End of the Year and What's Next

As I sit here in my home office, splitting my time between reading papers, watching the dog try to get into a comfortable position, and choosing which music I wish to listen to next, I can't help but think about the future and what it will hold for me. 

Not that any of those different things correlate to the future... I'm thinking that it's really just a mechanism for me to avoid doing actual work. 

Not that I'm not getting things done here!

Anyway, as I mentioned, it's the time of year where I reflect on what's gone by this past 360-some-odd days and look forward to what will happen in the coming year.  It hasn't exactly been the best year overall - there are many things that I would have been thrilled to not have had happened, both to myself, my family, and my friends - but there have been many happy occurrences that have lightened the mood, so to speak.  Throughout the year, good things have happened the have softened the blow of the not-so-good things, and like anything in life we just have to sit back, say "well, that sucked", and focus on what was good. 

I don't want to focus too much on what went poorly this year, so I will focus on what went well.  For example, this spring I had the opportunity to present my research and attend my first "national" conference, the American Physician Scientist Association meeting in Chicago.  It was quite interesting to hear from other physician-scientists at various stages of their careers, and how their projected career paths changed (often frequently) as they discovered the path that they eventually chose to follow.  It certainly helped me justify still being a graduate student at this point in my career!  In the same vein, as a research group we attended the Corn Belt RNA conference, a fantastic opportunity to discuss our research and learn from other RNA scientists, many of whom are located in our own backyard (relatively speaking).  Missouri wasn't half bad, either!

Athletically, I began and sustained a running streak that lasted over 4 months, helping me to cope with the stress of my adviser moving away as well as to shed a few pounds.  I'm feeling quite good about myself physically these days, and I'm looking forward to giving the marathon another go in 2012.  Perhaps.  I also did well in a few races this year, placing in the Clydesdale division at the Allerton Trail Race, a goal of mine since first running it back in 2006. 

Travel was a big theme this year as well, and we had opportunities to get to locations such as North Carolina, New York, Florida, and (quite often) Minnesota.  Despite not being in the lab (and the associated stress therein) it was quite nice to visit the people living in these locations, spend time exploring areas where I had not been ever (or, in some cases, had not been in over 20 years), and release some of the stress associated with other things at home and on the job.

As far as what the future holds, there are a number of themes that will be associated with the upcoming year.  These include:
- Taking back Chicago (best not to ask, but suffice it to say that we need to take it back)
- Fixing all of the things (mostly around the house)
- Writing consistently (both on lab-related stuff and in the blog)
- Finishing what I've started (with regard to research work)

I have a plan for the blog, the gist of which is to refocus my energies on reviewing papers and research that I come across as I work on my thesis (both the actual thesis and the research associated with it).  A quick review of the ASAP alters from ACS and the like can provide a lot of material suitable discussion, so I hope that I can make it a consistent topic of conversation on the ol' blogger.  I also intend to continue discussing my running here, hopefully in the context of research as well, because there is a pretty good body of research being conducted on exercise ("exercise science" I believe is the term) right now. 

So, if I don't get to it before then, I hope you have an amazing holiday, a Happy New Year, and I hope that 2012 brings you all of the good things 2011 brought and much, much more!

Holding Steady

No great news to report over here - I've been doing a lot of stuff around the lab and at home, both in preparation for the holidays and for what I am going to term my post-holiday "Writing Week", in which I will spend a majority of the time writing out procedures, crunching old data, organizing papers, and trying my hardest to get something tangible on the computer for the upcoming semester. 

While I'm not exactly certain that everything is working, things have been looking pretty good from a number of perspectives, and I'm glad that I'm feeling motivated and willing to put in the work to get things accomplished.  Let's just hope that this can continue.