Kyle on San Diego

Diego was nice. San, not so much.

Day 1:
Arrive. 3 hours behind Eastern time zone. Hotel is much nicer than expected, except for a strong bleachy smell (which was expected). Great location as well. Great mexican food. Cheap dive bars nearby. Drunk by 7pm. Very drunk by 9pm.
Day 2:
Day-long National Institue on Drug Abuse symposium. Queezy. Cool brain images. Boring talks about other stuff. Spoke to students of potential postdoctoral advisors of mine. Early to bed.
Day 3:
First day of neuroscience posters. A lot of walking and talking. Two great impressions of second postdoctoral opportunity at Hopkins. How is Baltimore for living? Anyone?? More drinking. BYObutter rules the trivia machine.
Day 4:
More posters and walking and talking. Great people watching.
Day 5:
Up at 7am for my poster presentation. Very successful overall: got some advice, positive comments, met some folks, plugged my work, etc. Quite a crowd. Especially around the adjascent poster, Steve's "Marijuana Munchies" study. Totally exhausted by early pm. Dinner with the lab at super-fancy mexican/french restaurant. Steak good. Cactus...intersting. 3 hours of drinking and exhausting conversation. Early to bed. Sort of.
Day 6:
Slept on flight home. When did they start charging for in-flight meals? Went to bed early. Drained.

What did I learn about SD?
San Diego has way too many advertisements for plastic surgery. The down-and-out folks ask for cigarettes, not money. The weather is too consistent. Downtown stuff is too expensive. Where are the hippies and homosexuals I've been hearing about? Not downtown, evidently. San Diego is home to the only calm and jolly schizophrenic I've met. My knees hurt.

Kyle Bleeds

I'm totally exhausted, a bit dehydrated, and I just cut myself badly while doing dishes....so I thought the time was perfect for some blogging. Blood = Blog.

Shine by David Gray, that's a good song.

So, this week I'm teaching students how to dissect sheep brains. Pretty fun, I must say. It's the first time I've seen much enthusiasm from them. Brains! Fuck Yeah!!!

Next week I go to San Diego for the Society for Neuroscience annual meeting. 35,000 strong last year, and this year is likely to be at least that large. I've never been to SD but have heard good things. I'm presenting my research that identified neurons that code taste pleasure, so I should ge a pretty good crowd at my poster. If the data doesn't do it, then my gimmick sure will: passerbys will have the opportunity to taste my nasty NaCl fluid that I gave the rats. Mmmmm, fluid.

There's a catch to the trip though: Steve has booked us in a roach motel that has awful online reviews (stuff about violence, filth, etc), and partly serves as a halfway house for the local debauchers. So stay tuned for stories from the halfway house--I'm sure I'll have a few by the end of the trip.

Kyle Rants and Waxes

STELLLLLLLLLLLLLLLAAAA!!!!
Let's get three things clear: I loved The State. I love Reno 911. I loved Wet Hot American Summer. Will I loave Stella? Yes.

Last weeks debate: bunk. Kyle didn't get any new information, save for a few insights into political tactics and personalities, neither of which Kyle cares about.

The Debate tonight: much more promising, matter of fact. We'll see.

Kyle dislikes Bush and Kerry so much, and especially Cheney and Edwards. Kyle may not vote. Uh-oh!

Kyle's students don't understand neuroscience and are driving him a bit nuts about the upcoming examination---so teaching is going quite well, thanks.

Kyle saw Arlo Guthrie last night and enjoyed the show. Highly recommended if you get a chance.

Kyle may change his name to "Kyle Guthrie" and sing folky tunes about working the line and pitching the man's coal. Or, instead, he may not---only time will tell.

And time will never tell, because Kyle has sworn time to secrecy. Ha!

Blog out.