Tina and booze

*smile*

Comedy Central cowards

well this is complete bullshit. comedy central pulled the re-airing of the 'bloody mary' episode of southpark where the virgin mary bleeds out of her ass, but the pope determines it out of her cooch and so isn't a miracle since women do that all the time. they pulled it because some obscure religious people who believe in the fantasy of xianity complained to them. meanwhile southpark showcases regular hits against jews, gays, pedophiles, alcoholics, black people, all people, the government, culture, and even the planet routinely, but making fun of some crazy wackjobs who think mary appears to them in toast and makes her statues bleed is somehow not ok? whatever.

religious zealots are getting out of control. why can't the government sanction these religious zealots? they seem to hate the islamic ones, why don't they clamp down on the run away xians? ooohhh, right, because most of the asshats in the government are simpering weak-willed asshat xians themselves.
bastards.

South Park episode pulled after complaints

Panini maker!!

Mom sent one of those single size grills so I decided to try to make
panino with it. Challah, tomato, red onion, smoked turkey, muenster,
chipotle mayo, grill, eat!!
It smells soooo good and tastes 20 times better!
Thanks moms!

Chili!!

@ hard times in clarendon and was waiting for chili.....and it arrived!
Arr num num!

Irex iliad

http://www.irextechnologies.com/shop/products/iliad.htm

It looks very neat!! I hope its not vaporware and that that damn
flexible screen technology moves along so we can have a roll up version
in a decade. (*sigh* hopefully sooner, but the stupid united states
would have to get its head out of its ass and start behaving ethically
and in its citizens best interests.)

Ants in my pants!

I think I have an ant problem. I caught these just today. Is it wierd
that I can identify the different kinds?

holy fucking shit for brains

ok, for those of you who know me, bear this in mind when you pay me the compliment of 'oh, you're so bright!'.

i dutifully wrote notes in and addressed and mailed 26 holiday cards yesterday. and today i recieved 26 holiday cards!

i addressed them incorrectly and they all arrived at thier indicated destination, my house.

FUCKING STUPID!

i never use the physical mail system so i guess it's no wonder i don't know how to address an envelope. it's not like there is error checking and format control on a piece of paper.
but still, i feel SO dumb.

This years anti-xmas cards ;)

The old grannies are SO cool!

Saturday follow up

So I got the news yesterday that I'd failed numerical methods. I loaded
all the webpages in my 'jobs' category and spent 5hrs going thru them
all, updating my resumes, setting the alert frequency to daily, and
applying for jobs. I think I applied for 7 jobs, more than 3, less than
10.

So what are the ramifications of failing this class? Its a core course
so is necessary to pass before taking the comprehensive exam. No comps
mean no phd candidacy, which means no dissertation proposal, which means
no dissertation, which means no phd.

So, I can retake the class, but I don't think that will solve the
problem, just hearing the same bad lectures won't make me understand the
material more.
I could take more math classes to get up to speed with the concepts in
class but that would be overkill I think and also something I would hate
with all my heart.
I could decide that if I actually need to know mechanical and electrical
engineering for the bioinformatics program then its the wrong program
for me. (Yes, his lectures and text was mech/elec eng oriented, no trace
of meaningful biology at all)
Or I could say screw it and just keep taking classes that I thought were
interesting and actually get something out of the experience, if not a
phd. I figure my status would be changed if I chose to do that, I think
there's a specific registration slot for that.

So I don't know. I hope I can find a job so I can have financial
freedom again though have less free time for studying. But being able
to feel secure and chart my own course at my own pace would be nice. My
own pace is in reference to not taking 9 credits a semester and not
having to depend on financial aid to exist.

argh.

well 2 of my 3 grades are in and it's not good. i have an A- in biochemical systematics and a C in numerical methods. that's a show stopper. so i'm combing job sites once again to try to find jobs to apply for that i won't get any responses on.

wow, pandora rocks

Pandora is incredible. you put in the title of a group you like and it finds music similar to it and streams it to your computer. i've really been enjoying it for the last couple weeks. :)

numerical methods final

just emailed my numerical methods final to the professor. i wasn't able to do 1 of the 3 questions so the result isn't going to be good. i think i did answer the other 2 questions fully though. i don't think i'll pass the class by getting a 66 on the final though.

that's all i've done today. next i have a biochemical systematics exam to take at 7pm. that should be easier or at least more enjoyable as i'll have to find information on the spot but it'll all be biology related and so will be more understandable.

then tomorrow i just have to email my biostats final to the professor. oh, i also have to drive out to manassas to drop off the bonus question as it is hardcopy.

Carol flashes the shocker on SNL

I wonder if ppl other than us know about it? What's funier is to wonder
if the fcc watches for it.

shocker

Shocker 4 da psp crazy squirrel!

I love that sqirrel.

shocker

microarray trainer update

ken called back today and let me know they weren't interested, as i thought.

finals

today i'm working on my biostats final and listening to npr. also applied for a couple more jobs at TIGR and posted my resume to craigslist.

meanwhile, i had gotten a call yesterday from ken @ terrapin systems in md about the microarray trainer position i had had a phone interview about a few weeks ago. all he said in his vm was that he had news but he didn't sound upbeat so it's probably not the news i want. i called him back this morning around noon and left a vm for him.

i also called anna @ MSD on tuesday to check if NIAID had gotten back to her about my resume. she emailed and said not yet and she'd keep me posted. i'm a little disheartened by getting the email instead of a phonecall, it makes me think my resume isn't near the top of the list.

Excellent article on security

Its long but well worth reading for more than just the security
criticisms of the government. It talks about a great public alert
system in portland, oregon.

http://www.wired.com/wired/archive/13.12/warning.html

TDS r00lz!

Screw you, bush! Goddamn retarded monkey asshole.

saturdays joy

what did i do today? well i did my homework for chapter 11 biostatistics of course.

woops, look what we did.

CDC: Deadly bacterial illness appears to be spreading

hurricane 101 for the new decade

ok, i'm getting tired of hearing about all the new orleans news and whether they should rebuild it etc. a bad design is simply a bad design, why repeat it unless you are blind, dumb, and retarded?

i think these people have to face facts, hurricanes follow a decade spanning pattern of wax and wane. by all reports we are entering an intensification phase which means the intensity of the hurricanes will be greater if not the number of them. though as we saw this year we had to start over and are now at hurricane epsilon.

i've been wondering what is going to happen next year when another strong hurricane (and i think you can start calling them strong at category 3) hits new orleans relatively close or spot on. i wonder if people will learn that idiotic building on coastlines is not a pattern that can continue in the same way as in the past.

revolution of revolutions! you must adapt your building and location choices as the environment changes.

USA behind South Africa, how sad.

South Africa’s Highest Court Rules In Favor Of Marriage Equality

wouldn't it be nice if we lived in a 'democratic, universalistic, caring and aspirationally egalitarian society' too?

arab violations

um, wtf? lissen my A-rab bruthas, the last thing you wanna do is pump some homos fulla more testosterone.

Gay partygoers to receive hormone injections

but if you do, then i hope a convo i had with a friend earlier today comes true :)

myriadian (1:53:06 PM): http://news.yahoo.com/s/po/20051129/co_po/gaypartygoerstoreceivehormoneinjections
****** (1:56:37 PM): i read that eralier
****** (1:56:54 PM): won't that make them more horny?
myriadian (1:57:16 PM): heh, yup  they'll just have 'roid ragin homos on thier hands
****** (1:57:26 PM): lol
myriadian (1:57:48 PM): i wish we were really cool and could hulk out when we got really jacked up on T
****** (1:57:57 PM): lol
myriadian (1:58:31 PM): it would be AWESOME nightly news to see 'Hulked out Fairies flatten repressive town!'
****** (1:58:40 PM): lol

specialist update

i had the phone interview with the lady and was able to answer in the affirmative for all but 1 of her questions and she asked what my salary requirements were so i told her between 50-60K and it sounded like that was fine, so now she is going to pass my resume to thier client and see what happens.

so this would actually be a direct hire position with MSD and not a contracting job, which is great because it means i get employer benefits and wouldn't have to float them myself. MSD is a consulting company and the job would be located at NIH in bethesda, so that is who is going to look at my resume next. so here's hoping someone at nih doesn't nix my resume becaues he can't understand what is on it.

interesting update

so i emailed about that outreach and communication specialist position last night at 1:46am and when i woke up today at 930am i had a response from the lady and she asked when a good time was today to call for a phone interview, so i responded and said as soon as 11am and as late as 630pm.

so, woo :)

oh how interesting

so an advisor sent an email a bit ago for a job at MSD as an 'Outreach and Communication Specialist'. it sounds very interesting, a few highlights:

Generate all materials and documents required to effectively
communicate scientific IT and bioinformatics concepts and practices to
the NIH scientific community.
* Plan, prepare, edit, write, and disseminate newsletters, articles, and
other collateral pieces.
* Prepare and deliver presentations.
* Conduct seminars and workshops to advertise new programs
* Manage the content of both intranet and extranet Web sites. This
involves participating in the design of the Web site layout;
researching, writing, editing, and inputting Web content; and managing
content curation.
* Work collaboratively with software developers to communicate Web site
development requirements and expand and improve existing features and
functionality.
* Deliver strategic communication plans.

which sounds like things i would enjoy, i LOVE talking about science afterall. i'm going to apply when i get home tonight and can send my resume.

job hunt info

well in my flurry of job applications, or responding to job ads, maybe that's a semantic difference, it turns out i applied for a job as a network engineer for Vie de France. now if only i knew something about them. maybe they give bonuses in tarts!

biostat exam update

well i thought i had made headway on the last problem that i wasn't able to do but the email from my professor reveals that what i had done yesterday was wrong. i just can't generate the expected values for a table of frequencies for a normal distribution. i'm not sure why, as far as i know i've tried every command that should produce the right output and multiplied each commands output by various n's to try to get to the expected values in an example table problem from the book but none of the values match.

weekend update

well i applied for 4 or 5 jobs on friday and and also 4 or 5 last night, so we'll see what happens from that. i worked on my biostats exam and am nearly all done with it, i just need to hear back from the professor about a question i have with one of the questions. did my biostats homework yesterday as well.

now i just need to take the biostats final, numerical methods final, write a 20pg paper, and take the biochemical systematics final to finish the semester.

i'm tired.

Borat r00lz!

Sue me, 'Ali G' tells Kazakhstan

once again kazakhstan, i'm tellin' ya, i got some smokes and a fifth of JD in my pants, let's get it on!

borat has his own webpage, who knew?!

http://www.borat.kz/

and doing all this borat-loving reminded me of my favorite turkish love-god, mahir!!!!

http://www.ikissyou.org/

as much as i love xians....

i just can't resist posting the link to the tivocommunity discussion of the trading spouses episode where the xian lady completely blows up and goes wacko.

She's not a CHRISTIAN- AAAAAAA

this woman sums up exactly what xians are all about.

@ school reading biostats

reading chapter10 in biostats in preparation to doing the homework this coming week. tonight in class we have a quiz on chap9, and we listen to chap11 lecture. so for next tuesday i have to finish a takehome exam and chap10 homework. i think tomorrow i'll come to campus and try to get the exam done completely and then work on the homework thursday or friday or over the weekend.

luckily i don't have any homework in numerical methods. i do, however, need to start working on the 20pg paper that is due by the end of the semester in biochemical systematics. i have all the material and gave my presentation on it a couple weeks ago so i just need to sit down and write it, which will be easy, just a time soaker.

having a coffee from the cafeteria now and taking a break after reading 17pgs in biostats, 43pgs still ahead of me and slightly less than 3hrs to go.

i'm feeling ok, the right side of my head feels the way it usually does, as though my sinuses are blocked and my right ear always has a change in pressure when i breath thru my nose , i hate that.

it's cold here in va now, only into the 50's today and dipping into the 30's at night to give a little bit of frost in the early morning.

penn jillette on 'this i believe'

so i was driving to campus today to finish a take home exam i had gotten on friday and was due today, and on my way i was listening to npr and heard the 'this i believe' segment and was delighted to hear that it was done by penn jillette. i was even more thrilled when he turned the segment on it's ear by saying simply, 'i believe there is no god.' YES! then going on to explain how it is far supierior to not believe in imaginary friends than to rely on them.

There is No God

job news

i had the 1030am phone interview with the hiring manager at terrapin systems for the microarray trainer position. i don't think it went well. she seemed to imply that my being in school would be a problem.

i don't understand what is up with these so-called employers. how can they think that i am an unattractive candidate compared to someone who isn't trying to better himself?

kazakh tyrrany!!

Kazakhstan threatens to sue comedian

hey kazakhstan, if i told ya i had smokes and a fifth of JD in my pants, would ya blow me?

holy wow!

holy batshit insane, batman!

'Cool mom' gets 30 years for sex parties

i don't really care that she had sex with high school boys (minors), what shocks me is her 'reason', she never fit in in high school (that would be about 25yrs ago) and she was starting to feel like she was fitting in.
now.
that she.
was boning.
hot jock-bod high school boys.
riding the piston.
like a 15yo.
girl cumdump.

GO MOM!

wow

wow, yeah, i'm feeling a big wave of depression. maybe it's more like moroseness. i put on HHUK and they are playing a hot remix of some song that goes 'bang bang, my baby shot me down', i think it's from the kill bill movies, but it is sapping my will to live.

creepy feeling

no news today, just a creepy feeling after i arrived in manassas and was getting a coffee. i was looking around at the sky and the trees with the wind in them and just felt creepy.

i also am not feeling great in general. i didn't sleep well last night at all, i had dreams that were like my waking life and i kept waking up from them, which was confusing. plus i couldn't fall asleep each time very easily.
my lunch isn't sitting very well with me either, i'm not sure why.

but yay, 1030am tomorrow is the phone interview.

tonight is biostats so i'm hoping to read chapter 9 which is the homework i have to do this week, and take the chapter 8 quiz which is what's being given today, and we listen to the chapter 10 lecture today.

numerical methods is having an exam this weekend, it's going to be posted about midday on friday and we have all weekend to work on it so hopefully i can do better on it than the previous exam. i also have a programming homework to finish for this class that is due on monday, the same day the exam is due.

i'm hoping today to read chap9 for biostats, have the phone interview 1030am tomorrow, then do the biostats chap9 homework for the rest of the day, then do the numerical methods homework on thursday, so i'm ready and free to take the exam over the weekend with nothing else to work on.

job news update and other minutae

i had talked with the guy from terrapin systems about the microarray trainer position on friday i think and as i was driving to school today he called back and tentatively set up a time for a phone interview with the hiring manager. well just as i sat down to make this entry he called back and confirmed the 1030am wednesday phone interview.

everyone will be glad to hear that thru rigorous training and substantial effort i was able to defeat the sugarman today in act3 of xmen legends 2. it was quite satisfying.

job news

talked with a guy from uspto today and he seemed to not like that i was in school, he cautioned me alot about how much work it is to get up to speed and offered the advice that i may want to re-organize my school plans.

it's strange but being in the PhD program has come up more than once as i've talked with potential employers as a negative. i don't understand why though but it feels unfair.

but, that may not be a problem if i fail numerical methods this semester. if that happens then i won't be in the program next semester most likely.

so we'll see.

Job news addendum

Called the uspto back and left a vmail with the guy to call this
afternoon or another day.

job news

so tuesday i spent a couple hours poking around monster, craigslist, and washingtonpost and applied for a few jobs. i got a call yesterday afternoon from terrapin systems about the microarray trainer position i had applied for. i returned the guys call today and he didn't know what kind of microarrays i'd be training on but the position trains gov employees on how to use the micro arrays. easy. so i forwarded him my word format resume as requested and the next step would be a phone interview with the hiring manager and then if that goes well an in-person interview.

meanwhile the uspto called back finally so i have to return that guys phone call today as well.

i forwarded the email from the recruiter for the job in long beach california to another grad student who has benchtop experience just so he has the guys name when he starts to be interested in looking for a job.

the acc attention from my monster resume seems to be over now so that was a non-starter.

and i just got an email from a synerfac recruiter about a qc job in mclean va. it sounds like i'd be designing and ts'ing assays. i'm not sure that's anything i'd actually be interested in.

did i mention...

how much i hate being in class right now? you can imagine when this started, but i hate being in class now. i hate looking at my professors and i especially hate when they look at me. when we make eye contact i have a physical sense of revulsion. i don't want to be there. but i do want the information, so if it was a remote class or televised then i'd watch it.

it would be cool if i could attend class as an avatar. i think i'd pick a bouncing sputtering ball of flame for some reason.

i wonder if..

well i spent the last 2hrs looking thru jobs at monster.com and craigslist.org and applied for a few at monster. i wonder if i should try to find companies that are aiming for what i think is going to be really important in the future, namely pharmacogenomic products. the only problem is, if it's hard to find companies that need bioinformatic scientists, i think it'll be nearly impossible to find companies that are involved in pharmacogenomics explicitly.

of course there's also annotation and drug discovery from deep sea creatures. i think this is going to be huge in the next 10yrs because these things thrive under such foreign conditions thier proteins will be very unique. now whether we can adapt them to make them useful and non-toxic is all part of the trick.

i wonder if i could join a sequencing project somewhere? hm...

why on earth?

so i had been contacted by the american college of cardiology about a senior specialist position they thought i'd be a good fit for, after playing phone tag with the lady for a couple days i finally got in touch with her today and we had a short conversation which ended with 'well, good luck looking for other jobs.'

the biotechnology patent examiner group hasn't called me back since i left a vmail with the guy that had called me about it last week.

i really don't understand why it's so hard to recognize that i'm completely capable of doing whatever these ppl think is a job. i'm not a one trick pony, i can do alot of different things pretty well and would develop depth and breadth at whatever job i happened to have. so wtf? why aren't i employed?

who's the asstard now?

so i thought i was at least kind of joking when i'd said to my prof that i'd been busy the last 2 weeks failing my 2 exams and that was why i hadn't gotten a figure done that he asked me for 2 weeks ago. i say only partially kidding because i knew by then that i'd gotten a 55 on my numerical methods midterm. well i found out tonight that i got a 50 on my biostatistics midterm. so now i've actually failed 2 exams, not barely scrape by, or do modestly well, but flat-out fail.

so what do i do? i don't know. i guess the patent examiner job is looking better and better. just fade into mediocrity with nothing more to show for my time and money spent in grad school than a boring job and a stale suburban life.

fuck.

A test of me

Merged blogs.

school update

right. so for those of you wondering, school isn't going very well for me at all this semester. whether that's reality or my perception or both, it doesn't matter. i'm stressed the hell out.

USPTO followup

well, today i get a call from a guy saying he would like to talk to me about a patent examiner job and offered today because they are having interviews today. i called him back and left a message and let him know i'd be around for another half hour and then am going to campus but the rest of the week is open for me.

so we'll see, i still don't really know anything about the job or if it'd be interesting but even if it's just tolerable it should be a good salary and let me survive for the rest of the time i'm in school.

WTF USPTO!?

so, i don't know why my life sucks. i was supposed to have an interview on friday as a biomedical patent examiner, thier website had accepted my application just fine. but today i get a vmail that they are cancelling my appt because my BS in microbiology doesn't qualify for the position. WHAT THE FUCK ABOUT MY MS IN BIOINFORMATICS?!

so i call the lady back and point out my MS and she's all shocked and surprised, fucking retarded bitch government worker. but all she can do is say some other office will have to call me and see if an MS in bioinformatics is right for the biomedical patent examiner position, because they want 'biomedical engineering degrees', so i ask what type of degrees those would be? she, oddly, didn't know.

so wtf? i'm waiting for some faceless government drones to call me back to tell me some shit that won't make any sense and apparently my friday will be free, i guess i'll go frolick in the sun in my poorness.

Initial posting

yo! just created my blogger account.