OHMYGOSHNGAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHH
Haha, so for once I'm not going to put off my blog writing because I have something related to say... this blog is dedicated to my rant about how AWFUL of a day it was! I'm pretty sure the other people in my lab have developed a resilience to this already, since they just brushed it off with a "oh, typical Monday", but I was really frustrated. So, this is going to be my "woes of research" post, maybe I'll do another "joys of research" one, if I can fit them all in one post :)
So basically, our lab is cursed. It didn't used to be cursed, this is a recent development. You know why I think it's cursed? This morning, my mentor Jen was doing an extraction while I was doing a Fastseq reaction on some PCR products to prepare them for sequencing. We both screwed up in frustrating ways (or at least she seemed sort of frustrated... she was working with Kevin who described it using profanity and the word "fest". Like "profanityfest"). I ended up wasting way too much money's worth of bigdye (probably should've been reprimanded, but the people in my lab are too nice to yell at me, haha) and messing up the same simple reaction, basically just transferring stuff from one plate to another like a robot, two times. And there isn't that much PCR product. So I had to go back to my bacteria, pick colonies again, and redo a bunch of the PCRs, getting basically nothing done in the morning - SO aggravating!
After lunch, I was feeling a lot better (I actually took an early lunch because I didn't think I could not screw up in that annoyed state). I finished my sequencing (which was now out of order due to the mishaps from this morning). Unfortunately, my frustration made my lab notes disorganized and barely legible. Not that my handwriting is ever that easily legible, haha! And I think I'm going to cut that short and say that the plates we submitted for sequencing were spliced up into chunks and fitted back together, and I'm so grateful that Lisa, who does the sequencing, was willing to deal with them. AND SHE'S ISABEL'S MOM. ISABEL, COMMENT ON THIS!!! Hahaha :D
So after I was done with the sequencing, I was pretty much "okay, so I'm going to do something that requires very little concentration and has very little potential for error - I know! I'll write my introduction!" This required logging out of someone else's account on the sexy mac and logging into Jen's. And the mac, which never freezes, froze. But you couldn't even tell, so we waited for what seemed like forever, and finally decided to switch to another computer (which wasn't as sexy, but easier to use for me because it was a PC). BUT THEN THE PC FROZE TOO. I fixed it, it wasn't as big of a deal, but seriously, when do 2 separate computers freeze within like half an hour?
Introduction: Sometimes, people screw up. Often, it's because they're having a bad day. Curses can sometimes cause people in a lab to have a bad day. In this particular study, we examine the effects of curses on a genetics lab.
Materials and Methods: Using a longitudinal analysis of the Willis Lab conducted between the dates of June 15th and July 13th, we estimated the ratio of work done to results obtained and assessed the qualitative effects on researchers' emotions (see fig. 1)
Conclusion: Based on the high ratio of work done to results obtained, the feeling of frustration present especially in the prone-to-overreaction novice researcher, and the prevalence of unfortunate incidences, we conclude that THE LAB IS CURSED.
Figures:
Fig. 1. An example of a common emotion felt in labs that are cursed
