point being?
I'm beginning to see what the upper levels were saying about the first year of graduate scool being a major waste. It has gotten to the point that I remember very little of what I did yesterday today, and if I manage to babble back what I have crammed for an exam, the odds are quite high that five minutes after the test I would have no idea what you were talking about if you wished to discuss the material with me. I am still not faring so well in nucleic acids (I suppose I shouldn't say still as there have been no opportunities since the last test to redeem myself). I have started a discussion group and we meet almost daily, sometimes twice a day to discuss papers and things that might appear on the next test. Meanwhile I also have a five page single spaced biochemistry paper on the structure, function, and catalytic properties of neutral endopeptidase due next Thursday. Next Friday is the test of doom (the week after that I have a biochem test but we're not even thinking about that because it is simply too far off the radar.) My research is incredably time consuming (I usually come in around 8 or 9 am and leave around 8 pm) and due to my inexperience several steps have had to be repeated. (My PI says that I am finding my 'cloning fingers'.) It's all fairly frustrating because not a lot of it makes sense in nucleic acids and while everything clicks in biochemistry that class is simply a marathon of silly busy work (like the 6 page homework assignment we had on understanding Rasmol last week that we ended up getting four extensions on simply because the questions were worded that shoddily). My most recent disappointment stems from a sudden assignment given to me by my PI Monday night. We have a departmental retreat this weekend and each lab is to make a poster presenting their work. I was assigned 1/8th of the poster to write, because I should know that much or something. I was supposed to write about the project I am working on (and a bit more because the project I am working on has more steps than I have months to complete it.) I spent several hours trying to find a way to write up exactly what it is that I am doing. In fact I spent so much time on this write up Monday night that I had no time left to study nucleic acids or work on my paper for biochem (which was frustrating). I got to lab today to see the final of the poster. My entire section (ostensibly the Monday night that I could have been writing a page of that biochem report) was cut from the poster. The PI wrote something else. I don't feel betrayed but I do feel frustrated. Why was my time wasted like this? This event will certainly factor in to my choosing of a lab. I don't need time that I don't have being stolen from me and then thrown away.
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