Easter

My cousin Brett and his girlfriend Emily came out from NYC for the weekend. They're touring Boston today...

Marianne made a wonderful meal of lamb-stuffed artichokes, pasta and a salad with sin pie (think serious chocolate) for dessert. She also put together these really nice baskets for us kids.

I dyed the traditional easter eggs.

Johnny did what he was told... most of the time...

Me, Brett and Emily with our nice baskets!

Friday

1. Graphs- GOOD
2. Data that doesn't jive- BAD
3. The possibility that I will have to re-think my entire thesis project- BAD
4. The thrill of possibly coming up with something more brilliant than before- GOOD (when not overshadowed by #3)
5. The possibility that I may have to "sell-out" and do what I consider to be "boring" science just to graduate- BAD

Net Worth of Today: sub-optimal

A run in the Sun

Today we had weather in the low 60's!! Amazing since yesterday was in the 30's! I brought my running clothes and instead of a 3:30 coffee break, I took a 3:30 running break. This is significantly longer than a coffee break, so I have to plan appropriately. I got back to the lab around 5!! It felt sooo nice to have some sun on my skin! I've got bad feet so I can only do this twice per week, so I always choose the sunny days! Now I'm back in the lab working on a graph.

Something We're Not

Why does it seem that we all want to be something we're not? It seems that everywhere I go, I see women who are extraordinary and I want to be like them in some way. I aspire to be an extraordinary woman myself and somehow feel pressured to be everything that I am not in order to fulfill that aspiration. Usually what I covet is a trait that I see as positive. The woman who is Godly, compassionate, artistic, smart, athletic, beautiful, thin, energetic, positive, multi-tasker, well read, fun etc. The list goes on and on. Usually these are things that I see as what makes one love another... or if I pass by and simply think that it is beautiful.

I have never met a woman who is everything. Then why do I feel like I should be different than the rest and should be able to achieve all of these things? Why do I feel like if I am not these things, then nobody will love me? Why do I feel like I am inadequate if at any given time I am not everything?

TRUTH: Whether or not you believe it, we are ALL created in God's image. All women. All men. God is the only one that can be everything. We cannot. He has given me every trait- quirky or not- that I need. If I do not need to be witty, then I will not be, for I am other things. This does not make me less, it makes me more.

God created beauty. I am learning to appreciate the many forms that it comes in. I cannot be a tree on the shore of Kitsilano Beach in Vancouver, but I can take a picture of it.

Happy Day

You know when something just makes you so happy that you squeal like a little girl and jump up and down and laugh and smile so much it makes your face hurt? Well, today, unexpectedly around 4pm, I ran into a lady who's a post-doc in the other TB lab on campus here at UMass and she had something large and sparkly on her left ring finger! Usually when I see her she's gowned up with two pairs of gloves on, a face mask and sleeve covers and head cover so I can't usually see her hands. I saw the ring and mid-conversation exclaimed "oh my gosh- you got engaged!!!" followed by the squealing and jumping that I mentioned earlier. Anyhow, I'm super happy for her... and she is proof that you can find that special someone online... even though I did not.

Before I die:

This afternoon I was harvesting some green-fluorescent Mycobacterium and while I was waiting for the centrifuge (three times) I started thinking about some of the things in life that I want to do and see before I die. There’s a book that lists 100 places to go before you die, but I’ve never seen it… this all comes from the people I’ve met along my way. These are not in any particular order… they are just as I think…

1. Go skydiving
2. Surf in Hawaii
3. Surf in Australia
4. See a whale while whale-watching
5. Go to New Orleans for Mardi Gras
6. Go to Rio (Brazil) for Carnival
7. Go to Munich for Oktoberfest
8. Go to Dublin for St. Patrick’s Day
9. Go to Glacier National Park in Montana before the glaciers melt
10. Backpack across Europe
11. Ski in the Alps
12. Snorkel where I can see tropical corals
13. Lay on a beach in Greece
14. See the pyramids in Egypt
15. Go on a safari in Africa (my grandma went on one in Kenya and said it was fabulous)
16. See the ancient Incan Empire
17. See the ruins of the Mayan Empire in Mexico or Guatemala
18. Go to Japan… anywhere… I hear it’s beautiful
19. See a bullfight and the running of the bulls in Spain
20. Live in a foreign country

I think I’ll actually do a lot of these…

Labitude

We use a lot of different ways to describe ourselves. Today I’m going to tell you 20 ways I would describe myself in the realm of Science (since most of you don’t know me there):

1. I am not the light-hearted friend that you may know at the beach. I am very serious and I don’t really care what you did last weekend
2. “Miss-Organized” has the messiest desk you may have ever seen… and my bench space looks lie that too sometimes.
3. I don’t keep track of time- it flies!
4. I’m either super distracted by Facebook/e-mail or I’m so focused on my work that you should make some noise when walking towards me so that I don’t jump 10 feet in the air when you say “I need you”
5. Don’t tell me how to do something unless I ask. If I don’t ask, I don’t care what you think. We are all trained by different people. Just because I don’t do it your crazy OCD way doesn’t mean that my way is incorrect. Ha.
6. I make up a lot of stuff as I go, “work on the fly” you might say. As long as you do it with confidence, people will believe you.
7. I am not afraid to ask for help. I believe that this has contributed to my success as it has broadened my horizons.
8. My favorite time to be in the lab is after everyone else has gone home… it’s so peaceful.
9. I hate giving presentations. My boss always tells me afterwards “we need to work on getting rid of your California accent” (apparently it gets stronger when I get nervous).
10. If it doesn’t get me closer to graduating, then I don’t care. Harsh but true.
11. I type my lab notebook.
12. I curse at the computer when it makes me angry. It often makes me angry… especially 2008 Excel.
13. Anything super-complicated is no problem for me… but simple math and linear regression curves, forget it! I’m lost. (thus today’s aggravation).
14. I get overwhelmed my the amount of things that I have to do, sometimes it paralyzes me to the point where I have to go for a swim before coming back to lab.
15. I am one of 3 Americans in my lab group of 9 people total.
16. I have goofy days at work too… usually from lack of sleep or wine at a seminar. Here's an example:

17. My job is to kill things: mouse cells or bacteria, I don’t care… just die!
18. I absolutely cannot multitask! If you ask me to do this, I will mess up, I promise.
19. I am a bit of a free spirit in the lab. My opinion is that academic science should be free of crazy restrictions like closed-toed shoes and lab coats (which should be reserved for industry). We should be free to pursue intellectual curiosities and having discussions about them without the hindrance of high-demanding people.
20. The bulletin board in front of me has the following things:
a. A cheat sheet for diluting antibiotics and other chemicals
b. A “coffee talk” calendar (this year). The April character is holding a cup of coffee saying “Drinking coffee & slacking off are all part of what I do”. Although January was the seller for me. She’s saying “Drink Coffee! Do stupid things faster with more energy!”
c. 6 different scribble-drawings of my “model” that will one day be my doctoral thesis
d. a list of important phone numbers
e. Mr. Right—grows 3-4 times his size in water!
f. A hand-knit ornament from a visiting Korean post-doc. His sister made it and it can be used to wipe down your kitchen… not me!
g. Sticky: OD(600) 1= 3x10^8 M.smeg/mL
h. A card from a girl from church who wanted to encourage me
i. An abstract that I need to add to my CV
j. Sticky: year I should consider applying to work for the Epidemic Intelligence Service
k. An e-mail from my dad 16 July 2008 saying my hard work will take me to the top and he loves me