Greetings from Boston!

Sorry I have been away from UGAP presence for a while, but I had to finish writing my dissertation up though Labor Day. But it is now out of my hands, Thank God, and I pray that my committee likes it! I will be back in Austin to defend in 2 weeks!!

And then, I went to California for 5 days, etc., so I actually haven't really been around Boston enough to say much about the city. Boston is definitely cooler in temperature, and in the morning or evenings, it is a light jacket weather.

Work environment is good so far, and I live really close, so I can ride my bicycle (which I got for free-more on this later). I live next to the commuter rail station Roslindale Village.

I live just outside of the subway ("T") range, which is a bit annoying. So I drive to many places, which is something unusual for someone who lives in Boston. Parking is difficult, but if I drive away from the city center, then it is fine.

As I haven't been out much, I haven't connected with a young adult community here, so that will have to wait until next week. Likewise, I have been floating between neighborhood churches, of which there are several within 5 minutes of driving. I think I may join the young adult group at St. Ignatius, a parish sort of inside Boston College. http://www.bc.edu/bc_org/prs/stign/index.html
I was really hoping to join a group not affiliated with a university, but my schedule doesn't seem to allow much else. Boston College (BC) is Jesuit, so the group could be interesting or irritating.

Today, I decided to go to the Cathedral to join their choir. Of 10 people in the choir, 4 of them are hired section leaders. The distinction between the volunteers and professionals are a bit abrupt - after 1 hour of rehearsal, the "professionals" continued to work on some nicer/harder/ repertoire that I don't get to sing. Other repertoire is nice, though. Most importantly, it takes 45 minutes each way to go back and forth from my apartment! That is just way too much! So I don't think I want to go back. I should have gone to another young adult group meeting instead, on retrospect. The South End neighborhood (where the cathedral is) is nice, though, but probably very expensive. Anyway, I am rather moody because I am tired, and that may be coloring my perception too.

I am thinking that I am going to Holy Name parish instead (3 minutes away). They sing contemporary stuff, but it is still good. I guess I will have to get musical fix somewhere else. It may be that I am too fixated on what I want out of church choir rather than how I should give to the Body of Christ.

Not having had time to do much else also meant that I don't have furniture. I don't have a couch, which is just really really annoying. I also don't have decent chairs. Fortunately, there is a rummage sale at a neighborhood church on Saturday, so I will definitely make use of it! But if I want nice stuff, I should go to rummage sales in rich neighborhoods.. oh well.

I got my first real paycheck - except they took out almost 25% in taxes from the paycheck. Ouch. We pay state income tax in MA.

Post-doc life is very different. I work in a large clinical research center, so there are groups of people who do different things: some people only do data collection; others only do stats; others only do analyses. Different from being a graduate student, where I had to all of the above.
I am also not doing much biomechanics or engineering, but learning to do epidemiology, which is a very big shift in thinking and learning. I don't really interact with other scientists/professors, etc., so it is not as congenial as I'd like it to be. Then again, I've only been there 2 months.

If you have questions or comments, please leave a comment!