Wednesday, June 10, 2009

Work is exciting! And other random thoughts

It's only been 3 days, but I'm enjoying it so much so far. First, I get to talk to people whom I find smart and interesting. Second, when I go home, I am home and I don't reeeeeeally have to worry about work anymore. Third, NewJobCity is beautiful. It's just so awesome in so many ways! I can't help but think that not only am I having way more impact than before by working on relevant industrial projects, but I am basically doing the same thing I used to do in grad school (research) but getting paid like 4-5 times as much. I can't get over how awesome that is, just in general!

I am seriously like so happy with everything right now - if only Mr. Phizz were around. Fortunately, he is coming to visit soon and I am even more happy about that.

The only thing I find a bit strange is how many meetings are held in the corporate world. It's like, a lot. Weekly group meetings were quite enough for me in grad school, but having like....sometimes 4 meetings in a day? Good lord. But sometimes it breaks up the day. Other times, it's just insane.

Oh yeah - and if I am not careful, I am going to get very, very fat from eating lunch out every day. Not only that, my wallet will get much thinner than it needs to be. I used to wonder about people who complained that they couldn't bring lunch because it broke social code at work. I thought that was the lamest excuse for being fat ever. However, I can see how that works. My boss doesn't ever bring lunch. When he says, "do you want lunch?" you want to say, "yes" so you can get face time with him. Plus, if a number of people go out every day, do you want to relinquish the only chance you have to hang out with people during the middle of the day? Not really...so far, I have only brought my lunch a few times, partially because it's been hard to get to the store to buy lunch stuff, partly because I've been busy, and partly because I want to get plugged into the work network by going out to lunch with everyone.

Anyway, so those are my initial thoughts about being a full-time employee. Woo woo!!!

10 comments:

Alyssa said...

I am so, so glad the job is working out so far! YAY!!

You are my inspiration that getting an "industry" job is totally okay, and in fact awesome :)

Amanda@Lady Scientist said...

I'm glad that things are going so well! Sounds like a good fit. About the lunch thing, someone suggested (maybe on another blog?) that you still go out to eat, but just get something small, like a salad or something. Then, you can nibble on stuff you brought with you for the rest of the day. Maybe that would work for you?

Jim L. said...

Glad things are going so well. See the corporate world is not so bad, I just can't wait to get out of it :-). And I know how you feel with the food, my wife is a resident and they always have junk food and lunches for the residents which is great but it is never anything healthy so she goes along but usually doesn't eat anything and will eat her lunch seperatly.

blank said...

Despite the threat of getting fat, I think at the moment it is really important that you keep having lunch with other people. You're just going to have to adjust your eating habits for the rest of the day around that unfortuantely. I find when I'm out for lunch soup is a great option (though perhaps not if you are in a place f decent summer. Here it works pretty much all year round!)

Though I am delighted to hear how well the job is going, please tell me that you are only having this may meetings because you are new. I am NOT a meeting fan! Unless I am trying to initiate one with my supervisor. Usually then he's not a meeting fan.

Woohoo for the work!

PhysioProf said...

w00t!!

Cath@VWXYNot? said...

Meetings can be great, if they have a defined agenda and outcomes! If not, they just become a great big time suck. I remember weeks in my industry job where I would go from meeting to meeting, each one adding more and more items to my to-do list, which I couldn't even think about tackling, because I had another meeting to go to... I hope you don't have too many days like that!

Psych Post Doc said...

I am so glad you're enjoying your new job.

I am not in "industry" per say but I so hear you on the meetings. I have actually taken over coordination of many of our meetings because I couldn't stand the time suck that they were when I first arrived at my job. Now, I do everything I can to avoid having unnecessary meetings and coming up with clear agendas for each meeting I coordinate so that it doesn't suck up all my time.

Even with that, there are still days where I feel like I got nothing done due to all the meetings.

PhizzleDizzle said...

Meetings in the beginning I guess can be good so I can sort of try to absorb the general accumulated knowledge from everyone else, but sometimes I think it would make more sense if I just sat down with someone and said, "tell me everything you know about X".

I am in a lot of meetings, but I suppose they make the day go faster, since I'm not useful enough to really help with that many projects quite yet.

Nicky said...

I've worked in both environments: where everybody eats lunch together, and where they don't. Be grateful that you're in the first environment, honestly. When I was in that situation, I constantly complained about the calories and expense, but I really loved socializing with coworkers. When I next moved to an environment where nobody went out and everybody ate lunch alone most days, I was going nuts after just a few weeks. It's lonely like that! Pretty soon, I was the one walking office to office getting people to take a break and come out for lunch.

microbiologist xx said...

So glad to hear that you are loving your new job.
I am horrible about bringing lunch. Not only do I just like going out to lunch, but it also breaks the day up nicely and gives me a chance to get the hell out of the building.