bad girl
I'm planning on skipping my 8am lecture tomorrow/later this morning, not because I have something better to do or I'm avoiding anyone, but because I probably won't get to sleep until 2 so I'll have 4 hours of sleep before the lecture and I'll definitely continue my sleep in the lecture anyway so what's the point? But don't think I don't feel guilty about this.
So on Tuesday I fudged up my first prac of the year, but luckily we weren't assessed on our results, neither did we have to inform anyone about the fudge-up :D We had to prepare cells for... cryopreservation so we painstakingly harvest the cells then count them (yeah, COUNT cells) then calculate how much of DMSO (Dangerous Reagent of the Hour) we have to add for cryo, and I add DMSO to what I thought was the media, but it turned out to be the cells. The right way to do it is to add DMSO to the media, then media to the vial, then cells to the vial. By adding DMSO to the cells instead of the media, we get less cells but what the hell we just chucked it in and topped it up with media. Fortunately, everything is either pink or colourless, so no one would know, unless they took it out of cryo or something.
Thursday is Micro and Med Biotech pracs, which means 5 hours of standing around in my labcoat. I wash my labcoat so rarely that it's practically an annual event. I know I'm not the only one because people tend to be very proud and announce when they wash their labcoats. The front part of the Micro manual tells us to wash it after every prac - does that mean I have to wash it 4 times a week?
I really love third year pracs - the reasons are that I practically know most people because we've had the same units since first year, secondly, we just have to follow the lab manual and do things ourselves, as opposed to second year pracs, where the classes are much bigger (50 per lab in Micro compared to 20 in Med Biotech). Bigger pracs mean bigger groups and suckier equipment. The Micro pracs also involve much more observing than doing things and getting results. They usually run for the whole 2 hours, which isn't bad if I was actually doing something. The demonstrators have to walk us through every single part of the prac, then the lecturer discusses the questions in the "last 10 minutes" of the prac. I guess I like it less because I don't know anyone in the prac so there's no one to share equipment with or talk to when I've finished whatever I'm doing. And Bunsen burners, god, I hate them and their goddam pilot lights. Time stretches when you're not doing something of consequence. Some 3 hour pracs can zip by in a moment, like last year's OChem pracs, when 3 hours was just not enough.
So on Tuesday I fudged up my first prac of the year, but luckily we weren't assessed on our results, neither did we have to inform anyone about the fudge-up :D We had to prepare cells for... cryopreservation so we painstakingly harvest the cells then count them (yeah, COUNT cells) then calculate how much of DMSO (Dangerous Reagent of the Hour) we have to add for cryo, and I add DMSO to what I thought was the media, but it turned out to be the cells. The right way to do it is to add DMSO to the media, then media to the vial, then cells to the vial. By adding DMSO to the cells instead of the media, we get less cells but what the hell we just chucked it in and topped it up with media. Fortunately, everything is either pink or colourless, so no one would know, unless they took it out of cryo or something.
Thursday is Micro and Med Biotech pracs, which means 5 hours of standing around in my labcoat. I wash my labcoat so rarely that it's practically an annual event. I know I'm not the only one because people tend to be very proud and announce when they wash their labcoats. The front part of the Micro manual tells us to wash it after every prac - does that mean I have to wash it 4 times a week?
I really love third year pracs - the reasons are that I practically know most people because we've had the same units since first year, secondly, we just have to follow the lab manual and do things ourselves, as opposed to second year pracs, where the classes are much bigger (50 per lab in Micro compared to 20 in Med Biotech). Bigger pracs mean bigger groups and suckier equipment. The Micro pracs also involve much more observing than doing things and getting results. They usually run for the whole 2 hours, which isn't bad if I was actually doing something. The demonstrators have to walk us through every single part of the prac, then the lecturer discusses the questions in the "last 10 minutes" of the prac. I guess I like it less because I don't know anyone in the prac so there's no one to share equipment with or talk to when I've finished whatever I'm doing. And Bunsen burners, god, I hate them and their goddam pilot lights. Time stretches when you're not doing something of consequence. Some 3 hour pracs can zip by in a moment, like last year's OChem pracs, when 3 hours was just not enough.