It's like being bipolar
On Monday I came into the lab and was excited about what this week would bring, with the opportunity to get lot's of research done without classes and teaching responsibilities. Not the ideal way to spend spring break, but it's how things work.
I got my grades from this quarter, A and A-. I was ecstatic. I was worried about how I did on a few things, but this validated my hard work and effort.
I got to isolate my organisms for the first time. Exciting. I went to assay them, and sure enough the squalene was in an ampule, and I wasn't sure about using it. Oh well, I decided I'll just do these cold and have a reference point. No big deal I guess.
I started working on a Western blot project with Nick the slacker. He actually showed up, which surprised me. But we started off with our protein determination assay. It didn't work, but that's fine.
Tuesday we tried the determination assay again, and it didn't work again. Not only that, but Dr. K was in a shitty mood. Apparently Jenny decided to go to visit her sister and new niece. But that's not research, and so Dr. K was pissed. And she took it out on us, I think. I still got a lot done that day as well, I believe.
Wednesday, Dr. Shann came over to inspect the HPLC. Apparently when Peter looked at it he was wrong to say the pump diferential was broken. So it works. Meanwhile, I was yelled at for not ordering a new bulb for the detector (which also seemed to work, and Jenny was taking care of). And apparently it's ridiculous that it's the second quarter and we haven't run anything through the HPLC (which we were told by several former students would not run again, and which we didn't get a professional opinion on until last week).
And now today, I come into lab and see that course evaluations are available. Great start to a day, because I know I'm going to get slammed. I know I'm not a very good TA, but I'm working on it. I read them, and I feel confident that my thickening skin is holding up. Of course afterwards I dwell on what they said, and how I disagreed. I was always prepared to teach them, and I always answered their questions, I thought. Of course, everyone seemed to constantly go to the lecture professor, bypassing me, with their questions. It pissed me off, because I'm much better at one on one than in front of a class. I admit that I'm not the best lecturer, but I try harder than anyone. I knew the material, maybe I just didn't express it well? I don't know, but for people to say that I was unprepared and didn't know the material makes me hate those ungrateful bastards. I wanted them to succeed, I wanted to help them, while other TAs were indifferent. I even refrained from talking shit about my students when we graded exams. Maybe they were all just whiny because nobody did well in the class. But I wish my effort and caring counted for something.
I keep trying to tell myself that I'm only teaching because I need to, and as long as I get paid nothing else matters. But still, it hurts that I get more negative comments than positive ones.
I tried to do a protein assay without Nick, who hasn't shown up in two days. I think he might just not want to deal with Dr. K. But anyway, I managed to screw up twice in the pipetting, and now I need to make more buffer. I was expecting to make it to Western blots by now, but no. I guess that's how research goes. I'll still get yelled at from Dr. K, because she thinks complaing will get results. I also ran the yeast sterol GC like she wanted, but I got no thanks, just a break from her bitching. She continued to yell at everyone for not having their own injection syringe, even though only Alex didn't have one. She freaked out about us cleaning them with chloroform:methanol because it can damage the column (even though we get all of it out, and SHE told us to use it). She asked me about the attenuation on the GC, and I said I needed to think about it, and she just walked away. And then she brought up the chromatography project on a collaborator's sterols. This was supposed to be Jenny's project for the conference, but apparently going to visit your sister and new niece over spring break equates to not going to do it. And she spent a good minute ranting about it, but at least it was in her conversational voice.
It's just like working for a 72 year old child.
So this is how grad school makes me bipolar. I gotta get out of here.
I got my grades from this quarter, A and A-. I was ecstatic. I was worried about how I did on a few things, but this validated my hard work and effort.
I got to isolate my organisms for the first time. Exciting. I went to assay them, and sure enough the squalene was in an ampule, and I wasn't sure about using it. Oh well, I decided I'll just do these cold and have a reference point. No big deal I guess.
I started working on a Western blot project with Nick the slacker. He actually showed up, which surprised me. But we started off with our protein determination assay. It didn't work, but that's fine.
Tuesday we tried the determination assay again, and it didn't work again. Not only that, but Dr. K was in a shitty mood. Apparently Jenny decided to go to visit her sister and new niece. But that's not research, and so Dr. K was pissed. And she took it out on us, I think. I still got a lot done that day as well, I believe.
Wednesday, Dr. Shann came over to inspect the HPLC. Apparently when Peter looked at it he was wrong to say the pump diferential was broken. So it works. Meanwhile, I was yelled at for not ordering a new bulb for the detector (which also seemed to work, and Jenny was taking care of). And apparently it's ridiculous that it's the second quarter and we haven't run anything through the HPLC (which we were told by several former students would not run again, and which we didn't get a professional opinion on until last week).
And now today, I come into lab and see that course evaluations are available. Great start to a day, because I know I'm going to get slammed. I know I'm not a very good TA, but I'm working on it. I read them, and I feel confident that my thickening skin is holding up. Of course afterwards I dwell on what they said, and how I disagreed. I was always prepared to teach them, and I always answered their questions, I thought. Of course, everyone seemed to constantly go to the lecture professor, bypassing me, with their questions. It pissed me off, because I'm much better at one on one than in front of a class. I admit that I'm not the best lecturer, but I try harder than anyone. I knew the material, maybe I just didn't express it well? I don't know, but for people to say that I was unprepared and didn't know the material makes me hate those ungrateful bastards. I wanted them to succeed, I wanted to help them, while other TAs were indifferent. I even refrained from talking shit about my students when we graded exams. Maybe they were all just whiny because nobody did well in the class. But I wish my effort and caring counted for something.
I keep trying to tell myself that I'm only teaching because I need to, and as long as I get paid nothing else matters. But still, it hurts that I get more negative comments than positive ones.
I tried to do a protein assay without Nick, who hasn't shown up in two days. I think he might just not want to deal with Dr. K. But anyway, I managed to screw up twice in the pipetting, and now I need to make more buffer. I was expecting to make it to Western blots by now, but no. I guess that's how research goes. I'll still get yelled at from Dr. K, because she thinks complaing will get results. I also ran the yeast sterol GC like she wanted, but I got no thanks, just a break from her bitching. She continued to yell at everyone for not having their own injection syringe, even though only Alex didn't have one. She freaked out about us cleaning them with chloroform:methanol because it can damage the column (even though we get all of it out, and SHE told us to use it). She asked me about the attenuation on the GC, and I said I needed to think about it, and she just walked away. And then she brought up the chromatography project on a collaborator's sterols. This was supposed to be Jenny's project for the conference, but apparently going to visit your sister and new niece over spring break equates to not going to do it. And she spent a good minute ranting about it, but at least it was in her conversational voice.
It's just like working for a 72 year old child.
So this is how grad school makes me bipolar. I gotta get out of here.