Silence

Posted on February 16, 2008 by Amanda

All I could think of when I read the NYTimes article was, Oh no. I know that’s not the most eloquent of thoughts to describe this latest tragedy, but that’s what I thought. My next thought was for the victim’s and the shooter’s (yes, I know that isn’t popular, but I can’t imagine entanglement of shame and grief his parents may be feeling right now.) friends and families. Their lives are changed. Their sister’s, daughter’s, son’s, brother’s, boyfriend’s, girlfriend’s, friend’s life is over. I know that my grief is nothing compared to their grief. That my new found trepidation of entering a lecture hall is nothing compared to their feelings. Still, my heart hurts for them. And I think that may count for something, somewhere.

Not to be melodramatic, but my mind keeps going back to the silence a witness mentioned in the NYTimes article. I’m not quite sure why it does that.

I want to do something to help. But all I can think to do is to blog about it. Any other ideas?

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E is for Excellence

Posted on February 16, 2008 by Amanda

I was given an:

by Katie at Minor Revisions and Mad Hatter at A Mad Tea Party!This means that I get to pass along the E! award to five excellent bloggers that I enjoy.

I hereby award an E! to:

ScienceGirl at Curiosity Killed The Cat. I find that I relate to her an awful lot with the stresses of grad school. Plus, her Anecdote Mondays always make me laugh (and the rest of my lab).

PsycGirl at Stressful Times for PsycGirl. She, too, is in a LDM (Long Distance Marriage… ok, I just made up that term). And it’s nice to not feel so alone and a freak for being in one (although, I wish neither of us were in this postion).

Julie at Disgruntled Julie, Ph.D.. Anyone who can get excited as me over a Pipet Stand deserves an E!.

My last two are going to two newcomers like me! The first goes to EarlyToBed who makes me laugh about her Friday Night Dinner Reports (and think about venturing into the kitchen). And last, but not least, is Brigando, who is shares my love for walking my pup.

There are so many others that I love to read, but I think, like EcoGeoFemme, that I should leave some for someone else to honor!

Posted in Uncategorized | 4 Comments

Those Ties, Indeed

Posted on February 14, 2008 by Amanda

“Wow. You went all out.” I told SIL-1 at dinner. She set the table with the “nice” dishes and glassware. There was a spinach and feta salad (my favorite), pasta with pesto sauce, and freshly made asparagus (my favorite vegetable).
“Yeah,” she said, “And there’s pineapple upside-down cake.” She gestured to the bar where a lovely cake was sitting. “Sit down. What would you like to drink?”

A few weeks ago, I asked her if she wanted to meet up for dinner again. Last time we had dinner together we had a great conversation and were making progress towards becoming friends. I think that PsycGirl was right. Adding one more person to a family already filled with siblings isn’t as great of a change as it is to me. So, I figured why not give it a whirl one more time?

We chatted for a while about school, work, the difficulties of LDRs (at least Dr. Man is in the same country as me!), and her “ministry” (a campus christian group). Finally, I asked about how the wedding expo went in InLawTown.

“Great!” she told me (rather enthusiastically). “We decided to have the reception at High-Brow Hotel and we’re going to have Flowers, Inc. do our flowers. I think we’re going to have Roses and these Daisies for flowers. And we want a square layer cake with real flowers. And my maid of honor is going to be SIL-2. I asked SIL-3 and Best Friend to be bridesmaids. And… you? If you’ll say yes.”

“Sure,” I said, shocked. “Of course. I’d love to.”

“Great. I’m so relieved,” she said, “I was hoping you’d say yes! So, let me show you the dresses and bouquets I was thinking of having.”

I was so shocked that she asked me to be a bridesmaid. [I should add that Dr. Man and I didn’t have any of our family members in the wedding. With his big family and other interpersonal relations, it would have been awkward to say the least.] I had heard from Dr. Man (who heard from his Dad) that she had planned on asking her sisters to be in the wedding. So, it never occurred to me that she’d ask me. It gives me this nice warm, fuzzy feeling that she thinks of me as her sister.

I think I’ve ended up with a sister (or a few) after all.

Posted in Family | 6 Comments

I’ve got a bluebird

Posted on February 11, 2008 by Amanda

I took a Mental Health Day yesterday. (It seems as go this is going around. Maybe it’s just that time of year?) I didn’t check my email, read blog posts, or watch the news. That means that today I’m catching up on: email, blog posts, the news, paper-reading, and experiments. I feel motivated. And that’s a first in a long while. Hopefully, it’ll last for the next few hours.

Posted in rambling | 2 Comments

Car and Driver

Posted on February 9, 2008 by Amanda

Labmate, Advisor, and I regularly go out to lunch together during the week. Sometimes FGS (Former Grad Student, who now works with our collaborator) and Roommate accompany us, but mainly it’s just the three of us. We have our favorite pizza joint that we frequent, where the staff knows us by name/drink order. Advisor refers to it as an “Alternative Lab Meeting.”

Now, Advisor is fairly easy going. He doesn’t care what selection or duration of hours we work… as long as we’re productive. He’s also graduated at least three female grad students. He’s married to a feminist and has a daughter. So, he’s not the usual Old(er) White Guy. That’s why this exchange surprised me:

My car will stall if I brake during the first few minutes that it’s on, unless I drive with two feet. And that’s a pain, complained Labmate about his old car.

Well, I drive with two feet all the time, I said teasing him about being a wuss.

That’s because you drive a stick, he replied.

You drive a stick shift?! Advisor said, surprised.

Well, yeah. Why wouldn’t I? I drive a sports car. What fun is an automatic sports car?

Because it’s rather unusual for a woman, Advisor replied.

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My Thoughts on Dark Materials

Posted on February 8, 2008 by Amanda

I just finished reading the books in the trilogy, “His Dark Materials.” To say that they surprised me would be a bit of an understatement. I knew that the author had an atheistic bent, but I expected the books to be a bit more… well… subtle. This was most definitely not the case. These books were hit-you-over-the-head-with-my-oh-so-clever-message, rather than the Chronicles of Narnia hey-I’ll-make-up-this-story-with-some-obvious-parallels-but-I’ll-make-it-an-allegory. I was, obviously, expecting the latter.
**Spoiler Alert**

I thought that, with the movie coming out, the books were geared for the elementary school demographic. However, with the first book ending with the main character’s father killing her best friend via severing the boy’s soul from his body, I began to question this. That’s pretty brutal stuff. I mean, Harry Potter didn’t even get into that stuff until book… what was it?… four, maybe. “The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe” only had Aslan die, but he came back.

The final book touched on some sort of after-life and killing “The Authority” (not God– just some lying angel). The young kids, at the end, were called “Lovers” and it was stated that they were “In Love.” Now, I’m not sure how much time had passed, but the books started when both kids were 12 years old. Yeah, that seems a bit… wrong.

In the end, I think that I liked it. I was glad that there was no bloody, killing God battle scene. That just seems overly hostile to me. Besides, if the author’s intent is to illustrate that there is no God, why would one have to kill God?

**End Spoiler**

Updated: I was talking to a friend of mine (who’s Muslim) and she was telling me that she hated The Lion, The Witch, and The Wardrobe. I asked her why and she said that the people Aslan’s “army” fought were brown and from far off lands. She said that always made her sad (as a kid) that she couldn’t be apart of Aslan’s realm because of her skin color/ethnicity. I never thought of that. I suppose that just goes to show the unconscious discrimination/stereotypes that I possess.

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Journal Club

Posted on February 6, 2008 by Amanda

Well, yesterday was much better. But on to other things… Ah, yes. Journal Club.

For people not in my department (I have no idea how prevalent these things are), they work like this: One student picks a paper not in his/her specific field, but within the purvey of biochemistry. Next, this student reads said paper and learns all the ins and outs of it. Thus, attempting to become a pseudo-expert of it within two or three weeks (normal prep time). When the day of their presentation occurs, they stand up in front of the entire department (mandatory for students and most faculty member show up) and present a prepared presentation. During this time, he/she is interrupted frequently to clarify and provide background on this paper and/or to defend the work of the authors (at the very least he/she should be able to justify its publication in the Journal). All students must present at this Journal Club once per academic year. One can “choose” (read: strong-armed) to join an additional journal club that’s within one’s specific field.

These things are all well and good, but I never can prepare for them properly. The idea that I’m supposed to add two extra papers to my ever-growing stack of things to read, and bump these papers to the top of my to-read list, is a bit… presumptuous. I barely have enough time to do my own reading (especially now… did everyone wait to publish in 2008?), let alone extra reading that is not in my field. Plus, if the student is going to present the paper to me, do I really need to read it myself? (I know the answer to that, consider it rhetorical.)

Still, I have this sneaking suspicion that if I want to do this (that is be a scientist in an academic setting) for the rest of my life, I really should act like it and read those bloody papers.

Right?

Posted in rambling, whining | 7 Comments

Amanda’s No Good Very Bad Day

Posted on February 5, 2008 by Amanda

Today is just one of those days. I felt ill almost all day, Undergrad’s experiment hit some major snags, Dixie Dog has some sort of intestinal issues, and Dr. Man’s promised Public U. contract for 2008-2009 has yet to arrive. So, I’m just going to pretend today never happened. I’m officially declaring that (for me) Monday, February 4th a non-day. Due to some anomaly in the space-time continuum I’m skipping straight to Tuesday.

You may now return to your regularly scheduled programming.

Posted in whining | 2 Comments

Blogrolling

Posted on February 3, 2008 by Amanda

I decided to add a “BlogRoll” to my blog. If you’re curious as to what blogs I read, check out the side panel. (But if I missed you, you want to be removed, or want me to add you, please let me know!)

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The Two Body Problem: Part 2 of ?

Posted on February 1, 2008 by Amanda

The past few days have been up and down. Dr. Man and I had a tiff over something really silly (who is driving this weekend), Advisor complained at me, Dr. Man and I made up (he’s driving down, today!), my Science has started to come together (this always makes me happy), and I’ve been able to spend time with Best Friend (who is really the best-est). Each up seems to be followed by a down, though, which makes the ups less fun in retrospect.

I’m excited to see Dr. Man this weekend. Referring the above down (and up), we’ve discovered another interesting facet to carrying on a Long Distance Relationship (LDR). We’ve found that we fight more. Now, I’m not talking about marriage-ending-horrible-knock-down-drag-out type fights, but I guess bickering is a much more accurate description. Without the facial and body clues, it’s easy to take a sarcastic remark seriously over the phone. After a long day, it’s easy to mistake the tiredness in Dr. Man’s voice for ambiguity towards me.

Plus, normal, everyday scheduling conflicts take on new significance. If I have to work late, then I may miss the time between the end of clinic and start of call for Dr. Man. Other times, he has to get up early in the morning and passes out by 8pm. So, if we don’t talk immediately after work, I miss him completely. My friends have become accustomed to me disappearing when we’re hanging out to take a call from Dr. Man. (As an aside: I know that this is horribly rude and insulting to my friends, but they’re rather understanding in this respect. At least, they’re still willing to hang out with me despite this!) This happens in the reverse situation, as well, the other week I was feeling sick and went to bed very early and missed talking to Dr. Man completely.

Then, there’s the whole problem as to what to talk about. This is only a problem when we’re both working to the exclusion of everything else. The question as to what each of us up to becomes rather boring, “Working.” Other times topics of conversation abound. Inevitably, those times are when we have limited time on the phone. But what I really miss is being able to just be quiet together. I, guess, though, silence isn’t really golden when you’re paying long distance.

Posted in LDR, whining | 4 Comments