Resistance is futile

Devil in the Details

2008-11-27T10:00:00.000-08:00

In this bittersweet memoir, Jennifer Traig laughs about her puzzling problems growing up with obsessive compulsive disorder in an era before OCD was a recognized disorder. With a witty humor, she describes trials that would have permanently scarred a less resilient youth. In a world where OCD is stereotyped in pop culture, TV shows, and movies it is a relief to find someone willing to provide a more realistic, though upbeat, view of this very debilitating disorder. I imagine many people will be able to find a little of themselves in Jennifer Traig, and teens now facing such issues will find the upbeat happy ending comforting. I give this book 5 out of 5 stars.

The Day After Tomorrw, by Alan Folsom

2008-11-22T14:09:00.000-08:00

In "The Day After Tomorrow," Alan Folsom weaves together a wide array of well-developed, interesting characters in an international murder mystery. It begins when Paul Osborne accidentally spies the man who murdered his father more than a decade earlier. Obsessed, he initiates a man-hunt which propels him into a powerful political intrigue as well as setting himself up as the prime suspect for an international serial killer. Despite the promising beginning, Folsom fails to deliver the anticipated suspense. Folsom's attempts at tantalizing foreshadows belly-flop when, by page 300 of this 600 paged book, he feeds enough information that an experienced reader will easily guess the "shocking" end. The final 300 pages of the book tediously develop a new (scientifically and historically impossible) twist on a plot which has been regurgitated since the mid-1900's.

Although Folsom's writing style is generally fast-paced and entertaining, unfortunately the suspense is repeatedly interrupted by over-ambitious development of the characters' sexual identities. Some of this development is necessary, but most of it is superfluous.

I would recommend this book for people who read quickly and do not try to interpret foreshawdows. I give this book 2 out of 5 stars.

Post Viral Fatigue

2008-11-20T10:38:00.000-08:00

Dear reader,

I have not posted for a very long time. And I realize that is a mistake. If I am to allow my alter-ego Esmeralda to reemerge, then I must annihilate the all traces of Post Viral Fatigue! What is Post Viral Fatigue, you might ask? Well, even if you don't, let me explain: it is a state of extreme exhaustion lasting months to years after a viral infection. But what viral infection did I have? Who knows? Nothing that can be traced, apparently. I go to India for a nice wedding, I come back with a sore throat and a cough, congestion and a dizziness--it progresses over the next 3 months to be extreme fatigue accompanied by a menagerie of obscure symptoms (including completely losing my voice for the conference in Namibia!). After FOUR mono tests (oh, of course the FOURTH test was the super-duper-never-fail-if-you-have-mono-we-will-know test) and a series of expensive scans, I am still in the same place as before, only poorer and with a more annoyed boss. But will I let my life come crashing to the ground? No! Will I hide in my room while surrounded by my computer and stacks of books? Yes! And I have decided to delight you all with my thoughts on current events, philosophy, history, and me; I will also astound you with a new book review section. I may crawl into my cluttered room as a post-viral-fatigued dollop of mud-brown amphibian tissue, but I will reemerge as a happy-jumpy adventuresome frog! With that insightful metaphor, I sign off.

Answer Me

2007-12-29T08:13:00.000-08:00

Death

I walk through the snow

Twinkle.

Ouch

2007-12-09T17:08:00.000-08:00

I am a person who never reads movie reviews. Or, at least not until AFTER I've watched a movie. From the few times I was forced to listen to a movie review read aloud, I came to believe that reviewers were often ignorant, action hungry teens who don't usually understand the point, or at least don't like the same types of movies as myself. It should have occurred to me that the person who was reading reviews at me was an ignorant, action hungry 26 year old who, at the very least, didn't like the same movies as myself. Ha

So, because I was shocked and appalled by the movie Apocalypto, I read the reviews. And you know what? Many of them agreed with me. Even reading the good reviews would have told me I wouldn't like this movie. Ooops. I guess my stubbornness has stabbed me in the back again!

Why would I choose to watch such a violent movie? Did it have a point? Perhaps to make us feel a little less guilty for the massacre of native civilizations by the conquistadors? Wow, I feel so much better now. I think I'll be able to sleep at night. Oh. Wait. I'm going to have nightmares from that horrible movie!

And that's what I think. With no spoilers. I'm itching to say what I REALLY think, but I will save that for a conversation with people who've seen the movie. Hopefully that's not very many.

But wait. Let me say one thing. Isn't it a bit cliche to steal omens from Mark Twain?

The Attack of the Tau--My Experience as an Elderly Student

2007-10-30T09:27:00.000-07:00

Coming back to grad school at the ripe old age of 27 has really changed the way I view student life. Then again, I'm still the same old me. For instance, we have a rough draft of our term paper for Drug and Gene Delivery due this week. Our project is to design a "better" drug delivery system for Alzheimer's. I wanted to title the ROUGH draft "Alzheimer's Wars--The Attack of the Tau." That was vetoed by my 4 (undergraduate) teammates. How is it I am still so much less mature than my teammates, even now?? As the only grad student in the class, should I be sacrificing my creative freedom for professionalism?

Another interesting thing I've noticed is that I'm attention deficit. I never paid attention in class when I was a kid, but I always assumed that was because school is really, really boring. I liked to sit in the back of class and read a book, or blow on my pencil to see how fast I could make it roll. (It rolled pretty fast when the angry teacher picked up my entire desk and tipped it over--apparently pencil blowing isn't an approved classroom activity.) My high school chemistry teacher used to always brag to the class: "look! Rachel yet again has come up with her OWN way of solving the problems on the test!" I never had the guts to tell him that I never listened to a word he said during lectures--so I had no idea how he TOLD us to solve the problems.

But here I am, sitting in a class that I really AM interested in. And I can't pay attention. I hear only about 1/4 of what the prof says, and that's only when I'm shouting out questions and answers every few seconds. Talking too much is the best way to keep my attention. The rest of the lecture is spent either in complete oblivion or in thinking about something the prof said, but in a way that is completely unrelated to what he's talking about. For instance, today, while Dr. Adams was discussing some treatment for Parkinson's where you probe the brain with electrodes, I was sitting there pondering the sketch of the medical device. I noticed that the sketch pictured a very handsome middle-aged man. He had a square jaw, suggesting that he had high levels of testosterone, in turn suggesting that he was strong and vital. Therefore, the advertisement subtly suggested that people on this Parkinson's treatment had strength and vitality. Exactly the traits that would be lacking in a patient suffering the symptoms of Parkinson's. Well done advertisement-drawing-dude! Oh, wait, what was Dr. Adams saying again???

But I think the most shocking incident to date is when I was sitting there in oblivion, and I suddenly realized that I had an empty pop bottle in front of me. I wondered: "what would happen if I threw this pop bottle at the front of the room as hard as I can?" Then I spent at least 5 minutes of the lecture either stifling laughter at the thought of throwing the bottle, or stifling my intensifying urge to throw it. Isn't that exactly the type of behavior that gets kids labeled as trouble-makers early in life? I wonder if they are the same as me. They just have an over-active brain that's full of ideas and images and thoughts and they just want to try it out...just to see...So maybe next time I hear about a trouble-maker, I will look at that kid's situation just a little differently.

van der Waals

2007-09-28T10:38:00.000-07:00

While grading the first quiz for Biology for Engineers, I was puzzled by some of the students' descriptions of van der Waals forces. Just to make sure I wasn't missing something important, I did a Google search and, of course, ended up at the Wikipedia site for van der Waals. Where else can you find helpful information about, oh, ANYTHING? So, the picture above was taken from that site:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Van_der_Waals_forces.

Did all of you know that a gecko uses van der Waals forces to climb things??? In case you aren't familiar with van der Waals, it is a inter- or intra- molecular force between two atoms. Each atom has a negatively charged electron cloud surrounding its positively charged nucleus, right? So sometimes, (for instance, by random chance), many of the electrons float to one side of the atom, leaving a slight positive charge on the side that they deserted. Remember that negative and positive charges attract? So, the slight positive side of the atom may induce the negatively-charged electron cloud of a neighboring atom to move closer to that same side...leading to a slight attraction between the two atoms. Apparently, this is how a gecko hangs on to a surface! It's sort of like rubbing a balloon on cloth and then sticking it to the ceiling, only you don't have to rub the gecko first....

Guns, Germs, and Steel

2007-09-16T17:01:00.000-07:00

I have been watching the National Geographic Documentary “Guns, Germs, and Steel,” based on the best-selling book by Jared Diamond. This was excellently filmed and very interesting. I recommend it to anyone interested in anthropology or history. The main question addressed is—“Why do white men have more cargo?” In other words, why were Europeans successful in conquering and colonizing most of the world? For risk of simplification, I will summarize Diamond’s idea:

The Fertile Crescent in the Middle East was the geographically lucky origin of not only wheat and barley (VERY important staple crops) but also of most of the domesticated animals. This herding and farming culture provided enough agricultural excess to support non-herders and non-farmers, who were able to develop technology and skills (like writing). Their closeness to animals also exposed these people to germs, which over hundreds of years they developed a genetic immunity to. The ideas, animals, and crops easily spread along an East-West axis (where people were attracted to similar climates and lengths of days) into Europe, Asia, and Northern Africa. So in the end, Europeans had guns, germs, and steel on their side.

The Americas, unlike Eurasia, are narrowly shaped along the East-West axis and broadly shaped along the North-South axis. Therefore, although there were some crops, one domesticated animal (the llama), and one written language (that of the Mayans in Central America), technology and food was not easily interchanged in the Americas. When Europeans came with their guns, germs, and steel, the native population was decimated.

Although I find this idea very fascinating and fairly convincing, I have a few qualms. First of all, I understand that the area around Panama is very narrowly shaped along the East-West axis, making exchange of ideas and goods difficult. However, North America, at least, is not too VERY long and narrow. Not narrow enough for this to be the main factor which slowed the progress of civilization. The documentary also does not address the reason why the Europeans apparently won this war. After all, if it is merely geographical closeness along an East-West axis to the Fertile Crescent, then wouldn’t Asia be just as likely to succeed as Europe? And, in fact, the moors were quite successful for quite a long while. So why didn’t they colonize the Americas, India, Africa, and Australia?

My answer to that is “just wait.” The war isn’t over yet.

I'm Ill--Not for the faint of heart!

2007-09-15T07:48:00.000-07:00

Dear friends and colleagues (ok, perhaps I'm being overly ambitious--Dear 4ish people that would actually read my blog if they knew I was writing in it again),

This week I was sick. It wasn't the miserable sick where you just sit around feeling horrible. No. I was unconscious. The whole week was spent in bed. Well, except for part of Monday (the day on which I realized I may be getting sick) and Friday (the day I felt awake enough to sit through an entire 5 hours of work after my class was over). So no feeling miserable. Just one whole missing week.

I even slept through my very first Drug and Gene Delivery quiz. Monday I came home early thinking "gee, I ought to get some sleep if I'm going to do this experiment tomorrow!" I took a NyQuil and slept on through till 5am when my alarm went off. I then said to myself "mrharkghse? hrehoivehfsmrsnnhzzzzzzzzz." And awoke next at 9:40am. 10 minutes AFTER my quiz was to start. So I dragged myself into the department thinking I ought to at least apologize for missing Grizzly's quiz. Much to my chagrin, the moment I walked into my lab one of the faithful undergrads said "Dr. Adams was looking for you, and he wasn't looking very happy!" So, mightily frightened, I walked with hanging head to Grizzly's office door. He proclaimed "There you are!" Then he roared at me, after which he wrestled a bear. The bear lost.

Anyhow, I pride myself in thinking that I learn something with every new experience. This time I learned that you can choke on snot while sleeping, but you're unlikely to die. I also learned that if I can't breathe through my nose while sleeping, my central nervous system will order my mouth to open and my lungs to take a breath. My eyes popped open last night for seemingly no reason, then my mouth, quite on its own, slowly and mechanically opened very wide, my lungs took a sudden, sharp breath, and then I choked on my snot. I rolled over thinking "Oh no! I have sleep apnea! No wonder I'm tired all the time, and often feel depressed about my work. And I thought that was graduate school!" Then I went back to sleep.

Drug and Gene Delivery

2007-09-06T08:13:00.001-07:00

This is what my drug and gene deliver prof looks like. I kind of find him scary. He asked me after class on Tuesday how I liked his class--I told him it may be a little more exciting if he jumped up and down and sang....

Why is she the man?

2007-09-03T16:18:00.000-07:00

Ok, so this weekend I watched She's the Man, the modern day snazzy remake of Shakespeare's Twelfth Night. It wasn't too bad, though wasn't too good, either. My question is: why, in Hollywood, do people always go to gay men when they want to change genders? Are gay men the only people capable of dressing you up like the opposite sex? Here at ______________________ University which is 80% male, I have seen many a he-she specie. Did these people consult their local gay man before choosing their wardrobes? Or perhaps they didn't, and this is why we can't quite figure out what gender they are attempting to portray. I mean, nothing against anyone who wants to dress in a creative (but non-offensive) way--go at it people! Doesn't bother me any. My point is just, why the gay man stereotype?

Ok, granted, the movie never said this guy was supposed to be gay. And possibly neither did some of the similar movies I'm thinking about. But if they weren't meant to portray gay men, why do people in movies always go to flamboyantly effeminate men when they want to dress up like the opposite sex? Is not a flamboyantly effeminate female just as capable of helping out? Or perhaps a rugged, good with his hands engineering-type man or woman? Being an engineer myself, I like to believe we are capable of building a more masculine woman or a more effeminate man...But maybe that's just in my own little sick engineering he-she specie sort of way? Anyhow, I must find myself a gay man to keep handy just in case...or at least a flamboyantly effeminate man...Never know when I might need one.

Edible Dormouse

2007-07-30T17:17:00.001-07:00

This, my friends, is the edible dormouse, or properly the Glis glis. As it's name suggests, you can eat it. But I think it's much too cute. Mr. G. glis here is one of the many animals that hibernate, wouldn't it be fun to work with them? Unfortunately, although they are common throughout Europe and Asia (where they are apparently eaten--hopefully not while hibernating!), I will not be able to work with them here in America. Out of curiosity, do you think if a human ate hibernating edible dormouse that human hibernation could be induced? Would such an experiment be allowed by IACUC? For more information, visit IACUC.org. If you find the answer, don't hesitate to inform me!

Upside Down and Bald

2007-04-26T17:48:00.000-07:00

Hey everyone!

Sorry I've not been posting lately! I'm so tired of this semester, I can't WAIT until it's over. My daily posts will resume when I'm finished feeling exhausted and return to my normal self-amused me.

The upside-down-and-bald guy above is my dear friend KM. I am blessed to have so many devoted friends. This PARTICULAR friend has been house-sitting for my parents and feeding my nephew's g.pig for the last month! How many guys would do such a thing for me?! haha

Sadly, I have known KM for almost 20 years now, and have just found the most horrible thing on my calendar. I have written down his birthday as TODAY. But I always thought his birthday was in the end of May!!! So what do I do? Do I call him up and wish him a happy birthday just in case? Of course that's what I'll do.

So happy birthday KM. You're now 2 years upside of a quarter-of-a-century. It's all wrinkles and aches from here buddy. Believe me, I know.

Happy birthday!

Superman

2007-04-23T17:45:00.000-07:00

One thing that I find fascinating about reading political propaganda is the way they can pack so many politically-charged buzz-words into one tight little paragraph. It's sexy. But, like everything on earth, the sexier it gets the less meaning it has. Haha. Ok, never mind, I don't really find political propaganda sexy. I find tall dark men with foreign accents sexy. Sometimes, I even find short dark men with foreign accents sexy. And SOMETIMES I find dark men with American accents sexy.

But that's so completely beyond the point. The point is Barack Obama has a sense of humor.

Vote Barack Obama 2008!

http://www.barackobama.com/

Pro-choice Obama seeks to endow American families with better medical coverage for the better educated children as well as for the anti-genocide veterans who have been finding and securing deadly weapons throughout the world and driving environment-friendly cars while resolving faith and politics and cleaning up the corruption in Washington.

For my father

2007-04-21T11:22:00.000-07:00

Roses are red.

Violets are blue.

My dad's almsot 70,

And his brain's full of goo!

Happy Birthday Daddy!

Engineer's Note to JKR

2007-04-19T18:16:00.000-07:00

A special thanks to my dear friend JKR for responding so quickly to my complaint that noone ever comments on my blog. I can always count on him to support me! And since he was so supportive, I will dedicate today's blog to responding to his comment on "Random Question."

The anatomy of all animals is selected (naturally or supernaturally) to fit the environment. An ant's environment is much different than a bear's-I'm sure you'll agree with that. This is why I feel a bear-sized ant would not be able to stand:

Let's, for simplicity, model the force of the ant's weight as straight downwards on vertical legs. The resultant pressure on the legs would be Force-of-weight/area-of-leg. The area of the leg is proportional to radius-squared (which we'll call length-squared). The force of the weight is proportional to volume of the body, or length-cubed. So as the ant becomes bigger, its weight increases in cubed units but the area of the legs only increases in squared units-leading to increasing pressure on the limbs. So, eventually a critical size is reached at which the design of the legs is no longer capable of withstanding the increasing pressure.

This, of course, also assumes that the density and relative proportions of tissues within the body remain the same as the ant grows. The anatomy of the ant is excellent for its size, but not at all fit for a bear's size.

Does that make sense?

Existentialism

2007-04-18T19:10:00.000-07:00

Yesterday's post got me thinking about my consciousness' relationship with its environment. If I have every sensation of having time-traveled, have I, indeed time-traveled? How am I ever sure that what I'm seeing in the environment is really what's there? How do I know I'm not insane and that everything I've ever seen and done was actually the hallucinations of a schizophrenic?

The thought first occured to me when I was 5. I was standing in the playground in back of the school, and I was spinning around and around and around in the way only a child can. During the time I was spinning, the bell rang, all the kids left the play-ground, lined up, and filed into the school. All this action was going on around me, and the only sensation I was aware of was the pleasant sense of confused fluids gushing within my inner ears. When I realized that everyone was gone, it suddenly occured to me. What if they hadn't been there to begin with? I mean, how could I not notice the bell ringing and all the kids leaving the playground? What if I had only IMAGINED they had been there, and when I became distracted by something more entertaining, they had all just faded out of existance?

Worse. What if everything that had ever happened to me was a hallucination? What if I were really locked up in an observation room and my dad and mom and a bunch of scary people in white coats were staring in at me spinning around and around and around, wondering what I thought I was doing?

Even worse. What if my dad and mom didn't even exist?!

Well, that's when the teachers sent out another student to fetch me so I was relieved to find that other people really did exist.

What sort of 5-year-old worries about such things? I mean, of course I realized later in life that it didn't matter if everything else was a hallucination, as long as I was happy with my hallucination...but still. I blame these worries entirely on my father. If he weren't such a weird guy, I'm sure I wouldn't have worried about such things until I was at least 12.

Time Travel

2007-04-16T18:20:00.000-07:00

The most horrifying thing just happened to me. I lost a piece of myself and I won't regain it for another 23 years! How could this happen to me? But let me start from the beginning...

I can time travel. I've always been able to do it. It's a sort of out-of-body experience. You know, moving through the fourth dimension. For example, when about half-way through a ski marathon I'd just say to myself "I'm tired. But think! Only another 30 kilometers to go, that will be over in no time!" And I'd imagine myself crossing the finish line and drinking my warm blueberry soup. And in NO TIME I'd be there, actually doing it.

I'd never thought much about my ability to time travel. You know, I wasn't REALLY wishing my life away because I would still have all those memories of having skied the last 30 kilometers. But today I did the most miserable, shocking thing. I said to myself, "Just think! In another 23 years it will be 2030!" Do you know how old I'll be in 23 years???!!!!! HALF A CENTURY!!!! How could I do this to myself?! I've time-traveled 23 years!!!!

I skipped all that stuff where I fall in love and get married and have little boys and girls...I'm feeling really wrinkly and achy and saggy right now.

Well, I suppose it serves me right. I shouldn't play in the fourth dimension.

Thankyou, internet, for listening to my tale of woe. I'm glad I will always have you there for me. I know I will, because I've seen the future.

Random Question

2007-04-16T15:37:00.000-07:00

Those of you who've prepared your blogger's profiles on this site know that the last piece of information they request is "random question." Unfortunately, this request caught me off-guard, and I didn't have my random question generator handy. So I had to settle for the less scientific source of random questions, my own brain. I came up with question "If an ant were as large as a bear, how fast would it be able to run?" I apologize to all of you for the flimsy excuse at randomness. My brain's "random variable" has a strong positive correlation to my interests (bears) and my profession (engineer), among other things. However, we'll have to make do.

This question has haunted me ever since I asked it. The obvious answer is "it wouldn't." I mean, come now, wouldn't the ant's scrawny legs be crushed beneath it's huge chitinous mass? After all, the volume to surface-area ratio isn't doing the ant any favors. But then, the (normal ant-sized) ant can lift 20X it's own weight. So, really, if the ant were as large as, say, a polar bear, it may become just a large, eerie exoskeleton slug-like alien thing with crushed legs poking out in all directions. However, if the ant were only as large as a black bear, well, perhaps it COULD still stand (and run).

My next curiosity is WHY did they ask for a random question, but not a random answer? Are random questions more interesting than random answers? I suppose it's probably because random answer generators are so much more expensive than random question generators. (However I hear the magic eight ball is an excellent resource for those in desperate need.)

Random answer: 347 elephants eating string bikinis

Thesis Proposal

2007-04-14T09:55:00.000-07:00

My thesis advisor SD has been telling me I need to focus more. I need to write more. I need to come up with a solid thesis proposal (draft) by the end of the semester. Do you think I have trouble focusing? I WOULD have goals in life, but I think they're over-rated.

However, to please two people in my life--my advisor SD, and my friend BR (who has secured a promise that I shall name my work after him), I have settled on the thesis pictured above. During the active part of Babu the SpaceBear's seasonal cycle, I will deploy him into space. There, I will administer calcein injections and take serum samples to determine the amount of bone turnover in my under-stimulated bear-buddy. I think a total of n=10 bears should provide me with statistically significant data.

There, my work for the next three weeks is complete.

Triskaidekaphobia

2007-04-13T16:54:00.000-07:00

Let me start out by saying how much I miss my dear friend NAD with whom I have spent two decades of Friday the 13ths watching cheesy horror flicks for the sole purpose of laughing at each other's sarcastic comments.

Now, on to the point. Phobias. Irrational fears. My friend MR was telling me about her phobia of the pizza delivery person (PDP). Apparently, the mere sound of PDP's doorbell ring resonates with terror through her heart. The the last time she was forced to answer the door to PDP, she cried for three hours.

But she's not alone. Nope, I'm afraid of windows at night. I remember one time when I was around 22...I had wanted to use the bathroom in my parent's house in the middle of the night, and found the curtains of the window WIDE OPEN. Of course, I could have used the bathroom downstairs, but I'm also afraid of their basement. So, I stood in the doorway, breathing calmly and deeply, deciding that all I had to do was dash across the room, pull the curtains closed, run back out again, wait with pounding heart until I had regained my composure, and then perfectly calmly enter the bathroom as if none of this had ever happened. But my plan of action didn't take into account a bunny rabbit making horrifying rustling noises. In a moment of complete heart-wrenching tension, I wrested the curtains from their rods and ran with a scream and a thump from the bathroom. Of course, my father didn't sleep through that. Thinking I was being attacked, he rushed from his bedroom ready to defend his youngest daughter from her assailant. Like the strong, former NSA member that he is, he protected me from the evil bunny rabbit. Meanwhile, I was almost in tears from a mixture of fright, relief, and embarrassment. Believe me, I haven't lived that one down yet.

Why do you think people get such irrational fears? Is it a natural effect of having "conscious thought?" Do animals have irrational fears? Can an animal even BE irrational? Is a creature without conscious thought Arational? Perhaps if I could accept the fact that my "irrational fear" of windows at night is the perfectly natural outcome of my intelligence, I would no longer be afraid?

On a side note, I would like to thank the world today for being thoughtful and caring. It's a good day when a gunman kindly apologizes for frightening an elderly store clerk and allows her to call 911.

http://www.cnn.com/2007/US/04/13/apologeticrobber.ap.ap/index.html

Banana Pellets and Cousins

2007-04-12T15:42:00.000-07:00

I just read two articles from the 1980's (science which is so old, it's embarrassing to reference)-- WAIT! First of all, let me assure PETA and other animal rights activists that I have never, ever participated in monkey research so please don't fill my apartment with skunks or egg my thesis advisor! At least don't tell him it was my idea!--So anyway, these scientists strap monkeys into a restraint chair and give them free reign over a lever which at EVERY pull provides one gram of yummy, banana-flavored pellet made from pureed Purina monkey chow.

When I volunteered as human guinea pig at (insert name of world-renowned clinic here), I was never provided with a magic lever-of-banana-flavored pellets! Where are my banana flavored pellets?????!!!!!! I've been duped.

On that same note, did you know there was such a thing as a hairless guinea pig?

Have you ever been frightened (or annoyed) to find out who your relations are? I haven't. But just think, T. Rex thighs have now been shown to be "closely related" to chicken thighs--using a "highly sensitive technology called mass spectrometry." Boy, a roasted T. Rex would make quite the Thanksgiving dinner, wouldn't it? How much stuffing would it take to fill a T. Rex? Do you think we could clone T. Rex and then domesticate and interbreed them for qualities like large, meaty breasts? These scientists are being very secretive. If they can procure enough protein from a dino bone to run a statistically significant mass spec experiment, why can't they get the DNA too? Move over Michael Crichton and your mosquitoes-in-amber! I knew I was a bone biologist for a reason!

Comparator with Hysteresis

2007-04-11T14:09:00.000-07:00

How would you like to wake up to three months of Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays just like this? I find myself thinking, "what am I doing here," "what on EARTH does this have to do with hibernating bears," and "Where do sea-shells come from?" Prof MN is full of fascinating factoids and dry witicisms, but he hasn't yet answered any of these three questions. Perhaps one day I'll raise my hand and ask. Say "Yea!" to class participation!

The book blog

2007-04-10T18:47:00.000-07:00

Bold the ones you’ve read

Italicize the ones you want to read

Leave blank the ones that you aren’t interested in.

(Oh, and the ones I own and haven’t had time to read yet are in red—Comments in Blue!)

1. The DaVinci Code (Dan Brown)

2. Pride and Prejudice (Jane Austen)—My Fav!

3. To Kill A Mockingbird (Harper Lee)

4. Gone With The Wind (Margaret Mitchell)

5. The Lord of the Rings: Return of the King (Tolkien)

6. The Lord of the Rings: Fellowship of the Ring (Tolkien)

7. The Lord of the Rings: Two Towers (Tolkien)

8. Anne of Green Gables (L.M. Montgomery)

9. Outlander (Diana Gabaldon)—Ok, I got bored and stopped half-way

10. A Fine Balance (Rohinton Mistry)

11. Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire (Rowling)

12. Angels and Demons (Dan Brown)

13. Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix (Rowling)

14. A Prayer for Owen Meany (John Irving)

15. Memoirs of a Geisha (Arthur Golden)

16. Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone (Rowling)

17. Fall on Your Knees (Ann-Marie MacDonald)

18. The Stand (Stephen King)

19. Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban (Rowling)

20. Jane Eyre (Charlotte Bronte)

21. The Hobbit (Tolkien)

22. The Catcher in the Rye (J.D. Salinger)

23. Little Women (Louisa May Alcott)

24. The Lovely Bones (Alice Sebold)

25. Life of Pi (Yann Martel)

26. The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy (Douglas Adams)

27. Wuthering Heights (Emily Bronte)

28. The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe (C. S. Lewis)

29. East of Eden (John Steinbeck)

30. Tuesdays with Morrie (Mitch Albom)

31. Dune (Frank Herbert)

32. The Notebook (Nicholas Sparks)

33. Atlas Shrugged (Ayn Rand)—Oh PLEASE Noooooooooo!

34. 1984 (Orwell)

35. The Mists of Avalon (Marion Zimmer Bradley)

36. The Pillars of the Earth (Ken Follett)

37. The Power of One (Bryce Courtenay)

38. I Know This Much is True (Wally Lamb)

39. The Red Tent (Anita Diamant)

40. The Alchemist (Paulo Coelho)

41. The Clan of the Cave Bear (Jean M. Auel)

42. The Kite Runner (Khaled Hosseini)

43. Confessions of a Shopaholic (Sophie Kinsella)

44. The Five People You Meet In Heaven (Mitch Albom)—Seen the movie!

45. The Bible—Ok, not all of it

46. Anna Karenina (Tolstoy)

47. The Count of Monte Cristo (Alexandre Dumas)

48. Angela’s Ashes (Frank McCourt)

49. The Grapes of Wrath (John Steinbeck)

50. She’s Come Undone (Wally Lamb)

51. The Poisonwood Bible (Barbara Kingsolver).

52. A Tale of Two Cities (Dickens)

53. Ender’s Game (Orson Scott Card)

54. Great Expectations (Dickens)

55. The Great Gatsby (Fitzgerald)

56. The Stone Angel (Margaret Laurence)

57. Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets (Rowling)

58. The Thorn Birds (Colleen McCullough)

59. The Handmaid’s Tale (Margaret Atwood)

60. The Time Traveller’s Wife (Audrew Niffenegger)

61. Crime and Punishment (Fyodor Dostoyevsky).

62. The Fountainhead (Ayn Rand)—Never, never, never

63. War and Peace (Tolstoy)

64. Interview With The Vampire (Anne Rice)

65. Fifth Business (Robertson Davis)

66. One Hundred Years Of Solitude (Gabriel Garcia Marquez)

67. The Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants (Ann Brashares)

68. Catch-22 (Joseph Heller)—Technically, this one was borrowed and never returned…I won’t name names

69. Les Miserables (Hugo)

70. The Little Prince (Antoine de Saint-Exupery)

71. Bridget Jones’ Diary (Fielding)—Love the movie, Colin Firth is sooooo handsome!

72. Love in the Time of Cholera (Marquez)

73. Shogun (James Clavell)

74. The English Patient (Michael Ondaatje)—This movie has Colin Firth, too.

75. The Secret Garden (Frances Hodgson Burnett)

76. The Summer Tree (Guy Gavriel Kay)

77. A Tree Grows in Brooklyn (Betty Smith)

78. The World According to Garp (John Irving)

79. The Diviners (Margaret Laurence)

80. Charlotte's Web (E.B. White)—First book I ever read!

81. Not Wanted On The Voyage (Timothy Findley)

82. Of Mice And Men (Steinbeck)

83. Rebecca (Daphne DuMaurier)

84. Wizard’s First Rule (Terry Goodkind)

85. Emma (Jane Austen)

86. Watership Down(Richard Adams)

87. Brave New World (Aldous Huxley)

88. The Stone Diaries (Carol Shields)

89. Blindness (Jose Saramago)

90. Kane and Abel (Jeffrey Archer)

91. In The Skin Of A Lion (Ondaatje)

92. Lord of the Flies (Golding)

93. The Good Earth (Pearl S. Buck)

94. The Secret Life of Bees (Sue Monk Kidd)

95. The Bourne Identity (Robert Ludlum)

96. The Outsiders (S.E. Hinton)

97. White Oleander (Janet Fitch)

98. A Woman of Substance (Barbara Taylor Bradford)

99. The Celestine Prophecy (James Redfield)

100. Ulysses (James Joyce)

Fugu Fridays

2007-04-10T17:19:00.000-07:00

Yeah, it's actually Tuesday, but I feel like a fugu. Not that I feel like eating one, I don't. And not that I feel bloated--though I may, I'll have to consider that. Perhaps I just feel like a big air-filled fish whose bubble is about to burst or perhaps fugus are filled with water and not air. Regardless, I most certainly feel like a fugu today, which is a Tuesday.

I just watched an hour of National Geographic's "Strange Days on Planet Earth!" Which really wasn't too great, though it wasn't horrible either. Pretty mediocre. But that has nothing to do with fugus.

I am about to read an article on wound healing in hibernating bears which is written in English. I also managed to extricate my car today (Yea!) and have eaten string cheese for the first time since Ash Wednesday.