down doobie-doo down down.... breaking glass ain't hard to do!
Friday the 13th and what a day I have had! The day began with an extremely long breakfast line that stretched all the way outside the building and down the sidewalk to the next dorm. Honestly, they have these summer camps come and all the groups always come as one big mob at the same time- it's really not a very smart way to do it. By staggering arrival times we could avoid these problems altogether! Anyway, getting back to me, I decided not to even go into the dining hall because it would take too long and I wanted to get to work early so I picked up breakfast at the place where I get my bag lunch every day... and may I just say it made breakfast at the cafeteria look really good! I ended up with frosted mini wheats, a carton of chocolate milk, and an applesauce cup- and on the food plan that probably cost at least $6! Ridiculous.
Once I got to work and ate my breakfast, I went to work setting up the rotovap. When I went to go fill my ice bucket, I noticed that a vial containing one of my peptides had exploded overnight and was now in about a billion pieces in the freeze-dry bottle. So, while my other peptide was on the rotovap, I set to work trying to recover as much as I could and pick the glass chunks out. Then I set up the HPLC so I could start purifying the shattered-vial peptide, but I needed more solvent to rinse the column. When I picket up the jar of solvent A, I completely demolished the test tube taped to its side holding a pipette; thank goodness I wore gloves or I would have gotten a nasty cut. Moving on, in the middle of my 3rd sample injection on the HPLC, it starts leaking like crazy onto the floor, so I ran to get Bimo, who spent the next hour+ fixing it. So before noon, I managed to break a test tube and the HPLC, and my vial exploded and a flask got knocked over and broken while we were messing with the HPLC pump.... basically, I guess I should stay away from all mirrors today or I might end up with even worse luck. Hopefully I will still finish my work today before dinner- and hopefully I'll be able to get in to eat!
On the brighter side of things, I get to go bowling for FREE tonight! And I will be back in MN in less than 3 weeks! Yay!
p.s. I just broke the HPLC again. And then the centrifuge stopped working. I am going home!
Once I got to work and ate my breakfast, I went to work setting up the rotovap. When I went to go fill my ice bucket, I noticed that a vial containing one of my peptides had exploded overnight and was now in about a billion pieces in the freeze-dry bottle. So, while my other peptide was on the rotovap, I set to work trying to recover as much as I could and pick the glass chunks out. Then I set up the HPLC so I could start purifying the shattered-vial peptide, but I needed more solvent to rinse the column. When I picket up the jar of solvent A, I completely demolished the test tube taped to its side holding a pipette; thank goodness I wore gloves or I would have gotten a nasty cut. Moving on, in the middle of my 3rd sample injection on the HPLC, it starts leaking like crazy onto the floor, so I ran to get Bimo, who spent the next hour+ fixing it. So before noon, I managed to break a test tube and the HPLC, and my vial exploded and a flask got knocked over and broken while we were messing with the HPLC pump.... basically, I guess I should stay away from all mirrors today or I might end up with even worse luck. Hopefully I will still finish my work today before dinner- and hopefully I'll be able to get in to eat!
On the brighter side of things, I get to go bowling for FREE tonight! And I will be back in MN in less than 3 weeks! Yay!
p.s. I just broke the HPLC again. And then the centrifuge stopped working. I am going home!