you know you've been in the lab too long when...

[labgnome]

1. You wonder what absolute alcohol tastes like with orange juice
2. You can tell what cheap and expensive white coats look like
3. You can't watch CSI without cursing at least one scientific inaccuracy
4. You use acronyms for everything and never stop to elaborate
5. Liquid nitrogen is only about a 1/3 as dangerous as you thought
6. You always seem to use the microscope after the person with the impossibly close together eyes
7. Accident reports are a badge of honour
8. You've wondered why you can't drink distilled water in the lab
- It should be clean?
9. You give the lab equipment motivational pep talks such as "Work for me today or I'll reprogram you with a fire axe"
10. You've worked out that a trained chimp could probably do 90% of your job
11. When a non-scientist asks you what you do for a living you roll your eyes and talk science at them until they've lost the will to live (mainly for fun)
12. You have to check the web to find out what the weather is outside
13. You realize that almost anything can be classed as background reading

14. People wearing shorts under a lab coat disturb you slightly as they look as though they might be naked underneath

15. Although all cooking is a glorified chemistry experiment you just still can't seem to get it right

16. Safety equipment is optional unless it makes you look cool
17. Warning labels invoke curiosity rather than caution
18. The Christmas night out reveals scientists can't dance, although a formula for the movement of hands and feet combined with beats per min is found scrawled on a napkin by a waiter the next day
19. You know which part of the lab you can chill out undisturbed on friday afternoon
20. You decide the courses and conference you want to go on by the quality of the food served
21. You are strangely proud of the collection of junk you've stolen from vendors at trade shows
22. You've used dry ice to cool beer down
23. No matter what the timings in the experiment protocol there is always time for lunch in the middle
24. You can no longer spell normal words but have no trouble with spelling things like immunohistochemistry or deoxyribonucleic acid
25. Burning eyes, nose and throat indicate that you haven't actually turned on the fumehood/downdraft bench
26. Your slightly too fond of the smell of (pick one or many) Xylene/Agar/Ethanol/Undergraduates/Alcoholic handwash
27. You've left the lab wearing a piece of PPE because you forgot you had it on
28. You moan about not being able to pipette by mouth any more
29. Security come round at 2 am wondering why the lights are still on only to find you with your arms up to your elbows in a glovebox
30. you have made some kind of puppet out of a nitrile glove and kept it as a pet (Putting dry ice in makes for a rapidly expanding if short lived pet - )
1. When at a Fall Out Boy gig you wonder why everyone is going round with Faecal Occult Blood (FOB) written on their head!!!!
32. You have an irresistible urge to rip your shirt off superman style cos it has press stud fasteners just like your lab coat.....Most often occurring as you walk through a door just like exiting the lab.... (The worlds of strippers and lab workers collide, not pretty)
33. You still get amusement out of "freezing" things in liquid nitrogen!
34. Blinking real fast has saved your eyesight on more than one occasion.
35. You've removed your gloves to find a small hole which has left you with either - wrinkly old person hands, a brightly coloured finger (histologists especially) or a burning sensation and dermatitis at some point.

36. You've bent down to pick something up off the floor only to scatter the contents of your top pocket.

[admin]

lmao.... very good!

[ramihs]

something tells me this post author has experienced all of the above.....and has been in the lab for quite longer than needed

[labgnome]

lets just say that i no longer wonder about the taste of orange juice and etoh. lol. just beginning my phd... havent been in the lab all that long, but i will be!!

[sharmakaushikp]

Nice one.

[oBWhat]

yes, sad but true! lol