Category: life events

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Long Live the Wesley House

So, Wesley House was pretty important to Brooke and me, and took up a great deal of time for the five years I was at Truman. Mike sent me a few YouTube videos of the band playing in Troy, IL (Troy United Methodist Church) and I must say, it brought back memories. The crazy thing is that Mike, himself, was the only person I recognized in the video. I know it’s been 3 years since we left, but still…it’s great to see all those new people as part of the band! And also good to see that the band is thriving, and so is the Wesley House as a whole (despite the state-wide organization deciding it isn’t a “vital ministry” anymore and not funding it anymore…grrrrrrr…).

Anyway, good times, yo… Good job, Wesley House Praise Band. Great to see you all in action again!

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Vacation Suggestions?

***EDIT***

Mom, what do you think about the Grand Canyon this summer?  We could go down on mules and leave Dad and Andy up above…Andy says he’s afraid of heights, but I think he’s really just a wuss….

Just in case anyone still reads this, I’m trying to decide where we should go for vacation this year. I’d really like to go southwest at some point, but I’d like to rent a jeep and go down into Canyonlands for a few days and I’m not sure we can afford that this summer. So, Andy’s never been to Mesa Verde so we could just go down and do that kind of stuff (plus I’ve been reading a lot of Tony Hillerman lately, so Chaco Canyon could be a fun adventure) and maybe head up north for a day or so, too. Or, we could go to the Dakotas, because I haven’t been there in awhile and Wall is always fun. Or, we could head the other direction to the east coast. Maybe to Niagra Falls, since neither of us has been there. Any other suggestions or votes? Keep in mind we’ll camp at least part of the time, and try to be as cheap as possible the rest.

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So now what?

My Prelim oral defense was on Wednesday…and was pretty friggin’ hard…but I got through it mostly unscathed. The exam consisted of a 20 min PowerPoint presentation generally reviewing all the stuff I put in my 25-page proposal, hitting the fine points and rationale, but not going through any specific experiments. This was followed by another 1 hr and 40 min worth of questioning on subjects peripherally related to what I’d written. A few questions were about why I’d chosen certain drugs, or why use this model for your experiments, or why this cell type, etc. Other questions were kinda related to what I was proposing, but mostly not.

In the end, I got 5 “yes” votes (out of 5) and was given a form letter from the dean saying that I need to be done by 2012. I certainly hope I don’t take that long, but hey…whatever…

Anyway, now I’m going to chill until after Christmas and then get started in earnest on the following:

1). I need to fill out the paperwork for “Advancement to Doctoral Candidacy,” get my signatures and get it sent off to the Dean’s office. Essentially, I’ve been a “graduate student” and now I’ll be an official “doctoral student,” which allows me to have fewer credit hours per semester (I only have 12 left that I need to complete…between now and 2012…heh…) and still remain a “full-time student.” It’s really just a formality, but still…can be annoying to get it all done…

2). Related to #1, I need to form a Doctoral Thesis Committee. This committee is separate from the one that I took the oral defense with, but can consist of the same members if so desired. These people are going to be in charge of pushing me along to make sure I’m not actually here until 2012. I’ll have to present my data for them every once and awhile (a few times a year?) and they’ll be the ones that decide when I’m done. They’re also there to “protect” me from my boss (which won’t be a problem…) so that she doesn’t keep me around too long doing lots of work when I could be out on my own… That’s their job, at least, but they won’t have to police Dr. Macarthur much, I expect…

3). Write up a paper for publication on the data I’ve obtained thus far. I want to get it started so I know what other experiments I need to start to fill out the paper. As Dr. Macarthur says (and I agree with), any paper should “tell a story”…so have a beginning, middle and end. I’ve got the beginning, certainly, and bits and pieces of “middle” and “end”…most of it being done, but I think I could use a bit more data to make the whole paper more complete.

4). I’ve got to present a paper on February 12th for “Journal Club.” This is done once a year (all students do it) and we have to pick a paper that we want to present in front of the department during lunch. It’s supposed to be pretty informal…but sometimes isn’t… 😛 Regardless, I’ve got to pick a paper first, then write up a PowerPoint presentation on it and generally know what I’m talking about with regards to the document. I’m not terribly worried about it, but it’s something else to complete…

That’s about it! Relatively downhill from here… I’m shooting to be done in early 2010, but if all my data comes in beautifully (as I know it will… :-P), then I could be out in late-2009. We’ll see…

Brooke just wants to go to Europe…so, the sooner the better for her… 😛

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D-Day: December 12, 2007

A day that will forever live in infamy… At 1:00 pm on December 12, 2007, I’ll orally defend (“D-day” as in “defense”) my preliminary thesis proposal. This is described as being the most difficult aspect of the Ph.D. process and will likely last nearly 2 hours, consisting of a brief introductory presentation by me, followed by lines of questioning about the subject and related subjects until they “feel I’m done” (or dead). The committee got together today to say that the 25-page document I turned in is “sufficient” and we can move ahead with the oral defense, and they set the date as next Wednesday.

I’ve been surprisingly good over these past few weeks with studying my old flash cards and review articles on the subjects of Parkinson disease, oxidative stress, the mitochondria and apoptosis (amongst others). I’m going to take a few days off between now and then to buckle down a few facets of the thesis proposal, as each committee member gave me a brief page with a few “suggestions” for things to think about. These are things they may ask about during the oral defense, but maybe not. Regardless, they thought everything was explained relatively well, but had a few questions on why I picked some experiments over others, or some time points over others, etc.

I feel pretty good right now about the whole thing, but I imagine that my feelings will change as we get closer. If I fail it (which does happen…), then I’ll get the opportunity to do it again…but I’m hoping it doesn’t come to that (obviously). Getting this all done before the Christmas holiday would be a big plus…

Here we go!

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Wait, wait…they won?!

For those of us that grew up in Columbia, MO and rarely had a terribly “winning” season, this has been rather interesting. Case in point, my mother had to ask Dad what a “#6 ranking” meant… “Is that in the Big 12,” she asked? “Nope…that’s in the nation.”

Not that I’m a terribly big football fan or anything…but…

Tigers

…good job, Tigers. I look forward to next week’s game!

(…of course, this is all made sweeter by simple virtue that they beat the undefeated KU to make this happen…w00t!)

Edit: Here’s an article in USA Today (Mom sent it to me…) by a sports columnist about the Tigers’ season, and game against Kansas. Says it all, really…

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SfN 2007

So, I was away in San Diego from Oct 31 – Nov 7 for two scientific meetings: National Parkinson Foundation and the Society for Neuroscience. These were my first real “meetings” that I attended and my first experience with people “in the field” that I’m working with (and there are a lot of the, apparently…).

The Parkinson meeting was over two days and was very helpful. The whole thing was set up so that there were presentations that were grouped along certain topics, discussed by people who know what they’re talking about, and educating the rest of us on this aspect of the Parkinson’s research field that we would otherwise be unaware of. Most of the discussions, it seemed, focused on the genetic forms of Parkinson’s disease (which only account for maybe 10% of total cases…) and that was informative, as we don’t really focus on the genetic forms, per se. Regardless, we met some folks, heard some good talks and learned more about the field.

While the Parkinson meeting involved 100-120 people, the Society for Neuroscience (SfN) meeting involved…oh…30,000 people…which meant that I learned a little bit there, but not as much as before. You come to a point where you get overwhelmed by all the posters and topics that your head spins…and after 6 days of straight brain research, you get tired and ready to go home. I learned a bit at the SfN meeting, but there was honestly too much to learn, and thus, it was a bit overwhelming… However, Newt Gingrich did speak to us…more on that later, perhaps… 😉

San Diego itself was decent, although Macarthur was right in that the place seems “artificial.” By that I mean that the downtown area didn’t have much character: you can go to Dogtown, Soulard, and The Loop in St. Louis and get a feel of “character,” but San Diego didn’t really have such things. That, and it was hazy the whole time – it was only sunny for one day in “sunny southern California” while we were there…

Anyway, it was a good trip! Certainly informative for a first meeting and I look forward to going to more in the future…hopefully an international one next time… 😛

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Still here!

Well, I’m sitting in the convention center in San Diego, CA waiting another hour before I present my poster… It’s been an informative and interesting trip, to say the least, but I’m ready to come home…there’s only so much neuroscience that a brain can handle… 😛

I’ll try and recount the experiences in a few days after I’ve recovered a bit – I fly back to St. Louis tomorrow morning, so it’ll be busy for the rest of today and tomorrow. Until then, I’ve got a few pictures up on my Picasa page (click on the Picasa Web Albums plug-in to the right-hand side of this page) if you wanna see what’s been going on so far in the trip.

On another note, it’s about 65 F here…and I hear it got into the mid 30s last night in Missouri… 😉

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Moment(s) of truth…

Lots of stuff going on, folks, so here goes:

1). Tomorrow, I’m turning in my 8-page research proposal. Assuming it’s approved (sometime next week), I’ll expand it to a 25-page NIH-style research grant and then, once that’s approved, I’ll orally defend the research proposal in early December. So yeah, this is one of those things you’ve gotta do to get the Ph.D. and, for the most part, is the absolute hardest thing I’ll have to do to get through this thing. So, if I’m studying a lot over the Thanksgiving holiday, that’s why… ;-P

2). I’m going to San Diego, CA. on Oct 31 for the annual Parkinson’s Society meeting and the Society for Neuroscience meeting. I’ll be gone until Nov. 7th, so it’s going to be a long trip! We’ve been getting our plane flights, hotel reservations, reimbursement shenanigans, etc. in order for the last few weeks and I think we should be ready to go, but I’ve still gotta get my poster done. These meetings typically involve “seminal presentations” from the big names in the field (i.e. Nobel Prize winners, etc…smart peeps, yo…) and then “poster presentations,” of which I’ll be presenting my research with pretty pictures and graphs. All told, it should be a good practice time for me to answer questions about what I did to others in the field that know infinitely more about the subject than me, which is really good in preparation for my oral defense a month later. Either way, it’s a paid-for trip to California, so I’m not complaining… 😛

3). We’re holding Grounded again this Sunday. Check out the website that I set up (should look familiar, compared with this one…) and stop by if you’re in the St.L area at 6:30 on Saturday night!

I think that’s about it for now? Sorry for the list… I’ve been kinda busy… 😛