Dr. Janai Ryan-Marie Carr (My amazing little sister)

A few days later I'm still at a loss for words. In most families there is a shining star. Someone who really stands out. Someone who not only meets your expectations, but proceeds to blow those expectations out of the water with a Hiroshima sized atomic bomb. In my family, as much as I wish it was me, I have nothing on my sister Janai. I have called her Jane for as long as I can remember, and as of two days ago, you've got to call her Doctor Carr. Yes, my sister has done something few can say. She has earned a PH.D in Biochemistry. My entire family has always been aware of her high intelligence. She skipped the 1st grade for crying out loud! That aside, as snarky, playful and witty as she can be, this has never masked the fact that she is scary smart. I flew out to Chicago to watch her defend her thesis in front of a room of friends, family, peers and other scary smart scientists. She not only defended it, but made me wonder why or how anyone in their right mind would question her work when her roughly 50 minute talk ended. It was absolutely brilliant. Just listen in to her mentor introduce her:

As you can see, her colleagues not only admire and support her work, but they think what we've always known Jane to be: way above the rest of us mere mortals. One of the heads of her department made a point of pulling us aside and informing us that she was the best student they have ever seen. Did you catch that? EVER! While following all the terms and processes of her work was hard to follow to us laymen, it was obvious that what Jane's doing is nothing short of groundbreaking. I have included a coupe of videos and pictures capturing this occasion below. What goes without saying is that my sister is well on her way to making her imprint in this world and our family could not be any prouder if we tried. Me personally, I couldn't help but puff out my chest as wave after wave of her friends, coworkers and colleagues came by to shake my hand, say congrats, and share their experience with this most extraordinary member to the Carr family. Best of luck Jane, we love you so much. You've made us so proud!
(I apologize for the audio in the videos; she wasn't miked)

Okay...Now say it in English.

This is a longer video, but the thank yous are toward the end. You might see and hear some familiar names *cough* Carr Family *cough, cough*

This is the part where Sean and I got pretty defensive of our sis because how dare they question her awesomeness!!

 Carr family dressed and on aproach

 She looks amazing, I know, but if only you could see the shoes...

 Title of Jane's presentation

 Long name; longer hallways

 This room will be nearly full by the time Jane starts talking. Of course Jane's friend Yalda had to get into the picture.

 Jane talking to her mentor Pradip and another really smart sciency guy

 Just one of her many amazingly detailed and informative slides. This made total sense at the time.

Carr family hanging on Jane's every word; even if we didn't understand it all.

Sean Jr. (my nephlet) didn't quite make it all the way through, but he couldn't have picked a better time to nap

Jane's peers had everything all decked out

If you didn't know, Jane's favorite cake is strawberry shortcake. I normally don't do cake, but this one was phenomenal!

Jane arrives to the party met with roaring applause

Hugs all around!

One for Uncle Don too. It was great to see him again. He seems to fly around the country in order to show up to our stuff. Thanks for all the years of support. We love ya Don!

Nephlet and DeeDee. I hadn't seen DeeDee in a long time. It was great to see you!! We gotta hit the links again soon.

Proud mother

Yeah, it's the cake again, but this time it's not covered!

Yalda, Jane and a proud father. He seems to be talking instead of smiling, which is unusual because he's normally so quiet:)

Looking good Carr family

Uncle Don, Jane and nephlet.

Jane's friends

Looks like they are holding her up. Figuratively that's what they're doing

Yalda, Jane and her other friend Matt.

It's a little blurry, but you can feel the love, right?

Jane standing next to her avatar. As Rowan would say: "Same, same!"

Jane's very "tidy" workstation

 

Jane promised that they weren't doing anything bad to this cute little mouse, but we had our doubts.

The guys down the hall doing a little "work"

This pic was hanging on Jane's workstation wall. Talk about a blast from the New Year's Eve past.

By the way, check back soon for the pics and vids from the rest of my antics in Chi Town...

Dragon on the Ledge

Finally

After hours and hours of screen time, my seniors' rough drafts are finally graded. Managed to finish the last one during the first 10 minutes of my last period class. (I know, I cut it close) Huge weight lifted. After another couple hours I got sub plans written, my classroom organized and ready for the next two days. At the moment I'm trying to get Roe to sleep so I can hit the road and head to Sacramento. Tonight I'll be staying with my little bro and jumping on a plane to Chicago at the crack of dawn tomorrow. I haven't seen my sister since Christmas, and I haven't been to Chicago in a few years. The point of the trip is to watch her defend her thesis and move on to her next step on her way to being a doctor. I'm so proud of her. I'm sad to leave my family, especially my wife, who is super pregnant and needs my help around the house and with Roe. I'll miss them both terribly, but I'm stoked to get outta dodge for a couple days and see my family. I'm not prepared at all for next week but that's Sunday's problem. Now if only this daughter of mine would close her eyes...
By the way, my two YouTube vids are perma linked on my blog so check it out!

In need of a W

For some, sports are second nature. It comes naturally, and with practice, they only get better. For others, it's takes time, effort and all the mental power they can muster to be just okay at a sport. Take a wild guess which category I fall into. Unfortunately, it's the latter. I've always loved to play, but whether it be confidence, ability, drive or all of the above, I've always been just okay at just about every sport I've tried. My shining abilities as a kid was that I could run fast, and jump high. Yes, I know, I'm black, so stereotypically it makes sense. That aside, after a brief ride on the bench as a sophomore on the freshman basketball team, I figured my abilities should be used far away from the gym's hardwood floors. (I won't even mention middle school bball with my dad coaching no-less!) I found a new place on the dirt track of my small ass school. There I did well, being good at the two main skills required of a track athlete. I ran fast, and jumped high. My record for the 100m dash was 11.88, and my highest high jump was just about my height at the time. Somewhere around 5'6". Sound impressive? Maybe for a small school competing against other really small schools, but it was only enough for 2nd. There was always a guy from Mariposa who beat me in the 100m and I was too short, (even jumping my height) to win the high jump.
Toward the end of my junior year my dad was really getting into golf and sometime later I acquired his old clubs. The perfect sport for a guy in my situation, right? Yes and no. For a solid decade I played occasionally (it's an expensive habit I used to say) and improved in barely conceivable increments during that time. If my high school had a golf team I think I would have improved faster considering how often I would have been playing and competition (in golf anyway) I play better. My school naturally waited until I had graduated to start a team and I had to get rounds in when I could, paying out the ass all the way.
Long story short, I have always loved to play golf. In the last four years or so, I finally found a way to play more often. I always liked having consistent buddies to play with so I dragged my brother in law out onto the course one day. Being the former in my little intro, he got hooked and started playing a lot. When I say a lot, take what you think a lot of golf is a double it (at least). Needless to say he got better, fast. My father in law's bed business FloBeds sponsored our team and we compete in match play events Monday nights starting in April. Unfortunately, I'm back where I started, feeling like the bench warmer on a team of stars. Granted, my handicap has dropped from roughly a 28 to hovering near 16. Team Flobeds won season 2 (see early post for my heroics) and placed 2nd last year, losing in a playoff. Still, last year I won only 3 matches and one was because the other team only had 3 guys, so I won by default.
This year I felt great going in. I've changed a few things mentally and physically with my game and I figured I really couldn't lose if I came to play. Then I remembered, it's golf. I tied my match last week, and last night, the only reason I tied was because the guy I played choked on his last putt, on the last hole. Upon reflection, I can't help but feel like I used to. The rest of my team is undefeated and playing great, and once again I'm just okay. I'm ready for my first win of the year, so I can at least contribute to a team, and a game, that I love.

Easter ups n downs

It's Easter Sunday and once again, up before 7am. Love my little girl for that! Anyway, once I got my ass out of bed Roe was just adorable looking for Easter eggs around the living room. The downside to the day is the stress has returned. I'm back to work tomorrow, and I haven't started the senior papers, and honestly I'm not sure if it's gonna happen. I feel like I'm letting the kids down, but my goal today is to be a good dad and husband. I've just finished my 1 of 2 church services of the year with the in-laws, and yes, Mass is still the same. After attending Catholic school from K-8th grade, two times a year is more than enough. Anyway, seven weeks of work and probably less until my little baby Zoey enters the world. I just have to remember to take one thing at a time. Gotta find done time to work today...

Procrastination and PB&J

I'm trying out this mobile blog thing and it's pretty cool. The wife wants to go on a walk, but what I SHOULD be doing is grading senior papers. Will it get done? Not likely today, but it really should be done by Monday. Let's see, that's forty 6-8 pages papers edited and commented on during my spring break. Since it's vacation do I actually have to work? Sadly, the answer is: always. I worked one day this week already and I feel that's plenty. Shouldn't English teachers be able to take time off too? My fear is that the answer is no. On the other hand my daughter got a silly amount of jelly on her shirt, so now it's off, and she's decided to make "spicy" pretend peanut butter and jelly sandwiches. That makes me smile.

Star Wars: The Old Republic

A new, bad ass, Star Wars MMO. Trying to be really patient since there is still no release date. Should be sometime this year (fingers crossed). If you are into MMOs and love Star Wars, here are some of my favorite sites with very frequent updates about the game. Feel free to join my guild here.


Official SWTOR site.
TORWars (my favorite fan site)
Correllian Run Radio



Dragon on the Ledge

When we met

Nine years ago I met someone. Four years ago I married that someone. Yes, it's been that long. As long as it's been, I can still remember the night I met my wife like it happened yesterday. Sure, that's a bit cliche, but what else can I say. Let me take you back nine years...

I was taking a poetry class my second quarter at UCSC. I had a small group of poetry nerds I hung out with, and every Tuesday we'd head down to 99 Bottles of Beer on the wall to take over the upstairs area, drink pitchers of discounted beer and write poetry. One Tuesday night, my buddy Tim brought his newish girlfriend, Freda. It just so happened that Freda had a roommate named Katie. That night I walked into the restaurant and I saw Tim talking to his girlfriend at the bar. I walked up to meet his new girl and Freda introduced me to her roommate.

Never in my life had I met someone so unique. (Keep in mind that I was going to UCSC) This girl had short red hair following the curves of her rounded face. Bangs hanging draped over one eye. Her eyes were not the same color and her smile was just so sweet. She was wearing socks on her hands cut into arm warmers. One was pink and one was purple. Her black skirt hung knee length hiding the tops of her black knee-high socks which disappeared into low top Doc Martins...

The next thing I remember, we were sitting upstairs with everyone else, only talking to each other. We sat across the table from each other, lost in our own bubble of a conversation. At some point everyone else left, leaving behind many empty pitchers of beer. Buzzed and not wanting the night to end, we decided to close the Irish pub down the block, Rosie McCann's. Every day after we spent together...that was 9 years ago.

To my best friend, wife and love of my existence...Happy Anniversary!!!

Dragon on the Ledge