Knifey Wifey (around 10:45 am today)

[prog]

I'm sitting at a drug discovery/biotechnology conference thingy that boss took me and two others to. Well, it's just at Hines in the middle of Boston, so he didn't actually take us anywhere; we simply met up here, and he paid for our admissions.

Really, I don't have much to do here. I have no questions to ask of these vendors; I have my job to do, using the equipment and systems available to me. Maybe after another year or two, after I've had a chance to steep in biotech for a while, I'll be more curious about activity in the field, but the most I can do now is pick up interesting swag. I got a shiny pen, some candy, and a periodic table poster. Hey, pretty good.

I did have one intelligent question for the MDL folks, wondering if they published the specification for a molecular compound file format they developed; it's something I've had to deal with at work, and the most I could find about it, at least via Google, was a partial reverse-engineering that someone in Germany had put on the Web. Sure, the MDL dude said, let me scan your card and I'll get that information to you.

Here, I started to get a little embarrassed. When I registered at the door, I automatically filled out my registration form with bogus information. This got recorded into a scannable chip thingy on my conference badge. But of course, instead of admitting this, I say "Sure!" and hand it over to whomever asks, so that their scanners inform them that I live at 123 Fake St. in Somerville, phone number 123-456-7890.

"You don't have your email address here," the MDL guy cheerily told me. So I gave him my goofy personal card, which actually does have my real email address on it.

I continue to be glad that I made those cards two years ago, as they have so far carried me through four different professional identities. However, I would not turn down some HMS cards, for situations like this. I should ask for some.