You can take the girl out of the research university...

Gentle readers, it's with great shame that I admit this fact to you: I am not a big fan of doing research. I don't just mean googling furiously to find the source of a picture, or plunging through records of political science journals to learn more about how State of the Union addresses affect public opinion polls. No, I am not a fan of testing hypotheses through experimentation or polling, then crunching numbers.

I thought I wasn't cut out to be a researcher until a project at work led me to this graph:

Rankings courtesy of AppAnnie.com; additional analytics are my own work

Well that looked weird, I thought to myself. Downloads for the Monster.com app peak on Wednesdays and drop drastically on the weekends. And then I suddenly understood the "research bug." I need to know more about this trend. I need to know if app downloads correlate to anything else.

So whenever I have time, I'll be researching the link between job-searching apps and the economy over time. I might even look at how popular game apps fit into the picture. Who knows? It's a brand new world in so many ways: As TechNet put it, "there are now roughly 466'000 jobs in the 'App Economy' in the United States, up from zero in 2007." And while the world of research isn't new to me, the idea of loving it is.

Of course, I will be posting my results whenever I have them. Just keep in mind that I am transitioning from college student to A Real Adult, and I might not have a lot of time to dedicate to number crunching. I hope this post has gotten you as interested as I am!

Nerdsanity

After teasing us for years with superhero movie after superhero movie, The Avengers is coming out tonight at midnight. Last night, I tried to distract myself from my impatience by making myself a shirt to wear to my first viewing. You can do it too! All you need is bleach, a spray bottle, contact paper, and a dark-colored shirt. (Or pants, if you wish.)

I got see-through contact paper so I could see the design underneath while I used an Xacto knife to cut away where the bleach would go.

I blew up a SHIELD (Strategic Hazard Intervention Espionage Logistics Directorate, or, depending on whom you ask, Strategic Homeland Intervention, Enforcement and Logistics Division) logo I found online. After cutting out the entire design, I took off the paper backing and stuck the contact paper on top of the shirt. I slipped a few sheets of newspaper inside the shirt to keep the bleach from getting on the back side of the shirt.

I spritzed bleach on the shirt and dabbed at it with a paper towel to keep the bleach from spreading through the fabric and under the contact paper.

I put cardboard around the contact paper to keep the bleach away from the fabric. I repeated the spritzing and dabbing twice more.

After the front dried, I flipped the shirt over and repeated the process and put another design on the back.

I was a little overzealous with the bleach here, and the stars got a little obscured because I put too much bleach and it bled into the fabric.

Final product was more red than bleached-out tan, but I like it. I'm happy with the result, and it really didn't take a lot of time. If you do it yourself, be patient and it will turn out well.

Not enough nerd for you? Here's a bonus: LEGO is coming out with an Avengers series. Sadly, the average play set is around $20, and since I can get about four meals for the same price and I have to prioritize, I'll only be lusting after these sets from afar.

But the posters are awesome.