I am in San Francisco at the MRS Spring meeting. The weather is beautiful and I am drained having just given two talks separated by a 15 minute sprint between sessions. As is the way with the Department of Homeland Security (why can’t they rename it as it is loaded with fascistic overtones?) two of my students could not get visas and so I had to make their presentations. I have talked about these barriers to conference participation before so I will not dwell on it. I will just add that after talks with Canadian colleagues, they have the same problem but much more so because N. America is one scientific community and a large number of non-Canadian phD students are isolated North.

Despite many years of practice at giving presentations I still feel drained after giving a talk. I do not get the same ecperience after delivering longer lectures to students. I think the issue is the feeling of exposure. Whenever you present research results you are usually posting a report on work in progress and there is nearly always something about which your deductions are tentative. Perhaps someone will stand up and say its all rubbish (I have seen this happen to others). I did get a question which condensed down to “I don’t see the point of your findings”. Again the compliments afterwards – are they just being nice? Do I detect a sense of paranoia in my thoughts, remember science is a cut-throat business as we compete for funding and priority.

The meeting is noticably smaller than last year and there are many fewer stands in the trade show. The recession must be biting. Also, there are many fewer tourists in the streets than I remember from the past. I have one more day to go before I return to an English spring. It is later in spring here, the flowers here are earlier than at home and the blossoms in the golden Gate park are those that I would expect to see in May back home.