Never Thought I'd Be A Laser Jock

At some point when I was looking for an advisor and was interested in Phil Reid I was discussing the option with one of my fellow first-years and she said that she had been interested in his research as well but didn't want to be a laser jock. I didn't think much of the comment, I shrugged it off and convinced myself that really, just knowing how to run your instrument is not a bad thing and I would definitely learn more than the shmo down the hall who just flips a switch and expects things to work. Plus, I'm sure, it was a matter of ego at the time... being a member of the small community of scientists who know how to run an ultrafast laser system was appealing to me. It still is. But five years later and with 8 months of serious laser jock-ing (pretending to be a laser tech) under my belt, I have a slightly different idea of what it means to be a member of this community. I never thought I'd be a laser jock, in the back of my mind I still always just expected things to work, but now I know you can't really do research in this field without becoming one. And so I will embrace it.