My 8 year itch

There seems to be a pattern of 8 years between major events in my life.  Some of these were in my control and some were not.  8 years after my first memories I was transported from the only home I could remember to another place.

I remember it being very traumatic.  My parents ripped me from a nice cozy school environment and placed me in another school where I did not know anyone.  I think that set the 8 year cycle in motion.

Eight years after that I married Robyn in Colorado and made that my new home.  Again 8 years later, we moved from our condominium into a house that we built from the ground up.  That adventure took 18 months to complete.

It was not long until I needed another adventure. I found a position in a well known classical French restaurant in the mountains outside of Estes Park, CO, about a 40 minute drive from our house.  I cooked there for over 2 years before returning to the software industry to make some money. 

I worked consistently in the computer industry until about 8 years after my cooking adventure when I came up with another big adventure.  I had been dabbling in adventure racing, where you orienteer, kayak, mountain bike, repel off cliffs, continuously for 48 hours to 7 days, depending on the length of the race.  I was rehabing an ankle injury and thinking about how to get into shape for the long races.
I had read about people running ultra marathons and traversing great distances. I thought that would be fun.  I had also heard of people running across the state, East to West, or North to South, but I had never heard of someone running the perimeter.  Should be easy!  So I started planning it out.

Robyn and I accomplished this adventure between January 1, 2001 and December 23, 2001. I started running from the four-corners monument and headed north.  After four days I had covered 96 miles.  We headed home only to come back about three weeks later to start another 4 days of running.  All told I covered 1814 miles in 89 days of running in less than a year, averaging 20 miles per day.  After that I was pretty much a slug for a few years.  Until the clock started to hit 8 years again.

I was a bit bored and began taking some computer classes. I had been working with some scientists in Molecular Biology who needed computational support for analysis of their experimental data. The work was fascinating and I kept asking why did they do it this way or that way.   Finally, they told me to go take some biology classes.  Once I started, I was hooked.  The biology is fascinating and they need computational people to help with the analysis.  I finished a Masters in Computer Science, applied to a program at the medical school down in Denver for Computational Biology and was accepted for 2009.  Eight years after the run around the state was completed.

I should finish up my research this year and graduate. This means that another change should be coming up.  What adventures are in store at the next 8 year cycle in 2017?  Next year we hope to be able to head to Europe for a couple (or three?) years as I pursue a post-doc position to gain more experience and exposure to different areas of Computational Biology and Bioinformatics.  After that I hope to return to Boulder and find a teaching/research position at a major university.  Hmmmm, that would be 2017, fitting into the 8 year timelines.

After that, what new adventures will I be able to take on in my 60's, 70's and 80's?  I hope to retire by then.  Or maybe I have been retired my whole life, doing what I want to do, and working only enough to let me have fun?  My wife would emphatically say YES.

I am a long haired scientist

It has been a couple months since I last got a haircut.  I randomly picked a salon from a dozen in the immediate area. It is a small shop with four or five chairs.  They are friendly and I have enough French to ask for a cut, and understand the time of my appointment.

My appointment was for 6:00 and I arrived outside a couple minutes early.  Mistake. It is a French 6:00 which means about 6:30.  Oh well, I read a magazine while I waited.

I should have brought something to read because all the magazines were in French.  How could I possibly find out the 10 best ways to keep a man or the 4 best ways to know if he loves you?

It seems that hair cutting is the same here.  I get my hair washed, then they ask me how much to cut.  I point to the back and show the top of my collar.  I hope that gets the point across. But, I won't know until it is done.

The cut is finished, a bit of blow drying and voila, I am a new man. And, of course it goes without saying, I look much younger, more handsome, and much more intelligent.

Degrees of Separation

It is interesting how all things in this world are connected.  Johannes Gutenberg (~1395-1468), the inventor who is credited with creating the printing revolution, is said to have been living in Strasbourg when he came up with the idea for movable mechanical type.  He had spent much of his youth there and in 1440 he is said to have perfected his method.  Although Gutenberg was not financially successful, his invention played a key role in bring education to everyone and was instrumental in the development of the Renaissance and Scientific Revolution.

Without this vital means of being able to distribute information and knowledge easily and inexpensively, education would have remained available only to the upper class and religious orders.  Without this invention, the world that we live in, and the education that I am undertaking as part of the scientific revolution, would still be lost in the dark ages. To celebrate the achievement of Gutenberg, the city has a square named for him and erected a statue in 1840. 

I have a connection with Gutenberg.  I married one.  The maiden name of my wife and editor, Robyn, was Gutenberg.  From talking with her relatives she believes that the famous Gutenberg was a great great .... great uncle.  I can now claim to be related to Johannes, however remotely.

Home stretch

I have one month to go.  I have been counting down the time until I get to go home.  I have read on other blogs and sites about expatriation that months three and four are the hardest.  It takes that long to make friends and find out what you really miss about home.  There is one thing I really miss.

I only have one more day until Robyn arrives tomorrow.  I am so excited that I can hardly concentrate.  It feels like Christmas, I need to clean the apartment and decorate it, and in the end I get a present.
Ugh, I do need to clean the apartment.  I have not had a visitor since the census lady a couple months ago.  Luckily there is not much to clean.  It only takes me about an hour.  But I need to wash all the sheets and towels, and make sure all the clothes I want for vacation are washed and ready to go.

Once Robyn leaves Paris and heads home, I will only have two weeks to wrap up my research here in Lyon.  That means I must get enough work done that we can continue the collaboration via long distance.  The work here has progressed a bit in the last couple of weeks. Still have a bunch of work still to do.
Before I leave, I need to hold a garage sale (give away) of all the things I have accumulated, including my nice brand new reading chair.  The graduate students will get first choice as they are as lowly paid as graduate students in the US and it costs more to live here in the city.  Most of them do not need any of the stuff, but I will offer it to them before giving it away.

I just realized that I have not driven a car in over three months.  It is hard to imagine not doing that for a lifetime.  I miss being able to drive from Boulder, (what I now consider to be a small town) and visit the tiny villages of Colorado and the rest of the western US.  Getting out into the open spaces where there are no people.  When I get back and get into my giant american super-sized truck, it will feel as big as my apartment.  Hope I can still park it.

I just heard from Robyn and she is on her way to the airport.  I should head to the apartment and start my chores.  I'm so excited!

More Food

The other day I was walking across the city, heading for an art store, but when I arrived it was near 1:00 pm and they were closed for lunch.  Many of the businesses in the city are closed for two hours around lunchtime as the French take great pleasure in their meals.  I had seen an interesting small restaurant called Saladbar Green a few streets away.

 It is a small place seating about 15-18 people and they make custom salads.  You pick the lettuce/spinach types you want and then you get to add four toppings of your choice.  It's similar to places in the US, a smaller version of Mad Greens for the Boulderites. It is a franchise that only serves lunch Monday through Friday and also has stores in Paris, New York, and London according to the napkins.  They stress natural foods and green earth friendly packaging.

My lunch was a bed of spinach, tomato, bell peppers (yellow and red), an apple & pear mixture, and curried chicken.  I added a citrus vinaigrette.  It was a huge salad that took me quite a while to eat.  I sat at the window watching people and Tram 1 pass along rue Servient and rue Vendome near Place Guichard. 

They had jazz playing in the background and the workers are all in their 20's and very friendly.  After finishing my salad, I asked about the desserts in the display.   Between my broken French and their broken English, I selected a parfait: cinnamon brown sugar crumble topping over fromage blanc with applesauce and chestnut puree.  Fromage blanc is kind of a cross between sour cream and cream cheese.  Tangy but not sweet.  Combine it with the flavorings and it provides a luxurious coating for the tongue.

Now I am hooked.  At the market I regularly buy the fromage blanc with citrus flavor and pour it over strawberries.   

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The other night I stayed late at the lab.  It was after 9pm when I started walking home.  I had not eaten dinner yet and there is a Subway right across the street from my apartment.  I stopped.  I made it over a month without resorting to American food, but it did taste good. Slightly different, but there were juicy and spicy jalapenos. Man, those I miss.  And ICE in my drink.  I don't think I have had an ice cube once before this.  Here I was able to get a whole glass of ice.  I miss that too.

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There is a McDonanld's a few blocks away and probably 9 or 10 others in the city.  There are lots of Subways, almost as many as in US, some just around the corner from one another.  This is just like the Starbucks that are on every corner and they are popular here as well.  Kentucky Fried Chicken is also an American import in Europe, but there are only a couple in the Lyon area and not very close to where I am, though one of the post-docs from Germany has a car and they all pile in and go there.

I'll admit that I am going to stop in a McDonald's soon because I can smell those fries and the thought of a drink with ice will soon be too much to pass up.

Although I have been eating at Subway every other week,  I did make it three months before heading to McDonald's.  I was out walking around the city on Wednesday May 1st.  It was the Labor Day holiday where everyone stops working.  All the transportation was shutdown and most of the businesses were closed.  I, of course, worked that day and when I went out, only the evil US corporations were still open.  So I headed in to get my fries and a coke.


The counter area of McDonald's is similar and the intent concentration of the kids is the same everywhere.  The two McDonald's that I have seen here in Lyon are both two stories.  The interior is anything but familiar.  Here the atmosphere is more fitting a cafe.  They don't have the normal uncomfortable plastic seats.  It is a place that the college students like to hang out on a holiday Wednesday afternoon. Maybe they are even doing their homework!?

Visit to Strasbourg France

Made my last visit to other universities here in Europe last week.  I stayed within France this time.  I went to Strasbourg by train, direct from Lyon.  I could have flown, but if you add the time to travel to and from the airports, as well as the extra time waiting for security and then hoping the plane will be on time, it is easier to travel by train.

The trains usually go right into the center of the city, making it much easier for people to meet you or for you to get to a hotel.  Strasbourg is a town that is right on the French-German border, due east of Paris.  Like many of the European cities, it is structured as a circle radiating out from the central church or cathedral. It is easy to get lost in the narrow, twisting and turning cobbled streets with five story buildings on each side before finding the view of the steeple to reorient yourself, only to get lost in a different direction.

The nice thing about downtown Strasbourg is that there is a river on one side and a set of trams that circle the other side, making it difficult to get lost by more than half a kilometer.  When I was mis-directioned, I would walk until I found myself at one of these landmarks.  From there I could just follow it until I got closer to my destination.

In one of my wanderings I found this swan sitting on her (his?) nest.  The other parent was just out of the picture.  There are lots of swans here in France.  There are often groups of 15 or 20 along the river where I run.  They tend to congregate at locations where they get fed regularly.  They are about twice the size of a Canadian goose, with a body about 3 feet long and their necks are just as long. They are very graceful, both flying and in the water, but don't let their gracefulness fool you.  They are mean.  They will peck you hard if you are not careful and they can break the skin.

 As I was walking home late one night, I passed the nest again and could make out something rummaging along the river near the swan nest.  You may be able to make out a large black river rat on the right of the image. After a couple of pecks, the rat moved on. 

I was once again visiting a campus on a holiday.  In Leuven Belgium it was the Easter Monday holiday and here in Strasbourg it is spring holiday week.  I really enjoy the campus in Boulder during the last half of May because all the students have gone away and the tourists have not yet started coming into town.  It was the same here in Strasbourg, as there are over 40,000 students and they were all away, making town and the trams easier to navigate.

The laboratory I was visiting was in the Molecular Biology Building, which was also my hotel for the visit.  Strasbourg is inundated by the politicians from the European Union for a week once every couple of months.  This makes it difficult to obtain a hotel room for visiting scientists, so they have converted a couple of rooms on the first floor into accommodations for visitors.  Because no other visitors were scheduled during my visit, I jumped at the opportunity to stay for free.  You can see my room in the photograph (red box), and because campus was empty, it was also very quiet.

This was a working trip and I was able to meet with ten different people over two days to talk about their research and possible ways I could help with their research.  This lab is one of the international laboratories recognized by the French government as  "excellent" and they are awarded extra funding for support.  This group has a wide range of research all focused around RNA. They are experimenting with several different model organisms (viruses and cells from bacteria, yeast, mice, human) and I talked with groups using NMR, micro fluidics, calorimeter, imaging, as well as sequencing.  They are all trying to answer very diverse questions, from RNA structure to RNA-Protein interactions to mRNA transcription levels.

The last night in Strasbourg I headed to Zuem Strissel, a restaurant suggested by my host for authentic local cuisine.  I ordered the Baeckoffe, a local dish of meats, potatoes, and carrots.  They bring it to the table in a nice crockery pot with a decorative lid and you serve yourself portions while the remaining stew stays hot in the pot. There is also another local dish that he suggested, which is like an endless pizza, with bacon, onion and covered in Gruyere cheese.  The people at the next table ordered it and after the second one came I asked them if it was Tarte flambes.  The woman and her grandmother were very friendly, and after talking with me for a little bit, they offered me a piece to try.  Good thing I did not order it, because it is very good and I would have eaten too much. Being on the border with Germany, they are a mixture of both German and French culture and cuisine. This place seemed to exude it. I had a very nice time and the waitstaff pictured above was also very nice, making my evening very enjoyable.