First off, thank you all for your kind words. Seriously, your support has meant a lot and I really appreciate it :)
"Caffeine" 10x14in
That said... Guess what time is? Time for me to beg you to fund my funemployment in exchange for paint splatters! wheeee! So if you want a painting, email me: cristina dot tortarolo at gmail and we can talk specs.
[For people who requested something last summer that I wasn't able to get to: I'm really really sorry- ended up getting a job and running out of time. If you're still interested let me know, I just don't want to make any assumptions.]
"Get In" 16x20in
While I started out mostly doing characters from movies I think I'm finally ready to move away from that. But whatever, who am I kidding, I'll do pretty much anything :3 Lately I've been illustrating quotes and that's been really fun. (You can check out past stuff here) Also anything from graffiti is fair game.
"Auguries of Innocence" graffiti
If you have ABSOLUTELY NO IDEA what you'll want we can chat and figure something out. I'm just. that. desperate. :)
"Sound and Fury" graffiti
Rough estimate-wise, I'm thinking a $10 base + $5/hour. So depending on size and the complexity of the image it'll probably fall somewhere in these ranges:
~50in^2 $20-30
~100in^2 $40-50
~200in^2 $100-120
This is definitely something we can talk about more in depth via email per individual case. Just throwing around some general numbers.
"Doors of Perception" 8x16in
Lastly, I've decided to set up shop on Etsy, so that's where I'll be posting anything random that doesn't get sold. Heads up.
I officially fail at social media. Told myself I was going to liveblog the bejesus out of this year's Society for Neuroscience conference but of course I chose the road more easy to travel by: a path paved with 140 characters and mobile connectivity. In my defense I was pretty busy during the daytime wandering around the convention center, stalking awesome professors and refueling on Starbucks grande chai lattes. But anyway, so that the nerdtastic excitement and general awesomeness of everything don't wither away in my terrible-excuse-for-LTM storage, I've decided to extrapolate my memories from posts to the twitterverse and hope this compiles a somewhat coherent narration of experiences.
It really was though. Airports are usually such depersonalized spaces: you're surrounded by thousands of people shuffling brusquely along in their own worlds, too worried about their own travel plans and schedule to waste time interacting with others. Understandable. Still, it was nice to look around and be able to connect with these complete strangers without saying a word: I knew why they were here and where they were going. It felt like we were all part of some secret club except instead of a complicated handshake, membership is demonstrated with long, awkwardly shaped luggage (even though technically I didn't have one. Boo. Joined my lab too late to be included in the abstract submission. But hey, I could still appreciate the unspoken bond.)
Touched down on Golden ground and had our spirits instantly lifted. How can you not smile at such a gorgeous state? We took shuttles provided by the conference to our hotel and were welcomed by this view. Immediately made a pact with my roommate to miss our returning flight and become bums on some, any, street corner of this beautiful city. But enough about our plans for umbrella tent shelters- IT'S TIME FOR #CONFERENCEBANTER.
View from our hotel room. Rockstar.
I really wish I could have taken pictures to capture the enormity of this convention. It was just... mindblowing. Humbling, even. Here are 30,000ish people that have come together to learn and share and explore research in a fantastically broad field. I was surrounded by molecular biologists, geneticists, computer scientists, engineers; people who work with worms, rats, clinical populations, controls; studies that utilize psychopharmacology, neuroimaging, behavioral psych measures... the list goes on. Yet we're all here on the same mission: to understand the brain (or waste our lives away trying). Gets me all warm and tingly. Poster of the day: "An fMRI Study of Two Brain Interaction Using a Novel Dual-Head MRI Coil System" That's right, you heard (/read) correctly- a dual head coil. The ability to scan two people's brains simultaneously opens up a new dimension of social neuroscience research. Assuming you have two verrrry small people that are comfortable hanging out in an enclosed space for the duration of the study and you're not particularly interested in the visual cortex- the possibilities are endless!
How about instead of asking me what I'm supposed to do with a handful of eppendorf tubes you ask yourself what CAN'T you do? eh? Poster of the Day: "Atypical Thalamocortical Connectivity in ADHD Youth" Theoretically, when we're not actively engaged in a particular task, our brain runs on a functionally connected network of brain regions, nominally, the default mode network. Looking at differences in activation between ADHD youth and control youth can help us understand what is going on when people's minds wander. Which, if the way I write is any indication, is something I'm INTENSELY interested in.
Eeeeeeeeee!
No offense to Science, Cell, Interdisciplinary Reviews in Cognitive Science, Nature, Nature Reviews Neuroscience or NIDA brochures. Just saying, you'd be a lot cooler if you were color-in-able.
That is all.
So this reminds me of a good point about social media: not everyone uses this platform to have narcissistic conversations with total strangers about the everyday minutiae of their lives: sometimes Twitter is actually useful. Case in point, if @BrainCatalog hadn't started following my account, the chances of me seeing their booth in the sea of vendors would have slim to none. And that would have been tragic. In a nutshell, they're creating a GoogleEarth-esque application that allows you to browse through mouse brain terrain. The exciting potential of this technology is tangible- can't wait to see where it takes us in the next few years. You can read more in the NYTimes or watch their intro video:
Poster of the day: Uhm, that one. "A Remarkable Increase of Visual and Mental imagery Following Ayahuasca Ingestion: An fMRI study" While I'm still very curious how they're explaining away the fact that an MRI machine overwhelms even the most sober of participants with booming, unsettling sounds and overloading the senses of someone on psychedelics is INFINITELY different than using the same environment with a control subject... this still wins the My Favorite Poster Ever Award (prestigious, I know). They interpreted their results to mean that more activation in areas typically associated with memory, vision and intention shows that using hallucinogenics affects our perception and separation of real life and our internal mental environment. A small step toward exploring reality perception and consciousness but a friggin' LEAP toward making psychedelic research a respected branch of neuroscience.
And it's about time.
(Randall Munroe, you're not helping. Even if we were all thinking it.)
Some parting thoughts: In the end, I'm very grateful for having the opportunity to attend this year's conference. It was a learning experience on many different levels and definitely makes me appreciate academia just that much more. Thanks to everyone who came to present their research and share their positive energy with the rest of us. Also, a special 'thank you' goes out to SFNPosterFace.com for access to the abstracts and entertaining us with their super creative Lady GABA- Posterface parody.
"When it's cor-ti-cal / If it isn't rough it isn't fun" ...Truth.
Observation number one: It is surprisingly easy to get from Oakland airport to the Haight-Ashbury district. Yes, I went from bus to train to another bus and walked a total of about 2 miles but it was ridiculously easy to do so. I didn't realize public transportation could be so available, useful, and tourist-friendly. Weird.
Observation number two (brought to you by Mr. Timothy Faust, Master Fusion Food Finder): You can shove literally anything into a flour tortilla and call it a burrito. Don't think I'm complaining about these flexible semantics though, I'm devouring them. We started with a spicy Korean bbq kimchi&pork burrito and ended the night with a Curry Up Now Green Monster delight. MulticultralWIN.
Observation number three: This has absolutely nothing to do with San Francisco and everything to do with what goes through my head when I'm alone for too long. So let's just say, studying for the GRESubject psych test has left a fair amount of buzzwords swirling around my working memory. I first noticed this when I brought up Kandel's experiments on the sea-slug aplysia in the middle of a conversation because I genuinely thought it was relevant. It wasn't. But anyhow, as I sit here sippin' my second cafe au lait of the day, I'm imagining what a coffeeshop conversation with John B. Watson would be like were he around. He'd probably point out that drinking coffee is part of a multi-reinforcement model with both primary positive (the energy, euphoria and overall warm tastiness) and primary negative (the headaches, ohtheheadaches!) reinforcement. Add in the common traits of free wifi and a chill place to sit around and you've even got some variable-schedule secondary positive reinforcements. Word. And now you know! (and knowing is half the battle)
Observation number four: Wandering around alone outside is officially my most favorite pastime ever. But who am I kidding, we all already knew this. There's just something so awesomely meaningful about journeys powered solely by your rhythmic footfalls- uphills, downhills, aroundabaout hills, through parks, under trees. Suddenly everything becomes a great purposeful metaphor for life in general and as Mr. Tom Wolfe would say "it's phony goddamnit it... but mysto..."
Observation number five: It is fucking GORGEOUS outside. And that's all I've got, folks.
Now back to working on my grad school apps. Spoiler alert: Berkeley's statement of purpose begins: "I would like to be a part of your program so that please don't make me ever leave here ever"
I have officially survived one week of being a Research Technician in the Computational Psychiatry Unit of the Human Neuroimaging Lab of Baylor College of Medicine (because I'm pretty sure the more prepositional phrases I tag on, the cooler I sound.) I'll be running subjects through giant supermagnets to get both structural images and time-sensitive maps of blood-flow during specific tasks. I could explain it in slightly less layman's terms, but that's really as far as my comprehension of the matter goes: these machines are ridiculously awesome and complicated and I've only scratched the surface of the iceberg that is 'working knowledge of functional Magnetic Resonance Imaging.' I know I've had lots of fun drunk conversations with my Electrical Engineering buds about how fMRI works on a more fundamental level, but for some reason, I never seem to retain much of the information from these discussions.
I can't even describe how excited I am about this position. Call it the 'honeymoon phase' if you will (but let's just say, I'd be getting A LOT more out of it if this were a honeymoon...) but so far the lab perfectly balances my need for empirical methods and interaction with people. Smash together qualitative Sociology, CogSci, and Neurobiology to find Social Neuroscience nested right in the middle. There is so much I can learn from working here, and the best part is, they're willing to teach! My goals for the end of the year (/semester) will be to operate the scanner solo, pick up some MatLab and get a better grasp on what neuro-niche I'll pursue for grad school. Last but not least... OMGBRAINZ!!! Um and also, I have hand-print access to get into certain rooms. So I'm basically a secret agent now.
Post script: Just so it's out there: If you don't know what the quote from my image macro is from, you really should catch up on your Juggalo-culture references. By watching this Insane Clown Posse vid (circa 1:50). Oh yeah, I went there.
Post-post script: I just realized I never posted my Psych animation presentation here, but it's on my folio-blog. I taught myself Flash for this digital short, so be kind.
. So I know you've been wondering why. WhyCalifornia? Why now? Oh dear god, why has she left me for so long, WHY?! Background info: my grandma likes to travel in the summer, and she was just lonely enough to ask me to come with her this year. Originally she wanted to go to Mexico or Spain, but unfortunately, the (people we were staying with realized that I would be coming along and) plans fell through. California was the next best choice because we have family out here: the 2nd daughter of five lives in Bakersfield and her two children, my cousins, live in Novato (near-ish Berkeley or Oakland). But I actually left just because I hate you. Yes, you.
And this is where my photo-blog of a journey begins. [WARNING: I'm going to list out the things I do each day as if I were some attention starved blogger addict (as if!), so for those of that you don't actually care about what I do, don't waste your time reading. Scan the titles and pictures and you'll be good to go. I tend to get obnoxiously meticulous when I document my life, which is why I don't usually make the posts public. But enough about me. Back to me.]
. I was super excited for the plane ride since I haven't flown anywhere since I was a rising senior in high school. (Wow. Please ignore the extent to which saying that makes me sound like a spoiled brat.) I love plane rides, especially really long ones. It's a freebie break from life to just sit, chill, readabook, stare at clouds, gain two hours of life, and accept free drinks from strangers. Really, my idea of the perfect outing. Oh yea, and the best part about airplane rides is when you get off the plane you ARE VERY FAR AWAY FROM HOME. That's always pretty cool. Did I mention that airports/planes are also perfect people-watching terrain? Mostly because everyone too preoccupied wandering around trying to find where they are supposed to be to notice some passersby happen to be staring at them and jotting down detailed notes about their various facial expressions. Though I also mean it in the warm&fuzzy sense. Maybe.
Landed. Drove home. Passed the fuck out.
. . GOOD MORNING, California! Started the day off by driving my older cousin to work at Hamilton Field so that I could steal his car for the day. Bought some 4.50$/gal gas and then set off for UCBerkeley, where my younger cousin is a student. I got a nice tour of the university and took some pretty brochure-worthy pictures, if I may say so myself. (This is the part where I off-handedly mention that I've decided to drop out of Rice and move to California. There are so manytrees here. I am powerless to their call!) After exploring the surrounding area a bit, we went out for Thai food, (I think I ruptured my stomach. It was so worth it) and then we drove home and made dinner. Huzzah (If anything binds the family together, it's gotta be our joint obsession with food. Mmmm fooooood.) And that was my DAY. (And that is my mango ice cream from the restaurant. It's so much more satisfying to see your food smile at you before I eat it... Take that as you will. )
. As for my NIGHT... I went out with my older cousin to a friend of a friend's birthday party. It was a pretty cute get-together slightly reminiscent of our first-semester-freshman-year-parties, back when alcohol abuse was a novelty. At the same time, the party seemed to be a premonition of future parties to come: a group of young adults meeting up at a friend's house to escape the drudgery of their jobs and desperately cling onto the last remnants of the "college experience" still acceptable for their age group. There were some sloppy (aka n00b) games of beer pong, a vodka-watermelon (which was DISGUSTING, by the way. I recommended next time they try oranges ), and a pirate ship piñata. This was the BEST PART. Get this- to open the piñata, the birthday boy turned on a strobe light and sliced it open with a samurai sword(I assure you, it was a real fucking sword.) It was the classiest and most responsible thing that I have ever seen (to top it off, the piñata was filled with an assortment of tiny liqueurs, condoms, and fake mustaches.)Moral of the story: people never grow up. Thank god.
(The fire pic was from grillin' dinner. Not that I needed an excuse. Fires are kickass.)
[Guilty. A lot of this post is a redux copypasta of messages I send people. This is because I'm a lazy piece of shit. And really, there's only so much you can say about what you did in a day. So anyway, to those people, if you even read this: I'm going to continue to be a lazy piece of shit and recycle messages here as the days go by. It's also because I care about the environment, okay? California does that to you.]
At the end of the summer.
...and then I burst in flames and am reborn from my own ashes!
I decided that if I formally list everything out here, there is a slightly better chance that I will hold myself accountable and actually do some of them. That, or that the list will just remain a constant, public reminder of what a failure I am . I figure this will build character.
- Six Flags
- Menil Collection
- Beach (Galveston counts, just this once)
- reread MOAR Crichton
- Miller Outdoor Theater
- Live music
- Lolololapallooza (maybe? plz?)
- Kemah Boardwalk
- Little Sister's Swimming meet
- The Dark Knight
- California
- Pick a water park, any water park
I know that some of these are pretty given, but it makes me feel good about myself to cross things off on a list irregardless of how silly the item might be.
LET ME HAVE MY FUN.
If we still find ourselves too bored, there's always Social Rule b.99.1.
Or we could start using made up words like IRREGARDLESS and see how many people still take us seriously.
I take a strange pride in being easily amused. Mostly because it allows me to stay content being while others are feverishly searching for stuff to do. However, living in the loneliest hallway in Jones Dorms (complete with creaky doors and a flickering ceiling light at the far end- I kid you not) has made me realize that even I, the great antisocialite, need to hang out with people and do things sometimes. Notice, I am not admitting weakness here. Human interaction and IRL events are only necessary so that I don't run out of things to blog about.
Monday Night I crashed your party... Drove with Kyle to JavaJazz Cafe with the promise of a live local DJ. At first I was skeptical, since the venue has a reputation for catering to tweens (and as we all know, I'm more into 8 year olds...), but P.D.A was an altogether pretty impressive show. Review: Even though I hate to pigeonhole his mad-stylez, he was kind of a pop-ish rapper with solid electronic/melodic beats. Very catchy. Very danceable. I approve. (Except for the name. Just so you know, PDA stands for Public Displays of Afflection-- a portmanteau defined as the struggle between love and hate. Really? ...really?.) Tuesday Night I said I'm sorry... Metrorail'd myself over to the Angelika to catch Iron Man with Viren. It's one of those movies that everyone but me had seen, so I was starting to get left out of lots of conversations. And birthday parties. Somehow, I found the only other human being on the face of the earth that hadn't seen it yet to accompany me. Unexpectedly proving my hyperbole-- we ended up being the only two people in the theater. Pfft. Where's the fun in buying popcorn if you have no one to throw it at? (Fine, you caught me, I didn't actually buy popcorn... but we ended up having a good amount of spare change between us for when a couple decided to enter the theater forty-three minutes after the movie started.)Review: I was pleasantly surprised. I mean, it's not going go win any awards, but I found myself cheering and laughing out loud more than I found myself yelling constructively-critical obscenities, which is always a good sign. And DAMN, the explosions were HAWT (*drool*). So yea, thumbs up. I'd definitely recommend the movie to people if I knew there was any possibility of someone out there not having seen it yet. But that would just be ridiculous.
Wednesday came and trashed it out again... Actually, all I did on Wednesday was go to work. Though I might head out to an apartment gathering later. I guess I have to do something blog-worthy now, like set furniture on fire or toilet paper their room to keep with this WILD OUTING trend of mine.
I was only having fun, wasn't hurting anyone. And we all enjoyed the weeknights for a change.
I don't know why I had to add that in... the titles are in no way relevant to the post itself. Bah, I'm a sucker for Billy Joel.So sue me.
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