Guess This Lesson Didn’t Stick

My friend, Dr. Isis, raised some hell over on ScienceBlogs last night, suggesting that – gasp – men may need to should do their fair share of the housework! It may be Mr. Clean, but we can tell who really uses those products- I know that this concept is still a a pipe dream for most women; I am, after all, the person who arranges the home appliance repairs, the housekeeper, the veterinarian, and the sports physicals (even, sometimes, when I am in a different time zone from my spouse).
The post did tickle some synapses and bring a poem from Free to Be You and Me to mind. Below, I present Housework, originally read by Carol Channing. Lyrics here were shamelessly cut and pasted from LyricsZoo.

Housework

You know, there are times when we happen to be
Just sitting there, quietly watching TV,
When the program we're watching will stop for a while
And suddenly someone appears with a smile,
And starts to show us how terribly urgent
It is to buy some brand of detergent,
Or soap or cleanser or cleaner or powder or paste or wax or bleach,
To help with the housework.
Now, most of the time it's a lady we see,
Who's doing the housework on TV.
She's cheerfully scouring a skillet or two,
Or she's polishing pots till they gleam like new,
Or she's scrubbing the tub or she's mopping the floors,
Or she's wiping the stains from the walls and the doors,
Or she's washing the windows, the dishes, the clothes,
Or waxing the furniture till it just glows,
Or cleaning the fridge or the stove or the sink,
With a light-hearted smile, and a friendly wink,
And she's doing her best to make us think
The her soap, or detergent or cleanser or cleaner or powder or paste or wax or bleach,
Is the best kind of soap, or detergent or cleanser or cleaner or powder or paste or wax or bleach,
That there is in the whole wide world.
And, maybe it is, and maybe it isn't,
And maybe it does what they say it will do,
But I'll tell you one thing I know is true.
The lady we see when we're watching TV,
The lady who smiles as she scours or scrubs or rubs or washes or wipes or mops or dusts or cleans,
Or whatever she does on our TV screens,
That lady is smiling because she's an actress,
And she's earning money for learning those speeches
That mention those wonderful soaps and detergents and cleansers and cleaners and powders and pastes and waxes and bleaches.
So, the very next time you happen to be
Just sitting there quietly watching TV,
And you see some nice lady who smiles
As she scours or scrubs or rubs or washes or wipes or mops or dusts or cleans,
Remember, nobody smiles doing housework but those ladies you see on TV.
Your mommy hates housework,
Your daddy hates housework,
I hate housework too.
And when you grow up, so will you.
Because even if the soap or cleanser or cleaner or powder or paste or wax or bleach
That you use is the very best one,
Housework is just no fun.
Children, when you have a house of your own,
Make sure, when there's house work to do,
That you don't have to do it alone.
Little boys, little girls, when you're big husbands and wives,
If you want all the days of your lives
To seem sunny as summer weather,
Make sure, when there's housework to do,
That you do it together!

Free to Be You and Me now has a 35th anniversary edition in print. I guess some many of its lessons didn’t get learned.

I Heart Word Clouds

As a visual person, I love both written words and images. Books-on-CD will never cut it for me. Word Clouds make me smile. Wordle, my favorite word cloud site, will let you create clouds from any web site with an RSS feed.

Today’s image comes from the wisdom of Dr. Isis:I really thought other synonyms would trump “penis,” if nothing else from their inclusion in “cockweaseldouchemonkey,” athough that appears to be a single word. Enjoy!

Throwing the Gauntlet

Experimental Biology approaches, so shenanigans must be planned.

For this year’s meeting a tweet-off has been proposed:

Isis the Scientist, the hottest goddess of science, versus Marty Frank, Executive Director of the American Physiologic Society.

VS.

Goal: enroll the most new followers on twitter during the meeting.

As a reasonably neutral party who already follows both of these distinguished individuals on twitter, I volunteer to moderate the contest as follows:

• Contest will begin at 0800 Pacific time on Friday, April 23, when on-site registration opens
• Contest will end at 0800 Pacific time on Wednesday, April 28, so a winner can be determined before I have to head to the airport; we can move this back to noon on Tuesday if necessary for the “prize”
• Shameless publicity stunts are not only permissible, but encouraged (especially if free drinks and/or public nudity are involved)
• I will provide updates online and via twitter throughout the meeting; if APS allows, I may even post it on the whiteboard with the official registration numbers
• The final “prize” will be negotiated by the participants; perhaps the loser buys at a tweet-up  or provides clown services at a party?

So, you two, are you up for it? Cause I’m ready for some game faces and trash-talking!

Musical Meanderings

Over at the literary temple of the goddess, Isis has entertained her loyal subjects with a number of Lady Gaga videos in the past week. I also saw Lady Gaga on some awards show on Sunday (as my husband clicked through every station available in some lame attempt to watch… nothing long enough to understand it). He actually flipped back when he realized “some chick wearing almost nothing was playing a flaming piano.” He seemed worried when I knew it had to be Lady Gaga without any help from captions or the announcers (are you really listening to this stuff? And watching it online, honey!).

During my brief morning commute I enjoyed Christmas music from a station that goes 24/7 holiday this week through December 25. It’s often corny, but you just can’t help blasting out Rudolph and feeling alive! I now drive a car with a radio that let’s you know who is performing most songs, and I am often surprised by the artists who have burned Christmas albums. That, of course, got me thinking:

Will Lady Gaga do a Christmas album?

Turns out she has done a Christmas song,:

Christmas Tree by Lady Gaga

Play song from iLike.com

 

 

I think some other traditional songs need the Gaga touch. For example, I Want a Hippopotamus for Christmas.

Just imagine what the Lady could do with this part:

“There's lots of room for him in our two-car garage
I'd feed him there and wash him there and give him his massage”

I suspect Lady Gaga wouldn’t be nude, but would wear chain mail and/or leather. And hot stilettos.

I guess I should do some work now. But once you get “Lady Gaga and a hippo video” in your brain, you have to let it out before you can accomplish anything else.

Clicking on the photo will take you to its original posting site.

Philanthropy Begins With Me

The local United Way campaign just kicked off, and the folks over on ScienceBlogs started up their Donors Choose program (click on over and help Isis win). As the leaves fall, so should dollars into important programs.

I decided to become a philanthropist shortly after taking my first faculty position in 1991. The funding climate, similar to today, was brutal for a new PI. I knew my best chances were with private foundations, especially local groups. So there was some self-interest in my initial volunteer efforts; however, I figured that it was my job to enable biomedical research, even if I never saw a dime.

Eventually, I did get some of that money, and it led to bigger and better grants. I still believe in keeping up the efforts. In the current economic climate, those same organizations and foundations are the only source of funding for many new investigators or for those whose idea isn’t quite ready for prime time (the NIH).

That’s why I am giving to enrich elementary science programs. That’s why I dragged my butt out of bed on a cold, soggy morning yesterday to volunteer at the local American Diabetes Association Walk (the balloon release at left kicked it off). That’s why I made time Friday to do a promotional interview about the Nebraska Kidney Association. This stuff is important, both now and tomorrow.

So click on over and support tomorrow’s scientists at ScienceBlogs.

Cylinder artwork courtesy of PhotoXpress.

Don’t Blame Estrogen

Over at Dr. Isis’ blog there has been much discussion about another blog on “civil argument” in the blogosphere. Isis took exception with some of the issues raised on another blog, and a commenter  to her blog suggested that the good goddess was on the rag (OTR). She went on to apologize for her judgment being clouded by blood flowing from her vagina. She goes on to say:

“Then, just when I thought I had cleared enough of the estrogen from my girl brain to understand…”

As a female and a scientist who deals with the onset of puberty, I feel obliged to point out that estrogen cannot be the bad guy during menstruation. As shown in the diagram (which accompanies an article on faqs.org – click on the diagram to link there) estrogen levels are at their lowest during menstruation!

Estrogen rises steadily and peaks just before ovulation, with a secondary rise around day 21 when the body is thinking it might need to sustain a pregnancy. Progesterone has its big peak at that time as well. If pregnant, these hormones remain elevated; if not, they drop off and menstruation ensues.

If people want to ascribe behavioral issues associated with menstruation (AKA OTR syndrome), they cannot really blame female hormones. Perhaps it is the lack of these hormones, their withdrawl, that explains things. Perhaps it is cramps and having to carry around “protection.” Perhaps the men around us are jerks when they know they won’t get any. It is not estrogen mucking up a girly brain!

Perhaps men only see us as “logical” when estrogen peaks at ovulation and we are most likely to have sex… I will leave that exploration to another time.

I would like to point out that estrogen is a really important hormone in the central nervous system. One of the lessons we have learned from knocking-out its receptors in mice is that male neuroendocrine feedback in the brain is estrogen mediated. Seems testosterone is converted to estrogen which then signals in the brain of the male organism.

So the Big E is just as likely to be screwing up his brain as hers.

A Woman of a Certain Age

Earlier today I was lusting over the shoes de jour at the blog of Isis when this ad showed up alongside her words of wisdom:

So we have a woman with gray hair writing on the chalkboard (how old school!) touting online educational opportunities (how… inexplicable).

And then you look to see which programs are being highlighted: Education, Nursing, Health Management, General Studies, and Financial Planning. How… traditional!

Now I grew up in Missouri and got my degrees (BA & MD) from one of the MU campuses (Kansas City). I suspect “women of a certain age” are a growth industry for universities, especially for online education. I suspect these may be popular programs amenable to online learning as well, but I can’t help noticing that they are very traditional pink collar fields.

The whole thing just made me feel, well, weird. I would have shown the potential student at a kitchen table, NOT in an obvious classroom situation. That is sort of the whole point of online education… it’s NOT in the classroom. The tiger tracks are cool, but surely the student could have been standing by a desk at home, perhaps in house slippers.

I also would have liked to see the “mature woman” looking a little nicer. The sweatshirt and jeans with runners is so “Early-bird special at Country Kitchen.” Surely a woman improving her mind and working toward an advanced degree would look a little more put together. Jeans, ballet flats, and a nice fitted jacket?

As a 48-year-old woman whose nest will be empty in a couple of years, I am near the age group this ad targets. I would think one that projects the desired image of an older, professional woman would be more successful.

But what do I know: I’m a doctor, not an advertising guru.

My First Meme!

I always try to rise to a challenge. After 48 years on earth, there are really very few things I haven't done. So, earlier today, I found out that Isis had tagged me for a meme:

Post your best/worst covers and tag some more muppethuggers. Oh and do a linkback to whomever tagged you if it wasn't me.

Well, I had to think long and hard to come up with examples of these. I mean, the original post had Joplin's Me & Bobby McGee, one of my faves. After a bit of free associating and some google searches, I found audio of two songs.

The good one first. I hang with baseball nuts (married one, gave birth to another, became one in the meantime), and we have watched Ken Burns Baseball at length. One song featured in the documentary was, of course, Take Me Out To the Ballgame, covered by Carly Simon. My household is in agreement that this is the best version of the song we have heard.

Many more options seemed available for the worst cover of all time; but here is my choice: Smoke on the Water on the Pat Boone album In a Metal Mood: No More Mr. Nice Guy. I get the shivers just thinking about it.

Unfortunately, I can't get videos of either of these, and the audio files don't want to post tonight. I think I can get the Carly Simon to go if I find our CD copy; however, just be glad I can't get Pat Boone doing metal loaded!

Hot Gossip in New Orleans

I had two completely uneventful flights (thank you, United Airlines) and arrived in New Orleans for Experimental Biology, too late for the Cannon lecture, but well in time for the opening reception. I had two drink tickets - not using them would be wasteful!

I hung out near the bars, figuring eventually I would catch up with everyone I know (rumors that we are raging alcoholics are patently untrue). We were a bit distressed when the pregnant grad student found out that they charged a drink ticket for a plastic cup of water - for a drink ticket we figured she should at least get the whole bottle! APS, take note and fix this for next year!

Eventually I was approached by the president of APS, Irv Zucker, who had a very important question for me: Who is Dr. Isis? I had to disappoint him; even though I have had frequent interactions with the goddess, all have been through her Dr. Isis email and the blogosphere.

We then proceeded to the president's reception (free bar, Makers Mark bourbon, and nice desserts) - did I mention that he is the chair of Cellular and Integrative Physiology at my institution and I have a courtesy appointment in his department? Well, EVERYONE is trying to figure out who Dr. Isis might be. Apparently this was a hot topic for the APS Council. Even colleagues with no interest in shoes or fashion porn are discussing this riddle.

As for me, I'm not certain I want to know. The mystery is part of the fun. For the rest of the meeting I will be looking at every female vascular physiologist with a runner's physique, pasty ankles, and hot shoes, and wondering if she could be the goddess.