MoJingly

Sorry I just saw this! Yes. I made them a nice little condo and leave them in the house when I am at school. They have each other and lots of toys so they don't get bored. When I'm home they run free, but they are litter trained so it's not a problem at all! "Femto"... like the science prefix... femtomolar? It means 0.000000000000001. (he's tiny)

Points for this website! It definitely made me smile.

Thanks, that is helpful! I wish there were little gnomes in the walls of our labs that we could just recruit to write the intros for us.

So, I'm writing my first manuscript! Yay! But citing things is making my head spin. I'm working on the intro now... A few questions (if any of you can help!) 1. At what point do I stop citing articles that say nearly the same thing? "The tomatoes grow at a rate of 3mm/month in Iceland." I've read, let's say, 50 papers that say that. Can I just cite a few? How do I choose which ones? (I'm not talking a well-known fact that wouldn't need to be cited like, "Beethoven was deaf." 2. Can you cite a review article that already cites those other 50? I've seen some papers specify, "for a review, see Smith et al." Do I have to do that or can I just cite Smith as a regular citation without mentioning it's a review? I can't get a clear picture of this by looking through already published papers. Thanks for your help!! Here is a ninja smiley to show my appreciation. --->

Usually, switching between programs in the same school isn't a big deal. I just did it (although I already put a year in the old program). Call up your adviser and explain the situation. I doubt you will come across as "a jerk" but, even if you do, it's your education. It never hurts to ask. The other thing to do would be to look at the overlap between the two programs. First year coursework is usually pretty similar. It might not hurt to just stay the course now and get a better feel for things once you have put in some time.

is a pretty fun discussion on POI from about a year ago.

Rochester maybe

Bikes get stolen on campuses. I don't care if it's the safest campus around. Be sure to spend the extra money and get a U-Lock for your bicycle! (I wish I did- my bike was taken even though I had a cable lock and it was in a busy area right outside the entrance to the school. With security).

Hooray! Congratulations!!

I find it strange that you were "assigned" a supervisor. Did you get any say in who it was going to be? I would say that you should bring this up to him. Tell him your interests. It's better to get a plan right now than get a few years down the road and be stuck. Grad school is a balance between what you want to study, what people will support you in studying, and what is actually a reasonable undertaking. Also, don't think that what you study in grad school will be what you end up studying forever. In fact, it probably won't be. Grad school is more training than anything. You're trained to think about relevant and important questions and then trained how to figure them out. Just a thought.

Aren't we all?

I wish there were such a thing as "magical bonding." My house is really tiny, and juggling two bunnies in two cages with separate "romp" times is getting old. Can't wait until they sufficiently bond and live happily ever after in the same place (which is actually a homemade bunny-worthy palace). 'Yall should seriously consider bunnies! Especially now after Easter- so many people buy them as a gift for their kids and then when the novelty wears off they end up in shelters. Poor guys. I can totally see myself becoming a "bunny woman." You know... like a "cat lady" but with little floppy big-eared rabbits instead of cats. I seriously want to leave lab right now and go home to play with them.

House rabbits are awesome as a grad student! I'm currently in the process of bonding these two (that's a bit stressful, as bunny fights are heartbreaking). The grey one is my holland lop bunny Femto. The dutch (b&w) is the newest addition to the household named "Fermata." (combining music and science-get it??) Fermata is a rescue bunny and a sweetheart, she's tolerating Femto but he has fallen completely head over heels in love. I'm amazed with how much personality these little guys have. It makes me giggle every time to see little balls of fur hopping around my living room. Seriously a mood lifter no matter what kind of day you have had.

It doesn't sound promising, but keep asking. Have you actually called admissions or have you just emailed? That's the first step.

Nope, still got a B- in the class. lol. Oh well. Call it life experience. MOVING ON.

YOU CAN DO IT!

That makes sense, Eigen. I keep seeing different ways of doing this in papers. The one I'm looking at right now, for example, always has the citation before the period. Hmm.

So I'm currently writing a final paper for a class that didn't give any formatting specifications. I think I've settled on using the "Nature Paper" format from Mendeley but need some advice on where you most like citations in the sentence. I'm not sure if this is convention because I've seen it quite a few different ways. Tips?

I agree. I definitely have time for a social life, but that's because I know that if I don't make time, I will go nuts. Think of grad school like a job. Don't let it control your entire life. Burnout can be a serious problem and it's important to keep things in perspective! Taking some time to be with friends can give you the balance to be a better student.

I sometimes start with Wikipedia. LET ME EXPLAIN BEFORE YOU SHUN ME. Don't use Wikipedia as your source, but you can use it as a launching block to find relevant papers. Sometimes those authors are really good at taking a complex topic and trimming it down into something that is easily digestible on a first run. Look in the sources section and follow the links to the papers they cite. It's a pretty good way to start.

Thanks for the encouragement guys! I just took the final for the class yesterday, and I think it went well! This was the best i ever felt after coming out of a test in that class, so my fingers are crossed that my grade comes up a bit! I'm pretty confident that I don't have to worry about probation. Woohoo! I heard somebody say that if you can survive the first year of grad school, then you have a pretty good shot at the rest. We're surviving, right?! GO TEAM GRAD CAFE

If you have an ALDI where you are, check them out. Beautiful food for significantly cheaper than the main chains. You can get some really great produce there. Pineapples, green peppers, avocado... stuff that is too expensive other places! And they have the best blueberries I've ever consumed. Canned goods there are super cheap. Mandarin oranges for $0.20, for example. There are rarely name brand things, but that doesn't matter at all. Also, we are getting into the season for farmers markets!! And utilize that slow cooker as often as possible. There's nothing like coming home to a prepared meal. The only negative thing is prepping it in the morning.

This is a good thread. I have some pretty nasty anxiety issues that have hurt my grades this year, but things are looking up. Lots of people in academia have anxiety issues. It's what we do! Who else would take all this time and little pay to figure out STUFF. We find problems, worry about them, stress over them, and then eventually figure something out. Isn't that what research is? There are so many topics about this in the chronicle, so I suggest a search of the forum. Here's one to at least take you there. http://chronicle.com/forums/index.php/topic,81867.0.html

Oh Sparky, I totally get that detailed perfectionism conundrum! Rooting for you! Thanks for your encouragement. My department head met with me to basically ask, "what's up with this class?" To which I just said, "no clue." Anyhow, I'm set to get at least a B- in the class now, and there is hope for the last test since that's what I am actually interested in! Sending you positive writing vibes!