Why Do You Really Want To Know?

First Feedings!

2009-10-12T12:34:00.003-04:00

So today was an exciting day in the lab, the first of my spiderlings decided to eat! After two weeks of watching them run from pinhead crickets, two of them finally got fed up enough to eat them. I'm seriously hoping that this starts a trend among the little guys, because watching them not eat for half an hour at a time is really discouraging and rather dull. This is another good sign, because once they start eating they'll usually keep eating which will keep me out of the lab before 8:30 in the morning. So there was much rejoicing.

Oh Look, It's October!

2009-10-12T00:44:00.000-04:00

I only slack on days that end in y, so don't give me any of this, "You never update!", nonsense. Alright, well, I do never update... but damn it, life gets busy.

Anyhow, back to the update... The first big item of news is, I graduate in April, if everything goes smoothly and my audit goes through, and if it doesn't the university and I are going to have issues. So, yes, one and a half blissful semesters left of my undergrad and then I have to apply to grad school, where the real work apparently begins. I'm really excited about it, I finally get to work with marine invertebrates! Bring on the colossal squid, I shall find them, and study them, and discover their secrets! *insert mad scientist laugh here* Speaking of mad scientists, research has begun in the lab for this year. Instead of doing the SDA and RMR research from last year we've decided to work on naive feeding behaviors and fasting spans before and after molts in spiderlings. So far, we've discovered that for some reason the spiders are scared of pinhead crickets. This was honestly a surprise to me due to how awesomely happy the bigger tarantulas are to chow down on a cricket (Feeding day is coming up, I'll be sure to get pictures). The only problem I'm finding with the research this year is the sheer amount of time that I'm spending in the lab along with the workload from all my classes. I'm still caught up and somehow have enough time for photography and my granny hobbies (Knitting, cross stitch, etc.).

In other news, I ended up in the hospital for two and a half days back in September. How, you may ask... well, I'm going to tell you. Turns out that zebra mussels are sharp and they will slice through a human foot quite easily. The cut, however, was not what landed me in the hospital, what landed me in there was the dirt that wasn't cleaned out of the wound with some sort of bacteria on it which had a chance to multiply when my foot was sewn shut. So Monday I went in for stitches and a teatnus shot, Tuesday I went back for a bad reaction to the antibiotic an my foot being a rather worrying shade of red. They finally let me go home late on Thursday, and my foot is still open and healing slowly. I can post pictures, but unless asked for they're remaining with my mom, because she's really excited about my foot healing for some reason.

Earlier this month I realized that Christmas is coming and I am nowhere near close to finishing most people's presents. My aunt's gift is the closest to being done, followed closely by my grandparent's blanket, and in a distant third is my brother's gigantic cross stitch that I don't even have half done yet. The next couple months are going to be a killer on the hands, pictures will be coming when each project is completed. Another side project is a cross stitch from one of my favorite web comics: Questionable Content This project is going to take me an insane amount of time to complete, it's by far the largest pattern that I've even thought of doing, but when it's done it's going to be amazing. I'll be posting progress photos and updates here, starting next week when I get the chance to organize all of my materials so you all can see the immense scale of this thing. 59 different colors and a base cloth of 20x24 inches should give some idea. It'll be awesome, I promise. (Special thanks need to go to Jeph Jacques for letting me use his strip for my own crafty ends).

Anyway, that's a lot of the random that's going on. One of these days, hopefully one that's on the soon side, I'll get around to updating this a whole lot more.

So Most of March Kind of Escaped Me.

2009-03-24T13:50:00.000-04:00

I just realized that it is the tail end of March and I haven't updated this since February. Hot damn, I'm a slacker. Well, not really if you look at the tangle of chaos my life has been this past month. Midterms for this semester were last week, the undergraduate research fair is this week, the last two weekends have had me in the lab 12 hours a day trying to finish the research that I'm presenting at the research fair, and homework has kind of reared its ugly head and decided to all be due at once.

So anyway, one topic at a time. My research is finally at its halfway point, so that means I have something to present at the Undergraduate Symposium this Friday, at eight in the morning. I barely understand my own research at eight in the morning, I have no idea how other people are going to get it. The phrase "Well, you see, you have to put the tarantulas in 50ml syringes", doesn't always go over well, especially if people don't get the fact that syringes come apart and there's a wide end at the back. So that's been a struggle. I've also given my weekends to the lab lately. It's not like I wasn't in there on the occasional weekend before, but lately I've been in there every single weekend for at least a good three hours. However, I'm almost due for a break since Symposium is this week.

Anyway, I'll have more to say once this week is over. To those of you who listen to me bitch, thanks!

Oh, For The Sake Of Pete!

2009-02-17T15:46:00.000-05:00

So next week is finally spring break! Huzzah, I get to get ahead on all of my crap that needs doing for the rest of this semester, which means lots of cell and molecular bio lab stuff, lots of physics stuff, and trying to get some photography and doodling in there somewhere, it also should mean that I'll be online for those of you who want to talk to me for more than five or ten minutes at a time! I'll also have new pictures up here and on my flickr page, because I don't have an excuse to slack about it next week. I also finally get to do all the laundry that's been slowly piling up for two weeks, hooray for trips to the laundromat.

Besides the excitement for next week and the amount of "free time" I'm going to have, I'm also really happy to go to the DIA (Detroit Instiute of Arts), this coming weekend! Right now they have some really cool chess sets on display, which look to be a pretty awesome exhibit. I also really want to go to the Detroit Science Center because they have the Star Trek traveling exhibit right now (Linky: http://www.detroitsciencecenter.org/StarTrek.html), yes, this makes me a total nerd, I know. The DSC also has a very sobering look at the Holocaust on display through the first of March as well (Link: http://www.detroitsciencecenter.org/deadlymedicine.html). So expect museum pictures sometime next week as well.

As far as life goes, this past week was much the same, busy, busy, busy. Valentine's day was nice, the boyfriend and I went and saw a movie, wandered around the mall a bit and proceeded to go home and make chocolate strawberries, then slept well into Sunday afternoon, which was very nice. This coming week looks much the same, I have two lab reports due, physics due Friday and several other bits and bobs that need doing, but all should calm down by this weekend.

So I've Been Busy...

2009-02-09T16:10:00.000-05:00

And a total slacker at keeping up with this blog. Sorry to all of you who actually read it. I'm going to try to keep a weekly one going for all of you that I don't get to talk to on a regular basis anymore, and I'm going to try to post some of the pictures I've been taking as well as some of the sketches I've been doing (if I decide that they aren't total crap).

Anyway, back to life. My work in the spider lab has kept me really busy the past month or two, we've been running metabolic rates and trying to get the GRs to eat cockroaches. Turns out, tarantulas dislike cockroaches almost as much as I do. They just refuse to eat them, which is a royal pain when your research centers around them chowing down on the gross little buggers. Besides that the research is going really well, we've got all the baselines done and now just have to run two metabolic rates with the new prey items and then I just have to finish the write up for undergrad symposium which is the last week in March. So, needless to say, I'm really hoping that the spiders eat the roaches this time around, because I've got stuff to finish.

On the research note, I've also decided that I'm not going to medical school. I'm absolutely tired of being perfect in EVERYTHING. Instead of struggling through another five years of school that I may not enjoy, I've decided to get my Ph.D. in marine invertebrate biology. Working in the research labs this past year has really made me want to go into research and field biology, there's so much I can do that's never been done and there are new strides being made every day. Also, I really like cephalopods... they're pretty awesome, go look up the new giant squid they found off the coast of Australia and tell me that it isn't cool. I also know that none of you can tell me that you can't see me absolutely loving research biology, I get to be curious and play with animals, perfect, right? Mom is less than happy, but I think eventually she's going to come around to the idea. I think she's mostly just disappointed at the fact that her daughter isn't going to be an M.D., and I hope that once she sees my research at the symposium she'll change her mind.

As far as non-academically related topics, there's a "new" boyfriend (we've been together since October), and he's absolutely amazing! It's been a long time since I've had someone that I can talk to about everything and someone who will be relentless in the pursuit of making me laugh. Oh, and he can cook... which is a totally amazing bonus. I've also been getting back into doing some photography and I've taken up what I like to think of as drawing but is probably just well constructed doodling. I also think that I'm going to take up making throw pillows, the boyfriend and I went to IKEA and I can totally make throw pillows like they have for far far cheaper, and to boot I can use my own photography if I can find cloth ink printer cartridges. Anyway, I've got more classes today, and depending on if anything interesting happens this week I'll have a lot more to add on Friday.

Life And The Stupid People Who Make It Suck.

2008-05-02T14:55:00.000-04:00

So, I've finally moved all my stuff, which is great, because hauling stuff up three flights of stairs sucks. I finally live with two of my best friends and don't have to go home at the end of a long night, which is fantastic. Time for the stupid people that ruin good things... someone stole the catalytic converter off of my car the day after I moved in. Now for those of you who don't know what that is, it's a bit of your exhaust that cleans the emissions and they are kind of expensive to replace. I ended up at the repair shop yesterday and had to pay $225 to have it fixed, that's a month and a half worth of rent... so guess who's pissed? Yup, that's right, me. What upsets me more is the fact that the police department isn't really doing anything about it, I understand that they don't have much to go on, but still, a little effort would be nice. So yeah, that's the rant for now.

Hooray! Well, For The Most Part.

2008-04-22T00:05:00.000-04:00

First for the "Hooray!", I got the research spot in the spider lab!!! *does her happy dance* I'm going to be doing some work with metabolic rates, which is actually really cool since there's not a lot of research being done in that area right now. So I'm actually on the cutting edge of something! Again, "Hooray!"

Now for the "Most Part". Money is going to be awesomely short this summer, the local vet clinic is hiring, but my faculty advisor warned me about working someplace that may not help me on a med-school application. So I'm not quite sure what to do there, because really, it's the vet clinic, or waitressing... and I really don't want to be a waitress... nothing against them, but I don't want to do it for another summer. Also, waitressing isn't going to help on an application either... so yeah, I'm thinking the vet clinic will at least give me some experience dealing with people in a semi-medical setting. So I'm going to talk to my friend that works at the vet clinic, and I think I'm going to be filling out an application next week, because it would be something I'd enjoy doing and I wouldn't absolutely detest my job. Plus, I'd get to be around animals every day... and that sounds like a perk to me!

Escaping Invertebrates and Walking All Night for a Cause

2008-04-01T23:29:00.000-04:00

So, remember the leeches? Apparently they got out of their little aquarium. We're not sure how they managed it, but they did. One disappeared about two weeks ago, and the other one we just noticed was gone today. How do they get out of a tank that has no gaps anywhere near the waterline?!?!

Leeches aside, this weekend is Relay for Life on campus. For those of you who don't know RfL is an event sponsored by the American Cancer Society that is held annually in places all over the country. Basically, you put a team together, raise money that all goes to ACS, and then you (as a team) divide up a 24 hour period and walk. Personally I have a lot of interest in something like this due to my future career goals (I want to go into pediatric oncology) and battles with cancer that have been fought and sometimes lost by people close to me. I urge everyone to find an event and participate if you can. There will be pictures up Saturday sometime of the event, I'll be there the whole 24 hours, so sometime in there things should get interesting.

Oh The Joys of Invertebrates.

2008-03-19T00:07:00.000-04:00

Today was arthropod lab day in my inverts class, which made me very happy because it meant I got to spend an hour with my favourite arachnid the scorpions!

Isn't he cute! Okay, maybe not cute, but they are sweethearts. This little guy tried to climb up my sleeve and sleep. Needless to say we were buddies for the day. Time for a "The more you know" moment, did you know that scorpions fluoresce under a black light? No, well, they do!

See! Scorpions fluoresce due to compounds found in their exoskeletons, and that is how you can find them in "the wild", or if they get out of their container and you have to tear the lab apart to find them. The little guys in the picture are the younger ones that haven't been "socialized", they really don't like being picked up and held yet. Eventually though, they will, and they'll be wanting to "snuggle" (I'm pretty sure you can only properly snuggle with mammals, but anyway) just as much as their older siblings.

This past week I also got to spend some time in the greenhouse on campus, and here are some of the pictures from that. I experimented with some macro work, and I'm not confident that it's "good" by any means.

Hooray For College Making You Do Strange Things.

2008-03-16T21:37:00.000-04:00

Leech pictures were promised, so here they are.

Mmm.... I must be tasty. Little guy latched on right over a vein too.

There's the Y-shaped wound the little guys leave after dropping off.

Oh, the stupid things I do in the name of science... *shakes head*

Reasons To Question Your Life Choices.

2008-03-10T16:34:00.000-04:00

So, I've been questioning many of my choices in life lately. The big one is "Why do I always feel the need to question professors about certain things?" Case in point, Thursday in my Natural History Of Invertebrates class, we were told there need to be volunteers to feed the lab specimens, being me I raise my hand and ask what the specimens are... yeah... needless to say I volunteered to feed them... them= leeches... yup, leeches. I spent the better part of an hour feeding a two inch long medicinal leech, and another six or seven hours trying to stop my hand from bleeding. "Six hours!?!" some of you are probably exclaiming. Yes, six hours. Apparently leeches possess an anticoagulant in their saliva that works extremely well, especially when they decide to chow down over a vein. So I spent most of Thursday attached to a leech or bleeding. Oh, and if you're wondering... yes, it hurt. Amazing time... yeah. Expect pictures sometime this week.

Time for the second set of bad judgment calls on my part. When you ask a friend to remind you to do something, write the something down. I had a very long horrible night last night trying to find the only 24 hour pharmacy in the county I live in. Besides having horrible directions to said pharmacy, which led me to drive in circles from about 12:30 to 1:30 AM, I'd never been to the town it's in outside of daylight... yes, finding things in the dark is much harder than it seems, I now believe my mother when she says things like this. So I drove around, praying that I was going the right way when I see a sign for my university. "Damn", I thought to myself, and proceeded to have my friend who was "navigating" call her sister to have her tell me that the previous directions for "If you hit the highway, you've gone too far" were incorrect due to her reading the map upside down. All in all it was a lesson in designating navigators in a vehicle and stress management. I now know exactly how many 25 mile circles I can make and not just run over a random pedestrian out at two in the morning.

Third questionable life choice: "Why am I CHOOSING to spend so much time and school and proceeding to freak out about it?" This comes from a bout of doubting my chosen career path due to the urge to travel and write a book or two. Right now I'm looking at another three semesters to graduate with my BS in Biology with a minor in Chemistry, after that, it's med-school (Hopefully). That's another four years of my life spent with my head crammed in a book. That's the unpaid school bit that is eventually going to cost me somewhere around six figures to complete. Damn. After that, I still have a residency which is going to take anywhere from 3-5 years, followed up by a fellowship that is going to be another 1-3 years. Every time I think of this I keep asking myself "Why?", I know that being an M.D. will be amazing, but for some reason, I'm getting seriously stir crazy in a classroom every day of every week, and doing it for another five and a half years?

All I can say, is wish me luck.

A Place For Random Thoughts To Have A Home.

2008-03-04T23:27:00.001-05:00

Since I'm probably going to be doing research etc. most of the summer and won't be around for random periods of time and won't be able to keep in touch, I've decided that a real blog is probably the best place to attempt to do it. So here it is, my first one... I'll get the real hang of it later.

Anyway, here's some food for thought...
1) Why in the world does anyone live in a place where it's 50 degrees one day and 15 the next? Really now, I've lived in a horrible, Godforsaken place that does this pretty much my entire life and I cannot for the life of me figure out why any sane person would, I can stand both extremes but not in the space of 24 hours. Really, that type of weather just makes me think that global warming is more like global PMS, and maybe it is just the mitten-y state, because even in the desert you don't have nice sunny weather for two hours, a foot and a half of snow the next hour and a half, and then a slight melt with a quick freeze following minutes after.
2) Why does it seem to me that fewer and fewer movies produced in the US are "good"? Honestly, there has to be a gigantic amount of talent being squandered in Hollywood lately, and I truly feel that the age of good cinema is past. With fewer and fewer movies like "There Will Be Blood" and "No Country For Old Men" coming out and more movies like "Strange Wilderness" taking their places, there doesn't seem to be a huge pull for me to go and spend $10+ at the theater anymore.