Thinking Back On The Lab

My wife tells me I'm a hypocrite because I like reading PhysioProf's posts at his blog and at DrugMonkey. Those familiar with both PhysioProf and me immediately will know why. For everyone else: foul language usually makes me cringe.

One of the reasons I like reading his blog is that his insight reveals a connection with science, teaching and mentorship that I resepect. Exhibit A:

[One] thing to keep in mind ... is that by the time you reach the end-game of grad school, are finishing up the last few experiments, and are beginning to write the thesis, it is highly likely that you will be pretty much completely disgusted with the science underlying your project, life in the laboratory, and science as a career. This state of mind is a natural consequence of the grueling process of earning your PhD, and does not reveal anything particularly salient about how you really feel about a life in science.

It is similar to how Army recruits feel at the end of basic training: drained, exhausted, miserable, and wanting to quit. But this is no time to make life-altering decisions, such as leaving science for some other profession. As soon as the thesis is accepted, a huge weight lifts, and over the course of a few months, you begin to remember the joys of a life in science.

He sure hit the nail squarely, here. Except for one thing.

I'll let you know when the weight lifts.

Too Legit To Quit?

How long can a newly minted PhD last without having a first author paper to his name?

Evidently, about 3 months...

Robey TE, Murry CE. Absence of regeneration in the MRL/MpJ mouse heart following infarction or cryoinjury. Cardiovasc Pathol. 2008;17:6– 13.

The text is available with subscription here. Email me or post a comment if you would like a .pdf.

This is the lead article in the first issue of the 2008 volume of Cardiovascular Pathology. Who says you can't publish negative results? If you recall, there was a bit of a splash earlier this decade about a funny mouse that could (amazingly!) regenerate its heart after injury. To catch up about how this over-hyped story has played out in the last 7 years, read this nice review.

It took a year for this to go to press after it was accepted, hence the lag between earning the PhD and being published. There are more on the way, hopefully including a pair I polished up for submission last Friday. But none will receive the fanfare I afforded this one. There is just something special about the first time.

As far as the post's title, what's up with PhD students slaving in the lab for years and then deciding not to pursue a career in academic science after all? I don't know. Check back with me in a couple of years.

T's Crossed

You can tell that I took this photo before the dissertation clerk realized that my dissertation's signatory page was printed in size 14 rather than 12 because she has that big smile on her face. It only took one puppy-dog face to convince her that it was actually okay. It's a good thing I didn't have to use the Force; my Jedi mind tricks probably wouldn't have worked on her.

I only had to reprint two pages and re-copy all of my tables. But it is over. I earned my Ph.D. just in time to rush over to Children's Hospital to take my pediatrics clerkship final. I passed the multiple choice part on the first try, but could have done better. I hope my subjective reviews come back stronger.

I am going to celebrate by attending a special screening of Judgment Day: Intelligent Design on Trial at the Pacific Science Center. This is one of Paul Allen's pet projects, and if you read ScienceBlogs, there's a bunch of good buzz (and plenty of ads) for it. I'll give you my take this weekend.

Graduate Ethics Education

This weekend, I'll be heading to Lexington, Kentucky to represent the University of Washington at the National Conference on Graduate Student Leadership. I'm giving a talk about how ethics education should and can be better incorporated into graduate school. I have 8 minutes... Naturally, I'll be speaking a bit about the Forum on Science Ethics and Policy, but I'll also lay out a case for why providing formal and informal training in ethical reasoning makes for better graduate students.

I had hoped to take my new EEE PC, but it seems as though UPS got confused and shipped it to Ontario, California instead of Seattle. I've already weaned myself down to checking email once a day. I think I can cut the cord for a whole weekend...

Advice To Those Who Follow

So let's say you are one of the 400 or so MD/PhD students out there planning on restarting medical school next year. Please give yourself more than 10 days between your defense and your first day on the wards. Trust me on this. No matter how little sleep you need, every day will drain your energy to the extent that the only science you could even consider doing after you get home is the variety served on CSI. And even then, it's a safe wager that you'd be asleep before the killer confessed in light of the evidence.

These days, I've been spending too much time on figures and edits and not enough reading about fever in the newborn or asthma.

I guess that is how it always will be.

Soooo Different

Wow.

Medicine is way different from science.

Details later...

Stealing Home...

The game is tied in the bottom of the 10th. I'm in graduate school's extra innings - that's the time between defending the PhD and moving on to whatever's next. If you've been there, you know that this period involves putting the finishing touches on the manuscripts, making sure the margins are all spaced correctly on the dissertation, cleaning up hard drive filing systems and making sure the lab notebooks are legible.

In baseball, if you don't score in the bottom of the inning, there's always the next inning. My situation is different. If I don't score right now, that's it. There's no second chance. Soon, a two-headed beast will emerge from the depths of the sea, barge through the bleachers and destroy the very field I am playing on. Lucky for me, I know the beast's schedule. It is due to arrive in 17 hours. Perhaps by the time you read this, the game will be over. I'll be a medical student at Children's Hospital

I'd made it to third base on Friday. My adviser and I had settled on the text for one of my papers and only had one figure to finish up for it. A second paper was in worse shape. I had modified one of my dissertation chapters for half of the paper, and was in the process of filling in the other half with the needed background and appropriate referencing. After fiddling with some of the figures (for too long!), I tied myself to the computer. I knew my adviser (former adviser?) was leaving early Sunday morning and he needed a copy before he left. Last week in a similar situation, I left a document on his doorstep. Hard copies are easier to travel with... This morning, I made sure the document was on his stoop by 5 AM. When I tied myself to my desk, I committed to stealing home. It was do or die. That sea monster was looming.

By midnight, I was in a full sprint. The southpaw pitcher had a deliberate windup, and I was two thirds of the way home by the time the ball left the mound. I just hope the pitch is in the dirt. I've already found weaknesses in the document I finished this morning, and one of my co-authors has already sent back some helpful comments. At least something is written. Today, I've been touching up my figures and combining them into those big panels that folks use so much these days. I'm ready for the imminent maelstrom of dust, dirt, and colliding bodies.

Let's hope that my trip home is as fortunate as this one by the Cubs' Derrick Lee. By the way, I've been tapped a couple of times in the past few days; Kate and Mike have passed on some good memes. You can expect my responses to show up in a few days. Those are two tags I don't plan to slip in under...

A Doctor For Two Weeks

Well, I passed my final examination yesterday. I tried to approach the presentation like it was any other talk, but that didn't work for me. I was nervous for 40 minutes - up until the Q&A. I came into my own then, and had actually a lot of fun; this extended into the hour long closed meeting with my committee. Perhaps I'm so used to the Seattle tradition of asking questions throughout the talk, I got intimidated by the audience not interrupting me! Reliable sources indicate that I carried on a couple of conversations with myself (three actually) during the presentation, which evidently elicited laughs from the audience. And then there's the complement that goes something like, "I actually understood (insert fraction greater than 1/2) of your talk!" I suppose that bodes well for my interests in communicating science to the public.

I can't say that I feel much different this morning than 24 hours ago. I'll try to put the PhD to good use in the next two weeks before I start the third year of medical school, as I finalize two papers and one resubmission. Then I will have to put the PhD in my back pocket for a couple of years while I assume the mantle of humble & helpful medical student.

Science MadMen

Have you been over to LabLit.com yet? Here's a reason: a little humor piece by yours truly was just published on the site. While you're there, check out other folks' contributions. A collection of work tied together by the genre of lab literature, LabLit.com seeks to document "the culture of science in fiction and fact." The brains behind the operation is Jennifer Rohn, a UW PhD recipient who now lives in the UK.

Organizing Students: Food

This one is almost a no-brainer: In order to get students to participate in a group, it is always helpful to provide food. Keep in mind that there are two types of food: free food and cheap food. Both are important.

Let's talk about free food first. Free food gets people in the door. In weighing the cost-benefit of catching an early bus home or stopping by for a light dinner at an evening members' meeting, the free food always tips the scales in the same direction. Graduate students are notorious vultures: some of us keep close track of all of the seminars that provide food. For me, it is cardiovascular breakfast club Tuesday morning, medicine grand grounds Tuesday noon, pathology presents Wednesday afternoon and South Lake Union tapas seminar Thursday late afternoon. And those are only the seminars that pertain to my education! If your student group reliably provides pizza or subs at its evening meetings, you will develop a reputation for being a friendly place. For recruitment meetings, I like to mix it up. Pizza or sandwiches are nice, but something different will elicit positive comments and good feelings. A spread of Trader Joe's hor'd'oeuvres is popular and cheap. It's best if you put the food inside the room where you are meeting - even in the back. This keeps the vultures from flying away! Also, at public events (FOSEP holds monthly seminars), get snacks and coffee and your attendance will increase. And be sure to advertise that there will be snacks provided!

But where does money for this food come from? Securing cash for food is notoriously difficult for campus student groups - especially at public universities. At the University of Washington, the main institutional funding sources say "NO WAY!" for proposals for food. For the Husky readers, this includes the ASUW, the GPSS and the LLC. If you want money for food, you have to raise it yourself. Fundraising is a topic that I will cover at length in the near future, but for the purposes of this post you should know that when you ask for money, make sure you ask for money that can be spent on food. Or, if you ever get a donation of cash or check, be sure to deposit it into an account that can be spent on food. This can be set up through the school's budgeting system.

Free food is one way to get people to feel like your group is there for them. If it works for drug reps, furniture salesmen and job recruitment, it will probably work for your student group. The other important type of food is cheap food. This applies when funds are tight or when some of the group's leaders hold planning meetings. Chipping in $5-7 for gourmet pizza, takeout Indian food or the like provides the opportunity to create a congenial environment to get the work done. There is a reason families try to eat meals together and friends get together for dinner: breaking bread is an age old tradition that unifies individuals. On a more practical side, sometimes the best time slots for students meetings are in the dinner hour, at lunch, or even breakfast. In Seattle, getting coffee can even turn into a working meeting.
Cartoon by Adam York Gregory. Check out his other comics at The Flowfield Unity. This post brought to you by our friends at FOSEP. Other student organization tips can be found here.

Organizing Students: Commitments

This is the second in a series of posts providing insight into the organization of student groups. It is offered by me, an outgoing director of the graduate student-led Forum on Science Ethics and Policy at the University of Washington. The last entry dealt with membership and the importance of remembering members' names.

One of the enduring challenges for student groups of any type or size is achieving the right balance between members' contribution to the group and commitment to their own studies. After all, students go to college for an education; the goal of which is often a degree. It is important for a student group to recognize its role as a supportive element to the college experience, but not the central one. It is easy for organization leaders (due their own investments of time and energy) to think of the group more highly than most of its members. Because of this, extreme care must be taken not to force members into tasks they resent. If the organization is ordered such that members agree with the mission, they will be willing to volunteer for tasks that are supportive. Often these supportive tasks are not time-intensive and enable members to contribute to the group without a large commitment. Once a part of the organization, many folks decide to take on larger responsibilities as leaders.

For a relatively small student group (25 active members), FOSEP plans a large number of events each year. There is usually one large public event (involving an audience > 250), 3-5 medium sized seminars (~125 attend) and many small events that range from journal clubs to happy hours. You can imagine that the time commitment to plan an event at the Pacific Science Center with media tie-ins and peripheral campus events differs significantly from announcing a monthly happy hour. But neither is less important than the other. For us, the happy hour is the main place where we socialize with each other and meet potential members. Therefore, the 'happy hour officer' is a crucial job, but one that can be done by a single individual. Members identify with our mission, and that serves as the common ground for all of our activities (outwardly and behind the scenes).

Larger events carry more stress and more tasks. FOSEP handles this by dividing leadership responsibility. We are a big advocate for co-positions: co-chairs, co-directors, etc. When there is a busy week of experiments or if one person is away at a conference, it is useful to have another leader who can cover if tasks need to be done. Such a leadership structure does a number of good things:

• It encourages consensus by removing a final decision from one person
• It enables members to cycle in and out of leadership positions as others graduate
• One leader can cover for another if needed
• Co-leaders have room to discover elements of the organization that they prefer or want to improve.

The main potential problem here is if co-leaders do not communicate well. We have observed that individuals united in a vision or that agree on a mission can overcome obstacles of personality.

Finally, there must be a transparency of commitment. This is difficult to establish early on, since it is often unknown just how much work running the organization will be. As the structure becomes more defined, members should know about both the tasks and the time commitments undertaken by current leaders. Incomplete disclosure of 'just how much time I thought I was devoting to this' can result in hard feelings down the road. We prefer that new leaders realize in advance that they may spend 5 hours one week, 1 hour the next and 10-15 on the week leading up to an event. Then, after the audience leaves and the positive responses come back, they can feel the reward of having planned a meaningful seminar. In a way, that some events have large time commitments demands that the presentations are good!

For members of a student-led organization, there are always more important priorities than the group or club. Occasionally, a member puts the organization near the top of her list. These usually end up being the group's directors; in FOSEP's case these folks sometimes choose careers more related to their FOSEP roles than what they did in the laboratory. But this cannot be expected of everyone. Any member's commitment should be welcomed, none should be scorned, and leaders should look out for each others' priorities. In the end this will make for a healthier, more sustainable organization that people feel good about contributing to.

Dissertation Introduction

If I am doing this right, I just passed a major milestone in the composition of my doctoral dissertation: I wrote the first paragraph. Saving it for the end - the academic cherry on top of the ice cream called a PhD - helped me keep focused on the prize. I haven't been able to 'blog my thesis' like another stem cell researcher and blogger, so this is all you're going to get, or all you have to put up with.

In the United States, cardiovascular disease accounts for nearly 2 of 5 deaths, and each year, one million people experience a heart attack [1]. If a patient survives a heart attack, the heart recovers by replacing dead cardiac cells with a non-contractile scar. No innate regenerative capacity been identified for mammalian hearts [2-4], and no intervention to reconstitute myocardial function by muscle cell repopulation after injury has been approved for clinical use. Cell grafting is an attractive approach to restore cardiac function in the infarcted heart. Recent studies have identified several cell types that form living grafts in the heart, many of which have been shown to improve cardiac function [5-10]. Clinical trials with cells implanted from skeletal muscle or bone marrow are currently underway [11,12] even though major barriers for successful clinical success – graft integration and cell survival – still exist. The fibrosis that rapidly isolates the grafted cells from the host myocardium [13] is a prominent physical obstruction that can interfere with graft distribution and survival as well as electromechanical coupling. We have identified that genetic knockout of the matricellular protein, thrombospondin-2 reduces graft-related scarring. Apart from fibrosis, cell grafts face a basic challenge of survival [14]. If cells successfully engraft into the injured heart, about 90% of them do not persist three days after injection [15]. Immense increases in graft cell survival are needed if cell-based cardiac repair is to become a reality. In order to investigate potential treatments for myocardial infarction, we evaluated the regenerative capacity of mammalian cardiac tissue, identified an intervention to improve engraftment of cardiac cells and developed tools to improve the survival of embryonic stem cell derived cardiomyocytes injected into the heart.

Hopefully that is intelligible. It was written shortly before the timestamp on this entry...

Organizing Students: Names

Have you ever encountered a distant acquaintance, not know his or her name, and been flattered that she or he remembered yours? Calling people by their names is something we humans as social beings appreciate. For many of us, remembering names is really hard. Is it possible that scientists are worse at this than other professions. We do spend a lot of time by ourselves in hoods, at benches and in front of computer terminals...

Keeping people involved in a student group requires relationship building. If the group is to persist, some of the most important relationships are vertical. The leaders need to be familiar with other members, because the new members may be tomorrow's leaders. Chances are good that the new members already know the leaders' names. They are after all sending the emails and standing up in front. This is why it is incumbent on the student leaders to make an extra effort to know members' names.

I am consistently embarrassed when I forget names; I am no expert. But of the many techniques you can find in self-help books, here are the tips that work for me.

• Repeat the name in conversation with the person when you first meet him or her. This cements the verbal imprint.
  
• Tie the person's name to one particular characteristic: academic department, advisor's name, molecule of interest, distinctive facial feature all work for me.
  
• Refer to this person when you talk to others: "The other day, Telemachus Brown was telling me about his interest in the psychology of parental absenteeism."

The more reinforcement, the better. Hopefully your brain won't then lock up when you see this person next. Particularly if you have worked closely with this person (you know who you are!) for years...

Maintaining a good relationship with future leaders is critical to your student organization's sustainability. It may sound obvious, but having your name known is important to people. When it comes down to it, you want a place where people know - people are all the same; you want a place where everybody knows your name...

This post is sponsored by the Forum on Science Ethics and Policy.

Organizing Students

Some readers are already familiar with my primary extra-curricular activity during graduate school. The Forum on Science Ethics and Policy (FOSEP) is a very active group of graduate students and post-doctoral fellows at the University of Washington who organize events on and off campus that increase dialogue about science and society in Seattle. I've been involved with FOSEP since I read a little article in Nature (needs subscription) in the fall of 2004, and since October '04 have been one of the group's directors. My involvement as a FOSEP leader is the primary reason I recently received a nice award from the UW Graduate School. FOSEP will very likely be the most career influencing element of my graduate school experience, although maybe the PhD will be nice, too.

Some of my FOSEP highlights include meeting Bill Clinton's Science Advisor Neal Lane, and picking his brain about science policy, organizing a symposium at the National AAAS meeting that included a presentation by Duncan Dallas, founder of the Cafe Scientifique movement, and planning a controversial presentation about the Kitzmiller v. Dover School District intelligent design case. None of these opportunities would have been possible without a well organized team of graduate students.

Tonight, I participated in the last leaders' meeting in my capacity as FOSEP director. In the course of the meeting, I realized that three years of leadership trial and error have resulted in a pretty comprehensive playbook for organizing and motivating a highly functional student group. Student organizations face many of the same tasks of other groups, but have added complexities of volunteerism, rapid member turnover, a lack of permanent space, funding needs and challenging schedules.

One of FOSEP's newer directors, Maris Lemba, suggested I catalogue my tips and tools on this blog. It just so happens that in the last week, three other people (at the UW and elsewhere) have inquired about recommendations I have about science outreach or student group organization. So thanks Maris! Over the next few weeks, I will be posting some of my tips. They will all be categorized under the label, "organizing students." I've put a special link on the right side panel, too. That way, if you want to periodically check back to see my latest additions, they will be easy for you to find.

What are the topics you can expect? They will range from practical to self-help.

• Nurturing Membership
  
• Raising Money
• Personal Leadership Development
• Networking on Behalf of Your Group
• Planning a Good Event
• Getting People to Attend Your Good Event
• Going Out On A Limb
• Using the Media
• Protecting Leaders From Burnout
• Outcomes Assessment
• Interpersonal Skills
• Running a Meeting
• Having Fun
  

Out of respect for everything FOSEP has taught me (and to try and get some of you interested in FOSEP) each of my posts will feature a little FOSEP logo to refer you to their web page. Don't hesitate to ask questions or post comments, either. Especially all you FOSEPers and FOSEP alumni out there.

When I Grow Up...

...I want to be a medical student.

Since the hell that I hear is third year medical school looks to me right now more like Elysian Fields (Odyssey 4.563), I decided to share with you the specifics of my clinical training schedule. Assuming my committee releases me from my current servitude on September 13, I will conduct the next academic year learning medicine in the following places.

• Oct 1-Nov 9: Pediatrics; Children's, Seattle, WA
  
• Nov 12-Dec 21: Family Medicine; Anacortes, WA
• Jan 7-Feb 29: Internal Medicine; Sacred Heart, Spokane, WA
• Mar 3-Mar 28: Internal Medicine; Harborview, Seattle, WA
  
• Mar 31-May 9: Surgery; Spokane, WA
• May 12-Jun 20: Ob/Gyn; Fairbanks, AK
• Jun 30-Aug 8: Psychiatry; Seattle, WA

I'll be applying for a carbon footprint waiver for all of that traveling... Fortunately, my wife and I will be in the same city (but not the same hospital) for all but 6 weeks of this adventure.

Wave Metaphor

I think I just let go of the tow rope.



I can't wait to drop in. Hopefully there will be more to my dissertation by the end than a bunch of sea foam...

Thanks to blogfish for the link.

Combined Degree Programs

I am part of an NIH-funded program that has been around for more than 30 years. The combined degree MD/PhD training program, called the Medical Scientist Training Program (MSTP, pronounced "messed up" by some of us) serves a need to better bridge basic science with clinical implementation. The idea is to train impressionable young scientists and clinicians in the ways of science AND medicine so that when they grow up, they can speak the same language and navigate the varied cultures of science, medicine and engineering. The result is a long, sometimes grueling path leading to a career in academic medicine. Every year, another 300 or so students sign up for this gig. One benefit of these programs is that we trainees don't have to pay for school, and get a livable stipend. The other side of the coin is that upon graduation we each enter a lifelong fundraising campaign to support our research. The big donors here could be private industry, but usually the benefactor is the Federal Government, via the National Institutes of Health.

Well, the NIH is seeking advice about how to reform the granting process so that the money (your taxes) they spend is most effective. For instructions on how to give advice, switch to this post. To hear one of my 'creative' ideas, keep reading.

I recently entered Seed Magazine's science writing contest. (The topic was science literacy.) Having only this blog as my science writing experience, I do not expect to win anything. For me, the contest helped me form an idea about what is missing in the public science communication complex. At the core of science literacy today is the need for effective translators; between religious folk and scientists; between doctors and newspapermen; between researchers and housewives; between professors and policymakers.

The MSTP has filled a critical need to connect the bench with the bedside. Sure, it takes too long for us to finish, and there is an attrition rate, but MD/PhDs tend to get grants because they understand what is needed on either the medical or the basic science side. Furthermore, several competitive programs exist to fund slightly higher risk efforts in translational medicine. Following these leads, the NIH would do well to support a small and competitive initiative to better train civic scientists. These would be professionals who garner some of their salary support solely to communicate with the public or with policymakers. A small number of students could earn dual degrees in hard science and communications or engineering and political science. These people will be the go-to resource for the public's questions and concerns about controversial topics like stem cell research, nanotechnology, designer genomes and drug safety. They also will be trained to develop innovative mechanisms to instill in Joe Public a scientific sense - that science does more than generate trivia.

This is my charge to the NIH (and other Federal funding agencies, for that matter):

Support Translational Science

Translators to the public and for the public. That will be money that can only feed back into the system.

The NIH wants YOU!

The NIH is seeking comments regarding NIH’s support of the biomedical and behavioral research, including peer review, with the goal of examining the current system to optimize its efficiency and effectiveness. The NIH is especially interested in creative suggestions, even if they involve radical changes to the current approach. Responses will be accepted until August 17, 2007 online or via e-mail (PeerReviewRFI@mail.nih.gov). I hope that all of you reading this - whether you are a grant recipient, a student or a taxpayer - will offer advice to Uncle Sam.

I made this post as part of a pyramid meme initiated by Writedit and sent to me by DrugMonkey, both individuals who know more about the nitty-gritty of NIH grants than myself. If you blog and want to tag yourself to write about this, here are 4 rules:

1. Include in your post the links to the NIH RFI and the comments page.

2. Include the list of six topics the NIH wants information about.

1. Challenges of NIH System of Research Support
   Please describe any specific challenges presented by NIH’s support of biomedical and behavioral research such as the current array of grant mechanisms, number of grants awarded per investigator, and the duration of grants.
2. Challenges of NIH Peer Review Process
   Please describe any specific challenges presented by the current peer review process at NIH.
3. Solutions to Challenges
   Please concisely describe specific approaches or concepts that would address any of the above challenges, even if it involves a radical change to the current approach.
4. Core Values of NIH Peer Review Process
   Please describe the core values of NIH peer review that must be maintained or enhanced.
5. Peer Review Criteria and Scoring
   Are the appropriate criteria and scoring procedures being used by NIH to evaluate applications during peer review? If not, are there changes in either that you would recommend?
6. Career Pathways
   Is the current peer review process for investigators at specific stages in their career appropriate? If not, what changes would you recommend?

3. Comment on one or more of these issues.

4. Decide who the next seven vectors will be for this meme.

I decided to forward this request to 7 other bloggers. The lucky winners here are:

The Daily Transcript
King of the Nerds
The Scientific Activist
Pimm
Science to Life
SeattleJew
Neurotopia

Check their sites to learn more about other folks' ideas, but most importantly, comment to the NIH!

MD/PhD Interest?

I've noticed a surge of referrals from an online forum about folks interested in MD/PhD programs. I am a student in the University of Washington's MSTP, and am happy to answer specific questions about our program or about my take on training the physician scientist. You can find one of my email addresses with only a little digging, OR you can comment on this entry. I am scheduled to defend September 13, and am very happy to be getting back on the wards.

You will probably notice that only a portion of my posts deal explicitly with medical research and graduate school. That's because I believe some physicians and scientists should assume more of a citizen's role - able to communicate about science and medicine in the context of public policy, general understanding and pop culture. This blog is meant to improve my communication skills in those areas.

Thanks for visiting!

Clouds Are Breaking

It's a Saturday night - June's final day. The last streaks of sunset are receding across the Northwest sky, rainclouds have been banished until October, and Seattle is in its prime.

Some of you will recall the 40 day flood of experiments I inundated myself with back on May 22. If your calender is handy, that means the time is almost up. Tomorrow, we can expect a reprieve. As I write this, I am preparing the last batch of cells for my last surgical experiment of my graduate career. The clouds are breaking for me, too. The sky is lightening. I can almost feel the sun cooking my pale Northwest skin.

This feels good.

I sure hope it takes me less time to find land then it took Noah et al. I am ready for it to finish.