pulse-chase

Currently, I have received 2 secondary applications so far, even without my primary application having been verified by AMCAS.

Is that a good sign, or are those schools just not selective just yet?

I'm looking at the research available. One school has great research and a great hospital but is located within a terrible city (so I've been told) within the Midwest. The other school has minimal research and is nestled within a decently diverse city. If split between these two cases, I would pick the quality research over the city. My reasoning is that I really don't enjoy much of the city aside from the food and the weather. As long as there's a cold season, nothing could bring me down.

My lab mate Mant should be coming back this week, with tales of her adventures in India. She told me before her trip that she would be riding elephants and hiking through some lush jungle. She better have the pictures to back this up.

Not much else is really happening outside of work. I have resumed running- R&D wants me to run some race with him on Sunday, although I am very much out of shape and have no desire to pay money, drive to a city 2 hours away, run, and then come back during a weekend when I should be writing or resting. Also, passing the qualifying exam has not done any good to his ego. It's still big as ever! Sometimes I wish I did not catch the mistakes that he often makes while performing experiments. It makes me think less of him as a scientist each time he makes the same error.

3 letters of recommendation have been sent to my pre-health committee. The only 2 remaining are my ED volunteer coordinator and my PI. Hopefully these 5 letters will compose some laudatory image in the minds of the admissions committees, but how well do people really know me? If people directly asked me questions, I don't think I would beat around the bush with my response. My replies are usually straightforward, honestly blunt. If people don't appreciate what I try to say in order to help them, how will they react against other people who say things simply to hurt their feelings? In any case, penning the essays for my application required much more self-reflection than I had expected. This was both good and bad for me, good in that I have a clearer answer in my head about why I want to help people and do research, and bad in that I had to access buried memories or feelings towards people who have died.

Tonight's plan will be trying to go to sleep early (failed- it's already midnight...) and waking up early to have a healthy breakfast before running in my other new pair of shoes. 8 pairs of running shoes lie across the floor of my bedroom closet. I have run in only 62.5% of them while the thought of purchasing another pair has crossed my mind more than once this past week. Goodnight!