Borderline Elementary

I have tried writing groups twice now. The first time was during my last year of PhD. It was a self-organized “support group” among graduate students. It did not go well for me, unfortunately. Things were hectic and I did not have an explicit achievable goal for each week other than “I want to finish my dissertation!” Regardless, now as a postdoc, I thought I should have a much better grip on goal setting and expectations (whether this statment is true or not is another topic for some other time…). Therefore, when the grad school here at IA State suggested a postdoc writing group, I jumped at it.

Lots of things happened this past week. Most important of all, Dr. Adina Howe gave some absolutely wonderful presentations on microbiome. A great amount of interests were generated and many good questions were asked. Also from the Q&A sessions, I had a glimpse of the side of the acadamic world that I am not familiar with at all. It went around two themes:

• 1. Is exploratory/discovery scientific research interesting/exciting?
     • (or necessary?)
• 1. Is collaboratory work a waste time?
     • (is all about competition right?)

Obviously, I am biased.

Writing journals has never been my thing, even though I was forced to do so since first grade. Of course, I quitted the moment I could. Ever since blogging has become a popular culture, I gave it several tries, precisely 4 times, throughout the years. They all ended like a sour relationship (or never ended…).