Category Archives: English language

Dyed-in-the-wool cheapskate

Posted on August 26, 2011 by Cath@VWXYNot?

Being genetically half Irish and an eighth Scottish, I have green eyes and curly brown hair that used to have a fair bit of red in it. The first white hair showed up when I was 19, much to my … Continue reading →

Posted in English language, family, first world problems, personal, silliness | 24 Comments

Training FAIL

Posted on May 6, 2011 by Cath@VWXYNot?

I just spotted this, from last year’s form: Someone apparently got more traininf over the last 12 months: the typo has been corrected for this year’s form.

Posted in Canada, career, English language, silliness | 7 Comments

Weekend fun: my next tweet

Posted on April 16, 2011 by Cath@VWXYNot?

Many, many thanks to Kimli for alerting me to “That Can Be My Next Tweet!“, a tool that creates mash-ups of bits and pieces of your most recent tweets to create much hilarity. My twitter stream is kinda schizophrenic at … Continue reading →

Posted in Canada, communication, current affairs, cycling, English language, politics, science, silliness, technology | 35 Comments

Paging Doctor Clueless!

Posted on April 5, 2011 by Cath@VWXYNot?

A story from way back in the mists of time… ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ A good friend of mine had an absolutely terrible time during her PhD, worse than anyone I know: her two co-supervisors had a fight and stopped talking to each … Continue reading →

Posted in career, communication, English language, idiocy, science | 11 Comments

Typo-chondria

Posted on March 27, 2011 by Cath@VWXYNot?

I received an interesting request last week from one of my colleagues: “Please provide an update on the [gene name] ozone OCD”. The email in question was sent to me, several other colleagues, and some of our external collaborators. The tell-tale … Continue reading →

Posted in career, communication, English language, technology | 8 Comments

Soylent’s is Golden

Posted on February 25, 2011 by Cath@VWXYNot?

Like many of my friends, I’ve recently become a big fan of Groupon and all the other group buying sites. See a deal -> press a button on my phone -> take the phone to a restaurant -> half-price dinner … Continue reading →

Posted in English language, food glorious food, shopping, silliness | 9 Comments

How to impress your friendly local manuscript editor

Posted on February 2, 2011 by Cath@VWXYNot?

Treat them as an inferior until you need something from them. This will make them incredibly grateful for your sudden interest in them when you… …hand over a “close to final” manuscript that MUST be proofed and edited BY TOMORROW, … Continue reading →

Posted in career, English language, publishing, science | 30 Comments

Hockey Pool, Week 12

Posted on December 27, 2010 by Cath@VWXYNot?

The last update of 2010! Well, I originally thought I was having a cracking week… but then I looked at the standings this morning! This week’s top point setters were Ricardipus and Lavaland, who managed 42 and 40 points, respectively. … Continue reading →

Posted in English language, hockey pool, silliness | 10 Comments

I don’t talk like this at all, eh?

Posted on December 13, 2010 by Cath@VWXYNot?

Damnit, I can’t get the video to embed, despite following Richard’s instructions. Here’s the link to YouTube (and another one, because the first one got taken down)

Posted in Canada, English language, silliness, videos | 18 Comments

Just… don’t.

Posted on December 2, 2010 by Cath@VWXYNot?

“BRCA status” is not so long and clunky that you should feel the need to say “BRCA-ness”, as in “property X is probably related to the BRCA-ness of the cell line”. If you absolutely must say “BRCA-ness”, pronounce it “bracka-ness”, … Continue reading →

Posted in English language, science, silliness, TMI | 9 Comments