(no subject)
My transfected (transduced? frakking terminology) cells are struggling. I hope they grow, because otherwise we'll need to order more Expensive Reagent X.
I feel completely off today.
Last night I had a very vivid dream. It was creepy. I was crashing a party at a convention center: one room was vegans and the other room was Paleo diet people--- that's creepy enough, but not THE creepy part--- and then these teens starting killing everyone. Specifically, with a bulldozer.
The bulldozer came my way, full throttle. I knew on some level it was a dream, so I wasn't frightened. The bulldozer pushed me off a cliff, and for a few wonderful moments I got to fly through the air, with a forest below me and lights from a city in the distance accentuated by the darkness as dusk fell....
And then I sank into the treeline, grasping half-heartedly at branches to slow my fall.
And this was the creepy bit: as I sank into tall grass, I sank INTO tall grass, and there was a little twisted gremlin-like creature in that grass that hissed my name. Very decidedly evil. It was like a warning (or a threat?), promising horrible things.
I awoke as though coming out of a deep trance... you know, the kind where you're aware of waking before control of your body returns, the kind that makes you feel like the line between Dream and Reality isn't quite as sharp as you'd hoped.
Now I'm groggy and feeling decidedly... off. It will be a Caffeine day, most definitely.
---
In more work related news, my boss told me that he's pleased with my progress, and how everything's been working the first time. Well, unless these cells die, lol. And our technician told me that usually after this transfection, we get much fewer cells (this despite the fact that I had the protocol wrong and left my cells in the viral sup/polybrene solution -.-;;;). And with poorer viability. So I'm not a miserable failure after all? Cool.
I'd better plan some experiments, though, or I'll hit a wall.
----
In other news, whenever I test my blood sugar after eating random things as I normally would, it's almost always <90. I figure I'm either a super awesome responder to insulin, which would be expected if you're doing CR, or a super producer of insulin, which would NOT be good I think, because one of the promising theories in how CR works is by decreasing insulin signals (specifically, IGF-1). As far as I can figure out from the literature, though, it's still an ASSOCIATION, but the vehemence with which a lot of really smart CR people defend this theory makes me think I've missed something.
As happens, once you've mastered one checkpoint you tend to move on to the next, so now my brain has decided I need to 'fast' (I hate that term, because 'fasting' has always been associated with spirituality to me, and this is not). There is an awful lot of support for going a long period of time without food as the best way of going about CR. Or even norm-calorie. The problem is that I don't handle it well. But I keep thinking that I'm just doing it wrong, which may or may not be correct. "If you just let yourself get past the I'm-going-to-die phase of hunger, you'll feel really good," says part of my brain, based on the fact that this does in fact happen on occasion. However, it's possible the I'm-going-to-die phase is an indicator that something's off, and I'm doing more harm than good. In theory, I like the idea of giving your body and mind a break from food (especially letting the insulin signaling decrease for a bit), and it seems sound based on experiments and anecdotes. In practice, it doesn't quite work for me.
I think maybe it doesn't matter, if you're doing CR. It does if you're ad-lib, that's almost certain. Meh. Maybe the world will end before we ever find out.
I feel completely off today.
Last night I had a very vivid dream. It was creepy. I was crashing a party at a convention center: one room was vegans and the other room was Paleo diet people--- that's creepy enough, but not THE creepy part--- and then these teens starting killing everyone. Specifically, with a bulldozer.
The bulldozer came my way, full throttle. I knew on some level it was a dream, so I wasn't frightened. The bulldozer pushed me off a cliff, and for a few wonderful moments I got to fly through the air, with a forest below me and lights from a city in the distance accentuated by the darkness as dusk fell....
And then I sank into the treeline, grasping half-heartedly at branches to slow my fall.
And this was the creepy bit: as I sank into tall grass, I sank INTO tall grass, and there was a little twisted gremlin-like creature in that grass that hissed my name. Very decidedly evil. It was like a warning (or a threat?), promising horrible things.
I awoke as though coming out of a deep trance... you know, the kind where you're aware of waking before control of your body returns, the kind that makes you feel like the line between Dream and Reality isn't quite as sharp as you'd hoped.
Now I'm groggy and feeling decidedly... off. It will be a Caffeine day, most definitely.
---
In more work related news, my boss told me that he's pleased with my progress, and how everything's been working the first time. Well, unless these cells die, lol. And our technician told me that usually after this transfection, we get much fewer cells (this despite the fact that I had the protocol wrong and left my cells in the viral sup/polybrene solution -.-;;;). And with poorer viability. So I'm not a miserable failure after all? Cool.
I'd better plan some experiments, though, or I'll hit a wall.
----
In other news, whenever I test my blood sugar after eating random things as I normally would, it's almost always <90. I figure I'm either a super awesome responder to insulin, which would be expected if you're doing CR, or a super producer of insulin, which would NOT be good I think, because one of the promising theories in how CR works is by decreasing insulin signals (specifically, IGF-1). As far as I can figure out from the literature, though, it's still an ASSOCIATION, but the vehemence with which a lot of really smart CR people defend this theory makes me think I've missed something.
As happens, once you've mastered one checkpoint you tend to move on to the next, so now my brain has decided I need to 'fast' (I hate that term, because 'fasting' has always been associated with spirituality to me, and this is not). There is an awful lot of support for going a long period of time without food as the best way of going about CR. Or even norm-calorie. The problem is that I don't handle it well. But I keep thinking that I'm just doing it wrong, which may or may not be correct. "If you just let yourself get past the I'm-going-to-die phase of hunger, you'll feel really good," says part of my brain, based on the fact that this does in fact happen on occasion. However, it's possible the I'm-going-to-die phase is an indicator that something's off, and I'm doing more harm than good. In theory, I like the idea of giving your body and mind a break from food (especially letting the insulin signaling decrease for a bit), and it seems sound based on experiments and anecdotes. In practice, it doesn't quite work for me.
I think maybe it doesn't matter, if you're doing CR. It does if you're ad-lib, that's almost certain. Meh. Maybe the world will end before we ever find out.