Well, this was an interesting week...

Read: "Well, this was an INSANE week." But, actually, it did have some "interesting" moments and I'll recount those in the order of how highly they load on the Interestingness factor. Ahhh, I'm such a nerd.

1) Moment in which Research Associate #1 calls me a dork in class.

My reaction was far more interesting, but I'll start at the beginning...Favorite Prof and another student had gotten into a debate about whether two different sets of behavior could be considered two separable phenomena or if one was a subset of the other (simply different levels of analysis of the same phenomenon). The student seemed to be getting a little annoyed at the prof, so I thought it would be fun to diffuse the situation by suggesting it was an empirical question. I did not, of course, use those words; instead, I implied it by suggesting we write items for each and see if a resulting factor analysis yielded one or two factors. Two seconds pass by in which everybody kinda looks at each other and nobody responds. So then Research Associate #1 calls me a dork with a definite inflection in his voice, suggesting perhaps that he was trying to emphasize the massive dorkiness of my statement. So now everybody responds by laughing hysterically and we've fully diffused the situation (not that it actually required diffusing anyways). But, I respond by pretending to get angry at him. I may have nudged him forcefully on the arm a couple of times. And I do remember stating something to the effect of, "Argh! Every time I say something smart, he tries to invalidate me." Favorite Prof jokes that he does that because he's a male. And, looking a little freaked out, Research Associate #1 states that it's his defense mechanism. Oh! Joy! I had great fun with that situation, but I felt I had to do some damage control and reassure Research Associate #1 that I was not actually angry at him.

2) Moment in which I inadvertently set up Slightly Egotistical Prof to use me as a target for a demonstration of the difference between hostile and instrumental aggression.

Now I'm in another class with a different prof, heretofore titled, "Slightly Egotistical Prof." We're discussing how to define terrorism; don't ask me how that relates to this class on research issues in development. This time I'm the one who gets into a debate with this prof about the difference between hostile and instrumental aggression. We have different understandings of the term and I basically stated that I did not consider him the authority on the subject and that I taught it differently in one of my classes (Oops! I set up a situation in which it was my word against his. Not a good idea when the prof has been consistently displaying tendencies towards egotism.) So he responds by stating that he's done research and published on the topic, but I've just taught a class. Oy! I laugh and make exaggerated motions of "Whoa! Okay there! I totally understand where you're going with this." But, he tries to assure me that he was just using that moment as an example of hostile, reactive aggression; he wasn't actually trying to attack my credibility. But, he did try to make sure that I knew he was right by getting some definitive handbook during the break and pointing out a passage in the book that supposedly supported his side. I sort of continued to bait him by saying that I thought the passage was a little vague and that I'd look up the original source that was cited in the passage. Ahhh, I think I'm getting a little too big for my britches.

3) Moment in which I tell Slightly Egotistical Prof's class how Research Associate #1 called me a dork in our other class.

Ahh, I couldn't help myself. Since we were talking about aggression, I brought up how I had "slightly nudged" Research Associate #1 after he called me a dork. We had a good time again allowing Research Associate #1 to defend himself, and pretty much laughing about the situation.

4) Moment in which Slightly Egotistical Prof and I end up discussing a new topic as the rest of the class talks amongst themselves.

I don't know how it happened, but we were having two students present on their topics and it was now Research Associate #1's turn to facilitate the discussion on his topic (which overlaps with my own past research). He started by doing a demonstration of the Tower of Hanoi with two of the other students who were not familiar with the task. I tried very hard not to take over his presentation, but I had more knowledge of past research on the task than he. So I directed my explanations toward Slightly Egotistical Prof while Research Associate #1 was distracted into explaining the task further to one of the students. Then Research Associate #2 started talking with the other student who didn't know about the task and we basically had three different conversations going on at the same time for the rest of the class period. But, it was quite fun to discuss the task with Slightly Egotistical Prof. We really got into it and talked for quite some time, and then he realized that we needed to wrap up the class. So Slightly Egotistical Prof summarized our conversation for the rest of the class and we called it good. Basically, Research Associate #1 didn't have to defend his articles and ideas against Slightly Egotistical Prof like the first student had to.

5) Moment in which I forget that I am still just a grad student and chat with Fav Prof and Slightly Egotistical Prof as if I was their peer.

We started "chatting" about the person who interviewed for a faculty position here (some people might call it academic gossip, but since I don't engage in academic gossip, we'll call it "chatting"). I had had a chance to talk for 5 minutes with the applicant about fMRI. The applicant did not agree that fMRI could be a useful tool for understanding brain function because of poor external validity, and because of that whole "correlation does not imply causation" thing. He sounded like a social constructivist, so I became instantly biased against him. But, I didn't try to seriously debate with him about it because the Department Chair was standing there and I thought I should be nice and go easy on the applicant. But, I was not so nice and easy on the applicant in my "chat" with the profs, because I thought he did not sound intelligent. However, one of the profs thought that the applicant was just dumbing himself down and making statements that would be consistent with the flavor of this university and department. Grrr! The prof thought that we should bring him here and that I should get a new advisor, preferably the new prof we're bringing in, which might be this guy. The other prof stated that I don't fit here, either. So it seemed that both of them had formed some impression of me that included that idea that I was rather intelligent and that my needs were not being fulfilled by the department or by my current advisor. Oy!! So I looked up the applicant online and discovered that he has a paradigm named after him. You know you're somebody when you have your own paradigm. But, alas, I'm just here to have fun, do my own research, and graduate with a Ph.D. I don't really have these crazy ambitions like I used to and I try not to exceed Slightly Egotistical Prof in the Egotism arena (but after having read this post, you might suggest that I start calling myself Slightly Egotistical Grad Student. He, he).

So I just want to have fun in this program and not take myself too seriously.