Exercise Break

I have had to slow way down on my running and jogging lately. I went and tried a walk/jog combo this morning and I just can't do it for now. It hurts my knees too damn bad. At least I have the bike and I can always walk. It just sucks because I worked so hard to get to my 5k and now I can't even do half that. *tear* At least I am able to still exercise and I still have all of the benefits from learning to jog which is more than a lot of people can say. And when the time is right I know exactly how to make the C25K program work for me and I will be back out in no time :)

To The Moon?

I have always dreamed of traveling through space. Of going to the moon and seeing the Earth from above. As a teenager I went to Space Camp to pretend to be an astronaut. I have visit Kennedy Space Center countless times and still get goosebumps when i see the space shuttle. I have never seen a launch but one day it will happen. I have seen every major movie, documentary, and read countless books about space and space travel. I am an avid scifi fan. I started my college career as an engineer with dreams of building the rockets to put people in space, and ended up a biologist in hopes of being the one to do experiments in zero G. In short, I have had a life long obsession with space.

I know now that will never be my future, but I hope and dream that my children or grandchildren will have the opportunities I never did. I have been following several stories lately on President Obama's plans to send us back to the moon. We are almost 40 years behind on space travel thanks to money being diverted for wars and greed. But Obama gives me hope that one day in the not too distant future we will pick up where we left off and continue forward again.

This is the article I read from MSNBC.com this morning that encouraged me....

President faces a Kennedy decision on space

*Image borrowed from msnbc.com*

Esty Time!

Today I ran across the most amazing artist named Elsita. I can totally see a series of these in my house. They are prints of some original paper cuts she made. Plus a paperdoll and a print I just love.

Flowers

Some of mylate spring/ early Summer flowers in Bloom.

How I Learned to Knit

I thought I would share and give props to some of the websites I have used to help me learn to knit. Of course I wouldn't be able to do any of this without Liz and Elisabeth, but they are a bit more difficult for me to share on the web. Also thanks to Liz for helping me compile this list.

Knitting Help - This site is amazing and she has great videos. My first rec for anyone who wants to start knitting.

Cut out and Keep - All Around great craft site

Free (or cheap) Pattern Sites
Knitting Pattern Central - Lots of free patterns and links to some interesting blogs
Knitty - Online Knitting Magazine
Jujube & Lolo - some of the most amazing and adorable kids patterns

Anyone have other good sites I should check out?

My First Scarf

This is my first knitting project I started when Liz was here. Not the best, not the prettiest, but I made it! I still need to tidy up the end threads. It is just a small scarf for Mr. Twig and he loves it too. I am hoping to start on another scarf this week that will help me practice working with two different colors. I also have a hat I am wanting to try. My MIL Elisabeth has been helping me a lot and I am so glad this is something we can work on together. I think knitting is fun and it is a productive way for me to spend my hours on the train when I am burned out of studying.

H.C. Ørsted’s Park

To celebrate my last day of class, I decided to take a little detour and walk from Nørreport Station to Hovedbanegård (the Main train station). I have done this many times before when I have a little extra time before my train comes. but today I decided to walk through the park I have often passed but never explored. Here are a few pics I snapped with my camera phone.

Summer Vacay and a Semi Graphic Mouse Post

Just a couple of more days and I will be back writing like a mad woman, stirring the pot, and creating controversy :p Monday is my last day of class until Summer Vacation. Wooohooo! Then just a couple of weeks before my mom gets here and 6 weeks until Tammy is here. *happy dance* It don't get much better than this!

My final lab is turning out to be quite long and boring and frustrating. Though the concept behind it is very cool. Just for sharing and learning, here is what we worked on today....


We dissected a mouse trachea and studied the cells between it and the esophagus, called the epithelial cells. We are looking to see how different chemicals and compounds cross into cells and what effect it has on them. This method is used to study how similar cells in humans react. But we use mice since most humans won't take too kindly to having us take out their throats! Thanks Mr. Mouse for letting us study you. It truly is appreciated!

PS. Any PETA or animal cruelty comments will be deleted. I normally won't censure my comments but seriously. I am a biologist. If you read my blog you know this. So either skip the post or get over it. Thanks!

8 More Days

Of this painful lab class to go! But things are looking up!

Today I met with the head of the Animal Behavior Group, and I am officially affiliating myself with their research group. I will be working with him on a Parrot Communication project starting in September. He is headed to Costa Rica in a few weeks to do some field recordings and I will be helping him sort out and analyze the data when he gets home. One of his research focuses is to find individuality in the calls and chatter amongst the birds. Like how they can tell each other apart. He warned me it would be lots and lots of computer time but I am game since I will be learning something completely new! I am lining this up to be a pre-thesis project so I can learn some methods and techniques. One of my options for my thesis is to venture to Colorado and do some similar studies with swift fox. But for now I am not worried so much about that. We will see what and where I end up doing for that later on.

Good things are definitely in the future and it feels good to be going back to the side of biology I love the most.

*Random* All three of us have been through it and back again with a stomach virus that has lasted almost a week. Twig is better but Mark and I are still struggling :( At least the endless rounds of laundry caused by it has ended!