在amazon上给自己买了几个新年礼物，三本书。08年的十大blog上说到了书，09年也不能少，所以就早早的预备了起来。 我向来看书很少，脑子缺乏从小说文字描述到真正人物场面图画的想象力，所以小说故事类的书是不属于我能看的。

说来这三本书也不是随便买的，其中一本是很老套，很葵花宝典，但是我从来没有看过的书。 Charles Darwin 的 “The origin of Species". Nothing in Biology Makes Sense Except in the Light of Evolution. Theodosius Dobzhansky 的这句话真的很经典，尤其是在这个以制造paper为目的的时代，物种起源应该是一本不错的，很急需的典籍吧，希望我能看得懂。

还有一本书和去年的”in pursue of genetics ..."有着一样的生世。也是实验室的印度朋友和我说起这本书，然后说他可以借给我看。接下来就是同样的每个礼拜三天的催促，最后还是没有能等来这本书。amazon上看看也不贵，就买下来了。 书名叫“ phanotoms in the brain" 。一听名字说的就是离奇的人脑袋在不正常的工作的时候给人带来什么样的幻觉的故事。

最后一本叫”mapping the mind". 人脑应该是世界上最复杂的迷宫，我不奢望我能了解它的全部。希望这本书能给我带来一些浅薄的认识。

Graduate study本来是只有时间看paper没有时间看书的岁月。所以忙里抽闲看这些书，不是为了消磨时间，而是为了消除无知带来的恐惧。

Not every decision in the past years changes future life. It is the determination to change that paves road for a bright future. It is hard to say how impactive my 2008 decisions are, yet it still worth lines of words in my space to remember the events, the people and the emotions involved in Henry's 2008. Here comes top 10 for Henry

1. 2008 adds a special source of power for Henry to pursue a meaningful life. Love from soul mate means encouragement, instruction, family, friendship and many other things that shed light on my way. Simply, thank you for everything.

2. The big plan for 2008 is to finding a better niche for me to develop myself into a scientist. It is a crazy decision to apply for another graduate program in the same field of "Biology", especially the decision was made after passing the prelim exam. I had great time with colleagues in the lab, with PIs, classmates. I make friendships with people of whom I see the friendships as a life-long ones. It is the Research I am not crazy about. I wish myself good luck with this ongoing plan. I give my regards to professors writing me letters and they are Dr. Antic Srdjan, Dr. Brenton. Graveley, and Dr. James Li.

3. My first formal proposal is finished on August 08, 2008 with a lovely oral defense that I would like to do it once again. To be honest, I enjoyed the oral part more than the writing part because in our department we write what our projects are.

4. Group 4 shrank to Group 3 with Yijian's leaving to Actuary Science in Uconn main campus On January 2008 and further shrank to Group 2. Yifan left to another nearby apartment. I have great time in the kitchen now since Feng is more submissive near the oven.

5. 2008 Trips: First time flying across the continent. Although I did not post any picture here of my California trip on June, I had great time. Labor day Boston, Christmas Ann arbor, November Baltimore, February New York, with different people and different mood. I feel I am not more interested in seeing the sights than imagining the way of life if I am living in these places. Every time I am in the middle of a city, I have the strong desire to interact with people walking around. Most of the time I do not have the chance, yet I had the experience of talking and helping a homeless people in San Diego. It is the first time I realize that I can cheer a person up without any intimacy.

6. Chinese Journal club: let's give applaud to all the people involved. At the very beginning, I was not sure whether people attend the journal club because of delicious food in Haonan's house. Soon after, I realized it is definitely not because of the food, especially after two round of awesome pizza. We might not perform as good research as students and postdocs in top institutes, but we are as passionate as them if not better. Thank you and good job. We will definitely continue in 2009.

7. Lost of family member. My grandfather had tremendous impact on my personality. He spent a lot of time with me before and even during my kindergarten. He made me realize the beauty of nature and seeded in my mind the desire to explore it. He did not receive the education to understand mysteries yet he never stopped trying. He had no heroic feats yet he was a legend to me. I can not stop missing him, yet I feel peaceful that I inherited his blood and his spirit.

8. Congratulations to my dear friends. I was happy to witness dream realization of some close friends in 2008. Fanying, Yifan, Bioman all got nice offers. Weddings, birth, job promotions. Our lives are changing dramatically.

9. Sports. It was the first of since I came to America that I could regularly play soccer in small teams every weekend. I like running on the ground with a football. Arsenal has long way to go if they want to win champions. I have faith in young gunners' potential, not faith in winning cups with a bunch of teenagers. Thierry Henry had miserable time at Barcelona but he is recovering recently. Good luck to all.

10. Best book, Best Movie and Best TV series of 2008:

"In pursuit of the gene: from Darwin to DNA" is the best book I have read in 2008. It was also reviewed on Nature. I was trying to write a review of the book on my space before I saw the nice review on Nature by Jerry A. Coyne (http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v453/n7199/full/4531181a.html).

"In pursuit of Happiness" is the best movie. The greatest happiness is not from how many things you already have but from finally get what you want after you never give up in tough times.

"Criminal minds" is the best TV series. Behavior Analysis tells you secrets of human mind.