here is an update. you deserve it.
Instead of going to bed (which is what normal folks would do at 1am after 11 hours of homeworking), I have decided to update the blog.
Homework doesn't really exist in grad school, in the event that you were wondering. There are two types of stress: Major events you need to deal with NOW (like hour-long presentations, exams, and such) and things you do that are not required but you do them because a) other people do them or b) you don't want to look like an idiot (like actually buying and reading the textbook). This semester I have a class that pitches me five or six journal articles on Thursday, in which I have to present said presentation and critique the rest of them, submitting two in depth questions or critical discussions for each of the rest of the papers. Due/presented Monday. I am also taking med student physiology. In the previous semester, I believed that med students were douchebags. I am still honoring that belief, but now I am adding that PT students are flaming asshats. I am garnering a strong dislike for other "professional" students, or anyone in the medical profession. I also have a class that is supposed to teach me a) how to ive presentations and answer questions properly, b) how to write grants, and c) safety and such. We give presentations every other week, and are videotaped so we can replay how "retard" each of us exhibit. That sure makes my day. I never watched the video of my senior seminar for a reason.
I'm the proud owner of a new cat. He is 7 mos old, a silver tabby. His name is Chowder. If you'd like to know why, watch Cartoon Network at night. He's a champ. Concurrently, I am also the proud new owner of a new SO. If that isn't news to celebrate, I don't know what is. Although said SO has "ownership issues" in which he probably owns me, but enough said. He is moving tothe fine and frosty tundra of MSP sooner or later, which excites me to no end. I spend my spare procrastination time on craigslist, apartment hunting for him, although it'll be three or four months.
On another work-related note: I haven't recieved any W-2s yet. Lame. Also, there really ought to be a bus stop at the hospital that goes to the U, in which I will not have to trek four blocks to themetrodome stop and watch my bus leave every single time. I have not had good luck with the busses lately. Metro transit and I are no longer friends. I really wish they would have started that Northstar commuter line earlier. Nothing says hurry the fuck up like an El train that stops for fifteen seconds. Nothing also says short bus quite like the number two bus. And all of the drunks, thugs, and homeless folks that ride it. Also note: I have to stand at chicago and franklin coming to and from the hospital between the number 2 and number 5 routes now. I'd rather spend the money to drive and park in a lot than stand in the dark at night. I'd really rather stand on Hall and Franklin back home in GR if that gives you a notion.
I am in the market for some optimism. Let me know where I can pick some of that up, right? I've still got a few left from the extra paycheck in January. Wait, student fees are coming up. Scratch that, I need five hundred.
As a graduate student, it is important to know people in high places. These include the social person of your department (hello summer BBQs), the student liason to the graduate committee (you say we are getting a 1k raise next year?), and the department secretary (yes, plz include me as a student liason for the recruitees. free all-the-food-i-can-eat at CHINO LATINO). Keep this in mind, should you ever choose to follow this path (don't.).
It gets harder and harder to watch people move up in their workforce, get houses, cars, marry away, take vacations, make $50k a year. Moving from a rotating student to a graduate student to a post-doc is sort of like moving up the bottom end of the food chain. Moving from single-celled organism to... multicellular parasite. As much as looking at salary estimates is exciting, knowing that I'll be taking home less than 20k for another four years, and then less than double that as a diploma-carrying Dr. (via the post-doc "I need four years of experience to get a job" route) for at least another four years, it is all quite depressing. I'll be thirty before I can afford to live my life properly. I'd really just like to be able to buy my groceries whenever, wherever, and to be able to buy what looks good... rather than shopping at the stores that have sales, and buying the food that is on sale at said stores. Some day I'll shop at Byerly's.
The more graduate student I become, the more jaded I become. Strange how knowledge and education does that instead of sex and drugs. Although I am fairly sure they are all intertwined together somehow. Also, why am I the only person in my lab who isn't married? I am also starting to think that pregnancy is contagious at HCMC. Things shock me less, I suppose. And really, I don't mean to continually stay out of contact with people from home. I'm just continually trying to keep my head afloat here. Like the breakfast club (courtesy of the simple minds), don't you forget about me.
In the end, I think we all just want to be taken care of. N'est-pas?
Homework doesn't really exist in grad school, in the event that you were wondering. There are two types of stress: Major events you need to deal with NOW (like hour-long presentations, exams, and such) and things you do that are not required but you do them because a) other people do them or b) you don't want to look like an idiot (like actually buying and reading the textbook). This semester I have a class that pitches me five or six journal articles on Thursday, in which I have to present said presentation and critique the rest of them, submitting two in depth questions or critical discussions for each of the rest of the papers. Due/presented Monday. I am also taking med student physiology. In the previous semester, I believed that med students were douchebags. I am still honoring that belief, but now I am adding that PT students are flaming asshats. I am garnering a strong dislike for other "professional" students, or anyone in the medical profession. I also have a class that is supposed to teach me a) how to ive presentations and answer questions properly, b) how to write grants, and c) safety and such. We give presentations every other week, and are videotaped so we can replay how "retard" each of us exhibit. That sure makes my day. I never watched the video of my senior seminar for a reason.
I'm the proud owner of a new cat. He is 7 mos old, a silver tabby. His name is Chowder. If you'd like to know why, watch Cartoon Network at night. He's a champ. Concurrently, I am also the proud new owner of a new SO. If that isn't news to celebrate, I don't know what is. Although said SO has "ownership issues" in which he probably owns me, but enough said. He is moving tothe fine and frosty tundra of MSP sooner or later, which excites me to no end. I spend my spare procrastination time on craigslist, apartment hunting for him, although it'll be three or four months.
On another work-related note: I haven't recieved any W-2s yet. Lame. Also, there really ought to be a bus stop at the hospital that goes to the U, in which I will not have to trek four blocks to themetrodome stop and watch my bus leave every single time. I have not had good luck with the busses lately. Metro transit and I are no longer friends. I really wish they would have started that Northstar commuter line earlier. Nothing says hurry the fuck up like an El train that stops for fifteen seconds. Nothing also says short bus quite like the number two bus. And all of the drunks, thugs, and homeless folks that ride it. Also note: I have to stand at chicago and franklin coming to and from the hospital between the number 2 and number 5 routes now. I'd rather spend the money to drive and park in a lot than stand in the dark at night. I'd really rather stand on Hall and Franklin back home in GR if that gives you a notion.
I am in the market for some optimism. Let me know where I can pick some of that up, right? I've still got a few left from the extra paycheck in January. Wait, student fees are coming up. Scratch that, I need five hundred.
As a graduate student, it is important to know people in high places. These include the social person of your department (hello summer BBQs), the student liason to the graduate committee (you say we are getting a 1k raise next year?), and the department secretary (yes, plz include me as a student liason for the recruitees. free all-the-food-i-can-eat at CHINO LATINO). Keep this in mind, should you ever choose to follow this path (don't.).
It gets harder and harder to watch people move up in their workforce, get houses, cars, marry away, take vacations, make $50k a year. Moving from a rotating student to a graduate student to a post-doc is sort of like moving up the bottom end of the food chain. Moving from single-celled organism to... multicellular parasite. As much as looking at salary estimates is exciting, knowing that I'll be taking home less than 20k for another four years, and then less than double that as a diploma-carrying Dr. (via the post-doc "I need four years of experience to get a job" route) for at least another four years, it is all quite depressing. I'll be thirty before I can afford to live my life properly. I'd really just like to be able to buy my groceries whenever, wherever, and to be able to buy what looks good... rather than shopping at the stores that have sales, and buying the food that is on sale at said stores. Some day I'll shop at Byerly's.
The more graduate student I become, the more jaded I become. Strange how knowledge and education does that instead of sex and drugs. Although I am fairly sure they are all intertwined together somehow. Also, why am I the only person in my lab who isn't married? I am also starting to think that pregnancy is contagious at HCMC. Things shock me less, I suppose. And really, I don't mean to continually stay out of contact with people from home. I'm just continually trying to keep my head afloat here. Like the breakfast club (courtesy of the simple minds), don't you forget about me.
In the end, I think we all just want to be taken care of. N'est-pas?