Strength whence we don't expect it

I apologize, but I'm going to wax sentimental and personal in this post.

Many of us bloggers have looked to our children as a source of material for our posts. See here and here for just two examples. We can't help it. Our kids tend to be a source of inspiration for creativity or at least discussion topics.

I'd like to relay a story about one of my kids that has taught me something important.

This past week, my family and I spent some time visiting my brother and his family in the Chicago area. From the moment we arrived, the cousins were engrossed in their playing. It was fun to see. During the course of play, someone decided to play a good ol' fashioned game of "jump off the top bunk onto stuff." Seriously, who hasn't played this game? We all have. Well, during the playing of said game, all of a sudden I hear my 4 year-old daughter crying.

She hurt her foot. After a few minutes of consoling, she stopped crying, but she did not want to put any weight on the foot. We put a little ice on it and gave her some Tylenol. Before we knew it, she was crawling around the house playing with her cousins. She was still unable to put any weight on it, but that did not stop her. She was not going to let her injury slow her down.

We thought since she was in no obvious pain that she slightly sprained it and that in a few hours she would be back on it.

She continued to play as if there was nothing wrong. She crawled around as best she could to keep up with all the kids. She never complained. When we tried to get her to put weight on it, she refused.

She went to bed that night, and we thought that by the next day it would be better. After all, there was no way it could be broken. She was in no obvious discomfort and wasn't complaining a bit. Not even a little.

In the morning, things had not changed. She still would not put any weight on it. She still crawled all over: up stairs, down stairs, across wood floors, across concrete floors. By noon, it became clear we should have the foot looked at. I was still convinced it was not broken, but it was time to have a professional doctor look at it.

Off to urgent care we went. Sure enough, metatarsals 1, 2 and 3: broken. They put a temporary cast on until we can see an orthopedic specialist. Until then, she can't walk on it. She has to crawl or be carried everywhere.
We drove for about 10 hours to get home. She never complained once. OK, maybe once, but she had gone 8 hours without any pain medicine. I kind of forgot.

So, what's the point of this post? I am once again deeply impressed by my child's toughness, strength and lack of self-pity. Primarily the latter. There are times when I have a little cold and expect the world to stop and give me comfort. I get a sliver and my world comes crashing down.

The only time she really cried was when we were at the doctors and I told her her toes were broken. She's only 4 but knows what that means. She cried. I cried. We both composed ourselves and from then on, I drew strength from her.

Happy Independence Day

Happy Independence Day!!!! 233 years!!!! Take that, Britland!!!!

Actually, thanks for the solid start, Great Britain. You really did set things up nicely. Sorry about that whole tax and representation thing. Things kind of got ugly. I'm glad we're friends. I raise a pint to you.

The USA is a great country and I am proud to be one of its citizens. Is the USA perfect? Nope. No country is. But I am proud to be in a country that let's girls go to school, that let's me decide who to vote for, that let's me criticize the government, that builds roads, schools and jails, that let's me brew up to 200 gallons of beer a year.

God Bless America.

Now, if you will excuse me, I have some transition metals I need to torture....
BTW, if you are ever in Madison, WI be sure to stop at the Great Dane Pub and Brewery. Awesome.

This is why I hate Microsoft

Try typing the following CAS# into Excel: 7440-05-3

Now, try to keep Excel in it's infinite wisdom from changing it into something else like a date or a random number.

If anyone knows how to force Excel to keep the number the way I type it, let me know before I punch my computer.

I've tried everything.

Beer and Celiacs

I'm brewing tonight, and as I do, I thought I'd tell a little story.

A few weeks ago, my family and I participated in the 8th International Walk for Celiac Disease.[1] I talked about this two years ago. Remember? If not, here's the link.

The main issue with Celiacs disease is those afflicted cannot tolerate gluten in their diet. Gluten is found in many grains including barley. That means no beer for those with Celiacs. That's not as bad as being allergic to hops because there is a solution: beer made using sorghum.

In 2007 I discovered Redbridge. The Anheuser-Busch gluten-free beer. OK, but not really that good. Very low hop flavor.

In 2009, I discovered Bards. Now this beer is a lot more interesting and flavorful. The most notable difference between this and the Redbridge is that the Bard's brewers don't mind using hops. The Hersbruker and Tettenang come shining through in the most delightful way. The result is a beer I would drink not because I had to, but because I want to.

Sadly, at the walk I only got a few small tastes. I will hopefully be able to find it around here. I'd like to try an entire 6

[1] the name is a bit misleading. We were not walking 'for' Celiacs disease. We are actually quite against it. We were walking to raise funds to research a cure.

more bar progress...

I continue to tinker with my bar. I recently added this feature:
I installed this liquor shelf using only materials I had on hand. It turned out pretty nice.

I would like you to note the bottle of gin right in the middle. My parents are moving out of their house right now and found this bottle of gin. They bought it before I was born, drank a little and put in a cupboard for almost 40 years. I tasted it. It's not very ginny anymore.

NOS and Boulder beer- Day something

I'm sitting in Denver International Airport enjoying the free wireless. Way to go DIA!!!! Every airport should have free wireless. It's 2009 after all.

I’ve done a very poor job of reporting on the NOS lately. Sorry. Instead of a blow by blow account, let me give a summarizing overview of things at the 2009 NOS and other things I have thought of and done. I will give a more detailed beer review tomorrow. As a preview let me say, I tasted 2 dozen beers in one day.

Part 1: NOS tidbits.

Robert Grubbs used a blue laser pointer. Very cool. I guess when you win a Nobel prize you can treat yourself to fancy little gadgets.

Phil Baran just might make it in this business. After hearing his talk, which ended the Symposium, I am convinced he is probably the top young star in Organic Chemistry.

Paul Wender's talk was not as brief as his taxol synthesis, relatively speaking. But, it was interesting.

The Symposium was superb. I am proud to say that I attended every lecture and looked at every poster. While it was awesome, I leave feeling a bit of melancholy. Seeing what remarkable things these people I have done, I look at my professional accomplishments and can't help feeling inadequate and unaccomplished. I'll get over it.

I was disappointed that it rained a lot. That put a damper on doing outdoor activities. I was finally able to see mountains on the day I left.

Part 2: Other observations and occurances

I rented a car and got a Toyota Yaris. What a stupid interior design. The speedometer is in the middle of the dashboard. Stoopid.

I mailed home some dirty laundry to avoid the $15 checked bag charge and to avoid waiting for my bag at the airport. I meant to include some lotion and toothpaste (both nearly full) since those are not allowed on carry-on luggage (they were more than 100 mL). I forgot to include them. IDIOT!!! I was forced to ditch them both in the garbage at the security checkpoint. Lesson learned.

NOS and Boulder beer- Day 2: Part 2

Yesterday was another busy day of lectures and beer pursuits. I recapped a little of it previously. Here is another very brief report. The only reason why I am writing this now is that it is raining outside... again. But, more on that later.

Part 1: The talks

During day two Melanie Sanford gave a fast-moving talk on Pd(II/IV) catalysts. She presented some very interesting work very quickly. Next, Tamio Hayashi talked about Rhodium-catalyzed reactions. I missed some of this because I had to poop. Eric Jacobsen gave a really good presentation on asymmetric hydrogen-bond catalysis. He mentioned a class of H-bond catalysts that are great at the asymmetric part, but they slow the reaction down. This made me wonder how he could call them 'catalysts.' Regardless, it was a wonderful morning of organic chemistry. Later in the evening, Andrew Streiweiser was presented with the Adams Award. He then gave a much more interesting lecture than I expected.

Part 2: The pursuit for beer

In the late afternoon I went out looking for beer. I decided to go to Southern Sun Brewery which is a larger version of the original Moutain Sun. When I got there at 3:50PM I found that it did not open until 4PM. I decided to wait a little while when this happened:

The heavens they opened up and began punishing the world for unknown sins or for my desire to obtain beer, or so it seemed. The hail, it was biblical and it started whitening the ground:

And I was kept from this:
Eventually, I realized I was being a big wimp and so I decided to walk the 30 feet in the rain and get me some beer. And it was very good beer. They only have about 25 beers on tap... I drank the XXX Pale Ale, the Old School Irish stout and Colorado Kind. The Kind was very nice. The Stout was unremarkable. The Pale Ale was an excellent example of the style.

After the poster session (several hours later, mind you), I took a walk to the Mountain Sun Pub and found out why they opened a bigger store. The place was packed with people drinking really, really good beer. I stood in a corner drinking FYIPA, an Amber, and something else I don't remember.

UPDATE: It is 4:09PM Mountain time and I want to go to the Walnut Brewery but am being held hostage by another monsoon. Nice weather, Boulder!