A Green Thumb?

We're working on our planting skills.... here are some of our experimental components:

Sweet Peas!

Wooly Thyme
Marigolds
Some plant that came with the house
Wisteria

Does your local Walmart sell this?

I thought it very cute to see baby pineapples at Walmart today... The only time I've seen anything like this was at the Dole Pineapple Plantation in Hawaii!

I've definitely NEVER seen these in the Walmarts on the East Coast OR even in other parts of San Diego....

MELEMENT!

So after I completed my thesis, Dave got his Prius... Well, now that he's won an award, I get my Element!

Meet Melement (Mel's Element)

My friend Paul knew I was looking for one and called me Melement in an email recently. I thought it would be a fitting name for my new car!

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So throughout our recent car buying experiences, I've learned it can be a pretty painful process, but if you do your research, and do as much of the negotiating you can via the internet, it can be relatively painLESS (except for the part that your wallet will be empty afterwards).

As my friends can attest, I had spent many months babbling about how I wanted an Element. The response I usually got was, "Ugh, that ugly thing??" But I've grown to love it's unique boxy shape. And for people who know me well, and know how much of a tomboy I am at heart, know it's a pretty good fit for me.

Also I wanted it for many practical purposes. We needed a bigger car to haul things (for example, bikes, surfboard, snowboards, furniture, boxes, going on camping trips), and I loved the fact that you can fit bikes INSIDE the car instead of strapping to the top of the car (which I hate because I'm so freakin' short, and I have a weird phobia of bikes flying off the tops of cars and crashing into other cars on the highway) OR the back of the car (my brother has one of those, and it always throws me off when I'm parallel parking because you lose a few inches of bumper space. i like being able to gently tap other cars with my bumper in tight spaces.). I also liked the amount of space IN it. It's lower than your usual compact SUV, so there's actually much more interior space inside of it. Quite roomy. Granted, I would have to be careful if I decide to drive over some curbs since I'll shear off the bottom of the car, but I think I can handle that sacrifice. And I also loved the fact that it has "weatherproof fabric" and "urethane coated utility floor". To interpret, easy to clean! There was a rumor that you could just hose down the floor which is false, but I hear if you need to, you can take a bucket and sponge it down. Sweeet...

Love the tailgate. Someplace to sit if you need to change out of your wetsuit, put shoes/rollerblades on/off, veg while waiting, etc.

Oh, and the backseats flip up! So cool when you need to put bikes in the car.... This is me testing it out. Heeeeee
I love my Melement.

On Day Two (today), we managed to make full use of it by buying several dirty pots of large plants and some 6' long trellises. I was also ready if my brother got stuck riding his bike through the hills of Rancho Santa Fe. But he made it through the exhausting ride.... But dang, I can't wait to make Dave pick me up in the Melement when I get stuck there in the future!

To answer a question that may crop up: The Kiwi Green Metallic Element (bright shiny green!) was my first choice, but unfortunately, there were ZERO available in San Diego at this time (and I checked ALL the dealerships in the area). I was sad, but orange was my second choice. I got so lucky! Only ONE dealer had it in the trim I wanted, AND I managed to knock off a little more than 2K off the MSRP....

What next? Time to plan a road trip!

Graduation/Best Clinical Research

Even though the residents don't finish until June 28th, the Scripps Graduation dinner was held today!

It was at the Hyatt in UTC, free wine and beer, FREE yummy dinner (surf (swordfish) and turf (nicely cooked medium rare filets)!), and dessert.

Us with Dave's fellow R3 Carl and his girlfriend, Jill

Dave, Richard (R2), and future intern Derek (he rotated with Dave as a med student and was AWESOME -- a valuable recruit for Scripps!)
my bro Ben and Neill joined us for the festivities

Another R3 Mansur and his wife, Lucy, talking to Dr. Higginbottom (a very brilliant physician, I must say)
Luminaries from Scripps
Proof of completion!!!!
And the biggest biggest surprise came later in the evening. At every graduation, there are a couple awards given out to members of the graduating class. One of which is for the best research project performed during their residency. Scripps is one of the few residencies that requires their residents to perform a research project during their program. I have no idea when they had time to do this... But Dave managed to spend some time working on angiogenesis in Quigley's lab in TSRI with a great postdoc, Veronica. And he managed to win the award!!!! It came as a big shock to him, and I really wished I caught the goofy grin on his face on camera.... But you'll just have to settle for a picture of the plaque. (Oh, and it came with a $500 check!)
Dr. Higginbottom presented the award. It was really great and he briefly described Dave's project. I'm very impressed by this man because we recently had dinner with him and had a nice conversation about science and research. Wow, what a sharp mind. He asked me about my project and was very fascinated by it, and even asked me to come give a talk to the residents in the fall (he wants someone to give the residents a perspective on the linkage between bench to bedside, and a timeline of how LONG the bench side can take)! Unfortunately for me, he definitely remembered it, and announced it to everyone at the dinner as part of his congratulatory speech to Dave!!!!... But I also really like him because he told Dave that Dave gave the BEST presentations out of all the residents (and meant it genuinely), that Dave was able to explain basic science to clinicians with no research background, which is no small feat!... And he encourages Dave to find a way to link his research mind to his clinical responsibilities in the future... Awwww, I'm so proud of my Dave.

Dave's first SD concert

After 2.5 years of music deprivation, Dave is making lovely sounds again! He joined the Poway Community Symphony Orchestra and today was his first concert with them!

It was held nearby at the...

The program

Empty stage waiting for musicians to fill it
It's Dave!

A very blurry Dave (dang old camera!) goofing off, playing his viola like a cello!

The Orchestra!

(Note the 2 young guys on the far left with their little mohawks. *chuckle*)

Hello Dr. Viola, happy to be playing again, no?
Work and play...

Poor Dave never gets a respite from work!

(Calling in to check on patients during the intermission!)

Crazy little ones

Dave's sister and family were in town for a few days and we stopped by their hotel room for dinner. Ah, the little ones are getting bigger and bigger!

Julia (5 years old!) being camera shy. What an oxymoron! When she was 2 years old, she was ready to sing or chant Chinese nursery rhymes at the drop of a hat. Tonight, she was so intent on pumping up balloons (which they then released, giggling and shrieking over the flying balloons), she refused to let us take a picture.

Crazy Ryan is 4 years old. He's crazy and fearless. He went around pumping up balloons, and then twisting and squeezing them in his hands until they popped. Ugh, the thought of it makes me shiver!

First Baseball Game in 20+ Years

Today Dave and I went to our first baseball game together. We went with some of his coworkers to the Padres-Dodgers game because there was a Taiwanese pitcher starting for the Dodgers and wanted to cheer for him.... My first (and last) baseball game ever was watching the Houston Astros in the Astrodome back when I was 8? 9? 10?? All I remember was that the field looked really small, and I ate so many hotdogs, I felt really sick and slept through half of the game... Thank goodness this was a whole different experience! :) Ha ha ha...

My dad got a HUGE kick out of the fact that WE were going to a baseball game (Dave and I don't watch much baseball). He was pretty excited for us. He's become the biggest Yankees fan due to Chien-Ming Wang's stellar performance this year. I hear the guy is a national hero in Taiwan! Not kidding!!!


I took a picture of me and Dave, but Dave hated his half of the picture and made me crop him out. A quick tangent: I just want to show off my new funky glasses that I was trying out for the first time. I had gotten them for ~$30 from Zenni Optical. If you know your prescription, and can measure your glasses, I would highly recommend getting your glasses online! You save TONS of money! And don't feel so bad testing out new styles... Not sure if I really like these yet, but what I DO like is that they have magnetic shades that just snap on, and I think they look a whole lot nicer (on my face) as prescription sunglasses....

Okay, back to baseball... Here's a pic of Petco Park, home of the San Diego Padres.
People in the stands (filled up a lot more later on. I was pretty impressed so many people came out on a Thursday night! Don't they work???)

The man we came to see:
In action:

It was a pretty interesting game. Kuo pitched alright. I think this was his second (I think?) time starting in the major leagues. He had done really well in the minor leagues, but was pretty erratic with his pitches. Anyways, although he's definitely no Wang, he was headed for a win. Even though he was replaced after the 5th inning, by the 7th, the Dodgers were up 5-1. During the 7th and 8th innings, most of the fans left...

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BUT they missed the biggest rally EVER! (okay, maybe not the BIGGEST, but a pretty good one!) Bottom of the 9th, Dodgers ahead 5-1, Padres at bat....I can't remember the details, but a homerun and lots of hits, the score is 5-5... THEN bases loaded, 1 out, 3 balls - 2 strikes... pitcher pitches... and WALKS the batter!

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Padres wins 6-5. An amazing game!

Returning to the World of Employment

After spending a couple months relaxing and enjoying the domestic life in San Diego, I decided to start looking for a job out here. Biotech, here I come!

I had always planned on having a career in the biotech industry. Although I have been strongly encouraged to do a postdoc in academia, I didn't see a reason to suffer through 2-5 MORE years of high stress, long hours, and low pay. I NEVER had the ambition to pursue a career in academics... I was looking for a career that challenged me, yet provided a 40 hour (and hopefully not much more) work week, job security, and financial stability.

Almost 2 months ago, I decided I was ready to start applying for jobs. I didn't want to wait too long; I heard long stretches of unemployment worked against you. Also, Dave had told me that whenever I got a job offer, I could go out and buy a car. :) Whoo-hoo! Talk about an incentive! Ha ha ha....

It was difficult to find suitable biotech positions for me. There are plenty of Research Scientist positions out there, but the majority required prior industry experience. And then I was overqualified for the rest of the positions. But that didn't stop me from applying to them! I did get lucky and found 2 PostDoc positions available at local biotech companies. Those are pretty hard to find. One of them was at a good company focusing on cancer therapeutics through chaperones. I thought I had a good chance for that as my thesis focused on a chaperone protein, but shortly after I applied, the listing disappeared. Shucks, must've applied too late...

But after sending out around 15-20 applications, I got an interview! It was for the other postdoc position I applied for, at a small company using mass spectrometry for genotyping. My previous experience made me a good candidate as I used to work at a sequencing facility and did a little bit of genotyping during grad school. Honestly, I wasn't very thrilled at this prospect as I wanted to continue protein work (similar to what I did for my thesis), but I couldn't be picky at this point. Anyways, I had a phone interview-- went great! Two weeks later, had another phone interview with the Director of the Department-- eh, went okay. Two weeks later, I had an onsite interview-- went well I thought. By this point, I was getting a little fed up. They told me at the last interview that I was one of 3 candidates remaining (whoo-hoo!). However, if the race was close, there was potential to be called in for ANOTHER interview involving an oral presentation.... Oh, did I forget to mention that this position was only for ONE YEAR?!?!? (Yeah, didn't really fit my description of job stability)

Anyways, around the time of that last interview, I saw an opening at Stratagene (A nice familiar name whose products I've used before. Heck, I first used one of their kits at my first lab job in 1996!) and decided to apply. Two business days later, had a phone interview, was asked to come back for an onsite interview in 2-3 days. 3 days after that, a JOB OFFER!

6/13/07 Update: I decided to take the Stratagene position!!! Although Stratagene has now officially merged with Agilent, I have been reassured it was a "good thing", and will be joining on as an Agilent employee. The potential for growth is great!

On another note, I was asked for a phone interview for another Postdoc position I applied for a MONTH ago! It's at a good reputable company, but alas, the timing just wasn't right... but it was so nice to get the email. At one point during the job search, I thought my chances were so slim, but yay, I CAN be competitive!

Ooooh, now for the car search!

Californian Cat

Even though born in Virginia, this cat has found that he's a Californian at heart....

Deciding whether to go out or not

He likes to roll around in the sun (even though the ground is so hard)

Working on his "tan"

He gets all his sides covered, so it's even