Thursday, August 7, 2008

Oh shut up already

The departmental talk I spent forever preparing went over well. I had many positive comments afterwards, even though the talk itself was poorly attended. I had a ridiculously rough time leading up to the talk. My supervisor had to order me to stop analyzing data...I just always felt that I hadn't done enough yet...the perpetual inferiority complex. As a result of my lack of attention to the actual presentation itself, my practice talks were excrutiatingly bad. I had to hold back tears during round two- honestly, that NEVER happens. I don't cry over stupid shit like that. But then, with the help of my fantastic lab mates, the actual day-of presentation was smooth. I kept thinking to myself "I would not repeat these past two weeks if someone PAID me". Which, incidentally, is the exact same thing I told myself for the two weeks of extremely late nights leading up to my poster presentation in Spain. I see a pattern.

I had two amazing days to recover, and then the start of the week+ long international protistology conference/tree of life conference. I gave my first "real" talk at that conference - in front of colleagues more experienced than I. In fact, there were startlingly few Masters students. So I was surprised I got a presentation prize. A $200 cheque, membership for free, and a gigantic book worth alot of $$. Combined with the copious amounts of free alcohol and food I ate during that week, well, I think I came out ahead.

Yay for Science.

1 comment:

James McInerney said...

Yaaaay for science indeed. :)