Saturday, November 7th, 2009
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3:27 pm - Alright, fine
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Thursday, November 5th, 2009
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2:35 pm - Then HEY! for a life of washing-up
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So I have been admitted into the sacred interior of the Davies Lab as an acolyte. For the past week I have been shown the various rites and rituals that are the acolyte's lot - Washing Up, every day, that the god of glassware not leave us bereft. Evacuation, and Flushing With Nitrogen, thrice, that the Oxygen Devil not undo our holy work. Collection of Glassware from the furnace of purification, and the assembly of diverse sacred works.
The Glove Box is far too great a shrine for human hands to touch. We sully it with our very presence, our mere breath, and so all devotions done therein must undergo the Ritual of Evacuation and Nitrogen, thrice, in the side-chapel. While one waits for the vacuum gauge to reach the bottom, indicating that all traces of Oxygen, The Destroyer, have been removed, one meditates upon the bounty of the Department so that when the offerings are finally purged clear of contagion and are ready to be admitted into the interior of the shrine, one is in a sufficiently devout state of mind to use the Great Gloves without damage.
Today, I was honoured. I was permitted to go, alone, to the deep vaults of the Inter-faculty NMR Facility.
In that great room to which all mere mortals are admitted only on sufferance, lines of black and yellow mark on the floor the places we may tread without the wrath of Electromagnet reaching out to strike us down. I stayed well back, less the abundance of metal in my person offend the mighty Field. O you foolish men that declare niobium to be a non-magnetic metal! The powers at work within that room cannot be so easily dismissed.
A sign was given to me: 400B, 15. The words of NMR cannot be heard by mortal ears. I came humble indeed to the Translators, approaching them with the correct offerings and pass-signs, and was not destroyed. On Monday shall I offer a prayer that NMR may have seen fit to grant me a holy riddle to decode, that I may know whether I made a Gilman reagent, or whether I fucked up again.
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(2 comments | comment on this)
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Tuesday, August 18th, 2009
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6:04 pm - Bugger!
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Those who've been paying attention will know that my mother is a bee-keeper, and I assist. Well today it turns out there's a sting in the tail of this cosy domestic apiculture: I've apparently developed an allergy to bees. Being stung in the head really goddamn sucks even without a body-wide plague of itchery and nastiness. I guess I have to start being scared of bees now :-(
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(1 comment | comment on this)
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Friday, July 17th, 2009
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6:46 pm - Further details
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Monday, July 6th, 2009
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1:03 pm - An Event, Ladies and Gentlemen!
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Wednesday, July 1st, 2009
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12:53 am - Transformers! ((a rant))
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I have finally sorted through the inchoate mess of impressions left upon me by Transformers 2.
I have discovered that I am actually angry - properly angry - at Michael Bay and everyone else involved in that goddamn abortion of a movie. Here we have a movie that involves giant alien robots, explosions, and some of the world's finest CGI. Optimus Prime, Megatron, Darth Soundwave. Not gonna be revelatory but should be awesome, right? ((oh and for those who like plastic women but don't want to watch porn I guess I should count Megan Fox in hotpants as a positive))
WRONG!
Instead we have a shitty pile of shitty stupid adolescent jokes and Shia shitty LeBouf's shitty fucking face spewing shitty fucking lines. The Transformers are background characters in their own fucking movie. Well fucking done Michael Bay you cocked up the easiest fucking thing in the world. I hate this movie, so much, SO MUCH. It has ONE redeeming feature: Bumblebee. There is no plot. There are no characters. There is no point. The thing that should've made it great - GIANT FUCKING ROBOTS - are all but missing. Nobody gives the tiniest shit about poor Sam's struggles to be a Normal Little Boy when he goes to college, not when we could be watching GIANT FUCKING ROBOTS. This movie is boring, which is the one thing a movie about alien robots that turn into trucks and tanks and fucking jet planes shouldn't be.
In summary: boring piece of half-digested shit. I want my brain cells back.
Also there are subsidiary rants about the colander they call a plot; racial stereotyping ((LOL black people are illiterate and it's hilarious!)); 'only America can save us now! GOD BLESS THE USA! Aren't you glad you have Uncle Sam in charge to protect the world with the incredible power of our patriotically perfect army!'; and frankly the way the movie deals with women would outrage the sensibilities of Genghis fucking Khan but there is not enough space in the universe to encompass all that is wrong with the way Transformers 2 treats its female 'characters' let ALONE the rest of this utter turd of a movie so I'll leave it here.
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(3 comments | comment on this)
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Monday, June 8th, 2009
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1:38 am - Freaking people out by humanizing the SS
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Friday, May 29th, 2009
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5:28 pm - fuck this shit
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http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/northamerica/usa/5395830/Abu-Ghraib-abuse-photos-show-rape.html
So the shine begins to wear pretty quickly off the Golden Boy, huh. Good thing the most powerful nation on Earth is led by a salwart, brave man who isn't afraid to bow to pressure... from the leaders... of a corrupt and broken army... who appear to've institutionalized every sort of torture and abuse... for shits 'n giggles.
After all the only purpose these pictures will serve is a legal one, right? And you know rape and mutilation aren't crimes or anything, at least not if the CIA and the army says you're allowed. We were only following orders, isn't that how it goes? No need to try anyone for this shit. Especially not given that releasing the photographic evidence of egregious human rights abuses that practically everyone knew or assumed was happening anyway might *gasp* tarnish the gleaming reputation of the United States of America!
I'm disappointed in you, Obama. For some reason I thought that 'setting a good precedent as a black leader of a historically racist country' would, somehow, translate to 'being a better person than the disgusting dregs of humanity who rape children in front of their parents'. Apparently not, not if the last few pathetic shreds of shit-soaked dignity that America has left are at stake.
Goddamn men with guns, nothing good comes of a situation when you let men with guns in.
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(12 comments | comment on this)
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1:17 pm - A carefully honed selection of lies
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Or, Things I Learned From My Supervisor
-There are few sights as endearing as a grizzled academic to whom a possibly novel idea for a reaction has suddenly occurred.
-Studying an area of chemistry that nobody else in the department really gives a shit about makes poster sessions potentially hilarious. I sing the making-shit-up song.
-Apparently archaeology is a proper science. They publish articles in Nature and everything.
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(8 comments | comment on this)
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Thursday, April 30th, 2009
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9:25 pm - And another thing...
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Take that Madgascar you little shit. Finally you are mine. Bow before the might of Parasite Kath.
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(7 comments | comment on this)
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8:41 pm - Petition fever
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petitions.number10.gov.uk helpfully provides a list of rejected petitions. Among the usual pile of whiny toss - many saying something along the lines of 'resign now' and a curious number with a single name ((we petition the Prime Minister to Peter Church?)) I found this one:
'ban the widespread use of the dangerous chemical dihydrogen monoxide (DHMO)'
...is anyone actually taken in by that anymore? Goddam, practical jokers, get some new jokes. Although it does still bitterly amuse me how often 'chemical' is a dirty word... sadly, 'Accept that Tuedays are boring and should be replaced by Fridays instead' was rejected due to being outside the remit of the Prime Minister. I would have signed that in a heartbeat.
In other news: the mingled scents of clove cigarettes and energy drinks will forever be my foremost association with Whitby. Sorry, Bram Stoker's Dracula, you just don't terrify me as much as 'Relentless' ((and this from someone who willingly downs Inka Cola)). Also, if you are ever to find yourself in that town, do visit the Dracula Experience on the pier. Do so on a Tuesday or something when there aren't any live actors to ruin the whimsically magical experience of hunting down the laser trip-wires and dodging screaming torsos.
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(comment on this)
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Friday, April 10th, 2009
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2:02 pm - Have you ever considered g*th music?
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I have a theory that 'Andrew Eldritch' is a title similar to 'The Dread Pirate Roberts'. That's why there's so much smoke at a Sisters concert you can't see the front row, that's why the lineup changes so often.
It all makes sense.
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(comment on this)
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Tuesday, March 31st, 2009
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11:36 pm - What the shit
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I have just sniffed every item of electrical apparatus in the living room of my parents' house, and come to the conclusion that it is a Phantom Scent I'm smelling. It smells like burning hair, strongest where I sit in front of the computer, and apparently was notable this morning as well. During the day, however... nothing, and I can't trace the smell. No wires are conspicuously badly plugged in and both the TV and computer smell like dust, not burning hair. The wardrobe smells like dust and grandmothers.
So there appears to be a stinky ghost in the living room. What the fuck, house. What are you playing at.
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(6 comments | comment on this)
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Thursday, March 19th, 2009
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3:33 pm - Google Street View
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It turns out that the only photo in which number 24, Greenford Avenue would be clearly visible... is also the photo in which a bus is sitting at the stop between it and the camera.
So our house is not on Street View in any meaningful sense. This should please certain privacy-mad residents.
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(10 comments | comment on this)
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Thursday, March 5th, 2009
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3:26 pm - Bugger
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I have angered the Lab God.
The three-day reaction yielded one-fifth of the amount necessary to do part two. So I forge ahead with adjusted quantities of other reactants, mixing up 'three' with 'one-third' and ending up with a massive excess of iron where there shouldn't have been one.
In response, the dark green solution that should have turned blue has spent two hours turning... sort of pink.
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(3 comments | comment on this)
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Tuesday, February 24th, 2009
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12:35 am - Results. No discussion.
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1. Tesco's kitchen spray ((with bleach)) is a better oven cleaner than bad vodka, although neither are stunningly effective.
2. Kai is less cavalier than Alban about stealing fine chemicals from teaching laboratories.
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(1 comment | comment on this)
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Monday, January 19th, 2009
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4:38 pm - Happy New President day!
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I celebrated by getting soundly and cruelly mocked by a lab supervisor by not immediately understanding why pumping nitrogen into a sealed system is a good idea.
Anyway, best of luck to Mr Obama. Hopefully he will be somewhat less entertaining than his predecessor.
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(4 comments | comment on this)
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Tuesday, December 9th, 2008
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1:57 pm - **LEVEL UP**
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I have achieved Level 21! EPIC LEVEL GROSSKOPF. I plan to spend my XP on Coursework so I can get the Not Fail 3rd Year feat, also on buying up my Void ring.
Ernst has gotten me half of Fallout 3. I got him the other half for Christmas. It was decided that wrapping it half-and-half, then unwrapping the half the other person wrapped with appropriate expressions of pleasant surprise, would be the funniest way to arrange matters.
current mood:  bouncy
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(6 comments | comment on this)
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Sunday, November 23rd, 2008
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1:14 am - Diego Rodríguez de Silva y Velázquez
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Having just shamelessly ripped off his painting of Christ Crucified ((Picocon art hopeful)), I'm beginning to reconsider my unflattering opinion of the Baroque era. Velázquez's Christ is not the angry Christ-of-war, glaring down from His cross, all but uttering 'I'll be back' in an Austrian accent. He is emaciated and pale and dying. This is how I like my Christs.
Also his portrait of Pope Innocent X is fantastic, if only for the look in the old bastard's eyes.
Hooray for expanding horizons!
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(13 comments | comment on this)
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Tuesday, September 9th, 2008
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2:42 pm - Pleasant surprise is pleasant
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Sudden, unexpected jeans! O frabjous day!
Also MELLEN! Are you around next week on Monday and/or Tuesday because that's when I'm in London and we, like, totally need to catch up...
current mood: bouncy
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(3 comments | comment on this)
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elsewhere_adore's journal