I'm hopping on a plane in a few hours to check out a few shows at Noise Pop in San Francisco, but for those singer-songwriter fans still in San Diego, I've got a pair of tickets to give away to see Kris Delmhorst at Lestat's on Sunday night. Her voice has a touch of the smokiness of Chan Marshall (aka Cat Power), and I love that shit. Check it out for yourself:
MP3: Heavens Hold the Sun
If you're interested, email me at natkardos AT gmail DOT com with "Kris Delmhorst" in the subject line and your full name in the body of the email. You will be put on the list with a plus one if you win.
Friday, February 29, 2008
CONTEST: Kris Delmhorst @ Lestat's, 3/2
366 Days, 366 Photos: 02/28/2008
Danger, indeed. I'm not so thrilled with the shadows in this image, but I still like how it turned out. Pleasantly surprising.
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Thursday, February 28, 2008
Look Ma, I'm a Street Person!
Except, you know, not the homeless type.
I'm much more comfortable with myself behind the camera, as opposed to in front of it, so I was pretty happy with how those photos came out. And thanks, as always, to the Whistlestop, for providing the perfect backdrop.
The funny thing about the second photo is, and ALL of my friends are going to call me out on this, is that I'm not really any good at pool. Oh well.
Daily Photo: 02/28/2008
I seem to be doing much better today (that being said, I haven't really gotten out of bed yet). I'm not planning on going into work, as I want to make sure I take it easy so that my trip to San Francisco this weekend isn't an absolute disaster. But I do hope to at least attempt to take some interesting photos today.
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Wired Photo Contests
I just happened to notice this, but it seems that Wired is running the occasional photo contest. The current one is "Red." You can go and vote on your favorites, and even submit your own.
Unfortunately, I somehow missed out on their Holga contest, but you can see the top 10 photos as voted by their readers, as well as 10 editor's picks. There's some pretty neat stuff in there.
Wednesday, February 27, 2008
366 Days, 366 Photos: 02/27/2008
I'm pretty impressed that I haven't managed to kill off these Forget-Me-Not seedlings yet. Actually, I'm pretty impressed that they even grew at all.
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366 Days, 366 Photos: 02/26/2008
I didn't take any photos yesterday. My first slip-up in the 366 Days project. I remember lying in bed thinking about it at one point, but I just couldn't bring myself to get up and do it, what with the fever and the tossing and turning in the sweat-soaked sheets. I thought about cheating today (by changing the date setting on my camera) but I figured "what's the point?" The goal of the project is to challenge myself to come up with new photo ideas, not to berate myself over failing to fulfill a deadline when life gets in the way. It's one thing to not take a photo because I'm being lazy. It's another thing entirely to not take one because I'm busy lying on the bathroom floor, cooling myself off by way of the tiles and a cold washcloth.
Had I taken a photo, though, it probably would have involved Nyquil, 7-Up, and tissues and looked a lot like this one, but with more used tissues lying around:
366 Days, 366 Photos: 02/25/2008
These are cells that I infected with a lentivirus containing the gene for green fluorescent protein under the control of a strong promoter. The strong promoter ensures that if the gene is in a cell, it's pretty much always turned on, and thus always making green fluorescent protein. Green fluorescent protein, being what it is, makes these cells glow green under a certain wavelength of fluorescent light. The cells themselves are HEK 293 cells, which were originally derived from human embryonic kidney cells. At this point, they've been cultured so much as a cell line that they're not very physiologically similar to normal human cells - but that does make them extremely easy to work with.
Taken with an Olympus confocal microscope. Another nerdy part of me was wondering if Flickr would pick up on the type of "camera" this image was taken with, but alas, it appears not.
Taken with an Olympus confocal microscope. Another nerdy part of me was wondering if Flickr would pick up on the type of "camera" this image was taken with, but alas, it appears not.
Daily Photo: 02/27/2008
I really like this photo, even though technically it's all wrong. Everything is out of focus, but it just does it for me. Maybe it's the glimmer of the fence in the background. Or the fact that it reminds me of fireflies in my backyard in June growing up. In reality, it's the lights strung across my side porch.
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Sorry for being M.I.A.
Sorry kiddos. I came down with something awful on Monday and was basically fighting a fever starting Monday afternoon and not ending until sometime last night (thank you, aspirin). I thought it was over yesterday morning, and that I just had the leftover aches and pains to deal with, but it ended up getting even worse until about the time that P was nice enough to stop by with some jello and eggo waffles. I decided to still try to take it easy today, since I want to be as close to 100% for my trip to San Francisco this weekend. I'm going to try to go into work for an hour or two (have to take care of some cells I have growing). I'll also try to catch up with my posting, but no promises. I also don't really expect to be going out at all the remainder of the week.
Ugh - don't you hate it when life knocks you on your ass?
Monday, February 25, 2008
Daily Photo: 02/25/2008
Skylight from the Museum of Natural History in DC.
I feel like crap today. Looks like my weekend antics have caught up to me, or maybe I caught it from a friend. Either way, I guess the bright side is that even though I feel feverish, my hands are freezing, so I can use them to cool off my forehead. Way to go, body!
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I feel like crap today. Looks like my weekend antics have caught up to me, or maybe I caught it from a friend. Either way, I guess the bright side is that even though I feel feverish, my hands are freezing, so I can use them to cool off my forehead. Way to go, body!
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Sunday, February 24, 2008
Song of the Day - Bon Iver, "Skinny Love"
I just downloaded Bon Iver's For Emma, Forever Ago from eMusic. And on the first listen-through, "Skinny Love" got the back-to-back-to-back triple play award. I can't for the life of me tell whether this song breaks my heart or makes me really happy. I'm not even sure what the man is singing about, but whatever it is, I've felt it too.
Saturday, February 23, 2008
Friday, February 22, 2008
Like Indie Rock? Like Cool T-Shirts?
...Like helping out charities? The the Yellow Bird Project might be worth checking out.
Who they are: A Montreal-based non-profit initiative that collaborates with musicians in designing t-shirts. The shirts are then printed and sold on the Yellow Bird Project website, and all the proceeds go to charity. The coolest part is that all the bands get to pick their own charity, so it's really something meaningful to them.
Who they've worked with: Clap Your Hands Say Yeah, The Shins, Stars, Rilo Kiley, Au Revoir Simone, Wolf Parade, My Brightest Diamond, and others. My favorite shirt so far is the Au Revoir Simone one.
And here's the scoop: Their latest t-shirt, coming out at the end of next week, was designed by The National. And we all know how much I love The National.
Can I get a pre-order on that shirt?
Anyway, go check 'em out, and buy some cool threads to support some cool charities!
Live Videos: Talkdemonic and Swim Party @ Casbah, 2/11/2008
All the photos I took this night were way too dark to post, so I thought I'd just post the videos. Unfortunately, I didn't have the foresight to take any video of A.M. Vibe, who sounded beautiful as always.
Talkdemonic blew my socks off. I went to the show not knowing what to expect, but it wasn't a girl playing viola + guy on drums + laptop noises. I'm glad I didn't know much about them beforehand, because I might have been negatively opinionated due to the laptop noises part. But they pulled off an amazing set that managed to give them their own sound amid all the other post-rock no-vocals bands out there at the moment. Truly gorgeous. Listen for yourself:
And Swim Party was awesome as usual. I think I noticed a new song I hadn't heard before in their mix, and I also picked up on the fact that they've been tweaking their older songs and playing new arrangements live. Way to keep things interesting, guys. I really can't say anything else about these guys that hasn't been said before, so here are the videos:
Pariah:
Tiempo Finales (the time signature on this one just kills me):
366 Days, 366 Photos: 02/21/2008
This is what happens when you let a polyacrylamide gel dry on your bench overnight. The blue bands are the result of a stain for proteins, which are separated on the gel by size via an electric current applied to the gel.
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Thursday, February 21, 2008
366 Days, 366 Photos: 02/20/2008
This is a little strip of grass next to an elementary school near where I live. It serves as a dog park in the evenings, which I always enjoy - if I can't come home to my own dog, at least I can come home to see a lot of people playing with their own dogs. It's an HDR merge of a bunch of images (14 I think) taken yesterday when the clouds broke for a second.
Sadly, there were no photos of the lunar eclipse later that night, as I was at Wine Vault and the moon was visible for about 4 seconds.
Sadly, there were no photos of the lunar eclipse later that night, as I was at Wine Vault and the moon was visible for about 4 seconds.
Wednesday, February 20, 2008
Tuesday, February 19, 2008
Monday, February 18, 2008
Rhett Miller live review for Impose Magazine
Photos: Rhett Miller @ Belly Up, 2/10/2008
Last Sunday night I went to the Belly Up to see Rhett Miller perform a solo acoustic set. It was quite a treat, as I had never seen him solo or with the Old 97's before. I did a write-up for Impose Magazine that can be found here.
I was blown away by his set. He played several new tunes that will be found on the Old 97's new record, coming out May 13th (two days after my birthday!). I recorded three of those, as well as two older songs.
Here's the first of four new Old 97's songs that Rhett played:
And here's the second:
"Book of Poems":
"Won't Be Home":
The third of the four new Old 97's songs (I didn't take any video of the fourth):
He also mentioned that he'd be back with the Old 97's in June, and I can't wait. The sound was absolutely perfect in the Belly Up and I didn't once even think about putting in my ear plugs.
366 Days, 366 Photos: 02/18/2008
Hard to believe that in all my 3.5 years of living in San Diego, I've never been to Seaport Village. Well, not really that hard to believe considering it's crowded with tourists. But Ms. Andrea lured me down there today with promises to find me a hat that I liked (I ended up with two!) from The Village Hat Shop. Of course I brought the camera and wandered around a bit, and this is what I ended up with. I can't decide whether I like the color version or the black and white better.
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This Week in Shows: 02/18-02/24/2008
Monday, 02/18: Anti-Monday League featuring Manganista, Chow Nasty, Alpha Channel, Beatmo @ Casbah, $7.
Tuesday, 02/19: Game night at the Whistlestop?
Wednesday, 02/20: The Lovemakers, Buddy Akai, Oslo @ Casbah, $10.
Thursday, 02/21: Liars, No Age @ Casbah, $12 advance/$14 day of show.
Friday, 02/22: Swim Party @ Whistlestop, FREE. Roses on Her Grave, Swedish Models, Desert Diamonds @ Ken Club, $? The Album Leaf, Kill Me Tomorrow, Manuok, What Laura Says Thinks and Feels @ Casbah, $15. Tough call.
Saturday, 02/23: Secret Apollo, Drowning Men, Beta Lion @ Tower Bar, $?
Sunday, 02/24: Local 94.9 Show featuring Get Your Death On, War Stories, Inigo, The Frantic Romantic, The Clap and Marco Collins' birthday @ Casbah, FREE or bring Marco a present!
Sunday, February 17, 2008
366 Days, 366 Photos: 02/17/2008
A ring that someone bought me a long time ago. Shot in a home-made light tent while sitting on a mirror.
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Daily Photo: 02/16/2008
Coronado Beach 1, shot by Natalie Kardos
Sorry for not actually posting this on 2/16. P got a new car so we decided to take it for a spin, which turned into burgers at Nunu's, which turned into a late night at the Whistlestop and crashing on a friend's couch for the second time in three days. What do I think I am, 21?
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Friday, February 15, 2008
Daily Photo: 02/15/2008
Since it was rainy out yesterday and I wasn't really feeling lab, I ended up in the library for about an hour. I checked out some books and, of course, took my camera with me to get this photo.
Oh, and after a pretty crappy day, last night turned out to be pretty awesome. No couples bullshit, no feeling down for being single, just good times with good friends at the Pink Elephant. And crashing on a friend's couch, only to wake up and realize that I had to come into work today. At least Monday's a holiday.
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Oh, and after a pretty crappy day, last night turned out to be pretty awesome. No couples bullshit, no feeling down for being single, just good times with good friends at the Pink Elephant. And crashing on a friend's couch, only to wake up and realize that I had to come into work today. At least Monday's a holiday.
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Thursday, February 14, 2008
Nature editors reject double-blind peer review
This is bullshit.
The editors at Nature, an extremely high-profile and well-respected (by some, but that's another issue) scientific journal, have decided to stick with the current system of single-blind peer review, instead of switching to double-blind review. This means that the people submitting the paper don't know who their reviewers are, but the reviewers know which lab is submitting the paper and which institution that lab is from. Which, as you can imagine can lead to a whole load of bias, including gender bias, which has been proven through various studies. In fact, Nature admits this, and suggests that, to counter it, the people submitting the paper use only first initials instead of first names on the paper.
This is exactly what I think is wrong with science these days. A lot of terrible research gets published just because it comes from so-and-so's lab, or from a lab at Harvard/Stanford/UCSF/etc. In a recent journal club, we discussed a paper published from Francis Collins' lab. Francis Collins is the director of the NIH. As a reviewer (even one who is unknown to Collins'), would you reject his paper? Probably not. The paper was actually fairly decent, but still. The problem exists.
And why won't Nature implement the double-blind reviewing system? To me, it boils down to laziness. They claim that it's impossible to make the authors of a paper entirely unknown, and so they are refusing to make even the smallest effort to do so. Wired has a good response to their decision, and I highly agree with most of the points that they make.
And don't even get me started on the Proceedings of the National Academy of Science, where Academy members get to submit two "freebie" papers a year which don't go through the normal review process.
It's shit like this that makes me absolutely sure that I want to get out of academic research once I get my Ph.D. Things like this, and the fact that I actually want to have a life outside of science.
