5-minute pseudo-masterpiece whilst trying to write up a mock grant proposal

Mind of a beta-Microbiologist - #7

I was amused when my copy of Microsoft Word© underlined with angry red zigzags the word "pathogenicity" in my document, reminding me of what I really meant. Although I really wouldn't like to live in a "pathogen city."

(tired) Mind of a beta-Microbiologist -#6

Lemons Lemons Lemons
They're so sour
They're so nice
I like them squeezed in water
With some sugar
and some ice.



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That, my friends, is what you think about after spending the day toggling between NCBI searches and assignment typing, and realising that your sanity shows significant deviation from expectation (P=0.011).

[µstory] Partridge

He would a’ bought me a partridge. I can see him now, runnin ’round town, visiting every farm and pet store and ’splaining his ridiculous scheme, and the owners grinning from ear to ear, some laughing, You’re mad! they’d say. Course if it din’ work out he’d get the bright idea of catching one out’o the wild, and lo he’d ’a done it too, near fright’nin the poor bird half t’death I would guess, his head all a-feathered, ha ha! And at night, when we’d all be right fast asleep, he’d a’ got out with the poor thing, climbed up the pear tree in the garden with it in a litt’a cage in the crook o’is arm, and got his head pecked a dozen times, and muttered and sworn and oh my nearly fallen off, but he’d do it. Break o’dawn he’d ’a called us I’m sure. Come out to the garden! he’d be grinning and Look out the window why don’t you, saying we’d be fair surprised. And we would be.

Random writing fragment

An interval.
It has been long since epiphanies flashed before your eyes, long since you felt the sharp stinging pain behind your eyelids that comes with this enlightenment. Shut tight, the light spots warn you of madness, remind you that reason lies beyond. Open, and force yourself to look at Truth in its brilliance; but for that glimpse, you must be blind to all else. Shut tight, and your vision is saved. But there will be only darkness for you to see.

Mind of a beta-Microbiologist - #5

Neisseriae
Are in your nez
Attached by Type IV fimbriae
That from the inner membrane grow
From single units of PilA
And out the outer membrane go.


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To be continued? :)

The pathopoet returns...?!

So I’ve started a new resolution – rather, I’ve revisited an old and oft-recycled resolution to write some worthy matter every day, or at least twice a week, depending on how it goes. The problem is, I tend to compose veritable epics in my brain and fermenting soliloquies which never end up seeing the light of day, due to the following:

1) I have a strict policy of preening any text that fumbles out of my mind into something decent before penning it down. I try to follow the route of Raymond Carver in my preoccupation with precision; I do believe, like any good poet (not that I’m calling myself a good poet, but merely indicating that I subscribe to similar theories) that things ought to be edited and refined; I vaguely remember my favourite poets and writers concurring through various quotes. However, this tends to mean that I end up writing absolutely nothing. So to remedy this, I am trying to edit absolutely nothing. Oh yes, I shall force myself to post this piece up while I cringe at its jagged corners.

2 )I have quick thoughts. Interestingly quick in Middle English means “alive,” and that is a fitting description too. I can never write as fast as I think – as for typing, will some kind soul please show me how on earth to patter down on these keys without looking? I compose what I consider to be good pieces, only to get hopelessly frustrated as I try to write them down. I am at thought number 998,786 and have gotten down four words. The end result is something that is painfully trying to catch up with the original sentiment, by then long dissipated.

3) I think of good things when it is most inconvenient. By the time I get some sort of writing implement or manage to reunite with my mechanical scribe, the muse has long since gone for a coffee and left me with fragments of ideas which barely make up a paltry sentence.

4) I can’t bear to jot down nonsense. Somewhat bemusedly yet with reasonable trepidation, I realize I am doing just that at this very moment. I love to flirt with sophistication, I am enraptured with subtleties, I gurgle with delight at that elusive complex metaphor. Which has thus far gotten me square in the middle of nowhere, as complex metaphors are wont to do.

5) I am obsessed with Purpose and Theme. There should be a Purpose to all things writ; and if they happened to be writ in a place with a little layout and quaint headings and labels such as “Stylus Virus,” then isn’t it awful to slide in something that is hopelessly disjoint from the whole elaborately established Theme?!

No, I suppose it’s not. And so, I just did.