July 2010
14 posts
2 tags
Disconnecting
Today I’m departing sunny England to head, via Paris and Munich, to Salzburg. I’m attending Roche Continents, a week-long programme at the Salzburg Festival exploring the common ground of creativity and innovation in the Arts and Science, along with 100 students of science, music and fine arts from all over Europe.
I really feel that this will be valuable time to disconnect from the...
4 tags
Paris. Alone
Due to a series of unfortunate events, I now find myself in Paris and free to my own devices for a day and a half on Monday & Tuesday next week. I haven’t been to the La Ville-Lumière for years and, as a somewhat rusty solo-traveler, am feeling somewhat lost. I’d appreciate mining your collective wisdom for your tips, secrets, and recommendations to make Paris alone magical. What...
1 tag
cheapdate →
This is why I have a soft spot for fly-boys (or Drosophilia geneticists): cheapdate is a fruit fly gene whose mutation causes Drosophila to be extra sensitive to alcohol.
I’d also heard a great story about a fly lab where all new genes discovered were named after wines. If you were the lucky investigator who got to naming rights, the PI would buy you a really expensive bottle of it’s...
“I made up my mind long ago to follow one cardinal rule in all my writing—to be...”
– Isaac Asimov on his writing style
1 tag
I Write Like →
An academic friend pointed me towards I Write Like, a statistical analysis tool, which analyzes your word choice and writing style and compares them to those of famous authors. Throwing a sample of my writing its way, I was quite pleased to discover that I write like the biochemistry professor, turned science-fiction author, Isaac Asimov. My friend was somewhat less pleased to be told that his...
2 tags
Realisations
In no particular order…
Cycling to work next year feels like a real possibility
I need a brief ‘Regenerative Medicine for Dummies’ pitch to tell people what I do.
Cambridge is still one of my favorite places
A weekend away from a computer screen is great for my eyes
Real people are excellent
My fencing has improve dramatically in the last six months, but I still suck
My...
“What would it pleasure me to have my throat cut
With diamonds? Or to be...”
– The Duchess of Malfi. Act IV, scene II.
Just 21 days until I get to see the ENO/Punchdrunk production of John Webster’s celebrated seventeenth-century tragedy of love, incest and murder. God knows how I’ll hide from spoilers and reviews after the premiere on 19 July.