Methyl moved to a new cave. The mossy rock now has dark green carpet, lots of room for plants, and a water heater that makes really strange noises whenever I use hot water.

It'll be really cozy once things are organized, but it is a disaster zone now. :p

Best things: email lists and colleagues with free/cheap furnishings.

Every better things: very nice people that help me move heavy stuff.

Yep, Methyl is finally Doctor Methyl!

Spazzzz.

Moving, finishing thesis edits, trying to push out papers, job searching for assistant prof position, starting post doc in Feb, and moving, and moving. Methyl shouldn't complain much about moving since it is only about three blocks, but yeah, it's a pain.

Spazzzz.

Methyl would really just like a couple weeks to not spazz.

Methyl: I need a kitchen faucet to garden hose adapter.
Nursery Guy: Uh?
Methyl: Faucet . . . garden hose.
Nurserey Guy: So just the adapter.
Methyl: Yeah, I've looked at these three other stores--
NG: You're wasting your time.
Methyl: So do you have one?
NG: No. It's VERY SPECIALIZED. You need to go to Super Special Irrigation Store. The manager will hold your hand.
Methyl: Really? It doesn't seem very specialized to me.
NG: Well, the threads . . . it'll probably have to be at least two adapters together, but don't worry, the manager will hold your hand.
Methyl: . . . thanks.

*Methyl promptly goes home and orders one of the many faucet to garden hose adapters off of amazon*

Yeah. Don't patronize the experimental scientist who had ransacked the lab to get good slip-joint pliers to get the stupid stuck aerator off the faucet. Yeah.

In other news, Methyl has almost jumped through another Flaming Hoop of Doom on the road to the phd. Methyl also edited the next story chapter, save for one fail-sentence, and will send it back to the beta again to fix whatever I broke. :p

Methyl ended up having a "oh by the way, you need to get this HUGE PILE OF WORK DONE IN A COUPLE WEEKS" thrown at her. x_x

Seriously.

So Methyl has been underwater. It all must be done by June 8. Then there will be breathing and sleep.

And maybe having to move, but Methyl hasn't gotten the final word on that yet.

Seriously, Methyl can't do all the things when there are this many things. o_O

Now Methyl is going to hunt down fifty journal articles and read them in 2 days. :D

Methyl is somewhat back to normal after a couple weeks of traveling. The second bit of traveling was more dramatic than planned. It was the day before I was to fly out and I'd organized everything and was even gonna print out a map of how to walk from my hotel in Boston to the place where the meeting was when I realized . . . the meeting wasn't in Boston. Turns out, I only needed to take the train an hour south, but there was a panic attack. I am now thankful that things in the new england area are very close together.

Today Methyl was awoken by a BANG BANG BANG. She crept out of bed and found a ladder by her bedroom window and a workman climbing up to the roof. Okay, no big deal. Methyl curls up again, unwilling to face the morning. Then DRIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIILL SAAAAAWWWWWW HORRIBLE NOISE!!!!!!! WTF. I still don't know what that was, but it went on for 20 min at a decibel level similar to a fire alarm. I think whatever the guy was doing was resonating some structural element and amplifying the noise to terrifying proportions. Apparently the whole building heard it.

And Methyl is reading up on non-Fickian diffusion in glassy polymer films, hoping to learn enough to put a sentence or two in this stupid manuscript that's almost done. Yeah, there's been science writing, but no fun writing. The phd must be finished and a job found (spazz) before Methyl can relax enough to tackle fiction. :(

This is awesome. The idea is to replace ITO (indium tin oxide), which (I'm pretty sure) is what's used commercially these days. People have also done this with Ag nanowires, but Cu is WAY cheaper.

Cu Nanowire Start Up!

At about 5:30, there's an awesome demo of a flexible display. It'd be so cool to come up with something like this and commercialize it!

Methyl got another roommate last week. It's sad to have to share my space again. Given how many roommate's I've gone through recently I've decided they need nicknames.

The last roommate will be named Silent (cause she didn't speak to me, except right after she got there, and to tell me she was leaving -- this includes a distinct lack of verbal response to direct conversation), also known as She-Who-Occupied-My-Kitchen. The latter nickname is due to her ability to consume all kitchen space when she was in it. I'm not sure how it worked, maybe an anti-personnel field of some sort.

The current roommate is 7s, which stands for "seven suitcases," because that's what she's deposited in the common space, along with other random packing materials. She's also writing up (and will walk in June, rawwwwr, I'm a bit jealous), so won't be here long. But yeah, with 7s, there's absolutely no space. At least she doesn't cook much, so we didn't have a cupboard fight, like I had with Silent. :p

I wonder what they've called me . . .

Perhaps She-Who-Does't-Do-Dishes-Often-Enough.

Some research journals require that each article be submitted affixed with a pretty picture as well as a snappy title. Sometimes this image draws in readers.

Sometimes for the wrong reasons.

TOCROFL

Yes, for example, use the figure from March 8th about a "kinetic isotope effect" to teach your minions how NOT to do it. Your data may cluster onto a little piece of the model curve, but that doesn't mean the model predicts that data!

Methyl currently has three documents open for editing. Note that one of these things is not like the others.

1) Patent application for FancyChemistry on Nanotoys
2) draft of ShortBlurb on InitialFancyChemistry that makes Nanotoys WorkBetter for Nano Letters
3) The story

*cowers under the mossy rock*

Methyl: Arrrgh! Legalease kills Methyl x_X. Cannot understand my own science in these terms! *squints* Is that my science?
Voldemort: This is the perfect opportunity edit the story. *glares* So I can go kill something, or at least torture something. I'm getting very irritated about being shoved into that little box in the back of your brain.
Methyl: *pokes Voldemort* Must. *poke* Finish. *poke* P *poke* h *poke* D *poke*
Voldemort: If you didn't need that finger to type I'd break it.
Methyl: *hides hands*