From pool to pool

Glenwood tigers are so cool?

It's an excerpt from one of the cheers that we used to do (the line followed "From city to city, Glenwood girls are oh so pretty" or perhaps "From spot to spot, Glenwood guys are oh so hot"). Of course, it's a swim team cheer, since swimmers have more time when everyone is huddling (and therefore more time to cheer) during their meets. I think it's pretty much a universal, though, and it makes sense: in a sport based on racing (i.e. swimming), when the louder that you are during the event, the better it is, well, you do lots of organized cheers, but in a sport where you really have to be quiet so that people can concentrate before competing (i.e. diving), organized cheers are less common. I'm imagining cheers during golf now, and it's funny. The one diving cheer that we have is Oo sa sa sa:

Oo sa sa sa Oo sa sa sa
Hit 'em in the head with a big keelbasa
Put 'em in a barrel
Roll 'em down the street
Tiger Divers can't be beat!

(repeat many many times, getting louder and faster). Since it was a diving cheer, it was of course my favorite. And the wackiness helps too.

I need to get pictures of the kids or the team or me coaching and put them up here. Or at least the pool. I hesitate to post pictures of other people's small children on the internet, though, just because I'm not an idiot. But here are some funny stories anyway. Most involve small boys, well, because we have a team of 45 or so kids of which 35 or so are small boys. It's pretty absurd. I'm actually not exaggerating there.

Ethan is one of the kids who I worked with years ago before I stayed in Chicago over summers. He and I had a bond way back when; I taught him his back dive and in my last season, neither of us went to all-stars even though both of us would have liked to. When I came to the first meet and started coaching (straight from the airport, I might add), he looked up at me and said "I remember you!" and then paused for a moment before adding "But I don't know your name." It made me smile really really wide. He's now taken to shouting "Hi Liz!" whenever he sees me.

(Yes, people call me Liz here. They always have in Maryland. No, this is not reason for Chicago types to start calling me Liz.)

Gabe (another kid from way back) is trying to learn a front flip with a full twist. Which is some combination of awesome and hilarious. He's a little bit sloppier on the board than a couple other boys in his age group, so he has to do harder dives to keep up with their scores. Of course, he could work on the fundamentals but those are boring. So in an age group where most people do flips or inwards, and the really good kids do one and a halfs or backflips, Gabe is trying a twister. Which gives him a 1.9 DD instead of a 1.6 DD (for the one and a half) or a 1.4 DD (for the flip or the inward). DD is degree of difficulty, a multiplier, which means that Gabe can get scored down by about 20% and still have the same end result. Since the scores hover around five, that's a good point per judge. Of course, he's going up against kids who get sixes and sevens, so he still has to shoot for a five or a five and a half. Of course, in many ways it's easier to get the one and a half up to a six than it is to learn the twister to a five. And he failed it at the meet on Sunday, but he's been doing it pretty well this week, so we'll see what happens. And in the end, if Gabe wants to learn a twister, I'm more than happy to teach him.

The referee for that meet was super super harsh (I could usually understand her calls, but I would have been easier on kids, probably, by virtue of the "they're five years old" factor. I don't have a problem with eight-and-under kids getting cute points). I think she also scored a little bit too much based on splash; there are, of course, some kids (like me, okay) who can't make a big splash no matter what they do. I can go in the water with an almost picture perfect cannon ball and still have not much more than a handful of splash (something I hated as a child). But there are also kids who cannot go in the water without a splash, no matter what they do. Since one of the hallmarks of a good diver is going in perfectly straight; which means without a splash, you can judge a dive to a certain extent based on how much splash it has. Of course, you shouldn't. Because if you do that, then a small person who goes straight in gets a higher score than a big person who goes straight in. And that's not right; no matter how much it may or may not have helped me while I was diving.

Uh. In any case; this harsh referee was obviously tired and cranky for the entire meet (which isn't necessarily her fault) but at the beginning of the meet was chastising our parent rep for some reason. And the parent rep (who does, actually, know me, and has for years), looks over and sees me coaching the kids and doesn't recognize me, and thinks "What on earth is the other team's coach doing with our kids?" Eventually, her daughter (who, by the way, is one of the cutest five year old girls I have ever met) jumps off the board, and I give her some advice, and the mother gets livid. She doesn't realize it's me until someone tells her "That's not the other team's coach; that's Elizabeth," at which point she (apparently) felt rather bad about it. At the end of the meet she commented on my haircut, and she and her daughter said goodbye to me. Which was the only part of the story that I personally experienced, and also made me smile.

I've had some comments from parents who knew me when I was diving telling me that it just feels natural to have me back, and those are probably the best. Sandra, the head coach, has repeatedly said how good it is to have me back (in no small part, I believe, due to the fact that I'm the only member of the assistant coaching staff that does things like show up on time or stay until the end of practice). Which is really, really wonderful.

The hardest part, so far, has been learning all the names. I've never been good with names, and forty-five kids is a lot of names to remember and a lot of people who don't really understand "I have been paying attention, I just don't remember your name." Every day I get a little bit better, and to be honest I've only been coaching for four days, so it's understandable I think. But with 11 eleven-twelve boys, of whom I knew three or four when I was coaching before, it's a lot easier to remember Gabe and Ethan and Tommy and Max from before and a lot harder to learn John and Joey and Billy and Mike and Bobby and... (or whatever their names are). The older kids are easier because I remember more of them and there are fewer of them (although I have a tendency to confuse kids with their older siblings at times). I'll fill out sheets for a couple weeks; that should help. (Who am I kidding; I'll be filling out sheets for the rest of the season in all likelihood).

Today was a good day

I've always loved gargoyles, they were one of the reasons I came to Chicago. So I couldn't take pictures without taking pictures of gargoyles. There's something creepy about these guys, I think. Like the ivy growing over them reflects how the real world, and time, imprisons us all and drives us mad. Or something like that.
I like how this one is staring straight at me.

This is sort of my image of the dorm and the university; I remember when I visited Hyde Park with my parents when I was a small child, and falling in love with the University because of a tricycle race and these archways. And here you can see the dorm through one of them!

From there I headed out to bigger and better things, of course, downtown for Silks. From that excursion I got more pictures of Chicago at large rather than just the University.

The desired photograph of "Grand" -- This is Grand. Doors open on the left at Grand. It's too bad that this is the randomly blurry picture that I took. So I don't know if I'll use it for anything; it was a nice idea perhaps though.

And me, upside down! At the moment this was taken, I was worried that my top foot was going to come untwisted, which would have been awkward. But I finally have photographic proof of Silks! It was definitely bittersweet, and the woman who taught the lesson was full of well-wishes and congratulations, told me to stop by when I visit Chicago (which I very well might do). Other exciting things that happened at silks today were 1) I climbed to the top of their 30 foot ceilings on my first go (usually I get scared that I'm going to fall so I start heading back to the safety of the ground) and 2) I successfully did straddle climbs for the like second time! There was another picture that was sort of from the side, and you could see the silver-dollar sized blister I have on the bottom of my foot (ow!) from walking yesterday. Ouchies!

I like this picture of the El. I like that the sign saying it's a green line train to Harlem and Lake is blurred out, and I love that you can see the city crystal-clear in the background (which only means that the city was not moving).

I also got a couple of the city from the bridge at the Ashland green line stop. I now have pictures of the city from South, North, and West. East would be harder without a sailboat.

I have other pictures that I am not posting out of kindness to your internet connection; sort of. I think these are the best.

I can has souvenirs?

I wandered around downtown today taking pictures that screamed "CHICAGO". I felt like such a tourist. The idea is to get a few that I wouldn't mind printing out and putting on a wall somewhere. I'll get a few that say "GRAND" tomorrow when I go to silks, and some of Hyde Park as well, because those should be less generic touristy and more personal. I might even get pictures of me hanging from fabric from the ceiling too. It would be a picture-full day. Hopefully. That's the idea, at least.

Taken from the point with Emblies, this is one of the few that I am happy about how it turned out. The city looks almost like a backdrop rather than a real city. Which is kinda nifty. It was raining down there and sunny at the point when I took the picture.

The Wrigley Building and Trib Tower and Michigan with the river. I want a picture with the river so I can point it out and say "See, it really is bright green all the time!"

Wrigley + Trib tower without the river. I really didn't want a picture of Trump Tower.


They were raising the bridges to let a boat through when I was downtown. This is State Street, I think.

The Hancock building from behind a tree? I couldn't get a shot sans tree without standing in the middle of the street, which I was loath to do. I don't know how I feel about this one.
The El, because why not?
From Fullerton Avenue, the north tip of the Lincoln Park Zoo. This needs cropping to remove the fingers. Which goes to show I am not a photographer.
From North Avenue, on the way to the North Avenue Beach.
A panorama at the north end of the North Avenue Beach (so around Fullerton).

And, because this picture needs to exist somewhere other than my camera, three Rosses!

A Start?

This isn't the whole story (that should be obvious). It isn't even a whole chapter. But I want some advice on whether or not to continue this, or if it would be better to drop it altogether. So; would you want to read the rest of a story that started this way? Does this work, at all, as a beginning? For highlights of what I'm planning: the rest of this chapter would include a visit to a meeting of the Society, and in the story as a whole there would eventually be (sabotaged) peace talks between (very conceited) earthquake-causing fairies and belligerent humans; I haven't worked out much more than that (read: How James & co avoid war).

The Society for the Unification of Humanoid Races

The poster had first appeared on the wall just beside James’ door two weeks ago, and he had torn it down in disgust. Now it was back, and James was seeking official help. He stood, staring at it as the elderly dean of students slowly walked towards him. “End Slavery – Humanize the Fairies” proclaimed the poster in big, bright red letters. Just beneath the words was a poorly executed caricature of someone James could only assume to be a Fairy – fashionable top hat and frock coat flaring out, dragonfly wings sticking out of his back, and spindly fingers reaching out to grab at an adorable human baby. James could tell it was a human because it had no wings. Beneath this were details: “The Society for Unification of Humanoid Races meets Wednesdays at six-thirty in Whitehall Library”

Had the artist ever even seen a fairy? Of course not; if he had, he would have known that they didn’t have wings. How could the shadowy villain even pull on a frock coat with those things sticking out of his back? “Professor,” James heard the aging professor’s labored breathing and turned to him. “See? This is offensive, racist propaganda. It has no place being posted in the University.”

The professor squinted at the poster through inch-thick glasses. James wondered if he could even see it. “You’re not a fairy, are you young man?” he asked in a creaky sort of voice.

James looked down at his threadbare clothes, his six-year-old shoes, and the slight bulge of fat at his belly. “Do I look like a fairy?” he asked, and then shook his head in anger. “And besides, that’s not the point!” He insisted. “I’m human, and I’m still insulted by this drivel!”

The professor frowned. “Don’t support slavery and kidnapping, do you?” he asked.

“Are you insane?” James replied, outraged. “This isn’t about me. It’s about the offensive poster I have to walk past every day on my way to classes.”

The professor sniffed, unimpressed. “I don’t see anything particularly offensive about it,” he croaked. “Everyone knows now, the Fairies steal human children to be slaves – it was all over the papers with that Douglass fellow last year.”

James almost screamed with rage. This was the enlightened faculty at the premier institute in the country? This was the person responsible for the public image and marketing not only of the university but also of the adjoining school of magic, which was populated almost exclusively by half-Fairies? “You obviously don’t know what you’re talking about, bringing that up,” James said, and he knew he should probably have more respect for his elders but enough was enough. “Douglass went to jail for threatening, kidnapping, and attempting to enslave another fairy, not a human. He was caught by a fairy, and he would have been tried under fairy law and executed, as he probably deserved, except we demanded due process and tried him in a human court, and some jury decided that life in prison was a better punishment. Carey Douglass was a pariah of fairy society just as he would be in human society, and is no more representative of them than he was well-liked.” James was shaking with anger, but his diatribe was taking the edge off of it and he slowly realized that he should potentially not be shouting at the dean of student life in the middle of a dormitory hallway.

The professor’s eyes were flint. “Mind who you’re talking to, boy,” he said sternly. “I’m not some two-bit bigoted student, or an assistant professor who wants to josh around with the kids. I have half a mind to report you for insubordination and insolence. Who made you the expert on last year’s court cases, anyway?”

“I was there,” James responded quickly.

The professor scoffed. “You won’t get out of this by telling tall tales, young man.” James almost opened his mouth to insist that he wasn’t lying, and if there was any doubt he would go and get Sergeant Tate to vouch for his involvement, but then he decided against it. It wasn’t universally known that Sergeant Hammond Tate of the Tinia Police used a crack squad of University Students (self-labeled the “magops”, with a soft g, for Mysterious, Abnormal, and Generally Odd Protection Services or Magical Operatives, depending on who you asked) to help with his stranger cases. In any case, the professor only paused for a moment before continuing. “Now, unless you can find me five students other than yourself who are honestly offended by this poster, I’m not going to do anything about it. The Society for Unification of Humanoid Races is a legitimate group and deserves their freedom of speech just like anyone else.”

The professor then turned and hobbled away. James stood, stunned, watching him leave. He knew that calling out and bringing the bigoted old professor back to talk to him further would do no good whatsoever, and might even get him in a fair amount of hot water, so he eventually just sighed, sent one last glare at the poster, and walked away.

So much for that idea.

At dinner that night, sitting in the kitchen of Brenda Christiansen’s new apartment, drinking a beer, he told the rest of the magops – Brenda, Kip Duncan, and Malcolm Jackson – the story.

“Jamesie, you’ve gone fey,” Kip said with a laugh.

“I have not!” James insisted. “This is about an objectively offensive piece of disgusting political propaganda, not my own friendship with certain Fairies! And would you please stop calling me Jamesie?”

Malcolm cast a glance towards Brenda at the word ‘friendship’, and Kip chortled with laughter. “Femininity goes with fey, you know that,” he said, taking another gulp of beer and leaning back to balance on the back two legs of his chair.

“It’s not that offensive, James,” Brenda said. “You’re taking this too personally. You should be glad that people paid enough attention to the whole Douglass-Nerissa-Whatever we’re calling it affair that they’re doing something to prevent it happening again.”

James set his beer down with a bit more force than was necessary. “But the things that they’re doing wouldn’t have stopped him. They wouldn’t have had any effect whatsoever on Douglass – they’re just perpetuating a vicious stereotype!”

“Just let it drop,” Malcolm warned.

James sighed. “It’s not as if there’s anything I can do anyway,” he said bitterly, and took another gulp of beer.

Kip shook his head. “James,” he said with a warning voice. “You are not letting this get you down.” James shrugged.

“Look, if it really is that big of a deal,” Brenda said with a pacifying tone, “Write a petition. Find five students. They must exist.”

Drabble part, I don't know how many: The Drabbling

Water

She might have been crying before she jumped in, but when she surfaced, the tear-stains on her cheeks disappeared. She sighed. Her expression softened. She took a deep breath and swam, relishing the cool of the water on her face, the tactile explosion of exhaling. One two three exhale inhale one two three exhale inhale. Out with her anger, her fear; in with soft happiness. Like supports like: if she wasn’t calm, liquid, flexible, she would sink. Her troubles slowly dissolved away. She flipped over to her back and stared at the ceiling, perfectly relaxed. The water held her up.

I'm not super proud of this one; it was an image that was in my head and wouldn't go away, and I needed something to write anyway, so I wrote it, but I don't think it has anywhere to go and I don't think it's particularly good. Something better tomorrow, I promise! Well, maybe not promise. But hope!

Drabble

Robot!

The kids from Boston and the kids from Texas and the kids from Pasadena didn’t know what they were doing. They were just kids after all. They thought it was a game. To be strictly honest, it was just a game, like hundreds of games before – see who could build the best.

But army officials don’t understand games, and the aging general public doesn’t understand computer games, and English-major journalists don’t understand robot games, and it started and it all went downhill from there.

If there’s one upside to the robot wars, it’s that now they won’t expect the Zombies.

One foot in front of the other

My jaw clenched. One foot in front of the other. As if it was easy. I teetered, slid my foot forward, waving my arms to balance. One foot in front of the other. That was all she said, and now she was gone. I shouted her name; silence. I took a wobbling step.

One foot in front of the other. Oh, and don’t look down.

The wire swayed beneath me. I breathed deeply. I couldn’t see the end, but I couldn’t see the beginning and I had just begun.

I took another step. One foot in front of the other.

Ever since Ayn told me about naso-labial lines, I've been looking for them, of course, because you can't stop, and I've especially been looking for them in my face? It bothered me a little bit that I could see them in the mirror, not enough to go out and buy anti-wrinkle face cream or anything, but sort of "Am I getting old?" in the same way that my impending twenty-second birthday worries me. Should it worry me that when I read a book I usually identify with the sixteen year old rather than the twenty three year old? Is that even true? It's hard to tell; I don't know; I haven't paid attention. Should it worry me that I still identify with Peter Pan even if I'm approaching adulthood? Or is that the appeal of Peter Pan, that everyone feels a little bit like a boy who didn't grow up?

I think, in part, some of the reason I like circus people is that they're misfits; they don't fit the stereotypes for their ages -- they haven't settled down and grown up, or if they have they've done it without really doing it. So maybe the answer to my worry is just as straightforward as, well, walking a tightwire (or a slackwire I guess); which remains something that I want to learn how to do. Hah. The edge between childish irresponsibility and dowdy adulthood is narrow, and possibly razor-thin. But I can has metaphor. Maybe that will be my next drabble.

Inspired, oddly enough, by Troll 2

Energy was first to go. She slowed down. She stopped caring about little things, like who was running for president or if we were at war. She had never enjoyed sunbathing, but now there was nothing she would rather do. Getting up was harder every time.

“Mom,” her son called, “It’s almost midnight. You should come inside.”

She didn’t move.

“Mom, I’ve made breakfast.”

“Mom, there’s no food and I can’t drive to the store.”

“Mom, I’m hungry.”

“Mom, I’m going to Billy’s. He says his folks’ll take care of me.”

She heard the door shut. She shed a leaf.

I know there are like four hundred and fifty three stories with the same plot (person turns into plant!). They are almost all cooler than mine. I am okay with this.

Also, I found the autosummary feature, but it turns out it was not nearly as dadaist as I remembered (at least with the two tries I gave it). Also, it works by scoring each word by the number of times used, and then each sentence by the sum of the common-ness of its words (probably with some control for length). So I pretty much just got a bunch of sentences of the sort "(Main Character) (common verb)."

Too bad!

Old Microsoft Word (I'm talking at least eight years ago or something, so Word2000 or... whatever) had this hilarious feature called "AutoSummary" as best I can remember. I don't know how well it worked with a standard, by-the-book 5 paragraph essay of the type I would have been writing in middle school, when I discovered it, but I do know that it would give me what I can only describe as a dadaist summary of a lengthy work of fiction (I tried it out on my first novel, to quite amusing results. Yes, this is how I discovered the feature; no it doesn't just take the first sentence of every paragraph -- I would have noticed that). I think it had something to do with finding the non-article or preposition words you used the most frequently, and I only figured that out because my two main characters' names popped up repeatedly.

Now I return eight or nine years later only to find that the deconstructionist summary feature is absent! Or at least, hiding, in Word2007 (curse you, Vista!). Of course, I shouldn't really be complaining about the loss of an amusing but pointless feature. However, it did spoil what would have been my five minutes or so of fun, threading my verbose stories through the digital shredder and seeing which 100 words popped out in which order. I think the moral of this story is that playing Microsoft Word (TM) was way more fun when I was a teenager. Sort of like how playing Windows (TM) was way more fun when I was a little kid.

Another 100 words!

iFace: The Future of Beauty

Sally hated iFaces, even if they were “the future of beauty”. Hers, a gift from a fashionable aunt, was only good as a paperweight. No, she couldn’t turn her face blue to broadcast her misery, but she would rather focus on her drink.

“You know, if you hold that any tighter, you’ll break it.”

She slammed down the glass. “What d’you care? Go hit on someone else.”

“Most women today aren’t worth the effort. They’re either depressed or shallow.”

“What?”

“You’re the only one who isn’t hiding her face.” Sally laughed, surprised. He smiled. “Can I buy you another round?”

The idea was for a monolayer-thin, flexible organic led screen in the shape of a mask with a wireless connection to a server in the sky for storing preset "makeover" files, which could do things like make it look like you had perfect eyeshadow/blush/lipstick or completely remove dark circles under your eyes, without the health risks of putting lots of nasty chemicals all over your face every day. I know, the details don't come through. Oh well. Hopefully the generalities (it's a mask, it's computerized, it has something to do with cosmetics) do. But might I actually have a little bit of plot, possibly even a character, in 100 words? Go me!

Another Drabble

It would appear that I feel like I'm floating away into nothingness. Given that I am waiting, bored for the summer to start and then graduate school to start and therefore my life to hit the reboot button, I think this is vaguely understandable. I'll try for a more cheerful 100 words tomorrow.

Peter was floating, his feet kicking freely six inches above the ground. He had always wanted to fly; and yet it felt so wrong now that it was real. It should have been invigorating to rid himself of the chains of gravity. But his stomach sank with worry. What if he could never land? What if he fell? What if… He rose another foot, and reached down, frantically grabbing Wendy’s hand. “Don’t let me float away,” he pleaded.

She smiled. “I won’t hold you down,” she said. He thought she might let go, but she didn’t. “I’m coming with you.”

Oh my; Elizabeth writing something short, again?!

Ayn suggests drabbles to help with short-form writing. I trust her since she is an expert in brevity and in wit. Here is one; for some reason I really want to title it with a reference to the Neverland. It doesn't make much sense.

If You Close Your Eyes And Are A Lucky One

The city floats on clouds, the grime of its streets seeping into the white cumulus mass, turning the sky ominous and dark. But the storm doesn’t break yet; it only drizzles. You can see the towers clearly, jet black standing out against dark gray. They seem too massive, too tangible to be floating midair, and you expect them to fade away into a mirage or fall, heavily, back to earth, shaking the ground and sending tremors out for miles. But the city stays afloat, and instead the mist seeps through your jacket and your skin and down to your bones.

I'll post with more pictures later. But an afternoon of waiting for PCR to be done has left me with several interesting oddities:

1) http://circusfolkunite.googlepages.com/crisscrosscircus

This is awesome. I wish I was one of those kids. Oh, how I wish I was one of those kids. Oh well.

2) The quote: "Monotremes are like the fantasy geezer aunt you never knew you had, breezing in from the other side of the world, with wild tales of the past and no plans for slowing down." (from here)

I never knew I had a fantasy geezer aunt I never knew I had; it's even better that she's a platypus.

3) I might be done with Scav for the foreseeable future, but the San Francisco Bay Area has something perhaps even better: Maker Faire. So I will not be starved for annual festivals of creativity and wackiness.

4) I agree with this article on just about every count. The revolution is coming, and it will be a revolution on the level of Galileo and Darwin. The argument of whether or not "God" exists fails intrinsically since "God" as a concept is so poorly defined (or impossible to define, take your pick). The real argument and the real paradigm shift we need to be considering is the shift away from any particular "God", the shift away from the revealed faiths, the faiths-of-the-book, and the shift towards and more accepting and more understanding and more universal faith that does not and will not contradict reason. (I'm sorry; any time you write down what "God" says is right or true in any but the vaguest and most general terms, you open yourself up to being contradicted by the wisdom of later days.) The interesting thing, to me, is that such a more universal faith seems to necessitate the abandonment of any corporeal/describable "God" de facto: In order to incorporate all ideas of "God", you cannot cleave to any one idea.

There was also a lot about Global Warming and Polar Bears going extinct that made me sad. But I don't want to post about that.

Pictures of Scav and a follow-up on the half-pony half-monkey monster later!

Scav: A Summary?

It's over. My last Scav at the U of C is over, and I don't know if it's really hit me yet. Knowing myself, I probably won't come back next year, and even if I did it would be different and probably not as much fun.

Hah. I am done being a Scavenger, and all I have to show for it is this awesome half-pony half-monkey monster. So that's the first story, which is that I got to do the Jonathan Coulton Item, number 164: I made this ____ to please you. But I get the feeling that you don't like it; what's with all the screaming? ... Maybe I used too many monkeys. Isn't it enough to know that I ruined a pony making a gift for you?


Yes, he is holding a Jonathan Coulton ticket stub, and yes he is wearing an NIH tee-shirt. I'm going to ask JoCo to sign the ticket stub the next time I see him in concert. Any suggestions on names would be appreciated, though, since I am not good at naming things that aren't Armadillos.

More pictures to come later, as I upload them from my camera and/or am sent them by friends. I had a hell of a time tracking down the page captain for this item, because after I heard it my eyes pretty much bugged out of their sockets and I thought "Oh man, I MUST do this item". But once I found him, told him that I really really really wanted to do the item, and also told him I would dress as a mad scientist and sing the song (if he wanted me to) at Judgement, well, he seemed pretty pumped. And when he saw the finished product, his eyes bugged out of their sockets in much the same way mine had when I heard the item read.

It is a very cute, and very cuddly, abomination, and I will display it with pride in my apartment at Stanford. I can't wait for someone to notice it and ask "What's that?" to which the only possible response is "It's a half-pony half-monkey monster."

I would wait for them to ask "Why, exactly, do you have a half-pony half-monkey monster?" before I explained that it was a Scav item, and what Scav is, and how awesome this year was.

Because this year was, in my opinion, the awesomest of my four years doing Scav. The half-pony half-monkey monster was probably my favorite item, and I absolutely loved how it turned out. The Monowheel was so very much fun. (And all of our showcase items worked -- Gir (cartoon dog balloon, item 18) was stupendous, the Zeusaphone could play recognizable tunes, and the potato gun that shot fire as well was, an exercise in hilarity). The dance at Daly Plaza (Blues Brothers item, number 136) was incredible fun, although I must admit (sadly) that as an item I liked Stick to the Status Quo a bit better from last year. I actually enjoyed the party more since (most) people weren't getting raucously drunk, and ours was, I must admit, absolutely amazing (in fact, everything that Anna McGeachy did in Scav this year was amazing, from what I heard). The Doll House was gorgeous, and I am so proud that I was able to do a tiny bit to be a part of that mammoth effort. Of course, there were parts I definitely didn't like (the Thursday Quads item comes to mind), but there weren't many (read: that was basically it). Even judgment was better this year than in years past, probably because I didn't have to stress and fret until the very end at which point a judge would ask me to do something totally ridiculous and absolutely absurd, and I would feel obliged to do it and possibly get hurt. Possibly because I had gotten at least a little bit more food and sleep than I had in years past. Possibly all of these things.

In the end, I hung out in Ross' room and pretended to be Ross with Emblies and Alex (yes, we were all pretending to be Ross; it was classy) between the judging of items and the final judgment. It was nostalgic in the extreme, and goofy and wonderful. THAT is my college experience (or at least the good parts): Hanging out in a dorm room, absolutely exhausted, chatting with good friends about life and the crazy stuff we just did, and getting ready for more wackiness. I worry a bit that I won't find that again, or that I won't find friends good enough, or something. It's hard to put a finger on it. But sitting in that room with those people I couldn't help forgetting that they had graduated and I had moved out and soon I would be in California, and just remember my second year -- only better, in a way, because this year has been so much better than my second year.

At final judgment, I was tackled and held in place while William Dix drew a mustache on me in sharpie, which was a combination of shame that I am small enough to be tackled so easily and pride that they thought I was enough a part of the team to force me into a victory mustache. Alex got away without one, and I don't know if that's because he's a black belt or he didn't really Scav this year or both. The chanting was hilarious (at the beginning, at least, although it did get old by the end), GASH rick-rolled everyone universally and went on to beat the FIST, Burton Judson came out incredibly strongly for third place (hooray!), and we won by a whopping seven hundred points!

The party afterwards made up in raucousness and insanity for the lack of booze at the Friday night party. We took over the third floor of section five, the RAs didn't care (neither did anyone else I don't think), there was dancing and cavorting, shouting and whooping and reveling that you could hear from the street, bad champagne and bad beer and bad mixed drinks (I had maybe two sips of champagne). And Dominos Pizza never tasted so good. The Burton Judson captains came over and William Dix gave them victory mustaches. It was, in short, everything that Scav was supposed to be, everything that Scav is, and everything that I wanted from Scav.

Next weekend, though, I am turning my sonic screwdriver into a screwdriver. Why? Because even if it isn't Scav, I still can.

Cuba is changing... a little.

My memory of Cuba will always be of a messed up, beautiful place with messed up, beautiful people. I don't know if that makes much sense. And I think the most significant part of this isn't that Cubans can buy certain consumer goods, but that they're noticing the "messed up" parts of the country. Because by far the strangest part of talking to Cuban high school students, for me at least and for a lot of the other students on the trip I think, was that Cuban high school students honestly thought that we were the ones with the repressive government and they were the ones with freedom of speech and expression. And as much as I hate the Department of Homeland Security and think that George W. Bush and his administration have hijacked the country and stolen many of our liberties, well, we're still pretty far from Cuba. To put it bluntly, our acceptable political expression is more than a tongue-in-cheek comment and a knowing smile, which was basically the most that any Cuban would do even in private.

So if young Cubans are noticing how messed up the country is, well, that's at least a step in the right direction. I know it's not much, especially not in such a brutal dictatorship. But it's a step. It means it's not hopeless.

The other thing of note is that, well, Raul Castro isn't much younger than Fidel, and Fidel's son ("Fidelito") has no interest in running the state. So in the foreseeable future, there will be a Cuba run not by a Castro but by... someone else? And who knows what that mystery person will do, or who that person will be, or how much unrest there will be in the country due to that exchange of power. Fidel to Raul was remarkably easy; I remember people worrying (hoping?) that when the elder Castro resigned or died, Cuba would explode or implode or whatever it is that such countries do without a leader.

But another interesting thing, for me, is that I don't really think China's model will work so much in Cuba. This is for purely personal reasons. The culture and the persona of Cuba was shockingly similar to our own. I got a strong sense of individualism and enterprise. (As perhaps best indicated by the pimp/economist who would not leave Noah alone. To this day I swear they were talking about Bush's economic policies.) This is in the middle of one of the most oppressive communist regimes, and people were still thumbing their noses and winking their eyes as if to say "Yes, it's wonderful isn't it, we all know that, but..." The 'black market' was blocks and blocks and blocks of stalls. It's obvious even from the article: the cab driver who wants to make himself an expert in cellular phones the minute he can buy one. In customs, everyone pushes and jostles to get to the front of the line. People weren't shy, they weren't formal or deferential or whatever. They were rowdy and noisy and alive.

And I haven't done the research to know if this is really different or not, but Raul Castro opened up the internet and immediately, there were people publishing blogs that were unfriendly to the state. They hide their faces and their names but they post candid truths anyway. When he said obliquely that people should make their concerns public, women came out in the streets to protest unjust imprisonment of their husbands. It doesn't work; the government tries to stamp it down, but if after such a veiled offer of an ear people are willing to take the chance and speak their minds, well, that's got to be a good thing.

On the other hand, this isn't the sense I got while in China; in a purely cultural respect. So much more of China's culture seems to be based around respect for your elders and knowing your place, it's hard to fit a raucous and brazen personality into that. That might be part of why communism (or authoritarianism, really) on such a massive scale has worked in China. If there were 1.3 billion Cubans instead of 11.39 million (that's a 100-fold, yikes!), Cuba's policies of repression might not work as well as they do. Of course, I'm not an anthropologist and I might be completely wrong, and in any case it's impossible to know for sure.

Part of me hopes that a little bit of economic freedom in Cuba will force the political freedom that I would like to see. It's interesting to me because of how I reacted to visiting both Cuba and China. I felt like China had the bad parts of Americana without the good parts -- McDonalds and Microsoft without pick-up games of softball in the park and laughter in the street. Cuba seemed, at least a little bit, closer to the good parts of my culture, the parts I'm proud of. The personality and the vitality was there, half hidden under the dust of the crumbling buildings. So every time the reporter compared Cuba to China, I winced a little bit. I hope that, with these small economic reforms, parallel social reforms are made -- I wouldn't want Cuba to turn into China.


Edit to add: On a more hopeful note, who wants to go back to Cuba with me when they open the borders again? Mango? Easha?

Well, when you put it that way...

Cory Doctorow posted about how awesome young adult sci-fi/fantasy is lately.

I no longer feel guilty at aspiring to be an author of awesome young adult sci-fi/fantasy rather than something "real" or "more serious".

Now I just have to work on the awesome part.

http://www.boingboing.net/2008/05/01/young-adult-sections.html

Err...

How pathetic is it, that while sitting in lab and doing experiments, I am reading this and thinking "Aw man, that sounds awesome!" Of course, I also really like the "DNA Explorer" kit from Discovery Channel store. I can no longer find it, but it was awesome (and had the centrifuge that the author says is sadly absent from most chemistry kits) and... man. If I had a relatively young cousin, I would want to get them nerdy toys. And I mean really nerdy toys.

Also, if I ever have a basement or a garage, I need to have a mini-lab there. Perhaps for recreational chemistry as I become more of a biologist. (The term "recreational chemistry" makes me smile).

Space Bus!

I have an honors thesis due tomorrow, so obviously I am writing fiction. Hah. As promised, the space bus story. This is a draft, and I have a second part semi-envisioned, but I like vague endings at the moment, so I'm thinking of leaving it roughly as is. I thought of trying to make this reminiscent of Ayn's drabbles; but there's a bit too much here to be a true drabble (100 words) and I am rather... prolix (?) in my writing. Or at least verbose.

So, exactly 300 words, because I wanted it to be very short, and I am arbitrary:

SPACE BUS

Honk! Jeremy’s eyes snapped open. What was a car doing out here? He was the only one who ever came here; that was its only temptation. He turned and saw, even more surprisingly, a bus, shimmering with fine dust. How had he not heard the approach of a bus?

Honk! The driver was waving at him. Jeremy stood up and approached. The door was already open; the bus inside comfortable and almost full. “Where are you going?” Jeremy asked.

“Wonderful places,” the driver said.

Jeremy looked behind him at the cesspool of a lake and the poor excuse for a boathouse. His Toyota sat in the driveway, kneeling with a flat tire. He shrugged, stepped aboard. Almost anything would be better than here.

The doors snapped shut behind him. “How much?” he asked the driver.

“I don’t want your money,” the driver answered, and the bus lurched forward, catapulting Jeremy down the aisle. He quickly made his way to an open seat next to a young woman. He smiled at her, but she didn’t look up.

The bus creaked forward, over dirt roads, making its way through the forest and finally out into a pristine clearing. A lake sparkled, clear blue in the setting sun. There was a little cottage right on the water with floor-to-ceiling windows, and a dock with a canoe and a row-boat and fishing poles already set out next to a pair of blue Adirondack chairs. Jeremy was in awe – wonderful, indeed, he thought. He stood to get out, but the woman beside him grabbed his arm with a surprisingly firm grip. The driver hacked a bit and climbed out of the bus. Before Jeremy could follow him, someone else was in the driver’s seat, the door was closed, and the bus drove away.

I'm going to Galapagos!

In September. Just before moving to Palo Alto! I am super excited. It will be an adventure in biodiversity and evolution!

And perhaps sea kayaking, too.

I will try my best to take lots of pictures of funny animals, none of which include me!

Or maybe I'll be all old-school field biologist and write detailed descriptions and include sketches. I would do that if I could sketch.

Also, I am about 25% done writing the "Imagination Train to the Space Bus" story. (That thing really needs a better title, especially since it does not feature a train.) My problem: It's turning out almost... serious, and not very funny! (Gasp, Elizabeth writing something that is neither academic nor meaningless fluff? What is the world coming to?) My goal: It will be the next post, sometime this week.

I can has Gymnastics?

Maybe.

Maybe not.

But last night I was doing front handsprings and (almost) front + back walkovers, and front flips on the trampoline. And one-armed handstands. And probably a few to many pull-ups because I have silks today. But I almost have my left split back, which is absolutely mind-boggling.
I have found that my diving hurdle is still way, way more comfortable on trampoline than the gymnastics hurdle or the multiple-bouncing approach. And so after three front-flips in a row that were very diver-esque, one of the new kids (Joe, I think his name is, first year + very good gymnast, on the diving team coincidentally) says, "You should really dive."

I tell him that I would if it didn't give me migraines and possibly fainting spells.

He says "You should really dive anyway."

I laugh and say that he might think differently after a month straight of migraine headaches.

Then we trade diving injury stories. He doesn't have many, but there are a few stories the team has accrued; one girl repeatedly smacking her chest so hard she coughs blood, another guy putting his knee through his face on a reverse 1 1/2, etcetera. He says that he's smacked so many times on one-meter he's sure he can't get hurt on that board anymore, I tell him the whole concussion story: namely, thinking that about three-meter, and diving until I couldn't walk in a straight line because of it, and his eyes sort of bug out.

They talk about the circus club, and ask why they never have any tumblers or acrobats. I say it's because the circus club is full of jugglers who aren't interested, and if any of them want to start tumbling with circus, well, they should. They say "But there was that girl who did aerial stuff!" I say she graduated, and I'm doing aerial stuff now for the fun of it, but not performing with the circus.

It was a night of interpretation -- hearing stories that I had lived recounted to me in a very different way.

Things like that yield... perspective. When Joe told me I should really dive, I laughed; it reminded me at once of the joy that sport gave me and the fact that it's not a part of my life anymore, that events conspired and I chose to go in a different direction. And when we bonded over diving stories, it reminded me that I can still have that part of my life, but in a different way than I used to.

My important experiments are stubbornly working and my unimportant ones stubbornly not working, so I find myself with nothing to do in the middle of the afternoon. Hence, reading random news articles. I found this one, which struck a chord:

In Politics, the Gaffe Goes Viral

I did note, first of all, that the idea of a journalist writing a rather incendiary article about how journalists now are out of touch with important issues and seem to be fishing for controversy is, well, rather postmodern to be honest. In a wonderful sort of way, if you ask me.

But what I found more important about the article, and more striking, is the difference in the level of constant surveillance candidates have to put up with today versus even eight years ago. (The difference, this reporter claims, is the blogging revolution: I know I had a blog eight years ago, but that was when I was a whiny teenager and blogs were for whiny teenagers).

He brings up something that I had not heard of, and was frankly appalled to read. It's an interview with George W. Bush in 1999, and here's what he says about it:

"Recall Tucker Carlson’s profile of another candidate, George W. Bush, in Talk magazine in 1999. In it, Mr. Bush gave a profane, intemperate interview in which he said, “I’m not interested in process,” and mocked Karla Faye Tucker, a convicted murderer who sought mercy from him as governor of Texas before she was executed in 1998. “Please don’t kill me,” he whimpered in mimicking her."

Okay. Now, I'm trying, honestly I am, to put all my preconceived notions about our President aside. I'm honestly trying. But it's really, really, really hard for me to think of this act as anything other than sadistic. He's governor, she's a convicted murderer, strapped to the chair; she has no power and he has every power over her fate. I'm not saying he should have pardoned her; I don't know the specifics of the case. But his democratic rival for governor of Texas brought up an interesting point:

"George W. Bush knew that he was not going to reprieve Karla Faye Tucker. He could have told her that the day before," Mauro explained. "He could have told her a week before. But he waited until the six o'clock prime time news, knowing she was strapped to a gurney still having hope about her life, and he grandstanded on her."

And, notwithstanding that, he actually mocked her plea for life in front of a reporter. I don't care if someone is a murderer, I don't care if you have to kill them for the good of humanity or to serve as a lesson for those who are thinking of committing certain crimes, I don't care if they honestly deserve death. Fine, we can have a discussion about the death penalty, and I might disagree with your specific beliefs, and I might not vote for you if you run for office, but believing any of those things or letting someone be executed because of any of those things is a morally gray decision, one that neither makes you good nor bad. However, mocking anyone's plea for life, whether that person is an innocent child or a serial killer, shows a lack of human sympathy that I simply cannot fathom. When someone says "Please don't kill me," and you let them be killed, even if you've done the right thing, it shouldn't be something to laugh about, to joke about, or to mock. Because if you laugh at that, and mock it, you're mocking and laughing at the idea of mercy, and repentance, and compassion for your fellow man, and, well, in my heretic's eyes there isn't much more holy than compassion and repentance and mercy.

Er. Well. Back to the point. George W. Bush mocked a woman on death row's plea for mercy in an official interview, and it wasn't picked up by the national media. There was no backlash. It wasn't the sort of thing that everyone knew. It didn't stop him from being elected, or, well, appointed, President in 2000. I cannot believe that the majority of people, no matter how conservative they were, would look at such a display of sadistic humor in an elected official with tolerance. I certainly hope they wouldn't.

Take, on the other hand, Obama. He calls a certain group of people bitter in a small fund raising dinner that most people thought was off-the-record. While I admit it was a stupid political move, and that I would not like to be called bitter by a candidate for president, and while he certainly alienated that group of people, well, two things strike me as odd. First off is the thought that, well, Obama is right. Those people are bitter. But they have every reason to be bitter. Every year, their paychecks gets smaller and their mortgages get larger, their kids are being shot in Iraq and Afghanistan, and the elected leaders who say that they are looking out for them seem, at best, so out of touch that they fail to offer any help whatsoever to the worsening situation. That's a good reason (several good reasons, in fact) to be bitter. More importantly, however, is that this, off-the-record comment to explain that a certain group of people has been shafted by the current administration and is understandably bitter, and so finds Obama's message of hope and unity hard to swallow, has been picked up by the national media and turned into a controversy. Obama is now an elitist pig, completely out of touch with poor rural voters, and disdainful of them. Versus Bush's comment, in an official interview, which is laughingly, disgustingly, sadistic, had no such ripples.

On the one hand, I want a press that will pick up a comment like Bush's and hound him about it until everyone knows that the speaker has, apparently, psychopathic tendencies. On the other hand, I don't want a comment like Obama's to be turned into a needless controversy. Is my own bias showing here, in that I think Obama will be a great president and Bush was a horrible one? Yes. But I hope there's more than that to my gut reaction. After all, there's a significant difference between accurately labeling one group of people as bitter and mocking a dead woman's plea for mercy.

Wasting Time

Back on to one of my obsessions, which is J. Craig Venter causing the Apocalypse: (metaphorically speaking, of course).

A clever idea for a story.

There's a bit of mumbo-jumbo that I don't like (for example, needing to tack on a few arbitrary base pairs from "something that had lived" to give it the "spark" necessary makes me bristle just a bit), but the concept is wonderful in its morbid hilarity. Well, the concept of "Saint" Venter, that is.

There's a little voice in the back of my head that's been screaming for the past week or so, that none of this can possibly be real -- that I'll wake up soon enough and be in high school for another year or so. I was going through my e-mail messages and deleting a bunch (and sorting out the rest) and I have to e-mail some of the people I had interviews with to tell them about my decision, and I need to find someone to do a rotation with, but none of that really needs to be done very soon (except for the first part about e-mailing people) and it all just feels like a dream. Like none of this could possibly be real; because part of me still feels like the uncertain sixteen year old asking Bill if I could work in his lab over the summer. Let me rephrase that. A lot of me (most of me?) still feels like the insecure sixteen year old asking Bill if I could work in his lab over the summer. And this whole polite assertiveness thing is incredibly difficult to pull off, and just about necessary.

And then there's the half of me that's saying "This isn't growing up; you're going to school for another five or six years and after that you're going to mess around in lab for a career? You want to be a scientist? What are you, five? Grow up and find a cubicle!" and the half of me that's saying "Holy shit this is for real and grown up and what the hell am I doing?"

And I know that the reality will be halfway in between (at least I think the reality will be halfway in between) and when I start feeling like there is no solidity left in my world, I remind myself of the present, and my current work, and the cloning that might be done, and the experiments to do, and that gives me some sense of perspective. Yeah, it's scary to think of things a career at a time, but thinking of things an experiment at a time is doable. It's comforting. I can handle an experiment.

And I might be done with cloning, which would be, maybe, the most miraculous thing of all.

I was going to write today. Or find a cool Shakespeare quote.

Instead, I filed taxes and other forms for a good 2.5 hours.

Not a good trade-off!

Sad but true; I didn't get NSF. We all know why that is, it's because I have a lame adviser who cannot get things in a little bit late, he must wait until they are very very late and/or not turn them in at all. Julie told me to find someone better for my PhD.

In other news, I finally went back to silks practice last Thursday, and it was absolutely wonderful. My arms are finally done being sore, I was laughing the whole time, and it generally made me super happy and pumped to be back. It felt so good to do something physical again, for a change. And although I was absolutely horrible at it, they were really supportive and friendly about it too. So those are all great things.

I was going to post and try to fool all of you into thinking that I was going to drop out of graduate school and join the circus. And then be all "April fools!" or something. But I decided that was lame and so I'm not going to.

Instead, I'll say that I'm going to Stanford! It's exciting to have made that decision. I'm really pumped about it. I need to figure out where I'm going to live, and where I want to do my first rotation, but... I feel on top of things. Which is awesome.

Hooray!

Done!

I am done! Done done dah-done done done! With my major and core and every single required class here. I can finally slack off! Whoop!

Well, I can finally slack off until September. Then the real work begins.

In the mean time, I can do something crazy. Like join the circus. Or write a(nother) novel. Or read some Shakespeare, so I'm not horribly terribly bad at playing tag with Alex. If that ever happens. Or all of the above!

Or, you know, I could work hard in lab. Actually get something done. I guess that's a possibility too.

Only at the U of C, ish.

WARNING: RAMBLY. I might clean it up later, make it more coherent, but probably not.

Every so often, something happens that reminds me of why I went to school at the U of C and not somewhere like MIT. Well, it's fairly often because this quarter it's been every Monday and Wednesday at 3:00 when I have a philosophy of literature class that certainly would not occur at a tech school. But every so often, something (other than Ted Cohen telling a joke) happens that reminds me of why I went to school at the U of C and not somewhere else, like MIT. Often enough, that thing involves Tom Stoppard. Today it was my glee upon finding an article talking about "postmodern science" or, rather, the use of science to explain postmodern life and vice-versa as epitomized by Stoppard's use of Quantum Physics in Hapgood (Quantum Physics + Espionage = fun times!) and Chaos Theory in Arcadia. Although the Arcadia analogy is not nearly so good, in my opinion, because in Hapgood the whole thing is tied up tightly in uncertainty and such (of every sort), whereas in Arcadia chaos theory plays much more of a sub-role, being discussed alongside other subjects, but never really encapsulating the whole thing; really Arcadia to me seems as much about thermodynamics as chaos theory, and as much about Byron as either of them (the link between Byron and thermodynamics is drawn, and beautifully so, by the simple statement "the action of bodies in heat"). I couldn't read the entire article, because Questia is a bastard that way (and the U of C network goodness doesn't give me access). But nothing is lost to the march, and so I can reconstruct it.

Ooh. I should re-read Hapgood now that I know some Quantum. Heh. And I should read Arcadia again after I finish Thermo, just because. I wonder if Stoppard has a Kinetics!Play, but I probably won't be taking 3rd quarter Physical Chemistry, so I suppose it's immaterial.

Also, I should maybe finish my work for class before going on a Stoppard binge. Although in one week I think such a thing will be entirely called for.

OH MAN. I just had a hilarious idea. Absolutely wonderful and hilarious. I'll post more on it later when I have my book next to me and have enough time to think it out more fully. BUT, to give you a sneak peek into how weird it's going to be, well, for a second there I imagined the Doctor philosophically interrogating Tom Stoppard's characters. ("No more it can, for time needs must run backwards" (or something like that) versus "From a non-linear, non-subjective point of view, time is more of a ball of... wibbly-wobbly... timey-wimey... stuff." (or something like that)) I realize, of course, that one is "real" philosophy while one is goofy, but I don't much care about that (have I ever? There's philosophy in Harry Potter, I tell you, just not very complex philosophy!). Anyway, if science fiction is good for anything, it should be good for blowing apart the paradigm and fostering imagination. Pointing out what should perhaps seem odd to us.

And that brings me back to Ted Cohen, and the Stories class, and the order: "Don't take it as a matter of course or an obvious fact that pictures and stories please us." And the burning bush. And that noticing that something is odd, or striking, or interesting (nothing more and nothing less) sometimes says something about you, and teaches you something about yourself and the world. Hah.

That's overwrought philosophy for you!

I may have just finished the second-to-last problem set of my college career. Hooray!

Also, at lunch today my bottle of tea came with a quote from The Doctor: "First things first, but not necessarily in that order. -- Doctor Who" This only makes it easier for me to obsess over Doctor Who until the next season begins.

Now, on to dinner and a lab report (not hooray!).

I almost forgot

When I was waiting at the airport for my shuttle to get to Stanford, this was brought to my attention.

Whenever anyone asks, from now on, I'll say that I'm studying the likely genetic underpinnings of Magic in Harry Potter, and point them to this article. Excellent!

Updatexors!

Quick update before I go back to frantically studying thermodynamics:

I still have to hear back from UCSF and Princeton. However! I have been accepted everywhere else! Hooray for me!

My choice, it seems, is coming down to Stanford versus MIT. They are both absolutely stellar programs, they both focus on actively promoting interactions between disciplines, they both seem like great places to live and be (with great cities nearby if not next door). What I consider to be the differences:

1) At MIT, you do not start research until halfway through your first year, whereas at Stanford you dive right in to rotations. At MIT, this allows them to require a "core biology" cirriculum and inundate you with classes your first semester. At Stanford this allows you to get a sense of projects during rotations.

2) At MIT, wackiness seems to be smiled upon, while people at Stanford seem more laid back and traditionally "cool" (if you can actually say that about graduate students). I might be able to find wackiness, or bring wackiness, to Stanford. As a city, San Francisco is much, much cooler (and probably wackier) than Boston. However, MIT is much closer to Boston than Stanford is to San Francisco.

3) MIT seems very post-doc heavy, as in there are tons of amazing post doctoral opportunities there. Stanford seems more focused towards Graduate students, which would be good for graduate students.

4) Stanford has much, much better weather.

5) In neither place would I be able to assistant coach diving. In Boston there would be more high schools with potential openings for me to do that. In San Francisco, there would be circus arts for me to do, but that would be a 30 minute commute.

6) Stanford is about 3.5-4 hours drive from Kevin, but to get home to DC would take the whole day and to get to Chicago would take most of the day. Boston is more generally accessible, but I would probably want to get on an airplane to see any member of my family (or my college friends).

7) Mango might go to MIT, but he might not. He won't go to Stanford. PCBio people are going to Stanford.

8) Stanford's campus is drop-dead gorgeous. MIT's campus is kind of... ugly.

After some research, Yale appears to have a program very much like Stanford's, but it is a brand new umbrella and might therefore not facilitate cross-talk as well during my prospective tenure. Plus it's in a rather ugly town (sorry Easha and Ryan), an uncomfortable distance from airports or family members or large cities, with fewer coaching opportunities and no circus stuff that I know of.

Back to thermodynamics!

Graduate Programs

First of all, some very exciting news for those of you who I have not already told: I have been accepted to four schools! Yale, Harvard, MIT, and Johns Hopkins! I am absolutely, incredibly, and stupendously pumped. Honestly, and I know many of you have said I was silly to think this, I started this process thinking I would get in to one, maybe two schools. And I have been accepted everywhere so far. Which is... charmed, I guess.

While I am thinking about it, here are one sentence (or less) summaries of the schools I have visited.

Princeton: Arcadia, but overwhelmed by undergraduates.
Harvard: It seems that the stereotypes are true. (They think their faculty are better than anyone else, and the graduate students seem to live in awe of the professors).
MIT: It seems that the stereotypes are true. (Oddball, clever, exciting, emphasizing a strong basis in biology in general before specialization in lab, and proud but not stuck-up.)
Hopkins: A small program, with a stellar medical school, whose star is rising, but is overwhelmed by undergraduates.
UCSD: They're trying to be the Harvard of the UC system in biology, and therefore stress the "top-10" nature of their school as well as the "unparalleled" associations with biotech and research institutes in the area. La Jolla is a designer community for the life sciences and in a gorgeous area of the country, but the closest big city is Los Angeles (shudder).
UCSF: A "Party School" compared to the others -- students are less mature, causing them to "lose focus" and take upwards of seven years to finish, but who wouldn't fall in love with the city?

Perhaps more info eventually. But my flight is boarding in the next 10 minutes, so I should sign off, pack up, and get ready for my incredibly long, probably unpleasant flight. Oh boy.

But, as a post script, does anyone want to weigh in with insider information about Princeton, MIT, Yale, and Stanford (which are my favorites so far I think)? In particular MIT and Yale; since I am awaiting judgment from the other two.

Notably not Interviews

So, I have quite a bit to say about Harvard and MIT (and I will happily babble to anyone who wants to hear it) and I'm trying to write a poem or a song about developmental genetics (because it's cool, and the joy and giddiness of it doesn't really fit into prose very well), and perhaps I'll post about that stuff later, but for now I have something totally unrelated.

In one of my many literature searches for articles related to ChIP (Chromatin Immunoprecipitation, the subject of the presentation I'm giving today and another thing I'll happily babble about to anyone who asks) I found the following, which is notably not about molecular biology. Now, I don't know why that popped up when I was searching for, most likely, different authors and "Chromatin", but I do know (now) that the Plague of Athens was possibly caused by small pox, typhoid, anthrax, bird flu or the bubonic plague, but was probably not caused by purely human influenza (at least, according to these researchers).

Did I find a way to put that tidbit into my presentation?

The answer, my friends, is of course I did.

Princeton (Interviews Part 1)

So I am back from Princeton (hooray! Elizabeth: 2, Chicago Weather: 0) (make that Elizabeth: 2, Chicago Weather: 2 since both my flights were delayed in a feat of blizzard). And, on top of that, I have a working computer. Put these two things together, and you get one mammoth blog post about Princeton (and about the trip there. The trip back was so horrid that I'm not thinking about it).

I. I entered the red line train car and sat down to the sadly familiar sound of what I thought was someone panhandling. He smiled and waved at a man wearing a Carhartt jacket who entered with me. I prepared to tune the beggar out, to stare blankly at the floor and not move very much, hoping he wouldn't notice me, acutely aware of the fact that I was the only white person in the car. I don't know why I notice that; I often wish that I wouldn't notice it, but it is increasingly the case that I will realize suddenly, standing on the platform or sitting down in the car, that I am in a way an outsider.

I realized, then, that he wasn't a beggar. He was speaking in the same tones and rhythms that panhandlers use to decry that they aren't out to get anyone, but they have some sob story or another and they're just down on their luck and they pray to Jesus every day and they know he'll look down kindly some day, but in the meantime couldn't somebody please just spare a dollar to get a sandwich. He was using that same affect of talking at people instead of to people; disregarding the fact that everyone in the car was doing exactly what I was doing, looking away sadly and pretending not to hear him. But he wasn't asking for money or giving us a story about how his younger brother just died and he was raising money for the funeral. He was advertising temporary employment opportunities for people who were down on their luck. For people with felonies on their record - it doesn't pay much, he said, but oatmeal is better than no meal, and if you put some sugar on it it tastes all right. For people over fifty, who are working on fixed incomes and have prescriptions to buy or grandchildren to take care of, who needed a little something extra. And he handed out little green tickets, green slips of paper with this information.

Then he talked about a show he was doing; he was a poet. I thought, okay, here's where it will become obvious to me why this man is standing on a train and reading his poems instead of sitting at home, snug and secure, or going to work at what middle class America calls "a real job". He'll read a bad poem and he'll "sell" it to someone, and I'll be able to go back to my cubby-hole definition of the real world. But I had to admit that it was unlikely; the man had proven himself unique already.

The poem he read was good; it would be the kind of rap I liked if I liked rap. Positive and self-affirming without being too trite and with a cadence and a rhythm to it that moves quickly from one rhyme to the next, emphasizing the beat and the sound and the shape your mouth makes when you say a word.

Really, it was exactly what I should have expected. He sold a copy of his poem for a dollar, and sat down to talk to the man in the Carhartt jacket. They talked about people they knew, upcoming shows, everything and anything.

In Ayn's latest issue of Paste, there's an article about Hip Hop as a nascent cultural artform, or at least as an artform and a culture unrecognized until now. One that is all about rags-to-riches stories, self-made men. I've always been skeptical about that, because I think so often its messages are more of misogyny and violence and materialism than good positive determination and success. So often it's performed by someone who is violent and angry and jealous and maybe doesn't even believe in the self-made idols he holds up. But the guy on the train was real, and good. Or at least, I could imagine it that way, and I have no reason to force myself to be so jaded.

II. O'hare was a blizzard. I couldn't see to the end of the runway because of the snow, and the flight monitor flashed CANCELLED in bright red for most flights. Orange delay times appeared beside most others. Please, I thought, let me get out of O'hare. I don't want to stay here. And, an island of white in a sea of red and orange, my flight to Newark was on time.

It wasn't until we were in the air and the plane was shocked by a crosswind that I realized I should perhaps have asked to get to Princeton rather than to leave O'hare. I laughed.

And I realized that my questioning, my pleading, was not a plea for mercy from the author but rather a plea of sympathy from the reader. I think it's odd that I can so calmly laugh at how ironic it would be if my plane crashed in a ball of fire (it's easier since I didn't think it would), and how I seek identification with a judge or an audience, given that I so strongly disavow the very existence of a higher being ala author. I can tell myself this is because future generations could hear or read my story, but they wouldn't know that I was laughing with them; they would never know any of my little pleas for sympathy.

III. Newark Liberty International Airport is like a vision of the future from the sixties: touch screens and chrome and a magnetic monorail called an "Airtrain" that comes every three minutes and talks to you cheerfully as you ride.

IV. The Nassau Inn is a colonial relic - It used to be a changing post for horses between Philadelphia and New York City. The elevators are tiny and jury-rigged and the walls would be crumbling down but instead they're remarkably well kempt. And in one room, "The Library Room", they've saved the money on bookshelves and books by simply painting a bookshelf and books on the wall.

The best part is that the pattern is on a short loop.

V. The graduate students here live in a dorm - a castle called "Graduate College" with a basement bar called the Debasement Bar, or D-Bar. I note that one doesn't actually want to go somewhere where one will be debased, and they look at me strangely as if they haven't heard the word debasement before outside of the context of their bar. I shrug.

VI. Fox advertises American Idol in the same breath as Super Tuesday Primary Coverage, tacitly equivocating the two. Because which teen gets a record deal is at least as important as who the next president is going to be. Or at least, it is for most Americans. Or maybe just most Americans who watch Fox.

VII. The outside of most of Princeton is granite, and paradigmatic, but the molecular biology program is new and exciting (perhaps in relative terms) and therefore has new buildings. All are connected by convenient tunnels. The inside is bold and bright and feels like something out of an animated movie, somehow younger than I expected. The tables and chairs are big matching sets in lightly varnished wood, the walls are white with trim to match the tables; it feels like an elementary school with an adult color palette. And, suitably, all the break rooms seem to have miniature, rather than adult-sized, furniture. Everything is big, bright, pretend colonial to as to be Classic. Like an old lady who only has one suit, in a 1950s cut, immaculate, adn looks stunning in it, but it's all she wears. Classic.

They're pouring money into the program; they guarantee funding for as long as you need it, and the money comes from the University, not individual labs or TA-ships, so in theory at least, you have complete freedom. Everything, it seems here, is handled by a benevolent God of Funding. In a climate where that is very much an issue, no one here seems much worried. Which is refreshing, but it makes it seem even more like a painting or a myth. Arcadia. Here we are, in the center of civilization, midway between New York and Philly, hidden in a picturesque suburb where you can see the stars at night, where everyone knows eachother and everyone likes eachother and strangers will talk to you in a coffee shop about David Hume's views on Religion. Everyone is happy, healthy, excited about work, and part of me is always looking over my shoulder for the real world, for death, for hardship and mortality, marring even this beautiful canvas. Part of me says that maybe these people really are just that good. Part of me wants to believe that money, and having the purse strings in friendly hands, really can change a lot. That this is what I always wanted academia to be and I should be happy to have found it. But part of me is reminded that this isn't every weekend, that real life likely comes even here, and that Death mars every canvas, no matter how lovely it is to look at. Here, I am in Arcadia, instead of Even in Arcadia, there am I.

Or, you know, not.

VIII. Two professors talk about research they're doing and I won't (can't, shouldn't) bore you with the details, except that it is so obvious from both talks the passion with which these people live. And they do it so differently, to boot. The one wants to change the world, she wants people to live forever, to have children without birth defects for as long as they care to, she wants to cure humanity of Death; or at least aging (which fits in so very well with my Arcadia metaphor, eh?). I talk to her later, and you can see it in her eyes when she talks about the therapeutic possibilities of her research. You can see it through the makeup she wears and in the wrinkles around her eyes. She has a young child, I learn later. I wonder if her passion, her mission, was selfishly motivated in that way. I think probably I'm imagining things. Creating characters. Writing stories, fictions that might not only be false but also offensive. I try to stop but my brain automatically makes connections. I cant' stop it.

The other, it is obvious, just gets such glee from the work that he can barely keep himself from jumping for joy. He loves the stories, the problems, the questions, the mysteries, the discoveries. He looks at a video he's seen so many times he must have memorized it, and still stares at it in awe, transported by its meaning to him. He giggles, his voice rising in a slow crescendo from a tantalizing whisper to a sanglante cry - how could someone not feel the emotion dripping from his voice when he talks about it? He is a child, still looking at the world with wonder, still gasping in delight at the sheer majesty of it, still stopping dead in his tracks when he thinks of the mysteries still in store for him.

I spoke to his wife, later, about my science and hers and science in general. She was attentive to my description and even asked me about the implications of my procedures on her work. I answered her quickly and correctly (I know that much) and didn't think about it until it was pointed out to me; a tenured professor had just asked me if I had any advice.

A yeast geneticist showed me amazing data about nucleosome rearrangement and transcriptional control, which is an interesting outgrowth of my current niche. And some more common stuff about reversible DNA-DNA interactions. I felt almost guilty I didn't have more questions to ask, but he e-mailed me this morning saying he enjoyed talking to me and hoped my return home was not too bad (it's Chicago in the Wintertime, so hoping it's good is hoping for the impossible, I guess). And if I have any questions, I should call him.

I'm on cloud nine.

A bacteriologist talked me through a recent discovery; it's part review of basic genetics and molecular biology (Bacteria have operons, where genes that are similar in function are clustered for co-regulation) and part theory of science (you can screen based on decreased viability, but you can't select based on it), and part joy of discovery and a cool story.

With all of the professors, I talked about the weather in Chicago and the programs and where else I'm interviewing. It's fun, but part of me wants to spend more time with a single person, to really get down to the nitty-gritty of a project or the program, rather than a whirlwind tour of the offices of five professors.

And that's how I feel about a lot of the people here; I want to sit down and have a real conversation, unlimited time, just get to know one person really well rather than meeting twenty.

IX. The graduate students give a "panel" discussion. I ask, if they're living in a dormitory and eating in a dining hall, if this wasn't just "College 2: This time we mean it" or if it didn't feel that way. They say that it's different because you're older (why, yes; well spotted) and people are more mature, and there aren't crazy parties all the time. And besides, it's awesome to live in a castle and eat in the Great Hall of Hogwarts. I smile. I have lived in a castle, eaten in the great hall, and had mature beer nights where no one gets drunk rather than crazy frat parties. And I decided that, rather than than that, I wanted my own kitchen and my own living room. The more I think about it, the more significant it feels - I want a place to call my own, I want my own space above all, I don't want a randomly assigned roommate and I do want my own kitchen. But the people here say no, it's better for you to do it our way so you don't turn into a hermit. When all I can think of it the fact that really I want a kitchen where I can throw a dinner party and no randomly-assigned roommate to be stuck with. I don't want to clean up other peoples' messes, and I don't want someone else cleaning up my messes, and I don't want to get into arguments about it. And they will happen, I know. They just do.

I guess part of my problem is that Duff and Ryan went to Graduate School and got single bedroom apartments; it felt like they were beginning their adult lives. TO me. Or something. There's something so nice about Yotom's studio or Christian's place; I have created a dream surrounding it that's hard to let go.

X. The campus is beautiful, old colonial brick buildings and lawns with big trees and a picturesque style. Everything tastefully arranged. The chapel is Rockefeller only bigger, and the Graduate College is BJ only nicer kept, the grounds are Snitchcock Quad without the divet and the concrete path. It's what we would build if we had unlimited money. I find out they have the largest endowment per student in the world and it doesn't surprise me. Everything here is well cared for, in a way that makes University of Chicago look old, dank, crumbling, or tacky. It's amazing. Almost unbelievable. But it is certainly for real.

XI. Chicago wants to make its undergraduates into graduate students; Princeton seems to want to turn its graduate students into undergraduates. They push heavily for graduate involvement in undergraduate student organizations. They create a new post: resident graduate student, who is simply a grad student living with undergrads and holding social events every couple weeks with no disciplinarian aspect to it. To me, it feels a little bit backwards.

XII. At dinner at a professor's house, we talk about hacks. A kid from MIT is there who was involved in a plan to steal the cannon from Caltech. They took it cross-country, put an MIT class ring around it, and replaced it right in time for Caltech's prospie weekend. I told a couple stories about Scav. The professor, not to be outdone, told a wonderful story. He used to be dean, and have an office overlooking Cannon Yard. He walked into his office and looked out of the window to see a huge hole in the ground and a pile of dirt. The cannon, having a history of forced transitions between Princeton and Rutgers, was liable to theft, and so had to be buried in the center of the quad. He called various administrators to tell them. They came down to the square and poked around, appalled, until the then-Dean noticed something else; the hole was off-center. Someone had dug a hole and, with the dirt, buried the cannon. They never figured out who did it.

And that's it for Princeton; Harvard and MIT are next so more on them next week.

Now for studying. So much to do!