Sam has been a bad, bad blogger and has not been posting. But now she's started a new food related blog, which she will probably update more often. It's located here:

http://rosemarylemon.blogspot.com/

Check it out if you're interested!

You know you've worked in a lab too long when...

you find yourself trying to repair a very dead pair of shoes with lab epoxy using a 1000ul pipet tip. I'm afraid I'll have to retire my favorite shoes; even after the epoxy treatment I can see my sock in a couple places through the shoe... not such a good sign, probably. Drat.

Why oh why...

doesn't Apple realize that not everyone has huge ears? I hate the little ipod earbuds; they're way too big for my ears and they hurt. :( I wish they sold child sized earbuds or something.

I know, I know, does that sound like an over-privileged Palo Alto child's complaint or what? But they really do hurt...


It took me a long time to break down and get an ipod, partly because I always think of this comic when I hear the word "ipod," and I get worried about having a robot chase me down the street...

I'm thinking this is a bad sign...

Just a short snippet of an output file my crystallography program threw at me:

The source line number is 1. awk: Cannot divide by zero. The input line number is 1. The source line number is 1. awk: Cannot divide by zero. The input line number is 1. The source line number is 1. awk: Cannot divide by zero. The input line number is 1. The source line number is 1. awk: Cannot divide by zero. The input line number is 1. The source line number is 1. awk: Cannot divide by zero. The input line number is 1. The source line number is 1. awk: Cannot divide by zero. The input line number is 1. The source line number is 1. awk: Cannot divide by zero. The input line number is 1. The source line number is 1. awk: Cannot divide by zero. The input line number is 1. The source line number is 1. awk: Cannot divide by zero. The input line number is 1. The source line number is 1. awk: Cannot divide by zero. The input line number is 1. The source line number is 1. awk: Cannot divide by zero. The input line number is 1. The source line number is 1. awk: Cannot divide by zero. The input line number is 1. The source line number is 1. awk: Cannot divide by zero. The input line number is 1. The source line number is 1. awk: Cannot divide by zero. The input line number is 1. The source line number is 1. awk: Cannot divide by zero. The input line number is 1. The source line number is 1. awk: Cannot divide by zero. The input line number is 1. The source line number is 1. awk: Cannot divide by zero. The input line number is 1. The source line number is 1. awk: Cannot divide by zero. The input line number is 1. The source line number is 1. awk: Cannot divide by zero. The input line number is 1. The source line number is 1. awk: Cannot divide by zero.


Hmmm...

Ok, I have to admit this one had me in stitches laughing... yes, I'm that much of a geek.

You know that a) you've worked in a lab too long and b) you have an overly acute sense of smell when...

you can tell the difference between bacteria growing in lag phase and in log phase by how the culture smells.

You know you've worked in a lab too long when...

You find yourself looking at the antibiotics tube thoughtfully, thinking, "Wow, we've got needles in the lab. I could just inject this stuff and skip going to the doctor entirely."

Dear heavens, I hope this is a joke...

I really, really do... but I'm afraid it may not be.

A note for lab workers who do not wish to be brutally murdered:

If someone else in your lab has washed a piece of equipment for her own use, and has set it aside to dry, away from all other pieces of equipment, do not take that piece of equipment without asking. Not even if it's the last one available, because, hey, maybe the person who washed it actually needs it! Maybe you're not the only productive worker in the lab!

Also, if you use the last of something, do not put the empty bottle/box back on the shelf. (I've found empty boxes/bottles THREE times in the two days!) Reorder the damn thing. And if you have used all of a kind of equipment that must be autoclaved, autoclave it yourself! Do not wait for a woman to do it for you. (This seems to be SOP in the lab. Leave all autoclaving and/or tip box refilling for one of two women to do. Guess what: not cool.)

I have had about a half a dozen times in the last two days where I have been royally screwed by people being just plain inconsiderate. Do not be a jerk, for I will wish plagues of irate ducks on you.

*Fumes*

You know you're a total geek when...

You see this comic and go, "Hey, cool! I already know LaTex! I'm a bigger geek than the grad student in PhD comics!" (Obviously I'm using a very... special definition of the word "cool" here).

Aww...how cute (and yet so dumb, really)

Two kids in Germany decide to go to Africa (because it's warm in Africa) to get married. Problems: no passport, no money, nobody over the age of 7.

Very cute, and yet pretty dumb. I may have gone around dropping things as a child to prove that gravity was still working the way I thought it should (after encountering my first helium balloon as a toddler), but I never thought I'd get away with going to another continent without anybody noticing.

Yeah.

I've started saying "Structural Biology." It doesn't make any more sense to most people than "Macromolecular X-ray Crystallography" or "Microbiology and Molecular Genetics," but it is faster to say.

Sam wants a snowblower for Christmas.

Why do snowplow drivers have this unerring instinct for pushing huge mounds of snow in my driveway? If a neighbor with a snowblower hadn't taken pity on me I might still be shoveling out my car. 

In other news, the dumber of our two cats finds this "snow" thing absolutely fascinating. She keeps trying to go explore it, even though it's deeper than she is tall. By about 200%. Darwin missed a few.

I am seriously considering trying out hibernation for this winter. Tonight it's supposed to be -20 to -29F windchill (for you snobby metric types that comes out to -28.9 to -33.9C). It's only December...it's only getting worse from here.

Let's hear it for global warming!

With windchill bringing the temp to -3F, I think I'll go buy an SUV. Vermont could use a little more warming...

Speaking of SUV's, is this not the stupidest thing ever? I mean, ok, I understand why we don't want a major American industry to go belly up. That sort of thing is bad for the economy, and puts a lot of employees out of work for no fault of their own. On the other hand, if that major American industry refuses to make cars that get more than, say 2.5 mpg, I'm not sure that throwing billions of dollars at the problem will make it go away. Maybe, shockingly enough, American car manufacturers should try making cars that are a) fuel efficient and b) smaller than your average tank. Just a thought. *Packs bags in preparation for getting thrown into Gitmo*

Deep thoughts...

You know you're finally settled into a new job when the printer runs out of paper, and you know where to find the obscure supply cabinet two buildings away without asking anybody.

You know you need to get out more when...

You're walking  down the hall, glancing at posters and find yourself thinking, "Man, I wish I had electron density like that!"

Sam I. Am needs a vacation...

Edit: My boss' husband once told me that the first thing that attracted him to her was her electron densities. I am a geek, yes, but there are far worse geeks out there.

So very, very true...

"Everywhere I go I'm asked if I think the university stifles writers. My opinion is that they don't stifle enough of them. There's many a best-seller that could have been prevented by a good teacher".

--Flannery O'Connor

Ok, seriously, folks, this isn't funny anymore...

You know how I said that I am bad for computers? Yeah. So I started  running several programs on a remote computer on our cluster at school. Normal programs that everybody else runs all the time, no problem.

Result: computer crashed completely, losing its  hard drive. They say it's not my fault, but I'm not sure I believe them...

Update: On the first day of this week, my computer gave to me...

In an effort to document why I believe my computer should be exorcized, I will keep a running log of what malevolent things it does to me. Let me know if you know any priests.

1. Mac OSX has crashed today. Twice. Mac OSX is not supposed to crash every five minutes like Windows does.

2. My web browser blew its brains out repeatedly.

3. My crystallography programs are not running. (This is probably my fault. I swung the chicken counter-clockwise instead of clockwise this morning).

Edit: Update 12.3.08

I seemed to have crashed another hard drive. I'm thinking that's a bad thing.

I think I sacrificed the chicken incorrectly...

The computer deities/spirits/demons apparently have it in for me. Even my boss is beginning to think so, and that's not a good sign. Here's my reasoning for this belief:

First: my computer has a tendency to play the little game we like to call "kernel panic." It generally does this before an important talk. 

Second: my laptop has the following problems:

1. The keys  "B" "G" "T" and "5" don't work. Just those keys, no idea why.

2. The lightbulb behind the screen appears to be broken.

3. Funny little lines appear on the burned out screen from time to time.

4. It. is. so. slow.

Third: no crystallography program will work for me. Today I ran *the exact same* program under my account on a server. Nada. "Input error" etc. I then ran it under a coworker's account. No problemo. 

Edit: I just thought of another example: 

When I lent my keyboard to Housemate Helen (don't you like your new nickname, Helen? I thought it had a nice Sesame Streety sort of feel) a few weeks ago it managed to destroy like five hours worth of work. I mean, it completely lost her file. Pretended it had never seen it. It's like I'm contagious or something...spreading computer malfunctions through computer accessories.

I'm beginning to feel like that guy in Good Omens who manages to break or destroy every single piece of electronic equipment he ever comes across. To the point of shutting off power to his city on a regular basis. Which, come to think of it, might be a highly marketable skill. "Will shut off competitor's power for food."

Happy Dance

Yay for cheap books... I found a whole bunch of David Eddings books for 75c each on Saturday at my church's holiday bazaar. And the entire set of Chronicles of Narnia for, like, $5. And then I found 5 Agatha Christie mysteries in the used book section of Barnes and Nobles for $5. I am a happy little (poor broke grad student) bookworm. I have this dream that someday I will be able to purchase entire series of book for *gasp* full price. Full price book purchasing= the true American dream. (For you lucky foreigners reading this, the definition of "American Dream" is very fluid, but generally refers to a plucky young poor (but not the wrong kind of poor, of course) person bucking society and making oodles of money. Apple pie may also play a part, but I'm not sure how).

Interesting. The american keyboard has the dollar sign but not the cent sign... *goes to look up magic key combination to get cent sign*

In other news...   mmmmmmm.....sugary caffeine. One of my house guests from this weekend snores so loudly that it kept me awake through the wall. Finally I gave up and slept in basement, where snoring, while audible even through earplugs, was somewhat abated. Am sleepy little Sam today.