exhaaaaaaausted

so I've been preeeeeeeetty scarce lately, even to jackie, who I see at least once every other day. (oh the joys of living within minutes of each other.)

so this entire week I've been working with this enzyme 7-HSDH which is pretty much the worst enzyme on the face of the earth. it has a real name, but that's what I've been labeling all my tubes (test, not fallopian, haha I know) with so I have no idea what it is but I do have the paper at the lab.

and holy moly it's so freaking gay. it has to be grown in plyss (one of the host types), which is annoying as hell because it's really really sticky, so I can never tell if I've lysed the cells completely or not. okay but that's not the really horrible part.

so monday tuesday and wednesday were okay because it was just growing and harvesting the cells (even though I had to go in on independence day! and I woke up late so I had to go in the afternoon boo on me). then yesterday I began the enzyme purification process, and this stupid thing has to be centrifuged five times. plus it has to be centrifuged at 15,000 rpm, and the centrifuge in our lab (the chem lab) only goes up to 13,200 rpm, which meant I had to use the centrifuge in the biology lab. which means I had to walk. which was gay enough by itself, but then the freaking centrifuge was booked for pretty much the entire day, so I had to carve out little 30-minute segments in there when I could centrifuge.

and then it had to be ammonium sulfate precipitated three different times, and each time you do ammonium sulfate precipitation it takes about an hour. but first before all that it had to be heat treated with the bacteria stirred at 70 degrees C for 30 minutes in a hot water bath, but the bottom of the beaker with the bacteria in it couldn't touch the bottom of the beaker with the water in it, so I had to hold it for half an hour. my hand pretty much died, but the good thing is I was wearing gloves so at least it came out super soft.

I had gone in early yesterday (around 8, as opposed to my usual 9) so I could leave early, but I ended up leaving at 8.30. then today I went in a bit earlier than usual (8.30) so I could leave early, but I ended up leaving at 6.30 because the STUPID STUPID STUPID diafiltration took six freaking hours.

beavis and butthead are so freaking retarded. they signed up to take calc over distance learning with stanford (wtf calc is not something to take over distance learning), and they had three months to complete nine assignments. so they got their stuff may 1, so it's all due aug 1. and right now they're still struggling through lesson 2. related rates! man they haven't even gotten to integration yet. it's ridiculous. I think I ended up doing pretty much the entire lesson for them. okay but they're pretty sweet because they invited me to go out to lunch with them (which I declined b/c I brought some frozen food there so I could save time and leave early, damn it all) plus they come keep me company in the lab when I'm doing my stuff.

oh wow I haven't even written about who all is in the lab now.

so there's:
monica, who is hispanic and has really nice jeans. I swear that was the first thing I noticed about her. she has so many pairs of seven jeans. anyway. and abercrombie. ANYWAY. she's super nice and so helpful and makes me feel really guilty for not being happier about working in the lab. she got a job at some hospital so now she only comes in every once in a while. she and her boyfriend are so cute together. and they're one of those ridiculously happy couples. awww.

hongmei, who just came back from china and has really nice hair. it's wavy (she got it permed) and really really cute. she teaches me chinese sometimes and makes me correct all her english mistakes. communication here is sometimes a problem when she doesn't know the word in english and I don't know the word in chinese. good thing weihua has a handheld chinese/english translator. she thinks students in america "are not under a lot of pressure" because "everyone can get into a college!" and she has a younger sister who "sometimes doesn't go to sleep until one or two in the morning!" I don't know how she has a younger sister with the one child thing. despite all this, she is really nice.

then there's weihua, who also just came back from china (I keep thinking he and hongmei are engaged, but they're not living together and neither of them have a ring but they went to china together...?). he's usually gone for half the day (actually from 1.30-5) because he's a TA. he got stuck with beavis and butthead. haha. there's not much to say about him. he's looking for a used car right now. he keeps falling asleep at the lab bench. his phone is the same as the one I lost. my favorite shirt of his is this green striped shirt. oh and he wears socks with sandals, which doesn't look as odd on him as it would on other people.

kathy, who is the postdoc and pretty much tells everyone what to do. I can't figure out her age, but she has an 11-year-old daughter. but her husband looks super old. who knows. she's one of those overly talkative people whom one should never ask for clarification or instructions because she'll go on talking for ten minutes when you got the point in the first thirty seconds.

giang, whose name is actually pronounced "yan". her family used to own the pho on parker and coit. her mom also used to do nails, so she gives me a lot of tips about nails. because of her, my nails are now square tipped.

chandrani, who works in the lab only sometimes and once made me grow culture for her three days in a row. exploiter.

heba, who I think is jewish and is always really really serious and working. makes me feel bad.

beavis and butthead, whose real names are eric and suraj, as I learned today from peeking in their lab notebooks.

but the good thing is I read about 300 pages of C&P at SMU this week. hoorah.

my todo list is pretty much the same as yours. sigh.

I also want to go shopping this weekend, though I should seeeeeeeeeeriously refrain. in the past two weeks I got like 28 articles of clothing. and that's just what I counted in my room. there's also stuff down in the wash. T__T;;

but we should go to the taste of dallas!

and man you are UNREACHABLE. are you okay? I tried calling you twice today but got your message thing. and now you're not online! okay I'll try calling again in the morning.

(and I broke down and watched P&P on wednesday night. =__=)