So, tomorrow I’ll be embarking on my first train ride. Not to say that I haven’t used light-rail metro systems, but this will be the first Amtrak system that I hit up. I’ll be leaving (eeeaaaaarrrly…) for Chicago to attend this year’s annual Society for Neuroscience meeting. 2008’s was in Washington, D.C. and 2007’s was in San Diego, so Chicago is considerably less interesting to me, but perhaps a train ride will make things a bit more interesting.
We basically decided that, rather than waiting at the airport and flying, we may as well take the 5.5 hr train ride instead. As I understand it, these trains have quite a bit of leg room (compared to the Coach area of a plane) and a snack car, so it should be more comfortable.
Anyway, I’m looking forward to the trip. We’ll probably get a chance to head by a few “sights” while in Chicago, as it seems that there is relatively little to see at the meeting on Monday and Tuesday (I present late on Wednesday). It looks like they put the majority of Parkinson’s-related research on Saturday (when I’m not there) and Wednesday (while I’m also presenting it), so we’ll probably dabble a bit in some posters and then go to Shedd Aquarium or something.
This will also be my last formal presentation of data at a meeting like this, certainly while a grad student at SLU. I at least think I’m going out with some good work, and the poster looks pretty. I’ve got some fluorescent images on there to add a bit more color to otherwise boring graphs (I had Brooke help me with some of the color choices, of course, as my Mom saw fit to give me color-blindness…).
Also, as this is my last trip as a grad student, I’ll also be hitting up the NeuroJobs portion of the conference, seeing if I can land a job somewhere. I’ve sent the resume to a few places, but haven’t really concentrated on it much yet because of various school-related things, and, well, doing experiments and such. After this week, I’ll be hitting that up in earnest.
Regardless, it doesn’t look like the busy-ness of the last few months is going away anytime soon. Guess I should get used to it.
So — are we moms always the ones who pass along the bad traits?? i.e. baldness, color blindness, etc?? Seems your sister managed to snare several of your dad’s ‘issues’ . i.e. eyesight, hearing, etc. Guess those aren’t genetic.
Hope you have a good trip! luv u
How did you enjoy the Amtrak? I’ve taken it out of Kville many times, and once out of St. Louis. Personally, I prefer to fly. Then again, I’m headed for the burbs rather than the city. If you have time, you should take a ride/walk over to Millennium Park.