An Update: Two Weeks In

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 Hi everyone, welcome back to my little corner of the internet. Over the past year, I have graduated with a bachelor's degree in civil engineering and begun my journey as a PhD student! I'm remaining at the same school, but the whole COVID situation means that my life looks a bit different now than it did last year. 


Things that have changed: 

  • I bought an electric bike and I've been riding it to school! I really like it - it makes riding up the hill to my house feel just like riding on flat ground. I haven't been late to class yet and I've only caved and asked Tim to drive me to school once.
  • My research focus is completely different. For my PhD, I'm studying a method of transforming mine wastes into concrete, specifically the durability of the resulting concrete material. I don't have a lot of experience with this yet, so I've been reading lots of papers lately and studying up! I got to tour the lab I will be working in, and might get to see a demo of the process next week :)
  • I'm riding horses again! I've been leasing an Arab cross named Castiel from a really great girl who lives nearby. The barn is only ~15 minutes away, and there is a dressage arena and some trails just outside the property. 

Things that remain the same:

  • My classes are more similar than they are different, I think. All of my classes are mostly on campus with a few online components. One class has quizzes online every Friday, so I don't have to go to campus at 8am that day. The other class periods have some lectures on Zoom and some in person, with masks and social distancing and sanitizer. 
  • Even with the slight easing of quarantine rules, I've enjoyed cooking and baking a variety of different things. Some of them have turned out pretty badly (like my sponge cake & the French onion tart) while some were pretty delicious (I made saltine cracker toffee yesterday and it's almost gone today ;)
  • I still have Zoom meetings with my professor to discuss my progress, although another (really cool) professor has also joined my team of advisors. I'm also working with other graduate students again, just a different group of them. I also have some of my best friends from undergrad in my graduate classes! Always an exciting bonus :)


All in all, my first two weeks as a PhD student have flown by! I don't feel too overwhelmed by my classes (yet) and I'm excited to start my research project. I'm technically involved in phase 2 of the project, which begins in January, so I'll be spending my time getting up to speed with what they learned in Phase 1 until that starts! I'm also going to be a TA for my professor's lab class, which I'm really looking forward to :) I've always wanted to be a TA... 

Happy Labor Day to all of you, thanks for following along!

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