Day Sixty Two

Today was a ridiculously busy day. I had a meeting with a potential research advisor at 10am and had to run to the shuttle stop to catch the shuttle that was just about to leave for campus. If I had missed it, I would have had to wait 10 minutes for the next one and been late to the meeting (which probably would not have looked good on my part). Luckily I wasn't too sore from the gym, and I made it to the shuttle stop just in time. Whew!

The meeting went really well - we talked about a project started by a 5th year grad student that I could potentially take over if I were to join the group. The next step is to find a time to shadow the 5th year as he does his research so I can get a handle on how things work in the lab. This will probably happen next week, and I'm really excited. Unfortunately, the government shut down has put a halt on all research grants, so now all the professors are even more worried about funding. It's not a good time to be a 1st year doctoral student. Or a professor looking for money. We're both in tough spots.

Then I had my TA meeting, which was unexpectedly short, leaving me with 2 hours to eat lunch and grade papers. This turned into eat lunch and try not to fall asleep on top of papers. It was rough. I think I may have dozed off for a couple minutes, then startled awake, but I'm not sure. We also had another emergency alarm test today, which is the siren that sounds like we're about to be attacked by a nuclear bomb. Pretty comforting. Especially when the random deep voice somehow projects over the entire (gigantic) campus. Then, immediately after the alarm, the UT tower started to chime "A Whole New World" from the movie Aladdin. It was just a weird sequence of events in general.

At 2pm I ran upstairs to quiz TA the afternoon lab, then I ran back downstairs to the shuttle (which I had to frantically wave down again to stop it from leaving me behind) to get to my car. I had an oil change scheduled at 3pm in south Austin and had to go pick up Bob Avant to go with me. He knows literally everyone that works there, and I'm pretty sure it worked in my favor. Bob, you continue to be the best. Thanks for my $30 coupon - free oil change!

And, when my day was supposed to be done, I had to go back up to campus for a guest lecture from 5-6pm. More electrochem, more confusion. It's been an exhausting day. Tomorrow should be way calmer, though any free time I have will be filled with grading, homework, and studying. Grad school is busy, and grad school is hard. Time to go to bed.