The day, of interview and studies

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Spent most of the day outside today. It was a good chance for me to browse through the textbook 'biotechnology for beginner'. I did most of reading in the quiet of the central library, though I did spend the early morning relaxing with some coffee in the Bryant park (before going off to a lecture for a while). Actually relaxing is not an accurate description of what I was doing. I was sending off emails and calling people left and right trying to arrange interviews for the diybio nyc peeps. I've never done anything like that before so things were getting a little chaotic, with last minute announcements and schedule changes. Mistakes and misunderstandings were plenty, and I was beginning to think that I was making some horrible decisions on the spot.
 
Well I was able to get one of the members onto an interview with the reporter (who I mistakenly thought was a man, and working for a school newspaper. She was neither), and arranged another one for myself in the evening. The whole process involved a whole plethora of trials and tribulations that happened due to my characteristic over thinking preparation and careless execution. After the whole planning and calling I stuff I met up with a friend and had some much needed lunch at the cafe Zaiya, which was overcrowded as usual.
 
The interview is done for the day and I'm in a bookstore trying to cool off my nerves with some Feynman adventures. My portion of the interview was interesting. The reporter lady was quite friendly, and was patient with my answers that sometimes turned into something of a rambling (I knew I should have taken that public speaking elective in High School). During the course of the interview I had to frequently ask her to repeat her questions though. For some reason my ears were picking up a whole torrent of background noises... Maybe I should get them checked out.
 
We spoke about the reason for my interest in diybio, along with the difficulties involved in getting a group working together. The topics moved onto interest in science itself, and I gave some lazy answers on that one. I feel very passionate on the issue of the nature and utility of the sciences in general but I couldn't find a way to put it in short eloquent statements... Not to mention that I felt disclosing such intense emotions would have been rather embarrassing.
 
All in all, my first experience in arranging interviews for a group (or arranging anything for a group for that matter). I keep on feeling that I should have been better informed and prepared, but I guess beating myself over it won't change anything. Time to give the Feynman book a little pause and arrange yet another interview for the valued member of our group. Just hope this one turns out to be better than mine.

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