PI quoted Tolstoy at me to illustrate the process of antibody synthesis (which I will be making for my protein at some point). It is awesome, horrifying, and hilarious at the same time. I mean, Anna Karenina? Really? Was that necessary?
Sometimes I think I like my thesis advisor because of his strangeness. Other times I just wonder.
That just makes my day.
My PI quoted Tolstoy at me to illustrate the process of antibody synthesis (which I will be making for my protein at some point). It is awesome, horrifying, and hilarious at the same time. I mean, Anna Karenina? Really? Was that necessary?
Sometimes I think I like my thesis advisor because of his strangeness. Other times I just wonder.
20090902
At Jerusalem next year
I am on schedule (as in the official schedule provided in the grad student handbook) now. I am slightly behind schedule in terms of where I'd like to be in my experiments, but catch up is in progress and I'm hoping that one of my experiments will yield a positive result soon. Meanwhile, my parents will probably attempt to come down here this weekend (where the heck they're staying, I have no idea, and I did warn them) and I will have to go in for at least 15 min on both Saturday and Sunday and work at least half day on Monday.
Well, cheers.
Jet-lag continues to recede. I just realized that while converting from Beijing Time to California time I must be at least on time somewhere each day of this slightly hazy week. Today, after some estimation of how energetic I feel verses how energetic I usually feel at noon, I concluded that I am currently somewhere between Brazil time and US east coast time. My aim is to be by west coast on Friday. I have switched down to green tea now, so victory is in sight.
My right eye twitches when I'm tired. It's getting annoying.
The HP box has arrived today, complete with forms, shipping labels, and three strips of 12" tape to reseal the box (yep, the box came sealed with those things in side, and two styrofoam things). Everyone say "bye" to Zen!
When my PI is mad at someone, he apparently, unlike other PIs, does not swear. He calls them names. Such as "dumbbell". It's all very PG. I am amused. He also commented on a sheet of data today that only God knew what it meant, then added that God might know, but He didn't choose to share with him.
Well, cheers.
Jet-lag continues to recede. I just realized that while converting from Beijing Time to California time I must be at least on time somewhere each day of this slightly hazy week. Today, after some estimation of how energetic I feel verses how energetic I usually feel at noon, I concluded that I am currently somewhere between Brazil time and US east coast time. My aim is to be by west coast on Friday. I have switched down to green tea now, so victory is in sight.
My right eye twitches when I'm tired. It's getting annoying.
The HP box has arrived today, complete with forms, shipping labels, and three strips of 12" tape to reseal the box (yep, the box came sealed with those things in side, and two styrofoam things). Everyone say "bye" to Zen!
When my PI is mad at someone, he apparently, unlike other PIs, does not swear. He calls them names. Such as "dumbbell". It's all very PG. I am amused. He also commented on a sheet of data today that only God knew what it meant, then added that God might know, but He didn't choose to share with him.
20090731
Perhaps it's a PI thing...
Today the PI dropped in on a conversation where my labmate was saying to a postdoc, "But apparently they're transparent!"
"But are they apparent?" Said the PI, and gave us the pleased smile of someone who had just told a really great joke.
We stared at him blankly for a moment.
"...what?" I finally said.
"Just thought it's an interesting turn of phrase," replied the PI, looking pleased with himself.
I thought about it for a moment and got that apparent and transparent sounded alike. Then I got transparent = trans-apparent. Then I realized that the PI was making a joke about how if something is apparent it's easily visible and if it's transparent, it's invisible. So saying something is apparently transparent is like saying something's visibly invisible. Or something.
It fitted with what I know of the PI's sense of humor.
"...but that's a terrible pun," I thought, but saying so seemed impolitic.
"He always comes up with these things that he thinks are funny and that no one else does," my labmate whispered to me as we left to go back to our experiments.
In other news, turned in transcript and stuff for my training grant application today. Am feeling twitchy.
"But are they apparent?" Said the PI, and gave us the pleased smile of someone who had just told a really great joke.
We stared at him blankly for a moment.
"...what?" I finally said.
"Just thought it's an interesting turn of phrase," replied the PI, looking pleased with himself.
I thought about it for a moment and got that apparent and transparent sounded alike. Then I got transparent = trans-apparent. Then I realized that the PI was making a joke about how if something is apparent it's easily visible and if it's transparent, it's invisible. So saying something is apparently transparent is like saying something's visibly invisible. Or something.
It fitted with what I know of the PI's sense of humor.
"...but that's a terrible pun," I thought, but saying so seemed impolitic.
"He always comes up with these things that he thinks are funny and that no one else does," my labmate whispered to me as we left to go back to our experiments.
In other news, turned in transcript and stuff for my training grant application today. Am feeling twitchy.
20090725
Effective, yet utterly bizarre
My PI explained an experimental design to me by likening it to hunting for purple aliens (I think he said Martians) in the New York subway.
How does he come up with these things?
How does he come up with these things?
20090601
But have you ever shaved a zebra?
Sometimes the PIs ask the oddest questions. Then again, I suppose someone who's studying the melanin pathway probably would be very curious about a zebra's skin tone.
Am having some trouble with my accounts right now. My salary has been reduced by half in the recent payroll and strange checks have shown up, with amounts just over of what would be half of my salary. The graduate program coordinator promised to look into it. I am just confused, and a little concerned.
Speaking of concerned, I feel as if the area where my apartment is has gotten progressively less safe. Last fall it was the safety issue of walking home alone at night, beginning of this quarter were reports of people whose cars have been stolen. This week it's acts of vandalism by people who are, apparently, racist and anti-gay-rights. Most of this is about one block away from where I live (Lucy, you might know where Regent is? It's near the crossing of that and La Jolla Village Dr). I feel like I should be braver about it, but I still can't quite bring myself to answer the door after dark when I know I'm not expecting anyone and there's knocking.
(Which has just happened.)
Ate an entire mango by myself today. Was late to class again because of the way class fell in the middle of labwork. Final project due next Tuesday!
Am having some trouble with my accounts right now. My salary has been reduced by half in the recent payroll and strange checks have shown up, with amounts just over of what would be half of my salary. The graduate program coordinator promised to look into it. I am just confused, and a little concerned.
Speaking of concerned, I feel as if the area where my apartment is has gotten progressively less safe. Last fall it was the safety issue of walking home alone at night, beginning of this quarter were reports of people whose cars have been stolen. This week it's acts of vandalism by people who are, apparently, racist and anti-gay-rights. Most of this is about one block away from where I live (Lucy, you might know where Regent is? It's near the crossing of that and La Jolla Village Dr). I feel like I should be braver about it, but I still can't quite bring myself to answer the door after dark when I know I'm not expecting anyone and there's knocking.
(Which has just happened.)
Ate an entire mango by myself today. Was late to class again because of the way class fell in the middle of labwork. Final project due next Tuesday!
20090504
Useful, in theory
Having eaten something containing those eggs mentioned yesterday and not experienced any symptoms of food poisoning or new-found super-mutant powers, I am forced to conclude that, perhaps, those eggs were "incredibly edible" after all.
Am running an experiment right now that'll go for at least another 15 minutes. Class at 10am, interview after that, class again after that, which means no time to stagger anything else with my current run. Which means I'm currently excavating my inbox (always fun).
...
Now it's 14:20. My last stats course is over, the final is take-home and due on Saturday. I would like to take the time to mention that I made another attempt to locate hand sanitizer yesterday at Longs Drugs, but couldn't find it. When I asked the staff I was told that the store was out. I blame the swine flu. (I also somehow suspect that no matter how many "antibiotics don't work against viruses" posters the MDs hang up, people are still going to think of antibiotics as the cure-all.)
...
Now it's 18:20. I'd like to say that the interview with my soon-to-be advisor went well. By "well" I mean "he spent an hour talking at me about potential projects and then said 'welcome back' and asked me what kind of pippets I like to use so the lab can set aside a set for me". He also managed to work in "a funny thing happened on the way to the forum" into one of his explanations, which I think Annie would appreciate.
I signed up for the summer reading program on campus, which goes from now till the end of July. I know we tried to do that reading thing together, Lucy, but it petered out after a while and, well, I think it will go better since I had to fill out paperwork for it. Meanwhile, I grabbed a copy of BELOVED from the library (oh yeah, that's the catch -- only the books from the campus library count) and managed to be completely distracted by it in the five minutes while I was at the bus stop (good and bad, I'll need to watch myself). My original pick was GRAVITY'S RAINBOW, but it's a bit long and I feel that I should refrain from picking up anything that's over 350 pages before spring quarter ends. (Summer, even if I don't get it off, at least will mean a lack of reading and papers from classes.)
Discovered today: carrot juice is bearable if there's enough stuff mixed with it that you can't tell there's carrot juice in the mix.
Am running an experiment right now that'll go for at least another 15 minutes. Class at 10am, interview after that, class again after that, which means no time to stagger anything else with my current run. Which means I'm currently excavating my inbox (always fun).
...
Now it's 14:20. My last stats course is over, the final is take-home and due on Saturday. I would like to take the time to mention that I made another attempt to locate hand sanitizer yesterday at Longs Drugs, but couldn't find it. When I asked the staff I was told that the store was out. I blame the swine flu. (I also somehow suspect that no matter how many "antibiotics don't work against viruses" posters the MDs hang up, people are still going to think of antibiotics as the cure-all.)
...
Now it's 18:20. I'd like to say that the interview with my soon-to-be advisor went well. By "well" I mean "he spent an hour talking at me about potential projects and then said 'welcome back' and asked me what kind of pippets I like to use so the lab can set aside a set for me". He also managed to work in "a funny thing happened on the way to the forum" into one of his explanations, which I think Annie would appreciate.
I signed up for the summer reading program on campus, which goes from now till the end of July. I know we tried to do that reading thing together, Lucy, but it petered out after a while and, well, I think it will go better since I had to fill out paperwork for it. Meanwhile, I grabbed a copy of BELOVED from the library (oh yeah, that's the catch -- only the books from the campus library count) and managed to be completely distracted by it in the five minutes while I was at the bus stop (good and bad, I'll need to watch myself). My original pick was GRAVITY'S RAINBOW, but it's a bit long and I feel that I should refrain from picking up anything that's over 350 pages before spring quarter ends. (Summer, even if I don't get it off, at least will mean a lack of reading and papers from classes.)
Discovered today: carrot juice is bearable if there's enough stuff mixed with it that you can't tell there's carrot juice in the mix.
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