Where did we actually end off last? The Ford Conference back in, uh, late October?

November was more or less a lot of social occasions, a decent amount of work, and some unexpected changes. For one, I got an e-mail from Hillary. It'd been half a year, perhaps longer. The last time consisted of going over to her apartment complex's vestibule to pick up some shades, where she couldn't come down out of being driven to either anger and/or disgust at my physical presence. Your estimation of my reaction to that reaction and the ending of the friendship is, likely, accurate.

I was ambivalent. On the one hand, when people are in, they're in. I missed her. On the other hand, I could see the same shit happening again if we decided to re-friend the situation. I went for keeping it at just e-mailing and getting reacquainted for that time being, at least until I started trusting her again. She seems slightly different, and much less of a bitch to me--which is a plus. Funny thing is that we've always gotten along really well in person. Anyway, it'd be nice to think that I actually learned something based on what happened. Kindof have, kindof haven't.

I also finally came to the conclusion that Erin just wasn't interested. However, my neuroscience friend Keith let me in on an amusing story. Apparently, Erin had the hots for a guy from her alma mater, and she'd asked him out one night at a party. He said naw. She then proceeded to have a shitstorm fit about it. "How can you say that?!" She screamed. "We've been talking for months and etc. etc." Everyone was suitably WTF. This confirmed two things to me:

1) It was a damn good thing Erin wasn't interested.

2) My interpretation of a stable person is post-impressionist at best.

Aside from that whatnot, there were a number of drinking occasions, watching Borat with Dan and Brian, and a few get togethers at my/Brian's place--none of which I set up, but I don't exactly scream "come over whenever! Yeah!" Inkwells, mahogany, and dusty books, yes. Up to partying wheneva, no.

One definite highlight was Thanksgiving. I didn't have any plans, hadn't heard from anyone, and Nicholas was having an anniversary with Steven. Mari was out with her fam, so that was additionally out. All of my local contacts were busy. And then I got an unexpected phone call I shoulda been expecting. It was Lisa, my colleague from the Ford Conference that I'd gotten to know better. She asked if I had plans. I said I thought I might've had some, but such was not the case. She invited me over to celebrate with her family and Vera's--a fellow psych person in the same specialization I am.

We had lots of baked ham, even more of the red Shiraz I brought, and yakked about research, holiday related stories, etc. I had a lot of fun playing with the infants and Lisa's 3 year old. I swear it's biological, but I really like kids now. I'll just neatly keep that one underwraps. It's kinda gauche in some of the circles I flow in. But then I'm just a gauche guy literally and figuratively.

And then there was the spike-sportin' magical dildo of late november to the 15th of December. I started studying for the cell and molecular neuro final about 3 weeks in advance. I only got through a few lectures a day, considering other stuff I had to deal with and the absurd notion that I needed to memorize molecular pathways. I say absurd because we were allowed a cheat sheet for the final.

The prep for finals was bad enough. Alongside that was stuff around the lab just getting intolerably annoying. I'd screwed up a few times because I was overbooked. I'll be honest: they were mistakes I felt embarassed I even committed. In one case I was so exhausted after dealing with lab crap all day, studying, and then then more studying that I forgot to inject dexamethazone at 8. Other people had always done it, so it didn't occur to me. I got HELL for that, even though my prof who was going to help me forgot as well. I tried explaining, and that generally worked. Same deal with a time when I'd worked out an entire schedule for that very same goddamn week long NEP induction. I hadn't set up the equipment for a wednesday draw where I had class, mostly because I figured since no one asked me to set up that the senior scientist I coordinate with would do it. Dr. C sent me a long e-mail about that. I dutifully explained that I thought it was a misunderstanding and that I'd talked with the senior scientist and established that, by default from now on, I'd set up stuff if at all possible for blood draws for which I wasn't available. I'd also foolishly left my lab notebook with the senior scientist to write some figures down in. I just knew handing it to her that people would look through it. Sure enough, in that very same e-mail, "additional concerns" had come up that my records weren't detailed enough, and how it was a regulation that this and good science that and feh.

And so I rightfully wrote back and stated that I'd since found out exactly what level of detail was expected. I'd previously thought it superfluous, for instance, that I needed to include the amount of Dex we injected, because I had the weight of the animal, the concentration we needed, and could derive said amount.

It was another one of those matters where no one had told me anything about it during training.

I went on in my reply to vehemently agree that doing a different type of project after this one would be better, something that "played up to my strengths" rather than dealing with this multi-tasking hell.

I'll continue after sushi. I am being called.

previous - next