Keep ’em coming, folks!<\/p>\n
VWXYNot? Comment(s) of the Week:<\/strong><\/p>\n Mar 04 2011: Mike<\/a> for “Mrs F. and I shall mostly be caring for a very unhappy, snotty, feverish infant tonight. Beware: this is the sort of trouble that Valentine\u2019s day can get you into. Always include protection with that heart-shaped box of chocolates.”<\/p>\n and then<\/a> “Taking a course in \u201clistening skills\u201d to aid your dating ability sounds a bit like cheating to me. Sort of like those odd pumps that are advertised in my straight to spam folder. If you have to be taught how to interact with someone so you appear to be human, well, it doesn\u2019t bode too well for the future. A deflating experience lies ahead for someone.”<\/p>\n Alyssa<\/a> for “I\u2019ve had some doosies \u2013 including a guy wanting to introduce me to his 6 year-old child on the second date, one telling me he loved me after a week, and one guy realizing he \u201cforgot\u201d his wallet after we already ate dinner :P”<\/p>\n Mermaid<\/a> for “Many of these dates sound really familiar. I would say we must have dated the same people (once only) except our ages are too different. I would say that I was too old for creepy old guy but that just sounds wrong to me \ud83d\ude42 . Perhaps there are just specific first date styles that \u2018unusual\u2019 guys have, and many of us have just had the unfortunate experience of meeting unusual guys?”<\/p>\n and Eva<\/a> for “I\u2019ve dated someone who showed me a powerpoint presentation about his work on the first date. That should have been a sign, but the topic was actually interesting, so it didn\u2019t put me off right there and then. Unfortunately, his job was the only interesting thing about the guy.”<\/p>\n Mar 18 2011:KristiV<\/a> for “I have an ornery retired surgeon friend who regularly rants about the \u201corganic\u201d label. The funniest of his rants is the one about the \u201corganic sea salt\u201d at Whole Foods.”<\/p>\n Beth Snow<\/a> for “Yesterday, for the first time EVER, a cashier asked how to pronounce my last name. And she wasn\u2019t even kidding. I was bewildered. \u201cUm, Snow?\u201d”<\/p>\n Mike<\/a> for “My surname in German was pronounced \u201cVofler\u201d \u2013 it\u2019s Fowler. In Finland and Spain it\u2019s pronounced \u201c{quizzically raised eyebrow}\u201d”<\/p>\n Frank<\/a> for “Cath \u2013 I thought your last name was Vwxynot?”<\/p>\n Steffi Suhr<\/a> for “\u201cScience project management: we\u2019re only trying to help\u2026\u201d”<\/p>\n Ricardipus<\/a> for “Cath \u2013 that is very impressive.<\/p>\n However \u2013 POWERPOINT? EXCEL? Project management and flowcharting should be done in MS Project, an evil piece of software that I never use.”<\/p>\n and Bob O’H<\/a> for “I\u2019m amazed you\u2019re spending so much time working on REDACTED. I can\u2019t imagine how you\u2019ll get it published, though.”<\/p>\n Mar 25 2011: KristiV<\/a> for “one of the student evaluations chosen to represent the need for curricular reform, particularly in the neuroscience course, groused on and on about \u201crope memorization.\u201d I know a thing or two about the neuroscience of learning and memory, but I haven\u2019t heard of rope memorization. ::snark::”<\/p>\n Ricardipus<\/a> for “\u201cThe Week Of The Ricardipus\u201d. Sounds like a long-lost Hemingway novel, from his later-life \u201cdrunk and suicidal in Idaho\u201d period.”<\/p>\n Thomas Joseph<\/a> for “Guess I still suck. Nothing has been the same since Cath made me brag. *glare*”<\/p>\n Ruchi<\/a> for “Admit it Cath. You were jealous of the baby and totally TRYING to kill her with whooping cough. ;)”<\/p>\n Steve Caplan<\/a> for “\u201cSo where you from?\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cIsrael.\u201d<\/p>\n There was a pause. A pregnant pause. An pregnant elephant pause. And longer.<\/p>\n \u201cYou a Jew?\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cYes.\u201d (I left my horn in the car\u2013want to see it? That\u2019s what I was about to say)<\/p>\n \u201cYou don\u2019t look like a Jew. Ain\u2019t never seen one before.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cHow do you know what a Jew looks like if you haven\u2019t seen one before? You can tell your grandkids about it. Can I have the key now?\u201d<\/p>\n That was my experience in Saskatchewan of the 1990s”<\/p>\n and Mike and Bob for the following exchange:<\/a><\/p>\n Mike: “I could show you some \u2018washrooms\u2019 in Helsinki bars that would amaze you. Mostly that health and safety in a developed country would allow these places to keep their doors open. The beauty went so far beyond desires that it came almost full circle. Almost, but not quite enough.”<\/p>\n Bob: “Mike has some strange ideas about what constitutes a romantic evening.”<\/p>\n Mike: “With my little monster rapidly approach 1 yr old, I\u2019ll take romance wherever I can damn well get it. Whether that be in Roskapankki\u2019s stinkin\u2019 I\u2019m already regretting typing this.”<\/p>\n Apr 01 2011: Alyssa<\/a> for “You can solve your problem by doing what I do: never ever watch the news and be so self-absorbed in your own world that you don\u2019t know what the heck is going on anywhere else.”<\/p>\n Mermaid<\/a> for “Crashed Ice looks like one of those events that would be an absolute blast to watch, but something you may not bring up in casual conversation with people you would like to impress. Kind of a guilty pleasure, like admitting to being a Buffy fan and STILL watching the DVDs.<\/p>\n Not that I would admit to that.”<\/p>\n Cromercrox<\/a> for “Crashed Ice looks gloriously barmy. For some reason it reminded me of Gloucestershire Cheese-Rolling, in which people throw themselves down a very steep hill after a round of Double Gloucester. Neither the people nor the cheese wear skates, though.”<\/p>\n and Ricardipus<\/a> for “Call me a conservative, but sports like snowboard-cross (and short-track speed skating) that rely on touchy-feely, car-racing-style positioning really don\u2019t do it for me in the Olympics. Most of the middle-distance running events fall in this category too. Put the athletes on a level field (so to speak), each in their lane, and let them race. Or do it time trial style, like downhill skiing or cross-country.<\/p>\n And then bring back poetry and drama competitions, for the full Classic Olympics experience.”<\/p>\n Apr 15 2011:Anthony Fejes<\/a> for “Wow\u2026 I go out for drinks so that I don\u2019t have to make them for myself. This just seems like the Ikea of drinks, except Ikea has better illustrations in their manuals.”<\/p>\n Massimo<\/a> for “Yesterday was Thursday! Tomorrow is Saturday!<\/em><\/p>\n Ah ! Take this, all of you out there who say that a PhD is useless !”<\/p>\n Ricardipus<\/a> for “I\u2019ve not a lot of use for Michael Ignatieff, who is sorely lacking in international political experience, and even less for Jack Layton, who I believe would promise us all personal jetpacks, free prescription drugs and resurrected dinosaur amusement parks if he believed we\u2019d vote for him.”<\/p>\n Anthony Fejes again<\/a> for “Fantastic\u2026 now I can torment myself with indecision knowing that there will be people who think I\u2019m evil for correcting the subject line AND people who will think I\u2019m an idiot for not correcting it! (-:”<\/p>\n Chall<\/a> for “Teemu Sel\u00e4nne might be the only Duck I like\u2026. and the one who almost got me into a fight when the Ducks played the Predators in Nashville a bunch of years ago.<\/p>\n (Let\u2019s just say I was a bit enthusiastic about his skills on the ice and forgot that there was maybe 4 Duck fans in the whole arena\u2026. and apparently you can\u2019t say \u201cthat was so beautiful\u201d about someone when they are one the wrong team?)”<\/p>\n and Antipodean<\/a> for “Would Palpatine have been more of less creepy with Harpers silver combover?”<\/p>\n Apr 22 2011: Bumper “I didn’t update BRC last week because I was skiing” edition:<\/p>\n Grant<\/a> for “You were saying the cat likes being *on* paper. Mine prefers being *under* it. If I leave a flat sheet on the floor, she\u2019ll slip her nose under one edge, push it up and burrow under, leaving her hiding under a tent of paper. Sometimes the paper tent will shuffle about the room, like a strange turtle.”<\/p>\n Bob O’H<\/a> for “I\u2019m moving to Bulgaria. By the sound of it, it doesn\u2019t even matter that I don\u2019t know any Bulgarian.”<\/p>\n Schlupp<\/a> for “One has to admit, though: With those reviews, ignoring them may be the best thing to do\u2026.”<\/p>\n Dr. O<\/a> for “I don\u2019t care how much someone pays me \u2013 I\u2019m not reviewing grants I know nothing about. It\u2019s enough of a struggle to read through some of the ones that are near and dear to my own research.”<\/p>\n Nina<\/a> for “It somehow reminds me of a student of my dad\u2019s who google-translated a term-paper from (random) bits of scientific literature (English to Dutch), and also translated some of the names of people that were cited in the literature. It took my dad a long time to figure out who those researchers were that she kept citing and that he\u2019d never heard of \u2026”<\/p>\n ScientistMother<\/a> for “the injury issue is why I always wait until the last minute to make my picks, not that helped me the other week with Ovechekin who waited till 3:45pm to say he wasn\u2019t playing \u2013 bastard!”<\/p>\n SB<\/a> for “I like that \u201cdrinking\u201d counts as an activity.”<\/p>\n and\u00a0Chris<\/a> for “Considering the sky is magenta, I assume these people where on something (maybe this \u201cdrink\u201d you keep mentioning) when this was painted. Never have I ever seen the entire sky in a colour even resembling magenta. Maybe a little bit on the horizon. Maybe more baby pink but magenta? Duuude, that is wrong.”<\/p>\n Apr 29 2011:“Bob”<\/a> for “Shoes are for The only way I can donate my shit, if he isn\u2019t here. I live in hope.”<\/p>\n “Eva”<\/a> for “The DNA model is a pie? I can put the cheese and the price change? Nice.<\/p>\n […]<\/p>\n “Not at home. Maybe not at once. Must clone self before the table here. More organised update later.\u201d”<\/p>\n Steve Caplan<\/a> for “Some of those sentences sound like the postdoctoral applications I get.<\/p>\n Also, \u201c\u201cShould P-cadherin come dressed as the future?\u201d That\u2019s precisely what what of my grant reviewers wrote in his\/her critique.”<\/p>\n “Ricardipus”<\/a> for “Two hours? When is a mention of science funding cuts revisited \u2013 how I can borrow?”<\/p>\n Anthony Fejes<\/a> for “I think silliness in right wing material is impossible because it is essentially already a parody of a rational perspective. In fact, even making a parody of a right wing video becomes a poe, indistinguishable from the non-parody version.”<\/p>\n and then<\/a> “I\u2019ve yet to see someone on the right approach their material with a sense of humour, or even clear data to back up their points. That\u2019s not to say that the left is always correct either \u2013 just that the right seems to jump straight to the quote-mining, skewed statistics and bald assertions.<\/p>\n It\u2019s like religion\u2026 Have you ever seen someone threaten you with eternal damnation and hellfire while being silly? It just doesn\u2019t make sense, and both the religious and the right are trying to do the same thing: Use fear as a motivator to encourage some behaviour.<\/p>\n Fear + Silly just don\u2019t work well together.”<\/p>\n May 06 2011: stephenemoss<\/a> for “In 1964 the British Conservative politician William Whitelaw (right wing) accused the then Labour prime minister Harold Wilson (left wing) of \u2018going round the country stirring up apathy\u2019. So, there is at least one instance in the history of politics of wit from a right winger. However, two years later as a small child I happened to meet Mr Wilson at a wedding, an encounter that I can recall quite clearly, and which with hindsight makes me wonder whether Mr Whitelaw may not actually have been joking.”<\/p>\n Mike<\/a> for “Does Cromercrox\u2019s long-standing perception of Boris Johnson as the finest blah blah blah, not count as right wing humour? Cromercrox is believably conservative (with a large C \u2013 n.b. that\u2019s not the one that rhymes with punt), but I don\u2019t believe he can type that statement over and over again with a straight face\u2026”<\/p>\n Antipodean<\/a> for “McGillicuddy. Sigh- I miss them. A political party whose leading mantra was facilitating \u201cthe Great Leap Backwards\u201d by, amongst other policies turning the motorway into a 6 lane goat track.”<\/p>\n Nina<\/a> for “Politics? Politics? You mean there is a commonwealth country out there NOT completely engaged in THE WEDDING?! Please tell me your pm is going to show up in a maple leaf patterned bear skin suit stone-washed with BC jade. CromerCrox<\/a> for “I do have a theory, though. Oh all right, an hypothesis. Left-wing tendencies tend to be seen in younger people, and right-wing tendencies in older people who\u2019ve had their idealism tempered by Real Life. This is why young conservatives are weird, and ageing lefties can seem rather pitiable. ”<\/p>\n Anthony Fejes<\/a> for “Is it possible that you\u2019re referring to the UK\u2019s conservatives? In Canada, our NDP would roughly map to the liberals elsewhere in the world, while our liberals are pretty central and possibly the closest to the old-time conservatives of the 1970\u2032s \u2013 though with a strong helping of socialism, and our conservatives are mostly of the gun-totting, anti-abortion, evangelical christian type. (That may help explain why Canadian conservatives have less of a sense of humour, and have a hard time winning seats in urban areas.)<\/p>\n It\u2019s hard to imagine most Canadians \u201cmellowing\u201d to become evangelical christians, though that would be pretty funny.”<\/p>\n Nina again<\/a> for “Fieldwork tends to get more fun when you\u2019re not responsible for the Nature papers that should come forward based on the crappy samples. and Grant<\/a> for “My main gripes are that while students do have to make their own way in the end\u2014as your article encourages\u2014I would like to see universities be more pro-active about getting students to see the wider range of careers as pretty much all they see while they are students is the campus and the lecturers, and there should be a better appreciation of jobs outside academia \u2013 countering the thing that only academic jobs are seen as truly worthwhile use of a higher degree.<\/p>\n […]<\/p>\n “Not just PIs\/lecturers with old-fashioned views, but those with more open view, but who don\u2019t actively show there is more than PIs\/lecturers to look up to or aspire to be. Just not doing anything leaves the students mainly only seeing PIs\/lecturers as the people that are using the qualifications they are training to get. That was fine when the majority of Ph.D.s did end up within academia, but that hasn\u2019t been true for some time. Hmm. This is a hobby horse :-)”<\/p>\n June 10 2011: Anthony Fejes<\/a> for “I don\u2019t mind keeping the governor general, given that their current job description could be limited to ceremonial roles, rather than enabling the conservatives to prorogue parliament ever time they have to face a difficult question.<\/p>\n The senate, on the other hand, should be disbanded at the first sitting of parliament, or perhaps, dismantled slowly like the UK\u2019s house of lords. Have them each write an essay on why they think they should keep their jobs, perhaps?”<\/p>\n […]<\/p>\n “we should decide if we want the position to be ceremonial or with some actual power, then modify the job description appropriately. You can\u2019t tell a person their job is ceremonial, then have them making decisions upon which governments rise and fall.”<\/p>\n Nina<\/a> for “do I see less Canadians abroad, or have they all taken the maple leaf off their backpacks??! Even I didn\u2019t mind it too much when MY maple leaf fell off my pack. And I am seriously reconsidering ever moving to Vancouver because it will perish in an earthquake and it won\u2019t be half as good prepared as any unprepared NZ city.<\/p>\n And that is all Harper\u2019s fault of course.”<\/p>\n Ricardipus<\/a> for “That was nuts, wasn\u2019t it? And as usual the geographic boundaries of the ridings fooled me: \u201cOMG THE NDP\u2019s TAKEN OVER THE COUNTRY oh wait no they haven\u2019t, they just have all the enormous ridings in the north of the provinces.\u201d”<\/p>\n and then<\/a> for “If Ignatieff returns to Harvard, you can put him down as the first example of Harper-Tory-Majority induced brain drain, I guess.”<\/p>\n Mermaid<\/a> for “Now we just have to somehow prevent the drivers that ignore the \u2018right turn only\u2019 signs and unexpectedly go straight or turn left. One thing at a time\u2026.”<\/p>\n Hermitage <\/a> for “Well, if the lights are ever out of commission again, you cyclists can start taping cardboard pictures of Hummers to the front of your bikes. Insta street cred!”<\/p>\n and Austin Elliott<\/a> for “Isn\u2019t \u201cTraininf\u201d Information about trains? Do they still have those in Canada?<\/p>\n And talking of a \u201cChair position\u201d reminds me that it\u2019s time I shifted my posterior by a few millimetres to the left, before my rear gets gangrene.”<\/p>\n June 10 2011: Massimo<\/a> for “Blogger meet-ups are always fun. It was a pleasure to meet finally the famous Mr. E-Man.. oh, and, yeah, you too, of course\u2026 kidding ! You guys enjoy the Stanley Cup now, and I shall be routing for the \u2026 cough, cough\u2026. Canucks, but\u2026. I suggest that you make plans to come to oil country soon, so that we can all go watch some serious hockey\u2026 OK, I better run for cover now.”<\/p>\n Kausik Datta<\/a> for “I\u2019d never have imagined Bob O\u2019Hara to look like that.”<\/p>\n and Prof-like Substance<\/a> for “The problem might be the fucking emails. If you leave for a while and all your emails are fucking, of course there is going to be a population explosion by the time you get back. Please remember to spay and neuter those fucking emails!”<\/p>\n June 24 2011:Lavaland<\/a> for “That\u2019s falcon awesome.”<\/p>\n Alyssa<\/a> for “You\u2019re a weirdo, but it sure makes for fun reading!”<\/p>\n Cromercrox<\/a> for “Golden eagles? Phooey. Golden retrievers can knock you over if you wave bits of meat at them. :)”<\/p>\n KristiV<\/a> for “\u201cMarmite\u201d gets you to Philosophy more quickly than does \u201cJohn Hagee\u201d. Bwahahaha!<\/p>\n I thought for sure the latter would go through \u201cevangelical\u201d and \u201cwindbag\u201d \u2026.”<\/p>\n and Massimo<\/a> for “It has been brought to my attention that reason<\/em> leads to an infinite loop.”<\/p>\n June 30 2011:Ricardipus<\/a> for “The key is to file the inbox emails into sub-folders. No need to read them all before doing this.”<\/p>\n Cromercrox<\/a> for “Don\u2019t tempt me. Crox Minor and I are already thinking of doing a video of ourselves dancing around on the beach with dead fish to accompany \u2018Iphigeneia in Brooklyn\u2019, the secular cantata by P. D. Q. Bach.”<\/p>\n and Steve Caplan<\/a> for “Thanks, Cath. Those images are a real TREET\u2026”<\/p>\n July 08 2011: Cromercrox<\/a> for “You are a grownup if and ONLY if you have a bradawl and know how to use it AND\/OR you buy T-shirts with nothing printed on them.”<\/p>\n and then “You know you\u2019re a grown-up when the band you\u2019re playing in starts attracting groupies but you\u2019d really rather have a nice cup of tea and a lie down.”<\/p>\n Silver Fox<\/a> for “Do you feel the heavy weight of responsibility on your shoulders all the time? If not, then \u2013 no. Not a grownup.”<\/p>\n Eva<\/a> for “Gah! My longest job was my PhD, which was about a *million* years. (Six years and three months, to be precise). A MILLION!<\/p>\n Oh, and longest time in same place by myself was seven years. Most of aforementioned PhD, plus a year after that. Fun fact: I got Penny within two weeks after moving into that apartment, so she also lived in the same house for seven years. My cat totally beat your house record!”<\/p>\n and Ricardipus<\/a> for “1. Does your institution have any kind of formal pre-submission peer review of grant applications?<\/p>\n Yes indeed. Now ask me if it\u2019s useful. Go on, I dares ya.<\/p>\n 2. If so, at what stage of the submission process is it applied?<\/p>\n Ideally, you\u2019re supposed to submit the form (similar to your now-dead \u201cForm 100\u2033) SIX WEEKS before the grant deadline. Just imagine how often this actually happens.<\/p>\n 3. Do all grants go through this process, or only those submitted by new investigators?<\/p>\n Allegedly, all of them, except if you claim they are exempt. \u201cExempt\u201d sometimes can have the alternate meaning \u201cI am a busy and important researcher who has better things to do than submit this form, just see if you can make me, nyaa nyaa nyaa\u201d.<\/p>\n 4. If the process is selective, what are the criteria for a grant requiring review?<\/p>\n No real clue, but see answer to question 3, above.<\/p>\n 5. Do you find the practices in place at your institution to be helpful?<\/p>\n *COUGH SPLUTTER* sorry, something stuck in my craw there.”<\/p>\n July 15 2011: KJHAxton<\/a> for “Just before I left, my postdoc lab was doing some work with bladder tissue. They determined that rat bladders were too small to be inverted and used for tests so they contacted a local slaughterhouse for a supply of fresh pig bladders. Two of the research team had to go early in the morning to collect the supply, armed with jars of buffer solutions and boxes of ice to keep the tissue viable. Once they got back to the lab, work had to start immediately, and almost as immediately there was the loudest shrieking screaming laughter I\u2019d ever heard. I don\u2019t know if it was similar logic to your monkey bum, or because they were both females, but the good folks at the slaughter house had very kindly left the very well endowed pig penis still attached to the bladder.<\/p>\n I made sure I was working else where on subsequent bladder days.”<\/p>\n and then<\/a> “we do forensic science and the final year students doing dissertations (literature based, no experimental work). There are always a couple on forensic etomology \u2013 the order bugs go to corpses, the life cycles of maggots etc. I once made the mistake of reading a draft for a student first thing in the morning, straight after breakfast, straight before a staff meeting. I spent most of the meeting trying not to throw up.”<\/p>\n Professor in Training<\/a> for “Too many to list, but the one that keeps coming to haunt me is the urine specimen I had to process when working in a hospital lab during my pre-grad school years \u2026 the specimen was dark green and had things crawling in it \u2026 if it hadn\u2019t been labeled as a urine sample, I would have thought it was pond scum.”<\/p>\n Kyrsten<\/a> for “Sadly, I managed to almost outdo myself a year and half later, when sitting on the patio of an expensive restaurant, I got bit by a spider. What little biology I\u2019ve taken allowed me to confirm the identity of a wolf spider, and thus making me feel ok\u2026until that night when I started to swell around the site. Being a microbiologist, I was able to see the hallmarks of a lovely S. aureus infection and swiftly got myself to the hospital, with a swelling about 5 inches in diameter \u2013 and was immediately put on some massive doses of antibiotics. The weird thing? it was the other leg, SAME SPOT. A good friend told me shortly thereafter that \u201cI shouldn\u2019t let insects try and get fresh with me\u201d.”<\/p>\n Beth Snow<\/a> for “I\u2019m the same with parallel parking \u2013 I can totally do it if no one else is with me, but as soon as I have a passenger it\u2019s like I\u2019ve never been behind the wheel of a car before. And need I remind you that I drive a Smart Car, which is ridiculously easy to parallel park, given that it is only half a car? Talk about looking like an eejit!”<\/p>\n and Mermaid<\/a> for “I also hate when you are having a meeting in another office and you have to \u2018drive\u2019 their computer to find files you require. I always end up looking like I can\u2019t read and have a bad case of the DTs\u2026shaking hands and a complete inability to find files.”<\/p>\n July 22 2011: Steve Caplan<\/a> for “Mostly for my neck I am doing hourly stretches\u2013people ask me \u201cCan I help?\u201d when they see me seemingly trying to hold up the door frame.<\/p>\n When on vacation a few weeks ago in Washington, I took the thick rubber strip that I have been using for physical therapy to stay in shape. The therapists showed me that you can close a door on the band and use it for resistance training for the shoulder neck. It was pretty embarrassing to have to call the bell-boy up to our room when I found I couldn\u2019t get the closet door open afterwards\u2026”<\/p>\n Nina<\/a> for “You never came home from a 14 hour lab experiment feeling worn-out, aching, trembling and hallucinating??? What am I doing wrong???”<\/p>\n Bob O’H<\/a> for “Now, if only we were all mice, all our health problems would be solved. The only thing to worry about would be being sacrificed at the Altar of Science.”<\/p>\n and Steve Caplan again<\/a> for “\u201cKindly lie down and die\u201d\u2013that\u2019s what it sounds like!”<\/p>\n July 29 2011:<\/p>\n Cromercrox<\/a> for “I can spell difficult words like \u2018Paracyclotosaurus\u2019 and \u2018buttered toast\u2019, but I still have to think \u2013 hard \u2013 when asked to tell my left from my right.”<\/p>\n Ricardipus<\/a> for “I believe this is related to the \u201cturning the map around so it\u2019s pointed the same way you are\u201d approach to navigation. An approach espoused (geddit?) by certain members of my family, but not others oh no no no not at all.<\/p>\n And: (a) you\u2019re a freak, but not for this particular reason, and (b) your method makes perfect sense to me, but not to certain other members etc. etc. etc.”<\/p>\n Mike<\/a> for “Mrs F and I also differ in this respect \u2013 I\u2019m a \u201cmy right side = your right side\u201d kinda guy, she\u2019s a mirror imager. This probably means our wee man will grow up with food permanently stuck to his face.”<\/p>\n and ScientistMother<\/a> for “Whether you\u2019re a freak or not is not for me to judge, since I think we have alot of similarities and I hate to be the pot calling the kettle black.”<\/p>\n Aug 19 2011: Ricardipus<\/a> for “I grew up in Kingston, a city characterized by many things including a large bend in the Lake Ontario coastline where it meets the Rideau River. To this day I can have confusing conversations with my parents as to whether certain streets run south to the lake, or east to the lake (or north or west in the opposite direction).<\/p>\n I need a GPS, I think.”<\/p>\n Frank Norman<\/a> for “Of course you know the area is really gentrified when you see a restaurant open up that sells retro de-greased greasy spoon fare but at five times the price of the old closed-down greasy spoon cafe.”<\/p>\n Cromercrox<\/a> for “I bet the cheese shop has resident bouzouki players, and never has any cheese.”<\/p>\n and rpg<\/a> for “\u201cThe fact that most people agree on something doesn\u2019t make it any more correct in my mind.\u201d<\/p>\n That statement is true. And I cling to it. However,<\/p>\n \u201cThe fact that most people agree on something doesn\u2019t make me a freak\u201d<\/p>\n is demonstrably false.”<\/p>\n Sep 2 2011:<\/p>\n Chall<\/a> for “yeah maybe\u2026 but I don;\u2019t get why they\u2019d bother with sending out money to do some research if they \u201calready know what they want from it\u201d. Just save the money, the time and write the report from the beginning. Wait what? That\u2019s not \u201cthe scientific way\u201d??? duh.<\/p>\n (sarcasm)”<\/p>\n Mike<\/a> for “I firmly believe that even if the tiny steps scientists (and their administrators et al) take might not seem like they make a difference right here, right now, it was someone\u2019s tiny steps some time ago that have helped make the crucial medical advances that allow us to say things like \u2018this brain surgery was relatively straight forward\u2019. And any steps you\u2019ve taken may well be helping out someone else in need somewhere else in the future. And the medicinal benefits of a good cuppa should probably not be underestimated.”<\/p>\n Steve Caplan<\/a> for “though we all have our doubts, occasionally\u2013especially when encountering personal and family-related medical crises\u2013remember that today\u2019s basic science is the future of medicine. Your years of basic research are not lost or wasted, but enriching the next generation.”<\/p>\n Steve Caplan again<\/a> for “When I was a Ph.D. student, I used a primordial version of EndNote (I believe it was called \u201cEndNote Dino\u201d). For whatever reason, of the 196 references in my dissertation, EndNote decided it didn\u2019t like the second author of every paper that had 2 or more co-authors.<\/p>\n No matter what I did or tried, I could not solve that problem. As such, I manually entered 174 2nd authors into my dissertation\u201d<\/p>\n CromerCrox<\/a> for “Many years ago when the world was young (OK, it was 1987) and I was writing up my Ph.D. (we didn\u2019t have things like endnote, we had to do it all by hand), I had recourse to my adviser\u2019s thesis on a similar topic, and found that not all the citations in the text corresponded with a reference at the back. I questioned my adviser on said omission and he went all wistful and recounted this story.<\/p>\n My adviser (we can call him AL) was having his thesis typed up by a typist, that is, a person who used a typewriter. The typist agreed to type the thesis in exchange for AL\u2019s moped. It came to the point where AL had to take the references to be typed \u2013 these were written individually on large cards, several hundred of them, tied up with an elastic band, which AL carefully stowed in the pannier on the back of said moped. And so AL set off.<\/p>\n It was quite a long way to the typist\u2019s house. It was getting dark, and it had started to rain. AL went over a small bump in the road, the pannier sprang open, the elastic band snapped and all his references flew out like snow all over the dark, wet road. AL collected up as many as he could, but \u2013 he said \u2013 there were probably a few \u2013 those he didn\u2019t manage to catch \u2013 still rotting under a Cambridgeshire hedge.”<\/p>\n Mike again<\/a> for “I\u2019m amazed this was the problem you ended up blogging about. Srsly \u2013 so many different people actually using the same reference software? You were lucky. When I were a lad, all my co-authors insisted on eating reference gravel.”<\/p>\n Ricardipus<\/a> for “I feel your pain\u2026 I am currently filling out a report for a Certain Funding Agency With Which You Are Familiar(TM), using an online system for a Certain Regional Organization That Administers The Funding Agency\u2019s Funds In This Region (More Or Less, E&OE, etc.). Said online system has, in fact, a \u201creference lookup\u201d feature similar to the one you describe. Putting a plain-vanilla PMID into it and clicking a couple of buttons results in a satifying SLURP of the data into all the relevant fields (author, title, abstract, etc.).<\/p>\n Except when it doesn\u2019t.”<\/p>\n Hermitage<\/a> for “There is no \u2018America, Fuck Yea!\u2019 in the url, so clearly it\u2019s fake.<\/p>\n Duh.”<\/p>\n and Juniper Shoemaker<\/a> for “It only does that to Canadians. The solution is for us to annex you as planned.”<\/p>\n Sep 16 2011: Ricardipus<\/a>for “The problem with using a Smartphone is that people will automatically assume you\u2019re checking your email, or playing a game, or something. Well, judgmental people like me, anyway.”<\/p>\n Ruth Seeley<\/a> for “This happened to a neighbour of mine, except the water was shut off while she was in the middle of attempting to dye her waist-length hair. And it stayed off. Her solution was to dispatch all the occupants of the house to buy four-litre jugs of bottled water. My one attempt at dying my own hair involved henna \u2013 an attempt I quickly abandoned when I saw henna mud on my knees \u2013 I could just tell it was going to be like the attempts to paint my toenails \u2013 polish everywhere but where I wanted it. Whenever I\u2019ve considered doing it myself subsequently, reading the \u2018use of this product may lead to blindness\u2019 included in the instructions has always made me stop and beg a friend to apply the dye instead (at least I\u2019ll have someone else to blame, if not sue, if I do end up looking younger but unable to savour the results myself).”<\/p>\n Nina<\/a> for “I suppose this is why my mum always had me dye her hair for her before I moved too far away \u2026 it is a pain though to dye someones hair when she is in constant panic the dye will burn of her brains. Gah.”<\/p>\n Grant<\/a> for “I have red hair. When I traveled to Pakistan, at several times an old (and possibly slightly dotty) man approach me asking where I\u2019d gotten my hair dyed. Muslims there dye their hair with henna after their pilgrimage to Mecca & and they were very impressed with my hair job. I took a fair bit to convince them that was the way that my hair naturally is.\u201d<\/p>\n CromerCrox<\/a> for “It took me a while to work out why I hadn\u2019t noticed the crowd of Halal butchers sneaking into our bathroom so they could slaughter goats. Mrs Crox fessed up to her hair dye.”<\/p>\n and Seth<\/a> for “It mentions Cleavage so it\u2019s parent control or nanny state censorship”<\/p>\n 23 Sep 2011:<\/p>\n Nina<\/a> for “Well, something similar? A wedding and a conference at the same date. The conference date was known since \u2026 4 years ago. The wedding, 6 months. Why don\u2019t I just skip the conference? Silver Fox<\/a> for “Get your PIs to agree to have all their shit together one month ahead of time. (Right.)”<\/p>\n Chall<\/a> for “I\u2019d stick with tax people or why not Santa Claus? I mean, surely they\u2019d understand that Santa can\u2019t take off 23-26th of December GMT\u2026. ;)”<\/p>\n Ricardipus<\/a> for “I *still* get that dream about realizing it\u2019s near the end of term, I haven\u2019t been to any lectures, haven\u2019t read the textbook, it\u2019s too late to drop the course and I\u2019m going to get zero. And I need it to graduate.<\/p>\n Nothing to do with grants, but the traumatic events that cause it are kind of similar.”<\/p>\n and Steve Caplan<\/a> for “Ahhh, but grants can MAKE YOU INSANE. So if your mother had you tested years ago, things may have changed\u2026\u201d<\/p>\n Sep 30 2011:<\/p>\n Massimo<\/a> for “At some point it boils down to asking oneself \u201cOK, I know this person, she is my friend for xx years \u2014 do I really believe that she is trying to avoid this ? That she is wanting to play prima donna and be begged ? Is it conceivable that she may be making this up, \u2019cause, really, she hates beer and traveling ? Should I suggest that she ask for a postponement, since only uncommonly gifted people like me have such brilliant ideas \u2014 she may not have thought of it ?\u201d anarchic teapot<\/a> for “I think my weirdest dream was a half-waking one during a particularly stressful project. My two-month-old kitten was explaining basic principles to me since apparently I\u2019d forgotten them\u2026”<\/p>\n Ricardipus<\/a> for “Back in the dim and distant past, a friend of mine who worked in an honest-to-goodness photograph developing shop told me the advice his boss had given him about mixing developer \u2013 which went something like this:<\/p>\n \u201cMix it until it\u2019s piss yellow\u201d.<\/p>\n Art, meet science.”<\/p>\n Austin Elliott<\/a> for “Speaking physiologically, the shade of yellow-ness of your piss varies considerablydepending on how \u2018water-loaded\u2019 you are, and thus as a function of how much fluid you have been slurping down recently. Tricky for photography.”<\/p>\n and Mermaid<\/a> for “Similar instructions are common when trying to learn an old family recipe from my mom (who learned it from my dad\u2019s mom), which really can\u2019t be written down. \u201cAdd flour until it feels right\u201d is a favourite, as is \u201cMix until it looks the right level of combined\u201d. I am sure with practice I will know what it all means, but in the meantime the failed batches are depressing.\u201d<\/p>\n Post(s) of the Week:<\/strong><\/p>\n Mar 04 2011: Nina<\/a> for “Fieldtrip part 1, the good, the bad, and the rain” (it’s another grumpy fieldtrip post from Nina! How could it NOT be awesome?!)<\/em><\/p>\n Hermitage<\/a> for “How gaming makes me a better grad student: grinding” (I love this series, although I’m astonished to find that people will spend hours and hours on boring repetitive tasks for little reward FOR FUN in their spare time!)<\/em><\/p>\n EcoGeoFemme<\/a> for “Getting Creative” (being in a small field without lots of ready-made kits forces you to come up with your own solutions)<\/em><\/p>\n and <\/a>Flowing Data<\/a> for “A study of iPad usage via fingerprints” (I once tried to write a post about how I know which iPhone games I’ve been playing lately based on the pattern of fingerprints on the screen, but I couldn’t get the photos to show up properly. Now I don’t have to!)<\/em><\/p>\n Mar 18 2011: <\/strong>Nina<\/a> for “The field trip to Auckland\/Waitakere ranges” (at this point I may as well just admit that anything Nina ever writes about field work will automatically end up here. I love it!)<\/em><\/p>\n
\nbogs or not.<\/p>\n
\nI can\u2019t believe no one else brought this up so far.”<\/p>\n
\nSigh.”<\/p>\n
\nI guess it is not exactly the same, as people get married only once (ahem, hmm, hahaha), and the conference is every 4 years.
\nOn the other hand, during the conference I will be able to possibly find a future job. I m pretty sure that a wedding of a medical doctor and an accountant is not going to get me a job.”<\/p>\n
\nA reasonable person will conclude that in all likelihood if you say you can\u2019t go, you just, um, can\u2019t go. The unreasonable ones\u2026 whatcha gonna do\u2026”<\/p>\n