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| It's okay.
Back when I used to teach introductory chem (think Ch1a with "electron going up and down like crazy" intact, but everything else at a reasonable level), I used to have recurring visions of hopes and dreams swirling down around a flushing toilet. But I eventually got over that. Now I'm teaching an upper-division analytical lab. It's a hard lab to get an A in it, but it's also nearly impossible to fail.
Sometimes, when everyone does badly and loses some points, I get a mental flashback of the Mighty Morphin' Power Rangers in a group fight against a new enemy. I remember that every once in awhile, you'd see a bunch of explosions on-screen (none of them actually near the rangers), and then everyone would scream and fall down at once. Then the red one would get up, look around in exasperation, and say "He's too strong!" Later one they'd get into their zoids and actually win the fight, but only after several iterations of explosions and falling down. Sometimes my kids stop falling down. Sometimes not.
This is the kind of thing that keeps me going.
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| Yesterday, I found a paper with all of somebody's credit information in the gel scanner, which may also be known as The Place Where We Often Place Carcinogen Jell-O, (You Dumbass). I think I might not have minded this (potentially very bad) mistake of leaving one's credit card information lying about if it hadn't also been fairly disgusting and unnecessary - there is a clean scanner in the mail room. It took me until today to figure out who it belonged to, because the computer controlling the scanner was unable to boot and tell me who was last logged in. Google quickly confirmed the owner's identity.
Anyway, I figured it out today and returned the paper to its rightful owner, because if I'd made a mistake like that, I'd be paranoid as hell not knowing where it'd gone and whose hands it was in. Only, I could tell that the particular dude who had made the mistake didn't care. Instead of saying something like "Thanks," or even, "Whoops!" he said something more like, "uhhhh??? I don't need this paper anymore." Uhhhh. I really expected something better from a PhD scientist, but I guess repeated experiences have demonstrated that scientists aren't necessarily very good at dealing with social issues, or sometimes life.
So listen up, my fellow scientists and techers, especially those of you still stuck there: don't ever leave your credit card and personal information lying about like my colleague did, because you don't want someone to steal it. Furthermore, you should think about building up good credit while you're still in school. Good credit is important for the stuff you're going to be doing in the slightly-more-real-world. Okay?
As for the gel scanner computer, it seemed like a power supply problem. I didn't have time to check it myself, so I called ITS. "When I try to turn it on, the power light blinks orange and the computer doesn't boot," I told them. Somehow, the person who took that call took it to be:
Call Summary : When I turn this computer on, it says
it
Call Description : When I turn this computer on, it says
it connection failed
Category : SOFTWARE
...a networking software problem. I am not sure if this is funny. It seems like it should be. I want to laugh, but it's not quite working out for me yet.
60 days to go.
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| #6: Name a hypothesis, protein, or experimental technique something silly, then write about it in Science
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| A few weeks ago, I made tonkatsu. I do have to say that it went quite well with peach ice cream.
Two weeks ago, I also did this:
which means that once I cure cancer, I'll have fulfilled the purpose of my life.
This was the first time I ever managed to win Minesweeper on expert level, so don't look down on the elapsed time. I did it in between scanning gels.
I'm going to Seattle, again. Hooray!
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| I usually try not to go shopping at 99 Ranch on the weekends, because that's when they put out the free food samples, and that's correspondingly when throngs of free-sample-loving Chinese people come out to block the aisles with their shopping carts. (I know all about it because one of those people is my dad.) I had to go into work this morning, though, so I stopped by on my way back home.
This time, I met was a really old man in the rice aisle. I'd apparently eaten a 20 lb bag of rice all by myself (though I think I started last June, when Lisa left), so I was at the store to get another one. I had picked up a bag of Nishiki musenmai medium grain calrose and turned around to see this old man and his cart blocking me into the corner. I guess he was shaken up by the sight of a nice young girl carrying 20% of her weight, because he got kind of flustered when he realized he was in my way. Anyway, he got out of the way, and I smiled at him, and it fulfilled my 99-Ranch-nice-feeling dreams.
Later on I saw a young woman wearing one of those oversized solar visors ram an old woman with her cart without apologizing. And I mean, she really did hit that lady. It was sort of comical, but then again not.
Later on I saw this same young woman in the parking lot - still, with her visor, taking a damn long time to cross in front of my car and holding up two others. I thought about hitting her for the old lady's retribution. I probably shouldn't have even thought about this, because later on at Mitsuwa I got hit by somebody's unapologetic Grandma. Fortunately, those Japanese carts and ladies are even smaller than I am. I should have gone after her with my $3 mountain potato.
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