Moving and stuff

First off, a big thanks to everyone for the congrats! I'm so glad to be done at last!

Well, time has certainly flown by! Funny how that happens when you're busy packing, moving, and getting settled in a (sort of) new place. All the while making the final corrections to your thesis and relying on dial-up internet. Of course, I can make the trip into town to use the high speed wifi at the public library, but I am nothing if not lazy, so a trip into town doesn't happen every day.

We managed to pack everything from our apartment into a POD. It was a tight squeeze, but we managed. Then, we had a cookout at someone else house to say thanks to everyone who came and helped pack and to get in one last goodbye with our friends in North Carolina.

A few days later, after taking care of some final things at the school, Mom and I loaded up my car with the rest of our stuff and the two cats and headed back to Texas! Fortunately, Soup and Stuart are really great passengers. They spent the entire trip perched atop our mounds of junk watching the scenery and sleeping. Well, most of the trip anyway. Soup acted strangely like a dog and kept trying to climb into the front seat. Stuart and his huge head are on the left, Soup is on the right. Strange names for cats, I know. There are stories behind both of those names.

But we made it back safe and sound! Now I'm working on relaxing, reading, and doing some good knitting. I've got a lot of projects to keep me busy this summer, and I'm looking forward to finishing some up and starting on others.

I'll be taking fairly regular trips into town to use the internet, so you might start seeing me comment on your blog more regularly. Today, though, I have about 100+ unread posts in my Google reader. This is going to take some time.

Just call me...

Dr. Gena!

As of 11:30 today, I am no longer a graduate student! I am now Dr. Gena, Ph.D.

More later; I'm off to celebrate right after I take a nap.

I don't really think we need these

Seeing as it's in the 90's around here lately and I'm about to move back to the even hotter state of Texas for the next month or so. But still, scarves are fun and functional, and make really great accessories. Me? I've been wearing this new red one around despite the heat, because I am impervious to heat and have a superhero sized ability to get cold anytime, anywhere.

I just love that border! This is one of the scarves from Victorian Lace Today. I'm too lazy to look it up, and I should be doing more important things than blogging right now. However, if I were actually a superhero, I would be a bad one because the one thing I really really excell at is procrastinating.

The yarn is Malabrigo lace weight, colorway Snowbird, knit on size 5 bamboo needles. Sooo soft and squishy that I want an entire wardrobe made out of this yarn. Or at least several more items. I didn't (shockingly) modify the pattern, but I knit the body portion much longer, because I wanted a really long scarf that used up all the yarn. When done, I had about a quarter-sized little ball of yarn left. Just enough to patch any holes if necessary.

Next up is the DNA scarf. This one is a gift for my advisor as a way of saying "Thanks for putting up with me for the last 4.5 years. Thanks for letting me do whatever the hell I wanted to in the lab and not really knowing/caring what I was doing. Most importantly, though, thanks for not stonewalling me when it came to this whole 'graduating and leaving here' thing. I really appreciate it."

You can find a pattern for the scarf here, should your inner nerd want one for yourself. This pattern I did modify to make it a size I thought best. It is made from just over 2 balls of Kathmandu Aran yarn (85% merino wool, 10% silk, 5% cashmere) and is really soft with a great drape. Knit on size 7 needles, I believe. It measures 5 feet or so long, and around 6 inches in width.

So. 52 hours left and I'll be Dr. Gena. I'm nervous and excited and just want to get it over with. My seminar is prepared, I need to read over bits of my document a few more times, and I mostly just want to have the defense over with. My mom, brother, and sister-in-law (along with their newest baby! yay for babies!) are flying in today. I've got a week full of parties to attend, a defense to make it through, then a weekend of packing up and moving away.

I'll try to get off another post before we move, but I'm not promising anything. If you hear silence on this end for a long time, it's because I'll be spending July and half of August living in the land of dial-up. I'll still be reading all you guys, but probably not commenting much (still) and not posting so much, either.

When I do get back to regular blogging, I'll likely be busy arranging our new fancy-schmancy apartment in southern Louisiana, starting a job (a real job! not more school) and learning the ins and outs of a bigger, stranger, and more exciting city than the one I'm in right now. Life is certainly all about change, and GP and I are staring a bunch of them right in the face. I'm off to drink more coffee and eat more Tums. Next time you hear from me, all this will be behind me.

Finished Object: Dissertation

Finally, at long last, the dissertation is completed! As of last Thursday it had been printed up and distributed to my advisory committee. Now I have just 2 and 1/2 weeks left of being a graduate student. I'm so relieved, happy, and excited that I could dance. Or, it could be that I've just had too much coffee. 

So here it is, in all it's glory:

Final page count: 208

Final word count: 36,604

Number of figures: 23

After printing up 6 copies of that for distribution, I feel like I should be planting a grove somewhere to replace all the trees I killed. 

Now, it's tradition that a graduating student like me give a gift to their advisor upon completion of the dissertation defense. Or at least, it is in our lab. Previous students have given our boss new Hawaiian shirts (he actually is Hawaiian, and really does love the shirts) or books they thought he would enjoy. Me? Well, being the knitter that I am, a long time ago I came across the perfect thing to make the bossman for his gift. The DNA scarf. 

It's perfect for a number of reasons. First, my work has revolved around DNA repair mechanisms. Second, the virus we study has a double-stranded DNA genome, much like we do. Third, DNA is basically the universal symbol of the science geek. My boss is nothing if not a science geek.

Now, if only I could remember how many bases there are per turn of the double-helix, I could actually make the scarf represent the viral genome, which is 36 kilobases in length. But, then it would probably wind up being really short or really long, and I would have progressed from science geek to science supergeek who really needs to get a life. 

Page count

1 week until the dissertation is due. 

I'm drinking coffee and eating Tums like they coordinate to make a healthy diet. What? Tums have calcium. I'm getting a lot of calcium.

Page count so far: 159.

Almost done. 

Back to the coffee pot.

Progress

It's almost like there's a countdown clock in the back of my head. Right now it's saying "T minus 5 weeks to graduation." Yup, 5 more weeks of school and I am done. Finished. No. Longer. A. Student. 

Naturally, the first project I've been making progress on is the dissertation. I won't bore you with details, because they pretty much bore me at this point. Instead, here's a picture of my work station, also known as the dining room table.

It got so bad I actually had to clean it off so I could focus and be more productive. Now the piles of papers are taking up room on the empty bookshelf (GP already packed up all the books for moving). 

Project number 2. Hey, remember how I like to knit? Yeah, I remembered too, and I've been doing some of it! I really forgot what a great stress reliever it is, and I've been taking breaks to knit a row or two before I start working on writing a new section. It's been going pretty well, because I have finally finished the body of the stole I've been knitting since the dawn of time. It's been so long since I blogged about it that I can't even remember the name of the pattern.

Ah, I remembered, sort of. It's the Victoria shawl with something or other border. I'm glad to finally be done with the body, because the border really is the reason I started knitting it in the first place. 

Alright, enough procrastination. Back to work.

Blogiversary and an update

Look at that! It's sometime around today that this here blog turns 2! Funny how time passes when you're not paying attention.

In other news, GP and I made it to Louisiana safe and sound. A 13 hour drive with lots of luggage, a thunderstorm, and a dog, but we made it. The itenerary for tomorrow looks like this:

morning - Gena's job interview

afternoon - house hunting

evening - night out in New Orleans!

If your reading this in the morning, around 10 am central time, send some good vibes my way.

Have a great weekend, everyone!

P.S. the link to the picture of Clark is also a link to a homemade ice cream recipe. Since it's 80ish degrees here in LA, I think that's a pretty appropriate recipe to link to!

Happy Mother's Day!

Virtual flowers for all you Moms reading. Thanks for all that you do!

Dissertating

I'm bored. Bored bored bored. I'm sitting at Bruegger's Bagels, downing coffee and writing the background section of my dissertation. Let me tell you, after a few days it gets really dull and full sentences are excruciating to put together. However, I will persevere! 

So, here's my schedule for the next 3 1/2 weeks until I have to turn this beast of a document in on June 4th. Today and tomorrow: finish the background (currently 26 pages - I imagine it'll round out at about 32). Next week: finish data collection and finish writing the results section. Week after: finish writing the discussion. Week after that: turn it in, puke from nerves, eat a ton of Tums, and drink a lot of rum. Then, defend it on June 25th, and move back to Texas for the month of July. Sound like a plan? I think so.

What else is going on these days? Well, I have a job interview! 

GP, in his extreme nerdiness that is rivaled only by my own, applied to graduate school for physics-related stuff. He got accepted to several programs, and finally decided to accept a position at a school in Louisiana! Yay, GP! Way to be a nerd! Naturally, because we'd prefer not to have to live in different time zones again, I applied for jobs in the area near where he'll be at school. My top choice employer emailed me back the same day, and I'll be interviewing with her this coming Friday. I'm very excited and feel like a real adult going for a real job interview. And the best part? No. More. School! While we're down there, GP and I will be looking for places to live for the 3 years we'll be in Louisiana.

I'm happy to be moving on to the next stage in my life, and excited about moving to Louisiana. Although I consider myself a Southerner being from Texas, I'm not really from the South, more the Southwest. When I moved to North Carolina 5 years ago, I was struck by how different the culture and history is from that of Texas. I mean, I knew that NC and TX were colonized by completely different countries, that NC has been a part of the USA since the Revolution, and that TX gained its independance from Mexico as a completely independant country that later joined the USA. But I never understood how those differences influenced the mindset and culture of a state until I left Texas. It actually explained a lot about the mindset of Texans. But I digress.

Depite the fact that Texas and Louisiana are neighbors, I am well aware of the cultural differences between the two states (hello, Louisiana Purchase and French influences!). It will be fun to learn more about the Cajun culture and to find some new recipes to share with ya'll. Also, I'll be really glad to move back to oak tree country and get out of pine country, which drives my allergies crazy!

So keep your fingers crossed that dissertation writing goes smoothly and that I do well on this interview. I'll keep you updated with little blurbs like this as time goes by. Maybe I'll even have some other news to share with you, like the fact that I have a new neice! My brother and his wife welcomed their newest baby on Thursday morning (I think it was Thursday, all the days run together for me). She's their 3rd, and I can't wait to meet her!

Goodbye and Hello

Tomorrow, I say goodbye to one who has been a constant companion to me for the past nine years. My Jeep.


Jeepy, as I affectionately call him, has been with me since I was 19 years old. He has taken me from Dallas to Amarillo, from Abilene to Austin, and from Texas all the way to North Carolina. I always knew that the end of my academic career would mean the end of my relationship with Jeepy (my longest relationship to date!) but it's still a sad day. I am comforted in knowing that Jeepy will be the first car of a 16 year old girl, whose dad is buying it for her tomorrow.

So long, good friend! Best wishes with your new gal!

And a big welcome to my new vehicle!


I really needed something with better fuel efficiency (18 mpg on a good day just isn't feasible anymore) and I wanted a sportier look. So today I got the car I had decided on. A new Mazda 3 hatchback. I love it. Love it love it love it. This is the first new car I've ever had. Only 39 miles on the odometer! Crazy.


If you look, you can see Jeepy looking all forlorn in the background of the pictures. So sad!


Anyone have a good suggestion on a name for my new ride? My first car was Lucy the Lumina, followed by Bruce the white Jeep, then Jeepy who sometimes went by Big Red. This car is definitely a girl, and needs a good name.

And Mom, you're going to enjoy driving this back to Texas with me in June. Because I'm graduating June 25th!