Knit Digestive System.

I actually came across the knit brain from the previous post at a crafty forum I read sometimes. The people there find all kinds of fantastic projects and items. This completely knit digestive system came up in the same thread as the brain. I'm going to keep an eye on this one.



The first Fibonacci legwarmer was finished just after knit group last night. The second was cast on today. It's slow going because the wool is fine and the entire thing is ribbed for extra stretch. Next up in my knitting bag is the fourth self-striping sock since Christmas (I had to take a break before I finished the last one...fourth sock syndrome, anyone?). Self-striping wool is a mathematical achievement in itself. One of my favourite bloggers, Eunny Jang of See Eunny Knit has a great tutorial for home dyeing.

Okay, I'm out. I've been doing some research on my science family so I'll try to update that tomorrow.

Cass

Knit Science.

Two of my favourite things all rolled up into one great big geeky yarn ball.

This anatomically correct knit brain is one of the most complicated knitting projects I have ever seen. People can be so creative.



I'm working on my own geeked-out project right now too. I'd been meaning to make some new legwarmers for awhile. With a christmas present gift card to my current local yarn store (LYS) I found 3 skeins of Wellington Fibres in pearl blue and forest green. The wool is absolutely beautiful; grown, spun, and dyed in Elora, just north of here. I've incorporated a stripe pattern into the legs that is based on the Fibonacci numbers. The first number is 0, the second number is 1, and the subsequent numbers equal to the sum of the two preceding numbers. This sequence is aesthetically pleasing and is found widely in nature....the spirals in a shell, the seeds in a sunflower, the branching in trees are all patterned following these numbers.


To say the least, they are turning out very well and I"ll be casting on the second at knit group tomorrow night.

Sweet dreams, Cass

"I'm a sucker for clever webcomics".

Truth. I can start at the beginning and just make my way through. Andrew thinks I'm crazy because I sit at my computer with my back to him and lol.

Earlier today, a friend directed me to xkcd. I had mentioned that I was looking for a t-shirt that I had seen someone wearing awhile ago. And there it was. I want to wear something with wit and style to my thesis Defense. This will do the trick nicely. Dress pants, maybe a tailored jacket, some kitten heels, and a Stand back I'm going to try Science t-shirt.

Another webcomic that I can't get enough of is NatalieDee. I like to pick a particularly offensive or confusing episode, put it up on my laptop screen, and face it at Andrew while he's in his office and I'm off doing something cool. This distracts him and effectively takes-away from his super-typing abilities and then I don't have to hear updates as often. "Wow, my thesis is 30,000 words long now." Yeah, well mine will be too.

Back to the hilarity that is my Friday afternoon,
Cass

p.s. Andrew just came up to me all bundled up and yelled at me through my headphones that he is off to school. I showed him this, laughed at myself, and said I was a bad grad student. He yelled back, "yes you are, today!" Aw, I like him.
c

An extra little side project.

My advisor is nearing retirement. He spends a lot of time working on projects that he has wanted to do for much of his academic career. He just does a lot of crazy and interesting things in general, but one of my favourite projects of his is a screenplay he is creating about a scientist who died for his beliefs. I won't give much more away, but to say that I am endlessly inspired by the creativity of the people I work with. They have had a big influence on helping me decide on the directions I am hoping/wanting to take over the next few years.

The other day a past student came into the lab to chat with Doug about life in general, it seems. Doug wasn't in, so she asked me about my work and the grad student lifestyle. We had a good chat and Doug showed up. I tried to focus on the analysis I had been working on, but in our lab it is impossible to stay entirely out of a conversation. Since I was sitting just down the lab bench Doug was using my experiences in the lab as examples of how one goes about securing a grad studies position. Doug loves to compare the committment of a Masters student to the committment of a partner in marriage. In his words, if you're entering grad school you are marrying your project. In my mind, it's a short-term marriage lasting on average 2 years sometimes including an extended period at the end were you just keep dragging things out and dragging things out until you just have to split because you can't take it anymore. Just dump yourself, already. heh. That being said, I know what he's getting at. To be successful in grad school you need to trust your instincts, dive in head first, dedicate yourself to your work, love what you're doing (ha - at the analogy, of course...I love my work), and accept that this will change you, generally for the better (there are always exceptions to the rule). Anyway, on this particular day, Doug took this analogy to another level. He started talking about me as the scientist kid. He is my scientist father, his advisor is my scientist grand-father, and so forth back to the days of my old, affluent, white-men scientist forefathers.

This idea really caught my attention.

So, aside from figuring myself out, I'm going to use this space to develop my scientific family tree. I have a feeling that this will be much easier than regular family-tree making. I won't have any gravestones to take rubbings from and universities are very good record keepers.

So to start out, let me introduce you to my scientific immediate family: The Cliff Ecology Research Group. I've got nothing but love for these ones.

Cass

First off.

There's this thing that has been bothering me for a little while now. I catch myself thinking about it at odd times and noticing it around me wherever I go. It distracts me from my work and my everyday life. I know I need to deal with it, but I'm not quite sure how to go about doing that.

If there's anything I've learned in my past 7 years of postsecondary education it's that when something is bothering you this much you need to do something about it. This bother is what makes the scientific community tick. We notice something and it gets to us, we feel angry about a situation, confused or frustrated because we don't know, so we learn all we can and we ask questions. We ask clear, consise, well-thoughtout questions. Then we take these questions and develop hypotheses and predictions to study. And so it goes.

This thing that I'm thinking about is too big right now for me to put it down in one post. I think I'm going to need a few good, long ramblings just to sort this all out. I know it has to do with communication, disconnect between the scientific community and the general public, the division of arts and science, being pigeon-holed as a scientist when there is really so much more that I do. I suppose I'm struggling to define my own identity right now. I'm at this funny-feeling changing-over graduating and looking for the next big project while I try to satisfy my craving for adventure place. I've spent the past year trying to live in the moment and manage my anxiety, but it's tough to enjoy my current situation while I deal with all of these new ones.

So, lately I've been looking for some way to focus all of this chaotic energy. I've been trying to find myself a personal challenge or project. A lot of people on the internet seem to enjoy documenting some aspect of their daily life with pictures and blog entries. I think I want to do this too. I've made three previous attempts to join the blogosphere. All regarding topics I thoroughly enjoy, but I haven't been able to commit. I'm not making any promises about the content here, but I am going to attempt to stick with it for awhile. Maybe I should think about giving myself a more well-defined goal in that respect. I'll think about it for awhile.

Just had to get that out there,
Cass