PTSD

Waiting for the Revolution*

I am still on a BNC high so forgive me if I'm even more incoherent than usual. Unlike E, who seems to have chosen sucky panels to go to, I had excellent luck with mine to the extent that my panel (not helped by the fact that one of my recurring nightmares did come true and I did forget my English-speaking abilities for a while during my talk) was probably the least fun one. I tried to muster up interest in Zebra mussels and United States science policy but it just wasn't happening. E, as usual, was good and she got to meet one of her "peeps" so it worked out well for half of PTSD. The other half had heaps more fun with her poster (which wasn't actually a poster but bignamesecurity person liked it! yay! I just wish I hadn't been tongue-tied and unable to talk).

But, I said I wouldn't blog about the BNC any more (well, I said I would but would wait till later). This is actually more about some things that happened in the past day or two. First, I found out that I did get a summer job. As a foreigner in the Land of the Free, options for work are highly limited so I was (am) extremely well-pleased especially as summer is the only time I can work full-time. It works out well since I can now pay my tuition and the exhorbitant health insurance costs that TUWSNBN charges its students and maybe even save enough to send Mum and Dad off to visit LilSisNo1.

The slightly odd part (for me anyway) is that I will be working with (for?) other postgraduate students, including E (who gets to be a teacher). So, E is going to have part of me (or is that vice versa?) as her TA. This is rather amusing in that I always saw E as being ruthlessly efficient. In our past days as Research Assistants, she'd be running around copying gazillions of stuff while the rest of us whinged when we had to do any copying (I was extremely fortunate in that the person I worked for had very little administrative stuff for me to do and it was mostly all research). That's a lot to live up to. I'm warning you, E, that I do best with deadlines. And structure. And a timeline. In any case, it's going to be fun in that E is going to be lording (lady-ing it?) over me. I will be running around being oppressed in a typical Third World/postcolonial fashion.

All I have to say is that expect this summer to be the beginning of a revolution when the masses take over (well, if it's only me, then is it called "a mass"? Can a mass revolt?). I'd have to figure out the effects of power and coopt/resist it but in a very localised fashion. That just sounds like a bit too much work to me but do keep tuned to PTSD for more Summer action.


*For those who, like me, are keen on films, there's a good one called Children of the Revolution about how Stalin might have had a half-Aussie illegitimate child.

posted by Priya @ 11:19 PM