Ratz

So I am fostering rats. I volunteered for a rat rescue that takes in animals that have been abandoned. Yes, there exist organizations that do this, they foster the animals they get in people's homes rather than a shelter till they get adopted. I thought since I was curious this would be a good way for me to see what pet rats are like, help out and get support like the cage provided.

So I have two very very cute males. They're interesting and I always go for interesting. They also sleep a lot. And they vocalize in an ultrasonic register but you can hear some of the lower chirping notes.

Thanks Erik for the picture, my experiments are ongoing...

The thesis

Hmmm, I think probably the only thing worse than going through your really old lab books from 5 years ago trying to figure out details of experiments, is going through someone else's old lab book trying to figure out experimental details. Holy crap I'll be doing this for a while.

Also, while I never considered the daily '24' a bastion of journalistic competence, I can't believe they referred to Owin Wilson as the 'butterscotch stallion'. Unless of course that's some tabloid standard that I'm unaware of... probably a good thing.

Long time no blog

In the end of April I got to watch one of my scientific heros in real life, Dr. Richard Dawkins gave a talk at the Chan centre and I was lucky enough to have scored some tickets. His talk was mainly about what had been covered in the God Delusion. He was a very good speaker and a very generous question answerer.

One thing I observed at this talk were the militant vegetarians. I'd only heard of them but in real life they were like a dog with a bone (picture the growling and the shaking and the not letting go). During question period there were three questioners challenging Dawkins to give up meat because he was popular and they claimed not eating meat was a natural outcome of his species-ism philosophy. The idea is that we are not obviously related to any other living organism only because the 'missing links' are all dead. If the missing links were still alive (say between chimp and human) we couldn't tell when humans stop and chimps begin and therefore we shouldn't eat 'anyone'. Dawkins agrees that the species divide is completely arbitrary and therefore not a good way to decide who can be hurt and who can't, Jane Goodall is also involved in this movement and one focus is to eliminate experimentation on primates. Anyway, Dawkins said we could choose to draw the line (eatable vrs non-eatable) anywhere in all life and that he wanted to draw the line based on capacity for pain and the animal's understanding of its fate (i.e. humans would be horrified about living in a field knowing they were only being fattened up for the kill but we have no indication that cows have the same dread). But the vegetarians wouldn't take anything other than a complete capitulation to their ideal. I wondered how they decided their line was the correct one. Of course, there's always a Simpson's quote "I'm a fifth level vegan, I don't eat anything that casts a shadow".

After Dawkins I was sick for a week and completely behind in life. I told one of my labmates that I really wanted a secretary and a personal assistant and she pointed out that what I really wanted was a housewife. Then everyone in the lab was agreed that what we really needed was a housewife - dinner on the table, house clean, groceries and laundry done plus free child care.

So after another week of trying to get by without a housewife I had the most perfect weekend ever. It included:
Friday:

• tequila shots and board games.

Saturday:

• great riding lesson


• dress shopping (normally a horror but I went to Plum, had some great assistance and was out in no time with three great looking dresses.)


• more board games


• Memphis Blues - I'm not much of a meat eater but damn that BBQ is tasty


• second showing of Ironman (great summer blockbuster, I highly recommend).

Sunday:

• got the motorcycle on the road with minimal fuss


• hanging out on a nice porch in the sun. Maybe doesn't sound so exciting but I don't have much access to those nice backyards/porches since you pretty much need to spend a million dollars to get a place like that in Vancouver.

So after a nice break, its back to the lab on Monday but significantly less stressed out. I even am starting to think I can handle it without the housewife...