Intro: THE PUMPKINS ARE COMING!
Several great things happened this week.
The FIRST great thing is that I FOUND PUMPKINS!!!
*dun**dun**DUN* *steeples fingers* MwahahahahahaHAHAHA!!!
Yes, it’s that time of year. Time for Emory and all people of my acquaintance to drown in pumpkins. I just wish I could give Ms. Harmon, Dr. Parker and people at Oxford pumpkins. But, I don’t think I can pull that off safely. *droop*
I found a little pumpkin horde near campus with the cute, tiny pumpkins that I like! YESSSSSSSSSSSS! I can’t tell you how happy this makes me. It’s a thing. I get as excited about little baby pumpkins as I do about … I don’t know … things I get excited about! Like science, squishy things or anything cool, like mushrooms. And cats.
The pumpkins … they are coming! >.>
Wednesday: seminar about how stupidity and laziness makes you money, after a long time (not really but almost)
His talk was somewhat interesting – he just told a rambling story, pretty much – and he was obviously a silly, exuberant kind of person. He now runs his own company selling gels – gels like for arms rests and stuff.
He said the keys to his success were “stupidity, laziness, bull dog (determination) and dumb luck.” Then, he explained what that meant. I thought this was absurd, but funny – and yes, he’s actually right – in his case, that’s why he’s successful. But he shouldn't tell other people that. It's a bad example of what to do!
He said he was stupid because he misjudged the market - he sold his products to patients, but he should have sold them to their therapists, because they give out the products - only, the patients liked his products so much, they eventually all knew about him anyway. And he was lazy, because he refused to get a code for the insurance to catalogue his products, to give to people. But, somehow that means he has a market with no competition, because all the other people selling things have insurance codes except him. I'm not sure I understand this much. But, I'm not worried about it, because I'm not sure I want to. O.o
He said he was Dr. Liotta’s second graduate student! That fascinated me. He talked about how Dr. Liotta liked to talk to his graduate students and had all these cool ideas at the time – some of which were incredibly stupid – he said. But one of his stupidest ideas that he refused to do and he gave to a different graduate student ended out being the solution to a really hard problem – so he said – always listen to your professor's stupid ideas and don’t be afraid to say things that are stupid, because they might actually be smart solutions. That reminds me of Gokul's stupidity in research article.
Things I thought about randomly at the seminar
And I thought about that, and was amused. I also wondered, if that’s what Dr. Salaita will turn into one day – I mean, I really think, the Lord will make Dr. Salaita really famous and well-known, like Dr. Liotta. Which is perfectly fine by me, whether He does or not. But, if He does, Khalid I hope will not turn into Dr. Liotta’s personality – all hands off, traveling all the time, never interacting with the grad students – no, no, no. Not allowed. No. Well. It’s not something I have to worry about right now, really. I wonder if Dr. Liotta was more like Dr. Salaita in his younger days. No idea.
I also worried, that if the Lord does that, and Dr. Salaita suddenly becomes famous, he’ll leave and go to CA. And then, I’m doomed. *droop* Because, I can’t follow – I have to be in GA. And I like Khalid, a lot. I really don’t want him to leave. I want to stay here forever and work for him. And I like GA and being near my family.
But I guess that’s neither here nor there either. Whether or not Dr. Salaita leaves is up to the Lord, after all. Or, the Lord could have some other more amazing place for me to go or person to work for, but – I don’t feel as if that’s what He has in mind. It's better than I thought. I didn't realize He could put me somewhere that I'd like so much right here in my hometown! That totally solved a lot of problems for me. And He could also just as easily bring all kinds of good stuff to Khalid, in GA, instead of taking him somewhere, if He wanted to. I mean, Dr. Liotta’s still here. I wonder why he hasn’t left. I really don’t know. We need more good people in GA. Why is it, when something good happens to someone down here, they always leave? How are we ever going to accomplish good stuff in GA if all the good people leave, I wonder? Hmph. Well, it's encouraging to me that a scientist from Scripps recently left CA to come to GA! Now, that's what I'm talking about. More good scientists - come, come to GA, please, thanks.
It’s ok. I think Emory is about to become more famous maybe. I don’t know. I really have no idea, but there are good things in the works. I just know it!
Anyway, that’s what I was thinking about, at the seminar.
Also, I really liked this silicon gel thingy the speaker had – it was so cool and squishy – it squished in a very unusual way; it was jelly-like – and impossible to describe. I wish I could have one at my desk, to squish and stare at it, because it's so fun to watch. Here’s his company if anyone’s curious and wants to know: http://www.gelovations.net/ I think that’s the right website.
Thursday: Pumpkins, Weiwei, new speed vac and John took me on a surprise date - lots happened!
And I gave Weiwei notes on his proposal stuff. He is SO funny!
Aside about Weiwei
Weiwei, the post-doc, sent me an email with his proposal draft with the tagline “Cool stuff from Weiwei,” which made me totally burst out laughing.
Weiwei likes to laugh at things I say and at my enthusiasm. He’s started talking to me in “Jessica speak” – my language of silliness, more or less – and we’ve had such great, amusing exchanges these days. He’ll be like, “Jessica, isn’t this COOL!” And I’m like, “YES, YES, YES!” *dance around Weiwei* It’s SO COOL!
On Friday, he asked me what was up and I said, “I’M POURING A GEL AND IT’S SO EXCITING!! Maybe I’ll get COOL DATA! You never know.” And he said, what, you’re pouring a gel? And asked to see this, because he hadn’t seen gels being poured, but read about them.
I’m not sure if he was being serious or just nice, but I was like, “What?? You want to SEE! COME SEE!” So, I got to explain my gels to him and he asked questions and said it was interesting. Weiwei is the sweetest person ever.
Other Stuff About Thursday
We got this brand new speed vac! IT’S SO PRETTY!!! *squeals with delight* I said this and Weiwei burst out laughing. He was very amused. I guess he never thought of a speed vac as pretty. Truly, it’s the most pretty speed vac I’ve ever seen – the one we had at UGA in the Kushner lab was also old, like the old one that broke in this lab. But this one is GORGEOUS!
Khalid looked at it – he said – but it looked to me like he just looked at it across the other lab bench – that doesn’t count – you have to be in front of it a few inches AWAY from it and THEN look at it. How can you see it otherwise? You have to appreciate it properly! It’s so beautiful looking. And shiny, and silent, and spins so fast and looks so space age. But, probably Khalid has seen lots of new, cool speed vacs before, so he’s not as excited about it. But I was very excited!
What is a speed vac, you may ask?
A speed vac is a centrifuge that spins small tubes around with their tops OPEN, while a vacuum sucks all the air out around them, so that they can dry. I think it spins so that the sample in the tube and the tubes themselves don’t get sucked into the vacuum, or something like that. I had to use one for isolating and drying RNA samples once upon a time.
Our friend Brian went to Belgium for the Warmachine World Tournament!
Brian, our Warmachine player friend, went to Belgium with team USA for the Warmachine and Hordes world tournament – they are playing right now – so far, Brian’s team hasn’t lost! He’s in there with the best of the best Warmachiners from the WHOLE world! Isn’t that the coolest? There are two USA teams. We’re all rooting for them! John updated me on that today and says it looks like it might be them and one of the German teams in the finals. Brian is one of the best Warmachine players in the US and likely the world and John says, he might be one, if not the best Menoth player right now.
John took me on a date
On Thursday night, John and I went to Chilis, which was loads of fun, and watched the first episode of The Legend of Korra, the new avatar series. He says it’s really good. It was great to spend time with him - we had lots of silly conversation and I got to hear about Warmachine. I really think I'll like the Legend of Korra. I loved the original series.
Friday: James is ridiculous!
James was home when I got home! I was surprised. I talked to James earlier in the week while at school – he wanted to ask me dating advice. This is humorous in and of itself, but I am his sister, so that counts for something.
Kevin said, “I’LL talk to him for you.” *smirk* *smirk* And Daniel was like, “Oh, don’t get involved in that!” Then this spawned a discussion on dating – pooh, pooh – one of my least favorite topics.
Believe me, I wouldn’t be involved if I could, but James is a talker and always has been and likes to talk to me about uncomfortable things. So I talk to him. But, James has gotten much more mature and just in general amazing in the last few years – he’s really grown in the Lord and done so much great stuff! I’m so proud of him. He’s going to be an awesome dad someday. I told James later what my grad student friends said about him and he thought that was absolutely hilarious. I knew he would.
At dinner, he, as usual, completely stole the show with his giant speech of informative stories, including uncomfortable ones. Later, I laughed randomly while looking up articles and he said, “What?”
And I said, “I’m laughing at what you might say.”
And James said, “Things I MIGHT say! That’s a new level! I’m humorous – IN THEORY!” Which of course, made me totally laugh. James is ridiculous – but then, we both are – in different ways.
Today and FIN
Mom was telling me about this bad dream she had – it was terrible, but amusing – about how she fell asleep at the nurse’s desk (in her dream) and then couldn’t find her patient, to give her her pain medicine on time, because the hospital had turned into a maze – it got more and more silly – I’d relate it, but I have to get stuff done now. I dreamed about cats, I’m pretty sure. I can’t remember exactly what about – I tend to dream about cats, for some reason. My dreams have usually absolutely no connection to reality at all and are totally bizarre, fantasy/SF stuff, with random people or things from real life thrown in. My favorite is still the one about the Sith Lord who tried to impersonate Dr. Kushner and steal my E.coli data, a few years ago. That one is actually one of the more normal dreams I've had.
That’s all! Here's a link to the picture commentary so you can see the new speed vac!