Entertain me people. I'm begging you.
Archive for the 'Day in the life of DrugMonkey' category
I wonder what happened to that lab?
Many years ago when I was a much younger scientist, reading through the literature was occasionally frustrating. I'd come across a lab working on some question of interest and wonder why they just.....stopped, almost before they got going. Often the authors in question never returned to the published literature and I would wonder what happened.
Later on, in a few cases I would run into them again.....maybe they went to Administration in their University, maybe became a NIH Program Officer, perhaps ended up in BigPharma or publishing. In other cases there was never much trace to explain what happened.
I think we can assume it was frequently grant money-related.
We're facing another round of the phenomenon, I sense. The current economic climate for biomedical research scientists is very grim. You know this. News of 5%ile paylines posted by at least one NIH Institute is gripping. In the bad way.
The rumble of labs closed due to loss of grant support is swelling. No longer a FOAF, either, but someone you know. The degrees of separation will shrink. People will be lost from science.
This means that future bright eyed graduate students or postdocs will read and wonder.
"What happened to that lab", they will ponder, "the papers were leading somewhere cool but they just stopped".
Tightly wound
A friend was recently observing that we academics seem pretty high strung right now. Cranked up to the breaking point, I'd say.
Of course we are. This sequester and continuing resolution thing has really put the bite on. The lab closings that seemed only in the realm of a Friend of a Friend or a likely possibility are now becoming reality. I'm seeing PIs leave. Close down. Jump ship. In all of this there are technicians and postdocs losing their jobs. Grad students who cannot find a funded lab to join after the rotations are finished up. Institutional decision making that seems even closer than usual to hand-flapping panic rather than a plan.
Baby, it's cold outside.
"Please oh please let the suspect look like the kind of person who represents the group I already suspect was behind it"
Pretty much everyone, as we wait with bated breath for the first suspect in the Boston Marathon bombing to be arrested.
Quickly avert your eyes
I don't agree with calls to not show the pictures of the gory aftermath of the explosions in Boston this week. It's hard to look at and it shocks some people. If your kids run across it you might have some nightmares or some explaining to do.
So what?
This is what happened. And there were people in horrific pain, people horribly maimed and some people killed. Why should we be afraid to see this? We who gobble up violent video games and teevee shows and movies with glee.
Nobody is actually forcing you to look at it and to mull it over. You have the option of quickly looking away.
I think we should be viewing the graphic depictions of carnage from the wars we engage in too.
And also, capital crime executions should be on the nightly news.
Maybe, just maybe, we'd take our actions and inactions as a society a little more seriously if we all grappled intensely with the consequences.
Thought of the Day II
Never, ever pay one bit of attention to what any artist has to say about his or her creation. They don't know anything about it either and their insight is just made up bullshit. Just enjoy the damn thing for what it means to you.
analogies
my blather on the realities of being an NIH extramurally-funded investigator is to "game theory" what screaming and waving in panic is to dogpaddling over to the side and climbing out the pool ladder.
Idle thought
Relevant to Sci's recent ranting about the paper chase in science...
Sorry reviewers, I am not burning a year and $250K to satisfy your curiosity about something stupid for a journal of this IF.
Hey Cat Fans, LOOK! You too can be just as stupid as a dog owner!
Apparently some epic dumbasses decided that the common housecat, bloodthirsty lethal little murder-cat killing machine that it is, wasn't quite badass enough.
What. Is. Wrong. With. People?
