Thursday we took an AP bio field trip to a biopharmaceutical company in town. First, some marketing people gave us free food and made us brainstorm. Then some more marketing people presented a really boring powerpoint on quality. Then some scientists gave us a tour of the labs. Then we came back to the room with the marketing people and they gave us more free food and information on how we could eventually come to work at the biopharmaceutical company if we wanted to.
Basically, I paid no attention whatsoever to the science aspect of this. What I was really interested in was the culture. What are research scientists like? How do they interact with each other? What do they do all day? I was really psyched about going on this field trip, and the reason I was psyched had nothing to do with wanting to be a biologist and everything to do with that book I used to be writing (remember that?) and hope to start writing again and finish writing someday.
The conclusions I came to: Research scietists are, in general, very quirky, shy, earnest people who, in general, I like very much. There is something endearing about people when they don't seem to care about much except the fact that doing science makes them happy. I think my favorite person there was a twenty something year old girl with bad skin, glasses, piercings, and a kind of shy, dorky, enthusiastic smile who spends all day identifying the bacteria and fungi that contaminate things. She seemed to find bacteria and fungi very exciting. She showed us some different types that she finds particularly exciting. She talked about how cool her job is and how it's like solving mysteries every day. She seemed very open and innocent, and she also seemed very uncomfortable talking in front of a group of eight biology students and a couple of her coworkers. Her hand was shaking as she held up culture plates for us. There was a lady in charge of chromatography who probably had the worst ADHD of anyone I've ever met in my life. There was a short, squat guy who helped lead us through the tour who didn't talk but would occasionally burst into manic laughter. There was a rather Julian-esque guy who made exagerated motions with his hands while speaking very softly. There were radios in all of the labs playing blues and indie rock while chemicals churned in giant vats. On a whiteboard in the hallway, next to some muticolored games of tick-tack-toe, some scientist had drawn a stick figure characature of another scientist with a little arrow pointing to it that said "slacker."
The marketing people were just slimy. They had unconvincing smiles and spoke in euphamisms and wrote down the things we brainstormed in different colors of magic marker. I didn't trust them. I trusted the scientists. The scientists didn't have anything to hide - they just want to keep identifying fungi.
Anyway, the marketing people gave us all free baseball caps with the name of the company on them. And they said we could keep the safety goggles we wore in the labs if we wanted. All the AP bio kids walked around for the rest of the day wearing their hats and goggles.
We carpooled instead of getting a bus for some reason. There are some girls that I kind of hang out with in AP bio that I think I am going to miss after the class is over, but not enough to talk to them ever again. That kind of thing always happens - it's always over after the class ends. It is kind of sad. They are all very interesting people. I carpooled with them and we listened to the Postal Service so loud we couldn't hear each other talk. I don't think I like the Postal Service.
I am not doing so well in precalc right now. The other day I couldn't take a quiz. I had been absent a couple times, and I looked at it, and I didn't know how to do a single one of the problems, and I freaked out. Hoffman sensed that I was freaking out and brought me out into the hallway and, once I told him what was up, honestly, said that I didn't have to take the quiz. It made me feel guilty how understanding he was. I talked to him about it after the fact, and I ended up being able to study for the quiz for a couple days and then take it with twenty five points off. This was extremely generous, but it's still going to make my grade really sucky. I have gotten Cs on three out of the four assessments we've gotten back this term, so we might be talking D range. I am hoping that getting caught up with the homework will completely solve this problem and that it isn't just that I'm dumb. Even so, I have decided to take AB calc next year instead of BC. Because I've realized that there is really no reason for me to take BC calc other than the fact that I am a snob. I don't think I would actually enjoy it enough to make it worth the work. Besides that, I don't want to have a nervous breakdown again.
On the not feeling bad about myself side, the AP bio test was relatively easy. I'm thinking I got a four. I guess most of the reason I feel like I don't know anything about bio is because I hate Ms. Bio and her inability to understand or speak English. At first I was looking forward to spending every day as a study working on our giant scary project because I wouldn't have to listen to her talk, but now I realize that she will talk anyway. She always does. She will say, "this is really important, kids," and then she will spend forty five minutes saying absolutely nothing at all. And when you ask her a clarifying question, she will recite those forty five minutes over again and not answer the quesiton.
On a completely different note,
I hate all holidays. And I love hate post secret.
Anyway, homework. I'm gonna do that now.
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