Life in the lab!

Let’s get crushing:

In the lab at long last... Having started lectures last week, I’ve been ‘chomping (or is it champing?) at the bit’ to get back in the lab. If I’m honest, apart from wading around in a muddy estuary somewhere, the lab is where I feel most at home...  Ready to don my lab coat now!
Way back in July I had put some peat samples in the oven to dry (only a degree or two above air temperature, don’t worry it’s not dangerous!). I came back to find them out on the bench with a note on top saying ‘taken out of the oven for a holiday!’  That could only mean one thing... that they were ready to face the horrors of ... The ball mill! Sounds awful doesn’t it?
See animation for a demonstration of its brutal crushing power!
Before starting I was given some very stern warnings about the mistakes made by the previous two users of the ball mill, who had each caused catastrophic destruction costing thousands of pounds!

After several days (plus a lots of noise, some dodgy solvent smells, plenty of dust, and an encounter with two delightful pharmacy students on Tuesday who were using a polymer that STANK of fish!) I have now processed 12 out of 16 samples and have not broken anything yet... let’s hope all is ok for the last four!

J’s record of the week:

‘Uptown top ranking’
 by Althea and Donna

Jamaican teenagers Althea and Donna (aged 17 and 18 respectively), released this single in the UK on Lightning records. It was number one on the UK chart in February 1978 and although they released other material, remains their only major hit.
It brings back memories of a really snowy winter and cosy evenings cuddled up to my mum by the Rayburn in the kitchen listening to the radio, as we had no central heating or TV! I was too young at the time to have bought this on vinyl, but it is a permanent fixture on my iPod which I listen to when in need of a smile (see Monique’s blog for the healing powers of music) and I will always love it to bits!  Jerushah x