I thought I’d use the first post of 2021 to post updates and celebrate 2 years of sporadic blogging. Cover art inspired by “Uncut Gems.”

2 years

I started this blog in January 2019 for multiple reasons. First and foremost, I wanted to share what I was up to, both inside and outside of lab. I was struggling to generate data, which sucked, but at the same time I was learning a lot of cool molecular biology techniques. I figured blogging about my experiences, good and bad, could help me explain what doing science was like to family and friends. Maybe I could help someone else struggling with the same issues I was facing; at least I could show others that failed experiments and troubleshooting are common in science. Plus, explaining and sharing science is fun. Maybe I could help an undergrad or high school student figure out if science is right for them. I know that when I was in high school, I wanted to know what scientists were like.

Two years later, I’m glad I started this website. I got an email from someone asking for help with troubleshooting TEVC experiments, which I was happy to answer. A professor from Sweden found my blog, upgraded their microscopes to digital ones, and asked if I could send any leftover opusxpress parts we had in lab (again happy to help.) Some of my most popular blog posts were “How to run DNA/RNA gels at high voltage (i.e. faster)” and “Thoughts on grad school” which I hope were useful. Plus, one of the UCSD students I mentor saw my hiphop wall of fame, which sparked a long discussion on the Griselda movement (Burden of Proof and Pray for Paris are both insane; everything Griselda is album of the year for me.) It felt good to be able to talk science and hiphop.

My original goal was (at least) 1 blog post a month which I’ve mostly kept up. The pandemic and postdoc lyfe threw me off a little, but I’m hoping to get back in the groove of posting frequently.

Grant submitted

I spent the winter break working on a grant for the Burroghs Wellcome Fund. I’m supported in the laboratory (stipend/benefit wise) by a T32 training grant from the National Institute on Alcoholism and Alcohol Addiction (NIAAA) but this award would let me expand my research project and provide additional training opportunities (hence the name, Postdoctoral Enhancement Program.) Its actually the perfect program for someone already on a training grant, since the funds are strictly for enhancing research and training. If you’re interested in postdoc funding, the PhRMA foundation has postdoctoral fellowships that cover salary for pharmaceutical and translational projects (but no indirect funds.) There are also 2 year PhRMA predoctoral fellowships available. Submitting this grant reminded me of the process I went through with the AFPE predoctoral awards in grad school.

Money/Stocks thoughts (NOT ADVICE)

California wage laws raised my salary from $54,000 to about $56,000 this year, which I appreciate. Without California laws, I’d be paid at NIH guidelines for postdocs with 0 years of experience, which is $52,000. Another way of looking at this is that, per NIH guidelines, I’m getting paid the same as a PhD with 3 years of experience. Alternatively, I’m making $18,000 more than I made as a PhD student (before tax.) Remember, I graduated from undergrad >5 years ago, but I technically only have 7 months of *experience*. Also, for my whole PhD (5 years) I wasn’t eligible for retirement benefits from USC (as an NIH predoc I also technically couldn’t open a retirement account anyway) but as postdoc on a T32, I’ll qualify for retirement savings matches from my employer next year.

Pyrrhic victories aside, why do I bring this up? Because I think finance is cool? Yes. But also because I love watching the stock market, and the past 12 months have been interesting! A few things first: the stock market =/= the economy, and this =/= stock advice. So what’s going on? Last year I posted about some ETNs I was in, and sure enough, a few weeks after that post, coronavirus lockdowns triggered stoplosses on FNGU and LABU; I canceled my AMZN stoploss and held until the summer. Being a lockdown, you can’t do much. But thanks to the Robinhood app, you can trade stocks more easily than ever before, and people have been doing just that! Matt Levine and many others have written about the rise of retail investors and the Boredom Market Hypothesis (BMH) which I was fascinated by. I locked in profits on everything early in the crash and didn’t believe in the rapid market recovery, so I missed the rally/party, which is amazingly still going. In that time, Hertz went bankrupt, then its stock rallied due to increased interest from retail investors, so Hertz tried to sell new stock until the SEC stepped in (their prospectus was amazing.) Tesla became the most valuable automaker, and the CEO Elon Musk became the richest person in the world (and accidentally incited a rally for SIGL, not the Signal app.) Moderna went from plucky but unproven biotech to FDA EUA’d and BioNTech partnered with Pfizer for its own vaccine (PFE stock isn’t doing as well as antivaxxers/conspiracy theorists would have you think lol) Bitcoin rallied later in the year, hitting all time highs and made many people rich.

To summarize; I got a raise at the beginning of the year, which made me think about money stuff (s/o Matt Levine!) from last year. How is 2021 starting? Well, Citron’s Andrew Left has been in a battle against r/wallstreetbets, a subreddit, that has already blown up a hedge fund (here is a great post detailing the saga by NOPE its Lily, highly recommended follow on twitter.) Investors have pushed gamestop (GME) to ridiculous levels, multiple days in a row. Same with BB and AMC. Interesting does not begin to describe what is going on. Is this the 1918 Spanish Flu and the roaring 20s at the same time? Why not. A David vs Goliath situation where retail investors blow up hedge funds? Probably not since institutional investors are also either in gme or benefiting from the moves. Long live the meme stock thesis? I don’t know. On 1/27/2021 r/wallstreetbets went down for a few hours and Robinhood sent out a message on market volatility #idemnification #alphabetboysarewatching

Big FOMO vibes aside, I’m chilling. I’m more of a stock-picker, not a technical trader or a redditor. I am a hiphop fan tho, and JAY-Z once said “I heard ************* saying they made Hov/ made Hov say “OK, so/ make another Hov/”. I’m not sure I can make the same picks I made last year, so I just won’t (for the time being.) Besides, while I like playing around with Robinhood, I have a roboadvisor for my “retirement” funds. Its not an IRA, just an investment account. At this rate, I could technically retire at 45 (gotta stay solvent for the future😉)