I have had another good but slightly frustrating week this week.
On Monday night, a bunch of people who lived in the other apartments came over, and we ate dinner together and then ate strawberry shortcake- we used the fresh strawberries that we picked this weekend, and whipped cream that my roommate whipped herself (apparently, if you whip cream, it becomes whipped cream. ) This was fresh and delicious.
Tuesday, I went to CVS and got a TB test. That was exactly as exciting as it sounds.
Wednesday was our lab meeting. It was my week to present (in our lab people present every other week) and so I did! It went okay. I was able to explain my project pretty okay, I think, and the problems I was having. Then my lab group discussed the project and solutions, and at one point the PI turned to me and commented, “the conversation is flowing really well. I keep forgetting you’re nineteen.”
So yay me!
At our lab’s journal club, the paper we voted to hear more about was one related to the possibility of dogs smelling cancer. According to the paper, they had much more success than the electronic nose technology that preceded them. Apparently: blood of people diagnosed with lung cancer smells different than the blood of people who are healthy. There were 3 dogs who determined this was true. We also talked about how apparently, someone had trained pigeons to differentiate tumors from H&E stained images by pecking, the same way they trained them to differentiate between paintings by the same artist in our psych textbook. So this was an interesting conversation, and we mentioned that we could use it as cocktail party fodder at the barbecue that night.
My PI also mentioned at the meeting that there would be a barbecue for the summer students and that he encouraged my whole lab to attend. I did not end up with that extensive of an entourage, but my mentor and my PI both came, and we had a nice time talking with some of the other people in the program.
Afterward, I went over to one of the other apartments, where we had a second dinner of mac and cheese.
Today, we had a bioethics workshop- a professor from Wesleyan came to talk to us about ethics specifically within medicine, but also in science as a whole. It was really interesting, which was probably helped by the fact that he was a good speaker and seemed passionate about what he was talking about. We’ll have the second part of that workshop in late July, and I think that will be interesting as well.
I also got my code working after the workshop today, which was impressive because with the Employee Recognition Day large lunch/ice cream we enjoyed, I was only actually at my desk for 2 or 3 hours. And this is really good because I’ve been stuck on this for like a week.
After work we went back to the apartments and folded dumplings as a group activity, which we then ate for dinner. We’re going to be making dinner together once a week, I think. I think there weren’t quite enough dumplings for everyone, but luckily we had all the leftover food from yesterday, and so I am still uncomfortably full off mac and cheese again.
Yesterday I realized that I haven’t had mac and cheese in probably a little under a year, and I think it’s hitting the spot. 🙂
Things are still going well, and I think we have a good weekend planned.
American in Moldova 