Home is where you hang your hat

Have I mentioned that I love this place?

The summer was kind of overwhelming with all the newness...new people, new job, new city, new home...and while I did love the adventure of it, being the new person is always a little uncomfortable. It's hard to break into an already established group, and being the new person that nobody knows very well gets old quick. That's all of a sudden not an issue anymore because all the other new students are settled in now. It's really nice to have other people around who are in the same boat. Not to mention that they are all fabulous. We had Newbie Movie Night yesterday, and several new clubs are in the works.

The new living situation is proving to be a winner. Most of the new roommates show the potential to be almost as great as some of my more exceptional past roommates. We tried to have a house dinner on Friday. It would be nice to have everybody in the same place for a little while, but that didn't work out quite as planned. One roommate ditched us, and another invited some other people. Not that we were trying to exclude anyone, we just wanted a chance to get to know the people who share our bathroom without any outside distractions. The plan was foiled, but we did have a great time.

My research is finally starting to take shape, I guess. I'm getting used to the idea of telling the whole jellyfish community that their method sucks. Somebody's got to do it. The rest of the questions I have are still huge and scary, but at least I have a large selection of interesting questions to consider. I finally feel like I'm doing real science, and it's a huge challenge, but I'm up to it.

The other day, one of the last remining summer undergrads asked me if I was homesick. My immediate reaction was "What are you talking about? I am home." That felt good. I do miss my family and my old friends and the good old days at Coastal, but this definitely feels like home now.