Sports Brackets

I am fortunate to work in a social lab where I have friends. We hang out and do social things, celebrate birthdays and special events.

We also get into sports.

My family has always been a basketball family - my grandfather was a basketball coach, my dad and uncle played in highschool/college, and my brothers grew up playing the sport. I got the height (5' 11" baby!) passed down in the genes, but none of the talent (can't make a basket to save my life), so I am content to just watch the games on TV. When somebody in lab suggested an NCAA pool this past March, I jumped on it.

Most of the lab participated - there was quite a list of brackets in the pool. Every day around the lunch table, we'd check in and discuss - requisite trash talking, laments, etc. But do you know who came out on top at the end of the day?

Miss Outlier, yes indeed! Correctly predicted Duke as the champions, making up for some poor choices in the sweet 16 round.

I don't really follow professional football (though I do proudly wear my alma mater's colors on game day for college football), so I didn't participate in the NFL bracket. But there was one of those too.

And now, pride is on the line again around the office for the soccer pool. There's never any money involved, but reputations and friendly competition are at stake.

A good chunk of my friends are taking off after this summer, since they've graduated. They are sticking around as post-docs for now, but this is the last sports season we'll have this camaraderie. I'm going to miss them.

But not enough to feel bad when I win this pool too... :) Go Brazil!

Keeping the Pipeline Full

I got to see my extended family recently for a wedding, and one evening the adults got to sit around and shoot the breeze. The grandparents and assorted family wanted to know what all the young adults' five year plans were. It was interesting to hear my cousins' plans for their life - it's been a while since I've heard what they are up to.

One cousin plans to stay in her career for the next couple years, she's happy with her new house and job downtown. Another cousin (newly graduate with her bachelor's degree - congrats!) decided that instead of going back for her Master's, she would stay in Big City where she is interning, and pursue an office career. She is building her shoe collection, and I am in full support of that. :)

Figure: Oh yes. Someday.

Then what about my plans?

Well, grandparents, I'm in school. Still. Yep, haven't finished yet.

Do I know what my five year plan is? Not really. I don't have a plan nailed down, but I've got a lot of options.

Maybe I'll work for a microfluidics startup company, or start my own. I've got some good contacts in that area from my research (and even more with the recent networking event).

Maybe I'll start that business I worked on last semester. I already have a business plan, and I've continued to develop the idea this past semester.

Or, who knows, maybe this crazy idea with the business kid....

Everything in the pipleline involves entrepreneurship, (which I've known for a while I'm interested in), so there's a common factor there. I think I've done a pretty good job setting myself up, doing things like organizing an entrepreneurship workshop.

The key here is that I have a pipeline. I've tried to keep multiple things in line, because you never know what's going to pan out in the end. I'm hoping that if I keep myself positioned as well as I can, learn as much as possible, keep an open mind to opportunities, and pursue what I'm truly interested in and excited about - that my life's path will both challenge me and allow me to make a contribution to the world. And make enough money to live on, of course. If I can buy a few pairs of killer shoes, I'd be a happy woman.

Figure: Right after the Louboutins.

I don't expect life to always be awesome, or perfect. I just want my life to be interesting - the worst possible thing for me is to be bored.

During the conversation with my family, somebody brought up a book they were reading. The author really encourages readers to - loosely paraphrasing - don't work for your money all your life, make your money work for you. One of the quotes from the book is, "Why climb the ladder when you can own it?"

I have to say, for my own life, I think I'm going to take that quote in a different direction. I'm not much interested in climbing the ladder, and I'm not counting on ever being rich enough to own it.

But shoot, somebody's got to BUILD the ladder. :)

New Layout

I've had this blog since Jan 2009, and it's always looked the same. For a lot of readers I know it doesn't matter, because Google Reader is the great equalizer - everything looks the way the RSS feed formats it (which is no formatting at all).

But I decided it was time to upgrade - the main issue I had was that the blog post text area was not wide enough. I wanted to use more of the screen, and not have the post be so skinny. It looked okay when you viewed the sidebar and post together, but if you scrolled down past the sidebar, well shoot - there were barely six words to a line!

So I like this format better. I tried changing the colors to something completely different - but then that throws me off. So I kept the colors similar.

Comment, suggestions? Is this easier to read?

Heard At the Office

Labmate 1 trying to get labmate 2 to take a break and join the group around the watercooler:

"Hey, come sit down and decompress with us."

Labmate 2, having spent the entire morning watching the FIFA soccer game:

"But I haven't even COMPRESSED yet today!"

Hello to Inside Higher Ed!

If you are visiting from Inside Higher Ed, welcome!

(I've just been mentioned on the website here.)

If you'd like to hear what my career has been like, please feel free to peruse these posts.

To read about my Master's thesis, try these.

For all the adventures that this curious grad student has been on, these are my favorite stories.

And of course, I discuss research too. Look around and stay awhile. :) Say hi in the comments if you like, it's a pleasure to meet you.

PhD Committee Building

Well, let's see. I passed quals. I have a thesis card. I picked a topic. I wrote a proposal. What's next?

I need a committee.

The rules are that I need at least three professors on the committee. The conventional grad student wisdom suggests that you want to keep it to as few as possible - because the more advisors you get, the more opinions you have to deal with, and the harder it is to schedule meetings. It may sound silly to worry about scheduling meetings, but it really isn't trivial to get a handful of professors in the same place for an hour. I've seen a couple people who almost couldn't graduate because they couldn't get their last committee meeting scheduled. And trying to schedule the actual defense is a real bear (although come on, who worries about that when you are two years away from that point?).

My own advisor is obviously member #1. I need two other professors.

My thinking is that I am researching several things - a manufacturing process, a precision machine design, and a new material.

I work in a lab for manufacturing, which has a whole bunch of professors involved, each of which have their own individual lab. One of the other professors in this lab specializes in precision machine design. My thought is that he would be perfect for member #2, because he covers the bases of both manufacturing and machine design.

I went to talk to this potential member #2, explained my plans for a PhD and asked if we could discuss any overlap with his lab's interests. Turns out a lot of the ideas I had for machine design are things that his lab has already tried (some worked, some didn't). At first I thought, well, beautiful! This has already been done! But perhaps not so beautiful - if somebody else has already done most of the novel machine elements I was going to design, maybe I need to pick something harder? Or maybe it will just make it a really fast PhD.... :) In any case, the professor actually offered to be on my committee. So, check! Moving on.

My ideal member #3 would have expertise in the fancy material I want to try, and also expertise on the applications of the devices I am making. Even though I am on the "making the chip" side of things, I need somebody on the "using the chip" side to advise me what they actually need. I might not be able to find someone with both of those qualities, in which case I might need a member #4.

I contacted two professors who are on the applications side, and asked if I could come visit and learn more about their labs. I met with both of them, and it was quite useful. I was able to get some good information on what the specifications for my machine/process should be, and what qualities they need from the finished product. They both confirmed that the problem I want to solve is indeed an important problem, which is good to know. One even said if I could do what I proposed, it would be "transformative." That's what I like to hear!

I didn't ask either one to be on my committee, because I'm not sure if a) either one is interested or b) which one would be a good fit for what I need. Of course, not that I'm entirely sure WHAT I need, since I haven't done the research yet... Neither of them have expertise on the materials side, so not ideal. I still have plans to meet with a couple other professors on the materials side. Maybe I'll get lucky and find my ideal member.

In any case, I'm 2/3rds of the way to a committee. That's enough accomplishment for one week.

VTOL

The Marines had a recruitment week here on campus, and one of the coolest things they did was fly in an Osprey.

This is a plane that can take off and land vertically (Vertical TakeOff and Landing), because the propellors can turn 90 degrees to face straight up like a helicopter, and then change to straight ahead like a jet for long flights.

How cool!

Here's me, just to prove I was there... :)

The Marines also flew in a helicopter, and I got to be the first one to take a ride.

The Marine who was flying the helicopter was funny - he was joking with me, saying now normally people aren't allowed to just fly over the city landmarks like this, but we're the military so we are allowed... I tried to say something witty in response, but I was too tangled up in my headset and trying to stay away from the steering mechanisms (I was in the copilot's seat) to come up with anything good!

Since I had a headset, I could listen to the pilot as he talked with air traffic control. He told the controller lady that he was going to be flying four minute flights for the next two hours (shuttling around people who wanted a ride), and the lady told him not to bother reporting every take off and landing... I don't know how you could even log new flight plans that fast, so I don't blame her!

All in all, a great experience, and a wonderful example of the types of opportunities that I get to take advantage of as a student. The grad school life has many perks!