Patience

I am still in the wonderful situation of having too many projects that I find interesting, and too little time. I guess that means it is about time for me to apply for faculty positions and recruit some students to help me! Well, that will have to wait until the fall.

Presently I am stalling patiently waiting on a very large file to transfer, after testing some new code. I'm really excited because this is for a project I've been putting off for several weeks, and it feels nice to be making progress on it again. 

No exciting pictures this time, but I thought I'd give an update.

My super-exciting Y diversity paper was rejected again. The major criticisms were that it was difficult to read given the very short format of the journal, and that it just wasn't interesting. A collaborator was quite upset at the rejection, but, I haven't really been bothered by it. They didn't have major complaints about the science, and, whenever I find time to reformat for a journal with a longer format, I'm confident it will get published. I think eternal optimism is a character flaw that suits me well as a scientist. 

I've been learning a lot about RNAseq, pregnancy and Rheumatoid Arthritis, as well as managing large files. I have run into a "segmentation fault" problem (running out of computer memory) with one of the programs I'm using that I haven't been able to solve. It is immensely frustrating because it only occurs with certain runs, and, since I've automated the code submission, there isn't any human errors in the syntax that could cause it. After many failed efforts I think I may have to break down and email the authors of the paper about the code. Let's hope they are responsive.

The Bear is keeping us very busy. We had to switch daycares at the New Year. Our old daycare closed for personal reasons (although they might reopen sometime in February), and after searching and interviewing, we found a new one that isn't as convenient, location-wise, but that we really like. The first couple days the Bear wasn't very happy going, but on Friday, she went in, and came home without any tears! A bonus of this place is that they are a husband and wife couple from Chile and speak fluent Spanish and English with the kids. It has been a great motivator for me to brush up, and improve my Spanish.

At the library today I picked up several Spanish music CDs to play, and kids books in Spanish to read to the Bear. I'm a little embarrassed at how much I have forgotten, but am excited to learn alongside the Bear.

Ciao!