It’s been another week of intense lab work, but I did manage to take a little break over the weekend with some pool and poker. On Friday night, I left work around 11pm and headed over to Jillian’s with Mike for several rounds of 8-ball. Slept in on Saturday, and spent the evening with friends for some take-out from Dok Bua while watching Rounders, followed by a night of intense 5-card Draw and Texas Hold’em. Fortune smiled upon me this time (actually, for the first time) and I came out on top … not by much, but enough for lunch money for the next several days.

Today marks the infamous day when the fate of my 4th-year med school friends, at least for the next several years, was determined. Yes folks, it’s Match Day 2004! The good news is that all my friends, including my roommate, matched into their top-choice program! Unfortunately, the very concept of residency for me still lies far in the distant future. Incidentally, my old high school friend Sara was also up here in Boston this evening, so we attended the HST Forum together, where we dined over some good food and fine company.

That’s what I learned from work this week. I was starting to get frustrated several days ago when my first round of subcloning yielded no positive colonies as shown by restriction digest. After consulting with another post-doc in my lab, he suspected a strange phenomenon known as BamHI star activity. Apparently, under certain conditions, this restriction enzyme can exhibit a relaxation of its specificity, leading to non-specific digestion of my product. The two lanes shown in the picture, believe it or not, were digested with the same enzymes! (If you had to know, it was NotI and BamHI) I just repeated it the second time using less enzyme and over a shorter time, and voila! behold my beautiful clone! Yes, it’s sad that the only thing I have to report is from work, but that’s pretty much what I’ve been up to all week.

Last night, Bob and I went out to see an advanced screening of Starsky and Hutch starring the dynamic duo of comedy Ben Stiller and Owen Wilson – a hilarious movie to brighten up my day following yet another depressing lab meeting. In other news, today marks my last day as a Pharmacology class TA. It’s always sad to leave ’cause I enjoy teaching a lot. The good news is that I’ll have much more time to focus on work now.

Vive la France! Maybe because it was our first trip together, or perhaps there is indeed some merit to the cliché notion of Valentine’s in Paris, but despite our complete lack of French language skills and the bitter cold that overtook the city, Melody and I were nevertheless left with the fondest of memories for this week-long vacation. Our trip began on Sunday the 15th, with a tour of the beautiful cathedral of Notre Dame, followed by a stroll through the Latin Quarter, a visit to the Pantheon, and finally concluding with a cold walk down Rue Mouffetard to a small cozy restaurant for a steaming bowl of soupe d’oignon au gratin. Still a bit jet-lagged, we woke up late Monday afternoon to tour the endless corridors of the Louvre, and finished the evening with a stroll down the garish and bustling Champs-Elyseé, but not before stopping at a local diner for some mouth-watering confit de canard and braised skate. On Tuesday, we awoke early to beat the crowd to ascend the Eiffel Tower, spent the afternoon in Musée Rodin, and by dusk was fast asleep back at our hotel room. By the time we realized that we had missed dinner, it was already 3am! Luckily, the sleep afforded us the ability to wake up earlier on Wednesday to spend the morning in scenic Montmartre, beginning with a view of the intricate mosaics in Sacre Coeur, followed by a stroll through the fairy-tale land of Amelie Poulain, passing street artists hounding us to sketch our portraits, the Moulin de la Galette featured in Renoir’s painting, and last but not least, the Moulin Rouge. After some Thai curry for lunch, we hopped over for a peek into Box 5 of the infamous Opera Garnier, the inspiration for the Phantom of the Opera, and from there, walked to the Jardin des Tuileries for a short break, then back to the Louvre to cover what we missed from our first visit. We devoted the next day to Versailles, which despite most of the gardens being closed for the winter, still retained its lavishness and magnificence. On Friday, we visited the impressive collection at Musée D’Orsay and stopped by the Jardin de Luxembourg before our flight back to NYC the next day. Having spent so much quality time with my dear Melody, it was tough returning to lab on Monday and made for a slow week at work, which explains why it took me so long to put up this update. Fortunately, the best news is that the BI has offered Melody a residency position here, and she has decided to accept the offer! It certainly made for an easier farewell, knowing that she’ll be coming back for good this summer. Be sure to check out the travel page for additional photos from our trip! Oh, and happy leap day!

With the grant out of the way, lab work slowing down a bit, and my gf visiting for 2 full weeks, I can finally be a happy puppy again. While this week has been spent laying low in Boston, mainly because I’m teaching problem-set sections for Pharmacology and also doing some intermittent experiments in lab, the two of us will be taking a trip to Paris next week! After some last-minute web searching, we were able to find a great air and hotel package from Virgin Vacations for a week in the City of Lights, just in time for Valentine’s Day! Meanwhile, Melody will be interviewing at the Beth Israel Deaconess for their 2nd year Ob/Gyn residency position this morning. It’s exciting, but at the same time rather nerve-racking. I can only keep my fingers crossed in the meantime…

Work Hard. Play Hard. That’s the motto that would best characterize the events of the past week. I went from pulling all-nighters for my PQE on Monday to my birthday celebration on Thursday, then busting my balls on my PI’s grant, and on Friday joining in the festivities for the Neuroscience recruitment weekend. I took off from lab around 10pm to head over to Jillian’s with my friend Mike, where we played 2 solid hours of 8-ball (completely ignoring all the prospective students, of course), followed by dancing at An Tua Nua, which featured a mix of music from 80’s to modern Hip-Hop. The beautiful thing was that everything was covered by the program – from the cover charge to drinks at the bar. All you had to say were the magic words “Harvard Neuroscience”. Other than that, my parents were in town this weekend, so I just chilled with them while I continued working on the grant. It’ll be another breath of fresh air once this grant is over.

AAAAAAAAAHHHHH!!!! I’ve just officially turned a quarter-century old! I can almost feel my muscles getting weaker and my joints creaking as I move about. Fortunately, I was joined by a group of good friends this evening to bring some light to my misery, and celebrate my 25th birthday together over some fried calamari, a plate of Shrimp Bistro Pasta, and a yummy slice of Coffee Heathbar Crunch cheesecake from Cheesecake Factory. As always, they made us wait the usual hour and a half, but thanks to the comedic genius of my peers, we were able to entertain each other and prevent ourselves from eating each other while we waited. Unfortunately, though I would’ve liked to continue the festivities after the big meal, I had to go back home to work on my professor’s grant. It turned out that his R01 was due Monday, and considering the fact that it’s the most crucial NIH grant supporting the lab, and I am among the beneficiaries of the money, it’ll be important for me to help out as much as possible over the next several days.

After a long-fought 2-hour battle, I’m happy to report that I’ve passed my qualifying exam! It feels as if a huge weight has been lifted off my chest… I can breathe more easily and even the air smells better! =D My oral defense went from 11am-1pm, during which time a lot of tough questions were thrown in my direction. Fortunately, the examiners were incredibly helpful and gave me pointers to help confirm my preliminary studies. I’ll definitely need to unwind for the rest of the week before returning to hardcore lab work.

Yuube, tomodachi wa hayai tanjoubi no purezento ga moo kuremashita! Miyazaki no Sen to Chihiro no Kamikakushi no DVD desu! Kanashii kana, jikan ga nai kara, kono eiga ga mienai. =( Ima, benkyoo shinakereba narimasen! (Man! I’ve forgotten so much Japanese, I think I had to use my entire repertoire of Japanese vocab for these four sentences =P)