I use photoshop very often to put together figures. Especially lately. And today, when I felt like goofing off, what did I do? I opened photoshop. Kind of sad? Or kind of beautiful? Anyway here are two scenes from Canada: (1) This is a picture from a walkway I used to love in Mont Royal Park.

(2) "Pink Lake" is in the Gatineau Park, and for some reason I just really like how it looks in deep, deep pink. I am a simple person.

What the what? Is this real???? (Mind exploding)

I'm really thankful that I was thrown into "Music for young children" (MYC) classes at an early age. Look at this: now scientists have evidence that music training makes preschoolers smarter, at least in terms of a measure of "verbal intelligence". Oh you crazy scientists from Toronto, experimenting on preschoolers. Finally, science my mother (who is an MYC teacher) can get behind.

I read this today about BrdU birthdating: "one of the most misused techniques in neuroscience" (Taupin, Brain Research Reviews, 2007). Easy to say about pretty much any technique, but in this case I sort of agree. To celebrate I have written a poem:

Boundless cell labeling
Relentless quantification
Dosage dependent artifacts aplenty
Unendurable

Although there is kind of a lot of negativity in science, so I must counter myself with:

Bountiful germinal territories
Replicating cells spinning and grooving
Dancing out of the ventricular zone
Undetectable? Not for long!

So apparently male crickets are more chivalrous than you are. Can you deal with that?

The cortical area for embarrassment is the pregenual angular cingulate cortex (pACC), and it's shaped like a boomerang. Anyone want a lesion?