Thursday, March 14th, 2013

Good morning!  Sorry I forgot to post yesterday - I ran in to work and completely forgot!  I haven't had any Park pictures for you lately - it's just been so dark that it's just starting to get light by the end of the walk.  Good things have been happening.  I've been about 30% stressed for my ACE lately.  I would equate that to "30% of my thoughts when not directed on focusing on doing something are ACE thoughts."  I'm in the middle of a big experiment, making it a little tough to focus on the ACE.  To work on the ACE, I really need full days of concentration.  i.e. I need to have nothing else to focus on for the day - to just sit, and be in the zone, and work.  The reason for this is that I really need a mental warmup to get thinking my best.  I go through about 30minutes to an hour of marginal concentration before I'm really working effectively. 

Yesterday I knew I had about 2.5 hours after lunch that could be devoted solely to the ACE.  I didn't want to waste any of that time so at the end of lunch, I turned off the light in my apt (I go home for lunch), and just sort of silenced my mind for about 10 minutes.  I repeated that there was nothing else to check or work on or finish to sidetrack me once I got back to work.  When I got back to my lab, I was really ready to go and focused-in right away.  I think I'm going to make this a regular thing. 

I also got news of my ACE committee - that is - the group of faculty that I'll give my oral presentation to in about a month.  They'll be responsible for reading & critiquing my proposal, grilling me at my oral, and then ultimately deciding on whether I pass or not.  I'm very happy with my committee assignments - they are all nice, normal (seriously you don't know how important that is), and reasonable people.  They will be interested in pushing me but not bashing me.  There is one lady who I kind of admire named Inez Rogatsky.  She specializes in signaling at HSS (The Hospital for Special Surgery - one of our affiliates).  She's kind of a baller and knows a TON.  She's a real intense woman of science.  She also will most definitely be the one to convince.  She'll be the one who really grills me - I've seen her in action.  I'm a little scared of her, but also very excited to get to know her better.  My committee head is Theresa Lu.  She's also at HSS and I have a great relationship with her because I TA'ed for her this year and got to interact with her quite a bit (she runs the fundamental Immunology course for 1st years).  She's kind of a saint.  She is a physician, sees patients, runs her own lab, runs Fundamental Immunology, and serves on ACE committees.  She cares about grad students, which is not universal among principal investigators at non-university research institutions like MSKCC, HSS, and Weill Cornell.  I'm happy to have her be my chairman. 

Anyway, that's all for now. 

Carpe diem,

J