Simple Lecture Day.

As Friday's go I think everyone wants class to be simple and go by fast. In biology that was the case and I was very grateful. My biology professor also likes to add life lessons into his lectures. Today he made a point of "Want a perfect grade? I want a perfect answer." That overwhelmed me. Biology is messy and has endless variables and how can I give a perfect answer when there is none. My professor also made a comment that I could relate too. "Calculus and Chemistry are a high puke factor for me." I thought I would have to learn to love chemistry, but now I can just stick to biology. Personal victory!
Happy Friday Everyone!

First Lab Day.

When I'm on campus I never have a lot to do besides homework. I have friends, yes its true, but we don't drink or go to parties. We would rather stay in our dorm room, stay in our pj's, and watch a movie. Which happened tonight. While that's fine, if this would happens everyday I would go stir crazy. So yesterday I agreed to spend my Saturday starting my internship in the parasite lab. I signed up for this internship to get a jump start on my experience in a lab setting and overall make myself more marketable for the future. Last semester this seemed like a good idea, but once I started my 18 credit schedule I couldn't even think about this new adventure. With the option of working in the lab on the weekends I jumped on it.

So this morning instead of dreading leaving my bed, I moved at a faster pace. I was filled with a passion to just jump into whatever my jobs and responsibility were going to be. Even though I was excited I did have little to no experience working with parasites. With this, I was a little nervous that the information related to this topic was going to be too difficult for me to understand. I found out today that this experience didn't require me to be genius, or even an expert in this field.

The day started at 11 with meeting at the lab and starting to go over the brief explanations of "This is extremely dangerous if in contact with...." I waited very patiently to start learning the things I was able to do in this cluttered lab. Using the word clutter would be an understatement. The counter-tops were covered with scribbled on scraps of papers and various sizes of text books. Then where there wasn't paper or books there were mysterious powders sprinkled and dry spots of solution that never got wiped up. In all of my day dreams, I never imaged I would be working in the worlds messiest laboratory.  I ignored it, or at least the best I could try.
Even though I had an unsettling feeling about the cleanliness of the lab, I was confident that I didn't have to hesitate to ask questions about anything in the lab. I asked the graduate student, that I was working with, about his project that I was assisting him with. His reply was long and a could understand about a half of it. Something to do with identifying trematodes species then making a reference book cataloging the genetic material in the mitochondria of the species of trematodes making it easier to identify them in the future. His goal is to someday be able to save people lives with this information by making diagnose whatever parasite that lives within a patience. So with my optimism kicking in I feel like one day that this little lab work could help someone in the future. A lowly undergraduate making a difference in someone life in the future!
Overall today went really well. At some times it was tedious and frustrating but I pushed passed that and now rock at pipetting under a microscope. After 6 hours today in the lab I look forward to getting some sleep and then go back at it tomorrow. Now with todays adventure I will have some fun science dreams in my sleep. 

The Start of the Journey

I started this morning off with my first biology lab of the semester at an early time of 8 a.m. Maybe for others this isn't a problem, but to a college student this situation is worse than walking in the bitter cold (which happens to be the climate here). Making my way through the snow and wind that tugged at my jacket, I tried to forget about the blizzard warning that was in affect for two more days. The quick 7 minute walk from my dorm to the science building, Trafton, turned into a ice rink with an added challenge of whirling snow. I burrowed deeper into my puffy jacket and picked up pace.
I am personally a pretty outgoing person, even with people I don't know, but as I made my way into the classroom I could tell I wasn't the only student who regretted thinking they could handle an 8 a.m. class. I made my way to the front of the class and sat down to an empty desk. The graduate student who taught the class had no obstacle of teaching at the crack of dawn and powered through all of the material that needed to be done. Usually in class I try my best to pay attention and understand the material that is explained, but this morning my thoughts drifted to the future. I dreamed of a time where I had my own lab and with that research I was going to change the world (I'm very optimistic in the morning).
After those thoughts I thought I needed to track my thoughts and goals as a scientist, even though I'm only a lowly undergraduate. I could see myself in a position that has me being a doctor in Environmental Science and working on my own research. This goal is far, far away. This goal is going to take a journey, some could even say an adventure, to get to my goal. Tracking my journey and sharing my passion might help me in the future to motivate me in a low spot that could happen tomorrow, next week, next year, in my graduate work, or anytime in the future. I don't want to give up on this, ever.
During lab we went to a lecture in the library. The librarian, who was explaining proper research data sites, told us we were only baby scientist. We still had a lot to grow but we have the opportunity to succeed. My tired, optimistic self promised to write a blog to track my growth as a scientist. So here we are. Let the journey begin.