At Last!

I have excellent news to report.

Eight months after I moved into the apartment, I have found my jar gripper-thingy. Hallelujah! Now I can open that apple sauce!

Oh, this is gonna be good...

Poor kid. I hope she got paid well for that photo. 

Thoughts on Passover.

I'm not participating in Passover this year, again. I've skipped it the last two years.

I feel pretty guilty, although there are some justifications. St. Louis is not exactly a hotbed of Jewish culture and Passover choices were extremely limited (matzah, gelfita fish, cookies and soup for the most part). I still feel like I should be doing it, although the recent trends in Passover-friendly food have felt like a commercialization of the holiday to me.

I don't know. Being honest with myself, I just don't want to go through the hassle. My diet is heavily carb based, and switching over to Passover is a major adjustment. Last time I did Passover in St. Louis I essentially ended up eating Matzah and cream cheese for lunch and Matzah Ball soup for dinner. That was about it. Given my dissatisfaction with Judaism in general, I'm not at all enthusiastic about participating in the holiday. So, I'm not going to. I do believe in observing religious dietary restrictions, but I'm not sure how that applies to me, since I'm not very religious. Does this make me a hypocrite?

A mild rant

I'm not really sure where to go with this, I put the Nernst equation
in there though. I'll think on it some more tomorrow, but let me know if
you guys have anything for me to chew on.
-One of my lab partners

Think on it tomorrow? Tomorrow?! the day it is due? AHHHHHHHH! Let me kill her, please? Please? She doesn't show up to the help session, she doesn't show up to the group meeting, she turns out a shit piece of work and she is going to finish it tomorrow!? We have had three bloody weeks to work on this assignment and it wasn't that hard!

At least we will turn this in tomorrow, for better or worse, and then I will never have to work with her ever again. I'm just going to go quietly seeth while re-writing my data analysis now.

Jefferson Revisit

I attended the Jefferson revisit today. It was pretty good, I liked the faculty I met, the campus is definitely the best one I have been accepted to and I really like the curriculum. I met some students, although there were definitely those awkward pauses after everyone has introduced themselves and no one knows what else to say. I also found out today that Tulane didn't offer me any money beyond loans. Given that their tuition is higher than Jefferson, I have eliminated them from my list. I also withdrew from Drexel, so it is down to Jefferson or Temple. Mom remains convinced that after I completely settle down and am established into a school, I will get pulled off the waitlist somewhere.

In other news, Oz fell into the tub. While there was water in it. The squirrel in the ceiling is currently driving all the cats nuts. Except for Kit, who has a shaved neck and looks goofy.

Mental Note:

McLeod AG, Shen AC, Campbell KP, Michalak M, Jorgensen AO.
Frog cardiac calsequestrin. Identification, characterization, and subcellular distribution in two structurally distinct regions of peripheral sarcoplasmic reticulum in frog ventricular myocardium.
Circ Res. 1991 Aug;69(2):344-59.

Race Results

Well, they posted the race results. I was 17th out of 117 women in the 20-24 age group, 59th out of 565 total women and 370 out of 1606 total finishers.

I am quite pleased.

Oh, the pain

Well, the marathon is over. The pain, however, will be around for quite some time to come. Besides the standard leg pain and stiffness, I also have abrasions on my ankle, armpit and breastbone. Minor ones, but a little shocking in the shower. I currently feel a bit ill, but this is familar from previous long runs in which I pushed my body too far. It should pass soon.

The race itself was cool. Hairy bunny boy got on my nerves, but it's no big deal. I just don't understand why someone would deliberately push their way in front of me and then invade my personal space. It's not like we were going anywhere quickly...took over a minute before the crowd thinned enough to even start jogging.

The first 13 miles went really well. I felt good, I was putting in 8:15-8:30 splits every mile. The weather was beautiful. Sunny, with a light breeze and 60-70 degrees. The breeze was just enough to feel good without hindering the run.

I started to slow down after the halfway point. Miles 13-20 were okay. I was probably doing a 9:00 pace, but it was tough to tell because the course got a little hilly. Not bad hills, but long inclines. I took advantage of all the water stations, although I skipped the gel. If you had seen the gel, you too would have skipped it. Maybe it's okay in little packages, but I have issues with scooping it off a tray. I did skip the little package station and the hard candy, but I'm still leary of running and eating.

Miles 20-26.2 were torture. God, I have never hurt that bad in a race. EVER. Not even when I split open my knee on that trail run. My legs felt really heavy and stiff. My pace dropped way down and I just suffered through the rest of it. Even when I started stopping and walking at the water stations, my legs still hurt. I never just gave up and walked, but it was tempting. I finished in 3 hours 57 minutes flat, which isn't bad. My goal was to finish under 4 hours, so I'm content.

Afterwards, I got my medal (big clunking Heavy thing. That thing has some heft. I was a little worried it was going to tip over my lap) and my "blanket" which is actually a large silverly piece of mylar. I was going to ditch it, but brought it home for the cat. If he doesn't like it, I'll drag it home on Wednesday and give it to Oz, who I know will like it. It crinkles and glitters, afterall.

The food spread was very decent. I got a cinnamon bagel, many, many cookies, string cheese, two bottles of water, a package of fig newtons, a granola bar and a package of pretzels. I also got a fallafl, feta, hummas wrap, but it wasn't very good. I don't think I like feta. Then I collapsed, instantly stiffened and got back up to walk it off. I signed up for the free massage, which I eventually got, although I had to wait over an hour for it. It felt wonderful though.

And now, I am debating what to do with the rest of the day. I need to finish reading Cell Bio. And read those articles on frog physiology. I should probably read the latest Endo too. So, basically I'm not moving. Ever again.

Telemarketers

I just hung up on that telemarketer. I feel a little bad, but not that bad. I told him, no thanks, I don't want a special visa card, but he just kept on going. So, I hung up, mid-spiel. I am really tired of telemarketers, I wish they would just leave me alone. I've gotten in the habit of telling them I am underage, which usually gets them to back off pretty quickly and politely. I wish I could just completely eliminate my landline, but I do need my internet connection.

Tomorrow is marathon day. I am very excited, even though picking up my registration stuff was a pain. I foolishly ignored local news and headed downtown yesterday - right into the Cardinals home season opener. Big mistake. I've come to the conclusion crowds bring out my surly, rude side. Especially when I have somewhere to be and everyone, their whiny three year old child and their slow mother-in-law is going in the opposite direction.

I have to leave at 5:35am tomorrow morning for the race, but it'll be cool. I noticed that about 1600 people had pre-registered for the marathon alone, so it should be quite the crowd. The weather is supposed to be nice, and I am looking forward to the race.

Things have been busy, and unfortunately, I don't see a break in the future. I go home next week for the Jefferson Second Look Weekend, and then I get to come home and finish off the final Q Phys lab report. The professor moved back the due date, but it just prolongs the agony in a way. The lab hasn't been too complicated so far and I'm planning on journeying down to the medical school library this afternoon, after I finish the first drafts of the methods and results sections. I guess I'd better get on with that.

Hold on...

My textbook is so cute when it tries to build a sense of drama...

Protein kinases catalyze the transfer of the gamma-phosphate from ATP (or rarely, GTP) to amino acid side chains of proteins. Most vertebrate protein kinases phosphorylate either serine or threonine. Other phosphorylate tyrosine. A few phosphorylate serine, threonine, and tyrosine.

Ooooh! And tyrosine! Some little kinase is working overtime...