A Natural Scientist

I quit one of my jobs this week. I'm finishing the semester and I'm out. Hurrah! I'm interviewing for another job, which would...

Some pratty little business-school first-year once told me that my experience in grad school was a sunk cost  and therefore I should quit si...

Well, in fact he's been saying word-like things for several months, but around 16 months (so in February) he started talking in grammati...

I am, in truth, fairly keen on Bug learning to read before he goes to school.  He will probably be capable of it without a lot of pushing (...

I was reading some of FMH's posts on her son , and thinking on some of the curious and unfortunate aspects of the US school system as a...

(I warn you in advance that I don't have much of a point here.) I have a cousin who is now twenty.  His father is 65 (second marriage)...

I think public education is really, really important. According to the government about 90% of American children attend public schools. E...

I am angry that because I don’t fulfill Advisor’s notion of a proper grad student, I am being denied aspects of training that are mine by ri...

I am going to tell you the real reason that I am leaving academia. Eventually. Let me tell you some stories first. [In several parts becau...

I am sure that all of you have heard of the recent measles outbreak in San Diego. Drugmonkey touches on the deep inconvenience of quarant...

PCR: Still cool! Back in the day it was possible to get an entire PhD for cloning a gene. (See the person at the bottom of this list , for ...

PCR. Right. Amazing! Miraculous! Biological! What is PCR, you ask? Polymerase chain reaction. In other words, replicating DNA over many t...

1. Happy birthday to my poor, neglected blog. It's one. I think it may be teething. 2. In honor of which (okay, not really) I am givi...

Oh, you're so adorable. So young and doe-eyed. So naïve. (Such twiggy little people… are you old enough to be in grad school?) If y...

Random links, courtesy of the Centre Nationale de Recherches Scientifique s, which has the most random library ever, followed by random musi...

Also behold: A salt lamp that “possess[es] the unique capability of generating negative ions in the air thus working as [an] ionizer. Thes...

Behold: A dog blanket that, and I quote, has “Anion, Aloe, Anti-bacteria and Magnet complex functions” and “emit[s] Far Infrared Rays”. I u...

My favorite cousin- let’s call her Jo- teaches in inner-city Philly. She’s on ‘special assignment’, so lately she’s been teaching remedial ...

When I was in elementary and middle school, we did a lot of really, really boring labs. They were so dull, I don’t even remember them. B...

Kids are very curious. Whose kid hasn't taken something apart? Who hasn’t heard a two-year-old ask why ? Why is the sky blue? Why do f...