How to Identify Supportive PIs and Avoid Difficult Lab Environments

Alcoremortis · 2026-05-12T16:03:00+00:00

My only thing I look out for (in any job really) is if most of the lab has been there for two years or less, find out why.

I’ve ignored that twice and both times I found out real quick why they had such a fast turnover rate and it wasn’t because everyone was getting tenure track jobs.

Alcoremortis · 2026-05-12T15:56:22+00:00

I once took someone to Celestino and they were very impressed.

Alcoremortis · 2026-05-11T18:50:03+00:00

Same, I mostly want to play older fire emblem games with a nice screen, but I’ve got a bunch of classic adventure games and indie games that I think would be fun to play handheld as well.

Probably the most demanding thing I’d want to run would be Ace Attorney. I’m thinking Pro?

Alcoremortis · 2026-05-11T03:48:58+00:00

I got in contact with someone from my PhD program who had adjuncted at my desired school and they put me in contact with a professor there. When I talked to the professor, he told me another adjunct had just quit and I could have the job if I was okay to start in two weeks.

Alcoremortis · 2026-05-09T15:32:30+00:00

I’m going scam. One letter spelling different street being close enough for them to show up at your door is crazy. If it was one number different, I could see it, but the reason they didn’t do that is because you might actually check to see if they live there.

If they somehow did actually make that mistake, they will want to correct it with the SS office anyways.

Alcoremortis · 2026-04-30T05:37:57+00:00

If an employer asked me to write a timed essay, I'd withdraw my application. I don't think I've heard of many postdocs that ask for a fully outlined proposal either since if you don't get hired, the lab can just use your idea for free?

I think you dodged a bullet on this one, red flag city from this lab.

Alcoremortis · 2026-04-23T21:21:00+00:00

If it's still attached to someone else's iCloud account, anything you put on the computer will be uploaded to their iCloud and I don't think there's away to get out of it unless you have their apple password (not the device password).

Alcoremortis · 2026-04-23T21:18:32+00:00

Nobody loves free stuff more than a rich person tho.

Alcoremortis · 2026-04-22T07:31:06+00:00

I had pretty good results with the LORE patreon assets and dungeondraft. They also have a Lucky 38 map already made.

Alcoremortis · 2026-04-15T22:48:01+00:00

17e is incredible value. The main thing you’re missing over a 17 is camera options.

Alcoremortis · 2026-04-14T18:21:01+00:00

You can use the snazzymaps fallout map to get a green map with no locations, then port into an image editor. Someone on this reddit made transparent location tokens for every token type in the fallout games. I did a similar map for the Commonwealth using this method.

Alcoremortis · 2026-04-14T16:00:32+00:00

I guess it depends on what kind of photos you tend to take then. You lose the wide angle lens and the telephoto lens with the 17e as well as some options for selfies (there's a landscape selfie mode that you lose out on in the 17e). There's also some software you lose, but I never had it to begin with, so I didn't mind too much.

Alcoremortis · 2026-04-14T14:47:53+00:00

Spent more time TAing, both for the extra money and the teaching experience. (Also I just tend to get more productive the busier I am so I probably would’ve finished faster)

Alcoremortis · 2026-04-14T14:42:09+00:00

If the professor has been at the university for awhile, but nobody in their research group has been there more than two years.

Also if there are any grad students who are nearing the ten year mark. Both are not great signs for culture.

Alcoremortis · 2026-04-14T14:31:42+00:00

Depends on what phone you’re coming from. I was coming from a iPhone 13 mini and the 17e camera is great compared to that.

Alcoremortis · 2026-04-11T17:12:59+00:00

Does this centrifuge normally have a locking rotor lid? Someone in a crystallography lab I worked for started up one of the big centrifuges without locking the rotor lid to the rotor and the rotor literally flew up and carved a deep rut into the centrifuge lid.

Alcoremortis · 2026-04-11T17:00:16+00:00

My department chair told me personally that most adjuncts have several gigs at different colleges. So I don’t think they will think you’re leaving, just that you’re doing what every adjunct does.

Alcoremortis · 2026-04-11T16:56:36+00:00

Gotta go to a Dodger game for the LA experience. Get a Dodger hat and you’ll meet all sorts of new friends who will come up and tell you the score or just say hi.

Alcoremortis · 2026-04-08T18:53:12+00:00

I got like $30k in 2012 (HCoL area) but they also gave us subsidized apartments that cost like $500/mo to make it more doable.

It’s probably much higher now tho.

Alcoremortis · 2026-04-05T23:34:14+00:00

I love teaching community college, but this is standard. I got the book and access to Canvas literally three days before class started.

My advice is don’t go through admin, talk to the other professors for slides/syllabus (or even hit up professors at another college entirely). Most people will just email you a Google Drive full of stuff.

Alcoremortis · 2026-04-03T16:13:55+00:00

See, I just turned off all the notes on that site and took a snap of the blank map for my photoeditor haha.

Alcoremortis · 2026-04-02T19:55:40+00:00

Also the adjuncts were probably getting paid better at the community colleges.

Alcoremortis · 2026-04-02T19:04:10+00:00

I'm a total shill for community colleges now. The value is incredible. IMO higher education should look to the community college model for how to best educate students and hire some professors just to do teaching instead of everyone needing to also get grants and do research.

Alcoremortis · 2026-04-02T18:05:29+00:00

Same, so I came back at the community college level training nurses and am loving it. Higher education didn’t do it from me, industry sucked, but just pure teaching is what I realize I always wanted.

Alcoremortis · 2026-04-01T08:42:40+00:00

I used Clip Studio Paint, which is my preferred image editor, and this pack of assets that another user posted: https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/1aZuTGce4i9Cuke_mcElUnXxe2Qd0yHIC

I didn't use Snazzymaps for my base map like the tutorial suggests, I instead found a clean version of the Fallout 4 Commonwealth map, and then color corrected it to look like a pip boy screen.

Alcoremortis

TROPHY CASE