Comedy Tuesday...

            I’ve had the last couple of days off as I was in London last night seeing the awesome Peter Kay at the O2 arena. Needless to say, a considerable number of shandies were consumed by all involved and I woke up this morning not feeling particularly fresh to say the least. However, a pint of Kronenbourg and an all-day breakfast meant I was slightly more coherent and thus able to brave the Tube and, horror of horrors, London buses. This all went without a hitch and I got on my train home without too much hassle. I did a crossword, I looked out the window and then I fell asleep in possibly the most uncomfortable position I could muster at that point. An hour later, I pulled into the station and realised I had pins and needles in not just my leg but both arms as well. A couple of minutes were required to sort myself out before I proceeded on a Quasimodo-esque jaunt down the carriage attempting to get some blood back into my limbs. All I can say is that I’m glad no-one saw this.

            This took the time to around about 4pm where I made the fundamental error of deciding to go to the lab for a bit before going home. I decided to work up the 3-hour long reaction I had left stirring for the past 4 days when I got there. The product is an amide, which I realised was in fact really water-soluble when I got a ~10% crude yield after standard work-up. After sitting there watching 100 mL of water vac down on the Buchi at half 6 on a Tuesday evening whilst mildly hungover, I needed some comedy (or at least something entertaining) to occur. Thankfully this came in the shape of a colleague down the corridor. A supposedly intelligent Masters student had just asked her how to make brine. She was nice and told her to put salt in water, whereas if it was me I’d have probably told her to slowly neutralise concentrated hydrochloric acid with sodium hydroxide. Thinking about it, maybe that’s why I wasn’t asked in the first place.