Summer nights

Warm summer nights with the windows open and a light breeze flowing through the house is one of my most favorite parts about summer. It really feels like summer now, the flowers are blooming, the vegetables in the garden are forming and the grass is growing! I even saw a baby pumpkin forming!

I am hoping the my field research will go well. Been thinking about my squash plants and hope that they grow well so I can get some good data! My lab research is going better. I have been working on a new method and I think it will be better than the ones out there. Maybe it will become a methods paper. Still feels weird that I can start publishing soon.

Sometimes I wish people that weren't in academia understood just what I do. To clarify, I work year round. I work in the field, the lab, am done taking classes, teach undergrad classes and am starting to write my dissertation. I was talking to my dad the other day because I feeling bad about working so many hours and not making much as far as a salary. He actually had a refreshing perspective 'hey you are getting paid to go to school, what is better than that?!' Well, it is a good deal when you think of it that way. But I have to say it is a ego reducer when I am almost 30 and make a TA salary. Oh well, not for much longer!

I really thought this summer was going to be tough because I wouldn't like doing lab work, but actually it is getting to be pretty interesting and fun!

I am starting to feel better overall, more optimistic about the future and my incisions are healing. I even feel motivated to start exercising more. Feels good, starting slow but I know it is worth it. Not only for weight loss but it also relieves my stress, lowers HDL and increases oxygen. All good things.

Right now though, I am content to eat my fruit salad and feel the breeze float through the house :)