A New Scientific Law
Aug. 2nd, 2004 02:16 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
trinityvixenSo, suppose you manage to friggin set a gel for the first time ever. It then follows as punishment for getting that right (and by right I mean bare-bones it-held-together-and-didn't-leak-but-it-still-doesn't-look-so-good) that you must lose an entire cell line to contamination. I finally lost the battle with the P127 cells. Something just got into the splits I made, which was obvious, but it doesn't explain what I did wrong the second time I split the cells. I started with three plates of this cell line, and one I took and made four plates out of, the other two I left alone. I lost all the ones I split and one of the original, which left me with one of the original, which I split more carefully. It, too, was contaminated. Something got into that cell line. Damn it. My boss was dismissive, saying that these things happen and the idea is to get really good at cell culturing so it doesn't happen again.
But I am good at it. I know what to do and how to do it. I know to change pipettes, to sterilize, sterilize, sterilize (I use more EtOH per trip to the TC hood than anyone else in the lab bar none), but I just messed up this one line. I've had all of one contamination before this, with my mouse cells, but otherwise, I've been stellar. This isn't bragging, I'm just sure I know what I'm doing. I messed up this line, and suddenly my boss is talking like I'm still a greenhorn. I've been working primarily with this part of my job since I started, weeks and weeks ago, and I've gotten pretty handy at it. I do know what I'm doing. I guess I should just be grateful she's not mad. It's just that she's so particular and demands the best--while she says these things happen, I can't help but wonder if she's thinking of the last woman she let go for not being good enough. Damn it. I'm going to have now devote the next two weeks solely to getting really fucking good at these gels and the transfection this week, or I'll have nothing to show for the three weeks she's been out.
And one more rant from the left: If ever I needed further proof that George Bush doesn't represent this country, I've got it in the Times' special interactive Campaign 2004 map of the US. Check out "The Money States" option. Yes, most of the country is red (or pink, as is the case with those states that haven't really committed heavily to either campaign), but swing over to the electoral vote breakdown and a fair few of those pink states show up as solid blues in terms of where the electoral votes are going. So, maybe, just maybe, this isn't about money, which, if it were, Bush would win hands down (he's just invested so much, and he's not even got started on the tax-funded part of his contributions yet, I don't think). Dubya pulls in most of Texas, where he was governor, and Florida, where Jeb is governor. So what? Kerry gets strong ratings in Masschusetts where he is senator. Hey, good for him. Maybe if he gets a brother to run a big important state like Pennsylvania or Ohio, we can cross those off the swing state list. Officially, on the rest of the site, Florida is a swing state. Do any of us really believe Jeb isn't gonna wrap that one up and hand it over this time, too? The Money States map is depressing. There are all of three Democratic holdouts--the usual ones: California, New York, Massachusetts, with the rest being only lightly more Democratic than Republican in terms of spending. Still, crossing my fingers that the electoral vote tally -- currently Bush 190, Kerry 168, undecided 180 -- comes up more blue in the future...
Also, Julian's rather brilliant argument about Christianity on my last rant says better what I ranted about for longer than she did, so, don't read my last post, just read her response to it. It's brilliant.
But I am good at it. I know what to do and how to do it. I know to change pipettes, to sterilize, sterilize, sterilize (I use more EtOH per trip to the TC hood than anyone else in the lab bar none), but I just messed up this one line. I've had all of one contamination before this, with my mouse cells, but otherwise, I've been stellar. This isn't bragging, I'm just sure I know what I'm doing. I messed up this line, and suddenly my boss is talking like I'm still a greenhorn. I've been working primarily with this part of my job since I started, weeks and weeks ago, and I've gotten pretty handy at it. I do know what I'm doing. I guess I should just be grateful she's not mad. It's just that she's so particular and demands the best--while she says these things happen, I can't help but wonder if she's thinking of the last woman she let go for not being good enough. Damn it. I'm going to have now devote the next two weeks solely to getting really fucking good at these gels and the transfection this week, or I'll have nothing to show for the three weeks she's been out.
And one more rant from the left: If ever I needed further proof that George Bush doesn't represent this country, I've got it in the Times' special interactive Campaign 2004 map of the US. Check out "The Money States" option. Yes, most of the country is red (or pink, as is the case with those states that haven't really committed heavily to either campaign), but swing over to the electoral vote breakdown and a fair few of those pink states show up as solid blues in terms of where the electoral votes are going. So, maybe, just maybe, this isn't about money, which, if it were, Bush would win hands down (he's just invested so much, and he's not even got started on the tax-funded part of his contributions yet, I don't think). Dubya pulls in most of Texas, where he was governor, and Florida, where Jeb is governor. So what? Kerry gets strong ratings in Masschusetts where he is senator. Hey, good for him. Maybe if he gets a brother to run a big important state like Pennsylvania or Ohio, we can cross those off the swing state list. Officially, on the rest of the site, Florida is a swing state. Do any of us really believe Jeb isn't gonna wrap that one up and hand it over this time, too? The Money States map is depressing. There are all of three Democratic holdouts--the usual ones: California, New York, Massachusetts, with the rest being only lightly more Democratic than Republican in terms of spending. Still, crossing my fingers that the electoral vote tally -- currently Bush 190, Kerry 168, undecided 180 -- comes up more blue in the future...
Also, Julian's rather brilliant argument about Christianity on my last rant says better what I ranted about for longer than she did, so, don't read my last post, just read her response to it. It's brilliant.
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Date: 2004-08-02 05:03 pm (UTC)Happily, the candidate that raises the most money doesn't always win. Sometimes, in fact, he loses badly. (FDR and Lyndon Johnson were both outspent by their Republican rivals yet both of them won by huge margins.) It's true, the guy with the bigger campaign chest usually wins, but I think that's because popular candidates raise more money, not because they're buying more votes. But when one candidate appeals more to the rich, and the other appeals more to the poor, the money totals won't reflect popularity very well.