Next time he visits, Patrick and I are going to go to this bakery in Boston. It looks like it has some yummy stuff (and they have the best gourmet sandwiches in Boston--Patrick loves his sandwiches). The coolest thing is that their chef used to be a management consultant, then she left that job to become a pastry chef.

At our meeting yesterday, Anne suggested that if I stay here and get my masters, I could get a part-time job at a bakery to see how I'd feel about it. Patrick said (and I agree) that it might be too stressful combined with grad school, and I wouldn't want to be too busy to enjoy it. But if I did decide to get a job, it would be cool if I could work at flour. After all, the chef would be sympathetic to my desire to leave my set career to bake. And you know, if they wouldn't take me, there are tons of other bakeries in Boston. I want to visit them all!

It would be silly if I got a part-time job at Sweet 'n' Nasty, the erotic bakery. It would make for good stories, but not good resume-building. Hmm...

Anyway, I won't be looking for part-time jobs for a while, if at all. Still need to decide whether I'll be staying here at all. Apparently, the other first year grad student in our research group is taking next semester off to do some soul-searching. Good to know I'm not the only one :)

But in positive research news, I found a new mini-project to do today. It doesn't require synthesis, and it'll occupy me for a few weeks. By the time I'm done with it, I'll have made my big decision. So that means no more synthesis for me in the near future, unless Anne is just playing a dirty, dirty trick on me. And I'm actually excited to see how this project turns out.

I got a coupon for $5 off a $35 order at Amazon when I used a Bank of America ATM in Palo Alto (I miss them--they don't have any locations in Boston. Bank of *America*, my ass!). So I spent it last night. I needed a new alarm clock because I bought my current one for $5 when I was at the hostel in Boston this summer (I lost the one I brought with me, then it turned up at the front desk after I'd bought the second one, but I regrettably decided just to leave it there--who needs two alarm clocks?). So my cheap alarm clock isn't reliable, and I ordered a new one for $15 from Amazon. It sets itself using a radio signal from the atomic clock. Fancy! I also got a decent can opener and a slotted spoon. A very practical purchase.