Posted by Nahrain from DNab4078e2.Stanford.EDU (171.64.120.226) on Friday, June 14, 2002 at 1:02PM :
In Reply to: for Nahrain posted by Lilly from ? (160.129.27.22) on Friday, June 14, 2002 at 8:51AM :
: xxx Better'n perfume! Just kidding. Once I spilled some organic stuff (we were synthesizing esters) all over my gen chem lab notebook, & I had to turn it in to the prof in a tightly sealed plastic bag (he demanded to see the original write-up from lab)... I'm sure it made his day. To this day, I still have not found the words to describe the sheer heinousness of that smell.
*********Speaking of perfume, I think I have enough for the next 10 years I kid you not. My aunt sells perfume and gives me tons of it. I'm such a pack rat. I so much girly stuff that I don't even use on a daily basis. I do wear make-up not because I feel the need to do so to feel good, I just like it and all the perrrrty colors.
: xxx I can't believe you said that! Take that back! Just kidding. I liked the Atkins book as a supplement to this book by Woodbury, our official class text. Lots of kids hated the Woodbury & loved the Atkins - but I didn't really have a preference.
****We ONLY used Aktins...the prof switched the book for the next yr. hehe Im not sure to what though. We used the Vollhardt book for organic chemistry which is pretty good overall.
: xxx I think it'd be interesting to TA an intro bio course. I haven't yet - it's actually not a requirement for my department. But they recommend it for students interested in teaching - which I am.
Sweet! We need more women in acadamia. That's such a problem. I think the chemistry graduate programs have no problem getting females into and through the program, but getting them to go into teaching is really tough. There is truly a lack of representation of women! You know, I think its really because most of the men in acadamia are of the old school and are pretty much jerks. I have faith in the next generation...
: xxx Sounds like my school! I went to Sewanee, a.k.a. the University of the South, a liberal arts college. The student population was about the same size as your undergrad, which was smaller than the population of students at my high school... Gossip ran rampant all over the place, & still does. I think we had about 10 chem majors in my class. It was hard to recruit majors for that department since the profs had a reputation for giving out brutally low grades. I think we had half girls, half guys.
******** Ahh, I know that school! Do you know a girl named Tracy T? She went there and graduated in 2000 I think ...chem major. She went to UNC and transferred to Stanford after a year so she's a first year now. Small schools are like high school---you know everyone you want to within the first week :)I still love the environment though.
: xxx I think it's a conflict between ways of thinking, again. Biology requires a lot mroe memorization, at least in undergrad courses. P chem is a bit more mathematical - you derive equations; they aren't handed to you. You want a doctor with good, fast recall.
****** I agree. Fast recall is good :) Its a different way of thinking. I've always like mathematics--I almost double majored. But after diff. Eqns., I was like, umm, no modern algebra thank you very much heheh
: xxx Sorry about the torn ACL! I'm going to hit the trails a bit this weekend, too.
******I'm excited about going. The weather is going to be great--mid 80s. Its a change from hitting the malls...YES, I like to shop...goes with the whole pack rat thing. I have more clothes than I could possibly wear. I'm going through them and donating some this summer.
: xxx Did you read the April, 2002 issue of Scientific American? There's a 2 page article "It's Not Easy Being Green" about marketing polyaspartate - a biodegradable replacement for polyacrylics derived from oyster shells - to US industries. It's a really good article... Apparently, if you replace the hydrocarbon compounds that make up the backbone of polymers with peptides, bacteria can degrade them, & the material is quite strong. European companies are using these biodegradable compounds. But I know nothing about titanium catalysts. Do you feel like explaining it to me? I'd like to know more.
******I'll check out the article. I will tell you more about Ti catalysts at a later time :)
: xxx Basically, I do a lot of microarray & real time PCR experiments right now... the idea is to be able to fish something exciting out of these experiments. I hormone treat cell cultures & compare gene expression profiles of the hormone treated cells with the gene expression profiles of the same cell cultures not exposed to hormones. Working w/ multiple results from microarrays can be a bit challenging for me.
*****Sounds cool. Too biological for me to understand though hehehe
: xxx Yeah, I'd love to teach & do research.
*******More power to ya sista.
: xxx Yeah, until I realized that being forced to listen to hypochondriacs bitch & complain all day is not my cup of tea. Plus, there's something I find incredibly romantic about being a lab recluse. & I love being able to explain things I know about to other people, & arguing with people about the uselessness of their lab work. One thing that I want to do is go back & relearn the material from my intro physics using Feynman's lecture series for text. & also take a diff eq class, some compu sci classes, a wilderness first aid training course, & learn how to fix cars in a general sort of way.
***All important things to learn. I liked physics a lot. I don't know about the Feynman lecture series. Is it good? I want to take a comp. sci class too, but its tough cause the focus here is SOLEY on research. Iff. Eqns is a fun class.So much that I regretted not going into engineering. I'd like to take some engineering classes here. I'd like to learn to do some basic programming too. Fixing cars---yeah, I should learn that. I speak Assyrian, but I don't read or write, so I want to pick that up at some point. I used to read and write when I was in London..like 5-6 yrs old. Man, I'm upset that I let go of it. There is so much want to read, learn and do.....finding the time and putting in the effort is obviously the biggest part of that.
: xxx That's so funny! My best friend since 3rd grade was raised Republican, too. She's really liberal, though, except when it comes to religion. I think she's more liberal than the other Republicans I know just because she's part Cherokee (she's actually a member of the Cherokee Nation), & so she really gives a damn about the underprivileged in this country. I adore her, despite her tendencies to take the Bible a bit more literally than I can stand sometimes. & the other thing is that it's hard to explain to her things about the Palestinians... her grandfathers fought in WWII, so she feels a lot of pride about US foreign policy. I try to avoid the topic w/ her, but I *wish* I could talk w/ her about it. But then again, she's always trying to talk to me about houw I ought to interpret the Bible, so maybe we'll make a trade - she can say whatever she wants about the Bible to me & I'll listen if she lets me tell her my perspective on the goings on in the Middle East & how the US government is so corrupt.
******That IS funny. This girl was my roommate for 4 years at K. She's just great and we share so many inside jokes and moments that I cant quite get with anyone else. She is a confirmed Catholic but dated a conservative, Repulican, and atheist guy and she no longer practices. He turned out to be a jerk and they arent dating now...She's into evolution and such. She's pro-choice, and she's going to medical school in two years for women's health as of now. She's getting an MPH at U of M. Anyway, her and I don't talk about politics and such issues.. We acutally were kinda at each others throats during the Bush/Gore thing. I was so pissed that Bush won; not that I was a big Gore fan, but hey, its like who would you rather be president of the TWO. Urgh. One time she got kinda edgy when I was raving about how cool it is that there is an Assyrian female that went to Stanford med and is now doing her residency here too in Ob/GYN. She's like, I'm sure there are plenty of "German-Americans" that have gone through the program. So basically she doesn't "get it." She knows who Assyrians are and such ..mostly through her art history classes...but I let her know. She's great.
Oh, one of my roommates here (she is gone for ths ummer) was part Native American and Republican..BIG TIME. She said sides with Israel 100%. I got so annoyed. I personally choose to remain neutral on the topic. I think both sides have faults and that's pretty damn obvious. Yes, the treatment of Palestians is inhumane, but I also think that the suicide bombing route is NOT the way to go. I know they can't defend themselves militarily, but still, they are playing into the whole "Axis of Evil, Arabs are bad" kinda thing.At least that's how the US sees it like that. What I want to know is where are their Arab brothers and sisters?!?!! What kills me is that they claim they are all one with other Arab nations when the time calls for it, I think the other Arab nations are too oil-tied with the US and the rest of the world to honestly give a damn. Its pretty damn sad. I've come to accept that we live in a world of special interests. No one gives a damn about others. Yeah, I may have lost faith in people, but is that surprising? Anyway, I think that Israel can exploit whatever they do simply cause if the strong national ties with the US. It doesnt take a genius to understand when people say that Jews run the US..At times like this, its hard to imagine that they don't. Oh, I don't know about how I feel about this: I guess some people would side with Israel as it remains the only non-Arab state in the mid east..Well aside from Armenia and Iran and such. I guess some people think that someone this is going to give Assyrians legitimacy to have there own state in the mid east as we "are the original inhabitants of part of this region." I don't think the Jews give a damn if Assyria exists again or what happens to Assyrian period. So siding with Israel I dont think is going to give us anything. Siding with the other side won't either--at least I think. We'll just be labeled at "Christian Arabs" and added to their numbers. I may be wrong, but whatever I'm rambling now..so I'll stop. :)
: : I could write forever so I'll stop for now..
: : Nahrain
*****See what I mean.
: xxx I like getting to know you - have you considered maybe coming to Iraq w/ us next summer?
*****I've never considered it. It would be a push to get my parents to agree with that. I don't think I'm ready for soemthing like that now. I'm struggling to take two weeks off for the summer as it is. I would be a wonderful experience. I would like to go back one day though.
Man, I write too much...
Nahrain
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