It has been a while, but still less than a month, since the last post, so I'm pretending to still be posting regularly.
We were shipped shark cells (which were dead on arrival) and a shark rectal gland. We are now growing rectal gland epithelium, or trying to, with the eventual goal of immortalizing shark rectal gland epithelial cells. And here is the big discovery, for me: even in a cell culture dish, dissected away from the rest of the body, alive and (relatively) kicking, shark cells smell strongly like dead fish. Yay science.
We got through the opening weekend of Les Miserables at the theatre, and it was impressive. Tech week and opening weekend is always some stress and a long haul, and that is doubly or triply so with a 3 hour show with 36 cast members and a similarly sized orchestra. Personally, this is the first big chunk of cello playing i've done since I broke my left index finger last holiday season. I had some serious callous-building to do and my hands are way out of practice, so my fingers would HURT after playing for 3 hours straight (which is not much of an exageration - the cello plays in every one of the 31 songs in Les Mis, and never has more than about 30 seconds of resting). I am still making some errors here and there, but for the most part I am ridiculously proud of the way it sounds. end brag.
The best news of late, though, is from Cain - he was going to read some Harry Potter, but couldn't remember which book he left off on. So he made the decision to restart the series from the beginning, and went on a Harry Potter kick. He will be Harry for Halloween, and he NEEDED to have the official HP wand that he saw at barnes and noble for $30. Saving the money from his allowances was going to take too long for am impatient 10 year old, so he decided to make the money himself, by selling his self-folded origami creations. His repertoire includes ninja stars (multiple subspecies), balloons, cranes, dragons, and boomerangs. Since mom and dad have been at the theatre every night, the babysitter, our friend Terri, took him all over town to likely spots to sell Origami. He got kicked out of the mall by security on his first day, but was not dissuaded, and made a killing the next day at a busy bus stop. Then Terri helped him make an order form and collected orders from all the rest of my colleagues at work, and he was over the top. The whole thing was so fun to watch ... he now has the wand, and brings it into the closet under the stairs to read the books. My kid wins at Harry Potter. Love my kids.
