Pucker Factor

My friend was relating a story about a dangerous piloting mission he had just gotten back from flying - and on my end of the conversation, my ear was glued to the phone, taking in the harrowing details.

"We took off in minimum conditions from a tiny airstrip in the middle of nowhere, headed toward another tiny island in the vast ocean. Our destination airport had clear weather when we took off, but while we were flying the weather fogged in and closed off the landing site."

So where will you LAND?

"We had to quickly re-rout and head to the only other landing site within our fuel range."

Whew, I'm thinking - they are saved.

"But while we were flying and trying to divert to the alternate, fog closed in on THAT landing site too. The weather models predicted it should clear up by the time we got there and needed to land, but there was no guarantee."

So wait a minute - let me get this straight. You were flying, in terrible atmospheric conditions, over icy freezing water, running out of fuel, with any Coast Guard or other help hopelessly far away in case of trouble, and for some period of time there were NO LANDING SITES AVAILABLE?

"Yeah," he said, "That one had quite the pucker factor."

I'll say.

The story stuck with me, not only because of the gray hair I was growing, or because I love hearing adventure stories, but because of that phrase. Pucker factor.

Turns out, that's a common phrase in the military. To quote the NY Times,

In armed services slang, ''the pucker factor'' is the stress that afflicts human beings on full alert. If the factor is missing, the person reacts like a robot, numb to sensitizing tension; if the factor is too high, the person crumples or ''puckers'' in panic.

I'm pretty sure "pucker" refers to the tightening of some, ahem, distinctive muscles rather than "crumpling in panic," but we'll give the NY Times the benefit of the doubt for trying to be classy.

I had never heard this slang before, but it seems like a uniquely perfect way to sum up the feeling. A bit of a flippant phrase - that both brushes off of the gravity of the situation (an attitude that irritates me sometimes when I'm worried for the safety of my friend), but also thumbs a nose to the danger (an attitude that allows folks in those situations to do their jobs and not get overwhelmed).

Now I don't deal with any hair trigger situations in my world, but I bet I could find some places in my life to work this phrase in.

Reserved the lab equipment because the tracking code predicted your samples will arrive, but you haven't actually received the package yet? Pucker factor 4. Writing a conference paper on a deadline and you didn't actually do the experiments yet? Pucker factor 6. Advisor pops in unexpectedly on Friday at 5pm and wants to talk about long term plans and experimental results? Pucker factor 8.

The top of the scale is admittedly different for most of us than for the pilots, given that nothing in research is going to die (except for bio grad students - bless your souls for having to keep cultures alive), but I think the sentiment still applies, no?

Using Home Built Equipment

When I wrote the other day about training on new equipment, it brought to mind a story from lab.

There is a difference between homemade equipment, and industrial equipment. When I am being trained on new equipment, or training someone else on equipment, that assumes that there are correct, known procedures for operating said equipment.

Such is not always the case. I work in a lab where we build machinery - which means a lot of what we use we make ourselves. I happen to be very proud of this fact. My Master's project involved building a machine that duplicated the function and quality of commercially available equipment, but for $10k instead of $250-500k. Take THAT.

Now my labmate has built a roller machine for his PhD. It is very cleverly built, with precise design and a fancy control system, and nothing else exists quite like it. His whole degree was based on the design and fabrication and testing of this machine.

However, he never actually manufactured anything with it.

Turns out, my work can use his machine to actually manufacture things. This is an excellent example of a cohesive lab research direction allowing students with complementary projects to leverage each other's work.

Or, you know, of me being lazy and not wanting to re-invent the wheel...

My labmate is ridiculously proud of his machine. He wired it up to run with a joystick. He is even MORE ridiculously proud of the joystick than he is of the machine.

Said joystick has a total of 23 buttons, in addition to the roll/pitch/yaw functions, and of course, the trigger. All 23 of those buttons have been programmed for some function, such that the ENTIRETY of the software needed to run this rolling machine is available from the joystick.

Whatever floats your boat, man...

My boyfriend wants to wire his truck to run from a joystick, too. What is it with men and their joysticks?

On second thought, don't answer that....

Now this labmate is actually pretty excited that I am going to use his machine to do real manufacturing (or, as close as we get to real manufacturing in academia... meaning, I am going to make more than five parts in a row...). But he was headed away for two weeks of vacation, and I needed to use this equipment while he was gone.

So he trained me to use his equipment.

We spent an afternoon doing a quick run through, and I took notes in my lab notebook and did my best to follow along. Then we ran some experiments together - me using my equipment to do the initial steps, then running over to jam my part in his machine and finish the process.

The results were gorgeous. GORGEOUS.

Then he left, and I headed down to lab to run some experiments, very excited about replicating these gorgeous results. I could not get the stupid thing to calibrate. I did EXACTLY what I saw my labmate do, and the roll just waggled around and never settled out to initialize. Fine.

I poked around, and discovered a loose connection between two cables. Excellent! Now the roll would calibrate. On to Step 2.

I tried to actually roll something - a blank, to begin with.

No pressure. The roll just floated, never touched anything. Hmm. Went back over to the software, and all my settings had been erased. Hmm again.

Reset the parameters, tried again, and now the roll just MASHED into my blank.

Okay. Now it's getting personal. Going and mashing my blanks...

I futzed around with it for a good hour, and the upshot is that I never got it to work. I sent an email to my labmate, and bless his heart even on vacation he wrote me back with a couple things to try. I attempted, but that roller still hated me.

Then he came back from vacation, and we went together down to lab, and I told him to just watch me run it.

I ran the calibration procedure, so far so good. I then went to roll something - "Wait wait!" he said, "Did you put that in force control now instead of position control?"

Well, no.

"Obviously it defaults to position control while doing position calibration, but if you are running with a force during rolling, you need to switch control methodologies."

Well, okay... not like you told me that "obvious" fact...

Then when I tried to change the settings, once again all my settings were erased. What's going on here??

"Oh, well that's a software bug - if you input the numbers while the data logger is running, it doesn't save them."

Ya know, these would be useful tidbits to include in training...

We discovered a few more little details that he had neglected to mention, just because it's so ingrained and obvious to him, because he built and programmed it himself.

By the time we got all the way through, I found myself irritated that he had forgotten to show me all these things, and just somehow thought I would automatically KNOW. It's not like I can READ MINDS, dear, you have to TELL me what you are THINKING so we can COMMUNICATE in order for this to work...

Then we both looked up and realized how much we were acting like a married couple arguing - and he laughed and yelled, "And we're NOT ASKING FOR DIRECTIONS, EITHER!"

Pick Up Line

I squish my toes through the sand, enjoying the walk in the sun.

I nudge my boyfriend, "Can we go get chocolate at the candy store?"

"Of course!" he replies. "I was figuring you might want to do that."

He knows me well.

I'm on vacation, I have nothing in particular to worry about, so my mind wanders and I watch the highschool-age beachgoers flirting, trying as teenagers do to impress each other.

"You know what I don't understand?" I postulate to the world in general, "I don't know why guys always try these cheesy pick up lines. If you just say 'Hi, how are you, my name is Joe. You look lovely this evening.' it really does just fine."

My boyfriend glances at me out of the corner of his eye. "Oh, I don't know about that. Most girls need more than just 'hello' to get them to pay attention to you."

I ponder this. I'm still pretty sure that all the girls I know don't really go for "Hey angel, did you fall from the sky?" or whatever nonsense guys think is going to work.

I look at my boyfriend again - and oh, he's grinning. I missed that mischievous twinkle in his eye the first time...

"That's why we pilots wear the flight suit!"

Top Gun. A must-see for anybody dating a pilot.

Okay. Well. Point conceded.

A Diversion from School Life

There is something incredibly sexy about a man working elbow-deep in grease on an engine.

Guys with pink popped collars? Eyeliner? Mere silliness. I'd take any day instead that guy I know in the automobile lab, scruffy chin and worn-in jeans, waving a wrench in the air as he explains the details of piston architecture to undergrad students. (Did you know each of the three rings on an engine piston has a specific purpose and design?)

He's whip-smart, friends with everybody, social and outgoing, and works like a real man. He's interested in entrepreneurship, flies planes, drives motorcycles, and is a natural leader. I've known him for two years, enough to appreciate the depth of his character.

I wonder if he'd go for a girl with a Craftsman toolbox in her room?

Oh This Isn't Going to Go Well

I am particularly careful about my dating life and social life. I don't give out my number frivolously. But over the course of my two years here in Grad City, I've enjoyed getting to know new people. I'm a good judge of character and I've enjoyed getting to know the few guys I've had dates with, even though I didn't choose to stay with any of them for the long term.

But sometimes I miss.

A guy I was introduced to by a friend was charming, tall, funny, and seemed intelligent enough. Not an engineer, so I don't expect a rocket scientist...

But he texted me today saying, "Hi darling, this is _____, haw you'r doing ?"

Um, how I am doing is fine?

I called him back and left a message.

He called back at 11pm and wanted to come see me. At 11pm. We haven't even been on a date yet.

Oh yeah, this is not going to go well. In fact, it's not going to go anywhere.

Call me old-fashioned, but I like the guys in my life to be able spell and behave as gentleman.

After that, then I see if they can handle the fact that I like Star Trek, own my own cordless drill and have a Mensa card in my wallet... :) Most don't make it past that stage!

Distraction

This weekend I spent some time with friends, all boys (as is my lot in life), to take a break from studying.

And how, exactly, am I supposed to concentrate after this?



A real picture, I assure you. This is not his best angle, but I didn't want to show his face.

Unfortunately (perhaps fortunately?) I am not dumb and blonde enough to interest this particular labmate, which is why we get along so well as friends. But man, I sure don't mind the distraction...

Quals studying? What? :)

Celebrating Independence

I just read on Facebook tonight about yet another of my undergraduate friends expecting a child (in this case it's his wife that is expecting, I'm sure the wife would like to note there's a difference in the work involved). A rather ridiculous number of my friends are now parents, married, engaged, or have been dating enough years to be at the "it's just a matter of time now" point of a relationship. I passed a Facebook milestone late last year when 51% of my friends fell into those categories. Yay for advanced search on Facebook, when an inquiring geek mind wants to know these things on a whim at 1 am.

I offered my hearty congratulations to my friend, and then wondered to myself whether this means that I am getting old. While it probably does, (my boyfriend from freshman year now has two children with his lovely wife, how is that for making me feel old when I went back to visit), I am going to blame it on the fact that I did my undergrad in the south/midwest, where getting married young is common. My parents married at 19, and my grandparents married at 18. This is why I have been fortunate enough to get to know my great-grandmother.

I have most decidedly not carried on the married-at-18 tradition, or even the married-after-college tradition.

I have to say, I would not be averse to having an "SO" as it's known here - a significant other. Actually, the joke goes that the first two questions students from World's Best School ask each other (rather than the standard "where are you from, what are your hobbies") are "where is your SO, and what is your OS?". Operating system, of course. :) It would be nice to have someone to come home to each night, a partner to support each other and share in life, someone to love.

But then I think a little harder, and I find the idea of being tied down to one person scares the spit out of me. Because look what I can do on my own! I can do little things like:

- eat whenever I want, and
- eat whatever it pleases me to cook
- sleep whenever I need to
- decorate as I wish
- make weekend plans without consulting anyone else
- change my plans with no trouble

And I can do big things like:

- decide my own career path
- decide what country I want to live in (I was offered a job in Singapore upon graduation if I want it)
- manage my own finances
- make my own friends on my own merits
- take time off to vacation, visit family and friends, go home for the holidays.

For the right person, I suppose sacrificing being able to say "I suddenly want to go watch a movie RIGHT NOW" doesn't seem like much. All of the things in that list could be worth giving up. But for now, I'm happy celebrating my independence.

And, Watchmen was awesome. I didn't even miss the previews. :)

On the Blending of Love and Science

Oh sweet rainbows. Could there be any more chick flicks on TV this weekend?

I have been thinking today about the blending of love and science. Does the scientific approach have any place in relationships, and as women in science do we have a different experience?



In thinking about the various relationships and adventures in love I have observed in my friends and colleagues, there are two things I want to discuss. One is the difference I see between those in the sciences and those not, and the other is the difference I see between college and graduate school.

The difference between college and graduate school is pretty obvious. Holycrapeverybodygotmarried. I think this partly has to do with the fact that I did my undergrad in the middle of the bible belt. It doesn't have so much to do with religion, but I think in the South/Midwest the average marrying age is younger, and it is quite common for people to get married quickly out of highschool and college. I have bought an incredible number of wedding gifts for my friends from undergrad in the past three summers - I am thrilled that they are all happy, but selfishly I must say that I hope some cosmic tallybook is recording all of that for use when I get married someday. I recently passed a milestone on Facebook, in that 51% of my friends are now engaged or married. Nothing like going back for homecoming to find your boyfriend from freshman year is married with a one-year-old to make you feel like people have moved on without you. :)

But I can see the difference being married makes on those in grad school. There are several guys in my lab who are married, one who is engaged, and several who are in long-term relationships. As an aside, one of the married guys has a newborn, and his wife brought in the wee one wrapped in blankets to lab one day to introduce. My maternal instincts kicked in so strongly it wasn't even funny - I nearly decided to quit grad school and adpot....

The common thing I see among these friends is that they seem more balanced, more grounded. Being married has given them a better perspective - school doesn't mean any less to them, but they realize that there is more to life than the science. I think it also helps to go home to your significant other at the end of the day, because you get unconditional support and reassurance from them, recognition that yes, even if your science flopped that day, you are still amazing. This doesn't mean single people can't be grounded and confident, I'm just staying I think it's a bit harder.

Now, a point about the difference I see between those in science and those not. I honestly expected as a freshman in college that girls in engineering would have less drama in their love lives. We are supposed to be logical, right? Some of my best friends from college were girls (most definitely not engineers) I met in the dorm, who I grew very close to and who provided an outlet for me outside my school and science endeavors. These girls and I supported each other, and I was there with them for many an ice-cream binge after a breakup, or comforting sessions after somebody fell apart crying in the bathroom. What I am saying is, there was drama a-plenty. One of these girls is now married, and another is engaged.

I fully expected that the girls I knew in engineering would handle their love lives differently. They would make better choices, I thought, because they could rationally weigh their decisions. Well, as you can guess, a big 'ol "HA!" to that idea. There was just as much drama if not more than with my girls outside the sciences. Same thing in grad school. I suppose no matter how rational you think you are, the emotions will get you every time. Perhaps, even, the girls in engineering were less prepared to deal with the emotions - we get very little practice in our field at the emotional side of things.

So back to my original question: Does the scientific approach have any place in love, and as women in science do we have a different perspective or experience of love?

Well, gees, who am I to say?

I am going to propose that yes, scientific approach does help in love, as does education of any sort. Being able to take a step back and think for a minute does wonders to guard against rash decisions. I am going to cling to my perhaps naive notion that you can save yourself a world of hurt if you just take a minute to evaluate what you are doing, no matter what the area.

Do women and men in science experience love differently? I know for myself, I appreciate the people in my life who love me even more because I know it's not logical - and I love them back without having to explain it, or to justify it. I pride myself on being logical, but when a boy came along I really fell for I threw all of that out the window. So I guess what I'm saying is I think love is universal, and you can't do a flippin' thing about it.

So what do you think, internet? Am I just young and nerdy and have no idea what I'm talking about? What have been your experiences - has science affected the relationships in your life? Or does just asking that question kill the romance?

Oh, and a Happy (now that I have completely over-analyzed it) Valentine's Day to you -