The definition of science is… “Systematic and formulated knowledge”. And a scientist is a “student or expert in science”. But the interesting thing about the word “scientist” is it always seems to create connotations of white lab coats, test tubes, and crazy hair. The public image of Einstein himself. And so perhaps it’s for that reason that on Good News Week Monday night Claire Hooper miming a lab coat and test tubes and all things scientific did nothing to convince her team mates of who she was meant to be… a scientist. Yet a shake of the hand above the head and crazy look in the eye was the clincher.

And it’s obvious that at times I may be perceived as a little crazy but there is still no explanation as to why people constantly ask me why I did geology at university, and why I was into science. And there is also no explanation as to why I find it impossible to explain. And perhaps the following is an example of why I’m at a loss to providing an explanation. i.e. no one in their right mind knows why I became a “scientist”.

 Wendy Kramer’s Year 10 ReportWendy has trouble concentrating in class. She is capable of a very high standard of work when motivated - Mr Valender 

Funny that the report read so well seen as though my three main achievements in Mr Valenders class, who was laughed at due to his resemblance to Alby Mangels and called Mr Lavender, were:

1) Flinging him in the back of the head with a rubber band while he was writing on the board one day.

2) Putting chalk in his coffee when he wasn’t looking.

3) Sticking a Praying Mantis on his neck while on our one and only field trip… which was out to the football oval.

The sight of the insect banging away at the back of his neck like a typewriter, each alternate stick-like hand tapping out a Morse code, sent the entire class into stitches and was enough for him to send us all back to the classroom. To this day he is still unaware as to what was so damn hilarious.

But in this day and age science doesn’t have to be so tedious that one might feel the need to bring a more exciting element to class… like a Praying Mantis…, injure a teacher, or cause the situation where they frantically run to the staff room and phone the Poisons Information Centre. This day and age you cannot only partake in your average day science experiment, you can actually be the experiment.

Though as successful as the Praying Mantis experiment was in aim, method, results and (possibly not) conclusion… in many instances science experiments can go horribly wrong. Like for example, the first man in the world to undergo a face and double-hand transplant. Originally too deformed and hideous to even think about meeting the woman of his dreams, he was elated by the success of his face and double-hand transplant operation, the first of its kind in the world. But unfortunately it was to soon reek of infection and thus the new face and hand transplant guaranteed he was no longer able to pick-up chicks let alone relieve himself. The poor bastard died this week.

Being unemployed for six months now, incapacitated, and snubbed by Centrelink… I recently realised I have no source of income unless I sell my body. Not wanting to strip or prostitute, I searched the net for science related possibilities. I signed-up for a couple of studies but after many hours of perusing concluded that I’m simply not lab rat material as I’m not post menopausal, sterilised, over 60, and definitely don’t suffer from psoriasis, asthma or acne anymore. I take too many prescription drugs and I don’t even have a twin… so the excitement of finding http://www.gpgp.net (literally “guinea pigs get paid”) quickly waned. The only option left besides being apart of a live science experiment was being apart of a dead one.

I was initially drawn into researching “body donation” thanks to dodgy advertisements claiming to pay you thousands of dollars (while you are still living) if you donate your cadaver to science. Finally my mortgage woes were over. However, the more informed I became the more the reality sunk in… that all you are really doing is donating and thus there is no monetary gain in this life or the after life. My cadaver could be used as a crash-test dummy or utilised in munitions testing but I won’t see a cent. Or I could choose to join the highly prestigious “body farm” at the University of Tennessee and have forensic anthropology students prod and probe me while I decay the day away. And still wont have a penny to my name… let alone be at peace six feet under.

But this week I did take the plunge and personally signed over my body to science. I didn’t donate my cadaver but agreed to undergo cutting edge technology that has in no way been proven to be successful while one is still living and breathing. The lovely lass was kind enough to inform me about possible radiation poisoning… and of course I needed to know… “What do you mean an allergy… like a rash or something?” And she replied “well a rash would be at the lower end of the scale of symptoms”.

But symptoms aside I have now officially signed my name in the name of science and will undergo an “High Tibial Osteotomy”. I’ve agreed to let them cut a wedge out of my shin and realign my knee, proactively deforming me to rectify my 10 degree bow leg to 10 + degree knock kneed. And that’s not the experimental side.The experimental side is the part where they remove a bit of my cartilage and grow it in a petri dish. This admittedly sounds better than “on a pigs back”. They put Exhibit A back in my knee after six weeks.

I may have been less freaked-out once I knew it wasn’t going to be swine cartilage in my trotter, but was a little more freaked-out that they would purposely make someone knock kneed. But the biggest freak-out on the day was six signatures later when I asked how much I get paid for taking part in their “research”. The answer came after two shakes of the head that I didn’t take seriously as the girl was of Indian descent “No sorry, we don’t pay people to be in this study”.