Life: Active shooter safety training 6/23/22

 Our Cancer Center was mandating active shooter safety training for the staff. 

This training was announced after a school shooting incident on 5/24/2022 in Uvalde Texas. With some mis-judgements and confusion causing delay in rescue attempt by the police, the incidence left 19 elementary school kids and 2 teachers dead. The shooter was killed, which offers a sliver of solace in the terrible incident.

There was another incident in Tulsa, OK, which was a shooting in hospital on 6/1/2022. A disgruntled and resentful patient shot and killed four people. Three were hospital staff including the patient's surgeon, and one was a "wrong place wrong time" bystander. In this case, the police acted quickly and the shooter killed himself before more harm was done.

In such emergencies, response can make a difference.

I attended a training session today. Campus police chief gave a well-organized 1 hour talk with a short video, "Run, Hide, Fight". As the short video summarizes the message well, I link it here.

  ["Run, Hide, Fight" posted by Ready Houston. Nicely educational.]

Active shooter situations have occurred in schools, hospitals, churches, shopping malls, movie theaters, restaurants, concerts, even in a military base. It happened in many public places, and not only in a "soft" target. 

Sickening, but it is the reality of 2022 America.

Training needs to be implemented, although I'd rather not be in an active shooter situation that forces me to use the training. 

Following the training, I checked out exits around the lab and the office to "run". Also checked out if there are suitable rooms/places to "hide". To "fight" with improvised weapons,.....there is a fire extinguisher right outside of office, maybe pens and scissors (look pathetic), some notebooks and magazines for light emergency body armor and....maybe this marble tiger from Pakistan? Ugh.

Seriously, I don't fancy throwing a bottle of sulfuric acid or hydrochloric acid in the lab. Might work better than a pen, though.

My worksite is a cross between school and hospital. School teachers and medical staff will have it tougher, as they may have to look after young students or immobile patients. 

Heck, I'd really hate it if I were in the situation.

Science: Innovation in medical science...what does it mean?

 The word "innovation" is highly regarded. But what does "innovation" really mean in medical science?

Check out Shark Tank or something. 

We have seen a bunch of stuff trying to sell themselves as innovative, but did not fly. We have seen "innovation" for the sake of novelty, but nobody picked it up. (Come to think of it, they still can be good niche products for the fans. But the word "innovation" implies broad and big coverage). Perhaps, the notion of "innovation" is not understood correctly, not defined properly, or is just overrated?

In a government grant section, we scientists need to explain "innovation" of our research project. That made me think what innovation really means.

If we look back in the history, innovations were Dynamite, T-ford car, Walkman (Sony), ipod (Apple), Penicillin, guns, smartphone, vaccination, etc. 

mRNA vaccine is a major improvement in vaccination. You can debate if mRNA vaccine counts as a true "innovation".

Common to all "innovation" is that they all changed previous ways, status quo at the time, to a new way while solving problems with old ways. Innovations change our ways of doing things.

It sounds like talking from the result, I know. But in retrospect many innovations look like well-designed from the beginning, even if they actually were products of serendipity.

When I apply this notion of "innovation" to science, to be innovative, outcomes of our medical research should change current medical practice for the better in a big way.

I've worked in cancer chemoprevention research field for 15 years and have developed some familiarity in the field. There are many chemicals, dietary compounds, etc, that actually can reduce cancers in animals and likely in humans.

But the body of knowledge has not been fully translated to current medical practice. In fact, cancer prevention is rather poorly practiced. We are only beginning to test the approach on a small segment of patients with well-defined genetic cancer-predisposition (like Lynch syndrome with known genetic mutation that will increase colon cancer risk), or well-defined high risk factor (like pancreatitis for developing pancreatic cancer).

In these cases, applying cancer prevention measures by itself is innovation, compared with current practice of preemptive surgical removal of colon (which comes with likely QOL decrease) or of careful monitoring and doing nothing.

Anyhow, to define innovation, we need to know current medical practice. Then we need to apply our science and research to improve current practice for the better (hopefully in a big way).

Sure, "innovative" research tools like cancer genome sequencer have changed medical practice. The sequencer enabled oncology clinicians to identify gene mutations that are likely driving the cancer, so that the clinicians can pick a promising drug. Yet, clinicians changed their ways as users of the new tools. 

Basic researchers need to think what will bring next innovation and what will be accepted/useful to the users. 

True, many Nobel prize-level discoveries were ahead of time and had a long time collecting dust on the shelf before new users recognized the value and made them to innovation. Yet, we may need to keep putting forth the best designed outcomes.

Dance: "Bella Ciao"

 While browsing YouTube, I came across a video with a song with very "sticky" tune.

The song is called "Bella Ciao". Apparently it has been very popular in Europe for a few years (actually, in the US it was rare to hear the song).

Quick search showed; 

(a) originally the tune was a folk song in Northern Italy, 

(b) the song was used as anti-fascist song by European Partisans in mid 20th century, and 

(c) made very popular in Europe by Spanish TV-Netflix series "La casa de papel (Money Heist) "(2017/2019-2021) as its sub-theme song. The drama series was about two heists by a group of robbers targeting big national institutes (Royal mint of Spain and Bank of Spain). They used the spirits of the song as anti-authority, as the robbers go against the national police and security forces that are not afraid to kill the robbers. 

I checked out a few clips, and they looked good. The clip of the Professor and Berlin (two main characters. They go by code names) singing the song over dining table was quite powerful.

The original song has either wide fluctuation of tempo from slow to fast, or goes fast. As a dance song, it is challenging (may be polka?).

But due to the popularity, there are so many versions found in YouTube.

For dances, Samba/ballroom Latin version, and Tango/milonga version, can be found.

[Milonga version of Bella Ciao] (not my video, for disclaimer)

Like the musical interpretation with fast footwork on '45-'49

Last night I talked with our Tango DJ David and he added the song to his computer. We may be dancing to it in upcoming milongas.

Dance: Stage Tango 101, preparation for social Tango dancers

 There was a talk that I and a dance partner are going to demonstrate Argentine Tango, then teach Tango for about 45 minutes followed by some dance, in a wedding.

Due to schedule and other conflicts, I backed out of the gig. I am not going to do it. I suggested some others who might be able to take the gig. Hope everything works out.

This (unrealized) gig had me think about how we would have proceeded in preparation for 6 weeks.

The prospective partner does not have stage experience much, although she dances Tango in milonga and has decent basics for social Tango. 

My plan. First two weeks are time for physical and mental preparation, upgrading and converting Tango moves for stage version. 

That is why I planned to lecture Stage Tango 101.

(Some time ago, as a part of my Tango research, I interviewed several traveling Tango instructors [strong stage dancers/performers] on stage Tango. I planned to eventually assemble the materials as a book about doing or how to do stage tango. ...maybe later.) 

Anyway, as the prospective partner was already familiar with tango basics, the initial lecture should be simple. I planned to emphasize only 5 points. (It's a lot of work, though).

#1 Forget about milonga rules.

Social Tango in milonga and stage tango performance on an open floor are two different dances. In social tango, you are to respect other dancers, including no high kicks, no passing, no going against the line of dance, no lifts, no drops, etc.

Believe or not, there rules are rather strongly engrained in social Tango dancers. Milonga-raised dancers may become good at "staying there and going around each other in small ways" moves (molinete, giro, ocho cortado, etc). But they can also develop habits of restraining widths of stride, causing little timid walk that won't do well on stage. When larger energy/momentum is applied, they can collapse. And that shouldn't happen.

Going clockwise (not "counterclockwise, along line of dance") is legal on (solo) stage.

Taking big strides means you move fast from here to there. You can do it. No worrying for traffic jam or running into other couples.

And they never kick up big. On stage, you should.

#2 Focus on how your dance look

Stage Tango is a visual art, from the standpoint of audience. In social dance, indulging in your dance feeling is fine. But on stage in performing and in demonstrating your dance for an audience, you have to prioritize the look of your dance.

One of arts close to dancing is acting. You need to learn to convey your message by your art of acting/dancing. The message is visual, when your audience is far away.

Your feeling is poor indicator of visually good dance. 90-95% of social dancers in milonga have wrong or poor postures and body alignments that do not look "trained". Correct posture can be uncomfortable at first, because you are just not used to it.

Use mirror and practice until your "feeling good" matches your "looking good".

#3 Learn to move big and fast

You are "demonstrating" moves. Your moves, as a couple, should be visible from a distance (20 feet away at least. You need to consider how far your audiences are).

#4  Learn to use big and visible embellishments

Again, don't worry about kicking others. Break the "psychological block by milonga rules" first. Focus on how you demonstrate your embellished moves. 

To do high boleo and high kicks, you need to activate specific muscles in hips and/or legs. To add hesitation or styling in your walk to show your musical interpretation, you want to use ankle-foot play or some gesture moves. You need to know these moves as knowledge. Then, these moves need practice, both solo and as a couple.

This motion size and type conversion can take a long time for a dancer. The reason can be psychological and/or physical. That is why I wanted to include these points in the first lecture.

#5  Contrast in fast and slow energy flow

Dance can look boring if all moves are performed in a monotone, metronomic manner. Fast fast fast fast......predictability is an enemy of good-looking dance.

Besides, Tango music itself is a mixture of fast energy and slow energy. You dance to the music. Then you'll move with contrasted energies.

If you check out good stage dances, dancers mix up fast and slow, dynamic and deliberate. You should do it, too.

#1-#4 are already a lot of work. #5 may be a little much, but I wanted to mention it early.

Later on weeks 3-5, once the conversion started showing, we would have worked on select choreographed moves with the song (TBD). 

Dance is to be with the song/music. A choreography can be danced much easier with the matching song/music.

Your body cannot lie on stage. You show what you got. That is why stage dancing can be scary.

We can tell good dancers just by their dances. You show what you got. You dancers communicate your art visually to your audience. How exhilarating.

["Choreographed Stage Tango in Buenos Aires", from wikipedia]