Jon’s Corner of the Whirled

AVI Biopharma could get some defense spending dollars to research some potential treatments for “terror-oriented” diseases. I have been following this company for quite a while and it is interesting to watch the attempts to get a product to market.

They have struggled for years to get recognition of the technology they hold, and to find someone to help them bring a drug to a Phase III trial. It is my understanding that a Phase III trial is very expensive.

The press releases about past trials are usually impressive to the biotech naive (like myself). I wonder why they haven’t been helped by any big pharma company…

I have noticed my nose isn’t quite as sensitive as Lisa or other people I have gone wine tasting with. This translates into experiences where people smell and taste things in wine that I just can’t. I wonder if this is due to nasal abuse caused by previous employment. One summer job I had used bleach to kill mold and mildew. Every night, the floors and equipment would be hosed down (they processed berries and fruit in the place). Once a week using bug type sprayers, the cleaning crew would walk around and spray the equipment and the floors until the whole place reeked of bleach. I can’t image this helped my nose, or tastebuds.

A group of us went to the Noble Rot recently. I had the Italian Wine Flight (among other foods and wine). The “middle” wine’s nose (I was foolish enough not to write down the name of it and the lists on the website are old) was amazingly fruity. I enjoyed it quite a bit.

I’ve been working my way through chardonnay of various regions and preparations. I can say that it varies a tremendous amount based on climate. I have found that some taste like green apples, others like a big stick of butter. The difference is pretty amazing. Lisa says they all smell like vomit to her. She doesn’t like them.

I’m still bummed about my nose though.

Ok, where did I leave off. The party. There was music from The Cool Breeze Band. They were appropriate, and played a lot of music that Lisa enjoys. I could really care less what they played. Lisa and I don’t see eye to eye on music — she likes disco, and Yanni among other things. I much prefer music with some semblance of thought behind it. Music with something to say. Tom Waits, David Byrne, Robyn Hitchcock are all relatively recent music purchases for me. I don’t buy music very often, but when I do, I listen to it until I know it back to front. Anyway, back to the band. Lisa took this picture of them playing.

The night was fun, with stuff to eat, and drinks as well.

With the holidays behind us, I have a few minutes to post some of the goings on. Most recently, we returned from our journey Eastward to Kah Nee Tah. We left Portland on New Year’s Eve. The road conditions over the pass weren’t bad at all.

The drive took about 2 and a half hours. It seemed to go more quickly than that though. The desert (the GPS said 2000 feet, so I wouldn’t call it high desert), was quite pretty shrouded in clouds.

Our arrival was uneventful.

The room was unspectacular, but had a good view of the valley.

There is a year round pool at the resort. Supposedly they keep the temperature of the water at 82 degrees. There weren’t many people using it while we were there. No one was all that interested in going down to it, as it was pretty close to freezing outside most of the time.

Lisa’s parents hadn’t arrived yet, so I played around with the camera for a bit. Eventually they made it. We changed, and had dinner at the buffet provided in the package. Later we went to the party.

I’ll add more when I have more time.

I mailed my ballot this morning. My vote is cast! Perhaps this will relieve our house from the barrage of phone calls and knocks at the door we have been getting in the past week. Lisa thinks I should ignore all the political information I browse through daily, and I have to admit, it might be a good idea. I’ll be glad when I can focus my idle time on something that aggravates me less.

There are only a couple of weeks to go, and we will see what we will see. I’m keeping my fingers crossed that Measure 36 goes down in flames. I still can’t believe we have so many ignorant bigots in this state. Yes, if you support measure 36, you are no better than those that support racism.