First week impressions.

Well, my first week of grad school has been completed and I'm still alive.

The roommates have moved in, the cat is adjusting well, and I am not in the lab on a Saturday (a first and last occurrence). Life is good.

It was a crazy week---tons of new information to process, new people to meet, and I've already learned three techniques that are new to me. It looks like how my rotation will work in this group will be the style of me assisting the grad students in the group that work on my metalloprotein of interest so I can get exposed to lots of different techniques.

But the most important thing: I really, really like these people. My potential groupmates are really nice and funny and have been really welcoming. They're all really good buddies with each other, and a large portion of the group hangs out outside of lab on a regular basis. I'm hoping to break into this group soon. My current mentor is a fourth year grad student who has been a great teacher and very patient with me and all my questions. He informed me that "[I] seem to pick up things quickly" so I'm going to take that as a "you're not totally useless" sort of compliment! :)

My PI seems pretty awesome. Smart, funny, and passionate about her work. She's definitely a little scattered, but she's really blunt, which is new for me in a PI. I think I'll work best with a blunt PI: I tend to get irritated if you hint to me that you think I should come in more, you don't think my way is the most efficient, you think I'm not doing a technique right, etc. but you don't come right out and say it so I have to guess what's wrong. (Not to bash on either of my former PIs, there were many awesome qualities in both of them, but when you're trying so hard to be nice it can be difficult to be both kind and clear about what you want fixed.)

Anyways, I suggested something that I read to my grad student mentor for trying to fix one of the techniques, so he ordered the chemical and I get to try it this week. Most of the lab will be out for a conference next week, so I get to finally do a bunch of the stuff I've learned by myself. I also get to set up crystal trays soon!!!1!111 I'm super excited about that, since I miss doing crystallography and this will be the first time I get to do it since last summer.

Thank goodness my panicked state has finally subsided. Now I'm only flipping out about stretching the money I have until Sept 1st (payday seems so very far away) and my upcoming exams.