Many things can go wrong when you're doing your experiment. No, I don't mean accidents. I'm talking about unexpected delays. Like there may not be enough Teflon cups, not enough 15mL tubes, not enough 100mL bottles, and of course, not enough pipette tips. Like how I had to pipette 16x15mL using 1mL pipette because we're out of 5mL tips. I'd planned to do the analysis on Tuesday, but the air tank was not available and I had to wait until it arrives on Thursday.
It's so difficult to book the balance, and I had to do my weighing while my friend went for lunch (at 2pm!), or when she's transferring her digest. And I feel so paiseh for delaying her weighing when she has hundred over tubes to weigh.
And so by the time I finished diluting my solutions and re-preparing the external calibration standards for magnesium (had to reuse my calcium standards cos I'm out of nitric acid!), it was 6.50pm, and I was totally drained, hungry and thirsty. To think that I'd be starting my flame AAS at 7pm... Goodness.
I'd planned to do the analysis with my lab mate since she's analysing for magnesium as well, but then she realised that our matrices were different, so I had to wait for her to finish first. I finally started my analysis at 8.45pm, and ended at 9.50pm. Then I couldn't print the results because the printer is spoilt, so I had to save the results to my thumbdrive. I shut all the gas tanks and rushed home to have dinner at 11pm. And when I left the lab my friend was still diluting her samples... :(
And of course, after all that tiring work in the lab, I still have to analyse the data. I have a feeling this one is going to be tough. The calculations for strontium is driving me nuts. I don't know whether I made a calculation mistake; I hope I did, cos my recovery is only 40%!!!
Sounds really miserable right? But on a lighter note, I'm happy to say that for the first time in my life, I've managed to align the graphite tube by myself and had a successful run! ^_^
YAY!
ReplyDeleteGOOD JOB!
=D
- Fen
Yay!!!! :D Haha, look at the bright things!
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