marriage and motherhood.

With the announcement of engagements among friends in my graduating class, I realize that many of us are going to be parents by the time I get out of graduate school- one of my friends was married and pregnant at graduation.  Now, you can't be a parent without being an adult yourself, so this must mean we are entering real adulthood. On the other hand, I do believe that parents grow up with their kids, that parenthood is best learned with experience. My parents look like giddy kids when I look at my baby pictures now, but I remember thinking they were infinitely older and wiser.

The average age of first-time mothers has been steadily increasing for the past decades from 21.4 in 1970 to 25.0 in 2006. There is also a greater percentage of first-time mothers at an older age.

Source

A woman's fertility usually peaks at 22, and after 35 it is significantly harder for a woman to get pregnant. But think about the fact that a typical person graduates college at 22, spends four years in graduate school and another four to settle into a job and maybe a relationship- she may be 30 when she can even begin to consider having kids.

There has been much recent debate about part-time female doctors and their attempt at balancing family and career. But why is this a female issue? It takes two to have a kid, and behind every woman making a choice between family and career is a man who takes his job-option for granted.

Anyway, during my career crisis, I chatted with many professionals settled into their careers and curiously, all of the women asked if I were in a serious relationship, reminding me that this is an important aspect to consider when making life choices. But I wonder if they would have asked the same questions to males, if my male counterparts were reminded to consider marriage and family in constructing their life timelines.

I hope that I don't have to make such decisions in the future(I hope I never have to decide or choose), since a successful career is valuable for me and I would like to make full use of my education. But I think I am already ahead of the parenthood game, for example, I already know:
- how to negotiate bedtime
- how to find a pacifier under blankets and pillows in record time
- how to speak baby-talk

why can't research be perfect???

Familia has asked me to please put up some pictures of myself- so here we go. Today was the longest day over, and it's still not over yet. I woke up and frantically finished frosting the cupcakes I had baked the night before. I headed out to drop off the cupcakes at the volunteer organization, walking down the stairs juggling two dozen cupcakes, a lunchbox, and my hugemontacious tote bag.

I got into work later than usual, so I stayed over to finish up a task I had planned to finish by today. Unfortunately, some of our samples need to be re-prepped.

saddest thing to see on your screen at 7:30PM

When I saw that these streak marks on the sample, I wanted to cry. Then I remembered the security cameras above me.

One good thing was that there is no rush hour at 8PM. I stopped by Whole Foods and spent an idle twenty minutes looking at food and finally picked up a Muesli bread snack.

De-licious.

I feel like I've been working full-time forever, although it's hardly been two months. When I told my co-worker our samples are not ready, that they must be polished again, he warned me to "not go crazy"- I think he knows me well already. One thing at a time. Research can't be perfect all the time.

But Entourage is baaaaack!

am I average in my time and money use?

I like to compare myself to the average man. I don't mean in terms of accomplishments or education, since I am well aware that with my Bachelor's degree I've joined the 6.7% of the world population with college degrees. I am both proud and grateful about this accomplishment. But you know, it's the little things I think about, like: how much do others spend on groceries a week? How often do people do their laundry? How much do people sleep every day?

Deviating from the average on these minor points wouldn't make me abnormal, but still, I am curious. It turns out that Bureau of Labor Statistics compiles data on Americans' daily time use- they have done all the work for me already (ha ha), with the American Time Use Survey in 2009.

For instance, take a look at this:

- The average full-time college student sleeps 8.3 hours a day (really?) and an average of 3.3 hours studying, which is about 23 hours a week. This means that assuming they are taking 15 credits as semester and attending all the lectures, they spend about 8 hours studying outside of classes.

- The average male and female 20-24 years of age sleep for 9.4 hours a day. This means I don't have to feel like a lame ball for going to bed at midnight.

And how the average household spends its dollar$:

- Since the average household of 2.5 spends about $6372 a year on food, that comes out to about an average of $212/month for a single person.

Here's my latest favorite commercial- you gotta live those hours, spend those dollars.

"Kinsey": behavior behind closed doors.

Saturday evening after grocery shopping and literature search for work, I scrolled through U-Verse and found "Kinsey". It starred Liam Neeson and Laura Linney, and I recognized the name Alfred Kinsey from a psychology study I'd read for a psychology class. Press play.

Alfred Kinsey, an entomologist by nature who studied gall wasps, realized the need for a widespread study on sexual behavior while lecturing a marriage course at Indiana University. Realizing the lack of public knowledge and conversation about sex and sexuality, he began collecting information on people's sexual history through verbal questionnaires. He eventually published the results of his questionnaires on around 18,000 people in the Sexual Behavior in the Human Male and Sexual Behavior in the Human Female, known collectively as the Kinsey Reports.

The movie portrays struggles in Kinsey's professional and personal life. He struggled with his own sexuality including his (and his wife's) relationship with his assistant Clyde Martin portrayed by Peter Sarsgaard. The movie is informative and moving but never overwhelming. The different conflicts Kinsey deals with fade in and out (even the climax of the movie when his health is failing and Rockefeller Foundation withdraws their funding), but the movie is a overall satisfying portrayal of a great man who triumphs against social "propriety" to bring a much needed conversation out from closed doors.

It is rated R, and the subject matter may be touchy for some people. I highly recommend it- you may learn more from this movie than you did from your high school Health class, for example, that people's sexuality fit more onto a spectrum than a dichotomy (Kinsey scale).

cutest little ones.

There's more sprinkles than ice cream in there

"Oh my god, you might wanna mix it up before you eat it!"

Life with little ones is liberating and fun(ny). Why is that we have more reservations about life when we are old enough to know consequences don't matter? It's Friday! TGIF.