A Moment

I am currently at the Howard Hughes Medical Institute Summer Scholars Program at Virginia Commonwealth University. This programs started on Tuesday May 29th and will last until Thursday July 24th. To quickly sum the program up: the HHMI Summer Scholars program is designed to give undergraduate students to take part in a research experience with a mentor. To enable them to do this the program provides housing for the students as well as having several seminars and other events. Each of these events aid them in some way, mainly perhaps a chance for them to really gather just exactly what systems Biology is.

Tuesday- Move in was quite successful. My stepmom and dad helped me carry my stuff up. They left suddenly for I had an orientation meeting at five o'clock that evening. At orientation I met a few people. I already knew two people (Lindsey and Ena) and I remembered another girl from just random appearances though no introductions, I still dont know her name. After the meeting I finished unpacking after I spent a large of time rearranging the room. I disliked the initial setup because every piece of furniture was directly blocking an outlet (which didnt make sense). Needless to say, it took quite an effort to move them all on my own but I did do it.

Wednesday- I woke up early in the morning in an attempt to arrive at the class on time. Sadly I arrived so late that there were not anymore chairs remaining. I had to use a chair from an adjacent lab room. Fortunately for me, I wasnt the last person to arrive. Another girl came in right after me. There was a talk given by the coordinator of the Biology Program (Dr. Len Smock). He was quite interesting). That evening I went to the lab for the first time. It was quite nice looking, yet empty. I spent about three hours in there before coming back to the dorm. On Wednesday night, I went over to the apartment of one of the organizations I am apart of and had a ball. We played a bit of football and I managed to score the first touchdown. I was surprised for I havent played it in like two years.

Thursday-Thursday was a long day at the lab. It was my first full day there and I did several things. I would have had many pictures but I failed to bring my camera to lab. I started off by first taking part in the culturing of the cells. This is an elaborate set of methods that I wont go into, well maybe in another blog post, who knows. Regardless I did another cell culturing this day. I also counted cells using the microscope and a very particular piece of equipment. We also ran into trouble with the Incubator, which is sued to store to the cells in a relative controlled environment. Something was wrong with the sensor for the temperature, so we spent about three hours trying to normalize and stabilize the temperatures. We managed to do that. Lastly, I also watched as we did an extraction of a mouse brain. I didnt like it all, but I still watched it. I felt a little bad for the mouse though. That night I went out with a friend to see the movie Grindhouse and the Byrd Theater. It was an excellent movie that had me laughing and scared the whole time. It was a nice break from the burdens and speed of the week.

Friday-Friday was a rest day. I spent most of the day in the room on the computer and talking to friends. Perhaps the most interesting thing that I did was cook fish. It was so amazing. I will also add up several things later on.