bla bla bla lCP Mass Spectrometer bla bla bla

My boss said today that he was afraid of me becoming "overly focused" on one project. Yes, that does sound dangerous, doesn't it? I might actually get some work done!! Oh, my!

Conversations with my boss exhaust me. He pesters me with questions that he just has to know that I don't know, like--"...you know what an ICP Mass Spectrometer is, right?" It's getting to the point where I pointedly say "No." And always, after pelting me with hundreds of random, useless questions, he bombards me with hundreds of elaborate, confusing, in-depth answers. Useless answers, I might add--to go along with the useless questions. Okay, so it's not so bad--there are a few useful tid-bits in there once and a while--those I clamp onto like a drowning person to a life-raft. I frantically scribble those down. The rest, well...I'm not really sure where those go.

I get the distinct impression that my boss is investing. In me. He's stuffing me with all the information he can muster, talk talk talking my ears off and then releasing me into the wild for some hands-on experience. My grad student tells me that when he leaves, I'm all my boss has. I'm not sure how I feel about that. I totally understand what he's doing, though, and a lot of what he's doing is right and helpful, but then...why, 90% of the time, do I feel lost and purposeless? It's getting better all the time though, little by little. Today I held my own in a conversation about nitric acid, ethanol and phosphate-based detergent, so I'm making a tiny bit of progress. I've recently been attached to a project involving the carcass of a Gray-Horned Owl and some metal analysis. We clean the feathers, cut them up, digest them in some acid and then send 'em through a machine with tells us what we need to know. Neat!