ERR… ERR
STOP FLASHING AT ME! AARRRRG stop it! STOP IT NOW!
I’ve had enough with all of you assholes, I’m gonna take a week off an re-evaluate my life’s goals!
Specifically, I’m going to raise a mutated monkey army.
Oh yes it will be mine! Carefully trained attack monkeys with the glow-in-the-dark sex organs virus and genetically engineered to explode easilly. I will unleash my army upon your buisnesses, I will send HIV infected chimps into your offices, lock the doors behind them and pipe chimp phermones in through the AC ducts.
In short: The gloves are off and I will OWN you!
I’ve been good long enough, but I just can’t take it anymore. If I practiced the level of incompetence that the contractors which work on this facility practice Texas would be a BURNING BIOLOGICAL WASTELAND.
Ok ok, it’s already a burning biological wasteland, but I bet ya I can make it worse!
So I’m thinking that if I’m going to become a crazed super villian/scientist I need a sexy underling. Ya know someone who can seduce the hero into making a fatal mistake and keep the monkeys in line.
<Competative wages, good health plan, leather body suit and riding crop provided. Perks include playing with monkeys and beating peons>
Ok: So here’ whats going on that’s annoying me.
18 ohm water.
The ultra pure stuff. Basically just H2O with no nasties in it. Reagent grade water, usefull for all sorts of biological experiments.
Our nanopure machine is all FUCKED up.
The probe which tells us what ohm it is (I have no clue what this means, all I know is that when the read out says 18.3 ohms I dispense water) is 12 years old, is shitty and keeps falling out of alignment. Which means the machine just flashes ERR ERR ERR
Over and over again.
ERR
Actually it’s more like Err see it can’t do the BIG r… only the little r…
It’s amaizing the amount of pH controled water we need to go through, water without contaminates which can disrupt DNA or contaminate cell culture conditions… But guess what:
THE FREAKING MACHINE DOESN"T WORK!
It hasn’t worked in 10 goddamn monkey raping months!
It’s either been leaking from the remote or the filter cartrages or the probe has been FUCKED.
In the last month I’ve had 4 guys come out to fix it.
“The probe is bad, but they don’t make em any more I might be able to get one for 2,000$+”
URK
“I can try wiping it off with ethanol…”
Then later, “the probe is out of alignment…”
After that’s fixed it starts leaking.
Then it takes 3 different people to realize the O-ring on the hand set that keeps the water from oozing out is bad!
But guess what:
THEY DON"T MAKE THE GODDAMN O RING! A 40 cent piece of plastic that NOBODY MAKES! AAAAAAAAAAAARRRRRRRRRRRRGGGGGGGGG
In the mean time: every few hours we have to mop of the water. Well by me I mean I. NOBODY ELSE NOTICES IT!
I leave the damn handset in the sink, not hanging on the hook over the counter so the water DRAINS INTO THE SINK!
So I played phone tag for 3 hrs today. Upshot of the whole thing, 480$ for a new handset. 65$ for a handset filter + labor for installing a new handset on a machine which may not accept it.
And lets not forget that they’ll probably leave something not connected so it’ll leak again.
I swear to christ the next repair man who fucks up fixing something gets his keys thrown in the breeding corral! Let’s see that fucker leave when he has to fight 100 lb baboons in heat!
What really is pissing me off is this:
Boss: Wants nanopure machine fixed, tired of leaks.
Grants Mangement: They want to know how much this is all going to cost so they can file their paperwork.
Repair guys: Want to get a work order BEFORE they bill us so they can make sure they get paid.
Accounting: Doesn’t want any repairs to go over 200$
Me: To be left alone.
To make matters worse: NOBODY KNOWS WHO PAYS FOR THIS SHIT!
My boss doesn’t want to pay since it’s not his. He didn’t buy it, the foundation provided it…
So someone somewhere, in a secret bunker (the same place where they hid the wet bar for the christmas party) knows who is responsible for paying for it, and or buying a replacement.
And everyone is calling me wanting to know what’s going on!
I"M A GODDAMN LAB TECHNICIAN!
HOW THE SWEETLY BATTERED CHRIST AM I SUPPOSED TO KNOW WHAT THE FUCK IS GOING ON!?
I don’t know if I can order a new one. I can’t authorize any repair which costs more than a can of coke…
AND NOBODY WHO ASKES ME WHATS GOING ON KNOWS HOW TO TALK TO EITHER!
OMFG. Everyone says, ‘it’s not my problem’.
Yes it fucking is!
Boss: I can live with it leaking.
Foundation: You’ll be the ones getting the fines for too much water use.
Accounting: You guys have to pay the piper so to speak
Grants Mangement: You’ll know how much it costs to fix AFTER WE GET IT FIXED!
Repair guys: You’ll get paid AFTER YOU FIX THE FUCKER RIGHT
So why is it out of all the people involved the one with the most daily work (me) has to take care of this?
I am scientific support staff… I support the scientists. You guys are support staff, you support the scientists.
Arrg
It’s not like this is a single incident.
The nanopure machine doesn’t work… some idiot forgot to replace the CO2 tanks for the central CO2 system (our tissue culture incubators need 5% CO2 to keep the cells alive… if the central CO2 system goes down the cells don’t get enough CO2 and they die). That caused a week of me running around checking pressures of backup tanks and hounding the work crew guys to install new holders for CO2 tanks… (that resulted in some guy using a screw driver to punch a 10 inch hole in the wall of the BSL-3 so he could get a starter hold for a screw going…)
We had freezer problems and the guy fixing it electrocuted himself on the floor of the lab.
We’ve had flooding, insect problems and god knows what else.
AAAAARRRRRRGGG
If you have a crap DI system like we do here at WashU then I would suggest getting an Elix along with it but get one with a big reservour, it’s a RO deionizer that produces 15 MOhm from Tap H2O.
