Working My Buns Off

*ERRHH!!!*ERRHH!!!*ERRHH!!!*

My alarm asserts that it is time to wake, but I beg to differ. 6:30 AM and a new day has begun. After a healthy breakfast and a shower I make my way via the Illinois Tollway system to my first job of the day: Biochemical Research at Northern Illinois University.


The faint of heart beware, for I conduct REAL SCIENCE from the reasonable hours of the morning until the late afternoon. Bacterial transformation, DNA sequencing, protein purification, xray crystallography, and microcalorimetry make up only part of what may consume my day to day. Donning a white lab coat that would make Bill Nye proud, I pipette with great efficacy to discover the unknown. It seems fitting as I wander from lab bench to lab bench that Weird Al's "White and Nerdy" choruses in my head.

I've found that I truly love working in a lab. Each day brings new challenges and the hands on experience has concreted so many of the scientific concepts I'm working with. (More on the specific research projects later).


Finishing my experiments for the day I weave through the endless construction barriers to return from whence I came. I typically have a few moments to gather my thoughts before I begin my second job of the day: summer programs at the residential school where I work.


These summer programs include tasks like tutoring science, implementing local excursions, and lending an open ear. My day wraps up at about 11PM or 12AM depending.


Then I start all over again.


Needless to say it has been a busy existence, but it's quite delightful. By the end of the summer I'll have been part of three different summer programs (all with varying time frames and different goals), put in a great many hours in a real laboratory, and enjoyed 1 day off a week (excluding the week of Independence Day).


Summer is great, but I'm working my buns off.


Oh yeah! I forgot to mention that I'm still volunteering at the hospital every other week...