January 2010
43 posts
“Ugh, I’ve got the Swiss illness, something awful.”
– Better for you than the swiss roll illness.
“When your last name is “von Doom” I feel like you don’t have...”
“Coming from an immigrant family with all the underlying anxiety of a striver,...”
– Not it. Maybe it is it. But close enough.
Jaguar Shark
Ugh, once every 3 or 4 months, I’ll remember a piece of text. Not always the same piece of text, but some turn of phrase will stick in my mouth like the blister from biting the inside of my cheek. And the only way to soothe the mental blister is to track the swatch down.
Today it is something that I read in the NYT-magazine in the Cornell University Physical Sciences library (because it...
Suddenly remembered awkwardness
I used to take the plants I’d grown from clippings and kept in lab out for walks during lunchtimes in 2001. We’d go around the corner, down past the physics building, have a seat on a short wall, read some papers, and eat lunch together.
Needless to say, I’ve since learned not to talk to my plants. I mean, publically.
“Yeah, basically I’ve become the Henry Higgins of Oak Ridge, Tennessee. I...”
– If I weren’t a girl, I think people would think I was some perv. Better to be silent and be thought a perv than open one’s mouth and remove all doubt.
“When one man, for whatever reason, has the opportunity to lead an extraordinary...”
– While TLAwSZ is a favorite movie, Rushmore is ever delightful.
“At least we know that you couldn’t be an IV drug user.”
– It took 8 needles to get me to give up enough blood to do the pre-employment test battery here. 8. Rolling veins, a tendency to pass out, discomfort with needles…basically everything was working against the process. Oh, I hate needles.
However, during the same uber-visit, I did find out...
i wanna tell you how much i hate this
“How do I stay so healthy and boyishly handsome?
It’s simple. I drink the blood...”
– This was in a random text file of mine, attributed to William Shatner*.
*I believe there ought to have been the addendum “as depicted in Shatnerquake”. I’m not certain, though.
For the longest time I could not bring myself to...
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Actuality Based Crushing Disappointment
Every once in a while I remember that, although I had the actual paperwork on my desk for a good 6 years, I only dreamt that I got my FACS certification. (Though I did, in fact, manage the daughter of one of the scientists behind FACS and she appears in some of the literature, which was an area of knowledge I kept to myself in an attempt to be cool.)
…I had a dream this morning, between...
“NIYON ANOMHMA MH MONAN OYIN”
“You know, wait an infinite amount of time and they’ll find each other.”
– One of the most poignant things to ever come out of my boss’s mouth. On counter ions infinitely far away from each other.
"That's an awful lot of trust you're showing...
Few things are as terrifying as realizing you’ve been working at a project for a couple hours and the computer has started taking a little more time than usual to render—and maybe it makes that sad sound when it is warm and grinds a little—and you notice that the file that is filled with so much awesomeness and so much invested time is still called “Untitled” because...
Milemarkers for the day.
10:30 Contract arrives.
11:30 Contract has been signed and miscellaneous paperwork has begun to be filled out.
.
.
.
18:30 I suddenly get very excited about figuring out a way to keep my hair back in a grown up lady scientist way. Also I contemplate making a full on switch to button-down shirts. I am drawing pictures of roadsigns and watching a police procedural at the time.
“He gave off a sense of …”a flirtatious glance is as good as an...”
“Plagiarism…from the Latin “plagiarius” meaning...”
– Etymology further advises you to treat words as children.
“Ye have been served!
(22 minutes later)
…Ye have been served!”
– Better Off Ted is so good that I can literally rewind it and watch it multiple times in a row.
“I don’t feel as beautiful as I had anticipated…I feel like...”
– In cultural counterpoint to the “economic self-exploitation” predominantly depicted (e.g.: the repeated relaxation process and wearing weaves); Chris Rock shows Jason, the white hairdresser, getting botox and collagen injections in “Good Hair”.
I feel bad when I stack good...
“Sure, he starts out as a villain, but it’s not how you start out that...”
– Ted Geisel, whose doctorate was honorary and in humane letters, on the Grinch.
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“I work like I drink: alone! Or with a monkey watching me.”
– Oh, Krusty, I would have been in your fan klub too.
“A work of art is useless as a flower is useless. A flower blossoms for its own...”
– Oscar Wilde is maybe one of my favorite wildes.
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“I spent my formative years thinking that (since my mouth was closed,) no one...”
– 4th Grade was a time to learn many harsh lessons. Also, I may have looked like a female Martin Prince at the time, see below. Excelsior!
...Both Taste Better When Stolen
I haven’t been to lab in a week, so—while technically well rested—I haven’t felt “right” for a while. My site has been dying, my stuff is all crammed in limbo here in Menlo Park, my contract is still a thousand miles away and I was supposed to start work in TN a week ago. Also, I think my health insurance has lapsed. I’m being very cautious. For...
“YOU own an iron?!”
– My former boss. Honestly, with a little more incredulity than I thought was warranted for him to display in front of a large group of my scientific peers. I forget how I had gotten my hands on an iron, as I certainly didn’t buy one or bring one from upstate NY, but it’s not like I was...
“…I’ll keep you abreast of any further developments.
P.S.: Could you...”
“I passed my qualifying exam! I really kicked butt too. 3 hr exam in under 1.5....”
– -From email to a former labmate from Spring 2004.
I’ve been told it is pretty common for high achieving ladies to have the feeling that they are going to get “found out”. Frankly, I find that I generally know what I’m good at and what I’m less good at and it becomes...
“You cannot make a real commitment unless you accept that it’s a choice...”
– Relationships, Vocations, Etc.
“May those who love us, love us. And those who don’t love us - may God turn...”
– Irish blessing type thing. Apparently I don’t love someone and God has smitten me. Somewhere Homer was all “Oh spiteful one! Tell me who to smite and they shall be smoten.” and He was all “oh, don’t you worry, Mr S. I got it.”
“We hope your visit to math.com brings you a greater love of mathematics, both...”
– My dear maths,
You sell yourself short thinking people will only love you because you are pretty and strong. I’m not watching you lift at the gym—this is the internet. Be yourself: You’ve got a great personality and a delightful sense of humor. Don’t be too shy and your...
"Present yourself, opportunity--I am ready!!"
—Computation notebook PRT,V2. p. 22 (050512)
Reading my old lab notebooks is like re-reading really compelling editorial non-fiction. I literally gasped aloud when I realized that the protagonist (me, several years ago) was about to make a nemesis and a former colleague was just pages away from irreparably breaking my instrument.
That means the next hour will be full of the lesser hits...
“Chain diet coking? It’s gonna be that kind of day, eh?”
– Harry, one of two recent delightful former officemates.
“—0830—
HJS: Were you here all night?
ME: …No, I just...”
– Archived office exchanges.