Actually did some science the other day -- well, sort of. We had our weekly lab meeting in the a.m. at which Barney informed us he was expecting some cichlids (that's an African fish, for those who don't know) from the University of Florida, and thus he was organizing a fish killing party. His phrasing, not mine. Barney does a lot of protein assays and had apparently been performing some on cichlid tissues following protocols and analyses for killifish before suddenly thinking, "What if these protocols aren't valid for cichlids?" I'm thinking "Duh" because cichlids are African freshwater fish and killifish are North American estuarine fish (the species Barney uses, for the most part), but what do I know? Anyway, Barney decided he wanted to do some standardization, so we got to whack fifteen fish and dissect out their livers, hearts, brains, and bits of white muscle. We set up a bit of an assembly line -- Chad dunked a fish into liquid anesthesia (a POSSIBLE carcinogen, keep that in mind for later in the story) then measured weight, standard length, and total length, I recorded said measurements, Barney dissected and placed the tissues separately into tubes, and Sunil (our undergrad, keep that in mind for later in the story, as well) dunked the tubes in liquid nitrogen before storing them on dry ice until everything was finished.
Things were going well while Barney dissected and was basically keeping an eye on Sunil, but that only lasted for three fish. Then Barney had to take care of a gel he was running, Hector took over dissecting, Chad and I traded jobs, and Sunil the not-as-anally-retentive-as-the-rest-of-us starting slacking off. I turned around at one point to see him fishing for a tube in the bottom of the nitrogen container that he had just tossed in instead of holding suspended with forceps as Barney had told him to do. I politely mentioned he probably wanted to refrain from doing that anymore, but he didn't take me too seriously. As he was digging for another tube later, lamenting about how difficult it was to find amid all the "smoke" pouring from the container, Barney turned around and caught him. He chastised him minorly, but he really lit into him when he opened the ice chest and found the tubes arranged in a pretty haphazard manner. Chad, Hector, and I just looked at each other and tried not to laugh.
I was excused from the three-ring-circus after six fish because I had class, and I erroneously thought all the fun and games would be over by the time I got out. No. The boys had not gotten back to our little African friends in the two hours I had been gone. Unfortunately for Chad, Hector was gone, Barney was in a meeting, and I had to meet my attendant for a much needed potty break. That left him only goofball Sunil. I stuck around for one fish, recording data for Chad, when Sunil decided he would be helpful and take the fish out of the anesthesia for us. Chad told him he needed to remove some of the extra fluid from the fish, but instead of blotting Ms. Cichlid on a paper towel, Sunil starts shaking it. He's giggling like a screwball, and anesthesia (that possible carcinogen) is flying everywhere. Did I mention he was doing this eight inches from my face? Somehow, I managed to escape without getting a snootful of the stuff, but he did sling some in Chad's face. I not-so-politely mentioned that he might want to knock that the hell off. I vacated the lab shortly after that, leaving poor Chad to fend for himself. He's a big boy, he could handle it.
Don't get me wrong -- Sunil is not a complete moron. I just don't think he's as conscientious about details as the rest of us, which totally strikes me as weird since he's really into biochemistry. Well, that in and of itself is weird too, but I digress. He's just an odd duck who gives me the impression that he's being a clown so we'll like him. I like him best when he's not being a clown.
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