IRB scramble and CDC chat

July 24, 2012

So today was an interesting day. I woke up at 3am and couldn't get back to sleep. I chatted for a bit with folks back home before finally managing to fall back asleep at 5:30. To wake up to my alarm at 6. UGH. So after many snooze button hits I got up and went to work. The ladies here to intern with NOAA depart this Friday. They are very sad and unhappy to leave. Jen was taking the bike her mentor loaned her to the bus this morning so she could return it before Friday.

I got to work at 7:30 and promptly took care of two things. First, rebooting my computer and letting it update everything. Second, breakfast. First was a mug of Frosted Flakes. Jeff sent me a package of single serving size cereal boxes in the last care package from home. So over the past week I have had a mug of cereal for breakfast most days. I don't have a bowl at work so I use the mug, then rinse it out and make my coffee milk. When it is half coffee half milk it is called cafe con leche, cafe au lait, or at Starbucks - Misto. However, mine is about 1/6 coffee, 5/6 milk. So Coffee Milk :)

About that time Ann sent me the IRB response for the Hawaii Sexual Health Survey. The IRB wants us to submit a new application for expedited approval rather than exempt and to tweak the consent for to name the Counseling Center and their contact info due to the sexual and violence questions. So Ann worked on the application and I did the consent form.

After I finished the consent and sent it to Ann I went over to another building with Shu to meet with Don Hayes. Don is an epidemiologist consultant for the division sent here by the CDC. I have been needing to get over to his office to meet with him and touch base during my time here in Hawaii. I got to meet the new intern (GSIP intern, a PhD student) who will be working with him. Then Don and I talked for a while about opportunities with the CDC both on a Master's and PhD level. We discussed fellowships, locations of facilities, and many other things. We discussed the possible job here in Hawaii. He thinks if I qualify I should definitely try for the job - a great CV/Resume builder both to apply for PhD programs and for future job prospects. We discussed the blending of medical backgrounds and public health. Then we all had a great talk about comparing SPSS/SAS/EXCEL and other programs and the pros and cons of each. It was a great epi geek "talk story" as they say here in Hawaii. It was a great conversation. I really appreciated the information and feedback. I need to look up more information on the CDC website. I will probably have more questions then which he said he'd be happy to meet with me again if I had questions. So all in all a good conversation and something I needed to do while here.

I returned and was working on starting to get the HSHS set up in Survey Monkey. I paused for lunch. Lunch wasn't exciting so no pictures of food. Just leftover tappenado (basically a red sauce, no olives) with french bread, a yogurt and a bottle of water. I wasn't hungry much, probably because I had cereal for breakfast.

After lunch I worked on entering the rest of the survey into Survey Monkey. I finished that and was entering the last of the skip patterns when Ann came by my office. We went over the DVFR charts and rearranged some color schemes, I put together some new charts and we got rid of some others. The plan is to try to get this DVFR report finished this week and sent to others to read and review.

I left at 4 and headed home. I saw some pretty purple wildflowers so I took a photo.

I couple of views on the walk home. Just such a lovely pretty blue sky, a few white fluffy clouds. Palm trees blowing in the breeze.

 The palm tree in this one is the one that drops the coconuts i find on my way home.

 I found another coconut on the way! That gives me 3 to mail home! There are a bunch on the tree that are just at the ripe stage of falling, the ones that fall on the sidewalk and by the sidewalk are for anyone. I checked with the people in whose yard the tree is located. They said they have plenty that fall inside the wall they have so the ones outside anyone can take. WOOHOO!

So after a chat with Scott that will filter down to the boy at home I am updating the blog. I will be posting more tonight on the Big Island trip from this weekend.

Malama pono, (take care)
~Melissa