tales from the front

Hi! Figured it's about my turn for an update.

So I'm pretty much settled down in the Bronx. Unfortunately, it's a short term kind of settled down--housing has me in a temporary studio share. What that means is that they reserve the right to tell me to pack my bags and move to my permanent locale. Whatevs. Life is still pretty good, and the rent (< $300 a month, utilities included) is quite sexy. Very sexy. Yeah.

I think I have fallen in with my own kind, here at Einstein. Nerds. Super nerds in the form of PhD candidates. I've been at a bunch of mixers now, and I have to say that the dedication to research these people have is almost frightening. We don't talk about the Olympics at our PhD parties. We don't talk about drinking. We rarely talk about the hot girl across the room.

We talk science. The dude across from me is explaining Bioinformatics as he chugs a beer. The fellow playing flip cup juggles red, party plastic and a conversation concerning cannulas and electrophysiological apparatus with equal deftness. Yet another cradles his head in his hands, whining about how he has to go back to lab in 10 minutes to "finish another run." Someone else extolls on the poor state of NIH funding in a country with a crunched budget. Awesome.

On the other side of the spectrum are the MDs, whom I've had the chance to hang out with as well. These people aren't nerds (sorry Tammy, Karen). They're people we're familiar with: driven, hardworking, generally younger, typically Asian...and they all have an uncanny love for happy juice. I like these people. Fun to party with for sure.

The MD/PhDs really bring out the best of both worlds. Nerds and partiers. Some express one allele more than the other, but all are pretty cool, diverse people.

Through it all, I think I have to point out one thing: my youth. People going to graduate/medical school straight out of college (like me) are definitely in the minority. And there are a bunch of people here with kids. There are even more that are married/engaged. Scary shit yo. Scary. Even if they're older than me, they're usually no more than 4 or 5 years older.

Shit. Should I be thinking marriage already?