So… in addition to all the other craziness going on in my life right now, I am gearing up to go to not one, not two, but THREE consecutive conferences next week. First step is SACNAS, a conference for minority STEM (science, technology, engineering, and math) students that is near and dear to my heart. I went last year to recruit people for CU and I guess I did such a good job that they asked me to go back this again year! Yay! I am super excited about that! Also SACNAS is in San Antonio, TX this year and I have never been there… oooo new place! Then directly after that, I fly to Boston to attend a conference about Salmonella (for those of you that don’t know, that is what I am studying for my research project) with my friend Titanium and my boss. I have never attended a conference with my boss before so that should be fun. Also, a lot of big name Salmonella people should be there so it will be awesome to meet them and hopefully they can help me with the still mysterious parts of my project. After all of that, I fly back to Colorado for ~ 48 hours before taking off to go to Heidelberg, Germany (!!!!) for a conference about new techniques in microbiology. It is going to be awesome because there will be scientists from all over the world attending this conference! I feel very lucky/excited that I get to go to Europe twice in one year but I am also super nervous because I know absolutely NO German. At least in France, I could read signs and talk to people in my sub par/super slow/sometimes Spanish French. So that will be interesting…. Seeing how I got slightly culture shocked upon landing in France, I’ve bookended my trip to Germany with people that I know in the hopes that that should ease the transition to visiting another new country.

Now it’s your turn! Have you been to/lived in San Antonio, Boston, or Heidelberg? What should I definitely check out/eat/do there? Any travel tips for traveling with a poster roll as my second carryon (thrilling…)?

In other news, what have you guys been reading lately? I just finished Patrick Ness’ newest young adult book More Than This and I am still reeling from the crazy ending! Whoa!

PS – Patrick Ness is one of my favorite authors if you’re looking for a new set of books to read…