Graduation is OVER

Yep we finished up this weekend.  It is still pretty surreal.  I keep thinking it is going to eventually hit me that graduate school is coming to end but then I have to come to work and do a growth curve so I can do capillary electrophoresis tomorrow and then I realize why it hasn't hit me that I've graduated :)  Here is a picture of us in our robes.  John might add some more pics with the family later.  Regalia does nothing for the figure let me tell you :)

Almost the whole house is packed up.  My family (Mom, Grands, Dad and Bob) plus most of John's family (Peg, Dave, Ed, Jenna and Billy) came down for graduation.  After feeding them on Friday and Saturday, we put them to work packing our house.  I feel so guilty for everyone taking their vacations and then us put them to work but we are so thankful that they did help.  John and I wouldn't even be half as close as we are now if it had just been the two of us.  I think I spent most of the time in some sort of half trance state because it just seemed unreal that it was happening.  There were a few testy times as there always is when packing, hunger and fatigue set in but I think overall we all weathered it pretty well.  There is no way we could possibly thank everyone as much as they deserve.  I'm not sure how we are going to pay everyone back because a simple thank you just won't cut it.  John and I are certainly blessed to have such loving families that care about us enough to brave high 90s-low 100s weather to help us pack our stuff and then carry it to the POD.

Graduation was ok.  I was in the early pack to get hooded so I was getting just a tad bored by the time we finished with all the hooding and then the master's students walked across.  The speaker, the CEO of Build-A-Bear was actually pretty good.  I was wondering if the talk would be a huge analogy of college being like putting together a bear (the heart of a dawg, the stuffing of the knowledge you've taken in and the outer skin of the person you were when you came here; no matter what clothing you cover yourself with or where you move you always have your degree blah blah blah) but instead it was actually pretty good as commencement talks go.  I was impressed overall.  

We went to dinner tonight with Wendy, Andy, Chandra, Emily and James H.  Emily and James leave out tomorrow morning and it is just hard to believe that they are heading out to Idaho.  Chandra leaves on Tuesday for Arkansas to then head to Montana.  The whole thing just seems weird.  I mean I want us all to get jobs and move on but I don't really want everyone to move away if that makes any sense at all.  I still want to be able to go downstairs and run into James and Emily and go shopping with Chandra so we can gossip or complain.  I guess now it will be on the phone or through the internets.  Hopefully we can meet up occasionally so we can keep up.  I'm happy yet sad for everyone.  

So my strains are definitely growing tonight.  I might have everything spun down and ready to go to work tomorrow by 11pm which is pretty awesome for minimal media.  I don't know if I should want the experiment to work tomorrow or not.  If it works it means I have to do it for all the other strains.  If it doesn't I might not have to do this again and I might be officially done but the data might be a nice addition to the paper.  I really need a vacation though :)  What happens will happen no matter what I want :)