On my bench there is a box of 'Eppendorf' tubes. They are very nice—so nice, in fact that the entire lab has moved over to using them, and Stores now have them as a stock item.
I came back into the lab today, to do an experiment that has been on hold since I went away. I came, at length, to use a tube. I opened the box.
Now, these boxes are about 10 inches by 5 by 5. Inside there is a zip-lock resealable bag. The tubes are inside the bag.
So I opened the box, and it was empty. No tubes, no bag.
Some selfish bastard has lifted the entire bag, and left the empty box, so that when I'm in the middle of an experiment—hands full of secrets Man is not supposed to wot and whatever—I have to dash down to Stores and get a new sodding box. Good job Stores was open, because it means I did not have to breach my secret stash.
But come on. What kind of ignorant sod nicks your stuff and leaves an empty box there? That's not just carelessness, or forgetfulness, it's downright arrogant, antisocial arse-hattery.
And if you're reading this, I curse your minipreps and hope your proteins denature.
Comments
This kind of thing happens ALL the time in our lab.
I do a lot of tissue culture work, and once I left a tube of FBS along with new media I was making up to warm in the water bath. It was the last tube left as the person on TC duty was quite behind on their work. I came back half an hour later, and my FBS had disappeared, replaced by an ancient tube from three years ago which had been rolling around in the bottom of our freezer.
The mind boggles.
Posted by: tee | September 15, 2008 12:39 PM
I've only been in biochemistry for a couple years, but it's ALWAYS been Eppendorf tubes all the way.
Posted by: Corey | September 15, 2008 01:28 PM
tee , I've commented previously that this sort of thing doesn't usually happen in this lab. When it does, it usually coincides with an influx of students. But this, this is different.
Posted by: bk | September 15, 2008 01:30 PM
You have a Stores???!!??
Lucky!!
Posted by: SanDiablo | September 15, 2008 04:27 PM