For my fellow lady types

By Roz Young, December 18 2011

It’s a pretty good time to have a vagina. Things aren’t perfectly balanced between the sexes, and I’m not sure if they’ll ever be, but I think we’re a generation that can embrace our femininity while becoming accomplished, professional ladies. There’s no reason that we can’t enjoy indulging our girly sides AND expect to be taken seriously as confident, respectable women. You just have to own it.

When I was in high school, I spent a long time trying to convince a woman several years my senior that my love for Sailor Moon did not make me a disgrace to my gender. In her opinion, the show portrayed women as vacuous boobs and the girls were terrible role models for young ladies. I politely had to agree to disagree. That probably meant I gave her a typical teenage sneer and what I’m sure was an acidic and clever “Nu uh”! I was at the height of my eloquence and grace.

Part of the appeal for me is the way the girls of Sailor Moon are flaky teens. Well, Sailor Moon is. That’s kind of the point. She has to grow up and learn to be less selfish in order to take her place as a leader and hero. We don’t start out awesome. We push ourselves and it’s hard. See, it’s deep. And then she gets her into her ridiculously cute mini skirt and inappropriately low cut leotard to defeat the evil space queen and other assorted villainous types. Yeah, my argument kind of falls apart here, but I stand by how much I love it. Girls like things that are pretty. I’m ok with that.

If you want to discuss or flame me with your thoughts on Sailor Moon, I welcome the messages. Of course, if you haven’t seen the episodes or movies in the original Japanese, or read any of the comics, I doubt I can take you too seriously. Sailor Moon has layers people, and lots of them don’t translate too well into a heavily edited and poorly dubbed YTV show for kiddies. I’m also not alone, so if I don’t agree with you, I might just get a few girlfriends together, suit up into some schoolgirl threads, and kick your ass.

Now that I’m older and with some edumacation under my belt, the gender issue comes up more for career women in the baby making years. Myself, I’m not that interested in babies. I’m guessing I have a defective brain fold somewhere in the “nurture and mother” things lobe. It’s probably been scrapped to make extra room for zombie lore. But I think that women who choose their career over reproducing, or women who decide to be full-time mommies, and all the ladies who manage some degree of both, should be proud of whatever they accomplish if they have given it their best. We need to support each other, rather than be judgemental and critical. Do what makes you happy and everyone else can deal with it.

Ok, so the gender issue is out there. Women are still paid less for the same work and in academia, it’s tough. Dr. Laura Frost, a professor emeritus from the University of Alberta, has been giving lectures on this topic and gave an entire course in Austria on gender in education and professional life. It turns out, even women will select a male candidate with the same qualifications over a female applying for the same job. If you want to see an example of her course syllabus from a lecture in Calgary, check out this link. There are selected readings at the end if you’re curious.
www.ucalgary.ca/wao/files/wao/Careers%20in%20science_UofC_October-2011.pdf
Now that we’re all friends, I want women everywhere to know that it’s ok to be a girl. I don’t think you are failing the great feminists of the past, women who fought so we could attend school and be able to vote, if you look deep inside yourself and can’t escape a few gender stereotypes. If you like to knit and bake and wear pink, that’s awesome! And if you also like to kick box and shoot things, more power to you. I’m talking to you Erin, go ahead and enjoy your Wonder Woman baking gadgets. You define what it is to be a woman and you don’t need to justify yourself to anyone. Plus, Wonder Woman is cool.

But WHY?!

By Roz Young, December 5 2011
I can appreciate that as scientists, we can be kind of annoying. And honestly, environmental microbiologists are the worst. We talk about fascinating sewage anaerobes at dinner parties. We argue about the percentage of ethanol in our hand sanitizers while camping. We never let people use the five second rule without comment. We use the periodic table of the elements to make jokes. We talk a lot about cycles without ever really getting anywhere. And we are not just annoying to normal people. We are even annoying to other scientists. Today at coffee break, we decided it’s because we’re like the children of science, who don’t stop asking, “But, why?”...

Evidence. You don’t start out a microbiologist. You start out interested in science (nerd), and then biology, and then wonder why something gets sick, or how things break down, from corpses to oil. And as you keep asking, things get smaller, until you study bacteria instead of polar bears. But then you care about why the bacterium interacts with metals, how does it do that, and why the heck would it do what you find it does in the lab, out there in the real world? That’s the part that’s really interesting, why do bacteria do it at all? And that’s why geneticists find us annoying. Sure, they have the genes for all sorts of stuff. But, why? This is also why ecologists find us annoying. Sure, bacteria modify chemicals in the environment and make them less, or sometimes more, toxic. But, why? Engineers probably hate us the most. Bacteria cause all sorts of problems for industry. They make hydrogen sulphide, which is lethal at high concentration, and can grow all over stuff and foul it up. Engineers are looking for solutions to make cleaner drinking water and how to sterilize hospital equipment and food products. Sure, they like having us around to explain what happened, but they don’t care why. We care. So much so that we are super annoying about it. That sort of explains why I’m annoying about The Avengers movie too. Oh Captain America... but WHY??

My Secret Geek Shame

By Matt Baker, December 5 2011

I’ve never played Zelda.  There, I said it.  I know, it’s hard to believe. Not even one.  Yeah, that includes Ocarina of Time.  I have never held a controller from any gaming system and used it to move Link around or stab a ghost or whatever the heck it is you do in Zelda.  No, I don’t really know why, I just never have.  I didn’t even know Zelda is the princess until I was in University.  Dude, get off my back.  They just looked boring, alright?!  I remember watching my cousin play The Legend of Zelda on his NES and it just didn’t look that great.  I mean really, does this look fun?


Well it didn’t to me, so shut up.  And then, after my NES, I didn’t get another console until my PS2.  By the time I got an N64 it was used and they weren’t making games for it any more so I wasn’t exposed to the hype of Ocarina of Time (and playing N64 at my friends’ houses in high school was always Goldeneye or drinking and crashing in Rush 2, not a single player game like Zelda).  I was too busy playing games on my computer to worry about sequels to some lame looking game my cousin used to play.  Granted, I’ve just checked some screen shots and OoT looks pretty sweet.


Perhaps I’ll try the 3D version when I get around to buying a 3DS.  Or maybe I’ll just pick it up for my N64 now.  Who knows?  I could also borrow Twilight Princess from Roz (who hasn’t spoken to me since the coffee break when all of this was revealed this morning – apparently I’m not the man she thought I was) and then I could try out some Wii Zelda action.  On that note, I could even go out and get Skyward Sword.  But I think I should start a little earlier, familiarize myself with the basics a bit.  Carmen (a tech in our lab) tells me I should start right at the beginning and work my way through all of them, but I think that is a little excessive.  Anyway, now I’ve revealed the biggest, geekiest shame I have.  What’s your secret geek shame?