• #cu boulder

On April 17th and 18th, the “What Is a Feminist Lab?” Symposium will take place at the University of Colorado Boulder.

It is co-organized by Maya Livio, Lori Emerson, and Thea Lindquist. The event will examine the recent proliferation of labs, survey the lab landscape, and explore ways in which intersectional feminist approaches can be integrated into labs and the work they do.

While I won’t be in town, the speaker list looks awesome. If this is a topic you are interested in, send the organizers an email to get involved.

• #life dinner
• #quote

A friend from a long time ago, who I hadn’t heard from in a while, sent me an email with a wonderful nugget in it.

I just got back from Oahu and had an interesting experience on Waikiki Beach.   My son and I were boogie boarding and there were several people taking surfing lessons out in the waves with instructors. As the intrepid beginners got up on their boards and surfed one of their first waves, the instructors would invariably be shouting directives to them.

One of them was, “Direction you look is the direction you go!”

I was wrestling with this last night at life dinner with Amy. I am still Nev’s spell, so my brain only partially belongs to me right now. We were talking about where we were going, both literally (as in “should we do an upcoming trip next week”) but more importantly, figuratively.

Our best life dinners are the ones where we talk about the direction we are heading in, why we are heading there, and if we want to head there. We generally get a little time each month on the first day of the month to discuss this; last night it consumed almost all of the conversation, at least when I wasn’t sneezing.

While this conversation is often fun, it’s occasionally difficult. Last night was a mix, as I realized there was lots of different places I was looking at, which was preventing me from going toward one of them. And, the ones that I most wanted to go to weren’t getting many looks.

Anyone who plays sports knows this metaphor well. But it’s equally as good as a metaphor for one’s professional and personal life.

• #april fools

I used to think April Fools Day was interesting. Companies and people brought out clever web jokes, many of them subtle and almost believable. Some were entertaining, some were cringeworthy, but few were offensive.

Now, the whole thing is just extraordinarily annoying. Maybe it’s because I’m getting old and crabby. It could be because of my friend Nev who has taken up residence in my brain. It’s possible that it makes me feel like my tech news feeds have been invaded by the same kind of endless nonsense that now invades all other news feeds.

Or maybe it’s just easier to skip a day on the web, let people do whatever they are going to do, and pick it up on again on April 2nd.

In the meantime, if you want to play the classic game of Snake, Google Maps has you covered today.