The Eternal Post-Doc

One of my very first scientific mentors was a middled aged man who'd only been employed as a post-doc for his entire professional career after finishing his PhD. And at the time, I thought that was the craziest thing I'd ever heard of. Until a few days ago when I was on my way to pick up my daughter from school at 3 in the afternoon. Like a bolt of lightening it hit me that I've NEVER been a stay on a job for 39 years kinda person, preferring instead to change my environment every so often. Or 10 times in the last 10 years if I'm reading my CV correctly. I suddenly realized that flexibility and change actually works better for me than 9-5 daily political battles, inflexible schedules, and people with personalities that are a cross between a cactus and a fruitloop.

I realized that I thrive on not knowing exactly what's in the future place wise, then I started thinking about how that attitude fits in with a career in research and medicine. And believe it or not, it can fit in VERY well. Locums are people who fill temporary positions and in the US, those positions are usually filled by Physicians. And while I don't know any personally, I initially started thinking about this type of work a few years ago when locum Doc on Mommd made comments about her experiences.

The idea of being on a reservation in Alaska for a few months for 3 months (in the summer time, lol), taking a month off to work on my research, then working another couple months in the bayous of Louisianna sounds VERY appealing. I could do that for a few years, then take a 2 year Post-Doc in Bioinformatics while moonlighting on the weekends in an inner city hospital. In other words, I think being a Locum Doc could work very well for me!!!

Oh well, enough daydreaming about the future, I've got to work on my lesson plan for Monday as well as a complicated program for my Python class due the following Monday.
I've said it before and I'll say it again, LIFE IS GOOD!!! Or as Destiny's Child says in the video below, I'm doing so Good!