I was NOT expecting this!!!

Desert Island Discs

This weekend I was reacquainting myself with my CD collection (yes, I am old-school and don't have an iPod... it's sad that having CDs is "old-school"...), and I got to thinking about "Desert Island Discs". For those of you who haven't heard of it, it's a BBC radio show that has been running since 1942, where celebraties comment on the music they would want to have if stranded on a desert island (it's a little bit more complex than that, but it'll do for our purposes).

So here's my list of desert island discs:

The Commitments Soundtrack - I watched the film the other day, and it reminded me of how good this soundtrack really is. From "Mustang Sally" through to the soulful "I Can't Stand The Rain", every song is a favorite of mine, and I'll always remember my sister-in-law "Mrs JollyRgr" after hearing an average version of "Try A Little Tenderness" saying: "That song should only be sung by a soulful black man, or the fat kid from The Commitments..." and she was dead right!

Flight of the Conchords Soundtrack - Okay, so it's another soundtrack, but these guys are funny! Seriously, if you haven't heard them, go and YouTube them... I'll wait... If I'm going to be stranded on a desert island, there might be days when I need some help raising a smile, and these boys are the perfect medicine! Every song makes me laugh, especially "Business Time", "Most Beautiful Girl In The Room" and "Inner City Pressure" (where they're at their Petshop Boys-best).

Room for Squares by John Mayer - Sweetie and I had one of our first dates at the (no longer) Starwood Ampitheater, watching Marron 5 and John Mayer, so this CD has a lot of memories for both of us. We've been fans of his music ever since, and this CD has some great tracks like "No Such Thing", "3 x 5", and "My Stupid Mouth", which I can certainly relate with! Also, the CD has a periodic table on it, so what's not to like?

The Unforgettable Glenn Miller - I remember this record from when I was a kid, and the music has stayed with me... from dancing to "In The Mood", to playing "American Patrol" at my primary school graduation. I also remember my Mum going to great lengths to get a VHS copy of the "Glenn Miller Story". It's an oldie, but a goodie!

The Very Best of Crowded House - Couldn't complete this list without a good aussie/kiwi band now could I? I actually became a fan through listerning to their music played over the PA at the local supermarket where I worked, but from those humble beginnings I've become a true fan, and this CD has everything from "Don't Dream It's Over" and "It's Only Natural", to "Better Be Home Soon". Also, it's a double CD with a bonus live album, so that's more music for me!

Internationalist by Powderfinger - Lucky last (I was aiming for 5 CDs, but just couldn't do it)! My favorite band, hands down! I love all of Powderfinger's stuff, and I have all their CDs, but if I had to pick one, it would be Internationalist. From "Hindley Street" through to "Lemon Sunrise", I love every track. Especially "Good-Day Ray"!

Apologies to The Beatles, Triple J, and all classical music, but there was just too much to choose from!

Now, what about my readers? What are your desert island discs?

House Hunting

On Saturday, Sweetie and I started our house-hunting. We looked at 7 houses: 3 were easily dismissed, 2 were dismissed on further review, and 2 were promising. It was a pretty good start!

One of the houses was near a property that had some Christmas decorations in the yard... Well, we think there was a yard! There were so many decorations, that every square inch of space was occupied!!

The highlight of the hunt, however, was the first house. I opened the door to the shower and what should I find, but 2 samurai swords!! Were they hiding them for the inspection, or were they using the shower to wash off the blood... Very strange!

I have been accepted for publication... at last!

It's not that I haven't had a paper published before, but this one has special significance... It is the final publication from my PhD.

Regular readers of this blog (all 3 of you) will realize that I finished my PhD four years ago. So what took me so long to get this published? The list of reasons goes something like this:

• After completing my PhD I left the country for a new job in a different field (I am now on my second job since leaving the country, in another field)

• My PhD supervisor unexpectedly passed away less than a year after I left

• My PhD co-supervisor lost her father on the same day
  

• My PhD co-supervisor had a cancer scare (she is thankfully completely healthy now)

• Countless revisions of the manuscript and recalculations of data

• Finally, the first review of the manuscript required corrections. Included in these was a request to include a particular detailed mechanism for the chemical reaction I was utilizing. This seems reasonable, except that there is no proven mechanism for this reaction, and the particular mechanism requested by the reviewer did not appear to exist! Thankfully, the editors did not require me to make this addition

It took a while, but it got there in the end! (It sounds like I just published the little engine that could!).

The 5 Things Meme

5 things I was doing 10 years ago:
1. Completing my second year of my Bachelor of Science degree.
2. Starting my brief career as a cricket umpire.
3. Trying to get on "Sale of the Century" (missed out by one question!).
4. Sadly, that's about it... I needed a life! (ask me in a year... I found one 9 years ago).
5. Hmmm...

5 things on my to do list today:
1. Reading "Home Buying for Dummies".
2. Fix a guest presenter's presentation for class tomorrow.
3. Order Christmas crackers.
4. Emailing back a Deputy D.A. to give my "expert opinion" on a case (okay, so I've already done this and just haven't crossed it off my list... They will not be using my opinion!).
5. Buy tea bags (the class is extracting caffeine tomorrow).

5 snacks I love:
1. Australian iced doughnuts.
2. Ginger beer.
3. Coldstone ice-cream.
4. Cream puffs.
5. Anything snack that Sweetie cooks.

5 things I would do if I were a millionaire:
1. Invest for retirement.
2. Buy Sweetie a space flight.
3. Take Sweetie on another trip to OZ.
4. Pay off the house (okay, we don't have one yet, but we will!).
5. Something fun.

5 places I've lived:
1. Balga, Western Australia.
2. Maylands, Western Australia (Thanks Mr and Mrs JollyRgr!).
3. Inglewood, Western Australia.
4. Nashville, Tennessee.
5. Home is where the heart is...

5 jobs I've had:
1. Glassy at the local race-track.
2. Chemistry lab demonstrator (like a TA).
3. Cricket Umpire.
4. Postdoctoral fellow.
5. Instructor (Teacher).

5 people I'll tag:
Five people I don't know enough about (or want to know more about).
1. No comment...

Horses, Blood, and Vomit... All in a days work!

Well, all in a couple of days while at work at least!

Yesterday I got an email from my Mum about how she won $6.50 on a horse in the Melbourne Cup (Australia's premier horse race - "The Race that stops the Nation!"). It was always fun to have a punt on the Cup, and I always had a soft spot for the grays (who cares about a brown race horse? They are so common!). Anyhow, in memory of me, Mum put a couple of dollars each way on a gray horse, which ended up being the runner up! Ironically, on the same day here in America, another important race came to it's end. Much like the Melbourne Cup, the gray also finished as the runner up...

Yesterday, we took our sophomore class on a tour of one of the core facilities here at the University of Self-Promotion. This was a fairly standard and sadly uninteresting lab visit, until one of our students suddenly threw up in the middle of the lab! She had got her flu shot the day before, had felt unwell in the morning, improved enough to come to school, and then sudden was sick. Strangely enough, she was absolutely fine for the rest of the day...

Lastly, I bring you to the world of popular science. I recently reviewed a paper in my former field. I was picked as a reviewer as I had been referenced several times by the authors. The paper reported a novel finding that is important to practitioners in my former field. Last week I was contacted by a popular science magazine who were considering writing a piece on this paper (it must be noted that they no nothing of the fact that I reviewed the paper in the first place). I gave my opinion and answered a few questions, and heard nothing else from the magazine...

Today I was contacted by another popular science magazine about the same paper. They got my name from the article that the first popular science magazine wrote and quoted me in! The second magazine asked me a considerable number of questions and took down all of my information. They promptly published an online article on this paper this afternoon...

I am quite happy to be quoted in a popular science magazine (I was quite chuffed!). The thing is this: The first magazine made no mention of quoting me, but did. The second magazine clearly stated that they would quote me, but didn't! It's all rather confusing really...

Random Notes from the Week

As the title would suggest, this is not a well organized and cohesive posting. Rather, it is a smattering of comments on the week that has past...

A colleague ate some Pop-Rocks that expired six years ago! While it is quite an achievement to still own a packet of Pop-Rocks of that vintage, I do not see it as a good thing.

Republicans wear red ties, Democrats wear blue ties. Seriously, it's like a uniform.

Last night I saw an old Star Trek episode with Spock and Captain Kirk shackled in a dudgeon next to the skeleton of someone who apparently died and decomposed in situ. You could clearly see where the skull cap had been cut to remove the brain while the deceased was being prepared for life as a classroom skeleton. Instead, this skeleton became a Hollywood star...