Today was actually a pretty relaxing day. My transformation finally worked and I got bacteria!! I did a few minutes of prep work on it, but the real brunt of work will be tomorrow. I'm hugely ecstatic though.
I had lunch with Christina and Lesley, and it was really fun talking to them. With people like this, and always smiling, it was fun to get to talk to them.
Today was a pretty easy day, but tomorrow there's a lot of lab work (my mentor gave me 28 more samples, on top of my 12 from today...).
Monday, June 29, 2015
Book 2: The Golden Thread Day 23 (June 29, 2015)
Today, I left all forms of ID at home. So in order to get into NIH, I needed to have a coworker vouch for me, which turned out to be my mentor. I felt bad, making him walk all the way across the campus to the entrance, and then back.
I am never forgetting my ID or any form of identification ever again.
In the lab, I had to redo transformation (I actually went a step back and redid ligation) because I got no colonies from my experiment on Friday. It's going to be a long week if this doesn't work...
I was late for the first day of journal club because I left the lab late because my experiment was running late because the wait time was one hour to incubate and that is just too long. Plus, the building where my journal club was meeting was all the way across campus. Why did I not factor distance when choosing clubs? Oh wait, that's because I actually wanted to sign up for something interesting. And it is. It's about long noncoding RNAs, and it's completely over my head. I managed to skim the first few pages of a review paper we were emailed before class as an overview (don't worry, I'll struggle valiantly through it eventually), but it really is intriguing. I was assigned to someone by random, and we're presenting a paper on August 3rd, but I have no idea what our topic is and we have to submit a topic by Friday. Whoops. I was late, so I missed all the introductions and I felt awkward because I didn't know anyone's name, everyone knew mine and that I was in high school still (and therefore the youngest person there), but oh well, focusing on the powerpoint was hard too because there was too much information to process.
Afterwards, I end up walking with the girl who sat to my left (hi Bronte), and it turns out, she's the same age as me (so going to be a senior next year) and she was actually from Building 35. We talked as we walked to 35 and then we parted ways. I know I'll see her next week though, so I'm in no rush to throw myself at people and make friends effusively. It's nice knowing I'm not the youngest in the journal club: I'm the youngest with someone else.
Today was a rough, busy day, but hopefully my transformation was successful this time...today was the 4th time I've done this exact same experiment, and it hasn't even been a week yet.
I am never forgetting my ID or any form of identification ever again.
In the lab, I had to redo transformation (I actually went a step back and redid ligation) because I got no colonies from my experiment on Friday. It's going to be a long week if this doesn't work...
I was late for the first day of journal club because I left the lab late because my experiment was running late because the wait time was one hour to incubate and that is just too long. Plus, the building where my journal club was meeting was all the way across campus. Why did I not factor distance when choosing clubs? Oh wait, that's because I actually wanted to sign up for something interesting. And it is. It's about long noncoding RNAs, and it's completely over my head. I managed to skim the first few pages of a review paper we were emailed before class as an overview (don't worry, I'll struggle valiantly through it eventually), but it really is intriguing. I was assigned to someone by random, and we're presenting a paper on August 3rd, but I have no idea what our topic is and we have to submit a topic by Friday. Whoops. I was late, so I missed all the introductions and I felt awkward because I didn't know anyone's name, everyone knew mine and that I was in high school still (and therefore the youngest person there), but oh well, focusing on the powerpoint was hard too because there was too much information to process.
Afterwards, I end up walking with the girl who sat to my left (hi Bronte), and it turns out, she's the same age as me (so going to be a senior next year) and she was actually from Building 35. We talked as we walked to 35 and then we parted ways. I know I'll see her next week though, so I'm in no rush to throw myself at people and make friends effusively. It's nice knowing I'm not the youngest in the journal club: I'm the youngest with someone else.
Today was a rough, busy day, but hopefully my transformation was successful this time...today was the 4th time I've done this exact same experiment, and it hasn't even been a week yet.
Sunday, June 28, 2015
Book 2: The Golden Thread Day 22 (June 28, 2015)
This weekend has been out of the normal, which would have been visiting as many museums as I can. Today was no exception, where I went berry picking with Black, Cameron, Hui, Amy, and her boyfriend Tyler (Hui and Amy are family friends of Black). Today was cool and cloudy, so being outside picking berries was not unbearably hot.
We went first to pick cherries and blueberries. The tart cherries were super high up in the trees, taunting our shortness. Only the dark ruby red cherries were ripe, and even then, they were more sour than sweet. The blueberries grew in abundance on the bushes, and our buckets were filled in no time.
We did find a few itty bitty strawberries, but most of the strawberries have either been picked, or decimated by the incredible amounts of rain we've been getting because they grow so close to the ground. We then went to find blackberries, and despite most of them being pink and unripened and absolutely tongue-flippingly sour and bitter, I managed to fill half a quart with them, and I am so very proud of myself. I also managed to eat lots of blackberry "bubbles" (most of the blackberries were oddly formed so that they were just aggregates of ink blue bubbles) (not that I didn't eat my body weight in blueberries already) and my hands were stained from the juice. There were a few raspberry bushes and I managed to pick a few, but they weren't very tasty.
Afterwards, we were heading out, but a sign that read "black raspberries" caught our eye and our curiosity, so we decided to make one last stop before leaving. Thank goodness we stopped because black raspberries just might be my favorite fruit. Until today, I had never heard of the fruit "black raspberry," and now I was seeing bushes and bushes filled with these gleaming black beauties. After eating just as much as I was putting in my basket, with each berry tasting even better than the next, I think it's safe to say that black raspberries have trumped ordinary pink raspberries in flavor and juiciness.
Afterwards, we went back to Peking Palace (the place we were at yesterday) and ordered 6 different dishes from last night, and beef tripe again. Two nights of amazing food, all spicy goodness that warms your tummy. I may have gained 20 pounds from this weekend, but my want for authentic, delicious Chinese food has been saited. I have been starved for the past 6 years since Silk Mandarin changed ownership (and later closed).
It's back to work tomorrow, with its usual dose of newness. It's my first day of journal club tomorrow (eeep, I still have to read a whole review paper before 1pm tomorrow) and I'm pretty excited!
We went first to pick cherries and blueberries. The tart cherries were super high up in the trees, taunting our shortness. Only the dark ruby red cherries were ripe, and even then, they were more sour than sweet. The blueberries grew in abundance on the bushes, and our buckets were filled in no time.
We did find a few itty bitty strawberries, but most of the strawberries have either been picked, or decimated by the incredible amounts of rain we've been getting because they grow so close to the ground. We then went to find blackberries, and despite most of them being pink and unripened and absolutely tongue-flippingly sour and bitter, I managed to fill half a quart with them, and I am so very proud of myself. I also managed to eat lots of blackberry "bubbles" (most of the blackberries were oddly formed so that they were just aggregates of ink blue bubbles) (not that I didn't eat my body weight in blueberries already) and my hands were stained from the juice. There were a few raspberry bushes and I managed to pick a few, but they weren't very tasty.
The most perfect blackberry (and most largest) I've ever seen. It's beautiful. I ate it.
Afterwards, we were heading out, but a sign that read "black raspberries" caught our eye and our curiosity, so we decided to make one last stop before leaving. Thank goodness we stopped because black raspberries just might be my favorite fruit. Until today, I had never heard of the fruit "black raspberry," and now I was seeing bushes and bushes filled with these gleaming black beauties. After eating just as much as I was putting in my basket, with each berry tasting even better than the next, I think it's safe to say that black raspberries have trumped ordinary pink raspberries in flavor and juiciness.
These pink raspberries are unripened and grossly sour. Trust me, I tried one.
Look at how fat and delicious they look!
My hands were stained purple at this point...it looked liked they were covered in blood! It also didn't help that there were thorns on these raspberry bushes.
Afterwards, we went back to Peking Palace (the place we were at yesterday) and ordered 6 different dishes from last night, and beef tripe again. Two nights of amazing food, all spicy goodness that warms your tummy. I may have gained 20 pounds from this weekend, but my want for authentic, delicious Chinese food has been saited. I have been starved for the past 6 years since Silk Mandarin changed ownership (and later closed).
It's back to work tomorrow, with its usual dose of newness. It's my first day of journal club tomorrow (eeep, I still have to read a whole review paper before 1pm tomorrow) and I'm pretty excited!
Saturday, June 27, 2015
Book 2: Settling into Life Day 21 (June 27, 2015)
Today was a pretty relaxed day, but I went with Black to meet with one of their family friends (Hui, and her daughter Amy, plus Amy's boyfriend, Tyler), and we ate dinner together at a Chinese restaurant, the 5 of us ordering 7 dishes. There was so much seriously good food, but even though we all ate as much as we could, we hardly made a dent in the amount of food we had. It's also so sad, because at the end of this month (so in 2 days), the restaurant is closing because the rent is just so expensive.
We tried this delicious dish called beef tripe. It's more delicious than it actually sounds. I promise. The vinegar-based sauce was tangy and yummy, and the spicy sauce, pepper-based, was even more delicious. The food we ordered was all spicy, but it's been a long time since I've had good Chinese food, and I am now very content.
It rained all day today, which meant wetness everywhere, but at least it was cool. It was 70 all day long and hopefully tomorrow and the rest of the week doesn't get too much hotter. I like it this cool. Tomorrow we're going berry picking though, so we don't want rain...
We tried this delicious dish called beef tripe. It's more delicious than it actually sounds. I promise. The vinegar-based sauce was tangy and yummy, and the spicy sauce, pepper-based, was even more delicious. The food we ordered was all spicy, but it's been a long time since I've had good Chinese food, and I am now very content.
It rained all day today, which meant wetness everywhere, but at least it was cool. It was 70 all day long and hopefully tomorrow and the rest of the week doesn't get too much hotter. I like it this cool. Tomorrow we're going berry picking though, so we don't want rain...
Friday, June 26, 2015
Book 1: Settling into Life Day 20 (June 26, 2015)
Walking out of the Metro, I see Hetal, and so we walk together from the station to Building 35. I've brought my tennis racket for playing with Jon today, and I find out that Hetal used to play, so now we need to find one more person (preferably from our lab just because it'd be so much easier to coordinate times that way) and then doubles would definitely work!
Today at the lab meeting, Lesley gave her presentation, and she presented the background info on the basis of what the lab (overall) was trying to investigate. Because of that, combined with getting through the big bulk of the review paper I've been toiling over these past 1.5 weeks, I definitely was able to see the goal of my lab. At the same time though, lab work is so detailed and so focused, I still have a hard time seeing how all the cloning I'm doing fits in the larger scheme of the picture. Mainly, I'm just amplifying DNA so that there's an ample amount to work with.
I redid the transformation from yesterday, but the second time (first time today), I forgot to incubate at 37dC, and insteadincubated heatshocked at 42dC... So third time is hopefully the charm. 5 minutes through incubation, I realized I made the same mistake as I did yesterday, so I added the SOC media, and I think transformation should work this time because I don't think I've made any mistakes, and well, third time's the charm, right?
I was doing lab work for nearly 5 hours today mostly consecutive, only with an one hour break for lunch, mainly because of all the time from the transformations. At lunch, I ate with Lesley, my mentor, Catherine, and Alicia, and we talked about various things. Halfway through, Janet (who I played tennis with...and is leaving on Monday to go back to her lab in North Carolina...she was here on a sabbatical for 6 months) had a going away party, and the left overs were put in the break room. So we gorged on more junk.
I went to play tennis with Jon at 4pm, which was definitely much needed (both to shake off my exhaustion from the week and also the sheer amount of food I ate during lunch). We then walked over to Rock Bottom for happy hour. Oh, so I should explain why happy hour today. So Richard is a fun guy, he likes social. So whenever someone publishes a paper or basically, something extraordinarily big happens in the lab (so basically a paper gets published), Richard takes the whole lab to Rock Bottom, a bar in Bethesda, within walking distance from NIH, and the bill's on him, and there's appetizers and beer. Greasy bar food, beer, and nonalcoholic beverages too. We get a happy hour because in the past month, our lab has collectively published 3 papers. Which is a huge deal. Alicia, Danielle, and Catherine. This also coincides with Adam leaving the lab (his last day is July 10), so it's a celebration of many things. Yes Adam is leaving, but he has a "real" job now, so he's leaving the NIH (which is just like a temporary job, kind of like limbo, the time between getting your PhD and waiting for a job offer) to his new job which is in Boston.
Everyone is there at 4:30 (they go directly from work), Jon and I walk in at 5:15. Whoops. We probably didn't miss much though. There's just a lot of different small clumps that form, somewhat fluid, but yeah, small talk. It takes me a while to sort of fit myself in the amoeba of people around some tables, but I do get in, participate in a few conversations, but mainly just listen. I'm nursing a cup of ginger ale, which looks a little like diluted beer (but with ice and a straw), watching people slowly unwind, some much more than others.
We end at 7:30 approximately, I get home at 9, after stopping at Flippin' Pizza for some extremely greasy pizza. Michaela posts on the group chat we have between the four of us, that the White House is lit up tonight with rainbow lights to celebrate the Supreme Court ruling that legalizes sam sex marriage in all 50 states. Oh. I only knew about the ruling by quickly checking facebook (for the first time today) during a few seconds while waiting in line for food in the cafeteria, and I didn't know about the lights until Michaela asked if anyone would go with her to see it. So I end up going. Pictures below.
It's been a crazy day today. Bad because of transformation issues, also because today just felt like such a long day and I was just so exhausted from the week, but good because the lab meeting was cool (Alicia also presented, and her presentation was so intriguing, since she talked about Parkinson's Disease and Parkin and ubiquitin in mouse brains), lunch was entertaining, tennis was much needed, happy hour was definitely a first for me, and hey, the first time I get to see the White House and it was all lit up in rainbow colors. It's a milestone for the US, but we still have a long way to go before we can truly claim to be accepting of all people.
Today at the lab meeting, Lesley gave her presentation, and she presented the background info on the basis of what the lab (overall) was trying to investigate. Because of that, combined with getting through the big bulk of the review paper I've been toiling over these past 1.5 weeks, I definitely was able to see the goal of my lab. At the same time though, lab work is so detailed and so focused, I still have a hard time seeing how all the cloning I'm doing fits in the larger scheme of the picture. Mainly, I'm just amplifying DNA so that there's an ample amount to work with.
I redid the transformation from yesterday, but the second time (first time today), I forgot to incubate at 37dC, and instead
I was doing lab work for nearly 5 hours today mostly consecutive, only with an one hour break for lunch, mainly because of all the time from the transformations. At lunch, I ate with Lesley, my mentor, Catherine, and Alicia, and we talked about various things. Halfway through, Janet (who I played tennis with...and is leaving on Monday to go back to her lab in North Carolina...she was here on a sabbatical for 6 months) had a going away party, and the left overs were put in the break room. So we gorged on more junk.
I went to play tennis with Jon at 4pm, which was definitely much needed (both to shake off my exhaustion from the week and also the sheer amount of food I ate during lunch). We then walked over to Rock Bottom for happy hour. Oh, so I should explain why happy hour today. So Richard is a fun guy, he likes social. So whenever someone publishes a paper or basically, something extraordinarily big happens in the lab (so basically a paper gets published), Richard takes the whole lab to Rock Bottom, a bar in Bethesda, within walking distance from NIH, and the bill's on him, and there's appetizers and beer. Greasy bar food, beer, and nonalcoholic beverages too. We get a happy hour because in the past month, our lab has collectively published 3 papers. Which is a huge deal. Alicia, Danielle, and Catherine. This also coincides with Adam leaving the lab (his last day is July 10), so it's a celebration of many things. Yes Adam is leaving, but he has a "real" job now, so he's leaving the NIH (which is just like a temporary job, kind of like limbo, the time between getting your PhD and waiting for a job offer) to his new job which is in Boston.
Everyone is there at 4:30 (they go directly from work), Jon and I walk in at 5:15. Whoops. We probably didn't miss much though. There's just a lot of different small clumps that form, somewhat fluid, but yeah, small talk. It takes me a while to sort of fit myself in the amoeba of people around some tables, but I do get in, participate in a few conversations, but mainly just listen. I'm nursing a cup of ginger ale, which looks a little like diluted beer (but with ice and a straw), watching people slowly unwind, some much more than others.
We end at 7:30 approximately, I get home at 9, after stopping at Flippin' Pizza for some extremely greasy pizza. Michaela posts on the group chat we have between the four of us, that the White House is lit up tonight with rainbow lights to celebrate the Supreme Court ruling that legalizes sam sex marriage in all 50 states. Oh. I only knew about the ruling by quickly checking facebook (for the first time today) during a few seconds while waiting in line for food in the cafeteria, and I didn't know about the lights until Michaela asked if anyone would go with her to see it. So I end up going. Pictures below.
This is the closest picture I could take while trying to get as close as I can to the original lighting color.
If I don't take picture there, was I really ever there? Oh, the dilemma of living in the 21st century, filled with cynics and photoshop trolls.
Michaela took the selfie, because I am incapable of taking any selfies at all.
It's been a crazy day today. Bad because of transformation issues, also because today just felt like such a long day and I was just so exhausted from the week, but good because the lab meeting was cool (Alicia also presented, and her presentation was so intriguing, since she talked about Parkinson's Disease and Parkin and ubiquitin in mouse brains), lunch was entertaining, tennis was much needed, happy hour was definitely a first for me, and hey, the first time I get to see the White House and it was all lit up in rainbow colors. It's a milestone for the US, but we still have a long way to go before we can truly claim to be accepting of all people.
Thursday, June 25, 2015
Book 1: Settling into Life Day 19 (June 25, 2015)
Today I was supposed to do a whole experiment from start to almost finish with PCR. I was extremely tired today, so I stopped at Starbucks on my way to work to get an iced coffee (I have a giftcard that needs to be used). I ended up doing ligation wrong, because we were using a new program on the Thermocycler called Gibsen, and I accidentally used the ligation program. But all is well, my mentor helped me fix it. Then, I did transformation wrong. You have to wait an hour and incubate the heatshocked cells, but you mix the cells with growth media. However, I incubated but forgot to add broth. So I waited the whole hour (which was from 7:30pm to 8:30pm), only to find that I did it wrong, I had to stay in the lab for so late, and I would have to do it again. I plated the solution just to see if any cells would grow overnight.
So today was just a rough day, but tomorrow will be better with happy hour (to be explained in tomorrow's post).
Edit: no cells grew.
So today was just a rough day, but tomorrow will be better with happy hour (to be explained in tomorrow's post).
Edit: no cells grew.
Wednesday, June 24, 2015
Book 1: Settling into Life Day 18 (June 24, 2015)
Catherine wasn't here for the second day in a row. I made myself coffee for the second day in a row. Yay for two's? There are two summer interns (myself included) (Debra is the other) and there are two rotational students (Hetal and Christina). If anything, I can count to two.
Today, Lesley walked me through the steps of transformation, and so I'm qualified to do it on my own the next time. We also had journal club today (for our lab), but instead of a real journal club meeting, it was Christina presenting her previous research during journal club time. It was really fascinating (my first official presentation, because Danielle's presentation didn't have any background info, so everything was over my head and I was pretty lost), partially because there was background info, so I could follow her presentation. She did work with mitochondrial supercomplexes, and wanted to see the fluidity of the formation and degradation. Also, by serum-starvation, she was able to induce the increase in free-form complexes and the number of individual units, while seeing a decrease in the number of larger complexes.
Other than those two things, I did a lot of sitting at my cubicle, trying to digest this review paper. It's been a week and a day, and I'm just about halfway through with it. I got stuck on this one paragraph for a whole hour, trying to google every other word (because I absolutely do not have the background needed for this paper). Finally, I realized since Alicia was the primary author, and she was in the cubicle quad right next to my cubicle quad, I just walked up and asked her to explain the paragraph. She and Jeni then took that confusing paragraph that made me tear out my hair all of yesterday and today, and put it into a few simple signal pathways and diagrams. They are magical.
After the thunderstorm yesterday, today was so much cooler, with a high of 80 degrees, at least 15 degrees cooler than the "normal" day here. Right after lunch, I looked out the window in my cubicle quad, and the sky looked so blue, the sun was shining brightly, and the wind was blowing so that the leaves on the trees danced. I was fidgety, and so I took a waterbottle and nearly bolted out of the building. Thankfully I didn't have too much lab work today, so I could afford to go outside, but I'm so glad I did. It was truly the perfect summer day: the sun was just the right warmth, there was a cool, gentle breeze, and the sky was breathtakingly blue.
I met up with Hanna at the tennis court at Building 60, but that was occupied, so we walked off campus a few blocks down, to the park where Jon and I had played tennis last week. Both courts were occupied, and Hanna and I were about to discuss what we were going to do (call off tennis for today or wait for a court to free up) when I realized that Jon was playing at one of the courts with a friend of his. He had told me in the lab yesterday, that he was playing with a friend, but it wasn't something I had remembered until I was reminded of it, seeing him at the courts. He offered Hanna and me to play doubles, and so the next 45 minutes or so were spent hitting a ball back and forth, 4 people, one ball, and then starting a set. Janet was Jon's friend, and she is good and so is Jon. Hanna is very good (she told me she plays club tennis), but all in all, it was fun. I just need to get a lot of hitting in, just to practice getting used to having a racket in my hand. Today, in that one hour, I started to get in the hang of doubles formation again, I really got to practice volleys (none of my "volleys" were actually volleys and all of them I hit out), serves, and on top of that, it was fun. Not the comradeship felt when just hitting the tennis ball back and forth between 4 people, but the gritty concentration that comes out of being able to take a tennis match with just enough seriousness, without it being too much.
We all hit good shots, we all hit bad shots, but in the end, we all walked away from our 4 games played really treasuring the experience.
The people in my lab, the people I meet from outside of my lab...I may have had qualms about meeting people (and I'm not going to deny the fact that I still feel a little nervous), they have all been for naught, because everyone here is just so incredibly friendly, but they are also such distinct characters with specific mannerisms and interests. The people I meet here are from all walks of life, from all different cities and states and countries, but we're all here because of our dedication to science.
Each day, I'm more and more amazed at how incredible NIH really is. Today at lunch, Hetal was telling me about how NIH gives out many of the research grants, and the PI on staff at NIH do have a little easier access to these grants for their research. NIH is definitely the hub of all funding for science and here I am, with the third week drawing to an end soon, slowly uncovering the true breadth of NIH. I suppose it's for the better though because, fed in small doses of information and manifestations, I am not overwhelmed by the sheer weight of this internship, this institution, the fact that I am, despite only for the summer, a part of this keystone organization.
I walked with Hanna back through the NIH campus to the metro station. On our way there, we saw two deer. The second one we saw was behind a building, but the first one casually crossed the road and was perfectly fine being less than 5 feet away from people. I took my phone out to quickly take some pictures. After I had put my phone away, Hanna just laughs and comments on how touristy I am. I tell her, I've seen deer before, I just didn't expect to encounter them on the NIH campus, especially because the campus is gated all around. And it is a little weird. Where would the deer come from and where would they stay while on the campus? As we continued our walk to the station, she regaled me with a story about how last year, a black bear cub was found on the NIH campus, and that was the talk of the week.
Once I got to my stop, I accidentally took the wrong exit out of the train station, but this error allowed me to stumble across a Krispy Kreme! Clearly DCians might not think Krispy Kreme is a big deal, but back at home, where the nearest Krispy Kreme doesn't exist for miles, this is a momentous time in history, worth two seconds of looking extremely touristy as I take out my phone to snap a photo.
Tomorrow, my mentor gets back, so new experiments await!
Today, Lesley walked me through the steps of transformation, and so I'm qualified to do it on my own the next time. We also had journal club today (for our lab), but instead of a real journal club meeting, it was Christina presenting her previous research during journal club time. It was really fascinating (my first official presentation, because Danielle's presentation didn't have any background info, so everything was over my head and I was pretty lost), partially because there was background info, so I could follow her presentation. She did work with mitochondrial supercomplexes, and wanted to see the fluidity of the formation and degradation. Also, by serum-starvation, she was able to induce the increase in free-form complexes and the number of individual units, while seeing a decrease in the number of larger complexes.
Other than those two things, I did a lot of sitting at my cubicle, trying to digest this review paper. It's been a week and a day, and I'm just about halfway through with it. I got stuck on this one paragraph for a whole hour, trying to google every other word (because I absolutely do not have the background needed for this paper). Finally, I realized since Alicia was the primary author, and she was in the cubicle quad right next to my cubicle quad, I just walked up and asked her to explain the paragraph. She and Jeni then took that confusing paragraph that made me tear out my hair all of yesterday and today, and put it into a few simple signal pathways and diagrams. They are magical.
After the thunderstorm yesterday, today was so much cooler, with a high of 80 degrees, at least 15 degrees cooler than the "normal" day here. Right after lunch, I looked out the window in my cubicle quad, and the sky looked so blue, the sun was shining brightly, and the wind was blowing so that the leaves on the trees danced. I was fidgety, and so I took a waterbottle and nearly bolted out of the building. Thankfully I didn't have too much lab work today, so I could afford to go outside, but I'm so glad I did. It was truly the perfect summer day: the sun was just the right warmth, there was a cool, gentle breeze, and the sky was breathtakingly blue.
I met up with Hanna at the tennis court at Building 60, but that was occupied, so we walked off campus a few blocks down, to the park where Jon and I had played tennis last week. Both courts were occupied, and Hanna and I were about to discuss what we were going to do (call off tennis for today or wait for a court to free up) when I realized that Jon was playing at one of the courts with a friend of his. He had told me in the lab yesterday, that he was playing with a friend, but it wasn't something I had remembered until I was reminded of it, seeing him at the courts. He offered Hanna and me to play doubles, and so the next 45 minutes or so were spent hitting a ball back and forth, 4 people, one ball, and then starting a set. Janet was Jon's friend, and she is good and so is Jon. Hanna is very good (she told me she plays club tennis), but all in all, it was fun. I just need to get a lot of hitting in, just to practice getting used to having a racket in my hand. Today, in that one hour, I started to get in the hang of doubles formation again, I really got to practice volleys (none of my "volleys" were actually volleys and all of them I hit out), serves, and on top of that, it was fun. Not the comradeship felt when just hitting the tennis ball back and forth between 4 people, but the gritty concentration that comes out of being able to take a tennis match with just enough seriousness, without it being too much.
We all hit good shots, we all hit bad shots, but in the end, we all walked away from our 4 games played really treasuring the experience.
The people in my lab, the people I meet from outside of my lab...I may have had qualms about meeting people (and I'm not going to deny the fact that I still feel a little nervous), they have all been for naught, because everyone here is just so incredibly friendly, but they are also such distinct characters with specific mannerisms and interests. The people I meet here are from all walks of life, from all different cities and states and countries, but we're all here because of our dedication to science.
Each day, I'm more and more amazed at how incredible NIH really is. Today at lunch, Hetal was telling me about how NIH gives out many of the research grants, and the PI on staff at NIH do have a little easier access to these grants for their research. NIH is definitely the hub of all funding for science and here I am, with the third week drawing to an end soon, slowly uncovering the true breadth of NIH. I suppose it's for the better though because, fed in small doses of information and manifestations, I am not overwhelmed by the sheer weight of this internship, this institution, the fact that I am, despite only for the summer, a part of this keystone organization.
I walked with Hanna back through the NIH campus to the metro station. On our way there, we saw two deer. The second one we saw was behind a building, but the first one casually crossed the road and was perfectly fine being less than 5 feet away from people. I took my phone out to quickly take some pictures. After I had put my phone away, Hanna just laughs and comments on how touristy I am. I tell her, I've seen deer before, I just didn't expect to encounter them on the NIH campus, especially because the campus is gated all around. And it is a little weird. Where would the deer come from and where would they stay while on the campus? As we continued our walk to the station, she regaled me with a story about how last year, a black bear cub was found on the NIH campus, and that was the talk of the week.
Once I got to my stop, I accidentally took the wrong exit out of the train station, but this error allowed me to stumble across a Krispy Kreme! Clearly DCians might not think Krispy Kreme is a big deal, but back at home, where the nearest Krispy Kreme doesn't exist for miles, this is a momentous time in history, worth two seconds of looking extremely touristy as I take out my phone to snap a photo.
Tomorrow, my mentor gets back, so new experiments await!
Tuesday, June 23, 2015
Book 1: Settling into Life Day 17 (June 23, 2015)
Today I do some more lab work (experimental procedures I've done before many many many times) but I'm a little worried because my mentor is still out of town for a conference, and Lesley asked me to run a gel for her samples, and I really wanted the results to be positive and for my gel to not be smeared. And it was so much better! The cloning worked, all the gels ran cleanly, and I got the results I wanted. I learned how to read a ladder today (and Lesley printed out a reference chart for me!) and tomorrow I'll get to do some more transfection (I did it once...in the beginning of my internship...and I have a terrible memory, and my notetaking was subpar at that point...so it'll be so good for Lesley to do transfection with me so I can "learn the ropes" as she says).
Even though my mentor will be out until Thursday, everyone is so nice and open, I know I can always ask someone for help.
I dug back into that review paper, and I am about half-way through. And still so confused. It's dense material. And I found out for my journal club on Monday, I have another 19 page review paper to read...except for this time, it's on RNAs. I really regret not paying as much attention as I should have in AP Bio, especially during the RNA unit. But RNAs are fascinating, with all the siRNA and ncRNAs. I'm excited for journal club, but it will be additional work. Richard also stopped by to let me know that our lab was having a journal club (no, it's another event) tomorrow, and so...I'm not quite sure what it is, but I'm excited.
On my way home, I was stuck in the metro station because I didn't have enough money to pay the exit fare and I didn't have any money on me...so I had to call Cameron, and he came and bailed me out with his metrocard (that had money on it). When it rains in DC, it really rains. Today was no different, with flash flood warnings until 11pm, little rivers forming in the streets, water 2-inches deep covering the streets, turning it into a sleek black river. The water flowed down as a steady slippery sheet of water down the railings of the escalator leading to the train station and deep puddles, a few inches deep, formed on the sidewalks. My shoes and socks were absolutely drenched from wading through countless unavoidable puddles and rivers, and even the umbrella I had didn't do much with the torrential downpour of rain.
Exciting things are happening this week. Stay tuned!
Even though my mentor will be out until Thursday, everyone is so nice and open, I know I can always ask someone for help.
I dug back into that review paper, and I am about half-way through. And still so confused. It's dense material. And I found out for my journal club on Monday, I have another 19 page review paper to read...except for this time, it's on RNAs. I really regret not paying as much attention as I should have in AP Bio, especially during the RNA unit. But RNAs are fascinating, with all the siRNA and ncRNAs. I'm excited for journal club, but it will be additional work. Richard also stopped by to let me know that our lab was having a journal club (no, it's another event) tomorrow, and so...I'm not quite sure what it is, but I'm excited.
On my way home, I was stuck in the metro station because I didn't have enough money to pay the exit fare and I didn't have any money on me...so I had to call Cameron, and he came and bailed me out with his metrocard (that had money on it). When it rains in DC, it really rains. Today was no different, with flash flood warnings until 11pm, little rivers forming in the streets, water 2-inches deep covering the streets, turning it into a sleek black river. The water flowed down as a steady slippery sheet of water down the railings of the escalator leading to the train station and deep puddles, a few inches deep, formed on the sidewalks. My shoes and socks were absolutely drenched from wading through countless unavoidable puddles and rivers, and even the umbrella I had didn't do much with the torrential downpour of rain.
Exciting things are happening this week. Stay tuned!
Ooooh, look at how official they look!
My workspace with the new reference charts!
Monday, June 22, 2015
Book 1: Settling into Life Day 15 (June 21, 2015)
Arranged to meet Steven (a friend of mine back from IL) at the zoo today, and he brought another NASA intern with him. It was 105 degrees, we were there for just about 4 hours, and I forgot to wear sunscreen...whoops, I turned at least 10 shades darker that day.
The zoo was...decent, considering it was free. Between Lincoln Park and Brookfield though, I've seen all there is to see at a zoo, so it wasn't that special. The little tamarins were cool and the reptile house reminded me so strongly of the Wildlife Discovery Center (that I volunteer at during the school year).
On my way home, I walked to Whole Foods, where I got my first taste of fruit in 2 weeks. It's been too long...
In total today, I walked 8 miles. And it was hot and sunny. Exhausting day though, and it didn't go by wasted. There's so much in DC left to see though!
Pictures here.
The zoo was...decent, considering it was free. Between Lincoln Park and Brookfield though, I've seen all there is to see at a zoo, so it wasn't that special. The little tamarins were cool and the reptile house reminded me so strongly of the Wildlife Discovery Center (that I volunteer at during the school year).
On my way home, I walked to Whole Foods, where I got my first taste of fruit in 2 weeks. It's been too long...
In total today, I walked 8 miles. And it was hot and sunny. Exhausting day though, and it didn't go by wasted. There's so much in DC left to see though!
Pictures here.
Book 1: Settling into Life Day 16 (June 22, 2015)
Today was pretty relaxed. I just sat and tried to digest this review paper that my lab published, in order to get a better understanding of my lab's research and what I'm part of this summer. However, it's way over my head so I've gotten less than a third of the way through and I'm confused.
Did a little prep work for tomorrow (I'll be doing more in the lab tomorrow) but today was a pretty easy day. I met with Anna for lunch, and it was really fun to catch up with her.
Today was pretty relaxing, but tomorrow will be pretty busy. This will be an exciting week, despite today being misleadingly calm.
Saturday, June 20, 2015
Book 1: Settling into Life Day 14 (June 20, 2015)
Today, I revisited the Natural History museum. I have yet to go back to visit a few more exhibits, but the rocks and minerals one was a doozy. But so thorough. And I loved every minute of the 4 hours that I spent there. I posted pictures in my album on my facebook, so there's not much to put here. Click here to see the pictures.
It was nostalgic, seeing all these rocks and minerals and having all my previous geology knowledge come trickling back to me in bits and pieces. I was reminded of how much I love (and understand) geology. The crystal structure, the chemical formula, everything is so orderly.
Plus there are so many minerals and rocks and information that I didn't know, so it was extremely informative. The exhibit is so extensive (there's so many specimens...clearly I couldn't take pictures of all of them and of the ones I did take, only maybe a fifth of them were uploaded to my facebook album) but it caters to all ages too, which is really admirable. Of course, the content is so informative, so it keeps adults interested, but shiny rocks! Kids love the visual appeal and there's a lot of buttons to press and interactive movies or activities at each "station."
I also managed to find the Birds of DC exhibit (it was hidden in the ground floor so that's why I couldn't find it last week!) and it's not extensive, not like the field museum, but I found it interesting in that it was tailored to the local area, so they were birds that, if you were lucky, could find locally.
It's been a long hot day (it hit 100 today, again) and tomorrow will be even hotter...which is the day I planned to go to the zoo on. Oh well, it should be an exciting experience regardless!
P.S. DC weather is crazy. When it rains, it really rains. Rain doesn't come in steady pattering of rain drops, it comes in sheets. They generally pass by quickly, but it's torrential compared to Chicago weather. Today it also hailed. Yet it's always so muggy here, the rain will cool DC somewhat, but tomorrow will be just as humid and hot.
It was nostalgic, seeing all these rocks and minerals and having all my previous geology knowledge come trickling back to me in bits and pieces. I was reminded of how much I love (and understand) geology. The crystal structure, the chemical formula, everything is so orderly.
Plus there are so many minerals and rocks and information that I didn't know, so it was extremely informative. The exhibit is so extensive (there's so many specimens...clearly I couldn't take pictures of all of them and of the ones I did take, only maybe a fifth of them were uploaded to my facebook album) but it caters to all ages too, which is really admirable. Of course, the content is so informative, so it keeps adults interested, but shiny rocks! Kids love the visual appeal and there's a lot of buttons to press and interactive movies or activities at each "station."
I also managed to find the Birds of DC exhibit (it was hidden in the ground floor so that's why I couldn't find it last week!) and it's not extensive, not like the field museum, but I found it interesting in that it was tailored to the local area, so they were birds that, if you were lucky, could find locally.
It's been a long hot day (it hit 100 today, again) and tomorrow will be even hotter...which is the day I planned to go to the zoo on. Oh well, it should be an exciting experience regardless!
P.S. DC weather is crazy. When it rains, it really rains. Rain doesn't come in steady pattering of rain drops, it comes in sheets. They generally pass by quickly, but it's torrential compared to Chicago weather. Today it also hailed. Yet it's always so muggy here, the rain will cool DC somewhat, but tomorrow will be just as humid and hot.
Friday, June 19, 2015
Book 1: Settling into Life Day 13 (June 19, 2015)
So today I went to a workshop that's required for all summer interns. The metro was running late and I left the house late, so I ran in 15 minutes late, all sweaty, and had to squeeze into an open seat. Whoops, hooray for first impressions.
I tried to talk to people around me though, and especially when we broke up into groups to do station that practiced lab techniques (that part was pretty boring for me only because I've done everything for the whole week for at least 5 different experiments already except for the microscopy station, because I finally figured out how to look into a two-eye microscope without getting cross-eyed and dizzy...after a whole year of AP bio...the trick is to keep your eyes a distance away from the eyepiece), I got to meet Bryce, Samto, Darell, Emily, and Olivia. We talked a little, all of them were doing clinical except for Emily, who was doing similar lab work like I am, and Bryce was a coder. We ended up eating lunch together outside on a picnic table, talking and laughing. We talked a little from where we were all from, what we were doing, how we were liking it so far, and we tangented onto ambulance sirens, and even spiders.
The presentations were all pretty informative though, especially the one on poster presentations because that's information I'll need come August when I present, and the presenter was entertaining.
That was my whole day, since the workshop ran from 9am-4pm. Afterwards, I stopped by the lab for an hour, met with Jeni, who was one of the people running the workshop, and after talking to her about how I wasn't sure what type of lab notebook I should use (and how her presentation on the lab notebook was really helpful), she surprised me as I was packing up to go, with a new one that she had, telling me to contact Richard and Black to ask which I should, and if I didn't end up using this lab notebook, I could fill it out on my own and take it with me. Lab notebooks are supposed to be kept in the lab, so once I leave after the summer, my lab notebook stays behind, but I can always make photocopies before I go.
I got home pretty early, but I just vegetated as usual (after work, I'm so mentally drained, I just don't do anything for the rest of the night, and since this apartment doesn't have a desk, I sit on my bed and I am very unproductive).
Come Monday and Tuesday, I have a lot of lab work ahead of me. Actually not a lot. Just 8 samples I'll be working with, and that's a lot less compared to 28!
I tried to talk to people around me though, and especially when we broke up into groups to do station that practiced lab techniques (that part was pretty boring for me only because I've done everything for the whole week for at least 5 different experiments already except for the microscopy station, because I finally figured out how to look into a two-eye microscope without getting cross-eyed and dizzy...after a whole year of AP bio...the trick is to keep your eyes a distance away from the eyepiece), I got to meet Bryce, Samto, Darell, Emily, and Olivia. We talked a little, all of them were doing clinical except for Emily, who was doing similar lab work like I am, and Bryce was a coder. We ended up eating lunch together outside on a picnic table, talking and laughing. We talked a little from where we were all from, what we were doing, how we were liking it so far, and we tangented onto ambulance sirens, and even spiders.
The presentations were all pretty informative though, especially the one on poster presentations because that's information I'll need come August when I present, and the presenter was entertaining.
That was my whole day, since the workshop ran from 9am-4pm. Afterwards, I stopped by the lab for an hour, met with Jeni, who was one of the people running the workshop, and after talking to her about how I wasn't sure what type of lab notebook I should use (and how her presentation on the lab notebook was really helpful), she surprised me as I was packing up to go, with a new one that she had, telling me to contact Richard and Black to ask which I should, and if I didn't end up using this lab notebook, I could fill it out on my own and take it with me. Lab notebooks are supposed to be kept in the lab, so once I leave after the summer, my lab notebook stays behind, but I can always make photocopies before I go.
I got home pretty early, but I just vegetated as usual (after work, I'm so mentally drained, I just don't do anything for the rest of the night, and since this apartment doesn't have a desk, I sit on my bed and I am very unproductive).
Come Monday and Tuesday, I have a lot of lab work ahead of me. Actually not a lot. Just 8 samples I'll be working with, and that's a lot less compared to 28!
Thursday, June 18, 2015
Book 1: Settling into Life Day 12 (June 18, 2015)
So today, I had to work with 28 DNA samples (that's A LOT) and run a gel for all of it. I basically have graduated to being entrusted with the whole overarching process of PCR and then running a gel and measuring concentration (I'm missing the last step of sequencing) but that means that I'm starting to get the big picture of things, and that's good. However, my olfactory buds are permanently burned by the smell of bacteria...between handling them and having to work with the growth medium, my nose has suffered much.
Since my mentor is leaving for a conference (will be back on Thursday), I stayed later at work to go over some things I would be doing while he is gone. Other than that though, nothing was too exciting. I did crash halfway through the day and ended up making coffee with Danielle and Catherine's coffee maker, and falling asleep tonight will be difficult when I have coffee at 5pm.
Pictures will be less frequently mainly because I'm busy, there's not too many things I can take pictures of now, and any pictures I do take will probably just go on my facebook album, links will be provided.
Since my mentor is leaving for a conference (will be back on Thursday), I stayed later at work to go over some things I would be doing while he is gone. Other than that though, nothing was too exciting. I did crash halfway through the day and ended up making coffee with Danielle and Catherine's coffee maker, and falling asleep tonight will be difficult when I have coffee at 5pm.
Pictures will be less frequently mainly because I'm busy, there's not too many things I can take pictures of now, and any pictures I do take will probably just go on my facebook album, links will be provided.
Book 1: Settling into Life Day 11 (June 17, 2015)
Today was definitely so much cooler than any of the previous days. But it's still humid and hot.
Not too much lab work at all today, except for inoculating 28 vials. Which means tomorrow I'm going to have so much work doing miniprep for 28 samples. But I got to sort out almost all of my lab notes, which is really really great!
You really meet all sorts of amazing nice people and today was no exception. I asked Danielle if she had any papers I could read to get a better understanding of our lab's research, and so she gave me the latest review paper that they had submitted, and offered to go over it with me the next day if I had any questions. I hadn't had any papers assigned to me at all, and I tried reading the paper, but it was so dense, I had to look up every other word. I probably won't get it done by tomorrow, but I'll definitely finish it as soon as I can and if I have any questions I can't solve on my own, ask around, whether it's Danielle or Catherine or my mentor.
I met a grad student who will be here starting from August 8 (and Nick is starting the PhD track that Catherine is finishing up on with OxCam, University of Oxford Cambridge). Ate with him, Catherine, my mentor, and Danielle and had some interesting conversations. I bought lunch from the cafeteria for the first time ever. I had Indian food (which just might be my first taste of Indian food) and it was okay, a little kick to it, but it was fine.
After lunch, I went to Building 10 to see the concert that I thought was yesterday. It was pretty cool. From the National Symphony Orchestra, there was a flautist, an oboist, and a pianist. I did not know that piano/flute/oboe trios existed...
After work, I went to see Newsies, and the choreography was phenomenal. Obviously I couldn't get any pictures since no photos or video allowed in the theater, but yeah it was pretty good. This is the first musical I've seen, so I don't really have any comparison besides high school musicals, but this was pretty professional. Some people had better voices than others, but then again, maybe I'm just not used to broadway singing...is there supposed to be that many "voicecracks"?
Anyways that's it. Slowly easing into life. DC near the theater looks so pretty at night when it's calm and cozy and the temperature is actually pretty cool.
Not too much lab work at all today, except for inoculating 28 vials. Which means tomorrow I'm going to have so much work doing miniprep for 28 samples. But I got to sort out almost all of my lab notes, which is really really great!
You really meet all sorts of amazing nice people and today was no exception. I asked Danielle if she had any papers I could read to get a better understanding of our lab's research, and so she gave me the latest review paper that they had submitted, and offered to go over it with me the next day if I had any questions. I hadn't had any papers assigned to me at all, and I tried reading the paper, but it was so dense, I had to look up every other word. I probably won't get it done by tomorrow, but I'll definitely finish it as soon as I can and if I have any questions I can't solve on my own, ask around, whether it's Danielle or Catherine or my mentor.
I met a grad student who will be here starting from August 8 (and Nick is starting the PhD track that Catherine is finishing up on with OxCam, University of Oxford Cambridge). Ate with him, Catherine, my mentor, and Danielle and had some interesting conversations. I bought lunch from the cafeteria for the first time ever. I had Indian food (which just might be my first taste of Indian food) and it was okay, a little kick to it, but it was fine.
After lunch, I went to Building 10 to see the concert that I thought was yesterday. It was pretty cool. From the National Symphony Orchestra, there was a flautist, an oboist, and a pianist. I did not know that piano/flute/oboe trios existed...
After work, I went to see Newsies, and the choreography was phenomenal. Obviously I couldn't get any pictures since no photos or video allowed in the theater, but yeah it was pretty good. This is the first musical I've seen, so I don't really have any comparison besides high school musicals, but this was pretty professional. Some people had better voices than others, but then again, maybe I'm just not used to broadway singing...is there supposed to be that many "voicecracks"?
Anyways that's it. Slowly easing into life. DC near the theater looks so pretty at night when it's calm and cozy and the temperature is actually pretty cool.
Program notes for the concert!
I snuck a picture before the show started...whoops.
DC (near the theater) at night...there's something peaceful about it.
Wednesday, June 17, 2015
Book 1: Settling into Life Day 10 (June 16, 2015)
Today was just a really off day. Almost took a wrong turn on the way to the train station, the train was stalled for at least 10 minutes (it happened on the way home from work yesterday too). In the lab, I messed up a few experiments, and most notable was having to remake a gel 3 times because the first time, I forgot to add gel stain, and the second time, I forgot to add water to make up for the lost water after microwaving. On top of that, there is a music event at NIH that I wanted to watch and I thought it was today, so I told my mentor, and that's why I got all my experiments done in the morning. I walk to Building 10, reread the email, only to find that it's tomorrow. So I spent about 40 minutes walking to and from Building 10, and it was 96 degrees and you could feel the heat pulsing up from the sidewalk.
But at work, I got to meet Adam, who has worked here but is leaving July 10-ish, and I got to talk to Alicia during lunch, so I did get to meet more people!
After work, Jon and I had arranged to play tennis, and so we walked a few blocks, found this small park surrounded by lots and lots of trees, grass, and green, in this quiet neighborhood, and there were two tennis courts, both empty, and also a board! I'm definitely just going to go and hit against the wall by myself when I have no one to play with, because I need a lot of practice.
Anyways, playing with Jon was good. I have gotten really really bad after not playing really at all since the season ended. It's slowly coming back to me, but it's an excruciatingly slow process. More board time will help, I think. I hope the tennis courts will be empty more often, because I will definitely be coming back.
We played from 6:30pm-7:30pm. Walking back to NIH, I had to walk all the way around the NIH campus because as a summer intern, I don't have afterhours access, which means after 7pm, I can't enter the NIH campus. Surrounding NIH is a jogging path and there's lots of trees and grass. There, walking to the tennis courts, even walking alongside the street to get to the Metro (it took me 30 minutes to walk to the metro since I couldn't get into NIH, as opposed to a 15 minute walk had I been able to enter the campus), I found Bethesda almost reminiscent of home.
If I squint hard enough, if the sun shines at a certain angle and the sky is a familiar blue with well-known cloud patterns, if the streets were a little smaller, less busier, it looks like home. And to an extent, definitely more so than DC, Bethesda feels like home. There's a little more breathing space, a little more green, a little more quietness. Though it was definitely longer of a walk, I needed that experience to explore and find places that I want to return to, places that feel familiar.
And now, here's a picture of some mirrors that I saw while wandering the halls of Building 10.
But at work, I got to meet Adam, who has worked here but is leaving July 10-ish, and I got to talk to Alicia during lunch, so I did get to meet more people!
After work, Jon and I had arranged to play tennis, and so we walked a few blocks, found this small park surrounded by lots and lots of trees, grass, and green, in this quiet neighborhood, and there were two tennis courts, both empty, and also a board! I'm definitely just going to go and hit against the wall by myself when I have no one to play with, because I need a lot of practice.
Anyways, playing with Jon was good. I have gotten really really bad after not playing really at all since the season ended. It's slowly coming back to me, but it's an excruciatingly slow process. More board time will help, I think. I hope the tennis courts will be empty more often, because I will definitely be coming back.
We played from 6:30pm-7:30pm. Walking back to NIH, I had to walk all the way around the NIH campus because as a summer intern, I don't have afterhours access, which means after 7pm, I can't enter the NIH campus. Surrounding NIH is a jogging path and there's lots of trees and grass. There, walking to the tennis courts, even walking alongside the street to get to the Metro (it took me 30 minutes to walk to the metro since I couldn't get into NIH, as opposed to a 15 minute walk had I been able to enter the campus), I found Bethesda almost reminiscent of home.
If I squint hard enough, if the sun shines at a certain angle and the sky is a familiar blue with well-known cloud patterns, if the streets were a little smaller, less busier, it looks like home. And to an extent, definitely more so than DC, Bethesda feels like home. There's a little more breathing space, a little more green, a little more quietness. Though it was definitely longer of a walk, I needed that experience to explore and find places that I want to return to, places that feel familiar.
And now, here's a picture of some mirrors that I saw while wandering the halls of Building 10.
Tuesday, June 16, 2015
Book 1: Settling into Life Day 9 (June 15, 2015)
Thanks to the rain last night, today was a little cooler than yesterday (a high of 90 instead of 93!) and it was cloudier, which helped a ton.
Arriving at the workplace, greet Danielle and am a little surprised to see that Catherine is missing, but not entirely, since she has a thesis to write. Danielle tells me that there are a few new interns today, so I rush over to meet Jon's. Her name is Kristen. Then Jeni has one, who's name is Deborah, but she told me to call her KiniKini. She's Hawaiian, and knows quite a few languages (Some hawaiian language, Korean, English, and one other, I think) and she's pretty cool. Closer to my age than most, since she's a sophomore in college, and she said that she did this NIH program as a senior.
But beyond that, my feet hurt so much because I was standing up so much. Lots and lots of lab work, but it's a HUGE learning curve. My mind is so overloaded with information, I mix up my procedures and my "lab notebook" is currently a mess of looseleaf paper with scribbles on it, that I have yet to organize and decipher. Life's a process, and I'm trying to sort it out, page by page.
I learned how to use a repeater today, but I had a hard time disconnecting the tip, and I ended up squirting myself and my mentor with P1 buffer...and then he and I were laughing so hard because we were both confused and flustered. He couldn't see how I failed to do a simple task and I was laughing at the whole absurdity of the situation.
Today was so humid, but at least it rained, which cooled things down a bit. I stayed inside the whole day, and it got to a point where I forgot what fresh air felt like, what natural light looked like, and what the outdoors smells like. I also got very itchy to just run around so I don't go crazy being locked up in the building the whole day. Technically I could take a lunch break, but it takes a little time to enter and exit the building, and it was so hot outside, it's not really worth it.
And now for some pictures:
Arriving at the workplace, greet Danielle and am a little surprised to see that Catherine is missing, but not entirely, since she has a thesis to write. Danielle tells me that there are a few new interns today, so I rush over to meet Jon's. Her name is Kristen. Then Jeni has one, who's name is Deborah, but she told me to call her KiniKini. She's Hawaiian, and knows quite a few languages (Some hawaiian language, Korean, English, and one other, I think) and she's pretty cool. Closer to my age than most, since she's a sophomore in college, and she said that she did this NIH program as a senior.
But beyond that, my feet hurt so much because I was standing up so much. Lots and lots of lab work, but it's a HUGE learning curve. My mind is so overloaded with information, I mix up my procedures and my "lab notebook" is currently a mess of looseleaf paper with scribbles on it, that I have yet to organize and decipher. Life's a process, and I'm trying to sort it out, page by page.
I learned how to use a repeater today, but I had a hard time disconnecting the tip, and I ended up squirting myself and my mentor with P1 buffer...and then he and I were laughing so hard because we were both confused and flustered. He couldn't see how I failed to do a simple task and I was laughing at the whole absurdity of the situation.
Today was so humid, but at least it rained, which cooled things down a bit. I stayed inside the whole day, and it got to a point where I forgot what fresh air felt like, what natural light looked like, and what the outdoors smells like. I also got very itchy to just run around so I don't go crazy being locked up in the building the whole day. Technically I could take a lunch break, but it takes a little time to enter and exit the building, and it was so hot outside, it's not really worth it.
And now for some pictures:
Rain makes the windows all hazy.
The sky before leaving work.
Leaving the building.
Because it's an architectural beauty.
I've never seen magnolia trees before I came to DC.
Monday, June 15, 2015
Book 1: Settling into Life Day 8 (June 14, 2015)
Today, woke up pretty late, so it wasn't worth going to the Smithsonian, not with all the flute and studying and organizing I had to do.
Pretty relaxing day, not too much happened at all really. I fit in an hour of flute playing, which was really important because I haven't touched the flute in a while and lots are coming up for that. My embouchure is really weak and my tone is pretty fuzzy, so I'm definitely going to put in a lot of work this summer. I was never at the level that I should be by the end of the summer, but now, I definitely need even more work!
Tomorrow, it's back to work and it'll be a busy week, but there's a few things that I'm excited for, and I'll post about them as they come up!
Pretty relaxing day, not too much happened at all really. I fit in an hour of flute playing, which was really important because I haven't touched the flute in a while and lots are coming up for that. My embouchure is really weak and my tone is pretty fuzzy, so I'm definitely going to put in a lot of work this summer. I was never at the level that I should be by the end of the summer, but now, I definitely need even more work!
Tomorrow, it's back to work and it'll be a busy week, but there's a few things that I'm excited for, and I'll post about them as they come up!
Saturday, June 13, 2015
Book 1: Settling into Life Day 7 (June 13, 2015)
Woke up this morning, left for the Smithsonian at 11. Got there at 12:40 with lots of almost getting on the wrong train and walking in the wrong direction from the Metro Center (train station close to Smithsonian) to the museum. But I made it, despite how hot and crowded and chaotic it all was, and I wandered the Mammals exhibit. So many pictures, and I'll put some below, but I guess I could probably make a facebook album too... I think I'll go back again tomorrow to try to finish up the rest of the Natural History museum.
The Pride Parade was supposed to start at 4pm, or at least I was told to get back by then to avoid the crowd. I left the museum at 3:40, but ended up getting back to the apartment at 4:20. The train was extremely crowded and there were already people decked out in rainbow apparel walking the streets. I got back, and ended up going to the pride parade.
So the parade. Started at 4:30pm, ran until 7:15. It was hot today and the sun was intense (I'm pretty sure I'll wake up tomorrow with the right side of my face noticeably darker than my left...) but it...wasn't as bad as I thought it would be. The parade itself...less music, so less blaring speakers. However, there were two marching bands, and though the quality was so bad (blasting trombones, a metal piccolo...overall subpar instruments), it was a nice change and I found myself looking forward to them. There were lots of shirtless guys and lots of skin being revealed but not too liberal. Though I was given codoms 4 times. The first time, I didn't realize what it was, and then the following three times, they were handed to me, and I surreptitiously dropped them a few seconds later (since I was told I would need them and thus couldn't give it back). But besides that, it was fine. One little boy walking in the parade (he looked about 5 years old) walks over and hands me a wristband. I was so surprised, but that was adorable. People there are so nice too. People standing next to me or around me would talk or be excited, and sometimes if they caught something, they'd offer it to me, and if I caught a necklace or something, I would offer it too. If anything, the atmosphere is so positive and inclusive, and it was well worth the 3 hours standing.
Exhausting day, but well worth it. I'm starting to know my way around DC that's proximate to "home" and I've also realized how much of DC I haven't explored yet. Maybe going out for runs isn't such a bad idea afterall...
The Pride Parade was supposed to start at 4pm, or at least I was told to get back by then to avoid the crowd. I left the museum at 3:40, but ended up getting back to the apartment at 4:20. The train was extremely crowded and there were already people decked out in rainbow apparel walking the streets. I got back, and ended up going to the pride parade.
So the parade. Started at 4:30pm, ran until 7:15. It was hot today and the sun was intense (I'm pretty sure I'll wake up tomorrow with the right side of my face noticeably darker than my left...) but it...wasn't as bad as I thought it would be. The parade itself...less music, so less blaring speakers. However, there were two marching bands, and though the quality was so bad (blasting trombones, a metal piccolo...overall subpar instruments), it was a nice change and I found myself looking forward to them. There were lots of shirtless guys and lots of skin being revealed but not too liberal. Though I was given codoms 4 times. The first time, I didn't realize what it was, and then the following three times, they were handed to me, and I surreptitiously dropped them a few seconds later (since I was told I would need them and thus couldn't give it back). But besides that, it was fine. One little boy walking in the parade (he looked about 5 years old) walks over and hands me a wristband. I was so surprised, but that was adorable. People there are so nice too. People standing next to me or around me would talk or be excited, and sometimes if they caught something, they'd offer it to me, and if I caught a necklace or something, I would offer it too. If anything, the atmosphere is so positive and inclusive, and it was well worth the 3 hours standing.
Exhausting day, but well worth it. I'm starting to know my way around DC that's proximate to "home" and I've also realized how much of DC I haven't explored yet. Maybe going out for runs isn't such a bad idea afterall...
Book 1: Settling into Life Day 6 (June 12, 2015)
Two parts to this. Work, then nonwork.
So I get to work and my mentor brought croissants from Dolcezza's, which is a really really expensive coffee shop. Lab meeting starts at 9:30, and I get there at 9:20, got to cool down (because it hit 93 degrees today by noon, and was already warming up pretty fast in the morning), and then Catherine led me to the meeting room, and the day's food bounty was laid on the table. Leslie brought Dunkin Donuts because her birthday will be on June 14, so there was double the food! As we all wound down a little, I met Jeni, who is a grad student. I also found out that Richard, our PI (personal investigator), was vegetarian. Lots of random info, not sure if they're important, but if anything, it helps me get to know these people beyond what they do in the lab, which makes them more approachable to me.
Within 10 minutes though, we got down to business. Danielle was presenting her work and right before she launched in, she apologizes "sorry, there's no background info. But your mentor will bring you up to date on all of this." She talks really really fast. Not only was it really hard for me to try to even comprehend what they were saying, everything was also flying by me so fast. I caught a few things, but it was really really hard.
After the meeting, we resumed "life," and so I spent the whole morning in the lab, stopping at 12pm so I could eat, because I signed up for a workshop that was from 1-4pm. The workshop was about Leadership Skills in Science and it focused a lot on Emotional Intelligence (EQ). Sure it was interesting, but I harbored the hope of meeting more people if I went, and that did not fail me. I've started realizing that the more I get out of the lab and go to other buildings or put myself out there more to try to meet people, hey, I actually make friends! How crazy is that? It's intuitive, but I think I got pretty paralyzed by being alone and awkward, thus making me even more awkward and uncomfortable, causing me to not talk to people...so a vicious cycle, that prevents me from making friends and feeling more like I belong here.
It helped that the workshop forced us to talk to people around us because I landed in a group with people much older than me (Hanna, Michaela, Caro, and Jovana) and they are all college students, except for Jovana, who just graduated from college, so not a grad student just yet. We stayed after the workshop to exchange facebook information, and I think Hanna suggested going out to lunch sometime. If anything, I'm just glad I know more people here, and how cool would it be if we all met up for lunch one day? When Michaela (or maybe it was Hanna...I can't remember) added me, she just said "It says that it's your birthday" and I respond lamely "yeah, it is" and she and all 4 of them exclaim "Oh, happy birthday!" Growing up and acting my age does mean that birthdays are less of a deal and I force myself, despite how uncomfortable I am with accepting compliments or attention, to try to be gracious and at least communicate like a normal person with other people. So I just lightly laugh and say "Oh, thank you" and we resume solving the issue of why we can't add some people and figuring out how that all works out.
Going back to the lab, I did a little lab work, but also cubicle time. I got to leave at 5:40 (because I had got there pretty early due to the lab meeting). Before leaving, everyone was winding down, so I got to meet Shireen, who works at our lab, so that brings the total count to knowing 8 people in my lab. I have yet to meet Alicia, who I know her name only because Richard was talking to her at one point during the lab meeting, and also someone else...or maybe I'm missing a few people. But for my almost-complete first week in the lab, things aren't bad at all! Lots of progress, I'm slowly learning how to handle a lab notebook (I have to figure out how to organize it, I have to type up my sloppy notes...there's a lot of work I should do this weekend to sort it all out...) and I'm still forgetting steps in preparing DNA or mixing up procedures, but it's a process, right?
After work, my mentor took me out to dinner at an Afghanistan restaurant called Lapis. The food was really spice-ful, but it was delicious. I had this chicken kebob with spiced rice, my first taste of chutney, it was great. Desert was firnee, which is this rice pudding with cardamom (I didn't know what cardamom was, so the waitress was nice enough to bring us a jar of that spice and let us smell it. Definitely sharp and strong, but not unpleasant).
So lots happened today. Made friends (4 of them!), met more people in my lab, and tried new cuisine. It's felt like a long week (yesterday, I thought that today was Friday...so tomorrow will feel like an extra day of the week) but slowly by slowly, I'm settling into life as I'll be living it for the next 8 weeks.
So I get to work and my mentor brought croissants from Dolcezza's, which is a really really expensive coffee shop. Lab meeting starts at 9:30, and I get there at 9:20, got to cool down (because it hit 93 degrees today by noon, and was already warming up pretty fast in the morning), and then Catherine led me to the meeting room, and the day's food bounty was laid on the table. Leslie brought Dunkin Donuts because her birthday will be on June 14, so there was double the food! As we all wound down a little, I met Jeni, who is a grad student. I also found out that Richard, our PI (personal investigator), was vegetarian. Lots of random info, not sure if they're important, but if anything, it helps me get to know these people beyond what they do in the lab, which makes them more approachable to me.
Within 10 minutes though, we got down to business. Danielle was presenting her work and right before she launched in, she apologizes "sorry, there's no background info. But your mentor will bring you up to date on all of this." She talks really really fast. Not only was it really hard for me to try to even comprehend what they were saying, everything was also flying by me so fast. I caught a few things, but it was really really hard.
After the meeting, we resumed "life," and so I spent the whole morning in the lab, stopping at 12pm so I could eat, because I signed up for a workshop that was from 1-4pm. The workshop was about Leadership Skills in Science and it focused a lot on Emotional Intelligence (EQ). Sure it was interesting, but I harbored the hope of meeting more people if I went, and that did not fail me. I've started realizing that the more I get out of the lab and go to other buildings or put myself out there more to try to meet people, hey, I actually make friends! How crazy is that? It's intuitive, but I think I got pretty paralyzed by being alone and awkward, thus making me even more awkward and uncomfortable, causing me to not talk to people...so a vicious cycle, that prevents me from making friends and feeling more like I belong here.
It helped that the workshop forced us to talk to people around us because I landed in a group with people much older than me (Hanna, Michaela, Caro, and Jovana) and they are all college students, except for Jovana, who just graduated from college, so not a grad student just yet. We stayed after the workshop to exchange facebook information, and I think Hanna suggested going out to lunch sometime. If anything, I'm just glad I know more people here, and how cool would it be if we all met up for lunch one day? When Michaela (or maybe it was Hanna...I can't remember) added me, she just said "It says that it's your birthday" and I respond lamely "yeah, it is" and she and all 4 of them exclaim "Oh, happy birthday!" Growing up and acting my age does mean that birthdays are less of a deal and I force myself, despite how uncomfortable I am with accepting compliments or attention, to try to be gracious and at least communicate like a normal person with other people. So I just lightly laugh and say "Oh, thank you" and we resume solving the issue of why we can't add some people and figuring out how that all works out.
Going back to the lab, I did a little lab work, but also cubicle time. I got to leave at 5:40 (because I had got there pretty early due to the lab meeting). Before leaving, everyone was winding down, so I got to meet Shireen, who works at our lab, so that brings the total count to knowing 8 people in my lab. I have yet to meet Alicia, who I know her name only because Richard was talking to her at one point during the lab meeting, and also someone else...or maybe I'm missing a few people. But for my almost-complete first week in the lab, things aren't bad at all! Lots of progress, I'm slowly learning how to handle a lab notebook (I have to figure out how to organize it, I have to type up my sloppy notes...there's a lot of work I should do this weekend to sort it all out...) and I'm still forgetting steps in preparing DNA or mixing up procedures, but it's a process, right?
After work, my mentor took me out to dinner at an Afghanistan restaurant called Lapis. The food was really spice-ful, but it was delicious. I had this chicken kebob with spiced rice, my first taste of chutney, it was great. Desert was firnee, which is this rice pudding with cardamom (I didn't know what cardamom was, so the waitress was nice enough to bring us a jar of that spice and let us smell it. Definitely sharp and strong, but not unpleasant).
So lots happened today. Made friends (4 of them!), met more people in my lab, and tried new cuisine. It's felt like a long week (yesterday, I thought that today was Friday...so tomorrow will feel like an extra day of the week) but slowly by slowly, I'm settling into life as I'll be living it for the next 8 weeks.
Friday, June 12, 2015
Book 1: Settling into Life Day 5 (June 11, 2015)
Once on the NIH campus, I had to go to Building 31 to register for the Transhare program. Definitely took a lot less longer than the badge appointment I had yesterday!
The high was supposed to reach 93 degrees, and it definitely did. I had to walk from my building to Building 10 to pick up my badge (yes, I finally have a badge now...it's all official and fancy) in the afternoon, and I could feel the heat radiating from the ground. In the morning, between the Transhare and the badge, my mentor and I did a lot of lab work, and we were performing a gel electrophoresis with proteins! That was a new process I learned (especially measuring protein concentration), but we also revisited some previous procedures. My mentor left me to create an annealing reaction with some CRISPR primers, and it was a little daunting because he just got out all the supplies, and then left, but I did it right. Or at least I'm 99.9999999% sure I did. And with sig figs, that can round up to 100%. So all good. I still have to figure out how to keep a lab notebook. I've been writing on pieces of paper and my handwriting is atrocious. I can't even read what I write half of the time. It's all scrawls across pages, and writing in gloves doesn't help.
The whole morning, from 10:40ish to 1pm, we were in the lab, and time flew, I didn't realize it was past lunch time until my stomach started growling. Lunch is whenever, so afterwards, we returned to the lab, finished up some reactions, like our PCR work from yesterday with inoculations and then I had to pick up my badge. I'm definitely getting the hang of navigating the NIH campus, especially because I rely less and less on a pdf of the map (saved on my phone) each day.
In the morning, while working in the lab, I got a chance to talk to Jon. I met him the first day, when my mentor introduced me to him and mentioned how as we both play tennis, we could probably play a bit over the summer. I was loading DNA into the wells of the gel and I switched from my left hand to my right hand as I made my way down the row of wells, just for simplicity sake, but also because I was so nervous I was going to mess up, my left hand was shaking really badly and my right hand would provide some rest. My mentor commented on that and during some downtime (in labs, there's a lot of waiting around for reactions to occur or for some heating/cooling/ligation.whatever process to happen) Dan asked what hand I play tennis with, and if I was ambidextrous for tennis. We slipped into conversation about tennis and serving and everything, and I gave him my email so we could set up a time to play (I saw an email from him...I need to respond to that soon). So I guess now, on Day 5, 4 days after technically meeting him, I can say I've made a new friend, and Dan is the first friend who is actually in my lab! He's really nice. But technically he's new too. He's an employee, but he moved here with his wife and kids from Seattle 6 months ago, so I think he and I will get along just fine.
In the afternoon, back from my badge appointment, I just sat in my cubicle and worked. A lady (whom I had never met before) walked in and after she sat down, I asked her what her name was. Christine is a grad student working on her thesis. We talked a little, she told me about the zoo in Washington D.C., and I think she's my 4th friend. So hi Christine, I love how friendly and talkative you are, and you are definitely one of the younger people in the lab, and I hope we will get along this summer.
On my way into the lab from Building 31, I introduced myself to someone who was in the elevator with me. She works in the same lab location as I do, but since it's an open lab, she's not in my lab group. She was really nice and friendly, so I'll definitely say hi if I meet her again. Speaking of meeting again, as I was waiting in Building 10 for my badge, a girl walks by and she was a girl I met on Day 1 of NIH, after I had met Anna! It was so cool to see her, because as she walked by, she gave me a wide smile and I waved back. Even though the chances of me seeing her are really slim, it managed to happen and that smile brightened my day, made me feel a little more like I belong here, even if I really don't.
So cheers to more immersion, both socially and experience-wise. Each day, I slowly feel more at home, though it's still a rough process, kind of like centrifuging a mixture to create a suspension, where everything is combined. Okay okay that was a stretch, I'll stop now because it's getting quite late (3am over here). Tomorrow is my first lab meeting! I need to be at work at the bright and early hour of...9:30am.
The high was supposed to reach 93 degrees, and it definitely did. I had to walk from my building to Building 10 to pick up my badge (yes, I finally have a badge now...it's all official and fancy) in the afternoon, and I could feel the heat radiating from the ground. In the morning, between the Transhare and the badge, my mentor and I did a lot of lab work, and we were performing a gel electrophoresis with proteins! That was a new process I learned (especially measuring protein concentration), but we also revisited some previous procedures. My mentor left me to create an annealing reaction with some CRISPR primers, and it was a little daunting because he just got out all the supplies, and then left, but I did it right. Or at least I'm 99.9999999% sure I did. And with sig figs, that can round up to 100%. So all good. I still have to figure out how to keep a lab notebook. I've been writing on pieces of paper and my handwriting is atrocious. I can't even read what I write half of the time. It's all scrawls across pages, and writing in gloves doesn't help.
The whole morning, from 10:40ish to 1pm, we were in the lab, and time flew, I didn't realize it was past lunch time until my stomach started growling. Lunch is whenever, so afterwards, we returned to the lab, finished up some reactions, like our PCR work from yesterday with inoculations and then I had to pick up my badge. I'm definitely getting the hang of navigating the NIH campus, especially because I rely less and less on a pdf of the map (saved on my phone) each day.
In the morning, while working in the lab, I got a chance to talk to Jon. I met him the first day, when my mentor introduced me to him and mentioned how as we both play tennis, we could probably play a bit over the summer. I was loading DNA into the wells of the gel and I switched from my left hand to my right hand as I made my way down the row of wells, just for simplicity sake, but also because I was so nervous I was going to mess up, my left hand was shaking really badly and my right hand would provide some rest. My mentor commented on that and during some downtime (in labs, there's a lot of waiting around for reactions to occur or for some heating/cooling/ligation.whatever process to happen) Dan asked what hand I play tennis with, and if I was ambidextrous for tennis. We slipped into conversation about tennis and serving and everything, and I gave him my email so we could set up a time to play (I saw an email from him...I need to respond to that soon). So I guess now, on Day 5, 4 days after technically meeting him, I can say I've made a new friend, and Dan is the first friend who is actually in my lab! He's really nice. But technically he's new too. He's an employee, but he moved here with his wife and kids from Seattle 6 months ago, so I think he and I will get along just fine.
In the afternoon, back from my badge appointment, I just sat in my cubicle and worked. A lady (whom I had never met before) walked in and after she sat down, I asked her what her name was. Christine is a grad student working on her thesis. We talked a little, she told me about the zoo in Washington D.C., and I think she's my 4th friend. So hi Christine, I love how friendly and talkative you are, and you are definitely one of the younger people in the lab, and I hope we will get along this summer.
On my way into the lab from Building 31, I introduced myself to someone who was in the elevator with me. She works in the same lab location as I do, but since it's an open lab, she's not in my lab group. She was really nice and friendly, so I'll definitely say hi if I meet her again. Speaking of meeting again, as I was waiting in Building 10 for my badge, a girl walks by and she was a girl I met on Day 1 of NIH, after I had met Anna! It was so cool to see her, because as she walked by, she gave me a wide smile and I waved back. Even though the chances of me seeing her are really slim, it managed to happen and that smile brightened my day, made me feel a little more like I belong here, even if I really don't.
So cheers to more immersion, both socially and experience-wise. Each day, I slowly feel more at home, though it's still a rough process, kind of like centrifuging a mixture to create a suspension, where everything is combined. Okay okay that was a stretch, I'll stop now because it's getting quite late (3am over here). Tomorrow is my first lab meeting! I need to be at work at the bright and early hour of...9:30am.
Gel electrophoresis with proteins!
Wednesday, June 10, 2015
Book 1: Settling into Life Day 4 (June 10, 2015)
Oh badge appointments, how I love thee. But actually I do. It's helped me meet one person and I definitely got to interact with a few more. The whole process took less than 10 minutes, but I was there for 2 hours today, thanks to the crazy wait time. During then, I managed to talk to this older guy, striking up conversation with a snarky comment "do I have to move up in these chairs too?" as a reference to how we got chastised for not moving up seats in the first line we had to go through, as well as starting a conversation with this boy who sat next to me. He had his parental consent forms too, so I knew he was around my age, and we got into a very animated talk about colleges and standardized tests and majors and not knowing what to do with life. He had assumed I was from the Maryland area, so he started spewing some local jargon for neighborhood names, I think, until I told him I was not from the area. He was probably originally frustrated at my confused looks.
I got called in, and I didn't get a chance to ask for his name or contact info. So after my appointment was finished, I waited outside for 7 minutes to try to catch him and get his facebook profile, so we could keep in touch. He's at a different NIH campus, so I'll probably never get to see him, but he is from this area and we can always talk about college and our NIH experience. If anything, I'm just happy I made a friend. I can count the amount of friends I've made on one hand. It's not very many, but I'm still working on it.
I just love badge appointments. Within the two I've had, I've met two people I'll be able to keep in touch with over Facebook. Now to start meeting people in my lab is a whole new thing. In the lab, I feel completely incompetent, because everything is based on how well you "lab", but I clearly don't "lab" very well. Outside of it, it's more about personality, and I can engage in interesting conversations, such as tea infusions with Anna!
Walking to my lab, I walked with Chris (my new friend) and he went to the Metro while I continued on to the lab. There, I did some of my own studying at my cubicle for a while, but then my mentor showed me (and let me) perform a transfection, using annealing oligos (don't worry, there will be lots of bio jargon coming your way, but just take it all in stride) and let me watch him as he changed cell culture for the HeLa cells he is working with. I was so bad at pipetting during the transfection, he had me practice for 15 minutes (while we were waiting for the annealing to occur in the thermal cycler) with pipets and water.
Though I got quite a bit of exercise (okay okay, less than I've ever in my life, since being trapped in a building of steel and glass for almost 9 hours every day with hardly a break, and no moments to be outside or walk...and most of it is spent sitting at a cubicle), my appetite is still pretty full. I ended up eating my "lunch" at 5pm, but at least the break room was empty, so no awkwardness there, I guess. I'm okay with eating lunch by myself, especially because it's more like I choke down food so I don't pass out.
The afternoon passed by with lots of labs, me finally realizing I need to get my act together and figure out how to keep a lab notebook (I'm still pretty clueless on that...help!), but each day does bring something new, and that gives me something to look forward to each day, even if I don't practice flute like I should be, even if I can't practice tennis because that's a little difficult, even if I get home so exhausted, I have no motivation for further studying or anything using the brain. It's a miracle I've cranked out this post, but here it is, day 3 in Bethesda.
I still can't get over how beautiful Building 35 really is:
I got called in, and I didn't get a chance to ask for his name or contact info. So after my appointment was finished, I waited outside for 7 minutes to try to catch him and get his facebook profile, so we could keep in touch. He's at a different NIH campus, so I'll probably never get to see him, but he is from this area and we can always talk about college and our NIH experience. If anything, I'm just happy I made a friend. I can count the amount of friends I've made on one hand. It's not very many, but I'm still working on it.
I just love badge appointments. Within the two I've had, I've met two people I'll be able to keep in touch with over Facebook. Now to start meeting people in my lab is a whole new thing. In the lab, I feel completely incompetent, because everything is based on how well you "lab", but I clearly don't "lab" very well. Outside of it, it's more about personality, and I can engage in interesting conversations, such as tea infusions with Anna!
Walking to my lab, I walked with Chris (my new friend) and he went to the Metro while I continued on to the lab. There, I did some of my own studying at my cubicle for a while, but then my mentor showed me (and let me) perform a transfection, using annealing oligos (don't worry, there will be lots of bio jargon coming your way, but just take it all in stride) and let me watch him as he changed cell culture for the HeLa cells he is working with. I was so bad at pipetting during the transfection, he had me practice for 15 minutes (while we were waiting for the annealing to occur in the thermal cycler) with pipets and water.
Though I got quite a bit of exercise (okay okay, less than I've ever in my life, since being trapped in a building of steel and glass for almost 9 hours every day with hardly a break, and no moments to be outside or walk...and most of it is spent sitting at a cubicle), my appetite is still pretty full. I ended up eating my "lunch" at 5pm, but at least the break room was empty, so no awkwardness there, I guess. I'm okay with eating lunch by myself, especially because it's more like I choke down food so I don't pass out.
The afternoon passed by with lots of labs, me finally realizing I need to get my act together and figure out how to keep a lab notebook (I'm still pretty clueless on that...help!), but each day does bring something new, and that gives me something to look forward to each day, even if I don't practice flute like I should be, even if I can't practice tennis because that's a little difficult, even if I get home so exhausted, I have no motivation for further studying or anything using the brain. It's a miracle I've cranked out this post, but here it is, day 3 in Bethesda.
I still can't get over how beautiful Building 35 really is:
In the morning, walking into work.
Walking out of work, on the bridge.
Walking down the sidewalk, the glass is so pretty!
Leaving the NIH campus, here are the security gates.
Book 1: Settling into Life Day 3 (June 9, 2015)
So today in the morning, I was given more antibodies to catalog, and by the end, I had put in over 100 into the spreadsheet. Wow, I'm getting good at that task. It's like secretarial, but a working knowledge of antibodies is needed. So the fact that IgG is a type of antibody, and that mAb is a monoclonal antibody, which are usually with rabbits (or maybe it was mouse...oops, I forgot already), along with other things. I got pretty exhausted though and I knew it was pretty bad when I laughed at one antibody that was labeled "anti-Tim23"...
When I went to the break room for lunch, the tables were all full, so I went to the conference room and ate with my mentor. It was awkward as I was heating up my lunch because everyone looked at me, and I just stood there not even introducing myself, waiting for that one minute to go by as fast as it could.
In the afternoon, after some cubicle study time, I watched my mentor make a cell culture, maintain HeLa cells, and also saw some other HeLa cells that had GFPs in them under the fluorescence microscope, and that was super cool. I also watched him go through the transfection process, and that was pretty cool.
When I went to the break room for lunch, the tables were all full, so I went to the conference room and ate with my mentor. It was awkward as I was heating up my lunch because everyone looked at me, and I just stood there not even introducing myself, waiting for that one minute to go by as fast as it could.
In the afternoon, after some cubicle study time, I watched my mentor make a cell culture, maintain HeLa cells, and also saw some other HeLa cells that had GFPs in them under the fluorescence microscope, and that was super cool. I also watched him go through the transfection process, and that was pretty cool.
Antibody OCD: sorting the cataloged from the uncataloged.
Tuesday, June 9, 2015
Book 1: Settling into Life Day 2 (June 8, 2015)
First day at NIH! I arrive there, a little flustered because the Metro and NIH campus were all so new, but I manage to make it through the security (because I don't have my badge yet) and I miraculously find Katie's office (she'll be my Office Manager for the summer). There, she gives me a brief rundown of the program, hands me a folder filled with two big packets, and then takes me down to the lab where I'll be working at. There, I met my mentor and he assigned me to a cubicle and sat me down with an enzyme ordering manual. He mentioned a few things and the word appendix caused a little ding in my head, but I decided I would try to tackle the manual front to back. Plus I forgot about the appendix two minutes after he left me there. My memory retention is pretty bad right now...
Bad idea. I sat there for the whole day not having a single clue on what these words meant and I ended up googling every other word. Then I decided I should probably refresh myself on restriction enzymes in general, along with proteins, so that took a while. After lunch, I went back to studying, but an hour in, I was given antibodies and I had to put information into a spreadsheet on each of them. There were around 50 and at first it was difficult learning the "lingo," but I eventually got the hang of it. I had a badging appointment at 4pm. Since I was in the middle of cataloging antibodies still, I just put them back in the fridge and walked to Building 10. I didn't know how to find the badging room, but by asking around, I managed to. There was a little bit of a wait, so as I sat down, I started talking to the person sitting next to me. Her name is Anna and she is a summer intern from Spain. She's older than me by a bit, so she's an adult, but she's really really nice! She actually works in Building 37, which is next to my building and is connected underground by a tunnel. That tunnel is like a food pathway, and she was telling me about how she saw some tea places. We exchanged facebook contacts and we will hopefully go get some tea on a lunch break together sometime! I was really happy I was able to make a friend, and Anna is my first friend at NIH.
During the badging appointment, I found out that I was missing a parental consent form (I never got it...) so I couldn't get my badge until then. I was given a hard copy and told when it was filled out, I should schedule an appointment at Building 31, and it would all be taken care of then. So I left Building 10 badgeless, but with one friend.
I went back to antibodies, I finished, and then studied for the rest of the time. Work was done at 6:45pm, really late, but that's generally how all days will be. I'm not complaining, because I do go to work relatively later too, arriving at work around 10am.
And now for some pictures:
Bad idea. I sat there for the whole day not having a single clue on what these words meant and I ended up googling every other word. Then I decided I should probably refresh myself on restriction enzymes in general, along with proteins, so that took a while. After lunch, I went back to studying, but an hour in, I was given antibodies and I had to put information into a spreadsheet on each of them. There were around 50 and at first it was difficult learning the "lingo," but I eventually got the hang of it. I had a badging appointment at 4pm. Since I was in the middle of cataloging antibodies still, I just put them back in the fridge and walked to Building 10. I didn't know how to find the badging room, but by asking around, I managed to. There was a little bit of a wait, so as I sat down, I started talking to the person sitting next to me. Her name is Anna and she is a summer intern from Spain. She's older than me by a bit, so she's an adult, but she's really really nice! She actually works in Building 37, which is next to my building and is connected underground by a tunnel. That tunnel is like a food pathway, and she was telling me about how she saw some tea places. We exchanged facebook contacts and we will hopefully go get some tea on a lunch break together sometime! I was really happy I was able to make a friend, and Anna is my first friend at NIH.
During the badging appointment, I found out that I was missing a parental consent form (I never got it...) so I couldn't get my badge until then. I was given a hard copy and told when it was filled out, I should schedule an appointment at Building 31, and it would all be taken care of then. So I left Building 10 badgeless, but with one friend.
I went back to antibodies, I finished, and then studied for the rest of the time. Work was done at 6:45pm, really late, but that's generally how all days will be. I'm not complaining, because I do go to work relatively later too, arriving at work around 10am.
And now for some pictures:
The building I work at. It still amazes me how big and beautiful it really is, steel and glass and aesthetically pleasing.
The view of the lab from my cubicle. It looks as professional as it really is.
Antibodies and secretarial work (that also demands a working knowledge of antibodies and what IgG means and mAb and nondyslexic eyes/minds).
Just a picture of the train station on my way home.
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