A pat on the back for a p >.001 result

Dear self,

I am very proud of you today and, more generally, for this semester. You took it upon yourself to understand statistics, not memorize terms/equations for your multivariate stats class. When the first exam was approaching, you didn't devote as much time to studying as you thought you needed to. This resulted in a very anxious self before, during, and directly after the exam. EEK!

Well, self, I am proud to say that you earned an "A" on your stats exam! What's more is that you have learned statistics, which is no small feat for you. Let's keep on keepin' on, mmkay? Maybe you are not terrible at stats and your me-search has more empirical validity than once conceptualized.

Pedicure, wine, ice cream, massage? Which do you want? All? :)

Hugs to you,

Jaimie

Stats in everyday life

I consider Carlton to be my twin in my doctoral program. Here's one of the many reasons why. The gchat conversation below occurred today where I was half studying for an upcoming exam and half scheming with Carlton. And scene:
Carlton: HAHAAHAHHA! I love when you speak stats and mix it with everyday talk

me: :D

It's so bad and wrong-that's why it's funny

Carlton: it makes me feel all warm in side

3:25 PM me: Happy Valentine's Carlton. I hope your day has a small p value of fuzzy memories.

Carlton: today, on v-day, I wish you love and joy with you and your p < .05 other

why did we both think of vday jokes with stats?!

at the SAME time

me: HAHHAHAHHAHHAHAH

Carlton: OMG OMG OMG

we are twins

this is not possible

3:26 PM me: I know. I am sharing on my blog

Valentine's Day Letter

Taken from: http://www.theglobeandmail.com/life/valentines-day/be-my-valentine-beloved-xx-carrier/article1902699/ (thanks Nancy!)

A Love Letter from a Male to a Female Human, in the Age of Science

Dearest, sweetest, potential long-term partner,

Valentine’s Day is coming up on Monday and I hope that you will agree to see me again. I’ve enclosed a box of chocolates in a desperate attempt to release endorphins in your brain and confuse you momentarily into thinking that you are happy to be hearing from me.

Remember the party where we first met? It was a summer night and we were in a mutual friend’s backyard. I saw you before you saw me – my male amygdala responded to the visual stimuli more quickly than your female one – but you couldn’t help but notice me when I approached. You introduced yourself and then a light breeze ruffled your hair, carrying your scent into the air. In turn, my olfactory receptors were able to verify that, at that moment under the moonlight, you were not ovulating. I smiled awkwardly. “Do you know where the bathroom is?” I said, looking back toward the house before walking away.

The next time we ran into each other we were both on our way out of the gym. With my testosterone levels raised, I very much wanted to engage in criminal activity, do something else anti-social, or maybe have a heart attack. But I also wanted to have sex. Your own increased testosterone was binding with your estrogen receptors, so you accepted my invitation to get a drink. After we’d sat down, I concentrated on your face for the first time and my breath was taken away. “You are the most symmetrical woman that I’ve ever seen,” I told you, and you blushed.

Later that night, I walked you home and as we stood outside your apartment, you ran your finger lightly along my right cheekbone, tracing a scar, becoming more attracted to me as you imagined the brave masculine spirit that I must possess to have taken on some wild animal to protect those that I love. (That had really hurt a few years before when I tripped over my collector’s edition He-Man action figure and fell face first onto Castle Grayskull.) Next thing I knew, we were in your bed assessing each other’s waist-to-hip ratios and body-fat percentages.

That night, and for the next two weeks, we engaged in the activity unique to our species, bonobos, chimpanzees and dolphins – mating with no intention of procreation – and it wasn't long before I had hopelessly and 100 per cent fallen into a dopamine addiction.

Then came the day that I called you and you didn’t call back. A week passed. You had me wrapped around your finger like a prairie vole, one of the few mammals that, like humans, have the ability to associate the pleasure of oxytocin release in the brain to a specific partner. I remember drinking half a bottle of Scotch and cursing at a photograph of you on my iPhone. “I wish you exhibited a response like the prairie vole, but you must be more like a rat,” I spat. “A rat can feel pleasure without chemically attaching it to another living creature.” It hurt me to say that.

As the days wore on, I couldn’t imagine never limbically resonating with you again. I stalked you. I visited places I knew you’d turn up. My friends told me I was crazy, but I decided then that if loving you was akin to having obsessive compulsive disorder, then I didn’t want my serotonin levels to be as high as the average test subject who did not report that he or she had formed a relationship in the past 17 months. If that’s wrong, so be it.

When you finally did get in touch last week, you intimated that the volume of vasopressin secreted from your pituitary gland was not enough to form an attachment to me, and who am I to disagree? I saw you on the street talking to some guy who is an inch or two taller than me – and maybe you deserve someone of a statistically higher status – but it’s not like your lips are exactly half the width of your face at mouth level. Sorry, I don’t really mean that. I don’t know what to say. Maybe in a couple of days, when you’re slightly past the peak of your ovulation period – I remember your cycle – and become attracted to men for the longer term again, you’ll want me back. If you call, your voice will have a slightly lower pitch because you won’t be trying as hard to display your feminizing hormones, but it won’t matter.

They say love is blind. I don’t know about that, but I do know beyond any measure of doubt – or at least within a 4-per-cent margin of error – that I have been blinded by science.

Yours, an unrequited mate selection,

XY

I had to repost in my blog-too hilarious not to!

56 worst/best analogies of high school students

June 19th, 2007 by admin

Apparently the washingtonpost held a contest in which high school teachers sent in the “worst” analogies they’d encountered in grading their students’ papers over the years. (I place “worst” in quotes because many of these actually strike me as quite witty). The top 25 of these have been circulating around the “Sandra Bullock” (”net”, get it?) recently, but I decided to post all 56 that I was able to find. Here they are, in their order of objective funniness (in my opinion):

1. Her eyes were like two brown circles with big black dots in the center.
2. He was as tall as a 6′3″ tree.
3. Her face was a perfect oval, like a circle that had its two sides gently compressed by a Thigh Master.
4. From the attic came an unearthly howl. The whole scene had an eerie, surreal quality, like when you’re on vacation in another city and Jeopardy comes on at 7:00 p.m. instead of 7:30.
5. John and Mary had never met. They were like two hummingbirds who had also never met.
6. She had a deep, throaty, genuine laugh, like that sound a dog makes just before it throws up.
7. The ballerina rose gracefully en pointe and extended one slender leg behind her, like a dog at a fire hydrant.
8. He was as lame as a duck. Not the metaphorical lame duck, either, but a real duck that was actually lame. Maybe from stepping on a land mine or something.
9. Her vocabulary was as bad as, like, whatever.
10. She grew on him like she was a colony of E. coli and he was room-temperature Canadian beef.
11. The revelation that his marriage of 30 years had disintegrated because of his wife’s infidelity came as a rude shock, like a surcharge at a formerly surcharge-free ATM.
12. The lamp just sat there, like an inanimate object.
13. McBride fell 12 stories, hitting the pavement like a Hefty bag filled with vegetable soup.
14. His thoughts tumbled in his head, making and breaking alliances like underpants in a dryer without Cling Free.
15. He spoke with the wisdom that can only come from experience, like a guy who went blind because he looked at asolar eclipse without one of those boxes with a pinhole in it and now goes around the country speaking at high schools about the dangers of looking at a solar eclipse without one of those boxes with a pinhole in it.
16. Long separated by cruel fate, the star-crossed lovers raced across the grassy field toward each other like two freight trains, one having left Cleveland at 6:36 p.m. traveling at 55 mph, the other from Topeka at 4:19 p.m. at a speed of 35 mph.
17. Shots rang out, as shots are wont to do.
18. The little boat gently drifted across the pond exactly the way a bowling ball wouldn’t.
19. Her hair glistened in the rain like a nose hair after a sneeze.
20. The hailstones leaped from the pavement, just like maggots when you fry them in hot grease.
21. They lived in a typical suburban neighborhood with picket fences that resembled Nancy Kerrigan’s teeth.
22. He fell for her like his heart was a mob informant and she was the East River.
23. Even in his last years, Grand pappy had a mind like a steel trap, only one that had been left out so long, it hadrusted shut.
24. He felt like he was being hunted down like a dog, in a place that hunts dogs, I suppose.
25. She was as easy as the TV Guide crossword.
26. She walked into my office like a centipede with 98 missing legs.
27. The plan was simple, like my brother-in-law Phil. But unlike Phil, this plan just might work.
28. The young fighter had a hungry look, the kind you get from not eating for a while.
29. “Oh, Jason, take me!” she panted, her breasts heaving like a college freshman on $1-a-beer night.
30. It hurt the way your tongue hurts after you accidentally staple it to the wall.
31. It was an American tradition, like fathers chasing kids around with power tools.
32. He was deeply in love. When she spoke, he thought he heard bells, as if she were a garbage truck backing up.
33. The politician was gone but unnoticed, like the period after the Dr. on a Dr Pepper can.
34. Her eyes were like limpid pools, only they had forgotten to put in any pH cleanser.
35. Her date was pleasant enough, but she knew that if her life was a movie this guy would be buried in the credits as something like “Second Tall Man.”
36. The thunder was ominous-sounding, much like the sound of a thin sheet of metal being shaken backstage during the storm scene in a play.
37. The red brick wall was the color of a brick-red Crayola crayon.
38. She caught your eye like one of those pointy hook latches that used to dangle from screen doors and would fly up whenever you banged the door open again.
39. Her pants fit her like a glove, well, maybe more like a mitten, actually.
40. Fishing is like waiting for something that does not happen very often.
41. They were as good friends as the people on “Friends.”
42. Oooo, he smells bad, she thought, as bad as Calvin Klein’s Obsession would smell if it were called Enema and was made from spoiled Spamburgers instead of natural floral fragrances.
43. The knife was as sharp as the tone used by Rep. Sheila Jackson Lee (D-Tex.) in her first several points of parliamentary procedure made to Rep. Henry Hyde (R-Ill.) in the House Judiciary Committee hearings on the impeachment of President William Jefferson Clinton.
44. He was as bald as one of the Three Stooges, either Curly or Larry, you know, the one who goes woo woo woo.
45. The sardines were packed as tight as the coach section of a 747.
46. Her eyes were shining like two marbles that someone dropped in mucus and then held up to catch the light.
47. The baseball player stepped out of the box and spit like a fountain statue of a Greek god that scratches itself a lot and spits brown, rusty tobacco water and refuses to sign autographs for all the little Greek kids unless they pay him lots of drachmas.
48. I felt a nameless dread. Well, there probably is a long German name for it, like Geschpooklichkeit or something, but I don’t speak German. Anyway, it’s a dread that nobody knows the name for, like those little square plastic gizmos that close your bread bags. I don’t know the name for those either.
49. She was as unhappy as when someone puts your cake out in the rain, and all the sweet green icing flows down and then you lose the recipe, and on top of that you can’t sing worth a damn.
50. Her artistic sense was exquisitely refined, like someone who can tell butter from I Can’t Believe It’s Not Butter.
51. It came down the stairs looking very much like something no one had ever seen before.
52. Bob was as perplexed as a hacker who means to access T:flw.quid55328.com\aaakk/ch@ung but gets T:\flw.quidaaakk/ch@ung by mistake.
53. You know how in “Rocky” he prepares for the fight by punching sides of raw beef? Well, yesterday it was as cold as that meat locker he was in.
54. The dandelion swayed in the gentle breeze like an oscillating electric fan set on medium.
55. Her lips were red and full, like tubes of blood drawn by an inattentive phlebotomist.
56. The sunset displayed rich, spectacular hues like a .jpeg file at 10 percent cyan, 10 percent magenta, 60 percent yellow and 10 percent black.

AERA-NOLA 2011 (to be continued)

SERA and SNOW

This post might just be a series of photos from the Southeast Education Research Association and one chilly February day where it actually SNOWed in Austin!

I did NOT take this-stolen from a friend who stole it from someone else. It's gorgeous, though! Downtown Austin in the snow.

Our snowman

Cognitive quicky

My therapist (yes, you read this correctly-I think it's a good exercise for anyone to speak to a therapist, especially since I am one) says that I am a "classic NT". Kind of fun! I have been accused of "thinking like a boy" before and making decisions consistent with that gender expression. This all makes sense to me, especially the part about sharing the NT label with Einstein. :) My therapist also said that I am in a career that is dominated by SP's and that this could be a major source of conflict for me. Interesting.

Evidently being an NT means:

NT Temperament - The "Intellectuals"

NTs are introspective, logical and on a constant quest for knowledge. They are practical and unsentimental in their approach to problem solving. The actions of an NT are precise and follow a systematic course. Abstract, theoretical and technically adept, NTs are naturally inventive. They can also be described as being analytical, intellectual, inquisitive, independent and complex. Famous NT People Alexander the Great - king, military commander Albert Einstein - inventor Alfred Hitchcock - filmmaker (The Birds) Carl Jung - psychologist General Colin Powell - military figure Celine Dion - singer David Spade - actor, comedian George Carlin - comedian, actor, author James A. Garfield - American President John Adams - American President John Candy - comedian, actor Julia Child - chef, author, TV personality Lewis Carroll - author (Alice in Wonderland) Marilyn Vos Savant - author, lecturer, playwright Matthew Perry - actor (Friends) Nikola Tesla - inventor, physicist, engineer Richard Feynman - physicist Rodney Dangerfield - comedian, actor Rutherford B. Hayes - American President Sir Walter Raleigh - writer, poet, explorer Suzanne Pleshette - actress Theodore "Teddy" Roosevelt - American President Thomas Edison - inventor Tom Hanks - actor Valerie Harper - actress Walt Disney - filmmaker, entrepreneur Weird Al Yankovic - musician (satire/parody) NT Population 12.5% of all people 18% of males 7% of females -this explains a lot to me NT Career Matches Systems Analyst Teacher/Professor Scientist Judge Psychologist Computer Programmer Lawyer/Attorney Engineer Entrepreneur And finally... About the ENTP Expert Quotes & Links "ENTPs are idea people. Their perceptive abilities cause them to see possibilities everywhere. They get excited andenthusiastic about their ideas, and are able to spread their enthusiasm to others. In this way, they get the support that they need to fulfill their visions" - Portrait of an ENTP (The Personality Page) "It is so natural for these individuals to practice devising gadgets and mechanisms, that they start doing it even as young children. And they get such a kick out of it that they really never stop exercising their inventive bent" - The Portrait of the Inventor Rational (Keirsey) "ENTPs are usually verbally as well as cerebrally quick, and generally love to argue--both for its own sake, and to show off their often-impressive skills... argument as a sport." - ENTP Profile (TypeLogic) "ENTPs contribute an innovative, versatile, and enterprising approach to work. They view limitations as challenges to be overcome and look for new ways to do things. They need to find a niche for themselves in order to be free to maneuver. They prefer the start-up phase of a project rather than the followthrough or maintenance phase. Once the project is designed, they prefer to turn it over to someone else." - ENTP - The Innovator (Lifexplore) "...attention seeking, experience junky, insensitive, adaptable,not easily offended, messy, carefree, dangerous, fearless, careless..." None of this is me. :) - Jung Type Descriptions (ENTP) (similarminds.com)

I heart weekends!

Enjoying the second of two birthday weekends.

Friday

Thai Passion for dinner and game night with the roomies.

Saturday

Started off with some taco Deli breakfast tacos (thanks, Bryan)

Next, we went to the Alamo Drafthouse and saw The King's Speech on Saturday. For those you don't know, the 'Mo is a movie theater/dining/drinking experience. As such, we had: chips, queso and avocado; Mexican tofu salad, fried pickles and ranch, bleu cheese burger (Bobby) and chili queso fries, Fireman's 4 beer and Riesling. We are never eating again. Until tomorrow.

We met some friends at 219 and Fado to celebrate a friend's birthday. January is a serious birthday month! Mexican martinis are a serious drink.

Sunday

9:00 am Headache, Advil, back to sleep.

10:30 am Bobby and I took our inaugural ride on my FANCY NEW bike! I bequeathed my old bike to Bobby because it's too tall for me. I We had a blast! We explored some country roads behind our house, but due to our inexperience with bike riding, we neglected to consider that we might be thirsty on this uncharacteristically warm winter day. Or get lost. Or hungry. Or wonder what time it is. Live and learn! In any event, we are super duper excited about future Sunday bike rides and adventures.

Now we're watching our current favorite show Pushing Daisies and eating blue razz poprocks. Feeling more like 12 and less like 31. :) Since we rode our tails off earlier today, we're headed to Cannoli Joe's, an Italian place Bobby's been talking about for a year. Yum, yum, yum, yum.

As you can see, I just learned how to embed links into my sweet, tech-novice blog.

Field of Dreams

This will be a brief share, but since I use this blog as a forum for rants and satire, I think it's okay to get personal every once and a while.

Ever since I lost Sky I have been wishing to see her in a dream. I have incredibly vivid dreams and can often recall a lot of details about them. Not only do I dream vividly but I am very much connected to my dreams. That is, I will wake up emoting in response to my dreams. I think, as many psychoanalysts do, that dreams are windows to your subconscious and if people learned to pay attention to their dreams they would be privy to valuable information about themselves often masked in dreams as something far-fetched and nonsensical. I digress.

Even though I asked Bobby to wake me up early this morning, I elected to sleep in. I felt alert at 7:30, but I wasn't quite ready to get out of bed. I woke back up at 9:30 crying and elated! Here's what happened: in my dream I was living in my current house, though the backyard looked a little different. I saw there were some people (handymen I've known since I've lived in Austin) and they were fixing up a shed that isn't actually in my backyard. Anyhow, when I returned to my house after greeting them, I noticed a new kitten was running around. She sort of looked like Tabby, but not quite. I went back outside to determine how this kitten entered our home when I noticed the fence gates were left open. I went to close them and saw Sky curled up in the corner taking a nap! I slowly moved towards her because I was nervous I was making her up (which, of course, I was but in dreamland that didn't matter). She picked her head up, saw me, and walked towards me. She looked at me and started a low howl. The tone of it was longing and kind of sad. I threw my arms around her and began to nuzzle her the way we used to. Interestingly, as I am hugging her, I notice the men are in earshot but can't see her because we're on the side of the house. I asked them, "Did you hear that??" referring to her howl. They said they couldn't. She got up and walked near them, sniffing the perimeter of the yard as she used to. I asked, "Well, do you see her?" They didn't. She sort of sniffed herself to the other side of the yard and disappeared.

I am considering this dream a little victory of sorts. I have been really concerned that Sky hadn't made my dreams but I finally dreamt about her and it was under happy circumstances. I hope this is the first of many because seeing her healthy and happy was wonderful.

We Didn't Start the Fire

You should already be laughing. Because it's true. But here's how it didn't start...

Casa de Dry Tortugas housed the Stano family this past week and in response to our "hospitality", they gifted us a fire pit. Thanks, Stanos!!

According to Webster:

hospitality |ˌhäspiˈtalitē| (noun) the friendly and generous reception and entertainment of guests, visitors, or strangers.

According to Jaimie:

hospitality: a) when you expose a friend's parents to a grossly inappropriate movie featuring porn, masturbation, sex, genitalia, feces, autoerotic asphyxiation and so forth; b) when you come home at 4:00 in the morning on New Years Eve and bump into every wall in your home and speak in 6 foot voices so that your guests are roused from their sweet slumber.

While the Stanos have safely returned to their home state of Michigan, the fire pit remains safely on my back porch. It's 53 degrees outside on this fine evening so we decided to test out this pit of ours.

Attempt #1: Bobby purchased logs in advance and I picked up a copy of the Austin Chronicle that I never read, and it met its undue demise for attempt #1. While the Chronicle caught fire, the logs taunted us. We poured some vodka on it because it seemed like a good idea. Bobby remarks "Homeless people can do it! This is ridiculous."

Attempt #2: Bobby went to the corner store to get lighter fluid. Now we're cooking with oil (so we thought). The rest of the Chronicle was sacrificed along with 2 paint stirrers I planned to use to touch up the walls and several pairs of chopsticks from old Chinese take-out. The tip of one of the logs thought about catching fire. The cats sat at our back window and were mesmerized by the dancing flame which slowly petered out to a burning chopstick. In defiance, I mounted a 'mallow on another chopstick and forced it into the minuscule orange element. Nothing doing.

Attempt #3: I turned on the gas stove and made four toasted marshmallows effortlessly. Success.

Moral of the story: Buy a house with a fireplace. We couldn't have started a fire if we were in standing in one.

Also, Bryan didn't help. By that we mean, he and Bobby tried together and they (we) were still unsuccessful. The man cave loses its man cave card tonight.

This is not our fire.