AAS, Day 2

Ugh. I think I talked with about 5 people today at the booth (real conversations…I did tel more people that they could take pens, etc.)

The longest conversation I had was with Nick, the head of our lab (he’s not counted in the 5 people, since technically he’s here with the booth). He asked about my research with Kim, and we talked just a bit about the Constellation-X web page work I’ve been doing. Hopefully I didn’t make too much an ass of myself.

Perhaps the best part of manning the booth is people-watching. While I don’t like to encourage stereotypes, scientists are, in general, some of the most…um…interesting people. Take Mr. Beard, for example. Pat and I both spied portly man sporting the most…um…interesting beard. He had shaved his chin and cheeks, but left a bushy undergrowth on his neck. How…um…interesting.

I also went to one of the talks sessions this afternoon. The session was on Active Galaxies, my area of research, but I was disappointed that both of the speakers scheduled to talk about X-ray observations failed to show up. The other talks were interesting, though I can’t say I remember much about them now.

I was so tired by the end of the day, though, that I was ready to cry. Chris encouraged me to go to the grad student reception after the main sessions, but that would have been enough to put me over the edge. It was supposed to be an opportunity for grads to network with potential job connections. It’s hard for me to deal with that much socialization in one day — just being on display at the Con-X booth all day is nearly more than I can handle (even on a quiet day like today). I’m going to have to come to one of these as just a participant; that way I can bug out for a couple hours in the afternoon, regroup, and then be ready to network in the evening. Or I need to rethink my career, again…