New Do

Posted on March 31, 2009

Ah, why does it feel soooo good to get a new haircut?

We’re Number 3!

Posted on March 30, 2009

Ryan and I played in a mixed doubles disc golf tourney yesterday near Corvallis. The weather was off and on hail, then sunshine, then rain for the first half of the day, and then cleared up a bit for the afternoon. We didn’t play our best, but we still placed decently; 3rd out of 11 teams. We’re just lucky that we made it there on time. Ryan was under the impression that the first round started at 10, when it actually started at 9. We were still shuffling around the house a tad before 7am when a friend texted to tell me the players meeting was at 8:45! Needless to say, we hauled butt to get there. Glad we made it, because it was a good time.

“Quiverfull” gives me shivers!

Posted on March 27, 2009

Just more evidence on how the mouth breathers are out breeding the rest of us at an obscene pace. Within a few generations, we’ll be outnumbered thousands to 1. I’m just glad I’ll be dead by the time these (expletive omitted) people overpopulate the world, exhaust all its resources, and push the entire planet into catastrophic environmental collapse. Gah!

http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=102005062&ps=cprs

Welcome to Tabbed Brow

Posted on March 27, 2009

I can’t believe I’ve never noticed this before, but this happens every time I open a new tab in my browser. It is the shortened version of “welcome to tabbed browsing,” but I’m going to go ahead and believe it’s something made special just for me.

Volcano Monitoring

Posted on March 23, 2009

Back in February, President Obama made a long address to Congress, and the nation. Following that speech, Louisiana’s governor Bobby Jindal gave the Republican Response. Nothing in the response surprised me all that much, though his nod to “honest philosophical differences” between Democrats and Republicans on government spending did seem less like an honest recognition, and more like a thinly veiled segue to gripe about the stimulus bill.

He went on to talk at length about the wastefulness of particular items in the bill. He didn’t come up with these items all on his own. The Republican leaders had already published a list of what they believed was pork spending in the bill. The list included moneys for the CDC to prevent STDs, tribal alcohol and substance abuse reduction programs, state and local fire stations, repairing National Institutes of Health facilities, Amtrak, rural waste disposal programs, and public computer centers at community colleges, just to name a few. Jindal had clearly studied the list with the intention of finding what he felt was its most outrageous spending item, and mocking it in his response to Obama’s speech. His target: volcano monitoring.

Some of the stimulus money was slated for the USGS (US Geological Survey) and a fraction of that money was going to be used to update and replace old or broken monitoring equipment, and keep paying their scientists to use it. Jindal thought this was outrageous, clearly unaware that the US is third in the world for its number of active volcanoes. He may have forgotten about the 57 people who died when Mt. Saint Helen’s erupted in 1980, but the people of Washington sure didn’t. And neither did the residents of Alaska who see 1 volcanic eruption per year that fills the sky with ash causing respiratory difficulties, and interrupting air travel. I remember thinking at the time that someone should propose cutting funding to National Weather Service programs that track and predict the landfall location of hurricanes. After all, I live in Portland, Oregon and I’ll never see a Gulf hurricane. That’s pork spending to me!

No hurricanes in my backyard, and no volcano in his. I might expect this kind of NIMBYism (Not In My Back Yard) from an ordinary governor, but I have to admit, it’s extra chilling when coming from Jindal- someone that many believe will throw his hat in the ring as Republican candidate for president in the very near future. Because of this, I have been snickering happily whenever I hear news of volcanic activity. Today’s news was especially satisfying. Mount Redoubt in Alaska has erupted 5 times since Sunday! The plume of ash has caused disruptions to air travel in south central Alaska that could extend for a period of weeks to months. (For perspective, 20,000 passengers fly through the area on any given day.) That can’t be good for the economy. I Wonder how Jindal feels about that?

Why we order in

Posted on March 20, 2009

Often, Ryan and I pick up a take-and-bake pizza at the market for dinner. We dress it up at home with our favorite toppings (or…whatever happens to be in the fridge). We did this one day earlier in the week. As you can see, our tastes in pizza are a tad different. On my side you see some pepperoni, red peppers, garlic, feta and ricotta cheezes, and red onion. On his side you see…well, pepperoni. I’m told there was some garlic and fetta under all that pepperoni, but it could be a coverup, literally!

(Note: Ryan is looking a little overexcited for the pizza here.)

“Bad Karma” Hypothesis of PCR

Posted on March 15, 2009

Last Monday I ran a DNA extraction. Tuesday I used the DNA in a qPCR experiment. The results were uninterruptable. Garbage. Something had gone wrong. Several different possibilities come to mind immediately when this type of thing happens. Template inhibition, contaminant inhibition, bad enzymes, dNTPs, primers etc…all of which could cause the problem. Primer mismatch, and wrong annealing or extension temperatures are others. I have ways to test for all of these things, and that’s what I did Wednesday, Thursday, and Friday. But the results of all my tests turned up nothing. I am beginning to think nothing actually went wrong on Monday, but I just am working at the very limit of my detection capabilities.

This isn’t very satisfying. At least when there IS a problem, it can be identified by experimental means. This most recent conclusion is only reached by the process of elimination: “It isn’t any of these OTHER things, so it has got to be this.” I dislike that immensely. Anyway, to make sure I’ve thoroughly exhausted the list of “other” possibilities, I went to an online PCR forum that has a troubleshooting flow chart. Here is what I read:

I. Bad karma hypothesis.

Background:
This is basically the “God is punishing you” hypothesis. It sometimes gains a great deal of favor.

Symptoms:
- i) All rational explanations have been exhausted and yet PCR still is not working for you.
- ii) Persistent feelings of guilt (if you are a Catholic, this symptom could be misleading).

Tests and solutions:
- i) Try bungee jumping. If you survive, God must not be too hacked-off at you.
- ii) Atone for your sins and start over at the top of the flow chart.
- iii) If you end up here next time, have someone watch you next time you set up your PCR reactions.

We ShamROCKED it!

Posted on March 15, 2009

So right now there are beams of sunlight coming through my window and it’s beautiful outside, but it was a different story earlier this morning. I woke up at 6am (presunrise) and left to pick up Nick, and drive to the transit center to catch a ride downtown with Suzanne and Pete. We are Team OGI, and we gather once a year for the Shamrock Run in Portland. It was raining, windy, and cold. We parked in a garage about half a mile from the starting line, and got to the back of the crowd as the “90 seconds to start” announcement came over the loud speakers. Not that it mattered. After the gun went off, it still took us all about 10 minutes to actually cross the starting line since we started from so far back (see, you can’t even see it in that top right picture). Despite the weather the run was great. We had arranged to meet at the entrance to the beer tent when the race was over. You wouldn’t think you’d want a beer after running a 5k, but believe me, it’s surprisingly refreshing. Besides, all runners get a free beer and cup of chowder. What sort of graduate students would we be if we turned down free anything?! Anyway, here are some pics from our day. We shamROCKed it!

The Great Wall of (Mis)Communication

Posted on March 14, 2009

Yesterday, I had purchased some deli-sliced turkey and cheddar to make bagel sandwiches for lunch at the lab. I bought enough for yesterday’s lunch, and today’s as well, and had a few apples too. Upon leaving for home after work last night, I remembered that the bag containing all these lunch supplies was still on my desk. I had forgotten to put it in the fridge. I was already a few miles from the lab, so I called a lab mate and asked her to put the bag in the fridge. The exact quote was probably something like, “Could you throw it in the fridge for me?”

Fast forward to this morning at the lab. I thought I would have one of the apples for a snack during our departmental seminar. I checked the kitchen fridge. No bag. I checked the downstairs kitchen fridge. No bag. I then checked the lab fridge…the one with all the chemicals and bacteria and such. Would have been an odd choice for food, but you just never know. Still, no bag. Though relieved that my lunch didn’t end up in the very-not-food-friendly lab fridge, I was getting really curious as to the whereabouts of my lunch sack. I finally met up with my lab mate during seminar and asked about my lunch. Thrown away. She thought I called her to ask her to THROW AWAY MY UNEATEN LUNCH! Remember: “Could you throw it in the….” Communication lines had completely crossed. English is not her first language, and even face to face I’m not sure she fully understands half of what I say. Over the phone I simply had no chance. The barrier was just insurmountable. I call this the Great Wall of (Mis)Communication.

Chris Day

Posted on March 13, 2009

After a few rough days in the lab, I came home on Wednesday to find the mud room and kitchen swept, all the dishes done, counters and stove cleaned, and an amazing smell wafting up from the crock pot. Ryan declared a “Chris Day,” something he does now and again to put a smile on my face. He had cooked us up an amazing pot roast with potatoes and carrots and onions. He even made biscuits. It was a very nice Chris Day, and I am a very lucky girl. Thanks Ry.

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