Good morning, everyone.
I'm back from the cruise, which means my cell phone is back on and my e-mail is getting checked once again. We took a lot of pictures, some of which even have to be *developed*, like *cavemen* used to do. So I'll write up a big long diary of the trip later. I just wanted to let you know that we have made it back to areas where the ground is not constantly swelling and sliding beneath your feet. Which is sort of a shame, because that puts both me and Jess to sleep really well.
We're heading back to Austin tomorrow, and we're all excited to see our kitties and see if our tree made it through the week okay. It's been really dry, and our sprinkler system is on the fritz where the tree is. Real world concerns come flooding back once again. It was a nice vacation, though, and I'm excited to get back to my real life, being as my real life is pretty fantastic.
-N
Saturday, August 29, 2009
Monday, August 24, 2009
I give Avery credit for this one, Dad
I had a meeting with my boss this morning. I wanted to explain to him an experiment that I had completed on Saturday, and convince him that I was right, and I knew what I was doing. Conversation went like this-
Me: Two months ago, I started this experiment and I have to revamp the protocol based on those results. When I repeated it, I wanted to be able to account for a variety of factors that might affect the readout, so it was very difficult to amass enough samples to perform the experiment. Once I had the experiment started, I used a variety of painstaking methods to validate the readout.
Boss: Well that sounds like overkill.
Me: Yes, but I designed this experiment so I wouldn't have to repeat it. The results I have I am very confident in. See?
Boss: Oh yes, that is really nice. Hm. Yes, I think you are done with this experiment.
Me: slam Notebook on the floor and start singing "We are the Champions" in perfect Freddy Mercury falsetto
It feels pretty awesome to finally finish something. Few things in science don't lead to more questions, but I decided to nip that in the bud this time. I designed the experiment to tell me at least something every time I ran it, and it finally paid off! Now, I am off to spend the rest of the day posing like Mr. Universe.
Me: Two months ago, I started this experiment and I have to revamp the protocol based on those results. When I repeated it, I wanted to be able to account for a variety of factors that might affect the readout, so it was very difficult to amass enough samples to perform the experiment. Once I had the experiment started, I used a variety of painstaking methods to validate the readout.
Boss: Well that sounds like overkill.
Me: Yes, but I designed this experiment so I wouldn't have to repeat it. The results I have I am very confident in. See?
Boss: Oh yes, that is really nice. Hm. Yes, I think you are done with this experiment.
Me: slam Notebook on the floor and start singing "We are the Champions" in perfect Freddy Mercury falsetto
It feels pretty awesome to finally finish something. Few things in science don't lead to more questions, but I decided to nip that in the bud this time. I designed the experiment to tell me at least something every time I ran it, and it finally paid off! Now, I am off to spend the rest of the day posing like Mr. Universe.
Sunday, August 23, 2009
Back in California
Yes I know, I'm very bad at blogging. So I'm going to update everyone on my life!
I had a pretty good summer. Worked lots, made money, which was really the goal. But I'm back at school now, trying to get my room organized (obviously going really well considering I'm here on the computer.....) Classes start on Wednesday, so I'm just relaxing a bit before the grind of school starts again. Bleck.
My friends Tracy, Adam and Garrett came up this summer to visit me, and we had a great time. We did all sorts of crazy Alaskan things, like hiking, whale watching, beach fire and of course eating. We ate a lot. Thanks Mom!
Also this summer my friend Levi got me into rock climbing. I invested in some climbing gear, and have really been enjoying it. I have a bunch of friends here that climb, so hopefully they can motivate me to go and I can keep getting better at that.
And the other news I'm sure mom and dad have been telling people is that I have a boyfriend. His name is Sam, and he goes to school in Anchorage. So we will be doing a long-distance relationship, which will be very hard, but we decided it was worth it. I invested in a web cam and now we can talk over skype for free, and we get to see each other....sort of.
Other than that, not a lot else is happening, not right now at least. I'll have Newman Center stuff starting this week. We are planning a fundraiser so we can eventually build our own chapel, even though I probably won't still be at Sonoma when it's built. It's the thought that counts.
I hope everyone is well, and I will probably talk to you soon!
I had a pretty good summer. Worked lots, made money, which was really the goal. But I'm back at school now, trying to get my room organized (obviously going really well considering I'm here on the computer.....) Classes start on Wednesday, so I'm just relaxing a bit before the grind of school starts again. Bleck.
My friends Tracy, Adam and Garrett came up this summer to visit me, and we had a great time. We did all sorts of crazy Alaskan things, like hiking, whale watching, beach fire and of course eating. We ate a lot. Thanks Mom!
Also this summer my friend Levi got me into rock climbing. I invested in some climbing gear, and have really been enjoying it. I have a bunch of friends here that climb, so hopefully they can motivate me to go and I can keep getting better at that.
And the other news I'm sure mom and dad have been telling people is that I have a boyfriend. His name is Sam, and he goes to school in Anchorage. So we will be doing a long-distance relationship, which will be very hard, but we decided it was worth it. I invested in a web cam and now we can talk over skype for free, and we get to see each other....sort of.
Other than that, not a lot else is happening, not right now at least. I'll have Newman Center stuff starting this week. We are planning a fundraiser so we can eventually build our own chapel, even though I probably won't still be at Sonoma when it's built. It's the thought that counts.
I hope everyone is well, and I will probably talk to you soon!
5K finished
Waking up at 5:45 in the morning on vacation is unusual enough. Doing it so that I can run a 5K is downright weird.
Regardless, 'Team Venture' managed to run our 5Ks today just fine. I brought up the rear at 41:23, which is a pretty slow pace for a 5k, but I did beat...8 people in the race out of 177. Shannon was a few minutes ahead of me, and Jess was about ten minutes faster, which makes her *really fast*. Quite a change from the girl that used to stay beind me while I went running for TKD. No doubt I would do a lot better if I ran with any regularity, but unfortunately Texas summer heat procludes me from getting outside and running until the sun goes down.
Still though, the most important opponent when running is yourself, and I made my personal goal of running the entire time, despite being completely soaked through by the end of the run. The one upside of having to wake up early for a 7:30 run is that the sun wasn't fully up and toasty for the entire time. Humid, though. I would however, like to point out that I also was faster than everyone who did not go running today, and that's several million people, at the very least. So that certainly makes me feel better.
Tomorrow we're heading down to Miami to depart on our CRUISE which is very exciting. Communication will be somewhat limited, but cell phones will work if there's some sort of emergency. We do get charged international roaming rates, so use this power wisely. E-mail will be better. For some reason the ship has free wi-fi. Odd, that.
-N
Regardless, 'Team Venture' managed to run our 5Ks today just fine. I brought up the rear at 41:23, which is a pretty slow pace for a 5k, but I did beat...8 people in the race out of 177. Shannon was a few minutes ahead of me, and Jess was about ten minutes faster, which makes her *really fast*. Quite a change from the girl that used to stay beind me while I went running for TKD. No doubt I would do a lot better if I ran with any regularity, but unfortunately Texas summer heat procludes me from getting outside and running until the sun goes down.
Still though, the most important opponent when running is yourself, and I made my personal goal of running the entire time, despite being completely soaked through by the end of the run. The one upside of having to wake up early for a 7:30 run is that the sun wasn't fully up and toasty for the entire time. Humid, though. I would however, like to point out that I also was faster than everyone who did not go running today, and that's several million people, at the very least. So that certainly makes me feel better.
Tomorrow we're heading down to Miami to depart on our CRUISE which is very exciting. Communication will be somewhat limited, but cell phones will work if there's some sort of emergency. We do get charged international roaming rates, so use this power wisely. E-mail will be better. For some reason the ship has free wi-fi. Odd, that.
-N
Thursday, August 20, 2009
Vacation Time
Tomorrow Jess and I head out to travel the world, or at least small, warm, beautiful parts of it. We'll start out by hanging out in Fort Lauderdale and running a 5K with Jessie's sister. You know, relaxing stuff.
Jess and her sister got all excited about doing more running together and running a 5K the same weekend after they got faster together. Well that weekend is this weekend, and since, as luck would have it, we'll both be in the same city, we're all going to run together. Well, 'together', I guess. Jess and, I'm sure, Shannon, are both a lot faster than I am, being as I can't go running with any regularity in Texas summer heat. Still, we are signed up as a team, so yay for us! Being as Jess and I just finished a 5K run around the neighborhood, I feel confident that I can, at the very least, finish the run. It's all about setting achievable goals.
On monday, we go Cruising! Very exciting. We've signed up for some shore excursions, though a great deal of them involve water, so it's hard to know what, if any, pictures will be drawn from our experience. I'll definitely write about it, though. Having a journal to look back on is very nice.
We get back from the cruise on, I think, Saturday, spend a little more time in FLA, and then fly back on Sunday. So wish us luck, though it looks like we're already pretty lucky. Hurricane bill looks like it will miss us. :)
-N
Jess and her sister got all excited about doing more running together and running a 5K the same weekend after they got faster together. Well that weekend is this weekend, and since, as luck would have it, we'll both be in the same city, we're all going to run together. Well, 'together', I guess. Jess and, I'm sure, Shannon, are both a lot faster than I am, being as I can't go running with any regularity in Texas summer heat. Still, we are signed up as a team, so yay for us! Being as Jess and I just finished a 5K run around the neighborhood, I feel confident that I can, at the very least, finish the run. It's all about setting achievable goals.
On monday, we go Cruising! Very exciting. We've signed up for some shore excursions, though a great deal of them involve water, so it's hard to know what, if any, pictures will be drawn from our experience. I'll definitely write about it, though. Having a journal to look back on is very nice.
We get back from the cruise on, I think, Saturday, spend a little more time in FLA, and then fly back on Sunday. So wish us luck, though it looks like we're already pretty lucky. Hurricane bill looks like it will miss us. :)
-N
I'm on PubChem!
This is not as cool as a real publication, BUT, since I doubt many of our readers care about impact factor, I wanted to share with you the early fruits of my labor. The large scale screen we did with the group in Alabama is done, and by decree of the NIH, the results have been deposited online. And you can ALL read them! Look here!
I don't really recommend you do this, but if you feel compelled, scroll down to the middle where it says Large T Antigen Purification. I WROTE THAT. I tried to write it in a way that did not convey the blood, sweat, and tears and HOURS and HOURS that went into the protocol. Just the facts, ma'am.
This is both awesome and scary. Obviously this is a sign that we've made a lot of headway. Scary because now this information is publicly accessible, and it puts pressure on us to do something with it before anyone else does. Awesome because the results are cool, scary because I am not really sure what to do with them. Pubchem makes everything seem so streamlined and professional, it is hard to beleive that this is MY work (although this is partly because I had little to do with getting this data to this point). I hope Dr. Boss gets as giddy about this as I am, and maybe he'll be compelled to try publishing this stuff really quick.
I was going to write a story about how I was tired of being pushed around, went to stand up for myself and it worked out great for me- instead, I am going to try and get the bioassay to biocompare the parameters of bioinforming.... I really need to learn to use this site.
I don't really recommend you do this, but if you feel compelled, scroll down to the middle where it says Large T Antigen Purification. I WROTE THAT. I tried to write it in a way that did not convey the blood, sweat, and tears and HOURS and HOURS that went into the protocol. Just the facts, ma'am.
This is both awesome and scary. Obviously this is a sign that we've made a lot of headway. Scary because now this information is publicly accessible, and it puts pressure on us to do something with it before anyone else does. Awesome because the results are cool, scary because I am not really sure what to do with them. Pubchem makes everything seem so streamlined and professional, it is hard to beleive that this is MY work (although this is partly because I had little to do with getting this data to this point). I hope Dr. Boss gets as giddy about this as I am, and maybe he'll be compelled to try publishing this stuff really quick.
I was going to write a story about how I was tired of being pushed around, went to stand up for myself and it worked out great for me- instead, I am going to try and get the bioassay to biocompare the parameters of bioinforming.... I really need to learn to use this site.
Tuesday, August 18, 2009
Matt's Not That Old, Really
As many of our readers know, Matt is turning 30 this year. What many of you may not know, is that he may not actually make it that far. Not normally one for personal drama, I am beginning to suspect Matt may turn 29 for the rest of his life. And it is so much more than not owning up to how long ago Sept 14, 1979 was- this goes much deeper. It started out with some expected whimpering about not being ready to be old, but has become steeped itself in pity long enough to become a whole new beast. To deal with the emotional cavern that this birthday brings, he splits his time on both sides by acting in a binary fashion between 40 ("we ought to save this money for a down payment on a house") and 20 ("I am gonna celebrate with a Month of Beer Challenge"). Well, trinary- there is also complete denial.
My current challenge, is to plan an appropriate celebration for a guy who is wavering between not having a birthday, having a birthday where he is incredibly old, and one where he will never grow up. Imagine a sort of Mad Hatter's Party for Methuselah in Neverland theme- and if you can, be explicit in details, I am at a loss. In recent years, we have had several friends turn 30, generally there was cake, good friends and an absence of dentures, AARP members or Reader's Digest toasts. I would have thought that seeing this happen gracefully on so many occasions would help Matt transition, but I underestimated how tense he is about this whole birthday thing. It is surprising, really. Matt at his core hasn't changed since I met him, and I have a hard time imagining him being anyone but the laid back, logical, quiet fun loving geek I know today. Maybe he knows something I don't.
For those who are interested, I am assembling a birthday list I can send your way. If it isn't in your inbox tonight, and you want it, just say so.
My current challenge, is to plan an appropriate celebration for a guy who is wavering between not having a birthday, having a birthday where he is incredibly old, and one where he will never grow up. Imagine a sort of Mad Hatter's Party for Methuselah in Neverland theme- and if you can, be explicit in details, I am at a loss. In recent years, we have had several friends turn 30, generally there was cake, good friends and an absence of dentures, AARP members or Reader's Digest toasts. I would have thought that seeing this happen gracefully on so many occasions would help Matt transition, but I underestimated how tense he is about this whole birthday thing. It is surprising, really. Matt at his core hasn't changed since I met him, and I have a hard time imagining him being anyone but the laid back, logical, quiet fun loving geek I know today. Maybe he knows something I don't.
For those who are interested, I am assembling a birthday list I can send your way. If it isn't in your inbox tonight, and you want it, just say so.
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