After a short excursion around Tokyo, I am finally on my way back to Tsukuba. There could be nothing more sad a picture than this leafless weeping willow tree at night fall in Ueno Park. Well, I had a nice day and now, back to reality.
A fantastic scene along the moat of the Imperial Palace
For non-imperial guests, this is as far as we get.
On my way to the university, while walking along Ueno Park, these disciplined sea gulls sure know how to give a military salute! But the ducks dont seem to care at all.
ATTENTION!
Its Saturday!
And boy, I slept in the lab
worked the entire night
on some experiment (that ended up in failure)
I just woke up
to find this uneventful morning
just magnificent
blue skies, cotton clouds
the red brick building at Central-4
I am going home
Starting today, I decided to have salad for lunch and dinner everyday. That is how I lost weight in 2003, and am determined to do a reprise. I now weigh 70.75 kg, what would it be a month from now?
CRON stands for Caloric Restriction with Optimal Nutrition.
(never mind the pasta on the plate, Im just human)
We can actually extend species lifespan by as much as 20-50% if we restrict calorie intake; trim our mass down by around 10% of our target weight. It works in the lab, at least.
That reminds me, Dr. Renu just sent me the latest manuscript from Prof. Calabrese, one of the world's leading experts on hormesis. Deadline for my review on mortalin (a lifespan-extending molecular chaperone) and hormesis (a.k.a. beneficial stress) is by the end of February.
That gives me a little stress to start writing my article. Praise God for hormesis!! Am I right, Nietzsche-san?
Chinese fortunetellers are predicting the new Lunar Year is not going to be good. To ward off the bad omens, it has been advised to have dog figurines at home or at work.
I bought this little glass dog for good luck from a 100-yen shop.
Ganbatte!
(Jan 25 2006)
I have on my bench, blue, yellow and white tips,
piled-up empty tip boxes and a pair of sterile gloves
Youll never get bored
if you just think that for every box filled and sterilized
For every tip placed in its proper place
Is character galvanized
a stress-free (respite) in a stressful lab work:
riddled with negative data
but occassionally peppered with promising results
And how to make tip-filling more fun and colorful
Place you hands under the spell of Beethoven's Symphony No.5 in C minor
Feel every sleigh of your latex-lined fingers
And appreciate, if you can, these tips' enigmatic essence
a transition from chaos to order
my whole life
in a single afternoon
in a single working day
,
in that one afternoon
in that one working day
is my life, w
.................hole
(Jan 24 2006)
-thanks Dr. Kittiphong for the duck key chain
I was pretty uncomfortable that day, that I decided to visit a museum. And this was what I encountered, among the other zoologic curious at the Meguro Parasitological Museum (Jan 21 2006).
Its amazing how these worms could have a special, gastronomic preference for the brain. How did these creatures find their way up there? Am not a parasitologist, but could this provide a lead to develop an alternative way to deliver drugs that can home into the brain?
I, together other grad students, just finished with a meeting at the university (Jan 21, 2006). We were all told to change our professor because of the controversy in his lab.
Marking my first phlog entry, while taking a stroll along Ueno park, I captured an impression of this building. This is probably how I feel today, cold and Kafka-ish.