tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-378777052024-03-14T01:17:08.846-05:00Fun in the MudBecause you might as well laugh.Chrishttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01020261975738573981noreply@blogger.comBlogger6125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-37877705.post-32526571000150653102008-02-08T13:33:00.000-05:002008-02-08T13:36:27.308-05:00Proof of Gender<o:p></o:p><span style=""> </span>My daughter gives me proof on almost a daily basis that she is, in fact, female.<span style=""> </span>Sure, she has all the important bits, her 'biddle biddle' as she calls it, though I swear this isn't my fault.<span style=""> </span>Nor is it my wife's; we actually have no idea where she got this from.<span style=""> </span>We were teaching her the proper name—vulva—which she also knows and uses, if somewhat infrequently, when she busted out with this alternative. <p class="MsoNormal"><span style=""> </span>No, even if I didn't change and bathe her on a regular basis there would still be no doubt in my mind that she is a girl.<span style=""> </span>You see, whenever I use the toilet to empty my bladder (another word she knows), there is always this little raw bundle of obsessive-compulsiveness lurking outside, and as soon as I vacate the premises she rushes in and <i style="">puts the toilet seat down</i>.<span style=""> </span><br /></p><p class="MsoNormal"> She also, in case there are any doubters out there, puts the lid down too.<span style=""> </span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style=""> </span>Now, let me be clear.<span style=""> </span>My daughter is only just now barely grasping the concept of putting pee-pee in the potty.<span style=""> </span>It was a major breakthrough last week when she, for the first time, communicated any sort of pressing need prior to the actual event.<span style=""> </span>In fact, until today, she primarily used one of those little potty chairs, so it's not like the fear of falling in the toilet could possibly be high on her list of worries.<span style=""> </span>So it is in despite of all these facts that she insists on the toilet seat being down.<span style=""> </span>Only a female is capable of this sort of behavior.<span style=""> </span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style=""> </span>It is, of course, obviously a genetic problem.<span style=""> </span>I'm not certain how this particular mutation was peed into the human gene pool, but it does go against the general observation that women are driven by the need to be in committed relationships.<span style=""> </span><a href="http://www.scq.ubc.ca/a-game-theoretic-approach-to-the-toilet-seat-problem-2/">It has been definitively demonstrated</a> that when a human male and female are sharing one toilet, they minimize toilet-based energy expenditure by leaving the toilet exactly as it is when they are finished with their business.<span style=""> </span>If it's up, leave it.<span style=""> </span>If it's down, leave it.<span style=""> </span>So, if a woman's genes are fine tuned for maximum efficiency in a mutualistic relationship with a man, then this sort of behavior should have been weeded out by old <st1:city st="on"><st1:place st="on">Darwin</st1:place></st1:City> generations ago.</p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style=""> </span>Granted, the energy expenditure by the woman does increase under this arrangement when compared to solitary living.<span style=""> </span>However, that is offset by the greater amount of energy saved by the male, which he is then free to expend in providing for her and her genetic investments: hunting, fighting off wild animals, setting new records on video games, etc.<span style=""> </span>So it is obvious that this is a self destructive female behavior.<span style=""> </span><span style=""> </span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style=""> </span>I've tried arguing this out with my wife, but you know how genes are. </p> <p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style=""> </span>Anyway, let this post serve as proof of my daughter's gender to any potential husbands out there.<span style=""> </span>It had better be good enough for you, too, because if you try any other method of verification before the wedding you'll find yourself in the middle of a scene reminiscent of Sweeny Todd, only it won't be meat pies on the menu.</p> <p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style=""> </span>It'll be <st1:place st="on"><st1:placename st="on">Rocky</st1:PlaceName> <st1:placetype st="on">Mountain</st1:PlaceType></st1:place> oysters.</p>Chrishttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01020261975738573981noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-37877705.post-10923600939929947482007-12-21T13:54:00.001-05:002007-12-21T13:55:07.731-05:00On attaining pre-pregnancy mass<p class="MsoNormal">Last week my wifelet made some homemade biscuits for my work X-mas party.<span style=""> </span>As she was pulling them out of the oven (at around 9:00pm) we had the following conversation:</p> <p class="MsoNormal">Wifelet: “Do you want one?”</p> <p class="MsoNormal">Me:<span style=""> </span>“They smell good, but I’m really not hungry.”</p> <p class="MsoNormal">Wifelet: “I know what you mean; my mouth says ‘yes,’ my stomach says ‘no,’ and my hips say ‘what are you thinking you crazy woman.’</p> <p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>Chrishttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01020261975738573981noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-37877705.post-83185532751191970372007-12-13T08:41:00.000-05:002007-12-13T08:49:02.878-05:00Secret SantaThis year my new lab-group has decided to do a Secret Santa gift exchange. Here's the letter that will accompany mine.<br /><p class="MsoNormal"><br /></p><p class="MsoNormal">Dear Paige:</p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style=""> </span>You know, it’s not easy being Santa.<span style=""> </span>Oh sure, everyone has this romantic image of what my life must be like, but let me tell you, it’s not all rosy-cheeked children and deep belly laughs.<span style=""> </span>No, it’s only like that on the bad days, the really bad days.<span style=""> </span>Those are the days spent being mobbed by packs of miserable, present-grubbing, budding materialists that clamor and mew, “I want this, I want that!” <span style=""> </span>I have to just sit there and smile until my thigh is a mass of bruises caused by obese six-year-olds bouncing up and down, demanding more video games to ensure that next year they’ll be even heavier.<span style=""> </span>And all the while it’s “Ho, ho, ho,” until my abs start cramping up.<span style=""> </span>Of course, the snotty-nosed vermin are always disease-ridden and I bring an average of three different viruses home with me each time that spend the next two weeks having a competition over which of them gets which part of my respiratory tract.<span style=""> </span>Oh yeah, let me tell you, romantic doesn’t begin to describe it.</p> <p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style=""> </span>I’m letting you know all this so you’ll know that I understand what you go through all the time.<span style=""> </span>People think that being a marine biologist is all about diving on coral reefs and playing with the dolphins.<span style=""> </span>Ha.<span style=""> </span>I’d like to see them try spending a 16hr day in glaring sun, wallowing in knee-deep mud, surrounded by the sweet smell of hydrogen sulfide while being assaulted by insectile monsters with large claws and a nasty attitude.<span style=""> </span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style=""> </span>That brings us to your present.<span style=""> </span>See, whenever I’ve had a particularly bad day, I come home, sit down in front of the fire with my special hot-chocolate (1 package Swiss-Miss; 1 cup warmed vodka, splash of peppermint schnapps), and read this book.<span style=""> </span>It always cheers me up because I figure that however bad my life is, it’s obviously nowhere near as bad as that of the bunnies.<span style=""> </span>Indeed, after the second mug, I like to make up stories that would explain what drove the bunnies to such extremities.<span style=""> </span>It makes me feel all warm inside.</p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style=""> </span>So, bottoms up!</p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style=""> </span>Santa</p> <p class="MsoNormal"><o:p><a href="http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0452285186/ref=cm_cr_pr_product_top"> The gift?</a><br /></o:p></p>Chrishttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01020261975738573981noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-37877705.post-43415785743975643912007-09-24T07:53:00.001-05:002007-09-26T07:43:13.293-05:00Ph.innaly D.one: Now New and ImprovedJust fyi, I managed to successfully defend the old dissertation on Friday. Now I just have to get the old thing into the proper format, have it printed, and turn it into the proper authorities. It all went fine and if you want to see pictures check out the <a href="http://carpematrem.wordpress.com/2007/09/22/pictures-2/">Wifelet's blog</a>. I would have, but she hogged the computer on Sunday and I was forced to set several new Mario Cart: Double Dash records on our Youth Ministers Gamecube.<br /><br />And now, because you know you want to read 229 pages about a small clam nobody but crabs like, you can download and read my dissertation following the link on the right. <br /><br />And because I know you need a real reason: it contains a beautiful picture of my wife (page iii), and another of my daughter (page 229).Chrishttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01020261975738573981noreply@blogger.com5tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-37877705.post-53500147977593397102007-09-24T07:51:00.000-05:002007-09-24T07:52:33.728-05:00Detergent<p class="MsoNormal">Ask me how detergent works.<span style=""> </span>No really, ask away.<span style=""> </span>I took organic chemistry; I can give you a coherent explanation involving hydrophilic heads and lipids.<span style=""> </span><span style=""> </span>My professors would be proud.<span style=""> </span>Now ask me why I don’t do the laundry.<span style=""> </span></p> <p class="MsoNormal">Wrong.<span style=""> </span>It’s not because I’m a slob, it’s because I’m married.</p> <p class="MsoNormal">And stop thinking I’m some sort of paternalistic oaf, who lounges on the couch in an undershirt drinking beer.<span style=""> </span>I’m usually wearing much less, and I prefer red wine or brandy, thank you.<span style=""> </span>I also do almost all the cooking.<span style=""> </span>And I clean the toilet.<span style=""> </span>Happy?<span style=""> </span></p> <p class="MsoNormal">Good.<span style=""> </span>Now back to the subject.<span style=""> </span>I used to do my laundry, about once a week, or whenever I ran out of the limiting reagent (told you my professors were proud), usually underwear.<span style=""> </span>I had a very simple method: I took my laundry bag, I tipped it upside down over the washer, I stuffed the clothes in, I added detergent, and I turned on the washer.<span style=""> </span>When they were clean I put them in the dryer.<span style=""> </span>When they were dry I folded them and put them away.<span style=""> </span>Life was simple and my clothes were clean.</p> <p class="MsoNormal">Then I got married.<span style=""> </span>Now, before I wedded, I had technically never, well, you know.<span style=""> </span>So there were many things about women that I was very unfamiliar with, and in particular I knew nothing about their clothes.<span style=""> </span>They are quite deceptive, I found.<span style=""> </span>Externally and functionally they greatly resembled my clothes, and I’ve never had any problems with operating them.<span style=""> </span>At least, I mean I’ve never had any problems getting them off and I assume they go on pretty much the same way, though I wouldn’t know personally.<span style=""> </span>There were a few extras to accommodate the various anatomical differences, and some hooky fastener thingies that I’d never seen before, but they were easy to figure out.<span style=""> </span></p> <p class="MsoNormal">It wasn’t until we had settled down that the trouble began.<span style=""> </span>It turns out that laundering woman’s clothes is more complicated than keeping tropical fish alive.<span style=""> </span>You practically have to keep a pH meter by the washing machine next to the mass spectrometer to monitor water quality.<span style=""> </span>I tried to do the laundry once.<span style=""> </span>It went something like this.</p> <p class="MsoNormal">Wife:<span style=""> </span>“Sweetie, why are you putting all the clothes in the washing machine?”</p> <p class="MsoNormal">Me:<span style=""> </span>“I’m just doing the laundry.”</p> <p class="MsoNormal">Wife:<span style=""> </span>“But you haven’t sorted the clothes.”</p> <p class="MsoNormal">Me:<span style=""> </span>“Sorted them?”</p> <p class="MsoNormal">Wife:<span style=""> </span>“You know, so the colors won’t run.”</p> <p class="MsoNormal">Me: <span style=""> </span>“Why? Are they scared of water?”</p> <p class="MsoNormal">Wife, busily unstuffing the washing machine: “And you can’t machine wash this,” as she holds up some random piece of clothing that looks exactly like all the other clothes, “or this, or this.”</p> <p class="MsoNormal">Me: “But,”</p> <p class="MsoNormal">Wife: “Is this the mat from the kitchen?”</p> <p class="MsoNormal">Me, happy to know the right answer:<span style=""> </span>“Why yes, we hadn’t washed it in a bit and I thought”</p> <p class="MsoNormal">Wife: “Why did you put in it with my delicates?”</p> <p class="MsoNormal">Me: “Your whats?”</p> <p class="MsoNormal">Wife: “Didn’t you read the tag?”</p> <p class="MsoNormal">Me: “Why?”</p> <p class="MsoNormal">Wife:<span style=""> </span>“It tells you how to properly wash it.”</p> <p class="MsoNormal">Me: “I thought it was just there to let you know which side goes in the back.”</p> <p class="MsoNormal">After this little episode there was a similar scene involving the dryer, and a debacle in which my briefs somehow ended up slightly pink.<span style=""> </span>My wife has done the laundry since.<span style=""> </span></p> <p class="MsoNormal">My question is simply this: How could pink dye be so scared of water that I would choose my briefs instead?”</p>Chrishttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01020261975738573981noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-37877705.post-73921878467211998552007-09-12T07:47:00.000-05:002007-09-12T12:44:04.122-05:00Worry Wart<p class="MsoNormal">“You seem very calm, aren’t you worried?”</p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style=""> </span></p> <p class="MsoNormal">D. spoke these words to me in the hallway just a few minutes ago.<span style=""> </span>D. is a very nice person, despite having a PhD and studying phytoplankton, who recently agreed to be the moderator of my dissertation defense.<span style=""> </span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal">Some readers may be unfamiliar with how people get PhDed, but it’s really very simple.<span style=""> </span>Think of it as a fraternity initiation rite that lasts for six years; if you make it through all the tasks you get to join the club.<span style=""> </span>The first task is to ‘Build the foundations of your knowledge with your own two hands’, aka, classes.<span style=""> </span>Although grad classes technically have people who teach them, these people would almost always rather be doing research and can get quite snippy if you don’t already know the answers to the questions.<span style=""> </span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal">After all, didn’t you do the reading?</p> <p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal">The task an initiate must next complete is the prospectus.<span style=""> </span>After the classes have clearly delineated the boundaries of human knowledge, the student must gaze into the limitless expanse of human ignorance and pluck from it a question, and then come up with a plan to get the Darkness of Ignorance to retreat a few more steps.<span style=""> </span>It must be feasible, but not so simplistic that you look like wuss.</p> <p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal">So chose, but chose wisely.</p> <p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal">Then comes the comprehensive exam.<span style=""> </span>These take on many forms, depending on the particular brand of sadism favored by the faculty at your school, but they almost always involve standing in front of your ‘committee’, a group of PhDs who are specially selected to ‘aid’ you in your quest, and answering questions about anything they care to ask.<span style=""> </span>It is not unheard of for candidates to faint afterwards.<span style=""> </span>Physical encounters are usually frowned upon; psychological torment is so much more subtle and elegant after all.<span style=""> </span>As an example, one of my committee members showed up to my exam bearing a Samoan war club.<span style=""> </span>It was a beautifully carved blade of tropical hardwood guaranteed, if used correctly, to cure any head ache.<span style=""> </span>It made a resonant thudding sound when he brought it crashing down on the table in front of him.<span style=""> </span>It will not surprise the reader that a moderator is also required at the comprehensive exam.<span style=""> </span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal">In my case, his job was to make sure the club was used solely for psychological purposes.</p> <p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal">Then you actually have to battle the Darkness of Ignorance.<span style=""> </span>If you had a good plan, AND you’re lucky, AND you have an advisor who actually gives you time to work on your own stuff, AND your committee doesn’t decide it didn’t like your first question after, AND substantial parts of your research aren’t destroyed by a hurricane named Isabelle, then this part should only last four or five years.<span style=""> </span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal">Ask me why my first-born daughter’s name isn’t Isabelle.<span style=""> </span>Go on, you know you’re dying to.</p> <p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal">Next you have to write about it.<span style=""> </span>You must chronicle your own epic story, and call it your dissertation.<span style=""> </span>Make sure it’s well written, because it going to be read by so many people you couldn’t count them on two hands.<span style=""> </span>No, between you, your advisor and half your committee, you’d only need one.<span style=""> </span>But darn it, if you’re going to wax poetic about genetic variability among populations of parasitic isopods (think ticks that eat fish, unless you’re eating lunch in which case try not to), then you’d might as well make it good poetry.<span style=""> </span>Never ask yourself why the exploits of other epic heroes were so fascinating that other people couldn’t help but write them down.</p> <p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal">Of course your mom will read it, if by ‘it’ you mean the abstract.</p> <p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal">If you think that should be enough you are, of course, wrong.<span style=""> </span>You may have bravely walked into the unknown and lit a tiny candle that illuminated something that no other human had ever seen.<span style=""> </span>You may have managed to produce six hundred pages of heroic couples describing the experience, but that won’t stop your committee from trying to blow your candle out and claim that it’s all a load of copepod fecal pellets.<span style=""> </span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal">No, the only thing preventing that is the fact that committee member number three happens to study copepod fecal pellets and thinks they are the greatest gift to humanity since gelatinous zooplankton.</p> <p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal">That is why they call it a defense.<span style=""> </span>It’s an all out intellectual battle between you and five octogenarians who have been in school since kindergarten.<span style=""> </span>All that’s at stake is six years of your life.<span style=""> </span>I’m not worried though, because I know I’m ready and I know that my dear moderator, D., will be there to make sure it’s a fair fight, and that’s all I need. </p> <p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal">Of course, she doesn’t know about the war club, but that’s her worry, not mine. </p> <p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>Chrishttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01020261975738573981noreply@blogger.com7