Validation

I like it when what I think is true about the world is corroborated by a much more systematic view of the literature. I always have this fear I'm missing some major article, and it appears I'm not when it comes to HIV-related stigma.

I took a break from data analysis (which I'm redoing in a different way) because I just hit total frustration with the way some of this data works out... there's a question on the survey about whether the respondent used a condom the last time they had sex followed very shortly by a question asking how often the person uses condoms. You would not believe the number of people who say they used a condom last time but then say they never use condoms and, worse, the number who say they didn't use a condom last time followed by saying they always use condoms. OMG, are you not listening to your own answers! Never mind the big hunk of missing data I can't account for at all, other than people didn't want to answer the question.

So instead I'm reading, because that is way less frustrating and I have a huge pile.

Vacation has been good so far. We've mostly been bumming around, eating and shopping. We've re-devoted ourselves to making our way through the Sopranos (I already watched it all, but Joey has not). We're not doing anything fancy for New Year's Eve, just going to a tasty local Italian joint and then partying at home.

The New Year will bring attempts at: 1) real weight loss; 2) getting these manuscripts out the door because they are actually going to fill some gaps in the literature; 3) writing up a real research plan for my next study instead of having some vague notions of what might be nice.

Seriously

Data analysis has to be done carefully.  Otherwise it has to be redone.  And redone.

Chrome!

Holy hell is Google Chrome so much better than the ancient broken version of IE that is installed on my work computer!  It's probably also better than the newer version that ought to be on here.  I'm just glad it installed without the need for admin privs... I'm just going to assume I'm not breaking any regs by using a more secure browser.  Seriously, though, try it out if you haven't already.  It's so fast.

I'm still working on this damn paper.  Instead of writing, which is what I thought I'd be doing today, I fired up SPSS to check some things in the analysis.  Oh, there are so many things in the analysis that bother me, now that I actually look at it.  I'm going to try to tidy some things, but I don't think the analysis will change substantially.  SPSS is extremely easy to use, but there are some places where I'm looking for functionality that exists in Stata and I'm not finding it.  It may be that I just don't know what I'm doing, but it's also likely that SPSS is just not super sophisticated.

I'm glad I'm going over the paper with a fine-toothed comb, however... there are some clear wtf moments that I think reviewers might notice.

This week is going by a little too slowly for my tastes.  I really can't wait to get out of town.

Buttons!

One of the buttons popped off my coat late last winter season, and I just ignored it (despite how dumb it looked) until another button popped off last week (with a third button looking pretty shady). Now, it would help immensely if I hadn't gotten so, well, immense since I purchased the coat. It's now a snug fit. This morning I saw that Amazon had coats on sale, and nearly decided just to buy a new coat.

But in these internetting times there's really no excuse for not making such an easy repair -- I figured out everything I needed to know online in about 10 minutes, I dug up some sewing floss (threads wound together for things like cross-stitch so you can actually see it) and got those three buttons back on there good. Success! So now my coat works again, even though it's still a little snug, but that's a different problem.

Last night we went to Baltimore for a number of social activities. We met up at Maggie's with Joe's soc friends, and then we went to dinner for my friend's birthday (which was actually Monday, but she had horrible grant writing to do all that day). Then Joe and I went back to Maggie's before going back home. Baltimore is great when you spend 2/3 of your time there at Maggie's. Today we went grocery shopping, thus getting maximum utility out of the ZipCar. I'm kinda missing having my own car, though, and I'm pondering whether to get it fix now that it's been a few months since the last repairs, instead of an insulting three weeks. I still wouldn't drive it to work, since that commute is very hard on a car and the bus is easy enough (when it comes predictably) and gives me exercise. But it'd be nice to have it for errands and such. I dunno, we'll see.

This week is the last actually at work, and then I'm going to NJ for 2 weeks! I have to "work at home" three days in there somewhere, which should be easy enough with Joe hacking away at his dissertation. It should be otherwise relaxing.

R.I.P. H.M.

Henry Gustav Molaison, thanks for the memories!

Mid-week

I'm already looking forward to the next vacation! I want some more eggplant!

The ceiling has finally been fully restored to my office, so I think they must be completely done in here. Nothing is coming out of the heater despite my requests to the thermostat I now have in here, but it's not actually that cold -- I'm just a big baby. Now that I have a ceiling and no evening visitors to wreck my stuff, I reassembled my lamp (I hid it in a drawer because it was constantly being moved, including once out into the hallway). During the ceiling mess they installed a motion sensor on my light, which would be useful if I had a strong interest in using my light. Now that I have a ceiling for the lamp to reflect off of, I'd prefer to go back to that. I had to cover the sensor so that the overhead fluorescent grossness wouldn't click on everytime I wiggled in my chair. Now my office is cozy again.

Too cozy... I'm feeling sleepy.

I need to get this paper out the door. It really just needs some updates, but I'm finding myself tortured by some of the language we used in the paper, which is slowing me down some. Also the abstract is deeply flawed, and I don't understand why journals only give you 150 words. Gotta get pithy, I guess.