Day Six Hundred Seven

I have been absolutely horrible about updating this lately. It turns out, the week after Spring Break is madness. I already knew this, but it's amazing how I forget every year how hard it is to get back in to the swing of things after a week of extra relaxation. You mean I can't still sleep in until 9am every day? No, not acceptable. Ugh.

A bright spot of this past week though...my mom came in to town! She's here for a couple weeks, and it makes me very happy. After living at home almost my entire undergrad career, it's still weird not seeing my parents all the time, so having my mom here for an extended amount of time has been wonderful. Also, she's helping me move, and if she wasn't here to help me move...I'd probably be catatonic at this point. Mom, you're the best, thank you for helping me pack (and by "helping me" I mean "basically packing everything yourself") and shop for things I'll need. I now know that couches are very expensive. Goodness gracious.

This weekend was the second recruitment weekend for the chemistry department, which means my weekend free time got cut in half. But at least UT made up for it by feeding me delicious food on both Friday and Saturday evening.

This week...is moving week! Let the madness continue.

Day Five Hundred Ninety Eight

At the end of last week, I got a bill from TxTag (the billing agency for toll roads in Texas) for a road I've never even heard of, much less been on. Well, lucky me, the TxTag Customer Service office is in north Austin! Sometimes living in the capitol city has its perks. So instead of paying the $2.56 fee (cause you best believe I'm not paying for someone else to use toll roads here), I took a little drive waaaay up north. Turns out, the TxTag office is one exit before the toll road starts, so if you miss your exit...well, that just sucks for you. Sneaky TxTag. 

Anyway, for any of you wondering, even though the building itself is gigantic, they force all of the people visiting to cram themselves into a tiny lobby (standing room only) where 4 windows of customer service reps are available. Oh, and there's no public restrooms...not cool. So I waited 45 minutes in a line of very cranky individuals to have the lady at my window (who was very friendly, so no complaints towards her) tell me that I'd been charged for a Porsche whose license plate was one number off mine. Um, I'd be glad to pay the $2.56 fee if I get the Porsche in return. But I got it all cleared up and felt like a self-empowered champion, even though the whole ordeal took up half my day. That's pretty much been my big adventure for the week.

Other than that, I've enjoyed a blissful week of no teaching and no classes. I've spent the last 3 days grading though, which has been a bit of a drag. One of my favorite singers had some stellar grading advice though -- 

Best surprise tweet ever.

Day Five Hundred Ninety Four

You know you've fully accepted your fate as a graduate student when working over school breaks actually becomes...dare I say...enjoyable. The parking is so much better. And it's way less crowded everywhere. And I actually have time to get research done instead of having all of my time be consumed by teaching and taking classes. I know, it doesn't make sense, but it was nice to finally have a somewhat relaxing day at work. Though I know I can't avoid grading and my own homework much longer, since the end of spring break will come way too fast (as it always does). Boo.

I wish I had more exciting things to say for today. But I don't. I'll try to do more interesting things tomorrow (like a trip to the University health center! Happy St. Patrick's Day to me!). Until then, here are some baseball photos from Saturday's game:

Day Five Hundred Ninety Three

This weekend was a blissful weekend of sun, baseball, and barely any grading or homework. Its Spring Break this week at UT, and to answer everyone's question at once....I'll be working up at campus all week. Because grad students don't get breaks. BUT, since there aren't any classes this week, it means I get a whole week to get my grading and my own homework done, which is awesome and softens the blow of not getting out of work. Kind of.

I'll post some baseball photos tomorrow, because I'm too comfy in bed to post any tonight.

Day Five Hundred Ninety One

This has been a week where sleep has been evasive. Not for lack of trying, that's for sure. But its definitely been rough. Since I can't drink caffeine, when my sleep goes haywire my entire brain just moves slower...not a good thing in grad school. Thank goodness next week is spring break. While I'll still be working up in lab every day, it will at least give me enough flexibility to get my internal clock back in sync.

Not only was this week tiring, it was just kind of weird. Both of my lab sections were completely scatterbrained, and are lucky I didn't yell bloody murder at them (I've never been so close before). You can give marginal effort all you want in lecture, but please pay attention when you're in lab with me and handling instruments that are worth tens of thousands of dollars. Trust me, the department will choose the instrument over you should you ruin it. And I'll back them up. So FOCUS! Can you tell I was frustrated? Can you tell I'm still kind of frustrated about it? Aside from misbehaving students, I also had a conversation with my boss in which I was advised to not try as hard in the classes I'm taking. True story. I've never been told that before, so I still have no idea how to go about implementing that. I'm fairly certain my brain just isn't wired that way.

Texas baseball, thank you for providing a reprieve from SXSW traffic/madness tonight. And thank you for winning. And thank you Deb for being generous enough to share one of your suite tickets with me. My exhausting work week ended on a pretty stellar note.

Day Five Hundred Eighty Seven

I hate spring daylight savings time. I really, really hate it. I get that more sunlight during the daytime is nice, but the rough week of attempting to readjust my sleep schedule sometimes doesn't seem worth it. As a result, I remember about 20% of what was said during Cell Bio today. And 20% might actually be generous. Sorry, Dr. Chan. I promise to do better next time (maybe).

It was wonderful and rainy today, and it made me miss home. And isn't it fun when someone uses an umbrella and doesn't take into account that their personal-space-radius has increased by a foot? I'm looking at you, every other student at UT. I can only imagine the number of umbrella related injuries that were seen at the health center today.

Day Five Hundred Eighty Four

Guess who did her taxes all on her own today (with the help of H&R Block)? ME! It's my first time ever filing my taxes without help from my parent's financial advisor, and I think I did splendidly. I now understand why people hate filing taxes, because there are a million little boxes described in ways that I don't have a prayer at understanding. But they're done, they're filed, and I am pleased with myself.

Half my day was spent running around, the other half spent sitting catching up on DVRed shows, doing taxes, and grading. I ran to lab to take care of some general lab maintenance, then drove over to Frank Erwin Center to buy tickets to the Ed Sheeran concert. Tickets went on sale at 10:00am today, I got to the box office at 10:45am on the dot. When I went to go buy tickets, I was greeted with "oh, that show is almost sold out." Whoa, Ed Sheeran. Whoa. Apparently I'm not the only one that loves you so much that I go to the box office within an hour of tickets going on sale (and thank goodness I did, or I wouldn't be seeing you at all). Don't you worry though, I'll be seeing you when you make your stop in Austin.

After getting my tickets, I was off to the mall to exchange some clothes. I've lived here a little over a year and a half now...this is my 3rd time to go to the mall ever. I miss my tiny Olympia mall where I knew where everything was and you could walk from one end to the next in 3 minutes. Barton Square Mall is big, and I get lost, and then I get tired of the fact that I can't afford anything most of the stores there sell. I made a quick stop by Sephora (because I'm a female and can't help myself) where I asked about how to use various eyebrow products, because I own some and they always look goofy when I attempt to use them. The clerk looked at me and went, "you just trace your original brow" then dismissed me and walked away. Thanks, snobby mall employee. I will buy nothing from you.

On a final note, thank goodness it's the weekend. This past week almost did me in. Now I just need UT baseball to win their games this weekend, unless they want me to smack them all on the shuttle come Monday morning and tell them to get it together.

Day Five Hundred Eighty Three

Texas got a touch icy last night. The city responded accordingly and closed just about everything. I used to make fun of them doing this, closing down offices and schools at the threat of cold weather. Then...I learned how horrific Texan drivers are, and how terrifying they are to be around even in sunny weather. So I'm now completely on board with the seemingly-over-cautious-about-cold-weather Texan ways, especially when ice is involved. Also, it means I get to sleep in, and I'm almost always in favor of that.

UT decided not to close down for the whole day, but instead delayed opening until 2pm. It's the latest late start I've ever seen, but again, it meant I got to sleep in, so I was still a happy grad student. And guess what time the lab is that I teach on Thursdays? 2pm. Guess who had a bunch of cranky undergrads in class today? Me. We all survived though, even though two of the instruments decided to be stupid and not work today. Oh science, such a fickle creature you are.

Day Five Hundred Eighty Two

Late start tomorrow! Late start tomorroooooow! Its supposed to get cold and icy overnight tonight, and since Texans are naturally horrific at driving, UT decided to delay start until 2pm. That's the latest late start I've ever seen, but it means I can still teach my afternoon lab, which is a relief (make-up labs are a pain in the butt). But before that, I'll enjoy a blissful morning of sleeping in.

Moments after the delayed start email was sent out, I started getting emails from my students about whether or not we have class. Well students, since class starts after the delay time.....yes, yes we do. Though I can see how that would be confusing. Oh wait, its actually not confusing at all. Hope springs eternal when it comes to canceled classes.

In good news, the rest of my week should be decidedly less stressful than the first half of it was. Test corrections - done. Monster lab report due tomorrow - written. Brain - dead. Allison - exhausted.

Day Five Hundred Eighty One

Sometimes (almost all the time), grad school is really overwhelming. I'm talking sit-in-the-corner-and-wish-you-could-disappear overwhelming. Cry and mumble over the phone to your parents overwhelming (thank you parents, for listening to me even when you're tired of listening to me). So far, this semester has been brutal. Not the same brutal as my first semester of grad school, which I've almost entirely blocked from my memory, but exhausting and stressful nonetheless. In one sense its nice to know that if I chose to disappear for a few days midweek, people would definitely notice. But on the other hand, it would be so nice to spend a few days just sleeping and reading and pretending science doesn't exist (ie - spring break can't come soon enough).

Its overwhelming why-did-I-ever-do-this-to-myself times like this that I go on to Facebook and step back in time to January 2013 when I received my acceptance notification from UT. I was deliriously happy and in awe that such a renowned program would offer me the opportunity to be involved in it. I may have cried. My dream of extending the Longhorn legacy in my family while working towards a doctorate was actually going to happen. There are posts all over my Facebook wall from that period of time from friends and family sharing my excitement over the future. Its not hard to remember the amazing feelings that coursed through me during that time, especially following a recruitment weekend on campus and vividly remembering my own recruitment weekend.

Memories like this remind me to just shut up and deal with the crazy madness that is graduate school. Its exhausting and exhilarating and awful and stressful and an honor to be a part of. That being said, I'm still going to need you all to cross your fingers for me, cause the next couple months are going to get even more hectic.