I'm seriously considering dropping science (although the methods might come in handy) and taking up food. Check out my latest creation - a cold smoker:
The idea here is that you generate smoke in the green, steel, eggish shaped thing - and then pipe it into the 55 gallon barrel where some salmon, ham, or other yummy food is waiting. The smoke is cooled to 80-90 degrees so that the food is not actually 'cooked'. Typically the smoking lasts for 8,12, or even 48 hours. I'm seriously looking forward to the results.
What would you do if you quit your career? What's your 'Plan B' ??
More like this
Because there can never be enough research to illustrate the positive impact of public health policy on people’s health, here’s another one. This one found that comprehensive smoke-free indoor air laws resulted in a lower risk of asthma symptoms and fewer asthma-related doctor’s visits.
Half of us in the US now live in cities, towns or states that ban smoking in public places, including restaurants and bars (it's nice to be more enlightened than Europe in at least a few things):
We sometimes treat them like second-class citizens. Or do we? Certainly smokers hate it when we force them out into the cold for a butt. Here in Michigan, we're thinking about restricting smoking in a lot of public places.
These days, pretty much everyone, smokers included, knows that smoking is bad for you. It promotes lung cancer (and several other varieties of cancer as well), heart disease, emphysema, and a number of other health problems.
I guess I'd become a bicycle collector. Someday, I'd like to have a back yard full of bicycles. Is there much money in that?
One of my best friends quit the PhD to become a chef! He blogs about the transition whenever he gets a break from the kitchen if you're interested: http://28pans.wordpress.com/
As for me, I think right now my backup plan is to stay in science! Not quite sure what my primary plan is though :)
Since I'm already in my sixties, my plan B, should I ever abandon software development, involves messing about in boats.
Those aren't actually my bikes ;)
I built it at my neighbors - who owns a bike shop.
Thanks Christina! That's actually a great blog. I may be moving to Boston for a postdoc in which case I'll look you guys up ;)
I want to be a fern gardener.
More seriously, write. Like, fiction. Preferably publishable.
Come to think of it, being a fern gardener would probably work out as more profitable.
Grow weed.
I would become a Renaissance Person, creating art (not to sell but purely for the joy of creation), debating ideas with friends in a small cafe, traveling whenever I could afford it, particularly to Egyptian archaeological sites and Pompeii, occasionally taking certain chemicals to see if they broadened my thinking in any way, doing a little street art, taking photographs and unabashedly manipulating them in photoshop, learning how to edit audio and video, and writing a blog about all things (except NASCAR) but probably not promoting it in any way. I would also get more exercise.
That's Plan B. It really should be Plan A.
Smoke weed in the winter?
Seriously, after phd, postdoc and 5 yrs in industry... I might try my hand at music... or mowing golf courses.
I think I would no longer play guitar for our dog, but would go public as Jimi Hendrix re-incarnation No. 73 516. But I very much hope, that science continues to be more than a job for me, but a passion, and that music will always remain the best recreational activity.