Yoga by the Lake

When I do yoga, it usually means that something is going on. Historically I associate yoga with transitions and with moves to new places. I went to a yoga class when I visited a lab in Michigan for a brief sabbatical during my postdoc. I also did it after breaking up with a long-term boyfriend and moving into my own apartment. I had a yoga VHS tape I used to do in the basement of my old house. And, I tend to do it on vacation, if there’s a class offered at the hotel where I’m staying or on the cruise ship. I’ve even done yoga in church: Sun Salutations as part of an RE class about Buddhism that barely scratched the surface, of either yoga or Buddhism.

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Have Mozart Will Travel

My new string quartet has been looking for something to perform in a recital on May 15, for our violist’s teacher. We’ve only played together twice, at least twice with me on violin 1. The others know each other better and have been to music camp together and had coaching and everything. I’m holding my own, though. I can finally say that I too have chamber music experience.

Mundane Monday: My Writing Desk

Our house in CA has two “living rooms.” We didn’t have the same configuration in our old house, so our furniture didn’t quite fill the space. We got a nice old rolltop desk off of Craigslist, which I now use for writing.

Happy Non-traditional Easter!

Easter 1975

It’s Easter. Unlike other holidays, I don’t have a set thing I do every Easter, although chocolate is the one constant theme.

A Reading in the Public Library

Earlier in the year I got an invitation, at my author address, from a librarian at the Mountain View Public Library. She asked to schedule a public reading of my story from Geocaching GPS at the library.

Happy St Patrick’s Day!

I’m in an online fiddling group that has been posting recordings of jigs for St. Patrick’s Day. Alas, I’m not even a little Irish, as far as I know, but I love the fiddle music.

Nerve Growth Factors: A primer

In honor of Brain Awareness Week, I am writing about a topic I studied during my PhD in Neuroscience: growth factors, specifically nerve growth factors, also called “neurotrophins.” These are small proteins that help neurons to survive and make connections with each other. They do so by being made in one cell and binding to a protein called a receptor on the surface of another cell. Once the neurotrophin binds to its receptor, biochemical signals are activated inside the receiving cell that enable it to survive and grow.

Meow: cat update

Today I’m doing my part to fill up the internet with pictures of cats. After years of cat allergy, months of allergy shots, and lots of lobbying on the part of both kids, we got a cat last month. She is 4 years old, and she came with the name Sadie, which fits her, so we’re keeping it. She is part tabby and part Siamese. We’ve had her for almost a month now, and she is settling into her new home. The UULent word for today is home.

Image of the Week: Lighting up brain cancer

In honor of Brain Awareness Week, I am reblogging this article from the Wellcome Trust blog about ‘tumour paint,’ an experimental drug that literally lights up brain cancer, making it easier for surgeons to cut out more of a tumor while leaving normal tissue undamaged. You can read more about this linked story ‘Light at the end of the scalpel’.

Mundane Monday: Happy Pi Day!

I have several geeky T-shirts. One has the first page of the score from Beethoven’s Eroica on it. Another shows a brain lifting weights. Yet another, pictured above and at left, celebrates “pi day,” March 14, (3.14), which also happens to be Einstein’s birthday.