Another personal crisis....

This week was crazy. I went to a conference thinking that I would have an idea of the things that would be said in the presentations, but for a lot of them, I didn’t. Actually for too many of them I didn’t.
Andreas was great. Despite the fact that I am older than him by one year I feel like he is my big brother. He is so much more mature than I and in terms of career success he is beyond me. He is a postdoc in my lab and if you could only see how well he plans and does his experiments. I only wish I do experiments like that. Andreas carried this trip and converted it into something that could have just been a weeks worth of feminine hissy fits. There still were hissy fits but not as much as there would have been without him. He comforted me soooo much without doing anything at all, just being himself. I wish I could be like that. I told he brought out the best in people. I wish I could do the same. I wish I could just accept every one the way they are.
The thing with Andreas though, is that when he is in the lab, he is completely different. So I am going to have to remember that on Tuesday.
Anyways, Andreas made the party. Because of him we met around 5 guys. Which to me means 5 new friends while to Brianna it means 5 new possible husbands. Most of them were from Germany but there was one from Britain. The two that I will never forget are Bjorn and Jez. Bjorn, I never got to see his work, but he was super nice and good looking. I had never met a guy that was such a gentleman. He had married his first girlfriend after 7 years of being together 2 years ago. He wore a thick gold plain ring on his finger.
Jez was from Britain. He wore no ring, but he was engaged. His parents were mix, his mother from India and his father, I guess British. He had the accent. He also had the brain. At first I thought he was a very nerdy looking guy and I wondered about his work. Then, next thing I know he presents his work and it is beautiful. I am talking about Beau-ti-ful!!! work. He’d published in Science, Cell, and Nature in 3 years of Graduate school. I wanted to die. I still want to die. And then he was so gentle so serene so graceful.
I guess I talk about these people because I wish I were them in some ways. I wish I were that intelligent that gentle, that serene, that likable that influential.
I can’t help but be depressed. I am thirty years old and I don’t think I’ll ever publish in Science. And I just want to die. I feel like I deserve to die. What part of the puzzle am I? Lately I feel that I am not part of it at all. What is my purpose? I wish God would stop playing the silent treatment and just tell me already. Why does he expect me to read his mind?
Last night I called Carlos and I just started crying. I couldn’t help it. I needed to cry. What else could I possibly do except cry? But after talking to him I went back to the group we had found and they made me dance. While dancing I felt like God was right there with me. I know, you skeptic kitties are about to vomit but just give me a chanc to explain.
I said, “God I don’t feel good at all. What is going on? Why am I feeling so bad when I am doing exactly what I thought you wanted me to do? Why is this hurting?” and he said, “This is it Isa. This is where you decide what you want to do. This is when you just do it. Did you think it would be easy? Did you think I would make it easy for you? Whats the fucking point in that (yeah in order for him to keep my attention he cusses too)? If it were an easy mission I could have given it to anyone but I actually needed you for it and the truth is that you are doing a hell of crappy job. Pathetic really.”
And then all of the sudden I got this burst of energy. I danced it off. And I made a decision. I am going to work, as hard as humanly possible. There is only one problem. I am scared to do things on my own for the first time. And this is keeping me from doing anything at all.
No more. I just have to do it that is all.
Tomorrow I am going to read 3 papers on finding ligands. I am going to look at the paper that used RNAse to see what I have to do. On Tuesday I am going to ask Wes where I could possibly find some RNAse if at all.

And I am going to do it.

Retrovirology Conference

Hello Kitties,

My problems with Dr. Diva are over. The tests finally made it to his fucking stupid asshole. The reason why I am extra mad is that the MCB department sent me a messege saying that the grades were due Tuesday. Which means that all the previous emails I've posted on the blog are just his bullshit. It is not that he needed the tests it is that he was being a SUPER DIVA.
GOD I hate human beings. Especially idiotic San Franciscans who think that everything should be done for them whenever they feel like it.

Anyways... enough with that. I am at the Retrovirology Conference in Cold Spring harbor, and I just feel like my PI wasted his money. What am I doing here? I don't belong here. These people are brilliant. I am an idiot. I can't even pipette very well. In the mean time there are these people who have done such beautiful work. There is a British graduate student I met here. He has published 7 times and I think he is only in his 3rd year. It is not that he has published this many times but his publications are phenomenal. He has published in Science in Nature in Cell. He is motherfucking BRILLIANT.
Me? Oh you wanna know how many times I have published?

I feel so bad. I sat at those talks and I couldn't understand 3/4 of the talks. There was a session that I understood. It was about the viral budding of HIV. How VPU and a transmembrane protein called tetherin work. There was another one where they talked about the ESCRT system. But I didn't understand anything else. I feel like such a failure. Like such an idiot and I can't help it. I feel like I am never going to be a good scientist and it just makes me cry.
Why? OH WHY Do I want this so badly?

Happy Trails with Dr. Diva

Dr. Diva's email to me responding to the previous email:
Isa,
You are absolutely correct.   I did approve you going to this
conference----as I thought you were leaving Sunday and returning on
Wednesday---as in today.  But you only told me on Saturday morning that
the conference lasted ALL WEEK.   But I
figured..........well..........okay she did not know it was all week.  
Then I said--- we will compromise--- you will just need to grade two
pages---and mail the exams back to us by Wednesday.  We will do the rest.
THEN you tell me you are attending ALL the talks and DO not have the exams
ready still.  Then you say it is MY responsibility to get you a Fedex
number??  And only NOW are you finding out about Fedex there??   you have
been there since Sunday.
I also realize that you MUST have known the meeting lasted all week ---
some time ago.   As you had  the ticket for some time.    And you tell me
the day of the exam.    So what was your plan??
For us to wait all week for you to come back?? To not do any grading?
We need the pages as soon as you can send them.

Thanks,
Dr. Diva
-----------------------------------------------

My response to Dr. Diva's last email:
Dear Dr. Diva,
I sent the package graded papers.
I couldn't include the paper clip so they are all bunched up together but
you'll be able to distinguish when the 2nd page starts because the answer
sheet is right there.
I truly apologize for all the trouble I have caused. Obviously I didn't
mean to. I didn't know that this meeting would be all week and from
Morning til night until the week of the final. I had only received the
electronic ticket 2 days before the final.
It is not that I wasn't expecting to grade I just thought that we would
have a week before we had to hand the tests back in.
But whatever it is all my fault anyways I should have payed more attention.
So again I apologize to the both of you for causing so much stress and
trouble.
Here is the tracking number: xxxxxxxxx
The person in the FedEx office said that it should arrive tomorrow.
In the mean time if you guys need to turn in the grades in my previous
email I sent you the scores on each page for each student.
Let me know if you need anything else.

I am very sorry,
Isa

My Last day of GSI-ing and I am SOOO glad.

Email from professor after 2 nasty phone calls:

Isa,
> I am thinking that you should be using your lab's Fedex number as it
> is for THEM that you are missing your work HERE---for which YOU ARE
> BEING PAID!!!!
> Or that you use your own account number ---pay cash.
> IT is YOUR responsibility to make sure we get those exam pages as soon
> as possible.
> Please let me know as soon as you have sent them.
Professor Diva

My response to the Professor after being in poster sessions collecting as many notes as possible and oral
presentations from 9am-11:30 east coast time:

I am trying my best to do this. I know very well that it is my job and
that I got paid for it. Attached, you will find the scores of each student
on each page. So if you want you and Sean can go ahead, and meet, and add
up the grades using this sheet. IF not then do not worry because I am
going to do everything in my POWER to send the pages to you early
tomorrow. I realize that I am in a conference now and that I am missing
grading over there.
I just want to peacefully remind you that earlier in the semester I warned
you about this event. I asked you if it was okay that I come to this
conference and you approved it and said that "we would figure it out".
Please understand that this conference is something that I NEEDED TO DO
for  MY career. This is not just for Dr. Greene.
Again, the scores and names of the students are attached in the order that
the sheets were given to me and I will send the tests tomorrow, I have
never implicated otherwise.

Thank-you for your patience:
-Isa

happy times and fucked up times- In Lab

hi kitties,

So I went to the Institutes' retreat and had fun. For a minute there I thought that everyone was fun and not that bad at all. Then all the sudden yesterday I get a blood sample. I wanted to isolate my PBL's which was a successful procedure. Then I had to activate my T cells with IL2. This is where I failed.
So there is supposed to be this lab stock of IL2. A post doc in the lab prepares that stock and people take some whenever they needed. I didn't think of asking people for IL2 or anything cause I was depending on the stock. Then when I went to the stock box I found nothing in it. NADA. This is at 8:30 pm when I was trying to make it to Maria's for an emergency Fight Club meeting. No one else was in the lab that knew anything about IL2.
I went and checked the freezer again, checked all over the place. Every box every shelf. NADA. So then all the sudden I see this other box that indicates IL2. In the box I find this eppindorf with the alpha sign but it had the same concentration as IL2. Maybe it is a 2 and not an alpha. So I call Dave. Dave says go ahead use it, it must be IL2. Well, I added I finally picked up the phone to call the girls and instead there was a messege saying that the fight club meeting had ended. I call Maria, she doesn't answer, classic.... I call Sheri we talk for a while about recent events and the mystery of graduate life. I go home I come back the next day only to find out that what I had thought was IL2 was actually IFN alpha. I realize that all of my cells have to be thrown out.
I couldn't help get pist I mean real pist. If the lab stock would have been where it should've been then this would not happen. It is not like I can get PBL's this week again or next week. This means everything is delayed by 3 weeks. I got so pist that I ended up having a tiff. No I didn't scream, I didn't yell. I ended up venting to some one about how if you are responsible for stocks you should be responsible and put them where they are supposed to be. Well instead of saying you need to come down it is not such a big deal. Mistakes were made. I'm sorry your cells are shit now. Instead of any of that I get the, you are acting psychotic, I don't like your tone, why are you coming on so strong, I don't know what you are talking about, why don't you take 2 days off, talk.

Yeah it was great. Not only did I feel like people were hiding stocks from me but now I felt like I was being thrown out of the lab for complaining about stocks. GOD FORBID I ever complain about anything.
I have lab meeting in June and according to one of the lab people, I need to prove myself in this lab meeting or I am toast. We might as well throw away the toaster cause I am soooo burnt.

I wanna quit this lab so badly, so so so so badly. Hell, I want to quit Grad.