It's not a game... it's a lifestyle

After a few weeks of repos, hockey heated up for me this weekend. My ice hockey team (MsFits) participated in the annual Boomerang tourney and my winter ball hockey team (the Grrrz) had the championship game on the line. Schedules clashing is common for me, but I have a rule that certain teams get priority. So I missed one tournament game in lieu for the championship game on Sunday (sorry MsFits, but you understand...).


The annual Boomer tourney is one of the best tournaments I've participated in ever. This is my 3rd time playing in this tourney and eventhough my team has yet to win a single match in 3 years, it's still tons of fun. Every year the tourney has a different theme. My first year it was "Pirates of the Boomer" with swashbuckle theme everywhere. The refs were all decked out as Capt Jack Sparrow. We joked that some of the refs wore two eye patches at the same time with some "questionable" calls. Last year was "Budda-Bing-Budda-Boomer" with 1920s gangster theme. Refs this time around were of the Al Capone variety. This year was "SuperBoomer" with superheroines everywhere. There was definitely a bunch of "Ka-POWs", "SMACKs" and "ZAPs!!" on the ice with the hockey action. Asides from the good hockey, it's also for a good cause as proceeds from this tourney go towards city Art Therapy centres which uses art as part of the recovery process for cancer patients. In the 8 years of this tournament, they've raised over $14,000. Pretty sweet for a group of 18 women to organize such a thing!

So three games of ice hockey, followed with one winter ball hockey match to decide the city league champion. The Grrrz faced this team countless of times successfully but we were shocked when they owned us in the playoffs. This time around we made sure not to take anything for granted and my team put the pressure on for the entire game, player on player, no one giving up any pass, just go and get'em. It was a hard hitting game, but in the end we took home the (invisible) cup! Congrats Grrrz!


So end of hockey? Nope. Next week is the start of Summer Ball Hockey (definitely circle of life feeling). This time, I'm back in the MsFits net as they have a team for this league. But so does the Grrrz. So I'm switching teams and face the same group of women that I just won the Winter league cup with. That's one thing I've come to like about being involved with women's hockey: you meet a large group of women whom you become fast friends no matter which side of the line you're on. Sure there's always the odd chickie who gets her feathers ruffled, but overall it's about sport camaraderie more so than individual teams. I think this sport for women is important regardless of what some IOC president may feel about the program. My life has been deeply enriched these past 4 years playing with this hockey family.

During the tournament, we were treated to music between faceoffs... making the game feel more professional plus it gets everyone in a lively mood. One song that always gets me pumped is the Wiseguys' "Start the commotion". Ciao folks!

No joke!

So then, a lil' MIA but I'm back for updates.

News! News! News! After much thought and afterthought and afterafterthought, I decided to accept a post-doc position in the current lab I've been working in for the past 8 months. Yep, starting today I'm no longer a "tech" but have the privilege title of post doctoral fellow. Sounds snappy? Well the name is probably the only prestige thing. Funny thing about working in the sciences, you have to remind everyone who isn't in the science field that we do this for interest, not money. After 14 years of post 2ndary education, you'd think I'd land a high paid job. Nope, a PDF is not even an actual job. It's a trainee position. That's right. I'm a trainee, just like you see in the supermarket cashiers, the lil' labels under the name tag. Supposedly those labels are for your info to excuse any mistakes they so happen to make a mistake OR that they flip through the rolodex trying to find what's the number key for kumquats. So why a PDF? What's the point? It's for the long term career plans. If you want to do something with a PhD, you should have a few PDF years on the resume. It's just the way things work.

Aside from switching job titles, today marked the official move of the newest post-docs (moi and another PDF) into newly designated space for the vaccine project we're working on. It's not brand new lab space, but rather a former lab that recently retired. For the past month I've been actively cleaning out this old lab to make way for our project. It's been interesting with the things we've found during this cleanup. There's a few vials of unidentifiable things. Being an old microbiology lab, you never know truly if it's safe to chuck... or autoclave it.

We're sharing the lab space with a teaching lab course which has some interesting equipment. This photo is one example, it's kinda creepy. If you're wondering what they are, it's light source boxes for microscopes. Still, I dunno... creepy.

It's Easter weekend, I'm heading back to my old stomping grounds. Enjoy the weekend folks!

Lab OCDness

Today in the lab I was having this conversation with my fellow post-doc about people with OCD. He was recanting his experiences working in a previous lab about some bloke who had what we would classify as borderline-clinical commitment OCD. Some examples:

When using pipette tips, this guy picked them out in line-order from his box compared with random selection. FYI: Apparently this technique is called the anal-retentive tip usage method (ARTUM).

Ordered tip-usage:


Random tip-usage:



Another example was the reagent bottles and microcentrifuge tubes on his bench would be perfectly aligned:



The best example was that if you needed to take one glove from this guy's latex glove box, you had to take TWO. Never one. Otherwise there would be an unpaired match left in the box. Ohhhhh! The HUMANITY!

Now I have a few friends who have either openly admitted to having OCD or have closeted OCD (they exhibit the behaviour but haven't admit that there's a problem). I know that this is a legit psychological disorder. However, personally I think everyone has an OCD quirk in their daily routine. I found out mine a few years ago. It has nothing to do with lab work, but personal grooming. If I notice an aberrant hair on my face, I HAVE to pluck it out immediately (otherwise it really annoys me for the entire day/night). As for lab OCDness, I'm more a of random tip-user and although I like keeping my microcentrifuge tubes in order, if one's facing the wrong way... eh. As for the glove box issue. I will have to admit that if I take one glove, I do think, "but that will mean an odd number of gloves in the box". But that doesn't stop me. I'd like to think it's more environmentally friendly. Yeah... that's it.

I'm with the Jules

A few weeks back I was treated to a delightful night of modern and contemporary dance. I'm no an expert on dance styles and neither know the difference between a dosado and chassé. But I do enjoy watching dancers take the stage with imaginative choreography and unforgettable music. What made this performance extra special was that a friend in a former lab was one of the performers. There's a stereotype that scientists are married to their research. While that may be sadly true, we do have interests outside the lab (much to our supervisor's displeasure). Mine being obviously hockey. For Jules, she has recently rekindled her passion for dancing. Her enthusiasm and dedication to dancing is contagious. I often wish I had the grace in my muscles to move like she can. A Mad Beaker award to you Jules! She started a blog about her experiences if you'd like to follow along.

Back to the performance which was Orchesis Dance Motif 2010, I wasn't able to sneak a camera in and record some moves from the show. However I was able to make a soundtrack of the night with the selected music in which I'll post a few links in the coming weeks. Today's music is from an old group called Vitamin String Quartet. It's a group which could be classified part of the Baroque Rock genre. They take rock/pop songs from Coldplay, Evanescence, Linkin Park, even Eric Clapton and Enya and rearrange the music into a classical tribute. The result is you hear a great song remade into another great song. Radiohead's Reckoner remake is simply fabulous!

All good things...

Alright - hockey announcement time:

I'm retiring.

Yes, this die-hard hockey goalie is hanging up the pads and glove with the first team that got me back on the ice: Bio Sci Roaches. 7 years ago when I started my Ph.D. studies I heard about a women's intramural recreation ice hockey team in my department. They were looking for a goalie. I've been long interested in returning between the pipes for ages, but dilemma, I had no goal equipment. Not a problem, the rec league provided all equipment except for skates. Although I had to brave wearing common, smelly, damp, psoriasis causing equipment (ew!), I returned to the ice and rekindled my love for stopping pucks.

During the early years, I decided to add my own equipment time to time. Saved up enough for a helmet (painted no less!), then blocker, then goalie skates (I started out using just normal ice hockey skates. Goalie skates are about double the price of regular skates), until the point that I was proudly toting my very own full gear with the last purchase being my $900 hockey pads (a gift to myself for my 30th bday). But something was still missing. One game every other week wasn't enough to justify the money spent on equipment and I was wanting more athletic workouts. So I started to look elsewhere, finding women's leagues in city ball hockey and provincial ice hockey.

I still kept playing with the Roaches, them being my #2 team. I had to devise a commitment schedule with the provincial team having first dibs on me, then the Roaches, then city ball hockey, then rec ball hockey, then pick-up goalie status. Soon I went from playing once every other week to playing 5 times a week. People started calling it an obsession. But I found it therapeutic. This was "me" time. I could shut out all the noise (literally!) and daily problems between those pipes. And most of all, it was the only place that it really mattered that I showed up. People were always glad when I entered the dressing room to suit up. And even when I played like crap some nights, I was still accepted, still cheered on, still got "see you next game!". No other place, no other group of people has given me that feeling.

But to cliche things: all good things must come to an end. The 5 nights/week are a lil' excessive and I had to cut back somewhere. Because recreational intramurals are no longer my level of play, I decided to retire from the Roaches. I do so with a heavy heart. Although the roster has changed over the years, this team remains a great bunch of women.

And what better way to leave the team, being on top, undefeated, and the Champions of the Winter 2010 recreational intramural women's ice hockey. Congrats ladies! You did me proud!