A blog post long due. The new year has been pretty exhilarating so far! Mostly been caught up with lab work and a lot of writing (and I mean a lot!). That includes two first author manuscripts which had revisions and finally got accepted. Then there was a book chapter that the LEO team was asked to write. I had the opportunity to lead this one and I am happy to say that the chapter finally got accepted and will be published as well. And then there were four grants I contributed to, which took up quite a considerable amount of time, and another manuscript that is in review right now. I think this is the most I have devoted to writing in terms of writing multiple things at the same time. (My dissertation does not count because that is a different kind of writing...may be I will write more about that in a blogpost later). I have come to realize that writing is indeed an acquired skill. It takes quite a bit of practice, patience, and reading to write even one single line of meaningful words.
I was determined not to let my labwork fall behind though. Things have been on track so far. I hope to maintain the momentum. I will be sending off my samples for sequencing soon and I am excited and hopeful that the findings will be worth it. That is the beauty of doing research. You have an educated understanding of what you might expect but then again, you have no idea what you will see. The unexpected thrill of unearthing the unknown is all the motivation I need to do what I do!
Happy peaceful April to us all!