MJ, abused grad

Heal The Lab
Michael Jackson

There's A Place In
Your Heart
And I Know That It Is Love
And This Place Could
Be Much
Brighter Than Tomorrow
And If You Really Try
You'll Find There's No Need
To Cry
In This Place You'll Feel
There's No Hurt Or Sorrow

There Are Ways
To Get There
If You Care Enough
For The Research
Make A Little Space
Make A Better Place...

Heal The Lab
Make It A Better Place
For You And For Me
And The Entire Student Race
There Are Ideas Dying
If You Care Enough
For The Research
Make A Better Place
For You And For Me

If You Want To Know Why
There's A Boss That
Can only lie
He Is Strong
He Only Cares For
His own living
If We Try
We Shall See
In This Bliss
We Cannot Feel
Fear Or Dread
We Stop Existing And
Start Researching

Then It Feels That Always
Research's Enough For
Us Growing
So Make A Better Lab
Make A Better World...

Aerials
System of a Down
"Life is a waterfall
We're one in the river
And one again after the fall
Swimming through the void
We hear the word
We lose ourselves
But we find it all
(...)
And we are the ones that want to choose
Always want to play
But you never want to lose
Aerials, in the sky
When you lose small mind
You free your life
(...)
Aerials, so up high
When you free your eyes eternal prize"

Bring it on

Rocky Balboa talks about his grad school experience...

Eye Of The Tiger
Survivor
"So many times, it happens too fast
You change your passion for glory
Don't lose your grip on the dreams of the past
You must fight just to keep them alive
(...)
Went the distance, now I'm not gonna stop
Just a man and his will to survive"

Acknowledgments to my friend TT, who says "no more whining, time to fight!".

Tick tick...

Time is probably the most meaningful word during grad school. And how ironic is it that "tick" can denote a sound like a clock/timer as well as a parasitic arachnid that feeds on blood of warm-blooded animals (i.e. adviser)?
Pink Floyd's "Time" didn't need a parody. It just is.

Time
Pink Floyd
"Ticking away the moments that make up a dull day
You fritter and waste the hours in an offhand way
Kicking around on a piece of ground in your home town
Waiting for someone or something to show you the way

Tired of lying in the sunshine staying home to watch the rain
You are young and life is long and there is time to kill today
And then one day you find ten years have got behind you
No one told you when to run, you missed the starting gun

And you run and you run to catch up with the sun, but it's sinking
Racing around to come up behind you again
The sun is the same in a relative way, but you're older
Shorter of breath and one day closer to death

Every year is getting shorter, never seem to find the time
Plans that either come to naught or half a page of scribbled lines
Hanging on in quiet desperation is the English way
The time has gone, the song is over, thought I'd something more to say

Home, home again
I like to be here when I can
When I come home cold and tired
It’s good to warm my bones beside the fire
Far away across the field
The tolling of the iron bell
Calls the faithful to their knees
To hear the softly spoken magic spells."

Dedicated to my friend CR.

Dr. Marley, B.

Bob was the first to suggest unionizing grad students.

Redemption Song
Bob Marley
"
(...)
Emancipate yourselves from mental slavery;
None but ourselves can free our minds.
Have no fear for senior faculty,
'Cause none of them can stop the time.
How long shall they keep our profits,
While we stand aside and look? Ooh!
Some say it's just a part of it:
We've got to fulfill the book.

Won't you help to sing
These songs of freedom?"