Good news!

Ancient manuscript got accepted. GlamorMag manuscript has been resubmitted. I’m waaay internal on that one, but Crazy Man has been taking a very active role in the resubmission. Translation: he’s been talking to me about it nonstop for weeks. I’m sure we’re all super glad that’s done. Fingers crossed that it gets accepted. I’m optimistic.

We finally found a tiny, tiny difference in Duckling 2’s reagents. Today we find out if correcting that difference fixes everything. I’m also optimistic about that.

I’m still super optimistic about the grant related to Duckling 2's project. The grant based on the Golden Child’s project is out the door, but as I've said before, I don’t think there’s a chance in hell it gets funded. Ever. Grant number three is likely commencing this week. This one is based on Duckling 1’s project. I think it may be the most likely of this batch to get funded. I’m considering volunteering to take charge of this one as well, mostly because I think Crazy Man is completely burnt out, and I’m tired of hearing him whine and be pitiful.

I think other FGS has finally found a little motivation. We both have lots of bits and pieces of data about a certain protein and its regulation, all of which is sort of tangential to our other projects. I’ve been encouraging her to do a few more experiments and call it a co-first author. She needs a first author pub to defend (co-first counts), and I need to dump this data somewhere, so our powers combined and all that.

I also have some exciting experiments planned for this week. If I manage to pull out even a smidgen of data I’ll have something to write my meeting abstract around. I’m also getting a cool new reagent this afternoon. Hopefully I can do 3 quick experiments with that and finish out another first author paper. I think things are really starting to look up.

Updates

The crazy just keeps coming! Here’s my update on the things I had to get done in the next two weeks from my last post:

• Grant got out. I think it actually ended up being pretty darn good.
• I decided to table the meeting abstract until the late deadline. I won’t be eligible for a travel award, but I might still be mostly sane.
• Gave my talk and it went surprisingly well. Very poor faculty turnout though, which was kind of disappointing.
• Decided to put off committee meeting until I have a bit more data for the project I was originally planning on talking about, especially since Crazy Man hadn’t asked about it,
• Didn’t really generate new data for my talk. I ended up talking about a different project. But I did discover that I have some pretty cool data while putting my talk together. I actually made some summary figures that were pretty nice.
• Crazy stupid experiment hasn’t happened yet. I tried to optimize some conditions. Failed. Psycho Engineer is really trying to push forward the resubmission, which has turned into yet another epic battle of wills between him and Crazy Man. I just sit back and watch.
• I did manage to revise and resubmit Ancient Manuscript, resulting in a wonderful trip to Lush.

Of course, 25 new kinds of crazy have cropped up in the mean time, not the least of which being that I broke my shoulder. Doing any sort of bench work is a real pain when you can’t raise your arm more than, oh, say, 20 degrees to the front. A week after I slipped and face planted into the wall I can get my arm parallel to floor with only moderate pain. Doing lab work sucks. Physical therapy starts next week.

I think I’ve decided that Duckling 1 is not unteachable. Rather, I’ve come to the conclusion that she simply can’t multitask. At. All. As in, doing PCR to genotype 10 mice is a full day’s work. The sad part is I think she’s operating at full capacity. Since she’s new in the lab, her success rate as far as real experiments still isn’t very high, and Crazy Man is really pressuring her to generate all this data for this grant resubmission and she really doesn’t do well with pressure.

Speaking of Crazy Man, he has been in fine form lately. And he has decided that we’re submitting another grant on Monday, and the one related to Duckling 1’s project two weeks after that. The first one relates to Golden Child’s project and I firmly believe it will never, ever get funded. Period. I think the grant on Duckling 1’s project probably would do well if it had all the data he wanted. Too bad it doesn’t. And probably won’t unless I do all the experiments. Which isn’t fair to me or Duckling 1.

And now, me and my broke ass shoulder are going to attempt to do some science. By the way I do NOT recommend trying to do cell culture with your non-dominant hand.

RBOC

· Golden Child gave a talk today. It was pretty good (for him). He still said “um” an obscene number of times. Duckling 2 stopped counting 15 minutes and 200 ums in. I’ve decided that at his next practice talk, it’s a drinking game. Every time he ums, I drink.

· I am developing a terrible headache, which I really do not appreciate.

· In the next two weeks I…

o Have to finish writing a grant, that is clearly not Crazy Man’s top priority. (That’s another rant for another time.)

o Have to write an abstract for a meeting that I really, really, really want to go to, but don’t have any good data for the project I’d like to present.

o Have to put together and give a 30 minute talk.

o Have to have a committee meeting (although I’m thinking of putting this off at least a week or two.

o Oh yeah…have to generate some data for said 30 minute talk.

o Do crazy stupid experiment for resubmission of GlamorMag Manuscript with our collaborators. It’s not going to address the reviewer’s comment, even though it’s the experiment the reviewer suggested. The question is valid, but there’s really no way to address it. And definitely not this way. But nobody listens to me. Damn engineers! (And Crazy Man)

o Revise and resubmit Ancient Manuscript.

And that’s all in addition to my regularly scheduled experiments. Which are not going well. At all.

· I’m beginning to wonder if Duckling 1 is unteachable.

· A new batch (or 3) of a critical reagent for Duckling 2’s project no longer works. No differences between the batches by mass spec…sigh.

· Crazy Man needs to learn to not talk to me about signaling first thing in the morning.

· My department chair, who is also on my committee, informed Crazy Man that we should all show up for a faculty candidates seminar. He said he didn’t care if we slept; he just wants bodies in chairs. I’m told there will be food.

· I feel like a cow. I think it’s time to seriously start working out again and paying better attention to portion control. Maybe I should set some specific goals.

· I still haven’t blocked Other FGS’s baby blanket. The little one is only 4 months old. And it’s been done for weeks.

· I’ve been sitting here contemplating something positive to close with. Options are limited. I ate a really good apple today. Is that positive? Oh wait...my last post was about depression. I'm still doing better! That's positive! Not 100% good yet, but definitely getting better. So there! :)

Depression

Over the past few weeks (months?) I’ve been slowly becoming depressed again. I was aware of it this time, which is progress I suppose. I didn’t really do anything to try to stop it, but I did recognize it this time. Too bad that won’t spontaneously generate data for the seminar I have to give in three weeks.

Today was far and away the worst I’ve been. I didn’t want to move. I didn’t want to do anything. I didn’t even want to play mindless computer games, which is something I usually do a lot of when depressed. This attitude dragged on all day, but I did manage to get into lab for a few hours and actually accomplish some things. (I’m still working on a conversion factor for when Duckling 1 tells me how long something is going to take her. I think things take about 1.75x longer than she tells me. Which is about 15x longer than they would take me.)

After lab, TM had gone to the grocery store and I was sitting here grousing. I was eating some cheesecake in the hopes that would make me feel better, but even cheesecake wasn’t cutting it. I finally made up my mind that I was tired of this, and got up and worked out. Even though I may have yelled obscenities at the TV while I was working out, I do feel better. Not great yet, but better. And that has been enough of a spark to make me want to make an effort. The hopeless feeling has abated! And I’m going to Lush this week! Here’s hoping I’m on the upswing again.

RBO Crazy

Crazy Man sent me an email this morning:

1. Have you resubmitted your paper yet? (Um, no. Here’s the revisions…you said you wanted to see the final changes.)
2. Can you and Duckling 2 write a grant? Send it to me by Friday. (Wait…what??? Friday, as in the day after tomorrow Friday? As in I have to give a talk and be at a symposium all day on Thursday and you want me to write a grant and get it to you by Friday? Is there any wonder why I call him crazy man???)*
3. Duckling 1 said you’ve been helping her a lot with (technique she isn’t done with safety training for). Thanks for that. (Well WTF did you expect me to do? Even though she can’t close the refrigerator or find the chemicals on the alphabetized shelf…)**

* I do tend to binge-write much like I binge-read. I like to be thinking about things for a while and have a general outline and then just sit at home in my pajamas and write the whole thing in one fell swoop. Or maybe more like 3 days of that for an R01. I can handle an R21 or shorter private society grant in one day, which is what this one is. Last time I did this I condensed a 12-pager (that I wrote in one sitting) down to 5 pages and got it funded. J I’ve been thinking about this one a good bit, and honestly, I’m pretty excited about trying to crank it out and have it be really good just to freak out Crazy Man. I think he expected me to tell him he was crazy. I almost did. But I’d rather write a grant than practice the talk I’m giving tomorrow. I think I may be as crazy as he is.

** Duckling 1 is another story for another day.

Target fail!

I went to Target today to pick up a few necessities. (You know, like 3 different kinds of shampoo. Seriously.) I meandered back towards the Halloween stuff to look for some fangs to complete my costume(Vampire Pam!!). First I passed a row of Christmas cards. IT’T NOT EVEN OCTOBER YET!!! We haven’t even gotten out the Halloween decorations yet! But whatever…one aisle of cards. Next aisle: what remains of the clearance school supplies next to WREATHS! CHRISTMAS WREATHS! NEXT TO SCHOOL SUPPLIES. And the whole back wall was Christmas lights. Don’t get me wrong, I love Christmas, but seriously? It’s September. It’s not even really chilly yet. And what made me the maddest was that I couldn’t find any fangs. How can Target not have fangs for Halloween. Hmph. I was not pleased.

Oh glorious DivaCup!

mrswhatsit has an awesome post up about how much she loves her DivaCup. I too love love love love love my Diva. In fact, it may be the greatest thing ever! Check it out.