Small rays of light in an otherwise crappy week

Good news of the week

I got an invitation to submit a paper for a special volume of high profile journal in my sub field based on a talk I gave earlier this fall

A student contacted me asking if I would be her advisor for her Master's as she'd heard from a friend what an excellent teacher I was (Ha, those are the moments that makes it all worth it)

Misbehaving senior colleague closed the discussion* with the words "I see now that you do, indeed, have some experience with "our shared field" (I guess this can be consider a success under the circumstances).

*The discussion ended up in a series of emails in which we did eventually find some common ground and he did sort of explain his point of view. Despite the seriously peculiar start, I have the feeling that we will probably be able to do some good work together, eventually.

I GOT THE JOB

I'm going to be a professor and leave the postdoc world behind starting summer 08.

I'm wildly excited about it but also a bit apprehensive about the upcoming move, about leaving this place when we finally begin to fell settled and feeling weirdly guilty that it went so easily for me. I haven't told many people yet. That's a bit strange, I thought I would be yelling from the rooftops, but truth to be told all I feel when it comes to announcing the news to my colleagues is guilt for leaving, for having bagged a better job and for not appreciating enough what I have here. I told my PI who was excited on my behalf, but sad to see me go. I also told my department chair who was excited on my behalf, and maybe not too sad to see me go and I told some friends and colleagues in grad school city who ranged from through the roof happy for me, to well, OK if that's what you want. It's not as strange as it sounds, because my colleagues are mainly people from what I consider my secondary sub-field and I'm sure I could make a good career for myself here if I wanted to stay in that field and if I didn't want to teach. But my new job is a chance to switch to my primary sub-field and a chance to switch to a university environment rather than the more corporate style workplace here and I think that's what they don't understand.