Not too much has happened since my last post. The hell of the holidays is past, we finally put the damn Christmas tree away, I've taken some impressive pictures of building fires from my lab window. Those are the highlights of the last six or seven months. Now that we're caught up, the next two or three months are going to be very busy, exciting, and stressful. Next Wednesday, I have to give my research data presentation, a.k.a departmental seminar. I don't know what I'm going to talk about and I haven't started working on it yet (shhh!). Should make for a fun weekend.
I leave for an international Vibrio conference in Edinburgh, Scotland (!) on the 29th of this month. Me and my two lab mates are going together. They are graduating by the end of the summer, so this is sort of a last hurrah. I am presenting a poster on zebrafish diarrhea. Haven't started working on that either, but at least I got my passport renewed. The new passports are ridiculously and embarrassingly patriotic. There's eagles and Franklins and Liberty Bells and page after blank page bragging about how great 'Murica is. Good God, it's hideous. Oh well. One of my biggest fears about this trip is forgetting 1) my passport, and/or 2) my poster. I expect to be either drunk or hungover about 80-90% of the time while we're there. We don't leave for home until April 5th. I've never been to Europe and I'm really nervous and excited - I mean, they have real castles over there!! Should make for a fun week.
In May, I'm going to the national American Society for Microbiology meeting in Boston. By myself. Oh, and I've been selected to give a Young Investigator oral presentation in the "It Takes A Villus" session about gut pathogens. When I submitted my abstract, stupid me checked the box to be considered to give a talk. I thought that I had a snowball's chance in hell of being picked for a talk instead of a poster, like I was planning. I guess the Polar Vortex was more powerful than I realized. I still haven't told my boss or the rest of my lab. And, obviously, I haven't even thought about starting to work on this yet. Even though oral presentations are technically easier than poster presentations, I'm terrified.
Today, I finally saw a podiatrist for my foot that's been messed up since I dropped a glass casserole dish on it 5 years ago. It hurts every time I take a step, particularly when my big toe flexes upwards, and it's gotten progressively more painful over time. In addition to my injury, it turns out that I inherited two different foot defects - one from each parent. The podiatrist took one look at me and said that I have flat feet, which I must have gotten from my flat-footed father. Apparently having flat feet inhibits normal extension of my big toes, aside from any injury. After he took x-rays, he told me that I also have a bunion on my jacked up foot (thanks, Mom!). After looking closely at the x-ray, I could also see a bone fragment from the original injury that is wedged in the joint space. Ouch. The podiatrist proposed doing surgery to correct the bunion and to increase the joint space and clean out bony debris. Unfortunately, this involves breaking a metatarsal and placing a screw in it, meaning I'll be in a surgical boot for 6 weeks. Since it's my right foot, I won't be able to drive for those 6 weeks. I'm not sure how I'm going to be able to swing this, but I'm willing to do almost anything to stop being in chronic pain. Should make for an interesting summer. Stay tuned...
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