Right now I'm standing in the lab, waiting for my E. Coli innoculated growth medium to finally give me the results I've been waiting the last 6 hours for. It's only four more minutes of inhaling this acetone enriched atmosphere before I can reach in and see if they've stopped doubling.
Ah well, At least I now know my own mystery strain that Larry's friends' web has given me is Gram positive. The mucoid little diplococci flagellates will have to face the PCR next week, so I won't be too harsh on them. But the E. Coli will receive no mercy.
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Well, I just took the OD measurement and yet again the freaking E. Coli have grown, which means I have to wait here for another 20 minutes. Hurrah.
Temptation calls me to pour a healthy aliquot of ethanol into their container while snickering disturbedly. Or perhaps I'll introduce a competitive species in their flask to kill devour them, One of my colleagues perhaps. Yes, that will do, that will do....
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Sadly it's not in line with German law to do that. what a shame
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Sigh, 7 minutes to go. I might as well tell you about the university Olympics. Our block, with the utmost style, grace, and sportsmanship lost all but one of the games we were destined by the gods to play. The gods I say. That one game was the ancient and noble sport of dodgeball in which we kick peptidoglycan. But hey, it was a good Saturday - and we fought hard, which was the main thing...or so I keep telling myself. 4 minutes to go once again. Ah, the aforementioned gods had the honour of having me offered to them as a sacrifice. Steve the God of Bread was annoyed with the noise produced by the students studying on his turf. Long story, lots of filming, which basically ends with me being duct-taped to a chair on stage for about 90 minutes during the Olympix opening ceremony. Evidently I was not sacrificed since the people planted in the audience who I hired voted for the games to go on instead.
So now I'm here - and it's measurement time...
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They're still growing.
After a quick word with the supervisor it seems that I only need one more reading in about 10 minutes. I could kiss her, that is if she didn't work with quite so much bacteria on a daily basis.
Where was I? oh yes, taped to a chair on stage. It went fairly well all in all - good publicity.
2 minutes left...easily one of the longest lab sessions I've ever had. It's bearable, much better than error calculation in 1st year physics labs which I strongly dissuade any life scientist with a right brain from taking. 34 seconds...
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