Hehe... 5 months eh? And there was stuff, and shenanigans...beautiful word, shenanigans.
Well now that it's the end of May, and a very quiet calm day in the office, maybe I'll go ahead and do an LJ update...
This last semester was extremely busy and hectic, though mostly fun. I was taking two classes, Kinetics and Mechanics, sitting in on a third to review the material, Defects and Microstructure, TAing a lab class for undergrads, Materials Characterization, and continuing to attempt to put together a lab.
Got the B I needed in Kinetics to have a 3.75 GPA in the core classes to get out of the written portion of the PhD qualifier exam. Got a lovely A in Mechanics, and with both those passed classes should have all the class credits I need for a PhD, so should be done with course work!
The class I was sitting in on I have already taken, and TA'd, but it was one of the core which we get tested on and it was being taught this semester by my new advisor. Who is slowly learning how to be a professor.
The lab course I TA'd had 10 labs, 5 of which were my job to run, with ~5 students in each. It's the second time I TA'd that one and it's lots of fun, but it takes up a huge chunk of time.
My lab is still only slowly coming together. We have four furnaces so far, only one of which is up and running, and none of which actually go high enough for what my research entails so I'm working on a different set up for that. (That's right, 1700C isn't hot enough for my work!) But as of last Thursday, I'm finally starting on running some preliminary tests at least.
This past semester I was also dating a math grad student, Tim, though we recently decided we make much better friends than anything else, so that's not going on any more.
My brother and his wife had a second baby, another boy, this past March, and he is an adorable little snuggle monkey! The four of them and my sister were in town this weekend and I got to hang out with them for a bit on Saturday! Next looking forward to going to visit my parents' new lake house some time soon as apparently it's actually built. And my dad just had eye surgery on one of his eyes, which apparently went well.
Also! I recently got to see sooo many friends which is awesome. D&D with the Nova kids, dinners with Sophie and the Nova kids, shopping with Lyndsey! Also I think her and I are gonna hit up the spy museum sometime soon.
Now that I have provided reading material for anyone who is /exceedingly/ bored, it's probably time to go check on that furnace I've got running.
This last semester was extremely busy and hectic, though mostly fun. I was taking two classes, Kinetics and Mechanics, sitting in on a third to review the material, Defects and Microstructure, TAing a lab class for undergrads, Materials Characterization, and continuing to attempt to put together a lab.
Got the B I needed in Kinetics to have a 3.75 GPA in the core classes to get out of the written portion of the PhD qualifier exam. Got a lovely A in Mechanics, and with both those passed classes should have all the class credits I need for a PhD, so should be done with course work!
The class I was sitting in on I have already taken, and TA'd, but it was one of the core which we get tested on and it was being taught this semester by my new advisor. Who is slowly learning how to be a professor.
The lab course I TA'd had 10 labs, 5 of which were my job to run, with ~5 students in each. It's the second time I TA'd that one and it's lots of fun, but it takes up a huge chunk of time.
My lab is still only slowly coming together. We have four furnaces so far, only one of which is up and running, and none of which actually go high enough for what my research entails so I'm working on a different set up for that. (That's right, 1700C isn't hot enough for my work!) But as of last Thursday, I'm finally starting on running some preliminary tests at least.
This past semester I was also dating a math grad student, Tim, though we recently decided we make much better friends than anything else, so that's not going on any more.
My brother and his wife had a second baby, another boy, this past March, and he is an adorable little snuggle monkey! The four of them and my sister were in town this weekend and I got to hang out with them for a bit on Saturday! Next looking forward to going to visit my parents' new lake house some time soon as apparently it's actually built. And my dad just had eye surgery on one of his eyes, which apparently went well.
Also! I recently got to see sooo many friends which is awesome. D&D with the Nova kids, dinners with Sophie and the Nova kids, shopping with Lyndsey! Also I think her and I are gonna hit up the spy museum sometime soon.
Now that I have provided reading material for anyone who is /exceedingly/ bored, it's probably time to go check on that furnace I've got running.