Nice weekend, Finally

So we finally had our first summer-esque weekend and y parents were visiting!  Coincidence? I think not.  My DeeDa and I hauled a ton of debris (actually technically more then that according to the dump scales) to the dump.  We banished the peach trimmings, raised bed garden, rebar, broken shelves, broken table, old couch and chairs as well as other misc. lumber to the abyss.  Then we played with Danny's baby Chantelle, who is 11 days Oscars junior and it was funny to watch the difference.  Oscar was into running through the grass solo and Chantelle was all about the swing set, which Oscar traditionally is very suspicious of. We then went home for a nap, beer, pizza and sun bathing on our new picnic style bench.  We had so much fun relaxing for once we forgot to take many photos so here are a few misc ones from the last two weeks.

Obligatory Cat Pics.

Obligatory Garden Pics.

New bench in the shade.

He is finally old enough to start helping out around here.  Also note his super fly toga/unbuttoned one-zie

science thursday

I got the plague last weekend after all. Now we're all better! We have a new sofa, clean carpets, and lots of pictures for you!

I realized, again, this week while I was dithering about trying an important experiment, that the point of most important experiments is that you genuinely don't know the outcome. You think and hope that it will go one way, but you don't know! It's why you have to do the experiment! But for many experiments in molecular biology, the techniques are routine. If you want to clone a gene, and you know anything about the gene, the tools and methods are all standardized and you should be able to just make it happen. The hard part is moving beyond the routine data-collection and DNA manipulation to try something new that will expand the field.

It reminds me of when I was little and had long hair. I was very good at brushing the front bits that I could see and that had no knots in them. The back, though, was a territory I did not like to venture into!

It's hard to do the big experiments, too, because they are often expensive or involve some precious reagent. So if your protocol doesn't yield the answer you hope for, and you want to try again by varying the protocol a little bit, well, you might be out of luck. My instinct becomes waiting to see if the protocol will work perfectly, and then try the big experiment - which means it just takes forever for me to get around to doing it! In other words, the front bits of my hair are always very thoroughly detangled.

We'll see tomorrow how the experiment goes - until then here are some photos:

Oscar takes after his da in many ways, but up until now he hasn't been too keen on hats. The problem, it seems, is that he can't put them on his head himself. But this hat he figured out the trick to, and it made him very happy to put it on and take it off again!

Oscar is almost able to appreciate pictures of himself. While Eric was cleaning the carpets this weekend I entertained the boy by taking videos of him and playing them back. He watched them with fierce concentration, but only mimicked himself when he was doing something wicked like blowing raspberries.

Our new sofa, in its closed conformation. We laid on the bed last night and watched Columbo. It was extremely comfortable, once we got the plastic off the mattress. I was tempted to leave it on for all time (permanently free of cat hair!) but comfort won out almost instantly.

Look at him handling that banana all by himself! He's almost a pro! He's still working on learning how to manage the peel. He often licks it, and makes a terrible face. (Can you imagine being a professional banana-eater? -- Never speak of this.)

More! All Done!

Convinced? It's not a perfect system, because he signs "more" whenever he sees a banana. Or, who knows, maybe he loves bananas that much!

a plague on both your parents!

Oscar has given Eric the plague, so Oscar now feels perfectly happy and Eric is miserable. I'm holding out so far.
On Friday Oscar went in for his checkup. 27 pounds, 33.5 inches. That is, he's almost 3 feet tall! He's exactly half as tall as me! He's at the top of the charts for both stats, too.

Daffodils have started blooming, and some other pretty blue flowers (not squill) that I got on a whim in the fall. I have no clue what they are, except pretty. There's one lonely hot pink tulip getting ready to open too. The daylilies are emerging, as are the peonies and the beebalm. All the roses are making leaves, even the one we transplanted from the side of the house to the side of the shed, which seemed like it kind of wanted to die after that. I saw one little hint of a leaf on the peach tree today, so of course the forecast is for snow this weekend.

Eric's bonsai is really happy all of a sudden!

I made a lemon Bundt cake this weekend - it's almost gone now. Eric pretends this isn't cake, so at least I didn't eat it all by myself. It is full of lemon essence. Here is the recipe.

Oscar is a thrill-seeker and a nut-job.

What's new, hmmm?

What's new, hmmm?

Last Friday I got 3 liters of liquid nitrogen for freezing my Arabidopsis samples. I collected the samples and froze them, and they came with me in the liquid nitrogen dewar to Plant SuperGroup. Then me and my buddies went all the way across campus to the freeze-dryer and they started drying out. This operation made me and Eric late to pick up Oscar. Fortunately, we had a dewar full of liquid nitrogen to share! Becky and Lindsay and Rachel got to try freezing candy instantly, and then waited for it to thaw before they ate it. They also froze a hot dog and smashed it to bits on the deck. Unfortunately, Becky's siliconized tongs they were using to hold the hot dog smashed to bits also. Oh, well. We'll get her a replacement. Then Eric took the rest of the liquid and dumped it in the gravel pit. A thick fog spread over the ground, and we got out of there!

I took a writing class this semester, in anticipation of being asked to be a TA for a new upper-division undergraduate class incorporating lots of writing. And I will be that TA! We were doubtful that the instructional committee would permit this particular class, Plant Physiology, to have the intensive-writing section (a Capstone course), but they have decided to allow it after all. I will get some summer salary to help with the curriculum design, and next spring presumably I will get to teach it. This may be the last semester I TA Cell Biology...

Eric is learning all about radiolabeling plants and tracing the radioactivity. He's hot! (Or he will be if he's not careful.)

Finally, we have not imaged Oscar lately, we're sorely behind in our data collection on that front, but here is a picture of me with a Punjar (Swedish jackhammer), from when I was in ACE. That thing doesn't mess around!

This is the most uplifting video ever

Eric playing banjo - in his dreams

hoo boy

So last weekend was epic, because we had brunch at our house and our friends came over and we all had a good time. We made sour cream chicken enchiladas, which were delicious but underfilled. I also made an excellent lemon bundt cake. Eric ate more than one piece and I think if he were given the chance he would argue that it was not really a cake but more of a fancy bread. He's wrong, it was entirely cake, but it is a sign of its goodness that he wanted to reclassify it, given his deep-seated hatred of cake.

There was some nice weather and Oscar and I did a bit of gardening. He only tried to eat a few rocks, and only pulled up two crocuses. Mostly he helped me put sticks and rocks and weeds on the stick pile.

He also had a brief naked party before his bath.

The next day when I went to get him in the morning, he had gotten his arms out of his shirt sleeves, so his shirt was just hanging out around his butt. The diaper prevented it from wriggling all the way off. Just to show it wasn't a one-time trick, he took his arm out of his shirt at breakfast also.

He has figured out how to feed himself with a spoon. He can also say "More" and make the sign, and sometimes he says "Da" and means "all done." That one's still quite subjective, but "More" is really clear. He also says "No," but he doesn't mean it yet.

Eric has also figured out how to completely hypnotize him. It involves traditional Irish music and belly rubs.

Then this weekend we went on an epic adventure. Eric's brother's girlfriend Karina had a piano she didn't want anymore. It was a gift to her, and so she was willing to give it away, and we were happy to take it! So first, on Saturday, we drove to Castle Rock and dropped Oscar off with his grandparents, who took him on secret adventures he hasn't told us about yet (although word on the street is that they went to Osh Kosh and had a great time). Then we continued on to Pueblo, so about 4 hours total from Fort Collins. We met Jeremy and Karina at her house, and Eric and Jeremy headed out to acquire a UHaul and accessories. This took them about 2 hours. Meanwhile, Karina was getting ready to go to her nephew's birthday party with her mom, and was waiting around to help us load the piano before she left. Finally I said she should just leave, because there was no way four people could participate in the moving. They took off.

Eric and Jeremy returned - the close UHaul place didn't have any trucks that could go one-way to Fort Collins. So they had to go to the distant UHaul place, which was like 50 miles away. This place did not have dollies or ramps or any accessories, so after the UHaul was acquired they went off to the hardware store to get materials for a ramp, and furniture dollies. They got a giant piece of MDF board and some 2x4s, and then they headed back.

Karina had no nails. There was a hammer that her roommate was using to smash beer bottles for an art project, but no nails. The men went to the basement and scrounged some nails out of the walls - 4 nails. They nailed the 2x4s to the MDF just at the top, to make it nice and secure. Then we hoisted the piano onto the furniture dollies and strapped it down with Eric's dad's ratcheting straps. And then, we drove it out the front door and down the outside flight of stairs. 

Amazingly, nothing bad happened. No one got hurt, the piano didn't run amok, and it was landed gently on the ground. Then we drove it over the dirt to the curb and hoisted it down into the street. (I'm being very generous saying "we" here. I couldn't lift it at all, so I "held it steady" while Eric and Jeremy did the real work. But I definitely kept the piano from tipping over on them!) The piano had to go up the ramp next, and it was significantly more tippy in the street than it had been on the stairs. But again, nothing bad happened and it made it all the way into the truck.

It had to be strapped down somehow. This took about 45 minutes of intense negotiation, knot-tying, re-negotiation, tying the same knots again and deciding again that they wouldn't work - until finally it went against the back wall with one strap around the middle, just under the keyboard, and one strap over the top.

By this point it had started snowing. We got on the road - Eric was driving the UHaul and I had the car, and Eric had no cell phone so it was really old-school. Immediately Eric pulled off the road. WHY? Jeremy had Eric's keys, for no good reason. So Eric went back and got his keys, and then we got on the road. The piano hadn't budged at least.

Once on the road, we got on the highway. And here was a big problem - the UHaul could not go 75. Everyone in Colorado drives at least 80 on the highway, and Eric was stuck on the hills going 65 max. And I was following him. And the roads were only getting worse. There were many bridges, and they were all icy, and Eric was driving an essentially empty giant truck, so he slowed down even further. This was actually quite wise, as we had to navigate through 3 large highway accidents caused by people driving too fast over the bridges.

Bridges freeze before roadways.

But we made it! At last! And we feasted and said hello to Oscar and were all spoiled as usual by Eric's parents.

Today we got to our house and put Oscar in baby jail and set about moving the piano all by ourselves.

Eric is very strong! Our ramp (properly nailed together now) worked fine for getting the piano out of the UHaul but was too big to help getting it up our two front steps. So Eric basically hoisted it up there, with me supporting it briefly now and then.

And now it's happily installed in its corner! The cats have all taken a turn over the keys, and Oscar is only too pleased to help me play. He can reach the keys while standing on the floor. He particularly likes the very low and the very high keys. Eric tuned the guitar to the piano and we've already had some Beatles singalongs. Soon we will get the piano itself tuned and then we'll really be in business! I'm so pleased! I can make as much noise as Eric now!

Ta-da!

So that was my spring break.

Finally, to close, here is a link to an article about "adventure playgrounds" that I have been ruminating over. It makes me think that Eric and I already have the right idea about how to parent, which is a nice feeling. Whew! See you next week!

spring break for realz

In lieu of a post, here are some hilarious Harry Belafonte videos. Oscar enjoys them on a semi-daily basis.





More to come, of course. I should have some very exciting news for you this weekend, so stay tuned!

Spring break!

It's a time of long shadows now that it's getting nicer out. Eric is in Colorado Springs, learning all the ways of Monsanto and getting wined and dined by weed scientists. (The sign for the Weed Lab is painted on the building because it's been stolen too many times.) He took the banjo with him. 

We managed to prune the peach tree this weekend, and made a very nice brush pile that will sit on the patio until the yard waste collection starts. 

And, I presented at Plant SuperGroup, and entertained everyone with my science stories. It was nice to have something real to talk about. I got to pick and choose what data I wanted to present - such an embarrassment of riches!

Below you can see the real flowers that are out, and Oscar planting pinwheels and pulling them back up, and also Oscar running away with our frisbee.

and two more videos

Oscar is just hilarious, like all good babies. So here you go.

Equilibrium

I read in the Cell Biology textbook the other day that life cannot exist under equilibrium conditions. It's true, of course, but something I don't think about very much. A corollary is that chaos is maximum equilibrium. So when you put all your things away, creating order, harmony, peace, you are also destroying equilibrium. It makes me wonder if equilibrium of the soul is really such a good idea.

So on Friday Eric and I went out, to a restaurant, with our friends and without Oscar! We got a babysitter and had a grand old time. We were thinking to throw a party to celebrate Eric's first real paycheck, but then we didn't really want to clean the house. The restaurant was a nice substitute. Very little worth noting happened, but those things were these: I was proclaimed the leader of Eva's faith, by virtue of being an ordained minister of the Universal Life Church; Eva and Pat asked if I made lists to determine whether I was type A or type B (I mean what kind of question is that, really); Eric learned that his boss' nickname was Weed Jesus when he was an undergrad; and Olivia said Oscar was the easiest babysitting job she's ever had. Good job team!

My data are shaping up beautifully. Last week I showed that an antibody to extensins found in rice was also able to detect extensins found in poplar. This week I used that antibody to show exactly where in the stem the extensins are, and it is just where I expected they would show up. This is helpful not only for the paper I plan to write, but also because I'm presenting at Plant SuperGroup this week! Now I have something to talk about!

The gardenia is blooming inside, the snowdrops are blooming outside, and some yellow crocuses have started to make buds (that's how I know they're yellow). Things are starting to happen, but I'm not quite ready for them! Namely, we need to prune the peach tree, and tidy up the grapes, before they start getting all juicy and ready to make leaves and flowers and all that. But each weekend it's been cold, or snowing, or both, so we haven't done anything about it yet! Oh well. They'll make it through one way or the other.

I took Oscar outside in the snow, this time without hand coverings, and of course he stuck his hands directly into a big snow mound, and then starting crying. I agreed with that sentiment, so we came right back inside!

I have few photos for this week, but here are some of Oscar trying to feed himself with a spoon.