Lab Time

The labs today and Monday were pretty cool- we got to denature proteins, load our samples onto electrophoresis, and use antibodies to isolate actin. I think tensegrity stuff will be pretty interesting as well.

The beach trip on Sunday was nice. I fell asleep for two hours on the sand but it was nice hanging out by the water. The coolest thing was seeing these two girls draw cartoons on the beach boardwalk with charcoal. They were drawing characters like Wall-E and Spongebob just from their memory, and a long strip of the boardwalk was just full of these awesome drawings. You don't get to see something like that often.

I hope everyone's enjoying the second week so far.

-Min Lee

Coconut posicles have a lot of calories

HI THERE.

OKAY BYE.


just kidding! cosmos has been a blast! i really like my thuper cool friends and i learned a lot about them over the weekend! knotts was really fun; i liked that there were rollercoasters that were different from the amusement park i have where i live. a lot of them are the same too though. that's cool too! jello fight was a real experience of its own. now i can tell people that i've been in one! i ate some of it though. it got splashed into my face. that wasnt very appetizing.

beach:
jumping pictures
10 fingers (WOAH x])
sand in EVERYTHING
i heart you!

coooool beans.


i dont like latex gloves. they're really sticky.

gel electrophorosis is fun! =)

by the time i leave camp i will know how to solve a rubik's cube.

okay NOW bye!

ps. i hope my friend finds her swimsuit so that she can go swimming! =)

jellooo!

So the first week of cosmos is over. Despite having more homework than I expected, it was a pretty fun week.

I've never been to Knott's Berry Farm before. It's a small theme park but I liked the rides. The Silverbullet was an intense roller coaster. Then on Sunday we went to the beach. The water was freezing and there was hardly any sun, but it was nice to just relax. And then there was the jello fight. It wasn't exactly jello though and it did not taste good. I cannot wait until next weekend...sleeping in is always nice.

~Amna

My Thumb Hurts

Dear Cluster 7,

Sorpreeze! I'm glad we are looking at some experiments that have actual value, instead of looking at meece and porcine blood through microscopes (although the camera microscope was chill).

Just a little anecdote: I hurt my fingy playing volley and I got so saddie. It throbs so awfully. Then, to make it all worse, a camera crew came up to me and interviewed me because they thought I had a broken finger. OCEAN FORCE! It was the dratted documentary crew that interviews others on their appreciation of the lifeguards.

I said the stupidest thing: "Yeah, some of these lifeguards save lives like doctors ... " (that's good so far).

J.M.

... "and some of them are, like, Olympic swimmers".

D'oh.

Have a good rest of week cuz' I'm not gonna post.

I Just Wasted 10 Seconds of Your Life

Christina says I should post just in case I don't have time later. We are going to have two essays soon. I wouldn't mind all the assignments if they gave us more computer time. I mean, I have a lot of free time to worry about when we can use the computers. We voiced our complaints, so hopefully things will change around here.

LAB!!

Throwing a shout out to everyone at home and at COSMOS from here in the lab where we are loading gels with Blood cells. The essay that was due this morning literally killed me, no lie. And now we have yet another one due Friday, except this one is more than straight info so I may actually have to use my brain. GASP! Now it is my turn to load and I am afraid that I will be the first person to royally screw up and spill over the gel, or puncture it.
More to come,
Amanda Albi

So we're onto the second week! We're getting more independent now since we're no longer escorted by our RA's to class. I can't wait for the campus tour. Last weekend we went to Knotts Berry Farm and the beach. I used up one whole bottle of suscreen since we spent many hours in the sun. We ran into many UCI COSMOS students and I even ran into my friend Valerie from Harker. (: The best part of Knotts was riding the Pony Express to intense Western music and having Dippin' Dots all while bonding with my friends. At the beach, we did even more intense bonding, jumped waves, and played a couple of games in the shallow water. We also took cool pictures of us jumping in mid-air. [: Hopefully when I find my swimsuit amongst my luggage we can go swimming next time. -_- Okay, it's time to load our sample into the well now. Goodbye!

PS - I really like my random lab partner. =)

So, the second week of COSMOS is starting. Our first weekend was pretty fun. We went to Knott's on Saturday. Chantal tried to make Tiffany, Shannon, and me go on Silver Bullet, but we were all too cowardly to go. =D So we ended up going on Sidewinder, Jaguar, Perilous Plunge, Bigfoot Rapids, and Ghostrider. We saw RA's everywhere, and we also got to see some of the UC Irvine COSMOS people. I saw my friend there, so I'm happy. Ghostrider was pretty fun. We got in a really long line for the two back rows (our RA's who had lined up behind us went two rounds before us), but I guess it was worth it! The drops were really intense and unexpected, especially with Chantal telling us it was a REALLY slow ride with absolutely no drops. It turned out to be the opposite. Anyway, Knott's was fun, and we got to stay a good hour and a quarter after the Irvine COSMOS people until 9:45.

Yesterday we went to the beach. I didn't feel like going all the way in, so I waded in a little bit with Shannon. It was still fun anyway. Maybe next week I'll go all the way in...

I'd better get back to work now. We're restarting our lab work. We're going to be analyzing our ghost membrane samples from last week for the membrane proteins, which will be pretty cool. We're going to be loading our samples into the gel for the SDS-PAGE.

Have a good day!


~C.S.

5

Today we are doing a lab that involves gel electrophoresis, which is pretty interesting. Some people in other clusters are complaining about the lack of interest, but what we're doing now is fun. The subject is for what I got on the AP bio test. I'm really happy. XD I worked so hard for that, completely self-study. I'm so glad I didn't pay for that $700 class some of my friends took to prepare for it.
Knott's was really fun, I went on Silver Bullet three times! The lines were long and the food kind of bad with those vouchers, but I still had a good time. The Bigfoot Rapids wasn't worth it, the line was so long and I got really wet. I screamed a lot, as I hate being wet, and Dylan didn't even get wet at all (he told me he wanted to). Nevertheless, I had a good time.
i'll write more later, I guess.

One Week Down, 3 Weeks To Go

So the first week is over. It has definitely been a roller coaster, like the ones at Knott's Berry Farm. I did not go on any, although I did have a good time. My legs were very sore though. Anyway, there has definitely been some up and downs. The homework is killing me. I'm glad I was able to obtain my laptop from my mom, however it does not have Microsoft Word which is a pain. I hope next week the homework will be lighter although I just learned we have another paper due Friday. This does not seem like it is getting any easier. I am learning a lot though and that is the purpose of COSMOS. Whever was grading the COSMOlympics must have been crazy. Cluster 7 should have won, or at least get 3rd! The beach and jello fight were lots of fun. I can't wait for this week, hopefully there will be less homework.

Forever Young

Hey there!
Never got to talk about how we lost (yet so totally WON) the cosmolympics. Yeah. ROCK THE BOAT! I was our pie eater, but it was actually really gross pudding and I felt really sick afterward.
We went to Knotts yesterday. Christina, Shannon, and Tiffany were so chicken. I couldn't get them on to the Silver Bullet, but we ended up going on Perilous Plunge and Ghost Rider. Instead of pictures, the Ghost Rider ride has a video camera now so we could see me on scream perfectly pronouncing, "Oh, there are no droppps---OH SHOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOT!!!" as the coaster dropped us like an egg. Seriously, Ghost Rider is x10 as fast at nighttime for some reason.
Today I went to the beach. Shannon and Christina didn't want to go deep in to the water but I was able to go with Tiffany and we had fun stringing seaweed together. I realized how mature cosmos people are. Min has a inner child of 40 so he just slept at the beach (he says he is going through a middle age crisis and we were all very childish). My advice to cosmos peeps: We are teenagers! We are californians! GO TO THE BEACH AND GET IN THE WATER!
Bye.

Sunday Post

I think it goes without saying that our cluster should've placed in the Top 3 at Cosmo Olympics, if not won it all. But it was more fun than I expected, and we all did great. Knott's Berry Farm was boring for me because I live a couple blocks away from the park- I wish we had gone to Wild Animal Park or Sea World. I'm looking forward to going to San Diego Zoo, though.

The workload for our cluster is heftier than I thought. I hear a lot of people saying that our cluster has the most amount of homework. I can't really complain because I at least have a laptop. For the people who have to check out laptops, it really sucks. Hope we get some time off this week. Peace.

First Week: Done

This first week was beyond full of homework for us. It was mostly because Amanda and I went first on the scientists report, so the research report got pushed back to the next day, and then the lab questions got pushed back to the last day. Come to think of it, I suppose this is pretty good practice for in college and - actually - my next year of high school.


Well, that is all for now, Daniel broke his toe, so I am waiting for him to return and see if he needs any help.

It's Getting Warmer

Hey guys

An academic week has already/finally passed and I think I'm really beginning to get absorbed into all of the stuff we're doing. Everyone here- especially in my cluster- undoubtedly has a lot of potential to be the next nobel prize winner. no joke! The work is substantial I guess; it's just really difficult because of how little time we're given to do it. Time is precious here! But i'm looking forward to getting a chance to swim and get a few laps in today; it's really hard to get some exercise in!

That's excluding the four 15 minute walks we have to make from ERC to the bioengineering building.

Knotts tomorrow, beach the next day. It should be really fun if its not too crowded everywhere

Catch ya laterr.

WTH

hay, I'm writing so i don't get in trouble, nothing to report, other than the cosmos Olympics was RIGGED, we should have at leased ranked.... uh, that's about it, the bonfire was AWESOME, but mostly because i was with my friends. other than that it was unorganized and too short.

Thank goodness it's almost the weekend! I can't wait to sleep in tomorrow and on Sunday. I might go to the bookstore during Free Time today to get a UCSD sweatshirt. Going to the beach on Wednesday was definitely a fun experience. I've never felt such fine sand or lit a marshmallow on fire (literally) before. Last night's COSMOlympics was so intense. =P Dressing up and screaming were probably the best parts. I'm glad our cluster is bonding well. [: This morning we got to work with blood again so the labs are still part of the highlights of the day. I'm still getting used to the showers that randomly turn from hot to cold and vice versa, but I really like our Suite. I'm surprised (in a good way) that we get In-N-Out tonight and I'm looking forward to it! The walks to and from class are tiring but an excellent form of exercise, especially on the hills. Hope Knotts Berry Farm tomorrow is as good as I remember it was!

I love Fridays

Yay!! It's finally Friday..the end of the week.
I am looking forward to tonight and tomorrow.
Of course I'm excited to go to the pool and Knotts, but also sleeping in.
I've been waking up too early;;
I hope the Lab 5 essays does not take too long, because our study time is very limited.
So far, I am enjoying myself here at UCSD.
All of the people I've met so far are really cool. =]
Almost a week has passed, and I've pretty much adjusted.
The most difficult part is walking uphill to the classes, but at least I'll be in shape for season.
Hope everyone else is having fun too!
Knotts tomorrow!
Woot woot!!
-Hyungju Kim

First Week is donee

Hey all!

Like my cluster mates below me have said, we dominated the Cosmolympics and I'm being absolutely honest, we should have won, or at least placed. Everybody was incredible and the spirit was fun. I'm glad we have such enthusiastic kids in our cluster, I know my roommate said nobody in his cluster was really into chants and competing, which sounds boring. Our relay race was awesome, we finished a good 5 seconds before anybody else so kudos to all those in the race with me.

We got through the first week with no problems really. I'm really tired though and I'll admit it, I've zoned out a couple times when it's really dark. Everybody complains about the homework load but really, what else would we expect. I'm not too bothered, I know it could be worse. Plus I'm learning a lot of new stuff, it's not just review anymore. The post-lab questions are pretty tough and stretch out my mind, but I like the stretching. I should be working on my 4 PAGE SINGLE SPACED ESSAY now so I'm going to switch gears. See you all on the flip side..

Ev

P.S. Mom, Dad, Andy: If you're reading this, I love you guys! And call me as soon as my AP scores come in!

Cosmos Poem

Mouse blood and pig blood and many pipettes,
Moving liquids from one container to the next,
Essays about diseases I've never heard of, I study
Instead of getting much needed rest.

My eyelids fall heavy, and my chin falls flat
Good thing Ms. Nicely is there to wake me up
With a small pat on my back.

People here are very interesting
Socially awkward perhaps, but so am I
So it all works out somehow; a great dynamic.
More people to meet means more things to learn,
Funny how that works.

But buildings are nice, and air conditioned
The chairs are comfortable and the food is good
I'm working hard and trying to listen
Twenty some more days of this, I'm down.

Josh Denogean

400 Block: It's better on top! ; )

Porcine Blood

Good job everyday. It's almost the end of the week and we're closer to the prize? What prize you ask? The Prize.

Really liked that olympics, even though I lost the balloon toss for us. I'd like to give a shoutout to Evan and Josh for growing a pair of wheelbarrows and owning the race.

Also, thanks to Min and Christine for getting all those tough questions.

Nice job on the Paris Hilton question, Min.

J.M.