Fa-la-la-la-la La-la-la-la

About 2 years ago, my paternal grandmother (aka Horrible Henrietta or HH) was absolutely miserable to my mother and I when we went to bring her home from a self-induced hospital stay (she OD'ed on Imodium- this was not the first OR last time she has done something like this). HH was nasty to us at the hospital, at the pharmacy where we picked up her prescriptions, and at her home when we dropped her off. My mother and I left her house and went to finish our Christmas card shopping. We spent 45 minutes trying to pick out a card for HH, discarding card after card as too nice or too phony. Actually, it was quite therapeutic. We arrived home to a voice mail diatribe of accusations. Accusations which HH later claimed that my mother and I made up, essentially accusing us of lying, adding yet another accusation to the pile. At which point my father replayed the voice mail for her. Not once has she ever apologized for her behavior or for the pain she caused. Subsequently, I have only gone to visit my grandmother when there are 3rd party witnesses, like when she is in the hospital or a nursing facility. The sole exception to this is when I visit her at Christmas- even then I make sure to go when my father or brothers are present. I have written to HH explaining my reasoning and my absolute refusal to have anything to do with her unless she seeks psychiatric treatment. Clearly, when someone ODs on Imodium multiple times as well as deliberately hurting the people helping her, that person is sick. In fact, after this particular Imodium incident, the hospital set up an outpatient psych consult, which HH canceled. While I recognize HH has a right to refuse such treatment, I feel that I have a right not to have to deal with her psychotic abuse. Periodically since my letter, she has reached out to me, but never expressing any regret for the pain she caused me. She still categorically refuses to see a psychiatrist. One of the times she has reached out to me was this week in a Christmas card where she expressed the sentiment "When are you just going to get over this?" Not, "I'm sorry for my behavior." Not "I'm sorry I hurt you." Not, "please forgive me." No. She put it all on me...like this whole situation is some failing of mine. I'm sorry, but if you hurt me once, shame on you. If you hurt me twice, shame on me- for allowing you into a position where you could hurt me again! When is enough enough?

What ever happened to nice old ladies?

About a week or so ago I had a very interesting conversation with a friend about the lack of nice old ladies. Think about it- when was the last time you encountered a nice polite old lady? I regularly encounter mean old ladies, rude old ladies, funny old ladies, insane old ladies but rarely encounter a genuinely nice, polite old lady. For example, I was shopping at the Christmas Tree Shop 2 weeks ago and was browsing in the card section. All of the sudden my cart smashed into my shins. I looked up startled and a cranky old lady who had just rammed her cart into mine looked at me and said "Well, it was in MY way." Another old lady passing in the opposite direction looked at the situation and loudly commented "What a bitch!" I hope that comment was directed at the old lady who bruised my shins, but in all likelihood, it was probably directed at my inability to move my cart out of the other old lady's way!

The sad thing is, this type of behavior is all too common over the past few years. About 3 years ago, after being "abused" by the mean old ladies at the grocery store, I made a rule for myself- I only help people that ask me to NICELY. Why reward bad behavior? I wouldn't put up with behavior like that from a child, why should I put up with it from an adult?

Possessed GPS

For the past 2 weeks I've been thinking that DH's GPS is on a mission to get me into cemeteries. Seriously, each time I've borrowed it, if there is even a remote possibility of cutting through a cemetery, the GPS will detour me towards it. Not that I object to short-cuts, but where I'm currently living, cemetery gates are generally closed and locked at dusk. This means that if you drive into one at dusk or after dark, you may not be able to get out without phoning the caretaker. Not my idea of a good evening- as I had to explain to my MIL when we were traveling to watch DH play hockey at an unfamiliar (to me) rink. So when I had to take one of our vehicles into the dealer for maintenance the other day, I shouldn't have been surprised that it took over 1.5 hours to get there. Why? The GPS sent me by a funeral with double-parked cars in a construction zone. Yes, I know that even with the traffic feature, the GPS can't predict large funerals, however, it fit so nicely with the GPS's new-found affection for cemeteries. Then, returning from the dealership, the GPS routed me by 3 funeral homes- two of them with TRIPLE parked cars- essentially turning a 4 lane road into a 1 lane road with a police traffic detail. All because I wanted to avoid the parking lot that is the freeway during rush hour!

Yesterday, I mentioned this phenomenon to DH, who informed me that he's heard it's a common problem with GPS units in our area over the past month- they are preferentially routing people through cemeteries and past funeral homes. What I want to know is if this is someone's idea of testing out a Halloween prank....

Mountain Biking

After re-habbing my knee 3 times in the past 15 years, I'm beyond sick of stationary bikes. They make me feel like a gerbil. When I was griping about how out of shape I was from writing my thesis over a year ago, my husband bought me a mountain bike for Christmas. He promised that he would teach me to mountain bike. In the 2 years I've had the bike, I've gone trail riding exactly 3 times. The first time, I ended up falling sideways off a little bridge and landing in a bush (have I mentioned that my sense of balance sucks?). Not a bad place to fall, but I ended up with a branch up my nose and a very nice cut. Made for some cute pictures at a family party the following week! I did much better the second time a week later. However, since that time, I haven't gone trail riding. It's been over a year. Last summer, the weather was abysmally rainy for the first part of the summer and then I was prepping for my defense through the second part of the summer. So I was not surprised at how badly I sucked trail riding this past weekend. I wiped out twice. The first time in sand that I didn't have enough speed to make it over and the second time when my bike bounced unexpectedly and I got tossed over the handle bars. Meanwhile, my husband was battling deer flies while waiting for me to catch up with him. Two days later, I have some really nice purple splotches all over my legs and the palms of my hands (can we say death grip on the handles) and my husband's arm is swollen from all the bites. I think its bizarre that I can't wait to try again....

D.C. Career Fair Adventure

I just returned from a quick day trip to DC to attend a career fair. I got to the DC metro stop where I was supposed to meet my cousin about an hour early. To my surprise, I was greeted by a gentleman I shall refer to as "Spear Chucker". I refer to him as Spear Chucker because he was carrying a "spear"- or rather a long tree branch that he was using to stab at people (didn't actually make contact) like a spear while raving. Spear Chucker was wearing jeans that were slit up the sides nearly to his hip and up the inseam nearly to his crotch. The effect was that of him wearing daisy dukes with extra material hanging to his ankles. When he started staring at me, and muttering snob because I didn't answer him (hell, I couldn't even understand what he was saying) I decided it was time to go for a walk. I was right down the street from the White House, so I thought I'd go see if it was still blocked off like it was the last time I visited DC. It wasn't, so I joined the tourist groups and walked on by. When I turned to return to where I was suppose to meet my cousin, one of the security dogs went nuts on a van pulling onto the White House grounds. Said dog was trained to find explosives, so security and the local police quickly herded all the tourists (and me) back in the opposite direction I was traveling. At that point, I had less than 10 minutes to get back to meet my cousin. I had to walk 2 really long blocks in the opposite direction in order to head back to the meeting point. Somewhere along the way, I noticed Spear Chucker following me, but luckily, he got distracted by a group of Japanese tourists who wanted to take pictures with him. Finally met up with my cousin for a really nice lunch (Thanks Cuz!).

After lunch, I headed over to the Career Fair. At this point, I was 2 hours early and thought I'd walk around some, as I love that area of DC. However, when I got there, people were already queuing to enter the Career Fair! Yikes! So I went into a coffee shop for about an hour and then joined the queue. I got to chat with some really nice people while I waited and I also got to do some serious people watching. First thing I noticed is you could tell who was going for a legal position- they all wore black suits with white shirts. The next thing I noticed is that business attire has a very wide definition. There were 2 girls that walked by in outfits that can only be described as hoochie-mama. One of the guys behind me made the comment that "Do you think those girls know that Bill Clinton is no longer in office?" It was pretty mean, but as we were all thinking along those lines, we all laughed. Then there was a girl that walked by in a tux jacket with a pink tulle ballet skirt. Not sure what sort of position she was looking for. My absolute favourite outfit for the whole day though, was the blue velvet suit. It was worn by an older Asian lady- complete with Mr. T starter kit! She seriously looked like she wanted the position of "Elvis impersonator." Did I mention it was 90 degrees and we were standing in the sun? I do think the guy behind me had it right- "I hope to God she isn't wearing it because it's the best outfit she has!"

After the adventures of standing in line, the career fair was relatively tame. I got to speak to reps from each of the agencies likely to hire someone like me. None of them had brought scientific hiring managers, which was disappointing, but I did get email addresses for scientific hiring managers at various organizations. I also got to ask each agency which grade they would consider me. Each one assured me that grades are the same across the government- and then each one told me a different grade! Still, that is useful information I couldn't have gained anywhere else! After about 2 hours, I had spoken to every agency I wanted to, spoken to a few extra agencies that didn't have lines and attended 2 presentations about applying for federal jobs where all they did was hawk "The complete idiots guide to getting government jobs". At that point, the lines for some agencies went out the door and around the building and I decided to leave. All in all, it was a pretty fun day and I felt like I got something accomplished.

Unsweetened Ice Tea

In the past week, I've been to 4 different restaurants. Not a big deal to some people, but a fair number for me! I ordered unsweetened ice tea at each one (OK, I'm boring, but I don't like lemonade and I'm trying not to drink soda). At 3 of the 4 restaurants, I got diet iced tea aka iced tea sweetened with saccharine. Since when has it become acceptable to give someone diet iced tea rather than tell them that you only have sweetened iced tea? Saccharine, commonly used to sweeten diet soda and iced tea, has never agreed with me. So if they told me that they only have diet, I would have ordered something else. However, I know people that get violently ill from consuming saccharine. What if these restaurants served them diet iced tea instead of unsweetened iced tea without telling them about the substitution?

When will restaurants realize that sometimes you order something a certain way because that is the only way it won't make you sick?

Put Your F'ing Dog on Leash

So I just got back from walking my dog. It was quite the workout. I happen to be owned by the second largest dog (great dane) in the neighborhood, however, most people don't know about the largest (mastiff) because its owners never take it for walks. The walk started out by us dodging the two little white 5lb dogs at the end of our street who miraculously "escaped" again. They escape because their owners open up the back door and boot them outside; no attempt is EVER made to confine these dogs to their yard, despite the leash laws. Then, when my dog pounces at them (at because I haul my dog back) when they get too close, the owners freak. After this happened 3 times in 1 day last summer, I informed them that if their dogs ran at us barking and growling and snapping, it constituted an attack and I was going to let my dog defend himself. I also threatened to call animal control if I saw the dogs loose again. For a while, this worked, but they are back to being a nuisance again. However, tonight we managed to get away from the 2 little white dogs without incident only to encounter a medium sized dog about a quarter mile later. Great. My dog is already keyed up and in protection mode from the last 2 loose dogs. Said medium sized dog is supposedly being walked, but no leash is in sight. I'm told by the people "walking" the dog as he barrels towards us "Oh, he's friendly, you don't have to worry." Don't think they liked my reply of "Come get your dog before I let my dog get him." They then yelled at me to control MY dog, who is now pitching a fit, barking, snarling and snapping while trying to pounce on this dog. HELLO!?! My dog is on a leash and hasn't got your dog yet, so clearly something is controlling him! I then wrestle my dog into a headlock (yes, it must look hysterical because I'm only 5'8 and my dog is at least 6'3 when standing on his hind legs). I proceed to tell them that clearly, I have control of my dog and that the only reason my dog is flipping out is because their dog is off leash. I then inform them that they have until I count to 10 to get their dog under their control before I let my dog go. The guy then came and grabbed the other dog's collar and dragged him away. I let my dog down and tell him to sit, which he does right away because the other dog is under control. I then told them (in the sweetest tones possible), that they must be new to our state because they don't know about the leash and license laws (dog's collar didn't have any tags to indicate vaccination or license). I then explain that all dogs in our state MUST be vaccinated for rabies and licensed. They must also be on leash at all times off their property and must be confined to their property by either a fence, an e-collar, or a line when out in their yard unsupervised. I then wished them good evening and we walked on, my dog prancing at my side (he's always so proud of himself when he "protects" me). We then proceeded to have a good walk for the next mile or so. As we turned back up our street, my neighbor's girlfriend lost control of her dog again, for the 3rd time this week. I like this neighbor, and he is great about making sure this little devil dog is under proper control, but his girlfriend should not be permitted to own any sort of pet other than a gold fish. Seriously, this little yippy thing has major aggression issues which she admits to, no training which she never does anything about, yet she routinely takes it out to put it in its pen off leash in her arms. She is then shocked when the dog sees something or someone, claws the crap out of her, escapes and charges at whatever or whoever is approaching. So far this week, I've succeeded in driving the dog off by spraying it with water from my water bottle, by running straight for it like a mad woman and tonight by hitting it across the ass with the end of my dog's leash. She was not pleased by that, but what could she say? She knew that I was pissed the dog was loose again. We have lots of toddlers (2 across the street from this particular house!) in our neighborhood, and I shudder to think what will happen if this dog encounters them- probably at least a bite incident. I understand accidents happen and dogs get loose. Hell, my dog has gotten loose 2x under my care. Both times, I've taken steps to make sure that it didn't happen again. I have no problem with the people who are chasing after their dogs because the dog got loose, it happens, probably to everyone at least once. Is it mean that I hope that the neighbor's girlfriend loses her dog to the neighborhood fox or coyotes?

New Heights of Boredom - Actually Watching Soccer!

Since my family moved to the 'burbs when I was 10, I've enjoyed playing soccer but I have never been into watching soccer. It just isn't fast paced enough to hold my interest the way hockey does. So I'm a bit shocked by my current interest in the World Cup. Am I really that bored? Or is it simply because I'm cheering on 4 different teams (US, England, South Africa and Australia- the last 3 in the order that my husband has followed since a child) and I'll lose interest as these teams are knocked out of the tournament?

I find myself spending the majority of my time watching wondering if ESPN doesn't want to expand the market for soccer in the US. I'm assuming that more people tune in for the World Cup matches than the average MLS match (this could be completely erroneous). People that aren't necessarily soccer fans but want to see what all the hype is about. So you'd think that ESPN would employ an announcer that explained some of the rules of the game. I do understand that they don't want to annoy people that are already fans by chatter explaining the game or the rules, so at the very least, you'd think they'd have the announcers refer you to a website that has the explanation of the rules. What I'm looking for is something like how the MLB explains the rules and stats of baseball on its website. The point of all this is that I spent 45 minutes searching the internet for FIFA's official red card rules. Basically, I just wanted to know if South Africa's goal keeper would be able to play their next match against France (as I now understand the red card rules, he will not play but be suspended). Do you think I could find those rules anywhere? I found a whole ton of crap about how red cards relate to human trafficking (some sort of soccer-themed promo to raise awareness of human trafficking), but nothing about the FIFA World Cup rules. It was incredibly aggravating. Eventually, I fell back on asking the question on Facebook, where an old friend nicely clarified things for me (Thanks again Jill!). Still, I can't help but feel that if FIFA wants to expand their audience, shouldn't they make it easy for people to find the rules for their tournament? Or maybe they left it up to ESPN and it's ESPN's failure?

Murphy's Law

So, I just booked my plane tickets and registered for a government job fair. DH just got an awesome job offer in an area where there is little employment for me excluding the government. Hopefully, going to this job fair will give me an "in". However, knowing my luck, Murphy's Law says that I should get an awesome job offer sometime this week so that the plane tickets will be a complete waste of money.

Why would I give you my resume?

Before attending the job fair the other day, I did my homework. I identified all of the companies who I thought would be interested in me and all those with posted positions that would suit someone with my skills. While researching the posted positions, I discovered a position at a company I had never heard of that I thought I suited perfectly, I certainly have a great deal of experience in all the skills they were looking for. Only glitch- they were looking for someone who had done a post-doc for 5-7 years. However, the position had been posted in December, so clearly they were having a hard time filling it. I decided to stop by that company's booth and ask if the post-doc requirement was hard and fast or if they would consider someone with the right skills but no post-doc. Turned out the representative at the booth was the owner of the company. Said owner has a MAJOR chip on his shoulder against people who haven't done a post-doc. He flat out told me that "I paid my dues and I expect every scientist that I hire to have paid theirs." Fine. It's his company and he can use any criteria he wants for hiring. I thanked him for his time (hey, at least I know not to bother applying to his company!) and started to walk away. As I started leaving he asked me for a resume. I looked at him and said "What would be the point? You just told me that you wouldn't even consider hiring me." Seriously, what would be the point of giving him a resume?

Scam

So I got this weird voice mail the other day. In it, I was told (by a computer) that "We're interested in your resume and would like to set up an interview with you this week. Please call us back between the hours of 8-5 to schedule your interview." First thought that went through my head is "You're so interested in my resume that you couldn't pick up the phone and call me yourself?" The next thought was "I bet this is a scam." Seriously, what legitimate company trying to hire a PhD would have a computer call the person and NOT identify what company they were calling from? I'm pretty sure that even if there is an HR department somewhere that is using computers to call and set up interviews, that HR department would at the very least identify which company they were calling from.

HOWEVER, because I didn't know which company the message was from, I called them back the next day. I got a generic voice mailbox stating "The person you are trying to reach is out of the office. Please leave your name and number." That confirmed it for me. This call was totally a scam. I almost wanted to leave a fake name and number....

Stopping for School Buses

In the past 15 years, I have lived in 3 different states. All of these states require one to come to a complete stop when a school bus stops. One of those states requires you to "stop as quickly as is safe" no matter what the distance between you and the school bus that is stopping. So I'm in the habit of stopping a fair distance away from school buses. It hasn't been a big deal before today. Today, I had not 1, not 2, not 3 but FOUR student drivers in driving school cars (you know, the ones that almost look like taxis because of the student driver sign on the top?) swerve around me and drive PAST the stopped school bus. Hello? What on earth was the driving instructor thinking? Maybe the driving instructors need to retake the license exam? I so wish that I had thought to snap pictures with my cell phone. I would totally send them to the police AND the driving school.

What is wrong here?

Once I defended my thesis, I posted updated resumes on all the job posting sites. I received several calls immediately. The first 3 calls were from biotech companies who wanted me to come for an interview- until they found out that my degree wouldn't be official until December. While I could furnish a letter saying that I had completed all graduation requirements for a degree to be issued in December, that wasn't good enough for these 3 companies. No, for insurance reasons, I HAD to have my degree prior to them interviewing me. The promised to keep me in mind if they didn't fill the job. I haven't heard from them since (although I called all 3 the Monday after my degree was issued).

I've also had several calls from IBM, both before I was issued my degree and since. I know I said that I wasn't going to use real names, but after 5 calls from IBM or IBM recruiters, I think that their lack of database searching skills deserves to be made public! Apparently, IBM can't weed out people that work with biological viruses from those that work with computer viruses. After the 5th such call, I offered to show them how to exclude biological viruses from their database searches if they would hire me as a consultant. For some reason, they just weren't interested.

Another job search surprise has been the sheer volume of contacts from financial and insurance companies that my resume has generated. I actually chatted with one of the recruiters, who seemed like a really down to earth guy. I finally had to ask, "Why my resume? What about my resume piqued your interest?" The answer- "Well, completing a PhD shows determination and perseverance. Your integrative degree also shows that you can work with diverse types of people. So we think we could teach you, or send you for classes, in what you need to know to work in our field." Then he sheepishly added "Well, the people trained in finance have mucked up the system so badly that we thought we'd try people who aren't trained in finance." Um, hello? So the people who KNEW what to do mucked things up, so you thought you'd try people who had no clue (but basic math skills), to fix things? What is wrong here?

Book Addiction

Anyone who knows me knows I have a book addiction. I will read almost anything. I couldn't even tell you how many books I have because the majority of them have been packed away in storage for the past 10 years. Still, in the 3 years of living with my parents, I've managed to accumulate about 200 more books. With the thought of having to eventually pack up and move all my books making him cringe, my wonderful husband gave me a Kindle for Christmas. I love my Kindle, I really do. I love the fact that I can have hundreds of books on one device that happens to be smaller than most hard cover books. I also love the fact that it accumulates far less dust than the books do! For someone that hates looking at clutter and is highly allergic to dust, the Kindle is ideal. Additionally, I've already replaced about 65+ of my classics (L.M. Montgomery, Louisa May Alcott, James Joyce, Edgar Allen Poe, the Brontes, Jane Austin, etc) with the ebook for free, courtesy of Project Gutenberg (http://www.gutenberg.org/wiki/Main_Page). Actually, I even managed to find a few new books by above authors that I've never seen in print. So the Kindle has worked out nicely. I've also found a few new authors courtesy of free ebook sites. I've also found a few authors that were horrible, but hey, their books were free, so I'm not going to complain! Now all I have to do is go through my books in storage and find the classics so I can donate them to the library sale (most of them have been read so many times that they are beyond dog-eared and not worth the library keeping). I should probably also get rid of the Laura Ingalls Wilder books and Beverly Cleary books that are dusty and musty. That will be another 100 books to donate.

One thing I don't like about the Kindle is the book suggestions that are generated by Amazon. Basically, I've used my Amazon account to purchase a LOT of gifts and text books over the years. It took me a full day to go through and mark things "purchased as a gift, do not use for recommendations." Even though I wasted a whole day doing this, I still get recommendations based on things I've purchased (hence the wasted day!). Like recommendations for "The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lachs." We covered the story of Henrietta Lachs in tissue culture class and again in Bio-Ethics. I can't imagine that the book covers the story in any greater detail than we did in class, where we endlessly debated the policies in place when the HeLa cell line was created. I can't for the life of me figure out why, without my text books in the picture, this book is recommended for me. When I click on the "Why is this book recommended to me" box, I get ever-changing replies based on the science fiction books I've ordered over the years. I finally gave up and checked the "not interested box."

Anyone got any book recommendations or free ebook sites to recommend?

Job Offer

I've been very neglectful of this blog lately. I've been busy interviewing and attending playoff hockey games. Which brings me to the job offer. So, I applied for a government post-doc. Yes, you know how I feel about post-docs. However, government post-docs get paid a higher salary and get much better benefits. Hours after I submitted my resume and cover letter for the government post-doc, I get a call from the PI (Principle Investigator). Cool! Over the phone, I confirmed that it WAS a government post-doc, not an academic one (PI is associated with an Ivy League University). PI assured me that it was, and we set up a time to interview. Interview started well. We went to see his lab. OMG what a mess! I don't know how they get anything done. If there was any system of organization, I couldn't see it! There wasn't a single bench surface that wasn't covered with crap. By crap I mean old dessicated gels (some of which are likely carcinogenic), expired reagents (well, I hope they were expired- that type of reagent SHOULD be kept at 4C not benchtop), stained lab manuals and broken down equipment. I kept my mouth shut about the mess as I met the lab members. These poor girls didn't have lives. They work 16 hour days, 6 days a week! What kind of life is that? They proudly showed off their publications- 4 papers in a journal with no standards whatsoever in the past 5 years. They are associated with an Ivy League University and they can't get better publications than that?!? I actually managed to say something non-committal. Then, I got to question them about the work they do. They run a lot of FACS (fluorescent activated cell sorting), but they never run standards because "they are a waste of time and money." I wanted to say "honey, that is why you can't get your data published anywhere reputable!" Instead, I indicated that I would never work that way as it makes it impossible to compare results from experiment to experiment. PI actually looked surprised and interested at that statement. Whatever. When we completed the discussion of what they do, what they would like me to do, and where they see their lab in 5 years, the PI and I left the lab for the conference room to discuss salary and terms. Because the lab is associated with an Ivy League University, they aren't paying the government rates or offering the standard government benefits. Instead, they are paying the Ivy League University's rates and offering their crappy health plan (can we say Student Death). So why was it posted as a government position and why did you assure me that it was a government position? Oh, and I'd be expected to work the same schedule as the girls, 16 hour days, 6 days a week for 38k a year. EXCUSE ME?!? I made more money (well, per hour) delivering newspapers as a 10 year old! I wanted to stand up, say "Thanks for wasting my time and gas money", and storm out. However, what I said was "I would really have to think about it as based on what you told me, the position would not teach me anything AND would not really be a government position." I then told him that I had other interviews (which I did) and that I would get back to him in a week. PI was NOT happy about the delay (But you'd be associated with Ivy League University and would have an Ivy League University email address!), but agreed. I returned home, wrote the email and then saved it as a draft for the next week. I figured that if the PI was going to lie to me to get me to waste my time and gas money to interview for a position that I really had no interest in, then I was going to waste his time in return.

Oh, and about 10 minutes after I sent my polite refusal email I got a nasty email from the PI implying that I wasn't going to see a better offer. Really? I think I'd make more money and work better hours asking "Would you like fries with that?"

Grad School- Reactivating my Student Account

Remember when I mentioned all the trouble I had trying to pay tuition because my student account had been de-activated? Well, student accounts are used for more than paying tuition- they are also used for accessing library services (such as electronic journals), submitting your dissertation for format review to the graduate school and for submitting the final copy of your dissertation. In other words, I NEEDED my student account in order to COMPLETE the last requirements for graduation- submitting my dissertation for format review and submitting my final dissertation. So I was not expecting the hoops I had to jump through in order to get my account reactivated. First, I was told that my advisor had to request the account be reactivated. I contacted Prof Sunshine who took a week to go to the graduate office and ask what paperwork he needed to fill out. Then, I received a phone call from my graduate admin assistant telling me that my account information was ready to be picked up at the library. That touched off a flurry of phone calls to the IT department about the fact that unless they were going to pay for me to drive 500 miles to pick up the information, then they were going to have to mail the information to me. “But it includes a form that requires your signature.” Fine. I then offered to sign the form in front of a notary and have it notarized. This was completely unacceptable??!!?? I had to call the graduate office and speak with the dean’s admin assistant before I could get approval for the IT department to email me a form, which I then signed and FAXED back to them. I couldn’t scan and email it like a normal person because “how were they to know it was my actual signature”. What I’d like to know is how they knew my “actual signature” was faxed? I received an email saying that the received my fax. Wonderful! I then spent the next 3 days looking in the mail for the password the IT department was supposed to mail. Nothing. I called the IT department and was told it was in the mail. Another week went by, no password. At this point, I have 2 weeks before my committee is expecting my revisions. Other than some changes to graphs and the way figures were labeled, I hadn’t been able to complete any revisions because I had no access to journals. I called the IT department again and asked to speak to the manager (no point in blowing up at a fellow student!). Manager informs me that my password is still sitting on her desk because she didn’t know where to send it. The form I filled out included the section: Address to which information should be mailed- which I had filled out. So I gave the manager my address and asked when I should suspect to receive my password. I was then told 3-10 business days! Want to know why? The IT department drops the password into an envelope, addresses it and then drops it into inter-office mail. It then travels through interoffice mail to the university post office before getting posted. So I did what any good woman would do- I burst into tears about how my deadline was 10 days away and I couldn’t even get started on revisions until I received the password. Manager took pity on me and sent her student worker to drop it in the post box on his way to class. Password arrived in 3 days, giving me a week to complete my revisions.

Grad School- Thesis Defense

Thesis defenses have different formats depending on your program and your university. The format for my program is a public defense of about 1-2 hours which anyone can attend followed by a private defense with your committee which can be anywhere from 1-3 hours long. Typically, your advisor introduces you at the public defense. By introduce, I mean that the advisor tells where you did undergrad, what publications you’ve written and mentions any other honors your earned while in grad school. Prof Sunshine totally fucked up my introduction- about the only detail he got correct was my name. He got my undergrad university and program wrong, he also “forgot” about a major first author publication or that I won a prize for my presentation in France. To make matters worse- all of this information was in the program- which Prof Sunshine had in his hand! He then said “well, she took a break for a while and now she’s here to defend finally.” Prof Sunshine also “forgot” to remind the audience that I have a hearing deficit (which I had asked him to do). So I got to start my thesis defense by stammering out that I have a hearing deficit, so I need people to catch my attention (by waving of clearing their throat) and look at me when asking questions. Not the most graceful way to start. So I start giving my public presentation. Everything is going well when a cell phone starts ringing. Prof Sunshine then proceeds to take the call!!! WTF?!? Can we say rude. So I glare at him (and found our later that Mum flipped him off) until he hangs up and then continue. I get back on track- until I realize that Prof Sunshine is busy texting someone! HELLO?!? I completely lost my train of thought and just stood there. My department head who was at this point glaring at Prof Sunshine too, then gets me back on track by asking me a “gimme” question. I complete the talk and handle the few questions.

I then got a brief break while my committee went to get coffee. At this point I should probably explain that counter to “tradition” Prof Sunshine did not provide refreshments for my defense. Technically, I could have ordered refreshments and charged them to Prof Sunshine, but I didn’t even make the effort. One of my committee members referenced the lack of refreshments, so I pointed out that “having been away from the department for 3 years, I thought Prof Sunshine would have handled the refreshments because I wouldn’t even know what grant number to charge them to.” Yes, it was passive aggressive but I was beyond “playing nice” at that point. During my private defense, Prof Sunshine then sprung a “we haven’t been able to replicate any of these experiments” on me. WHAT?!? Then, Prof Sunshine proceeded to tell my committee that the lab was unable to replicate my in vitro results with a DIFFERENT cell line than I had used. I seriously wanted to say “well of course you couldn’t replicate the results you dumbass.” Instead I had to play all nice and say “well, introducing different conditions, such as new cell lines, is not REPLICATING the experiment- it is determining how the experiment works under those conditions!” Luckily my committee agreed with me and over-ruled him. I then spent the next 2.5 hours talking about what I would have done differently if I had “unlimited” funds to design ideal experiment. I was then dismissed to go “wait outside in the hall”. This is when your committee decides whether they will pass you or fail you.

Traditionally, if you pass, your advisor comes to get you and greets you with “Congradulations, Dr. ________!” That didn’t happen. Instead another committee member came to greet me. Prof Sunshine did not even acknowledge me when I re-entered the room- just gave me my list of revisions and left. Didn’t even say congrats. Never called me Dr. And the traditional party with cake and champagne? Yeah, that didn’t happen either. Instead, I went with my husband and parents to Panara to get a bite to eat before we traveled the 400 miles back home. Mum and Dad surprised me with Dom Perignon when we got home, though, so at least I got my champagne!

Grad School- Returning from a Leave of Absence

After finally distributing my thesis to my committee, I got to deal with the paperwork of returning ti university from a leave of absence. As a doctoral candidate, you are expected to be continuously enrolled from the time you pass your last exam (making you a doctoral candidate) until you defend your thesis. By continuously enrolled, they mean that they expect you to pay tuition. Well, I had serious issues with this because the reason my leave went on so long was because I clearly wasn’t a priority for Prof Sunshine. So I appealed the requirement for continuous enrollment. The dean hears such appeals. The dean thought that I should never have been permitted to take a leave of absence so close to completion of my degree. However, when presented with all my evidence (emails showing when I had submitted each chapter to Prof Sunshine, postmarks on the envelopes which I received feedback in, time stamp provided by the department secretary when I picked up feedback on the last chapter), he decided that Prof Sunshine hadn’t acted in my best interests and made Prof Sunshine pay 50% of the tuition accrued in my absence. Actually, my program secretary took care of me there. She back-registered me for off-campus dissertation work- which is about ¼ of the cost and doesn’t have any computer, lab and facility fees added in because you’re off-campus. I didn’t even know such a course existed!

Now, once I was back-registered, I expected the bursar to issue me a bill. So did my program secretary. A week went by- no bill. So I called the bursar. They don’t issue paper bills anymore- you need to log in to your student account and pay it. My student account had been deactivated 2 years prior. So I asked to be transferred to the person who deals with students returning from leave of absence. That person was completely unable to help me. She informed me that if I couldn’t log in, then I would have to come to the bursar’s office in person. Did I mention that I was living over 400 miles away from the university? So I called my program secretary to verify that the bill had to be paid prior to my defense date (generally, all bills have to be paid in full before you can defend). When she heard what was going on, she gave me 2 numbers. One for the IT department to try and get my student account reactivated and one for a bursar that she dealt with. IT informed me that they couldn’t reactivate my account until I had paid the bill AND my advisor had requested that my account be reactivated. So I tried the bursar number and got the bursar that I had worked with on the student health committee. Said bursar decided that I was getting the run around. She logged in, told me how much I owed and asked me to FedEx the check to her. Two days later, she had straightened everything out for me regarding registration and the bursar. However, she still couldn’t activate my student account, which is an issue its very post.

Grad School- Living with my family while completing my thesis

Now, you might be wondering why we chose to move in with my parents rather than get an apartment. First, the metro area we live in is VERY expensive. My husband is also a graduate engineering student, so without my having a salary, we could afford rent some place, but we probably couldn’t afford to eat very healthy and we definitely wouldn’t be able to afford to keep our cars on the road. Second, my husband knows me too well. If I took a job to help with finances, I’d get so involved with the job that I would put off completing my thesis.

Originally, when we moved into my parents’ basement, it was supposed to be for 3-6 months while I finished my degree. I still had a hard time wrapping my mind around the necessity for it. I’d been independent for 10 years, my husband for about 14 years. The idea of living by someone else’s rules was hard to adjust to. Compounding matters, my 2 adult brothers still live at home and have never lived elsewhere. Therefore, it drove us bonkers that they expect the “laundry fairy,” “cooking fairy” and “cleaning fairy” to take care of them. My parents wouldn’t accept rent from us, so we tried to help out a lot around the house. However, it is extremely frustrating to look up from yard work to see my brothers looking out of the window laughing at us. Still, my pride wouldn’t let me move back in without doing SOMETHING to pay for rent! So I’ve spent the past few years doing the majority of the vacuuming, weed pulling, raking and shoveling. I would also like to add that I’ve also spent some time “repairing” things for my mother- and giving my husband credit as Dad won’t admit that I may have learned a few things while living on my own. I also took over driving my grandmother to all of her medical appointments to help my father out. Actually, I initially felt bad for my grandmother- until I was reminded WHY I didn’t spend much time with her once I had the excuse of living at least 400 miles away. The woman is an emotional vampire- spend a few hours with her and she sucks your will to live.

So I spent the first 2 months living at home doing a very careful re-write of my literature review chapter, which was submitted to Prof Sunshine by the last week of October. I then spent the next 4 weeks writing and re-writing the 3 experimental chapters and the conclusion chapter. I was sending Professor Sunshine weekly updates every Monday morning. I had agreed to the weekly updates before taking a leave of absence. The theory was that this way Prof Sunshine could keep up with my progress and give me feedback. The reality is that the only feedback I got was a bitchy email the week I submitted my weekly update 3 days early because my husband and I spent 5 days in the Caribbean and I didn’t want my update to be late! I’m sorry, but I met the terms of MY contract- weekly updates by Monday morning. Where was my feedback?

Remember how I said that I submitted my re-write of the lit review chapter during the last week of October? Want to know when I got Prof Sunshine’s feedback? The first week of March- 5 MONTHS after I sent it to him! This is his definition of “timely feedback”? While I worked under him, God help me if I took longer than a week to review his grant or latest article. Oh, and I had to read his chicken scratch handwriting because he couldn’t figure out how to enable comments in Microsoft Word. I didn’t get feed back on 2 of the other chapters until May when I sent a nasty email and Cced the department head and my program director. It then took me until August to get the 3rd chapter and the following April (17 months AFTER I submitted it to him) to get the final chapter. To get that one, I had to drive the 400 miles to the university and request a personal meeting with him. F@*!$% couldn’t figure out how to drop it in an envelope and put a stamp on it. Have you ever tried to revise something that you haven’t even looked at for 17 months? Yeah, it goes real quickly because it is so fresh in your mind.

In any case, it took me 3 years to get permission from Prof Sunshine to submit my dissertation to my committee and request a new defense date.

Grad School- The Beginning of the End

I’ve spent a week writing and rewriting this post. I didn’t want it to sound like I’m whiney, but I am still bitter about how I was treated. However, if I remove the whininess, the post reads as cold and uncaring. So please pardon the whininess.

One of the first steps to writing your dissertation is to write your literature review (lit review) section. This section is supposed to demonstrate the state of the field when you began your research (and also demonstrate your ability to read and discuss primary literature). Some universities have detailed guidelines about the content of each section of your dissertation. Excluding font, font size, margins and table of contents requirements, my university really doesn’t have any dissertation guidelines at all. Pretty much, at my university, your dissertation committee tells you what they want in your dissertation- especially for your lit review chapter. So I submitted an outline of my dissertation to my committee prior to receiving permission to begin writing. Said outline was approved with a few minor revisions (a few topics added into the lit review). I then wrote the lit review and submitted it to Prof Sunshine on March 17. I expected to have a lot of revisions on the lit review because I was writing it while finishing my experiments, so my focus was a bit split. However, by the time 3 months went by and I hadn’t received any feedback, I thought I might have done a better job than I initially thought (I do tend to be a bit of a perfectionist). WRONG! On July 2nd, less than 24 hours before I left for home so that I could spend 6 weeks out of the lab writing the remaining 3 chapters of my dissertation (materials and methods, and one experimental chapter had already been approved), Prof Sunshine then gave me his required revisions on the lit review. Essentially, he wanted it expanded by 100 pages. This made my already tight timetable even tighter. Me being me, I attempted to re-write my lit review and write the remaining 3 chapters (2 experimental chapters and 1 “what does this mean in the grand scheme of things” chapter). I was so nervous about getting my dissertation done that I couldn’t keep anything in my stomach but watermelon and toast. I was also running 3-6 miles a day in at least 80F heat. With this level of exercise, a diet of watermelon and toast just doesn’t cut it- there aren’t enough calories. I didn’t sleep at all the 2 weeks before my dissertation was due. I’d go to bed, but my mind would be racing, so I’d end up getting up and working some more on my dissertation. The one time that I actually fell asleep in this period, my phone rang- it was Prof Sunshine telling me that he wanted more revisions on the chapter he had already approved! Needless to say, I came very, very close to making myself extremely ill. 2 days before my dissertation was due to my committee, I opened up one of my experimental chapters and found the last section I’d worked on written in French (and not very well I might add). At that point, I realized that I didn’t have enough time to fix everything before my defense, so I called the university and canceled my defense. I then shut my phone off, handed my laptop over to my dad (so that I couldn’t work), took 2 Benadryl and went to sleep. I slept for exactly 4 hours (normally 2 Benadryl knock me flat for at least 8 hours). I then returned the pissy phone call from Prof Sunshine letting him know that I wasn’t returning to the university until I’d had at least 12 hours more of sleep. I don’t really remember that conversation (can we say Benadryl hangover?), but I’m sure that I was a complete and total bitch. Actually, as I’m writing this, I’m realizing just how sketchy my memory is of this time- which tends to make me think that lack of sleep had me in a borderline (OK, probably not so borderline) psychotic state.

I returned to university to face the consequences of canceling my defense. Prof Sunshine was furious. He had been counting on me finishing so that he didn’t have to pay my salary and tuition. After talking the entire situation over with Prof Sunshine, my program director and my department head, I decided that I would take a leave of absence. This would free Prof Sunshine of having to pay my tuition and my salary and allow me to set my own timetable for completing my dissertation (it would also allow me to recover). It seemed like such a good idea to my sleep-deprived mind. So I took a leave of absence, packed up all my stuff and moved into my parents’ basement with my husband and our Great Dane.

Comments

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Grad School- Stint as Student Death (oops! I mean Health) Representative

When I arrived at grad school, our health plan was beyond bizarre. For example- our health insurance would pay for a mole to be removed IF it was cancerous and ONLY if it was cancerous. So that left us in the state of hoping to have cancer so that we wouldn’t have to pay $600 ($800 if they gave you a pain killer first!) for a mole to be removed. In what sort of sick world do people HOPE to have cancer?

So after spending 2 years trying to navigate the system, I volunteered to be the grad student rep to the student health board. The student health board consisted of the dean (who never attended a single meeting), a rep from the insurance company, the head of student health, the secretary for student health, a rep from the bursar’s office, a med student, a nursing student and a grad student. Our job was supposed to address the concerns of the students as presented by the student reps. The grad rep who preceded me nicely provided me with all of her notes. This was extremely useful when I’d bring up an issue and the head of student health would claim, “We’ve never had that complaint before.” I could then turn to my predecessor’s notes and give the head the exact date when she HAD in fact heard the complaint before. I was also a pain in the ass in that I was really good with paper trails. If a student brought an insurance complaint to me, I would request the bill in question as well as the insurance company’s response. I would then photocopy it, remove the students identifying info, and then make sufficient copies for the board. With concrete evidence in front of them, grad student concerns started to be addressed. The med student rep and the nursing student rep immediately started following my example. By the time I had completed my term as the grad student rep, the head of student health was openly hostile to me. I just wish I could have been a fly on the wall when my replacement showed up not only with my notes and my predecessor’s notes, but with detailed instructions for how to lay a paper trail.

The most controversial issue we dealt with on the student health board was the actions of one of the student health doctors. Said doctor refused to prescribe birth control because she considered it akin to abortion. The head of student health adamantly stated that this doctor had the right to choose which treatments she would administer. Normally I would agree, however, she worked for STUDENT HEALTH- I would say that 90% of the female students visit student health for birth control once a year. To make matters worse, said doctor was also assigned the task of negotiating with the pharmaceutical companies for discount birth control. Can we say conflict of interest? Luckily the med student rep and I quickly convinced the insurance rep that he should support the students on this issue. Basically, all we had to do was point out that a single pregnancy cost the insurance company at least 10x what a year’s supply of birth control does. Next thing we knew, the insurance company rep offered to take over sourcing discount birth control- and surprise- we got the best deal we’d had ever! However, nothing was ever done about the doctor. The best the student reps could do was make sure that we informed the rest of the students of said doctor’s stance on birth control. Word of mouth isn’t always the greatest, so we still fielded a lot of complaints. As far as I know, this doctor is STILL working at student health…

Grad School- Conference in France

After a few years of working in Professor Sunshine’s lab, I was fortunate to be invited to present a poster and give a talk at a conference in France. I should explain at this point that Prof Sunshine is not American, but is British. He also did research in several different European countries as part of his doctorate. Most European science labs speak English, but you generally need to learn the local language to speak with support staff. So I assumed that he spoke enough French to get by. Well, apparently Prof Sunshine’s idea of speaking the local language is to say English words with the accent of the local language. It was absolutely hilarious! Even better- everyone at the conference knew that the scientist and student from our lab consisted of 1 American and 1 Brit. However, I was consistently identified as British and Prof Sunshine as American! Boy did that tick him off! Perhaps Prof Sunshine should have chosen a wardrobe other than sneakers, stained shorts and ripped T-shirts. Presenting while wearing a T-shirt that said “F-You!” probably didn’t help matters any. To add insult to injury- I was wearing American dog tags (replicas of my husband’s), yet I was still consistently identified as the Brit. Silly wanker.

One thing that I did learn was that my education in French was woefully lacking in such useful items as how to order a pint of beer that was on tap. Luckily, a professor from Quebec quickly taught me this key phrase (Une pinte de bière pression s’il vous plait). However, the language barrier defeated both the prof from Quebec and myself at lunch the first day. Lunch was served as a buffet. However, no one was permitted to serve themselves- you had to indicate what you wanted to one of the servers. I noticed that the servers were getting a bit disgruntled as people pointed to the dishes they wanted. So I politely said “I would like these three dishes, please” (Je voudrais ces trois plats, s’il vous plait). I then pointed to the dishes that I wanted. If the dishes had been labeled, I would have asked for them by name. I was then given 3 servings of the first dish I indicated. I glanced at the prof from Quebec, he shrugged and then pointed to what he wanted. When we reached our table, he told me that he would have asked the same way I did! For the rest of the conference, I just followed everyone else’s lead and just pointed.

The language barrier also resulted in my being offered a post-doc at this conference. After my talk, I was invited to sit with some of the senior scientists (presumably to discuss my research). The waiter came around and took everyone’s drink orders. I ordered non-carbonated water as I was quite thirsty after talking. If you didn’t specify “normal” or “natural” water, then you got carbonated water by default. After the drinks arrived, one of the senior scientists asked me how I obtained “non-bubbly” water. When I explained I had ordered it, he asked me to order him a bottle of regular water. I caught the waiter’s attention and made the request. When the bottle of water was delivered to the table, the scientist turned to me and asked if I’d like to post-doc in his lab! So basically, by using a phrase that anyone with access to an English-to-French dictionary could come up with, I was offered a post-doc. Apparently my ability to order non-carbonated water in French was more important to this gentleman than completion of my doctorate. Made me wonder what the “qualifications” of his other post-docs were!

Grad School- TAing

Professor Sunshine volunteered me to teach a lab course for med students in exchange for the department paying my tuition and fees. Oh joy! Now I want to make it very clear that in TAing this course, I seldom interacted with the “good” med students. By “good” I mean the ones that show up having read the material they were instructed to read and that have a plan of action on what they need to get done in lab that day. These “good” students showed up asked questions about techniques or questions about the location of materials they needed, did their work and left- generally in less than 2 hours (lab was scheduled for 5 hours, the grad students and the “good” med students in the class could generally complete the labs in under 2 hours). I got to interact with all the students that didn’t complete the required reading and didn’t pay attention during the pre-lab lecture. My undergrad program had a strict policy of “if you’re not prepared, you flunk the lab because you are a safety hazard to yourself and those working around you” so I have very little tolerance for not being prepared. I think that if that type of responsibility was expected of me as an 18 year old, it can be expected of a med student that is generally 22 years old. I typically answered these students’ questions with “what does your lab manual say?” Needless to say, I was not a popular TA among this crowd. The most common question I was asked? That would be “Is this going to be on the exam?” Seriously? I thought that by the time you left 7th grade you’d have been taught that this is the one question you should never ask because the answer is always “Yes! It most certainly will be on the exam!”

My favorite story from TAing this class actually comes from the year before I started TAing, when I was required to take the class myself. One of the labs in this course taught how to isolate bacteria from the upper respiratory tract. Residents (doctors who are 2 and 3 years out of med school themselves) would come and demonstrate the proper technique for swabbing a patient’s throat. Then, the students in the class would have to practice the technique on each other. As part of the lab instruction for this class, students were given samples of various pathogenic bacteria, such as streptococcus, so that they could see what the infectious bacteria of the upper respiratory tract look like under a microscope and when cultured on a plate. This is essentially the parts of a throat culture that are generally done by licensed medical technicians but that rural doctors need to know because they often have to do these tests themselves. Well, the med students in this class decided to dip the throat swabs in these cultures before swabbing each other’s throats. Why? I have no clue! It certainly wasn’t in the demonstration I observed by the residents! I still have no idea why they thought culturing a patient’s throat involves inoculating the patient’s throat with infectious bacteria. I do know that at the beginning of the course, it was stressed that they were going to be working with actual pathogenic material, including clinical samples, and they should take all precautions (coats, gloves, goggles to protect their eyes). However, of the class of 150 or so med students, 127 med students were diagnosed with strep throat in the week following this lab. The consequence of this epidemic was that in subsequent years we were no longer permitted to use pathogenic bacteria in this laboratory course! Personally, I find it absolutely frightening that first year med students can’t be trusted not to infect themselves. Makes you wonder exactly what caliber of doctor we’re training in this country...

Grad School- the first couple of years

Going to grad school seemed like such a good idea. I had done an internship in industry and hadn’t liked the fact that although I was hired for a particular skill, my expertise was ignored because I lacked 3 little letters after my name. I want to make it clear from the outset that I never wanted to be a professor- I just don’t have the patience necessary to motivate students to want to learn. However, I carefully kept this preference to myself once I figured out that the objective of grad school is for professors to turn you into little clones of themselves. Not that I didn't like my professors- I just wanted something different in the career department.

The first 2 years were spent in boring classes. Boring because all but 2 of the classes were a rehash of material I learned as an undergrad. Seriously, if it wasn’t for some of the really cool people I met and became friends with, I really think I would have walked away from sheer boredom.

My first choice of lab was less than ideal. I chose the lab because I worked really well with the 2 senior students and the lab was doing research I found interesting. In hindsight, this is the second worst possible reason to choose a lab. The worst being because you think you’ll graduate “on time,” whatever that is! “On time” for what? Dinner? A movie? Christmas? The Great Pumpkin? My advisor in that lab was a clinician. While he was a great clinician, he often appeared bored by his own research, never a good combo. After a summer of helping to supervise a rotating med student and an undergrad interning in the lab (and really just having lab-wide competitions playing Text Twist), I decided that I needed to move to a new lab. Strangely enough, one of the senior students made the same decision about a month after I left. I guess Text Twist just wasn’t the same without me.

I chose my new lab after rotating through a couple of labs that had been unavailable when I initially arrived at grad school. My new advisor, whom I will subsequently refer to as Prof. Sunshine (obviously not his real name, but oh so bright and cheery), was a great boss. I enjoyed learning new techniques and developed the ability to talk about dissecting mice while eating lunch. You know its bad when your lunch conversation in the hospital cafeteria grosses a bunch of surgical interns out!

Training of Scientists and Engineers

Before I get into my life as a grad student, I should probably explain the typical training of scientists and engineers. Essentially, grad school is the last form of slavery permitted in the USA. A few people in my family have referred to it as “welfare for intellectuals.” However, I think that my husband (currently a grad student) explained it best. Basically, he reworded the following quote from Pulitzer Prize Historian David Brion Davis about slavery:

Yet we must never forget that these same "welfare capitalist" plantations in the Deep South were essentially ruled by terror. Even the most kindly and humane masters knew that only the threat of violence could force gangs of field hands to work from dawn to dusk "with the discipline," as one contemporary observer put it, "of a regular trained army." Frequent public floggings reminded every slave of the penalty for inefficient labor, disorderly conduct, or refusal to accept the authority of a superior.

so that it reads:

Yet we must never forget that these same "welfare capitalist" [University Graduate Programs] were essentially ruled by terror. Even the most kindly and humane [Professors] knew that only the threat of [failure, economic ruin, and permanent banishment from the scientific field] could force gangs of [graduate students] to work from dawn to dusk "with the discipline," as one contemporary observer put it, "of a regular trained army." Frequent public [humiliation and elongation of time until graduation] reminded every [graduate student] of the penalty for inefficient labor, disorderly conduct, [failure to publish], or refusal to accept the authority of [his/her supervisor].

Typically, the first 2 years your time is filled with classes in your field of study and doing 8-10 week stints in various labs to pick the one you want to work in. Once you pick a lab (and an advisor who is technically the head of the lab), you are no longer “just” a student (although you pay tuition or your advisor pays your tuition), but either a graduate assistant (GA) or a teaching assistant (TA). GA or TA positions generally require 20-40 hours of work a week that has nothing to do with your dissertation research. Typically, its better to be a GA than a TA because you can usually run your research alongside whatever you are running for your advisor. In any case you then perform laboratory research for the next 3-5 (or in some cases 5-9) years. At the end of that time, you typically spend about 3-6 months writing your dissertation. You then defend your dissertation publicly (to anyone who shows up) and privately (to your dissertation committee). Defenses (also called final oral examinations) can be quite caustic depending on the personalities involved. Finally, you revise your dissertation as requested by your committee and fill out a mountain of paperwork and surveys in order to obtain your degree.

Then, after completing your PhD in science or engineering, you are expected to take a post-doctorate (post-doc) position where you do further research “for experience.” Post-docs can range from 2-10 years and the average salary is $38,000 a year plus health care that is slightly better than student health, but still doesn’t cover prescriptions, vision or dental. Oh, and most post-docs are expected to work 60-80 weeks. Post-docs are greatly encouraged by your advisor, because that is what they did. However, unless you want to be an academic professor, there is no real reason to do one.

Is it any wonder WHY Americans do not want to pursue advanced science and engineering degrees? I mean who wants to work for barely minimum wage when they have worked so hard to obtain an advanced degree?

Introduction

To understand why I'm writing about life after grad school, you have to understand what my life was like in grad school, or rather, why I feel I have no life. Thus, the first few posts to this blog are going to be about grad school. Please keep in mind that all names (people, places and institutions) have been changed to protect innocent (and not so innocent) parties.