Not feeling controversial

Well, interestingly enough, the responses I've been getting to various blogs here have only served to reinforce my feelings about my last post.

Much as I enjoy being provocative, I actually don't enjoy most of the feedback!

People seem to think I'm serious about the ageism stuff- I'm really not. Others of you think I'm actually seeking your advice. I'm really not. I'm just thinking out loud. So your comments- you know who you are- aren't exactly educating me about things I haven't considered. And very few of you have made comments that I found genuinely thought-provoking. But I'm sure it's just more self-serving blog culture- you want to post here so your blog link will appear in a comment, maybe I will visit and see what you're about. Maybe I will. Others might as well. Just, please don't underestimate me while taking up space on my blog page. It's insulting.

Worse than that, it's quite obvious from the comments I'm receiving that scientists are just as bad as journalists. We always complain that journalists reporting on science tend to ignore the qualifying words that we use- "suggests that" vs. "is", "in some cases" vs. "always". etc.

In my case I tend to use words like "generally" and "most", which in my mind implies that there are, as in biology, exceptions to every 'rule.' But those of you who have sent me comments have obviously chosen to ignore the qualifiers.

Shame on you! I'm sure you do the same thing when you read discussion sections of papers. You're probably the same people who get upset when people suggest testable models and then don't support them with data- THAT'S WHY THEY'RE CALLED MODELS! We're going to test them in the next paper!

Sheesh.

To the two people who suggested I should post more often, I just want to say that I've been having problems with Blogger- not the least of which is very slow loading, blogs and comments getting lost in the ether, and spotty responses from the support team. My last blog actually disappeared when I first posted it, so either some resourceful support person fished it out of a temporary directory, or it just took a really long time to appear. These kinds of things are pretty frustrating when you consider that I'm posting in my spare time, hahaha, while incubating various things in lab.

Had a pretty frustrating weekend- the boyfriend is writing his dissertation, he is entering the Crazy Zone that everyone has to pass through before leaping through the burning hoop on the other side. I am trying to be supportive, but it is stressful. I'm having problems figuring out how to analyze some data, have been struggling with my computer for many hours and ultimately decided I just don't know what I'm doing, and until I make up my mind, no computer program in the world will fix it for me.

Sigh.

Visited with a friend who is now a science writer, realized we are growing apart in our different cultures- as in, she has lots of money, and seems to think that's important, and I don't. Very depressing since we seem to have very little left in common.

And last night (this morning?) I had a dream about eating a banana. I don't like bananas, btw. According to my dream book, eating a banana means that I am approaching a period of "hard work with little reward." Just what I needed on a Monday. Sure enough, I got in this morning to find that my blot had fallen off the rocker over the weekend, and dried out. Lovely! Such fail-safe equipment we have here! So I am starting that experiment over again (this was already the 2nd try).

Tell me again why I'm doing this- no, wait, I don't want to know why you think I'm doing this. Tell me again to quit whining and get back to work.