You know, that intro stuff by Mollie B. '06

Every journal has to start off with some sort of introduction. I’ve been keeping journals since I was 9 (I’ve always liked keeping ridiculously detailed records of my life… I guess you could say I was born for keeping a lab notebook), and even in my journal at age 9 I included a rundown of what I considered to be the essential statistics in my life: “My name is Mollie Burgoon. I live in Pickerington, Ohio. I go to Peace U.M. Church. I live at 12183 Cainwood Avenue. I aspire to become an author. (and teacher) or pediatrician or physicist or psychologist.”

Perhaps at age 21 I can give a more relevant introduction than I could at age 9.

My name is still Mollie Burgoon. I am a member of the class of 2006 at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, which apparently means that I’m going to be a senior in a very short period of time. Given that this means I will be applying to graduate school this fall, I’m not entirely psyched about this whole “senior” thing. I am a double-major in courses 7 (biology) and 9 (brain and cognitive sciences), which basically means that I like cells a whole lot, but I like neurons even better. As far as careers go, I’m planning to go to graduate school, get my PhD, then hole myself up in a lab for the rest of eternity.

There are two things I consider to be the love of my life: my dashing course 16 boyfriend Adam, and biology research. I am a UROP in the Sheng laboratory, where I’ve worked since the beginning of my sophomore year… I’m currently involved in two ridiculously cool projects, one of which involves running mice (this one is named 9M2) through a maze, and the other of which is concerned with examining protein interactions in the post-synaptic density of neurons.

In other areas of my life, I am a resident of Macgregor House, a dorm of fabulously uniresidential singles. I lived in A-Entry for three years, and am going to move to D-Entry for my senior year. I’m also a member (and former captain) of the MIT cheerleading squad. (By the way, I know you probably didn’t know MIT had a cheerleading squad, but since you read the previous sentence, you are now that much less ignorant. Yes, we cheer for football and basketball. No, we do not cheer for the chess club, although we would cheer for any student group that asked us.)

Well, I think it’s time to open this intro to the peanut gallery…