My Chromosomes!!!!!

(: !!!!CHROMOSOMES!!!! :)

I have had the most awesome week ever!!!! …This week my passions were justified. I said before that love cytogenetics!!!!!! And now more than ever!!!!

On Monday I had my lovely genetics lecture about cytogenetics which I love so much!! It’s so fascinating! I am really really going to miss genetics next term… I’m thinking of taking a paper next term that involves independent study on a chosen topic…I don’t think I’ll be able to survive without genetics otherwise! On Tuesday was media and on Wednesday was genetics again!! Yippeeee!! More chromosome study!!!! Down Syndrome, Turner, Klienfelter… and on and on and on about chromosomal stuff! Soooo fascinating!!! :) That night I stayed up till 1am doing my pedigree analysis for Thursdays lab, from last week…

On Thursday I had my final biology lab…. A couple of weeks ago I was looking forwards to the end of the course more than anything…. And now I’m sad that it’s almost over. Last week as I said we started our cytogenetics topic for labs, and we got our blood samples taken and then we left them to culture in medium. This week we centrifuged them, discarded the supernatant, centrifuged and resuspended them in fixative several times. Then Dr Rickards showed us the really fun part. Applying the sample to slides to get a monolayer of cells!

We stood at the side of our bench, put tissue paper on the floor, held a Pasteur pipette at eye level at the level of the table above the tissue paper and dropped drops of water down from the table onto the tissue paper on the floor! It was kind of like chucking tomatoes from a tall building, to get the tomato to mash! Smack! We had to practice our aiming with water first so we could get the sample in the right place on the slide! But it was so amusing! I loved it! So then we did the same with our sample! It was really scary at first. I didn't want to lose any of my sample... but all was well! I had enough sample to make 5 slides! :)

Then we stained and fixed them…..and then….dumdumdadum!!!! The time had come! The moment of glory...or failure. I looked down the microscope at one of my slides and saw….my chromosomes!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! I was soo excited!!!! I was so used to everything not working in the labs this year, that I kind of lost hope…but this time it worked!!! There were so many cells with chromosomes, at various stages of mitosis!!! Sooo exciting!!!!! I was soo excited that I didn't even get upset when I got my report back about PCR and found it wasn't that pleasant... at least I passed... Have to study really hard for my lab test!!! We got to keep our slides, and next week we will come in to the lab and take photos with a special microscope of our chromosomes!!!! I can't wait!!! Then I could see them more close up! That day I didn't want to leave the lab. I stayed till the last student had left the room, looking down the microscope browsing my slides and admiring my chromosomes! It is unbelievably exciting! I wish I had a microscope at home!!!! :):):)

On Friday was another day of cytogenetics (pretty good week, cytogenetics every day except Tuesday!). As usual the lecture was really interesting but seemed incredibly short! It's amazing how time flies when you're doing something great! That day my friend picked up a post-graduate prospectus, and while I was reading it I found out that my favourite cytogenetics lecturer Dr Rickards takes post graduate genetics! Yea!!

Today I happily spent all day doing my cytogenetics assignment and then started studying for my major lab test next Thursday. I can do well in it! I know I can!!!! :) This week after all my excitement I decided that I definitely want to go on to do lots and lots of post graduate study…to do with cytogenetics! This year I have finally discovered my area of biology that I’m crazy about!!!! And I want to learn all about it….!! So I want to do honors and masters and PhD…!!!! As long as it’s all about chromosomes I can go on motivated forever!!! There's so much to learn...and now that I've actually seen chromosomes in real life (NOT in a text book or hand out) it's even more exciting than ever!! J …Hey perhaps one day I will lecture about genetics! :)

Things are really looking up!

Last week was really good ....Maybe because I didn't have any horrible labs to stress me out...
On Monday I had genetics which was good. But I'm still looking forwards to cytogenetics, that's what makes me really excitied!!! Spent the afternoon working on my media essay on 'Stereotypes in To Kill a Mockingbird'.

Tuesday and Wednesday came and went. Had a media lecture on NZ sports! We compared sports in NZ to sports in Holland! Wednesday as usual I had a 2 hour genetics lecture in which we learnt about human evolution! Haven't done that since first year! Really interesting!

On Thursday for the first time this trimester I actually enjoyed the bio lab! That's because we were doing cytogenetics!!! My favourite ever! Our BIOL 341 lecturer Dr Rickards and Dr Ryan took the lab and for the first half we analysed a pedigree chart. We also got our blood samples taken! We were going to analyse them in the following weeks lab! We'll get to see our own chromosomes! After the lunch break (and my media tutorial) we got back and studied Allium!!!! We had to figure out how to locate meiosis in the Allium plant! It was really amusing! I made about 10 slide preparations trying to figure it out! At the end of the lab Dr Ryan showed me how to do it right...! It was really fascinating! Like it took me ages to figure out that meiosis is best seen in the anthers of the flower!...thanks to my minimal plant knowledge :( But it was interesting to finally see mitosis! We had to write up the method for locating meiosis for next week. And I knew how!

On Friday I handed in my media essay. Whew! That's out of the way! We had our last lecture on molecular biology. The following week we would be starting cytogenetics!!! On Monday we would be having Dr Rickards back for cytogenetics!!!! Yahoo! Can't wait!! :) I've been looking forwards to that since the course began! :) ...not that I don't like molecular genetics...it's just that cytogenetics makes me...really excited!!! :)

On Saturdey I went to Tanya's birthday. We went to a restaurant.... and Christina was there!! Yea!!! I haven't seen her since she left for university at the begining of the year! She came to Tanya's birthday with Adrian. I knew it! I was suspicious she'd be there...!! It was great to catch up! ;)It was a really interesting restaurant. First you chose a whole bunch of raw food and then you watch it get cooked! I had soo much seafood!...two plates full! ...and there was dessert...Tanya, Erin (Tanya's friend) and Christina....

...and dessert! It was great to see Christina and Adrian, and catch up!...
When I got home I had my genetics assignment to do... which was also really interesting!
I didn't really have a weekend that week because I had to do my essay for genetics on a human genetic disease. I studied the Fabry disease. First DiGeorge, now Fabry... That should be interesting.... I wonder if our last assignment will involve writing an essay too... :)

...life goes on....

Front cover of my immunogenetics assignment

Another week has gone. Still stressful but at least this week there were no tears! On Monday I had Genetics and I handed my immunogenetics essay in. On Tuesday I was so tired because I didn't have a weekend due to writing my genetics essay. I worked on my next lab report that was due on Wednesday. I also had to revise genetics. After much debate with myself and my conscience I decided to stay home and do my lab report instead of going to my media studies lecture. After all I could study the lecture myself since all the notes are up on blackboard. And I really had to get my lab report done.

On Wednesday I handed the lab report in and had genetics lecture which was ok. We were learning about genetic diseases. On Thursday I had the biology lab which was better than last week. Once again it involved using computers and researching things on the internet. I've never really used the internet at university, I didn't realize it was so expensive...and it wouldn't let me go on half the sites! Grrr how innoying! But this time everything went ok, and I got the lab done, even early! I couldn't wait till the following week!!! We would have labs about cytogenetics!!! I've been looking forwards to those labs since the begining of the course!!

Friday went by in a flash with my genetics lecture and learning about diseases... and study and assignments... busy busy!! So much to do!!!Appart from doing my assignments and lab reports that weekend on Sunday we went to see Linda doing her roller skating exam! It was so awesome seeing her skate! She's great!...and she passed her exam! :) It's so awesome watching rollerskating! Very inspiring! I should go do some skating sometime...after exams... which are coming up fast! Study time! Study study study!!!! :)

Tears of Polaris

Last week has been so much full of emotion that I haven’t been able to get around to writing about it until today. Sigh. Here it goes…

Classes resumed last Monday. I had my genetics lecture at 2pm. We began our topic on molecular genetics taught by one of our last year’s genetics lecturers. Although it was all incredibly interesting, it was challenging getting back into learning mode. By the end of the lecture I felt incredibly overwhelmed. Coming home I thought about that lab report on PCR that I had to finish writing by Thursday. Sigh. What has to be done gets done. After writing some genetics cue cards I spent the rest of the day working on the lab report.

On Tuesday I had media studies. We got told in the lecture that our assignments have been marked and we can collect them. So I went to get my assignment after the lecture…along with about 300 other media studies students. The queue was enormous. I waited a bit. It didn’t look like I’d get anything back anytime soon. Then, catching a glimpse of my bus I went home. I wasn’t ready to get my assignment back that day. That evening I pounded over my lab report. I finished everything apart from some calculations. They were so frustrating! And nobody I knew had done them! I was so confused. Different people said different things. But what is right? Feeling tired and frustrated I went to bed.

On Wednesday I went to get my media studies assignment before my genetics lecture. Thoughts kept running through my mind about my last years horrid experience of the English paper that I took. C+ C+ C+ for every essay I wrote! I hadn’t been able to figure out what’s wrong. But that was last year… Pushing those thoughts out of my mind I went and got my assignment… which turned out to be…a B+!!!! Yippee!!! So I’m not terrible at essays after all! The comment that my tutor wrote was also very encouraging, and after my genetics lecture (which was great, as usual!) I went home feeling happy…

Wednesday turned out to be the most positive day I’d have that week. Thursday came. My lab report due. I still hadn’t figured out those calculations. I was frustrated and confused. Hoped to ask someone before the lab. That day we worked in the computer room sequencing mtDNA data to find out what bird a feather came from. Several hours had passed and I still wasn’t getting anywhere with my data. My lab partner had almost finished everything! I had very vaguely found out how to do calculations for the previous lab report… Had media tutorial. Came back to the lab, continued attempting to sequence DNA. No luck. Then we get our previous assignment on PCR back. I just passed. This was the last straw. Went back to DNA sequencing…but couldn’t concentrate. I could feel tears flowing down my face. I couldn’t make them stop. Nobody noticed me cry…apart from my lab partner. He came over to me and helped me with everything. I was extremely grateful. At loss for words. Before I knew it, I was done.

I couldn’t wait to get out of the lab. Although the assignment I got back had useful comments, there was nothing I could do to improve my current report. It was done. Due now and couldn’t be changed. I felt so angry. Why can’t we get proper instructions for lab reports this year? Why do we always find out what needs to be done after its done? It can’t possibly be explained as being a 3^rd year thing. In genetics we get everything explained! Why not in labs? Oh how much I love genetics! I handed the lab report in and grabbing a biology prospectus for post graduate study I went home.

Mum and Dad were going out when I got home. I went to my room. I was still upset. Someone told me that grade point average for post graduate study entry was raised to a B+ this year. I didn’t want to believe it. But I found it true. All my emotions from that day seemed to combine into one big blob. I sat in my room and cried, and cried and cried. Although I felt like crying all night, I didn’t want to. I needed to blurt everything out. So I called Sonia and we talked. I felt so much better afterwards. I love my friends.

The next day the impact of Thursday had worn off, mostly anyway. I went to my genetics lecture feeling grateful that I have genetics as a subject that I absolutely love. Saturday and Sunday I spent working on my Immunogenetics essay due the following Monday. The disease I chose to write about was DiGeorge syndrome. It was fascinating, and I found it hard to keep to the approximate word number suggested!

So this was my first week back at university… oh and I also found that I have my exams in June on the 6^th and the 21^st. So that was another positive aspect for the week. I have plenty of time to study in between my exams!