The Silly New Fad in Scientific Paper Publishing

What's this new fad of putting up the picture of the lead author in scientific publications?

It's useless and distracting. I glance at the paper and instead of focusing on the title, my eye is caught by this picture... and I wonder how she can see with hair falling across her eyes, if she's outdoors trekking somewhere, if this picture was recent, how much this lady can trek, whether she had this picture taken specifically for this paper, and if so, why did she choose this particular picture, and if I don't have something better to do than wonder about random people.

Please, publishers, don't waste the 3-5 minutes of my attention that you've grabbed. Just tell me the main scientific story and store the biography for a news release. That same space could have better used by putting a little box with the highlights of the paper.

Kids, Language and Accents

Ani has a friend, L, in preschool.

L's parents speak Tamil to her, insist on her answering in Tamil and speak Tamil to each other.

I speak Tamil to Ani, but it is peppered with English. English is the language with which RK, Ani and I converse.

Ani speaks English with a strong Indian accent at home (complete with the head bobs... I didn't realize that either RK or I did that until Ani started doing it) and English with a strong American accent at preschool. He understands Tamil but he doesn't think in it. On the other hand, L speaks English only with an American accent, but Tamil with a Tamil accent.

Even more interesting: L calls Ani the way his name is supposed to be pronounced: A-nee
However, when she refers to him in the third person, he becomes 'Aah-nee', the American-accented version of his name.

It's one thing to read about kids unconsciously absorbing the culture around them, quite another to see it in real life.

Quote on attitude

“The longer I love, the more I realize the impact of attitude on life. Attitude, to me, is more important than facts. It is more important than the past, than education, than money, than circumstances, than failures, than successes, than what other people think or say or do. It is more important than appearance, giftedness or skill. It will make or break a company...a church....a home. The remarkable thing is we have a choice every day regarding the attitude we will embrace for that day. We cannot change our past...we cannot change the fact that people will act in a certain way. We cannot change the inevitable. The only thing we can do is play on the one string we have, and that is our attitude...I am convinced that life is 10% what happens to me and 90% how I react to it. And so it is with you...we are in charge of our attitudes.” 
― Charles R. Swindoll



Guess where I heard this? In a public bus in Boston!

Have been so inspired by this that I've resolved to maintaining a good attitude at all times.

And so far it's been 5 days (and counting)!


(kind of slipped up last night when I hissed at Ani harshly enough to upset him.... he kept trying to twist Durga's hand so he could hold it while going to sleep, making her wake up and cry, and making me want to rip my hair out)

Other fantastic news:
a) ASHG 2013! (See prev blog post for scant details)
b) Acadia/Boston! (yes, we were there. Beautiful and fun, both places. I'm so glad to be back home, though)
c) Figured out how to get average promoter methylations while controlling for CpG island presence!
(...aaand I just lost my audience with just that one sentence)

Notes from the ASHG 2013

My first gigantic conference! Used to attend Keystone as a grad student. Am at the American Society of Human Genetics annual conference in Boston this week and the scale of this is greater than anything I've attended before. Nearly 7000 attendees!

Currently at an exhibit hall which is the size of a football field, waiting for the President's speech.
In front of me is a Japanese group, all of whom bowed to each other multiple times. I imagine them saying "After you, dear chap" "No no, after you!" after each bow.
Multiple attempts to figure out who should sit down first.
10 minutes later: okay, they've figured it out. Now they've whipped out their cameras and are taking pictures of each other.
5 minutes later: they are now taking pictures with some of the award winners.
Update: oh wait! It's not an award winner who's posing for pics- it's the president!

Am sitting waay in the front- 4th row from the stage. I figure I should get my money's worth of education. No snoozing while at the conference! There are zillions of rows- there's supposed to be a screen every 25-30 rows, and I count 3. There are about 75 columns.

My article at the Family Medicine journal

http://www.stfm.org/fmhub/fm2013/September/Varsha582.pdf

Hurray!

What does it say about me when my sole first-author article in an academic journal is a creative writing piece, rather than a scholarly piece that advances science?

Note to self: Must publish PhD work. Soon! Aaarrggh!

Ani-isms

"Mummy, you look like a princess!" when he saw me wearing a skirt. 

"Turn around! Let me see!"  So I spun around slowly, since I was also holding Durga.

"No, mummy! You have to twirl! Like this, see?" And he showed me how.

"Appa! You are three. You are too old to be keeping your keys like this on the couch!"

"Appa, don't you drink that dangerous coffee!" (advice when Ram wanted cappuccino)

"Appa, don't you buy any colored poxicles!" (more advice)

 

"Mummy, see I'm not holding my pee-pee. How convenient!" when he realized he could pee without spraying the room if he reversed his toilet seat.

Recently Read

New blog of mine (shared with Gotti): http://recentlyread.livejournal.com

It's an account of what we read and what we like and don't.