Wailings from a former WEHI Princess
It's day 11 here at work and I finally got into the lab.. And I managed to put my lab coat on the right way round... Don't laugh! At WEHI we had reverse gowns that did up at the back, and here they have the more usual front buttoning lab coat type.. and it is amazing how automatic the action of putting on your lab coat can be, and how stupid you look as a new post-doc in the lab putting your coat on backward!
I then embarked on my
Leishmania adventure.
I had to make up my own media! Shock, horror!There isn't a huge bountiful fridge of solutions made up by a team of hard working media preparation staff here. Unbelievable! And did you know.. media is made up from powder! And you have to pH balance it, and then add lots of goodies, like serum and antibiotics and amino acids. Amazing! It was kinda fun, I guess.. but i think the novelty will wear off very soon!!
And don't get me started on office life outside the lab...
Firstly, there are no tea ladies. This was to be expected. However, there is no tea room. There is a place to make tea, as long as you bring your own tea, milk and mug... which is to be expected.. but there is no where to sit and drink said tea once it is made. Except in your office in front of your computer.. Hmmm... maybe they're trying to tell us something.
Secondly, the stationary cupboard is not the size of a walk-in wardrobe. And I had to buy my own tissues. Luckily I had an array of highlighter pens shipped over, and so I can adorn text with purple, pink, green blue or yellow as the situation requires.
Thirdly, they haven't heard of chocolate biscuit friday here..
I knew I was spoilt at WEHI, I really did. And I knew it would be different when I was here. And I even knew that there wouldn't be tea ladies and i'd have to wash my own cups and make up my own media. But knowing in your head is different to knowing in your heart.
Betty and Madu, I salute you.
My Weekend - By Dr Krystal
When you are a grown-up and have a real job you are allowed to have two free days for every five days that you work. Unless you are a PhD student. Then you either have no free days, or three-to-four free days depending on your work ethic. But I digress. Some weekends you are allowed to have three free days. In the UK, these are called Bank Holidays. Apparently when the banks go on holidays everyone else does too. This suits me just fine. This weekend was a Bank Holiday weekend. This suits me just fine, (again).
On the weekend I had fun. On friday I went to see X-men 3 with some people from work. As an action film I gave it 6 out of 10. As a general film, I gave it 4. I think I am generous. I tried to forget I was scientist when they discovered an antibody that reverses genetic mutations in an instant. *giggle*
On saturday I acquainted myself with my new city. It is strange to call York a city when it is so small. I would call it a town. But history says it is a city. And it has a lot of history. So I won't argue. I walked around and got nice and lost on purpose so i could find my way back again. This was not difficult as York is not a big city. I would call it a town, (again). I felt like I was in a story book, identifying everything as i went: "There is the bookshop" "There is the teashop" "Here is a hardware store" "Here is a florist" "This is a red car" etc.. "This is a 14th Century house" "This is an ancient medieval cathedral" "This is a viking excavation site" Ok, so this game is a bit fun when played in York! I bought some boring things that i needed (coat hangers and dish racks) and some things that I wanted (memory card reader and a smoothie).
And then I bought some shoes. I have been in York for less than two weeks without buying shoes, and I only bought five pairs with me on the plane and that includes slippers and runners and the rest of my shoes haven't been shipped from home yet and really truly i needed these ones because i haven't got a pair of practical sensible black shoes for work and these ones are very practical and very sensible and very black and only slightly fun as they are mary-janes and i like them.
*deep breath in*
On sunday I went to a birthday party of a work colleague at her new house in Southbank, a suburb of York. Her house is really nice, and very cute. Most houses in England are very cute. I saw streets and streets with rows and rows of attached houses, and their chimney pots all lined up and make a really cute skyline. At the party I drank some Australian wine I have never heard of. I realised that Australia exports a lot of wine that Australians have never heard of. And when I tasted it, I realised why Australia exports a lot of wine from Australia that Australians have never heard of. Kind of like Fosters. This is my "How to tell if someone is a real Australian" test. Offer them a Fosters. If they say no, they are a true Australian. There are a lot of pubs in England with Fosters on tap, and I say no every time. I am a true Australian.
Today is Bank Holiday Monday. I am at work. I am working on a fellowship application. Ok, I am writing emails and posting on my blog and reading articles online. I don't have internet access from home at the moment. But perhaps I will soon. And perhaps I will be working on a fellowship application soon. I hope.
And so I had a good weekend.
The end.
Evolutionary Theory
Ahem!
'Zis is my theory !
PMT is punishment for not being pregnant.
Disclaimer: This theory is not based on any of my own personal research. I am not an evolutionary biologist. I am not a hormone expert. I am not an MD, I am a real doctor with a PhD. So this is merely backyard fireside hypothesising at it's best...
PMT, or PMS or whatever term you want to give to the irrationality that occurs just prior to getting your period, is real. And I will provide no evidence for it but this: I can put a big red square around two days of every month on the calendar and on those days I will be highly susceptible to depression, anxiety and crying at meg ryan films. Most other days I am fine. On red quare days I have banned myself from making any life changing decisions - no break ups, no haircuts, no quitting, no sweeping generalisations about the state of my career or my relationships. I have even gone to the extent of officially notifying my loved ones, so that they can protect me (and themselves) from me on these days. And it works. As soon as I can attribute my feelings of unhappiness to a chemical imbalance in my bloodstream, rather than anything dramatically wrong with my life, I usually regain perspective.
So, why do women feel this way? If this is a biological pathway, surely it has been tried and tested over millennia with selective pressure applied. If we still have it, at one stage it must have been considered useful or beneficial, otherwise it would have been looped out of the genome. Ok, maybe it's not quite as simple as that, but for the sake of my ranting, lets continue.
So i was thinking.. If you take the purely evolutionary view that we are put on earth to pass on our genes to ensure the survival of the species, consider -
1) Being pregnant is good.
2) Not being pregnant is bad.
3) If you are menstruating, this is a sign that you are not pregnant.
4) See (2)
So perhaps the feelings of depression and sadness just before getting your period are your genes telling you that you should have gotten yourself knocked up by now...
Yeah, i know... lucky for me I'm an immunologist huh ?
Confession
I am addicted to UK Big Brother.
I still call Australia home
I got a care package!! Girl, you are the best !!
*huge hugs*
The postman arrived at 7:30 am and the box was from the Australian Store in London! I was SO excited... Inside was a treasure trove of tim tams, iced vovos, vegemite, milo, violet crumble and aeroplane jelly crystals!!! I may just have to become a regular customer... imagine all the twisties, cheezels, cheds and chocloate teddies!!!
An ode to Whitby
mushy peas
vibrant green coating the thick fat
logs of fried potato
cod
crispy filigree batter curls
soft white melting flesh
history
breathtaking ancient stones
belt buckles of centuries ago
beach
melancholy grey in rain
infinite blue in sun
Whitby
a jigsaw puzzle town
Soaking in the zeitgeist
I am absorbing and in some cases, actively consuming, much of the
zeitgeist here.
The word "the" is missing. Some Yorkshire man has swallowed it and won't give it back. Everyone "goes down pub" or "was late because i missed train" and "took dog walk". I am sure I will have an accent within a fortnight, but i really want to keep "the". It's such a handy word.
Chavs are the UK equivalent of Australian bogans. The most well known chav on TV is the "yeah, but no, but yeah" character
Vicky from Little Britain. I am not a chav.
Emos are not UK specific, but there are LOTS of them here.
Emo is originally short for "emotional" and has evolved into a sensitive new age punk/rock/goth kind of style. Or at least that is my take on the term. I have a strange fondness for emos. Perhaps it is nostalgic, as i am sure that when i was 18 i wanted to be one but they didn't exist then, at least not in the consumer format. I envy all the red stripey tops and cool lace trimmed black skirts. However, i do not wish to be an emo in my late 20's, that would be weird. Emo is a kiddy label ;)
I arrived at a fortuitous time for football in Europe. They do mean soccer, of course... I checked. In the space of one week i have watched the FA cup final and the European Champions League final. I now know that football is really all about
singing. Some teams have adopted songs that having nothing to do with football, for example Liverpool fans were singing "You'll never walk alone" during their victorious FA cup final game last weekend. Some are very simple and often obscene chants.. and some are re-worked lyrics to well known pop songs.. It was most amusing to hear the Pet Shop Boys "Go West, Life is peaceful there" tune with the lyrics "One-Nil, To the Arsenal", which was being sung quite loudly at the pub just prior to arsenal's loss to Barca in the European Championships.
Oh no. I've just spent a whole paragraph talking about football. I am doomed. And the world cup is just around the corner... right, moving on.
Fair trade products are highly prevalent in supermarkets and retail outlets. I am hopelessly addicted to the
Divine line of fair trade chocolate, the 70% dark chocolate is simply scrumptious. Fair trade tea, coffee, orange juice and snackbars are all available at the cafeteria at uni where I eat lunch. I've even seen fair trade beer and wine in the shops. I approve whole heartedly.
This heightened consumer awareness has also led to a proliferation of widely available organic food. Sainsbury's, a large supermarket chain, has it's own
organic in-house label, and products are rather reasonably priced and delicious. I consumed an entire tub of Sainsbury's Organic Hommus within 24 hours of opening it - but hey! - that's what it says to do on the packaging! I am just following instructions i swear!
Levels of technology usage are high here, many houses have wireless internet and online services are well developed. In fact, I just did all my shopping to set my house up online using
Argos. I bought pillows, quilt, sheets, towels, bathmat, lamps, laundry basket, storage units, bedside table, toaster, and a sandwich maker all in one go and had it all delivered to my house this morning. Easy. And online grocery shopping is quite standard and I think i will use it from now on.
This is day 7 in the UK, and I am starting to feel at home.
On the other side of the world..
I live within the walls of the city.. check out this
map, the arrow points to my place!
My street name is Walmgate, and there are many other similarly named streets within the town.. among them: Stonegate, Coppergate, Gillygate and my personal favourite,
Whip-ma-whop-ma-gate. Contrary to popular belief "gate" doesn't mean a gate where you enter or exit, as it is from the Viking word "gata" meaning street. The actual entrances and exits to the city through the walls are not called gates at all, but "Bars". I walk through Walmgate Bar on my way to work each morning.. but I have never seen anyone serving drinks..
So gates are streets and bars are gates.. confused yet? It gets worse...
The shop names here are equally confounding.. "Office" sells shoes, whereas "Boots" is a chemist. "Selfridges" has nothing to do with whitegoods, it's a department store as is "Woolworths" which is not a supermarket. I live near a "MacDonalds" which sells furniture. Go figure.
To further highlight shopping confusion, the Brits still use 1 and 2 pence coins. So buying something for 88p can require up to six different sized and shaped metal pieces *sigh*
Not that I'm complaining mind you, it's a very lovely and beautiful place, steeped in history and all that other pamphlet propaganda... but it really is the other side of the world.
Co-incidence? I think not!
The Scene: Dr. Krystal enters her new apartment.The
Tim Burton movie posters plastered on the lounge room walls instantly catch her eye... she scans the bookcase, a mixture of
fantasy,
fairytales,
historical fiction and
slightly feminist literature. Uncertain, she moves toward the CD rack.. radiohead, gomez, eels, mixed with musical soundtracks.. Confused, she opens the Dvd cabinet....
forgien arthouse,
charlie kaufman screenplays,
kevin spacey films...
Enter the housemate: Funky brunette haircut, eviable knee length skirt, shiny appendage piercings...
Snippets of conversation include:
"The Princess Bride is my favourite movie!" "No, The Princess Bride is my favourite movie"
"But really, I love Johnny Depp!" "No, I love Johnny Depp"
"I have to confess that deep down i'm a bit of a geek" "No really, I am!"
Will like attract like? Or repel ?
Stay tuned...
Time passes. Listen. Time passes
The Readers' Digest version of the past two months:
SCA Festival: Medieval feasting, wenching, fighting
PhD Graduation: Foofy velvet hats, lots of photos, flowers and friends
Visitors: Mum, Sister #2, Sister #4, good times
Love affair: Intense, beautiful, heart-breaking
Purple Turtle Party: tiaras, snorkels, 80's dancing, goodbyes
Packing: Hopeless, Helpless, Useless
Airport Goodbyes: More tiaras, crying and champagne
More Airport Goodbyes: More tiaras, crying and coffee
Aeroplane: Fluffy pink pyjamas, hot slop, slept a lot.
And here I am in the UK !
