Til dem der kender Bridget Jones Dagbog (og synes hun trods
alt er lidt sjov) bringer Students Corner et uddrag af hendes liv som PostDoc.
Selvom vi selvfølgelig alle er et mønster på effektivitet i vores arbejde, er
der måske alligevel visse ting vi kan nikke genkendende til…
Dr
Bridget’s Postdoctoral Diary
Monday
Number of e-mails read: 23
Number of e-mails containing scientific information: 4 (v. good)
Number of e-mails containing jokes from friends: 8 (v. funny)
Number of e-mails offering “male enhancement” or other spam: 11 (v.
bad; have they not realised I am a girl?)
Number of e-mails offering me Nobel Prize: 0 (but still hoping)
Determined to make this week superproductive. So I write a very
organised to-do list covering experiments for the next 3 days. Realise have
spent so much time writing list and checking emails that I am already behind.
Move last of today’s tasks to tomorrow and get started in the lab. Discover
that the evil PhD student has used up all the enzyme. First experiment now
moved to Wednesday I pending arrival of replacement stocks on Tuesday. Have to
go for a tea break to recover from stress and prevent strangulation of student.
Rest of day not too bad, for a Monday. Set up experiments for whole
week: Start cell cultures, book microscopes, make buffers, and even find time
over the bacterial incubator for a spot of eyelash fluttering at the sexy
postdoc in the lab next door. Feel like the very model of scientific efficiency
until the massive heap of unread articles on my desk collapses, launching a
tsunami of print and paper. Pick out a few of the most interesting-looking
titles and put them in my bag. Notice I actually now have collected quite a
pile in there. I’ll read them tonight for sure.
Search the Internet for exciting conferences in exotic locations. Very
enthusiastic about the prospect of a meeting in Honolulu when I remember that I
have (a) no travel money left and (b) no results. My boss points out that I
went to a very interesting conference last year in Dorset. Argue back that the
windswept vistas of the South Coast are no match for the sun-kissed beaches of
Hawaii. She retorts that I should be interested only in the quality of the
science and anyway, the funding body thinks that £46 for a return train fare is
more than enough to spend on me. Back to Mrs. Scoggins’ Bed & Breakfast and
not the Hotel Palm Tree Splendide this year, then.
Tuesday
Number of PCRs performed: 48 (v. good!)
Number of PCR bands detected on gel afterwards: 3, potentially 4 (v.
bad. Suspect evil student has been turning the machine off and on again).
Number of hours spent using fluorescence microscope: 4
Number of spots in front of eyes after using microscope: 1082
Tuesday is lab meeting day. Aaargh! It’s my turn to present results,
and I completely forgot. Recycle slides from last lab meeting and hope no one
notices. No one does. Whether this is because they have complete confidence in
my scientific approach or they really aren’t interested remains to be
ascertained. Realise with a sinking heart that I have made no progress anyway,
as have spent
last 3 months repeating experiments performed by an incompetent summer
student, desperately trying to reproduce the interesting (but haphazard)
results. When it comes to the “Lab Business” discussion, I glare pointedly at
Evil Student and suggest we could all benefit from being team players. Blush
like a lobster when someone points out that it was I who left a load of glassware
in the sink last week and contaminated the fridge with radioactivity.
Spend the rest of the day hiding in the dark in the fluorescence
microscope room, emerging like a mole blinking in the twilight at 6 p.m. Go to
pub with other postdocs. Despite best efforts to chat about news, football etc.
etc., we all end up talking science again. After one beer, half of them head
back to the lab. I go home, feeling wracked with guilt and fully intending to
eat a healthy dinner then spend the evening reading papers and planning
exciting new project
ll pm: Still surgically attached to sofa, watching reruns of 80’s
sitcoms with empty ice-cream bucket propped on lap. Hoping to absorb scientific
papers osmotically, as I figure out they must have been in my bag for at least
6 weeks now.
Wednesday
Number of cakes eaten: 4.7 (v. bad)
Number of times run
up and down stairs: 6 (invalidating the above)
Number of minutes
spent in darkroom with sexy postdoc: 8.2 (oh heaven!!)
One of the postdocs
in the lab has come back from holiday, bearing all sorts of goodies. Attack the
cakes with gusto, tempered only when Evil Student points out that I will soon
be too fat to fit into my lab coat. Will one day spit in his tissue culture, I
swear! Now running dangerously behind with experiments, as the enzyme I ordered
on Monday has yet to appear. So much for next-day delivery.
The x-ray machine on our floor is broken - found out after feeding my
precious films into it and hearing an ominous crunching sound. Stick a big “Do
not use” notice on it and run away, praying for people not to think it is my
responsibility. The only other developer is on the fifth floor, so I get a nice
workout trundling up and down the stairs. Rush through the darkroom door, all
hot and sweaty, only to find the lovely postdoc from the next lab in there,
too! Our hands brush together over a hot autoradiograph, the red light glinting
off his safety specs and making me dizzy from excitement. Or maybe it was just
the fumes from the developer. ...
Thursday
Number of scientific papers read: 4 (v. good)
Number of minutes asleep in seminar: 23 (v. bad)
Total number of timers in use at anyone point: 3 (v. confusing)
Start to panic as I realise it is now nearly the end of the week and
the majority of my to-do list is still undone. Successfully calm myself and
start about four experiments at the same time. All going well until about 2
p.m., when all my timers go off at once like a burglar alarm, sending me into
a massive flap. Must remember to work
out my time plan better in future.
Guest speaker arrives from the United States and gives an outrageously
boring seminar, hosted by my boss. The room was warm, the chairs comfortable,
and even the lure of free coffee and biscuits couldn’t keep me awake. Just hope
I wasn’t snoring this time. The best thing about snoozing in seminars is the
wonderfully abstracted quality of the daydreams, fuelled by hallucinogenic
slides and cheap coffee. Just when I think I’ve gotten away with it, my boss
asks me if I’d like a chat with the speaker. Can’t escape and spend a terrible
half-hour bluffing my head off whilst pretending I listened to his every word.
Explain my research to him, using dramatic scribbled diagrams, as he nods and
says things like “Mmmhhhh, very exciting ...Interesting. ...” Feel invigorated,
until he asks a really dumb question. I realise he has not grasped any of it,
make my excuses, and scuttle out of the office.
Run head-first into Sexy Postdoc, spilling buffer over both of us.
Mumble apologetically and later kick myself for not making more of the most
obvious chat-up scenario known to mankind. Spot him later wearing nothing over
his trousers but a lab coat--mmmmhhhhh! Am not brave enough to try this and
have nothing to change into. My clothes dry out leaving a most peculiar pattern
of salt rings, as if I have some dreadful personal hygiene problem. Very
embarrassing. Go home early to change.
Friday
Number of tasks on to-do list as of Monday morning: 36
Number of tasks on to-do list as of Friday evening: 27
Distance by which frontiers of science have been pushed back this week:
0.73 mm
An apologetic chap from Stores plonks a battered box on my desk. “Sorry
love, this fell down behind the freezers and we’ve only just found it. Hope it
wasn’t too important.” At least I know where that enzyme got to. Sadly, all the
dry ice has evaporated and after 3 days behind a freezer, the internal
temperature of the box is approaching that of the Gobi desert. Reorder the
enzyme, making sure to use Evil Student’s grant code.
A whole day of waiting around for things to happen. After yesterday’s
timer debacle, I am reluctant to overload myself. As a result, I realise with
mounting horror at about 4 p.m. that I will have to come in on Saturday morning
to finish things off. Determined
to make next week superproductive, so copy out remainder of to-do list in a
legible form. Pretty sure I must have made progress somewhere, but sometimes
you need a micrometer to measure it.
Ah well--another
day, another dollar (note to self: Must find out when funding body is giving
pay rise). |
