Hello hello!
It is a beautiful day outside, and as my chemistry Professor Hearn remarks, the peak of sunset-colored leaves. And though I’m reasonably sure that you don’t read this blog for the weekly weather updates, the gorgeous day has everyone in high spirits :). It matches my mood too, since I only have one midterm this week (Neuro’s tomorrow! I’m excited) and have had time to spend time with friends and even attend a lecture! Plus, we had another prospie weekend, so I got to spend lots of time with new people and the team :).
Walking to lunch at Bates today– these are completely unedited 🙂
I have to say, I’m becoming quite the admissions worker! In an unusual turn of events, my
roommate decided to move to another dorm (she is a science major, and would rather live on East side where most of the other science majors live). Thus, as of last weekend I am now living in a double room by myself, which offers unparalled opportunities for my friends :). I ended up hosting prospie Gabi for the night, and Nathalie, one of my older friends from Edina, says she might join me next week when her roommate’s boyfriend comes to stay over :).
In accompaniment with the hosting theme, I am getting so good at telling people what colleges I picked from, why I came here, and why the swim team here is the best thing ever. I am also getting used to talking a lot about neuro, since a lot of the prospies coming in are interested in the topic and I’m currently the only member of the team taking neuroscience courses. Also, I’m quite proficient at getting up on the soapbox and telling people to slow down, and please not worry about their major or future career right now, because you have to get here and take the courses before you can decide. I occasionally start to get impatient with how seniors in high school expect to have everything figured out first thing when they come to visit… until I realize that I do exactly the same thing :). Rushing the many decisions of what we’re going to do as adults seems to be a common theme in everyone except adults :).
I took prospies Sydelle and Gabi around the lake– definitely beautiful this time of year 🙂
Hanging out at the Leaky Beaker with the team and prospies– me, Gabi, Sydelle, Karen, Ika, Tiffany, and Karina.
Our prospies Karen, Gabi, Francesca, Sydelle, and Carol were energetic and interested, and I enjoyed hanging out with them, especially because since we do things as a team, I can get to know the current first-years on the team as well. Half of the team this year are first-years, and as everyone says, this year we’re going to be fast. Swimming has been ramping up, and our coaches Bonnie, Carlos, Mel, and Mary-Ellen have been pushing us to become better now, when there’s so much time to correct things. I’m already impressed with how much I’ve improved since last season, and how quick everyone around me is. We’ve all stepped up in early morning lift, too, which is proving to be a lot of fun and quite a bit more sweaty since we’ve added agility training and ropes (literally, we have 15 foot long ropes that we lasso around for 30 seconds per round.)
Research as been great too, as Professor Conway has begun doing electrophysiology experiments in earnest. In electrophysiology, one records the firing rate of individual neurons by comparing the voltage change on the inside of the neuron to the outside. It’s very cool to see actual recordings being done, instead of reading about results in a textbook. And cool doesn’t even begin to describe how awesome it is that I get to work in a Harvard Med School lab, with a Nobel Laureate down the hallway, under direct supervision of full-time students, as a sophomore undergraduate. Come to Wellesley, guys—the opportunities are freaking amazing.
So that’s swimming, research, school, this is blogging… what else have I got going on in my life? Ooh, I got to go to a lecture this week! It sort of doesn’t count, because it had to do with athletics, but since everything in my life these days has some connection to school/swimming/friends (i.e. team), I suppose it’ll have to be forgiven :). Anyway, Ika and I went to go see a talk about sports nutrition by Dr. Katie Ackerman, who I have an appointment to go see in two weeks at the Children’s Hospital to talk about bone density and food and more! It was a very informative talk (e.g. more carbs for athletes! Less protein, more fat. Less fad diets, more supplements for calcium, Vit D and iron, but nothing else! Plus much more) and I summarized for Tiffany and other team members who were jealous they hadn’t gone. (I’m quite a bit more awake at 7am than most, and tend to jabber excitedly to Tiffany and whoever else gets stuck in the cross-fire :)).
Another fun swimming-related event this week is Lip Sync. There’s a contest next Tuesday for any groups that want to lip sync to whatever songs they want, with cash prizes for the top three winners. Most of the team is participating (I am watching, and being very impressed with the dancing), and I think that what has been put together so far is very good :). I’ll save the actual film for the show, but I’ve some nice pictures from the practice sessions :).
Lip Synch PARTY! We are so impressive. I believe Ceallach is picking up Grace, Annie Ika, and Tiffany Kendra. Theresa and Suman are doing the foreground dance in front 🙂
More Lip Sync :). Grace, Annie and Ika performing a song that I’ve never heard of but involves lots of snapping in various directions!
Photo quality’s definitely not good in this one, but it’s pictures like this that make me love the team 🙂
Anything else I’m missing? Well, there’s all the little in-between bits of life, but those are for my own enjoyment and not so much for the retelling :). So much of my day doesn’t take the form of discrete stories, and yet it’s all the time that isn’t organized into events that really describe how I live as a person. It’s kind of an odd thing to think about as a blogger, but it’s true for everyone, I think, in that you only hear about the funny things, or the great accomplishments, and not all the time spent working or playing or living in the meantime. I suppose that’s why we live our lives and don’t just read about them; why friendships are built through sharing together and time, time, time.
As always, I’ll gladly beg for questions and hope you all have a marvelous Wednesday :). Wish me luck for the test tomorrow, and I’ll see you next week!
Monica