Hm. What next? Part VI

In my resolutions post I mentioned some changes underfoot, and one of those changes is my job!  In September a took a job with the same instrument company that I post-doc-ed with.

[Side bar.  I verbally use "post-doc" as a verb all the time, and I know I'm not alone.  My problem is the past tense of post-doc.  Post-doc-ed?  Post-doced?  Post-docked?  Should it even have a hyphen between post and doc?  Everything I come up with looks dumb.]

So as a post-doc I worked for an instrument company in Delaware, but I was primarily based in a lab at BFU (Big Fancy University).  It was definitely a non-traditional post doc, even by industry standards.  This lab is a joint project of sorts between my company and BFU.  While there are faculty chairs technically associated with the lab, I was pretty much the only staff person making things happen on a day to day basis.  Everything from prepping and running samples, caring for the instruments, data analysis, training users on various software programs, tracking down supplies, coming up with content for a lab handbook and website, to communicating guidelines and results with lab users.  I did my best to stay out of BFU administrative and political nonsense.  It was an insane job to say the least.

Since I got hired for real my responsibilities have gradually been transitioning away from this lab at BFU.  Supposedly there's a replacement for me... he's real and I've met him...but I'll believe it all when I see it.  (Let's say BFU has known since August that I was going to step down my time but not a whole lot has happened administratively to hire a replacement.)  In November I dropped to 50% time in Baltimore, with most of the other 50% of my time spent in California at another company location.  Since then I've been working a couple weeks in Baltimore then a couple weeks in California.  After February I'll do a couple months at 25% time in Baltimore, until finally dropping down to just a day or two every now and then.

In California I've been training and working on a new instrument that we've just put out.  I had experience on another instrument with similar technology in grad school, making me a good candidate ti work on this project.  I'll continue to spend lots of time in California for a few more months (hello frequent flyer miles and Marriott points!) before being based primarily in Delaware.  I'm sure I'll still travel quite a bit, though not as often, far, or for so long at once.

I'm pretty excited about the changing job.  There are a lot of less than polite things I could say to explain this, but in this venue it's going to have to rest with this: I'm ready to be done with Baltimore (both in terms of living and working there) and the work in California is pretty fun.  I think in the long term this will be have a lot more of what I want in a job than this post doc has had.  The post doc was in a lot of ways closer to the facility job I thought I wanted than this job will be, but there were a few things that made this not the best match for me that wouldn't necessarily be true everywhere.  If I ever did take a facility type of job (funnily enough I've been hearing rumors that there may be exactly such a job available quite soon), it would definitely have to be in a very different type of academic setting that BFU, where I'm preferably not starting from scratch and not the only person working in the lab.

P.S.  My other/older What Next posts are here, here, and here.

Wedding #3

Ok, before I lose all steam, here's Wedding #3 from 2013!  My college roommate (the other college roommate...not the one whose brother I'm dating) got married in StL right after Christmas.  I was super excited leading up to this one because of the venues.  Don't get me wrong, I'm delighted to see my friend so happy, but The Church!  The Chase!  Despite living in StL for several years including college, I had never been to a wedding at the College Church (listed among the most beautiful college campuses for a wedding!).  I'm sure I'm biased by all the great memories in this church (though to be fair there are some sad ones too) and the fantastic choirs, but this is hands-down my favorite church.  It's just exquisite.  The reception was held at the Chase, a very fancy, historic hotel not far from campus.  We used to go see movies there in college because that's right, there's a theater in the hotel.  The reception was on the top floor, with a lovely view of the city.  The hotel block for the wedding was at the same place, and between the off-season timing and the wedding block it was shockingly affordable.

Now I knew this wedding was going to be fancy.  The bride has by far the most elevated taste of all my friends, not to mention she's the most meticulous planner I know.  Let's say I wasn't disappointed by this wedding.  Not only was there a dress change during the reception, there was a hairstyle change between the ceremony and the reception.  Her dad is Chinese, so during the reception she changed out of her American-style, traditional white gown into a red gown, as red is the traditional color for Chinese weddings.  When I'd heard beforehand that she was going to change her hair before the reception, I assumed this meant something like up versus down, or changing to a more sturdy style for dancing.  What I never dreamed this meant was a new hair cut and color!  In less than 2 hours too!

Dinner was also super fancy...we were highly entertained by the number of glasses with the place settings.  It wasn't difficult to figure out what they all were (water, white wine glass, red wine glass, and champagne flute), but my goodness!  Add to that the fact that most people got to the table with their last drink from the cocktail hour in hand and I had nearly as many glasses as I use in a week in front of me at once.  A raspberry sorbet palate cleanser was served between the salad and the entree.  I've watched enough Top Chef to know what a palate cleanser is, but I'd certainly never been served one before!  When the chargers were cleared from the table before we expected there was a puzzled conversation as to the purpose of chargers that never got resolved, even after consulting with Boyfriend's (and college roommate's) very ladylike southern mother.

While this was a much fancier wedding than I'd ever come up with, I have to say it may be the first where there isn't anything I'd critique!  Everything was incredibly well organized and just so elegant.  I know I've talked about how fancy everything was, but really the best part was the gigantic smile on the bride's face.  It's the sort of smile that makes me weepy-happy. :)

Blurry roommates!

With the college-roommate-whose-brother-I'm-dating and our fellas

That sums up the 2013 year in weddings.  I don't know of any yet for 2014, but it's hard to imagine that won't change...

Wedding #2

Before I lose interest in blogging again I wanted to post about Weddings #2 and #3 that I mentioned when I blogged about Wedding #1 - Amy's wedding last summer in Massachusetts.

Wedding #2 was that of my other Amy - a dear friend from college.  She got married on a warm October Saturday in Cincinnati.  I made this trip by myself, since Boyfriend wouldn't know anybody else there.  Amy looked gorgeous, and the wedding was loads of fun.  There were several small children at the reception who totally tore up the dance floor.  There was a kids activity table with a basket of games and little activities for them - which I thought was a fabulous idea - but they were all far more interested in the dance floor, with and without any adults.  The other fabulous aspect of the reception was the alternative wedding dessert.  Instead of a cake there was a brownie bar!  Amy's mom made a massive pile of brownies, and there was ice cream, whipped cream, sprinkles, and all sorts of goodies with which to decorate your brownie.

Amy was a fellow alto in the mass choir in college.  We spent many hours cooking and giggling.  Sometimes at the same time.  I've always loved one of the things she said about our friendship when I graduated.  Since moving apart, we may not talk terribly often, but it's the type of friendship where we can always pick up where we left off as if no time as passed.  There is always lots of news to catch up on, but there's no period of re-acquaintance if you will.  With how busy life gets I have to say I feel very lucky indeed to have such friends.  Amy is one of those friends I mean to call more often this year.

New Year, New Post

So it's been ages since I've blogged, but in the spirit of New Year's and motivated by one of my favorite women-making-it-work-in-science-with-a-family bloggers (seriously adorable little family and frankness that makes me laugh out loud and adore her all the more) I decided to post.

I'll warn you right now that this is a stereotypical post on resolutions and goals for this year.  Let's check up on last year's goals as we go...considering the one I bombed in 2013 is going to make a reappearance in this year's list...

Student loans!  They're paid off!!  I made steady progress on them for the first half of the year until summer when I started saving money for a trip to France.  In September I got promoted/hired as a "real person" with the same company I post-doc-ed (what on earth is the past tense of the verb "to post-doc"???).  Getting a real PhD job came with a substantial promotion, and as soon as I saw my first pay check I promptly paid off the remainder of my student loans.

My other financial goal was to build up a safety cushion of savings.  I actually got pretty darn close to accomplishing this, but then Boyfriend and I decided to buy a house... So there goes that money.  While this wasn't exactly a fail, savings are important to me so it's going on the list for 2014.  I'm aiming again for 6 months of living expenses, as well as some money for a certain pricey occasion.

Along with saving, I want to figure out how to improve my retirement savings plan.  I only acquired retirement benefits when I got hired in September, so all I've done so far is contribute the maximum that my company will match.  But this year it's time to study up on 401ks and Roth IRAs and HSAs and who knows what else to understand what all this stuff is and figure out how to do the most I can for our little family (Boyfriend is in on this goal, too.).

Now here's where I bombed big last year.  The self-loathing weight loss goal that 99% of way too many women (myself included) make every year.  I'll use Academomia's terminology here - last year I was about N+7 at this time last year, with N being my goal weight.  Frankly, right now I'm not brave enough to step on the scale to see how far I am from N.  I'd guess I'm at least N+7, and it's entirely probable that I'm as much as N+10.  Let's not think about the possibly of  >N+10.  I think after a week or so of normal eating rather than holiday and travel eating I'll be brave enough to see where I am.

One corollary that I had to that was to complain less about my weight.  I think I've been pretty terrible about this one the last month or two.  And in all fairness, I've been travelling at least 50% of the time since the beginning of November, and then you throw in the holidays and it's just incredibly difficult to eat anything besides junk.  I asked Boyfriend, and maybe he's trying not to get himself into trouble, but he thinks I've been pretty good about not complaining.  I'm going to declare a verdict of decent success except for the last couple of months.  Since I still want to lose weight I'm keeping this corollary on the list so I don't tick off all my friends and Boyfriend.

The hobby goals I made last year were to make another photo-a-day album and to go on at least one hike every month.  The album has been made, with a handful of cell phone photo cheaters in place of photos taken with my big girl camera.  I think I may shelve this project until I have kids.  Or at the very least a bigger social circle.  Between living alone, having a much smaller social circle in Baltimore than in Tucson, and living in a city where it frequently feels like a really bad idea to walk around with my camera this project wasn't nearly as fun as it was in 2011.  I did get some fun pictures out of it that I'm happy to have, but it felt like a chore a lot more than it should have.  As for hiking, we did great through at least July.  Maybe we went on a hike in August.  Sadly I can't remember.  Maybe we didn't go for a hike in August after how miserably humid and nausea-filled July's hike was.  In September we biked at least 20 miles in the Camargue and walked all over several other cities.  Once we got back from France we spent almost every weekend looking at houses...so hiking fell by the wayside.

The only other specific goal I'm going to make this year is to keep in better touch with friends.  There are a handful of friends who have the same gchat habits I do, so I talk to them pretty regularly, but there are a handful of other still very dear friends who don't leave gchat open all the time.  My goal this year is to call those people more than twice per year!

I've got a lot of big changes on my plate for this year - buying a house, moving in with Boyfriend, a transitioning job with lots of travel - so I think that's plenty for official resolutions.  I don't know that I'll begin posting any more frequently, but I'm not ready to close the door on this blog, so I guess I'll just have to leave you in suspense on that front.

Happy New Year! It's going to be a big one!

Update

Some of you may recall a certain sloshball incident... Well it's been just over three years since that fateful day, and here's what my leg looks like now:

Significantly improved, but still significantly scarred.

My Other Home

So I'm so behind in blogging that three months later I'm getting around to writing about going to St. Louis for Little Brother's college graduation.  It was mostly a really nice trip, and I'm always happy to go to St. Louis.  I love St. Louis.  I loved my time there.  It's such an under-rated city.  Little brother still lives there, along with Dad's side of the family, and one of my college roommates.  I can't wait to back for Wedding #3 in December!

I mostly took photos of family and graduation stuff, so not a whole lot to share, but here are a couple shots.

Ted Drewes.  Amazingness in a cup.  It's right on Route 66, and it's pretty much a St. Louis icon.  Grandpa (mom's dad, who lives in Connecticut, not dad's dad who lives in St. Louis) thought it was crowded.  The crowd that night hardly counted as a crowd.  After a Cardinals' game it's nothing short of a mob scene.  Ted Drewes is an essential stop on every trip to StL.

Those of you who have lived in mid-town St. Louis may recognize this UFO-like building.  Though you may not, as it is now far more classily (Yep, made that one up.  Standing by it.) occupied than when I was in college.  At that point it was a Del Taco.  And I never once in 4 years ate there.  It was a shady, shady place.  Now the university has bought the apartments behind it, and it's much more respectably occupied by a Starbucks and a Chipotle.  The flying saucer has come so far.

Time for a tangent.  My dorm freshman year was directly across the street from the above flying saucer, somewhat separate from the rest of campus.  The road was a really busy road, and we were just south of a large and apparently confusing intersection.  Accidents happened all the time.  The former Del Taco makes me think of one of the dumbest accidents I've ever seen, which happened right in front of it.  There's a light there, and a school bus - you know, giant, bright yellow vehicle - was stopped at the red light.  I was walking up the street towards campus when I heard a crash behind me, and I turned around to find a vehicle had rear ended the stopped school bus.  I don't really remember, but I think it was a jeep.  It's entire front end was smashed into the back of the bus.  We're not talking little fender bender from somebody creeping forward at the red light.  How do you miss the GIANT YELLOW BUS stopped in front of you??

At commencement all the faculty in their academic regalia process in before the students.  Check out the guy in the middle of the photo below.  It's Dumbledore!  Apparently he teaches at my old college - he didn't die in Book 6 after all!  After the ceremony we were chatting with a professor (actually a Jesuit priest who lived in the same dorm I did my freshman year) who was a contemporary of my parents when they were all students at this same college.  Dad asked him who Dumbledore was (literally, that's exactly what he said), and this professor thought about it for a few minutes, and said he teaches in the theology department.  On that description alone, he knew exactly who he was.  Priceless.

While in St. Louis I got to hang out with my college roommate (the bride in Wedding #3 this year - and I'm seriously excited for that wedding!), and she and her fiance just got the cutest little puppy.  He's adorable, and super photogenic.

I just love St. Louis.  Only 4 1/2 months until I get to go back!

Happy birthday Little Sister!

Today is Little Sister's 19th birthday!  I will take this occasion to suggest that you browse through the Little Sister label to relive some of her finest moments, which are obviously documented on my blog. :)

Happy birthday, Little Sister!