Episode XX: Change

With the end of my first school year here in Kansas, there are a lot of changes occurring around me. Here I present a few of them; unfortunately, there are no pictures, as I recently moved and have yet to find my camera cable to upload my pictures.

1. From Crowd to Quiet

Summer in a college town means a small crowd around the city. Less of a line at the grocery store, less of a problem finding a parking spot on campus, and fewer restaurants open on-campus. It was kind of a bittersweet moment watching all the college kids pack up and leave town, as it reminded me that I myself can no longer look forward to blissfully lazy days of summer vacation.

2. From Student to Worker

With all my classes over for perhaps the rest of my life, I am settling into life in the lab, which means fairly hard work, but it also means that when I am done and I go home, I have ZERO homework, projects or tests to worry about. It is kind of a liberating feeling. So yes, for the first time in my life I am in somewhat of a 9 to 5 job, and I suppose it's really not that bad. However, I am still not, and never have been, considered a full-time employee. Rather, I am paid a stipend, and expected to work hard enough to complete a successful research project (which means: pretty hard).

3. From Small Apartment to Country Home

The Jayhawker Towers kicked us out May 22nd, and while it was a fairly nice place, I doubt that I will miss it. I am temporarily staying with a couple from church, who live out in the country in a very nice house, on acres and acres of land. It is great to drive out there under a dark, starry sky, and to see the fireflies out at night. The place is also incredibly quiet, with no cars or neighbors within earshot. This is certainly a welcome change from being awoken 2-7 times every night by my roommates or neighbors.

It really is a nice place, and if I ever get around to it I will post some pictures.

Episode XIX: Lab

Hooray! I made it into the lab that I wanted, as did my buddy who was trying to get into the same lab, so we are both pretty happy about that. There was not too much time to celebrate, however, for we have already begun working hard (or at least sort of hard) in lab.

Here is a quick look at the major members of the Lundquist lab (I stole the pictures off of the web):

And the new additions:

So my organism of study is C. elegans, a tiny, nearly-microscopic worm that is see-through, but we usually add various genes to our strains that make certain neurons fluorescent. Here is a typical picture.

In other news, next week is finals week for us, and after that I believe I will be completely done taking required college courses for the rest of my life. From here on out it is mostly just research and weekly seminars.