Create a Vacuum Day

Vacuum desiccator

According to holidayinsights.com, last Friday (February 4) was Create a Vaccuum Day.  Man, if only I had known that sooner!  I would have celebrated on time.  Instead, I guess I celebrated a week late.

Today I vacuum-impregnated my rock core samples from the Klamath Mountains.  You might be thinking, "Huh??"  One of my office buddies (a PhD student) showed me how to set my samples in epoxy and then put them in a vacuum chamber so that all of the tiny little air bubbles get sucked out.  Thus, I'm left with a nice (and bubble-free!) sample to look at under the Scanning Electron Microscope.

Yep, I think this is my nerdiest post to date.  And, by the way, I had no idea that Create a Vacuum Day existed until I stumbled upon it this evening. :)

Thesis stuff...

from PhD Comics

Mine's only a master's thesis, but the folks at PhD Comics are genius.  The goal is to defend my thesis in the summer (assuming I get it mostly written this semester).  But... it's hard to schedule anything with faculty during the summer (let alone 4 of them) due to busy schedules and field work.  And... things always take longer than anticipated.  The other day, I agreed to let my adviser request a TA spot for me in the fall. :(  I don't want to be in Vegas in the fall, but I guess if that happens, it would be nice to be able to pay rent.