The Advancement Came to Me

Dear Diary,

I have been selected for an interview for that Fellowship I applied to!  Wowie!  I'm super pumped for the opportunity to talk about my research and career goals in front of a panel of real physicists!

...Hmm, that sounds a lot like the advancement to candidacy.  Why have I been putting it off, you ask?  Well, I wanted to get the initial project I was given  out of the way.  I am was so optimistic!

But now the advancement has come to me!  If I had played my cards right, I could maybe just do both at the same time!  Over the weekend, I'll have to prepare a presentation on things I've done, places I've been to, and interview questions both technical and simple!

But the sartorial choices are key!  I'll need to find some proper dress shoes and choose whether I wear the blue or the red dress shirt.  I just got new ties for both, so this is an excellent time to ponder endlessly about which one will be cooler to wear (it's supposed to be over 100 the next few days!).  Hmm...maybe the purple shirt...with the skinny black tie!  Eh...or the blue...or red...or plain white...

Oh, and I'll get a haircut!

Another Fellowship appears!

Dear Diary,

Kieron has brought another fellowship to my attention!  And I might even be the person they're looking for on this one!  Even better, I actually want to apply for this one--I want it!

What's this?  It's due tomorrow?!  Oh boy!

So I turned to the master of the fellowship:  John, former group member!  He provided some material on this particular fellowship and it was very helpful.  Now, I just need to scramble around and get four letters of recommendation, a few essays written, and modify my CV.  Then if I get through, I'll need to prepare for an interview.

[Editor's note:  It pays to hear about and start early.]

Justin: unemployed

Dear Diary,

Justin's employment was terminated today.  He will now be working for the American taxpayer via the National Science Foundation as he won the prestigious Graduate Research Fellowship.

Fly little bird!  Spread your wings and go wherever the wind may take you!  He's now up in a big office on the second floor with the postdocs and other funded students.

The rest of us have to keep working for Kieron in the basement...Kieron also mentioned something about this being a lesson for the rest of us (eek!).  I'd better get to work!

The Fellowship of the Grant

Dear Diary,

Whew.  I'm exhausted.  I just toted a tiny grant proposal all the way across middle winter.  I wasn't really equipped at first to handle this task and take the precious to the end, but I had a great band of comrades who helped me out.  The ability to fund oneself is important as one grant can rule them all and, in the physics, support it.


Sure, we bickered about how the essays should be written, what they should be written about, who to send reference letter requests to, and ultimately who gets the money if we win, but the real adventure is between friends.  At first, the essays seemed to dig too deep and too greedily.  Strangely enough, the more I attacked the essays in a short amount of time, the less effective I was.  So, it was important to space things out.*

I had enormous writer's block and had to rewrite everything approximately infinitely many times, but it led to a good place.  I am worried that if we wind up some of the essays any tighter, then they'll snap in half while the reviewers are reading them!

And if I win, the precious will be mine!  I'll be invisible to all external granting woes!  It can even go on my CV!

...oh, and there's the sweet physics I'll get to do too...

*-But maybe not three movies worth...