(In our weekly lab meeting, one of my colleagues is presenting a complicated experimental plan with a lot of procedures over the course of several days.)
Boss: “You’re putting yourself at risk here by having so many steps. Every step you take…”
Me: “Every move you make?”
(I work in IT for a medical laboratory, and part of my job is to troubleshoot connections between medical devices and our software. The medical devices themselves are not ours to manage, however. I get this call one morning:)
Lab Tech: “Hi, my machine is not working. Could you help me, please?”
Me: “Sure! What device, and what seems to be wrong?”
Lab Tech: “It’s [Device], and I don’t know; it’s just doing nothing.”
Me: “Okay, let me check.”
(I see nothing wrong with my monitoring. However, our connectors have a tendency to need regular reboots, as they’re quite old and tend to give us trouble, so I’m expecting it to be something wrong with our equipment.)
Me: “Can you please reboot the connector? The one behind your machine.”
Lab Tech: “Sure, give me a sec.”
(My monitoring starts showing its usual shutdown and boot-up messages.)
Me: “Okay, looks good. Can you try the device again?”
Lab Tech: “Nope, still nothing.”
(I try every trick in the book to get the device to work, including having her reboot the medical device itself, which is kind of a last solution, since they’re not ours to troubleshoot. Nothing ever seems wrong on my end, but the lab tech still says it’s not working. This goes on for FIVE HOURS! I’m way past desperation point, when I ask her to walk me through every step of her process to see where exactly it hangs.)
Lab Tech: “Well, I put my samples in the tray…” *pause*
Me: “Yes, and then?”
Lab Tech: “Well, that’s supposed to be it…” *pause* “Oh, wait… I didn’t press the start button.” *pause, then my monitoring starts flooding with orders* “Now it’s working.”
Me: *screaming internally but somehow managing to keep my cool* “Well, there you go. Have a nice day.” *hangs up*
(We’re hiring a new research associate for the lab, and I’m in charge of vetting resumes to choose our new hire. After a few weeks, we interview someone we like, and we hire him. Shortly afterwards, I notice we’re still receiving resumes, so I talk to our HR consultant.)
Me: “Hey, I noticed we’re still receiving applications for the research associate position. I checked, and it looks like the job is still listed on [Job Website].”
HR: “Yes, it’s still there.”
Me: “But… shouldn’t we take it down? People are applying, thinking the position is still open.”
HR: “Well, we paid to have the ad posted for 30 days, so we’re going to leave it posted for 30 days.”
Me: “Isn’t that misleading?”
HR: “Sorry. It’s what [CEO] wants.”
(This was her answer to almost everything. Even worse, it was usually accurate.)
(One day I discover that the door to the chemicals cabinet in the lab is unlocked. Assuming this is an oversight, I inform one of the chemists who I am friendly with.)
Me: “Hey, [Chemist], I just wanted to let you know the door to the cabinet in that room is unlocked.”
Chemist: “Oh, that’s always unlocked.”
Me: “Really? But everyone who has access to this building can just walk into that room. Isn’t there really dangerous stuff in there?”
Chemist: “Oh, yes. You could make TNT with the stuff we have here.”
Me: *looks shocked*
Chemist: “What you do is—” *starts telling me the recipe for TNT*
Me: “I don’t need to know! But seriously isn’t that dangerous? A lot of people have access to this building.”
Chemist: “Ah, but you see, the trick is to make it without blowing yourself up. Most likely they’d kill themselves.”
Me: “Ah, they should make plastique. It’s nitroglycerin, basically, but it’s a bit more stable. I learned to make it when I was a kid.”
Chemist: *looks shocked*
Me: “That’s a quote from Terminator. I don’t actually know how to make a bomb.”
(Our new lab technician has a sense of humour.)
Lab Tech: *pushing the dirty glassware cart along the rows of benches in the lab* “Glass for the Glass God! Glass for the Glass God!”
(We empty and rinse our used glassware and put it in her cart. She comes to the row where the lab professor works.)
Lab Tech: “Glass for the Glass God! Glass for the Glass God!”
Professor: *confused* “Wha – what?”
Lab Tech: “Do you have any dirty glassware for the glass wash?”
Professor: “Ah! Ah, no, I don’t. Thank you, though.”
Lab Tech: *next row of benches* “Glass for the Glass God! Glass for the Glass God!”
Professor: *muttering* “I know what I thought I heard.”
