I'm crashing a small conference that is taking place at my college. It's tangentially related to my research, and I really enjoy poking around poster sessions, so it's been a really good opportunity.
MORE exciting, however, is the fact that I can pretty much understand everything. Obviously not everything, but it seems like I have come to the point in my studies where it's not really a struggle to follow along in a (well given) seminar, or get the gist of a (well written) poster. I don't get lost every 5th word.
Look at me, I'm becoming a REAL PERSON.
(Reading back over those short paragraphs, I feel a bit depressed. Is this even something to be proud of?)
Tuesday, July 12, 2011
Friday, July 1, 2011
Normal dangers
I'm still afraid of acids. I work a lot with neat nitric/sulfuric acid, and I find it completely terrifying. I thought that after working with this stuff for > a year, it would be no biggy. And it really is! If I splashed some on myself it would burn, I would deal with it, and then I would have a war wound and a story. That's really not so bad. But every time I pull out the bottle I see drips and splashes everywhere.
The real question is if I normally drip and splash this much and I'm just noticing it because of the substance? Am I really so sloppy at bench work?
I would also feel much better if I had some functional pH paper. Our is all 100 years old and doesn't actually turn colors.
In other more exciting happy news, my PI is about to drop a big sum of money to buy me some new toys! I feel like my project is finally gaining some traction. It's using a new method and the collaborator and student that started it are gone (one in a more dramatic manner than the other), so I was thinking that the whole thing was going to putter out when I left. But it looks like she's putting in a real investment right now.
It's better than Christmas. Hurray :)
The real question is if I normally drip and splash this much and I'm just noticing it because of the substance? Am I really so sloppy at bench work?
I would also feel much better if I had some functional pH paper. Our is all 100 years old and doesn't actually turn colors.
In other more exciting happy news, my PI is about to drop a big sum of money to buy me some new toys! I feel like my project is finally gaining some traction. It's using a new method and the collaborator and student that started it are gone (one in a more dramatic manner than the other), so I was thinking that the whole thing was going to putter out when I left. But it looks like she's putting in a real investment right now.
It's better than Christmas. Hurray :)
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