So its been over two years.  Much has happened, but then again, much is quite similar.  I suppose there is some news to deliver: I recently scheduled my final defense for this summer.  Yes, after 6 years, its all coming together.  My labmate and closest collaborator recently defended and will soon be off to their new exciting job where they will be making boatloads of cash. I, on the other hand, am still on the search for a shiny postdoctoral position which will allow me to get my hands on some really exciting instrumentation, and learn some exciting condensed matter physics.  I'm really hoping that I can find my way into a group which frequents a synchrotron if I can... I dont feel like my tuneable x-ray research story is quite complete yet.  Basically, I'd love something which will put me in a good position to apply for staff scientist positions in the future, since I'm regularly day dream of landing a national lab staff scientist job.

Writing is rough.  I'm pretty sure everyone who's gone through this will say it though.  It's not like "playing" in the lab.  You isolate yourself with your research and books and papers and you just toss words on paper.  I'm constantly thinking I'm sounding like an idiot, which is slowing down my process.  Writing is nothing like data analysis or aligning optics for an ultrafast laser, its more of an internal struggle than a mechanically tedious one.  I don't know that I ever thought I'd say this, but I miss feeling like a mechanic, and I wish I were playing with my "toys" again.  I'm thinking of all sorts of experiments I could run or could have run, but its only a procrastination mechanism, as is this post... so I'll hurry it along.

It's getting weird. I know I'm not gone yet, I don't even have a job lined up to have a start date to know when I'll be gone, but its starting to feel more and more like I'm ghosting out of existence in my lab.  Lab mates are telling me that they'll miss me.  It's just really, really surreal.  I've been in my lab for the graduation of every one of the graduate students before me, and I guess it never really struck me as a reality that "one day this will be me."  Well, it'll be me.  The defense date is scheduled.  I walked in the College of Science commencement on Thursday, and my Advisor hooded me.  There's no dropping the ball now, a Ph.D. is going to be fetched by yours truly, and I'm pretty ecstatic and terrified about that whole concept.

I've got graduate students who I've mentored a bit, I hope I've taught them well, and that they'll use what I've taught them well, and carry on the group traditions and make their own way through grad school the best way they can.  All I know is, this past 6 years has shaped me in a profound way.  The graduate students who acted as my mentors had a major role in that, and I can only hope that I have had a good affect on the remaining years of the younger (not necessarily in age) graduate students in my group and department.  I've gotten quite close with a couple of the newer members of my lab in the past year, and I do hope that they'll keep in touch over the years, wherever I do end up.  Boy am I a sap.  Back to writing about science for me... less of a chance for mushiness there.

Cheers,
Lasers

Ahoy internet land, Lasers here.

So, I wanted to post this up here so that I have something to hold me accountable.  I, Lasers, am going to get my energy up and my life back in order.  Thats right, I need to pull myself up by my bootstraps and crank it back into gear.  I'm a fourth year PhD student.  I need to finish.  I need to get a life.  And I need to stop being such a bad dog owner.  I am also planning to get back to my undergrad for homecoming this Fall, and I would like to not look and feel like such a slob.  So, as of today, the 22nd of April, I am (again) deciding to  whip myself into shape.  Emotionally and physically.  Honestly, I've been lacking motivation.  So, internet-peeps, what helps to motivate you?  What do you do to energize?

Hearts, stars, and horseshoes,

Lasers

Thing's I should be posting about

Hello again all,

I decided to do a quick post about some of the things I originally set off to blog about in the first place.  Now, in general its just a blog written by a chemistry grad student, yes.  A chemistry grad student who has more hobbies than she should have if she hopes to ever graduate...  I want to share some of these hobbies with you today, perhaps as a teaser for future blag posts.

Okay, so here it is, my list of awesome-tastic hobbies (AKA: granny hobbies)

1.  You guys know this one, its softball.  I play on a co-ed slowpitch softball team, comprised of Chemistry department folks and people with connections to the chemistry department.  I'm still itching to play fastpitch softball again, but I'll take what I can get.

2.  Baking.  Specifically gourmet vegan cupcake baking, although I do diverge from that category every so often.

3.  Gardening.  I've recently joined a community garden where I can actually plant things in the ground, but I've had much success with peppers, chilis, basil, and eggplants.  Yum!

4.  Cooking!  Not the same as baking, I tend to make things up, or try to cook things that I love to eat in restaurants.  Right now I'm on a serious Indian cooking kick... pretty much all my spatulas are stained with turmeric.

5.  Knitting and sewing.  As mentioned before, I am working on an epic nerd scarf.  I also dabble in fashion design, and if/when I have the time, will make myself clothing items.

6.  Dancing.  I used to go out with friends to clubs, to swing dance lessons, or out for salsa dancing.  Now if I feel like dancing, I just start dancing.  I frequently have solo dance parties in my living room, it's one of the best ways to shut my brain off after a long day in the lab, and just smile and enjoy music.

I hope to be able to update with favorite recipes, patterns, and gardening know-how, along with the journey to a Chemistry PhD.  All these things are mixed into the grad school experience anyhow.  Just feel lucky that I haven't written a whole post about RuPaul's Drag Race yet... muahaha...

Hearts, stars, and horseshoes,
Lasers

Post Oral Exam Mopeyness

Hi all,

Yet again, its been way too long, this time about a year since I took and passed my oral exam.  Since that glorious day, I've been battling the resulting gloom of having absolutely no direction in my life, whatsoever.  This is what happens after you've leaped over the last major hurtle, and realized that you are lost in a maze of research where you start to lose track of what day, month, year it is.  This is my life, and has been for the past year.

Okay, so its not all doom and gloom like I'm making it sound, but it can be pretty rough.  In the months following my oral exam, I felt pretty lost.  I came to lab, did some work, went home.  Rinse, repeat.  I didn't do much else, because that's how my life had been while I was studying for my exam.  What I didn't realize in those months was that I was slowly running myself ragged, and I was losing my support circle while I was at it.  By not seeing my friends, not getting out of my house, and not exercising, I was digging myself a hole.  A hole that I'm only really now realizing that I need to climb out of if I'm going to survive the next year or so.

As you know from previous posts.  I'm an athlete, or at least I was.  I played NCAA Division 3 Softball in college.  I barely got any sleep at all in undergrad, juggling two majors, a sport, and a stupid amount of clubs, jobs, and other activities, including spending lots of time with friends.  I really enjoyed undergrad, despite all of these things.  I get to graduate school, and the number of stuff that I'm juggling is drastically smaller, but the stress level is raised up to level 11.  I dont have a competitive sports team, and I feel like I dont have time for anything but school and work.  I get out of shape.  I feel boring.  All I do is work.

Anyway, I dont know how many people out there actually read this, but I've decided that I need to turn over a new leaf.  I cant keep doing this moping around, just researching and feeling sorry for myself, thing.  I'm going to get back into some sort of shape.  I'm going to do things that I enjoy.  I'm going to get out and see friends, or make friends.  Mostly, if I fall off the wagon, I'm not going to give myself too much crap about it.  I need to rise out of this part of my life and look back at it like I do undergrad.  That I worked my ass off, and that I feel like I tried to make the best of every aspect of it.  Success in research, in classes, in tests, is not all I'm holding myself to.  I want to also be successful at being a human being, who feels like a human being.  I need to put the glitter, rainbows, and unicorns back into my life.

So, if you hear me moping, tell me to get up and have a dance party.  Or to call up my friends.  I think thats the kind of support I could use right now.  Hope that if there are any other grad students out there reading this, that this can serve as proof that you aren't crazy, or as a lesson that you hopefully do not have to learn the hard way.

Love,
Lasers

I did it again

Ahoy again internet world,

So... I forgot about my blog again.  Dang.  So... its been since my oral exam... which was in March... just about a 6 month delay.  Not that I have anything special to account... just remembered that this is here, and that I've neglected it.

I'll prepare something to discuss/rant about soon.  Just wanted to put out a signal to the internet world- I'm still alive!

-L

The big day

I would like to give you all an account of the past few days leading up to my oral exam, and finally describe to you how my oral exam actually went.

Saturday:
Its ~3 days until my oral exam.  I'm not allowed to study, I'm supposed to "get my zen on," as my advisor has told me.  I go to see The Secret World of Arrietty.

It was cute, just what I expected of a Studio Ghibli movie.  I start feeling sniffly, sneezy, and kind of like a cold is coming on.  Great.  I go out for beers with friends anyway, because I'm trying to zen and not think about the impending exam.

Sunday:
Nausea, body aches, and chills!  Oh crap.  This is NOT the zen I was hoping for.  I sleep all day.  Eat 2 crackers and a pear.  Go to bed hoping that I feel miraculously better on Monday.

Monday:
Still got the body-aches and chills!  I can eat but everything tastes totally nasty.  I start to freak out because my oral exam is tomorrow, and I havent really practiced my new and improved powerpoint presentation.  Insert profanity (actually, more than one).  I email my advisor, telling him whats going on.  He offers to help me reschedule if I really cant come in the next day.  Rescheduling freaks me out more than taking the exam sick.  I rest the whole day. By night time I'm feeling OK.  I bring all of my food and drink in to campus for the exam.  In a last ditch panic, I flip through Atkins and I flip through my powerpoint presentation.  I toss and turn all night, waking up at every hour in a panic.

Tuesday:
The fated day is here.  I get dressed, realize that in this whole stressed out about the oral exam for ~3 month period, I have apparently lost weight.  My dress slacks dont fit.  Luckily, I have dress slacks from 4 years ago which do.  Whew.  All dressed up, looking snazzy.  My computer is packed up, I drive to campus (not wanting to walk all the way in my professional get-up).  Now the real panic has set in.  Coffee has been ordered, I've sent a friend off to fetch donuts for one of my committee members.  Ok, everything is in place.  A friend hangs around to keep me from being alone with myself for an hour before.  All I want to do is flip through my slides and flip through my study notes, but its not a good idea!  30 minutes until the exam.  Oh dang.  Food gets set up.  Projector is set up.  Another friend pulls me aside to give me a pep talk.  I dont know that I hear much of it at all, but I appreciate it all the same.  My advisor pulls me aside.  He gives me a bit of a pep talk, tells me how the exam is going to go.  Ok.  Its game time.  I walk into the room.

The Exam:
One committee member is sitting in the corner, he has his ipad on his lap.  He asks me how many slides I have in my presentation, "What?  Slides?  No, I'm afraid we're just going to cut you off here.  No slides."  I tell him I have too many, and to feel free to cut me off.  I also tell him that his donuts are here.  "Look at all this food! I'm afraid this exam is going to have to go 5 hours so that we can finish it all!"  I'm starting to mellow out, stuff is feeling more and more casual.  Other committee members wander in.  When the last one shows up, I am asked to leave so that they can discuss how the exam is going to go.
I stand in the hallway in my fancy dress clothes with a bottle of water.  I'm nervously sipping away.  How is this thing going to go down?  The grad student coordinator walks by, talks to me, and gives me a hug.  My advisor comes out, tells me its time, tells me to take a deep breath.  I walk in and suddenly we are off!  I start presenting my proposal, there are some bumps in my speech, but I recover.  The questions are all reasonable, and mostly they are curiosities.  If I dont know the answer, I think of things that might be true, and they seem to be satisfied by that.  They cut me off after an hour and a half of talking about my proposal.  I'm sent outside again.
Whew!  Its already half over!  The proposal part wasn't so bad, but I'm starting to get nervous about the general question part.
When I'm brought back in, everyone seems to be in good spirits.  Two of my committee members are joking and actually cracking up.  It feels VERY casual, with the exception of one committee member who is being very serious.  They all tell me that my proposal was VERY GOOD.  I'm smiling, but still wondering whats next.  Three out of my four committee members ask questions.   I'm asked about the laws of thermodynamics, vibrational spectoscopy selection rules, and bonding in ZnO.  It wasnt too bad, but I dont really know what this means.  I'm asked to leave the room again.
I'm wondering, am I going to get more questions?  How did I do?  I dont feel like I'm failing, but I dont know that I've passed either.  Its like I'm in limbo, but regardless, its almost over.
After a very short break, my advisor comes out and tells me that I did a really great job.  I'm stunned.  "It's over?"  He shakes my hand.  "You still need to sign the papers."  I walk in and they are signing away at the document saying whether I've passed or failed.  I shake two of my committee members hands.  What a relief.
Now that I think about it, I never really looked to see where on the paper it said that I passed.  I guess I just have to believe my advisor.  YES!  And I'm not passed with special requirements to teach a class or to take a class.  I've just passed.

Now, I'd like to say, oh yes, I feel like I totally aced that thing.  But I dont, and I dont think anyone who takes their oral ever does.  Its the whole fraud thing that I mentioned before.  I know that I didnt go in there and fool them, but at the same time, I wonder if I am still a fraud.  How in the world did that exam go by so seemingly smooth?  How was my proposal that good?  I'm sure I'll stop thinking these things eventually.  But last night I had a dream that they actually had failed me, and no one had told me.  So I know that still, deep in my subconscious, I'm wondering if I am actually deserving of my new PhD Candidacy.

It's the day after the exam now, and I'm still sick.  I'm stuck in bed resting after all of yesterdays excitement.  Food still doesn't taste good.  My sinuses are causing me incredible pain, and the dogs in my house are driving me crazy.  I cannot wait to be feeling better and back in the lab.  I miss my laser, and I miss my team.

Thanks again for all of the support.  I've finally made it.  Next big hurtles- writing papers, a dissertation, and defending it.  PhD-ness, here I come.

Lasers

3 days

The countdown is nearly up!  Less than 3 days until I take my oral exam!  Now, a treat for you all.  A friend of mine made me into a laser loving cartoon character (for my oral exam and other future presentations).  Enjoy!