CEREAL KILLERS ARE BACK AND READY TO ATTACK

We're in the semi-finals for co-rec floor hockey!!! This is NOT the first time that this team has gone to the semi's. I'd like to re-cap the history of the team, appropriately named Mat Sci Cereal Killers for their ability to decapitate Captain Crunches, pop those Pops, and make Toucan Sam follow its nose to the grave. Ouch. Yeah, for cereal.

In 2007, the Mat Sci Cereal Killers, formerly known as "The Fire Ants of Doom" aka "Harold & the First Years," began their journey to awesomeness. The team at that point was comprised of all first years + Harold, hence the name, duh. Actually, we did pull in a goalie, Erik or Eric or Mike. I have no idea where he was from. Anyway, the team had a total of 0 people who played hockey for real before, and maybe 1-3 who played street hockey as a kid, and the rest were newbs like me who could barely hit the puck without missing it. I remember there being an elaborate and detailed PowerPoint presentation in Bodeen put on by... Andy Shoch? and... others. It was actually quite helpful and the next step was the "scouting" session. Remember that? Basically everyone had to come to this pre-practice so that Sargeant and his Canadian posse and all the upper years could check out our skillZ and place us on the appropriate team. At that first practice I really wanted to impress them so I put my all into it, and I remember waiting on the sideline standing by Hersam, totally being freaked out and thinking "Wow, this is the real thing." My goodness, it was so fun being so young and ambitious and hopeful. Aside from that, little did I know that it didn't really matter for us because we were first years and we were going to put on the "bad" co-rec team. Well, whatevs, we started off on our road to stardom. Each regular season game we got better and better! We totally gelled and we could see ourselves improving leaps and bounds each week. We ended up losing every regular season game, but then there was the playoffs. We ended up going into TWO OVER TIMES + 2 ROUNDS of SHOOTOUT. Does this sound familiar current 1st years?!?! All I remember is wanting to be the LAST girl to have to shoot because I was absolutely horrible. It was so embarrassing trying to shoot at this goalie with my dinky little shot gliding along the floor (lifting the puck was absolutely out of the question at that point). Well, we ended up losing, but we felt like we had won. If there were an award for it, we definitely would've gotten the award for MOST IMPROVED. I kid you not.

So...as I recall, the "good" co-rec mat sci team WON that year. Now, being part of the "better" mat sci team, I have to wonder, will history repeat itself? I don't want to jinx it, so I won't make any predictions.

I'd re-cap on years 2008-2010 but I'll leave it for another day. All I'm saying is.. COME WATCH US AND CHEER FOR US!

NU Intramural Co-Rec Floor Hockey Semi-Finals

SUNDAY, 1 PM

PATTEN GYM

Mat Sci Cereal Killers vs Prestige Worldwide

The competition will be fierce and there may be an ejection or 2 (depending on how some particular guys behave, ahem A & J). =P

(FYI, the winner of the semi's will most likely win it all. The other side of the bracket ain't that tough. So this is for all the marbles!)

BTW, the baton has been passed on and you will soon be seeing new wanderings and ramblings from some young-en bloggers. It's gonna be good!!!

NU crapola

As you may all have heard, there is some crap waste of time CITI ethics something. We have absolutely no idea what it is, but we're expected to complete it and attend some seminar?? I think not.

What happens if we all just do nothing? They're all gonna drop us?

However...

If we must do this, can we make it a group effort?

How about each group complete a module and post the answers somewhere. How many are there anyway?

How's that for ethics.

Our Best Dressed Man

Goddag from Denmark! The Mat Sci dept just must be so dear to my heart because I am seeing look alikes... Like this one...Who does this resemble?

Maybe the hobo look is more common than we think. This guy is practically Jon Emery. Programmer? Is that what you do when you're not doing X-ray stuffS, Jon?

http://www.readwriteweb.com/hack/2010/09/interview-with-richard-clark.php

By the way, how goes it there? What's going on?! How are the new kiddos? Any cuties/hotties?! Someone update! =D

Modern Day Robin Hood

To the Ladies...

I feel so exploited. I was sitting here cleaning my make up brushes so that they'll be fresh and clean for tomorrow's exciting day in Cook. I have this special Sephora Brush Cleaner. The online description reads:

Sephora Brand Daily Brush Cleaner is an anti-bacterial daily brush cleaner designed to quickly remove light traces of makeup between applications. Just spray this purifying formula onto a tissue or directly onto brush bristles, then lightly swipe your powder, blush, eye, and lip brushes across tissue for a fabulous dose of freshness. No rinsing needed!

http://www.sephora.com/browse/product.jhtml?id=P208011&categoryId=B70#moreInfo

Wow so wonderful! Anti-bacterial formula! Just spray! No rinsing! Well, then I happened to look at my Sephora brush cleaner bottle and after getting past all the French, it says:

Ingredients: less than 5% non-ionic surface agents ALSO alcohol and perfume

First of all, what does non-ionic surface agent really mean? Secondly, that's it?! And how much did this cost? $6 for 2 oz. SIX dollars for TWO ounces!!? How much are those huge glass containers of isopropanol in the lab? Someone please tell me, or not. They make a killing on this stuff. Oh, and did you read the reviews??? 4.5/5 stars! Just take a moment to read them. All these girls are raving about how great this stuff is and oh, it has special chemicals with special anti-bacterial stuff. For example:

This brush cleaner makes cleaning my brushes daily fast and easy. It is a must have in my beauty kit that I dare not be without. The best part is that it contains antibacterial cleansing agents.

I love this, its not just a cleaner but has antibacterial solution in it to so it cleanses from germs in brushes. Its better than MACs brush cleaner & dries quicker!

I love this stuff!! Everytime I use it, it's like I have a brand new brush. I have super sensitive skin and it doesn't bother it. That's totally worth it. The fact that it's not to hard on the wallet is nice as well.

What a great value!

Lol, ok now here's one that comes from someone who knows what's going on:

I like this brush cleaner, I just have issues with paying this much for something I know I can make at home...so if youre more of a buy it girl and not a diy-er this works fine...if youre a college girl and want to spend your money on something else like makeup...find a recipe online. it will work the same, simple.

Despite the college girl comment, she is saying the absolute truth. Here's a quick DIY recipe:

http://www.ehow.com/how_4779487_make-makeup-brush-cleaner.html

Now how much do you think that all costs? Sure, the Sephora cleaner was only $6, but.. it was $6 for 2 ounces!

I realize there's the whole convenience factor and they give you this nice little spray bottle, but it just makes me wonder how much companies really make on all these make up products. There are A LOT of buyers, ready and willing to lay down the plastic for "must-have" beauty products. Obviously, our world is not going to change overnight, so why not capitalize on this? We are smart female scientists. I'm pretty sure we can get a piece of the pie and exploit the less-scientifically-inclined women out there. Just come up with some very basic products, such as this brush cleaner, and then tell the marketing people that there's top secret formulas involved. Yeah?

Conclusion: We should all go work for L'Oréal or Estee Lauder or any others on this list: http://beautifulwithbrains.com/2008/09/02/who-owns-what-in-the-beauty-industry/

Hunter, care to chime in?

Serious Question

What are you supposed to do when an office mate farts?

Laugh? Chuckle? Say "Excuse you"? Cough? Leave the room? Comment? Hold your breath? Fire back with a louder/smellier one? Say "ew gross"? Say "niiice"? Do nothing?

This was just a hypothetical, btw... ;)

My Sincere Apologies

I deeply apologize guys (esp. Lesley). This blog has been on a hiatus, but it is back!

First off, poll results... just normal - people are going/have gone to Europe, home, camping, or they don't take vacations...typical. We grad students are so predictable. *sigh*.

I don't know about the rest of you, but summer's been a kind of odd time for me. I have a lot to do but no pressing deadlines and no advisor around (he thinks he's such a hot shot now that he's been elected to the Academy... psh. whatevs GBO). lol. (don't worry, he won't ever read this...I don't think. and I actually communicate with him a lot. so please don't tell on me.) Anyway...anyone else feel this way? Maybe, maybe not. Nonetheless, summer is such an odd time to be a grad student because you feel like you should be taking a vacation...but you aren't. You feel like you should be at the beach...but (most) of you aren't. You feel like you should be able to sit in your office without shivering! Dude, what is up with the over a/c-ing? This happens inevitably every year. It's blazing hot outside but inside is freezing and really confuses me when I decide what to wear in the morning. Thus begins.... my RANT.

Everyone's got stuff they wanna complain about, so I'm going to add to the stupidity and annoying-ness of the world by starting off on my own rant here. I encourage you all to join in. C'mon, I know you all have things you really wanna say and people you wanna throw rocks at and just have no one to vent to (other than your office mate). So please feel free to use this as an outlet (just keep names out of it).

I'll start off. Things that just REALLY bug me:

• really slow people at coffee hour. I mean, dude, just pick up a brownie and move on! Don't analyze and optimize your perfect coffee hour selection. Just get whatever your gut tells you to get (but don't over indulge. Ugh, bugs me too when people pile on all the goods like there's no tomorrow).
• ghetto people on the bus and el (last week I seriously witnessed a lady who is just like Precious's mom [as in the movie "Precious" - very sad, very emotional, and crazy movie].) Her daughter somehow spilled the Windex in a bag, or the bottle was open already and spilled out, and the mom started yelling at her and complaining how she had to go get new Windex. She kept yelling at her and repeating how she couldn't believe she did that. She then picked up the bag and dumped all the Windex out right there on the floor of the bus. Then of course proceeded to yell at her daughter again. The whole bus was silent, including the bus driver. This mom was crazy.
• this doesn't really bug me, but is interesting. Here's the page for graduate school on the McCormick website: http://www.mccormick.northwestern.edu/graduates/index.html Look how old these people look?! Do we look that old? I highly doubt that. Maybe they should choose more representative people to post on the website.
• when people impinge upon your personal space
• so many gosh darn people asking questions in the Business and Management class. Most of the questions are good, but some people just ask questions because they wanna talk.
• along the same lines, people who talk to themselves during class. (haha Minna probably has greater reason to be bugged by this)
• people who can't take No for an answer. When I say No, I mean No!

That's all for now. Just fyi, though, these things don't actually ruin my life or anything, so don't be scared to talk to me or avoid me. =D

Other things on my mind related to grad school:

• That finance Prof was kinda cute! And I got to sit in the front row ;)
• Hm, maybe I shouldn't have made a Skype video call with a collaborator while I was at home, in my PJ's. Maybe I should've brushed my hair. Maybe I should've made my bed better? Maybe I should've covered up my stuffed animals. Uhhhh.....
• Coffee Hours totally get torn down earlier than they used to back in the day. Where does everyone go so quickly? Remember the days when we'd all be out there 'til past 5?
• I wonder if anyone else keeps all their samples in a lunch bag.
• I have no first author papers and this doesn't bother me. Is something wrong with that?
• I can't wait until I live in a place with central a/c
• Why are grad students so extreme? Yeah, they're smart, but some are so odd...=/

Forstar du dansk? Jeg amerikano. Farvel!