new project

i have been working on my jclub presentation the last two days, so even though i finished sweet relationship this weekend, i haven't found a new drama to watch yet. finally i finished the ppt tonight, and now i have also decided on my new project: bump off lover. actually i have been meaning to watch this for quite some time. but when i first wanted to, i couldn't find the episodes. tonight i realized that trusty mysoju.com has just finished posting all the episodes!

i know there are horror dramas, which i can't imagine being scared for like 14 episodes on end...would i just live in fear for 2 weeks? anyway, i'm not sure if this drama is actually supposed to be scary, but it'll definitely be a change from the normal romantic comedy idol dramas i like so much. i'll probably start watching tomorrow night.

tonight i was browsing dramawiki. they have a page for listing tw 2006 dramas, a page for 2007 dramas, and a page for 2008 dramas. so i was looking to see what dramas i haven't seen that are worth watching. this is how i decided to watch bump off lover. there is also a page for upcoming tw dramas. turns out, there is an upcoming drama called 劍道．愛("jian dao. ai" or "kendo. love"). there isn't a synopsis page yet, but all i can say is...THEY TOTALLY COPIED ME! i wrote a drama called 跆拳道﹐ 愛到 ("tai quan dao, ai dao" or "taekwondo, love came"). check out my drama!

fertilization

today i had an almost perfect fertilization with my super fertile fresh testes! in a petri dish of hundreds of xenopus eggs, only 2 did not fertilize. i'm so good at fertilizing eggs...muahahahah!

here's part of my job (i do this 3 times a week):

• ~one week before fertilization, i inject a low dose of human chorionic gonadotropin into a female xenopus. this is to prime her, or get her eggs ready and at the same stage. (at first, i was really nervous about giving frogs injections, because you can't be like, "okay don't move, or it'll hurt more." but it's okay, seems like they usually can't feel the injection at all!)
  
• the night before fertilization, i inject a high dose of human chorionic gonadotropin into the primed female.
• the morning of fertilzation, i squeeze and massage the female, while aiming her butt at a petri dish. eggs come squirting out into the dish! (easier said than done. you have to grab both legs of the frog, split them apart and stretch them out so she can't kick herself out of your hands. and it's best if you cover her eyes so she feels safe. and you have to massage and squeeze her while you are at it. and you only have 2 hands. i am now an EXPERT at this!)
  
• meanwhile, i drugged a male frog, cut it open, dissected out its testes, and stored the testes in the cold room. they can be used for up to 1 month!
• i cut a small piece of a testis, mash it up with teethed forceps, and touch all the eggs with my testis.
• i wait 3 minutes, allowing all the sperm to attach to the eggs.
• then, i flood the dish with water. the osmotic shock makes the eggs take in the sperm!
• ~1.5 hours later, the single cell eggs should have begun to divide into two cells!
• and my embryos are on their way to growing up!

these xenopus embryos are in two cell stage. i stole this picture, but this is pretty much what my embryos look liked. unfortunately, many times, instead of looking like this, the the embryos are all rotten and smelly.