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Cells and 'puters
So...
I'm taking a break from studying. From my very short study period. I'm like, still on the first page of my grammar book lol. Well, I did do like a 10 question warm up test before that but...
You get the idea.
I went to kino yesterday and found this N1 grammar book, entirely in Japanese. I don't know which is better, having to deal with 4 languages/writing systems, or having to figure out the meaning of phrases and sentences because it's entirely in Japanese and I don't quite get the full meaning of the sentence. And since I'm studying the grammar, it won't do to just get a gist of the meaning. I need to know and understand the exact usage!
So yeah. I'm just not giving a sh!t and reading my book in broad daylight. And hey, the rf I used to work with, who's sitting on the other side of the fence, I mean, divider, stood up and talked to me a while back. Like twice. And didn't say a thing about this weird yellow paged book in some unknown language. Heck. Nobody cares. I've read xkcd comics while sitting at my old spot, which is basically in the view of everybody, and only once did my ex-sup (no, not unsup, but the one before that), mention about it. Asked why I was studying rockets. Hahaha. But nah he doesn't care. Nope. Nobody cares. I've sat here and played vainglory and nobody noticed/cares. I just did earlier too, played a quick round of battle royal (and won, hurrah!) before I grudgingly took out my book to try and do something useful.
The clock is ticking after all...
But back to the title.
It's funny how everyone expects me to know everything. From gene expression to bacteria cultures to just everything.
Funny.
They clearly don't know what my degree was.
*shrugs*
Well. I can always fudge things. And if it doesn't work, it doesn't work. It's too hard. Beyond my expertise. Whatever. What can you do to me?
It's your fault for expecting me to know everything anyway... And really, I don't care either way. I'll get nothing out of it after all. I'm sure of it. Another paper? Don't be kidding me. You can't get a paper with the kind of expertise we have currently. Where nobody knows what they are doing.
But at the end of the day....
All that stays is the sad truth that there is way too much things that I don't know.
It's not about the job. It's about myself, for myself. Too many things I still need to learn, and it's like... Where do you even start learning? It's not about the hardcore sort of knowledge where you look up papers for. It's the more... 'softcore' stuff. And the reason why I loved working with unsup so much. Like learning how to locate the focus plane for a stupid, dilute wet mount. Gah. It's still on my to-do list. Someday when I'm in the mood... I'll just sit in front of the microscope and do just that.
Like yesterday morning and I got a message from the new boss asking me if I knew about some primer specificity. Well... The only solution I have to that was look up the literature where we got the primer sequence from... Because I don't think we did any primer design of that sort... But well, unsup had a much better solution. Search it up on ncbi database. Why of course! That's where all the sequences are. Everything newly discovered goes in there. And new sequences appear everyday. Maybe I should spend more time on ncbi huh. Of cos they'd have such a service. It's just that I never quite knew. Just what have I learnt about bioinformatics in school? Nothing, really. The stuff we learnt in undergrad? Really... we didn't learn anything at all. Well, unsup being the really nice person that she is says it's normal that I don't know because I wasn't trained in bioinformatics. Well... I guess that's true. Still... I came from a school where not knowing isn't really an option so... (Yeah, I'm talking about my sec sch.) And yeah... I should stop troubling unsup with such stuff because it's not her job anymore... But then sometimes I really just want someone to complain to. And when you complain about things in less vague terms unlike how I try to be really vague now... And to someone like unsup... It quickly becomes an advice and counselling session... And it's also true that both are also what I'm searching for when I want to rant.
I think I'm breaking apart again. Mentally. Falling into pieces. I think the 'I don't give a shit' is one of the syndromes of some sort of mental illness. Well it's clearly my way of shutting down and trying to make some free time for myself. Among other things. Like a close evaluation of the economic benefit of doing work vs doing 'work'. Just plain old logic. Which often saves the day for me. Like all the times I look down from the corridor and think that it'll be nice to just jump the barrier and fall down down down. (Yeah, having random thoughts like that isn't a good thing huh? And admittedly, it's becoming a lot more frequent recently and hence the reason I know I'm breaking into tiny bits.) But no, I don't want to jump to commit suicide. I just get the thought that 'oh, won't it be nice if we did that?'. Thankfully, the logical side of me tells me that I can imagine it all I want but no, we aren't jumping. Plus, I don't think I actually, really like the sensation of falling, so I don't know why I get that urge. And no, I don't actually want to die. Though thinking about suicide won't be anything new for me... I think I just want to hide in a hole and escape from it all. I've never said this much before huh, have I? Behind it all, I'm all broken up inside. Broken in strange ways by an education system that doesn't fit. I do well when I'm challenged, and intellectually stimulated. But otherwise, I get so, oh so very bored. And I'm the type of person who likes... Well. It's hard to put it. I don't really like being a leader in real life all that much, because I hate public speaking. And I'm the shy kid who doesn't really speak much. But nope, I can't stand working with or heaven forbids, under dumb people. Which was the reason why I left my previous job. And will once again, be the reason why I leave my current job. I would not have lasted 6 months if I was in unsup's position... Though admittedly, quitting a job in just 6 months would raise a lot more eyebrows for someone in her position as compared to myself, a nameless person with nary an achievement under her belt.
I guess I've been on this job long enough for it to look ok on my CV though. Quitting two jobs with each one less than 6 months each isn't good, but I've been here over 2 years now. Time flies so fast. I'm a senior in this place already lol. With a whole bunch of equipment supposedly under my care too lol. My bench... Well, it's become like unsup's bench in the past. The PhD students are 'looting' stuff from my bench to use. (But they return it, so that's fine.) When I go to my bench and see the guy searching around my bench for something, and I ask him what he needs... Hahaha. It's like me, or them, searching around the other bench (i.e. unsup's bench) last time. Which incidentally, still has the card with unsup's name on it cos the new rf felt embarrassed to take it down last time.
Thank goodness I've seen how unsup did her cultures for that stupid project previously... Because otherwise I'd have no idea how to grow those bacteria (like, even simple things like 'what should i grow the cultures in? bottles? flasks?'). And since nobody else does microbio work, we'd all have no idea. Yay. Till I started on this... conical flasks was more a chemistry thing (chem is my first love after all) that had limited use in biology. *shrugs* We never had conical flasks in my previous cell culture labs. The different worlds...
(Ok, I think I've seen some conical flasks being used for larger fly cultures... but flies...!)
(I don't really like flies...)
(Can't say I outright hate them but as much as possible I don't think I'd like to work on flies...)
This is all... So very amusing. Not as amusing as the boss in my previous job who refused to hire any rf for the project and relied entirely on fyp students. But I think we might be inching towards that level of absurdity... Little by little.
So me and the new rf were given a month to finish some experiments. *shrugs*
Let's see when we can actually start. Nothing is happening right now, though you can really blame us... Waiting on the reply from the vendor to check our equipment... Which is great because it means I can spend my time reading stuff online... And maybe even study some Japanese!
Only that I have to scale up on my bacteria cultures... New boss wants 10x more cultures. And to prevent contamination from taking out all the cultures, she wants it in 10x as many bottles. Which means come next week, I'll have 20 freaking bottles to take care of. Geez. 20! Oh wells. I wonder if I can get away with just sampling them on alternate days. Or maybe just sample half of them each time. Yeah... I'm probably do something like that. Depending on my mood...
Ok. Back to studying. Let's see if I can finish another few pages before heading home. It's Thursday already, hurrah!!!
I'm taking a break from studying. From my very short study period. I'm like, still on the first page of my grammar book lol. Well, I did do like a 10 question warm up test before that but...
You get the idea.
I went to kino yesterday and found this N1 grammar book, entirely in Japanese. I don't know which is better, having to deal with 4 languages/writing systems, or having to figure out the meaning of phrases and sentences because it's entirely in Japanese and I don't quite get the full meaning of the sentence. And since I'm studying the grammar, it won't do to just get a gist of the meaning. I need to know and understand the exact usage!
So yeah. I'm just not giving a sh!t and reading my book in broad daylight. And hey, the rf I used to work with, who's sitting on the other side of the fence, I mean, divider, stood up and talked to me a while back. Like twice. And didn't say a thing about this weird yellow paged book in some unknown language. Heck. Nobody cares. I've read xkcd comics while sitting at my old spot, which is basically in the view of everybody, and only once did my ex-sup (no, not unsup, but the one before that), mention about it. Asked why I was studying rockets. Hahaha. But nah he doesn't care. Nope. Nobody cares. I've sat here and played vainglory and nobody noticed/cares. I just did earlier too, played a quick round of battle royal (and won, hurrah!) before I grudgingly took out my book to try and do something useful.
The clock is ticking after all...
But back to the title.
It's funny how everyone expects me to know everything. From gene expression to bacteria cultures to just everything.
Funny.
They clearly don't know what my degree was.
*shrugs*
Well. I can always fudge things. And if it doesn't work, it doesn't work. It's too hard. Beyond my expertise. Whatever. What can you do to me?
It's your fault for expecting me to know everything anyway... And really, I don't care either way. I'll get nothing out of it after all. I'm sure of it. Another paper? Don't be kidding me. You can't get a paper with the kind of expertise we have currently. Where nobody knows what they are doing.
But at the end of the day....
All that stays is the sad truth that there is way too much things that I don't know.
It's not about the job. It's about myself, for myself. Too many things I still need to learn, and it's like... Where do you even start learning? It's not about the hardcore sort of knowledge where you look up papers for. It's the more... 'softcore' stuff. And the reason why I loved working with unsup so much. Like learning how to locate the focus plane for a stupid, dilute wet mount. Gah. It's still on my to-do list. Someday when I'm in the mood... I'll just sit in front of the microscope and do just that.
Like yesterday morning and I got a message from the new boss asking me if I knew about some primer specificity. Well... The only solution I have to that was look up the literature where we got the primer sequence from... Because I don't think we did any primer design of that sort... But well, unsup had a much better solution. Search it up on ncbi database. Why of course! That's where all the sequences are. Everything newly discovered goes in there. And new sequences appear everyday. Maybe I should spend more time on ncbi huh. Of cos they'd have such a service. It's just that I never quite knew. Just what have I learnt about bioinformatics in school? Nothing, really. The stuff we learnt in undergrad? Really... we didn't learn anything at all. Well, unsup being the really nice person that she is says it's normal that I don't know because I wasn't trained in bioinformatics. Well... I guess that's true. Still... I came from a school where not knowing isn't really an option so... (Yeah, I'm talking about my sec sch.) And yeah... I should stop troubling unsup with such stuff because it's not her job anymore... But then sometimes I really just want someone to complain to. And when you complain about things in less vague terms unlike how I try to be really vague now... And to someone like unsup... It quickly becomes an advice and counselling session... And it's also true that both are also what I'm searching for when I want to rant.
I think I'm breaking apart again. Mentally. Falling into pieces. I think the 'I don't give a shit' is one of the syndromes of some sort of mental illness. Well it's clearly my way of shutting down and trying to make some free time for myself. Among other things. Like a close evaluation of the economic benefit of doing work vs doing 'work'. Just plain old logic. Which often saves the day for me. Like all the times I look down from the corridor and think that it'll be nice to just jump the barrier and fall down down down. (Yeah, having random thoughts like that isn't a good thing huh? And admittedly, it's becoming a lot more frequent recently and hence the reason I know I'm breaking into tiny bits.) But no, I don't want to jump to commit suicide. I just get the thought that 'oh, won't it be nice if we did that?'. Thankfully, the logical side of me tells me that I can imagine it all I want but no, we aren't jumping. Plus, I don't think I actually, really like the sensation of falling, so I don't know why I get that urge. And no, I don't actually want to die. Though thinking about suicide won't be anything new for me... I think I just want to hide in a hole and escape from it all. I've never said this much before huh, have I? Behind it all, I'm all broken up inside. Broken in strange ways by an education system that doesn't fit. I do well when I'm challenged, and intellectually stimulated. But otherwise, I get so, oh so very bored. And I'm the type of person who likes... Well. It's hard to put it. I don't really like being a leader in real life all that much, because I hate public speaking. And I'm the shy kid who doesn't really speak much. But nope, I can't stand working with or heaven forbids, under dumb people. Which was the reason why I left my previous job. And will once again, be the reason why I leave my current job. I would not have lasted 6 months if I was in unsup's position... Though admittedly, quitting a job in just 6 months would raise a lot more eyebrows for someone in her position as compared to myself, a nameless person with nary an achievement under her belt.
I guess I've been on this job long enough for it to look ok on my CV though. Quitting two jobs with each one less than 6 months each isn't good, but I've been here over 2 years now. Time flies so fast. I'm a senior in this place already lol. With a whole bunch of equipment supposedly under my care too lol. My bench... Well, it's become like unsup's bench in the past. The PhD students are 'looting' stuff from my bench to use. (But they return it, so that's fine.) When I go to my bench and see the guy searching around my bench for something, and I ask him what he needs... Hahaha. It's like me, or them, searching around the other bench (i.e. unsup's bench) last time. Which incidentally, still has the card with unsup's name on it cos the new rf felt embarrassed to take it down last time.
Thank goodness I've seen how unsup did her cultures for that stupid project previously... Because otherwise I'd have no idea how to grow those bacteria (like, even simple things like 'what should i grow the cultures in? bottles? flasks?'). And since nobody else does microbio work, we'd all have no idea. Yay. Till I started on this... conical flasks was more a chemistry thing (chem is my first love after all) that had limited use in biology. *shrugs* We never had conical flasks in my previous cell culture labs. The different worlds...
(Ok, I think I've seen some conical flasks being used for larger fly cultures... but flies...!)
(I don't really like flies...)
(Can't say I outright hate them but as much as possible I don't think I'd like to work on flies...)
This is all... So very amusing. Not as amusing as the boss in my previous job who refused to hire any rf for the project and relied entirely on fyp students. But I think we might be inching towards that level of absurdity... Little by little.
So me and the new rf were given a month to finish some experiments. *shrugs*
Let's see when we can actually start. Nothing is happening right now, though you can really blame us... Waiting on the reply from the vendor to check our equipment... Which is great because it means I can spend my time reading stuff online... And maybe even study some Japanese!
Only that I have to scale up on my bacteria cultures... New boss wants 10x more cultures. And to prevent contamination from taking out all the cultures, she wants it in 10x as many bottles. Which means come next week, I'll have 20 freaking bottles to take care of. Geez. 20! Oh wells. I wonder if I can get away with just sampling them on alternate days. Or maybe just sample half of them each time. Yeah... I'm probably do something like that. Depending on my mood...
Ok. Back to studying. Let's see if I can finish another few pages before heading home. It's Thursday already, hurrah!!!
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