Cast of Characters

Dean: my beloved husband

Nellie, Wrigley, and Allison: my rambunctious cats

mom, dad (dearolddad), stepdad, stepmom, stepsis: I think this is self explanatory

Sylvia: Dean's mom

James: my partner in crime at work (he doesn't "give a crap" about his real name being used)

Dr. Hari: our advisor, mentor and boss

runnergirl: good friend and fellow blogger

my girls: my three best girlfriends from Minnesota

my boys: either the boys in my lab or the Minnesota Twins depending on the context

dumpster kitties: the feral cat colony I feed that lives behind the dumpster

Note: I must introduce another good friend that always prefers to remain anonymous. I often refer to her as "another blogger", "anonymous blog buddy", "fellow female physicist" or a similar descriptive phrase which conveys a friend who doesn't wish to be identified.

Recurring Themes in this Blog:

• My Work: doing research in a magnetic materials lab and working towards my Ph.D. in applied physics.


• Friends: see cast of characters above


• Cats and as a corollary


• My fears of becoming a crazy cat lady


• The plight of the female physicist: mostly consisting of venting about the (getting better but still existing) sexist paradigm of the academic system at a post-graduate level and my fears of turning into a "stereotypical female scientist" which is marked by a defensive, "bitchy" nature, poor fashion sense, a judgemental, hardened, alpha-female attitude, and a general lack of sexuality as well as my rage over the perpetuation of these stereotypes by the mostly male members of my field.


• My personal thoughts on books, movies, and sports


• Political opinions. My strongest political causes are: scientific funding, alternative energy sources, furthering embryonic stem cell research and separation between church and state.

Frequently Asked Questions

What exactly do you do?

I am a Ph.D. candidate working in an applied physics lab where I measure the magnetic properties of various materials. The materials I work with are made by other scientists in the hope that they will be useful for future electronic applications.

Why "magnetbabe"?

When I first got a blogger account, I thought your username had to be something original, like a Yahoo! username. I originally wanted to go with "materials girl" because of the funny dual meaning. (Us physicists really like silly wordplay for some reason.) Then I found another blog by that name (she was a sculptor) so I decided to go with "magnetbabe", a play on the corny "babe magnet" description of attractive men. I kind of liked the irony since I am a woman in a male dominated field. By the time I realized your username could be anything you want I had enough of a following that I didn't want to confuse people.

Why "Field Lines"?

One of the first things we learn about magnetism is that there are these "field lines" that extend from the north pole to the south pole of a magnet. The Earth has it's own magnetic field and hence it own field lines. With this in mind, I thought the title "Field Lines" had a global feel to it since I wrote it mainly for my friends and family in Minnesota. Fortunately, I have made quite a few friends in the blogosphere from East coast to West coast to Canada which makes the title even more fitting.

Also, "field" can mean your area of work, or a location for playing sports. These are also topics of this blog.

Where did your links go?

A couple months ago I took down the links to all the blogs I read. This was for a couple of reasons. First, a few of them were admittedly defunct and a few hadn't been updated in months and months. I didn't really want to take those ones out because I felt bad so I took them all out. Second, I also read blogs that I hadn't linked to which specifically didn't want to be linked to mine because I am not anonymous and thereful quite accessible. I respected that. Last, I always get a little nervous about linking new people and "what if I link them but they don't link me" or "what if they link me but I didn't think to link them" and other such stressful situations for hypersensitive people such as myself. So I freed myself from that whole issue as well. In sum, the "I Compulsively Read These Blogs" became completely misrepresentative of what I actually (compulsively) read. Instead, I put up a quote from The Man Himself.

Why not more about Dean?!

Because Dean is a very private person. He is extremely supportive of me writing to express myself but doesn't feel comfortable with others knowing the details of our relationship. Since I chose to not be anonymous, I agree with him wholeheartedly.