Hello, blog friends! I know I have been absent lately (and I know how much you miss Soundbites, I promise I’ll be bringing them back come fall term…). But I thought I’d check in quickly and report the successful submission of my first-ever academic paper!

This is a big deal for me. As someone who came from a non-science background, I didn’t really understand how important it is to get your name on something in a journal. And when I started in grad school, I figured I wouldn’t be publishing until I had finished my masters research, since the project was big.

Thankfully, Holger and Tiffany included me on a side project involving red-legged frogs, and I got to take point on it. So after several weeks and months of this:

(image copyright Jorge Cham, PhD Comics)

we finally ended up with a manuscript and some figures worthy of submission. And after a last crunchtime effort by Holger and I this afternoon, we got it out the door just in time for me to go on vacation to Europe for two weeks!

The relief is palpable.

I have really enjoyed having this project be my first manuscript submission, as I have a lot of intellectual investment in it but pretty much no emotional investment (unlike my thesis, which is my baby). Failures during the writing process were easier to learn from, and successes were great.

So keep your eyes peeled…we just have to go through review…and then, fingers crossed, PUBLICATION!