Life day by day / Viata, zi de zi

One day I went to a store to look for a dress. Most dresses cost between 15 and 25$. The one I liked cost 40$.

The modern dogma says red meat is bad, meaning not healthy. But I know someone that eats red meat as medicine. This person used to be a "vegetarian" until she discovered she was anemic. It turns out iron from plants it is different than iron from meat, and red meat is the best source for iron. So now, on occasion she buys a burger, or a steak just to get her fix of iron.

Sunbathers who bronze beautifully have natural selection to thank. Research published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences suggests that the ability to tan is a trait that evolved several times in mid-latitude regions, such as China and the Mediterranean, where the sun’s intensity varies dramatically from season to season. If inhabitants of these regions had consistently dark skin, which blocks the sun’s rays, they wouldn’t have produced enough vitamin D in the winter. If they had consistently light skin, their bodies would have been robbed of folate, a light-sensitive vitamin essential for cell division and repair. Folate is especially important during pregnancy; too little can result in birth defects. Indeed, the researchers posit that sun-induced folate deficiency, rather than skin cancer or sunburn, was the driving force behind the evolution of dark skin and tanning.

I read something interesting in Nature magazine news yesterday and though I should share. A dude studied what happens when you pop bubbles, that was his PhD thesis. And he published a paper in Nature. I am not sure what methods he used to study bubble popping because I did not read his article, but the conclusion was that when you pop a bubble it does not vanish, it actually forms smaller bubbles. So, you do not "kill" the bubble, you actually make "offspring". He is now a PostDoc at MIT.

Maybe I chose the wrong field. I should be a physicist not a biologist.

Why do we like it?

Why do we seek it?

Why can’t we live without it?

Today I had a big craving for chocolate. So, I take my 1$ bill and go to the vending machines. Should I get a Twix, should  get a Snickers? Eventually I decide on the Twix. I am not going to eat until I get back to the lab, but I can stare at it, can’t I? It says Twix PB. PB? Peanut butter. OH NO! I should have taken the Snickers. But that has peanuts too, I try to console myself.

The PB was on the back, advertising the new Twix with PB. Mine was the regular one. HUH!

:)

Buy one get one free. You do not even need one, but you are going to buy 2, because it is cheaper that way. You do not need it now, but they want you to buy it now, and you do.

You just won a free cruise for 2. BUT: to maximize your gain pay us for a week at this stupid resort that no one wants to go to, and pay us for a trip to a nearby casino, and you can have a free one night cruise. Somewhere you did not really want to go, on a time of the year you cannot really take vacation, and you HAVE to enjoy all this extra stuff you do not really want to, or cannot possibly enjoy, just to get this tiny little "free" (about 100$ for taxes) thing. When you could just buy a cruise when you wanted it, where you wanted it without all the hassle. But also without any freebe.

The same thing happens at the lab, we get these awesome offers for stuff we just order last week, of stuff we only need to order once a year, or stuff that you can only order in small supplies because it goes bad, but if you order a whole lot of it is cheaper, except that in the end for you it is still the same because you end up throwing away half of it.

I am just a little upset right now, but soon I will get home, eat my chocolate muffin, look at the Christmas tree while listening to Christmas carols and everything will be ok again, specially with George by my side.

Rule: If SDS in a 20% solution precipitates it is too cold.