Goal reached!

I made it.  26 pounds lost as of yesterday.   OK, OK, I got an extension regarding the deadline....the new one is/was today.   I feel pretty good, and I don't think I'm done.  Resting heart rate less than 60.  More energy during the day.  Moving around more easily at soccer practices.  Ye ha!

No Reason

I've started reading Al Gore's book, Assault on Reason. While an increasing number of Americans are finally expressing their collective loss of confidence in the President, his administration, and their policies in Iraq, in the "war on terror", foreign policy, domestic policy, and the destruction of fiscal responsibility, Gore systematically and coherently shows how they got us here, and how we (the Public) let them, following like sheep and believing every unsubstantiated untruth used to justify their actions. We are just as responsible, along with our media, because it is us that swallowed every dire warning about how we needed to bring the war to the terrorists, that Saddam was behind 9/11, that it was and will always be a fight against the evildoers, that you're either with us or against us.

Bush needs to reduce every situation and decision to simplistic language, often in very black and white terms without any nuances. He does not listen to points or evidence contrary to whatever belief he may hold on a subject. He stubbornly holds on to those beliefs no matter what the outcome may be. While this in itself is a simplistic analysis (read Gore's book for the comprehensive one), it does explain the quagmire we now find ourselves in. More than 3500 dead servicemen and women. Tens of thousands maimed for life. More than that with significant psychological problems that may last a lifetime. Yet the Administration blithely goes on, now vetoing any congressional bill that would force the President to start a logical and phased withdrawal. We've created one hell of a mess that will take years, and maybe generations, to fix. And there's so much to fix. Our standing in the world as a moral authority (now pretty much gone). Our economic status (maybe not teetering on the brink, but sure leveraged to the hilt). 

Lab personnel woes

I finally have time (sort of) to take a few minutes and do a little brain dump while on my way to San Diego/La Jolla for a Metagenomics meeting. My 'boss' and I are attending, mostly just to learn about a new and emerging field of research that can be used in all sorts of ways to study populations (usually microbial) in various environmental niches. Basically, 'sequence everything' in a sample to tease out relative populations, identify new species and/or new genes, etc. The power of high throughput sequencing and advances in bioinformatics is making this possible. But this is the fun stuff...

The problems in the lab are still a huge drain on my enthusiasm and energy. It is finally coalescing around the actions (and sometimes inactions) of two individuals. Both are full time government employees (which I only bring up because while I have considerable 'power' and influence over the direction of the research as program manager and their supervisor, there is no hope of ever moving them elsewhere). Both try to work hard, and in most ways both seem to truly care. However, lately due to both my dissatisfaction with their overall performance and emerging facts about their behavior towards the techs and students, I am going to be forced to sternly confront them about many of these issues.

I've already had one run in with one of them. She is feeling very insecure, seems to think she has ownership over much of the lab research, and resents the fact that indeed she does not getting what she feels is some sort of entitlement. It blew up over my plans to bring in a new post doc to jump start a relatively new area of research for the lab in evolution of pathogenesis of one of the marine species we are working on. Frankly I do not have the confidence that this individual is able and capable of moving this area of research in a manner and speed that is necessary, but even if she did, she does not have the drive to ensure success. I ended up telling her that she can work on some of it, but instead of working in an area that would better suit her capabilities and need to develop project leadership on something of her own, she will again be subordinate to my overall direction. So be it. She will not like it but it's what she's asked for. What I cannot stand and will not stand for, is how she has taken to treating a few of the other younger technicians in the lab. It is close to blowing up now and is something I cannot let go any longer. Thankfully, I have my direct supervisor's support and understanding in my want and need to utilize "hungry" post docs and students to truly move the research in novel and state of the art directions.

The second individual approached me yesterday to first complain about one of the aforementioned technicians asking too many questions (I say so incredulously since isn't that what a student is supposed to do?), and then to tell me point blank that he wanted to make sure I had X's (person discussed in preceding paragraph) back! Frankly after speaking with the technician later in the day, I wanted to can both of the more senior staff on the spot! I'm now hearing about instances of rudeness, complaining, verbally dressing down for mistakes, all dumped on anyone unfortunate enough (at least the way it sounds) assigned to work with them.

So yes, I need to handle this. As of right now, I'm not sure exactly how. I'm wracking my brain to figure out why they are acting this way because they are and have been great people showing plenty of empathy for others. One wants everything right now and seems to feel that getting a PhD gives some sort of inalienable right to "run" everything. The other has had some significant health issues (and I found out yesterday about some very severe health problems of his long time partner), and this may be influencing his actions and his work. Their is both explicit and implicit pressure to move the research and get manuscripts out the door, and yes much of this comes from me. Somehow I need to make the point, without further exacerbating how they treat the others, that they need to be better teachers and team leaders, that they need to nurture the scientific curiosity that the younger folks have, not try to stomp on it over some misguided attempt to exert control.

Or I'll stomp on them (!)

I truly find myself wishing I'd gone farther with the faculty position application at WSU. I'm not sure I can continue to do this for another 10-15 years with this laboratory dynamic.

Better get the weight loss update out of the way. Slow steady progress. Running going ok, and generally have more energy. Runs are now between 3-5 miles, averaging a little under 8:30/mile. All runs since the trip to Sarasota have been on the roads, no treadmill. The only "problem" is that all possible runs from my house generally involve signicant "hillage." Great for cardiovascular conditioning, tough on any speed gain desires. Of course, I really don't care about speed anymore. Just get in shape and stay uninjured!

Fathers and Sons

Yesterday was Father's Day, and unfortunately, I had to spend all day traveling to Sarasota FL  for  a  meeting (leaving home at 3:45 AM PDT and arriving at the destination hotel at 8:00 PM EDT is not my idea of a fun day).  (In yet another digression, it's really not all that bad to be sitting on my Holiday Inn balcony overlooking Lido Beach while I write this!)  Anyway, on Saturday my son celebrated the day with me by giving me one of his now famous homemade cards and  a book titled "The Road" by Cormac McCarthy.  The book and author were recently highlighted by Opra, otherwise I may not have heard about it.  That's a shame really since after reading this one book, I do believe he is one of the great American authors.

The Road is about the travels of a father and son who after surviving a nuclear holocaust that wipes out much of the world are traveling south towards the ocean in order to find other survivors (good guys) that they might hook up with.  The book starts several years after the nuclear exchange and the world has been plunged into a nuclear winter of  grey rain and snow, little sunlight and decreasing temperatures, and no living vegetation, birds, or other wildlife. It's a story about trying to survive, where the sole purpose is the feeling of the father that he must do anything in his power to ensure his  son's survival.  At times, this drive is at cross purposes with the father's moral compass, when he teeters on killing others who threaten his main goal.   The father is challenged constantly, in search of food to avoid starvation, and to continue the journey while avoiding marauding gangs that have taken to slavey and cannablism to survive.  As the story progresses, you realize how intertwined the father and son have become, and it's the young pre-teen son who becomes the reason of morality for the father.  

I finished the book before my connecting flight.  All I can say is that I had to move away from a crowded waiting area in order to read the last chapter by myself.  If you have children, you will feel the same emotions welling up inside you that I did, stemming  from the most basic, almost primal feeling of protectiveness that parent's feel.  I so much wanted to hug my son and daughter when I finished the book, with tears in my eyes.

Better update the weight thing...

So here's where I'm at, after updating the graph to show the real starting point of 193 pounds.  Making progress, feeling better but still flabby around the middle.  I can run up to three miles with the pace getting down in the low 8's per mile (not all three miles at that pace yet thought). About 12 pounds from the goal of 168.

Weight loss update #2

I didn't take it seriously enough until last weekend. This week I managed a strict caloric-limited diet, staying around 1100/day. Supposedly that's below the "safe" limit of 1200 but I'm feeling fine. If I keep lunch light, and add a granola bar in the afternoon, I've been feeling OK. Night is the toughest since one really bad habit I've had is eating something, yogurt, a dessert, something, after 9 PM. That's the biggest no no right there. I've also been getting back on the treadmill more (finally did move it to the garage), and even though I've been a little sore, 3 miles on it today felt pretty good. Not much speed yet though, that was at 11:08/mi and included some walking. It'll get there if I'm patient and persistent.

How do you make sense out of the senseless?

It's been a little over 36 hours since 32 people were murdered at Virginia Tech University. So many young students and professors, shot to death for reasons only truly known to the young man responsible, before he killed himself.

Why?

News programs are parading 'experts' in front of the cameras and microphones, all with their theory as to why the 23 year old student decided to take out his anger by killing so many before turning the gun on himself. But can anybody really explain what drives this thought process? I know there are a lot of rational psychological explanations, but none of them can adequately explain what would drive someone to commit such a horrific act of violence.

I've felt an almost overwhelmng sense of sadness today. I'm sure most people in the country feel the same way. As a father of two, one in college and one in high school, it's so easy to imagine what if that's one of your kids. Tears come easily.

Why?

Weight loss update

OK, I could be doing a lot better. I've lost five pounds to date, to 188. I got a ways to go, for sure, and only 2 and a half months left.

My goal is to move the treadmill down to the garage where I don't have any excuse not to use it. It's also time to start exercising on the bike trainer.

time to start losing it

Yep, I've been putting this off too long. I need to lose at least 25 pounds. My wife made me a bet....we could keep the new DVR from Comcast that I brought home after we added a new HDTV (our first), if I lose the weight in four months. I'm using a diet calculator on my old Palm Tungsten that figures what your basal caloric intake is based on your weight, age, and activity level. You then tell it how much you want to lose and by when, and it calculates what your daily caloric intake should be. It uses a database of foods containing calories, protein, fat, fiber, carbs...this is so you monitor that you eat the right foods during a diet.

So, today I'm 193 lbs. My basal metabolic rate is ~ 2365 calories. To lose 25 pounds by June 4 my average calorie intake should be 1435 calories.

Day 1 is over and I held myself to 1404 calories!