How to Fix a Phone, Science Nerd Style...

Pop it into the desiccator overnight:



A desiccator is a chamber hooked up to a vacuum line, and it has a drying agent in the bottom. So you turn on the vacuum to take all the air (and the moisture that comes with the atmosphere) out, and the drying agent grabs the remaining moisture.

This actually fixed my phone! It worked perfectly, I made calls and responded to texts, and everything.

Then, I went outside into the humidity, and all was lost. So I still need to drop $$ on a new phone. (Or I could only use the phone in November-February, when there is no moisture in the air anyway.)

Rats!

CSI: Laboratory Forensics

Whose bacteria could be contaminating your cultures? Oh, you have the DNA sequence? Oh, that's the DNA in the bacteria I was just using... shit.

DNA is as incriminating in laboratory contamination as it is on CSI.

(frown)

Scones, Attempt #1

Penance for turning off the shaker on X, so I made pennance-scones. (X was reluctant to specify a penance-baked-good-of-choice, so Y and Z (real names, no joke!) like scones. They were ok.

Baking! Yummy!



The aftermath:



Somehow, I didn't manage to take a picture of the scones themselves.

Next goal: make them whole wheat!

Massive Piles of Cars and Food

Transformers 3 is filming in Chicago:



Walked past the set on the way to Kuma's

(This burger is already partially eaten. So many leftovers!)

Watertower place

Ran around the city for little sister's 21st.

No luck getting into Inception.

Rainy Night, Rooftops

We went over to an acquaintance's for beer for her birthday, which was nice. The rooftop has a nice view of downtown, and a storm was rolling in. I was trying to get pictures of lightning, but the low cloudcover just made for really diffuse, lighter patches in the sky.

This is the view looking downtown:




Towards the west (looking out towards the burbs):




We went inside when my hair started standing up on end. Woah, building charge? As we were going back into the building, we passed a couple heading out to the roof. We told them that they should stay inside because there was lightning close enough to make my hair stand on end. They replied "well, that's why we are going out! We want to see!"

Darwin Award in the making...

Weird Dreams

1) I haven’t been sleeping much lately, so I’ve been too worn out to push nagging worries away. Today I am terrified that I am wasting my life. Although I love what I’m doing, I don’t know if I can do it forever. I feel compelled to somehow change the world for the better. I would love to make changes to science education in order to help people think through problems in a logical, evidence-based method. Use facts to investigate the world. “Better living through science!”  or something equally corny.

(The obvious flaw is, of course, that in the modern era, it’s really difficult to separate facts from lies. Sometimes it’s unclear when the news is news and when the news is entertainment, and everyone is constantly spinning facts in a neverending PR-battle.)

(Nonetheless, I think a lot of situations could be partly resolved if we all sat down for a second and evaluated our thoughts and behaviors logically. Yes, this is “the pot calling the kettle black.” You caught me, now enough with the attitude!)

This may be the only scheme that I can concoct to "improve" the world using my current skill set.

This is one of the things that sometimes keeps me up at night.


2) I’ve been having weird, vibrant dreams lately, and I haven’t been able to shake them once I woke up. After a little research, the symbolism is alarmingly obvious. Wow, subconscious, thanks for the kick in the butt...


3) Brains are bizarre and incredible.

Summer in Chicago

The weather in Chicago has been hot and sticky lately. It is so humid that walking more than a block outside leaves all your skin moist and uncomfortable. My walk to the lab where I work is a little over a mile, and frankly, I am starting to wonder why I bother to shower before I leave home, since I feel like I have just stepped out of the shower by the time I get to work. And don’t even get me started on my feelings about humidity and wavy/curly hair. Despite my best efforts, I have cultivated an intimidating, poodle-esque hairdo.
 

Fortunately, the sun sets eventually, and the lakefront breeze cools down the city a little. Our new home has a fantastic porch a little bit above street level. My roommate and I spent the night out on porch relaxing and lamenting the tribulations of graduate school.
 

Here’s our view. The people-watching is great here: there are all sorts of interesting characters in the city.

Bonus question: Can you find my roommate in the frame?
 

Bonus answer: Probably not. My camera took a hit (literally) at some point in the moving process, and the only way to adjust settings is to prod buttons indiscriminately until something happens. After that, editing on the computer has limitations. Hmmph. My roommate is on the far left, sitting on the ledge reading a book.
 

In other news, we are finally settling into our new home, or at least that’s what I’m going to tell myself. At the very least, the kitchen is cleaned and unpacked, which is really the most important part of the house anyway. The pets have acclimated to my room and are enjoying the extra attention from one of my roommates. More on that later.