Damian is a graduate student in Michigan State University's Department of Plant Biology. I invited him to write this post after hearing his plant-related Miley Cyrus lamentations... and am absolutely thrilled with the outcome. Enjoy. -Anna

​[Damian writes...] Ok, so I’m about to get REAL petty– and yes, this is going to sound totally inconsequential, but hear me out.
 
I get it, there are far greater perils facing humanity at the current moment (read: the US federal government just walked away from the world’s first and, at the moment, best global initiative to combat CO2 emissions– one of only three nations to do so on Earth). Regardless, since she’s recently careened back into the limelight, I need to take a moment to acknowledge the country-born, tongue-flailing, cultural-appropriating elephant in the room… that is, our very own Saturday-morning-starlet-turned-wrecking-ball, Miley Cyrus. Yet, despite what initially appears trivial, in reality, may be a matter that threatens the well-being of plant communities EVERYWHERE!

Nate Emery is a post-doctoral researcher in the Dept. Plant Biology at Michigan State University. Visit his website or follow him on Twitter for more info.

[Nate writes...] So much of life is figuring out what you want to do. As you go from one life step to the next, everyone asks "What are you going to do now?" or "What will you do with ___ degree?" More often is the case where you don't find "the answer" immediately, nor did you know what "your passion" was since age 5. 

Keep reading at kbs.msu.edu

[Anna writes...] ​​I spend a lot of time on Stack Exchange. It’s an online forum where people ask questions about how to do statistics in the program R. Like Yahoo Answers for nerds.

​A visit to Stack Exchange is just about the only guaranteed way to ruin my day.

[Anna writes..] I think I’d really enjoy being a costume designer, Broadway superstar, or Olympic gymnast. Unfortunately, I don’t exactly have the credentials for those positions.
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Over here in reality, I will soon be “moving out of higher education in search of new challenges and opportunities” (thanks, Jobs on Toast). So I’m currently putting together what should be the most important résumé of my life... and belting the Hamilton soundtrack in my kitchen. As I’m contemplating how to compile my relevant experiences and sell myself, I’ll do what I always do when I need to get my thoughts straight: write a blog post.
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[Anna writes...] “You don’t look like a tromp-around-in-the-woods type.”
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It was 2012, and after four years in an Environmental Studies undergraduate program and a few summers spent in various eco-jobs, I was more than familiar with the expected look. Luckily, the boy commenting was a cute prospective graduate student from Washington D.C. at my grad school interview weekend and not, say, my future advisor who was about to hire me to “tromp around in the woods.”

[Anna writes...] It's me. Actually, it's the research. 

​I have known I would leave academia since Monday, February 25, 2013. It was my first year of grad school. A professor in my department’s wife had had a baby the day before, on Sunday. On Monday he came into work like it was a normal day.

[Anna writes...] Let me start off by saying I firmly believe that Gary Johnson knows what “Aleppo” is and does, in fact, know many names of many foreign leaders. I believe this because when I listened to the recordings of those interviews, I had horrible comprehensive exam flashbacks.