Firstly, I have been editing one of my dad's grants for the NIH (National Institute of Health). My whole childhood revolved around Dad's start-up companies. I grew up visiting the office and all the laboratory equipment. I remember startling images of different animal parts sprawled out along operating tables for several animal studies. Dad's phone placed them right next to our family photos, so there was really no transition between the two. Thankfully, I was never invited to these animal studies growing up, though, as I got more involved in biology, I often wondered what happened behind the looming operating door.
Dad encouraged me to "talk shop" with him, discussing my high school dissections, my college physics classes, and of course, laboratory research. Our relationship only started getting closer once I became more involved in my biology major and finally ending up in a laboratory as an undergraduate researcher. There I was introduced to the importance of the grant process, editing a few grants within the lab, mainly for grammar. Dad asked me to do the same, as I had little experience with the research he was doing.
Dad currently works for four different companies designing and selling medical devices. With a background in engineering, he could have worked at a big medical company, but instead wanted to get his hands dirty in design work. I've honestly never seen someone as dedicated to raising up companies from complete nothing as he is. He can take a drawing and turn it into something sellable. At least, that's how I've seen him...I'm probably biased.
Our main commonality is reading books. We have similar reading tastes of history, science, sci-fi, and good stories. Often we swap books, whether I start it first and think Dad'll like it, or the other way around. It probably began when I was twelve years old, and Dad asked me to read Dune by Frank Herbert, just to get the idea of what constituted as classic science fiction. In return for a rigorous, and....enjoyable....read (cue sarcasm), I offered Crime and Punishment as my suggestion for him. We've been swapping books ever since.
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| P.C: Ben Frazier |
When I'm not editing my dad's latest NIH grant (I've learned more about colonoscopies than I ever thought I would), I've been hiking. This week I hiked Arthur's Rock, near the Horsetooth Reservior in Fort Collins. My best friend Ben and I went up on Sunday before the heat of the afternoon, when temperatures reached around 99 degrees Fahrenheit. Arthur's Rock is a 2.5-mile hike with a change of 1,000 feet in elevation. The summit overlooks the city of Fort Collins. Ben and I rested and watched two eagles (I think they were eagles), before descending down the hillside.
I was a sweaty and sore mess when we reached the parking lot. And I was extremely glad I did a bunch of squats the day before, hiking on sore legs.
I didn't get a reprieve the next day, as my parents decided they wanted to hike Mount Sanitas, near the city of Boulder. Mount Sanitas is approximately 6,900 feet up in elevation. The pictures online showed a wide and somewhat flat looking sanded road that led into a valley.
This was not the case. Instead, we ended up bouldering half of the hike to get to the summit which overlooked Boulder. Coming back down, we took the East Ridge trail, which included more bouldering, and lots of switchbacks. Once we did get into the valley with the sanded road, it was almost 11 o'clock and we were all famished. Poor Emmie, my jack Russell, had to be carried multiple times due to exhaustion from jumping down boulders that were twice her size! She did really well though, and we made it back to the car sore, but satisfied.
Today, was ab day for a workout. I'm trying to take it easy on the legs for now.
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