Construction day

"You see, Kirstin, the great thing about biology is that you learn a lot of random skills. For example, I'm getting pretty good at plumbing." - one of my professors in college

That is a LOT of PVC fittings!

Ask anybody, and they'll tell you they want a job in which they're not doing the same things over and over again every day. That's the dream, right? I'd be curious to see how many people actually achieve it, but I can tell you with certainty that I do not do the same things at work every day.

For example, yesterday. There was a giant box delivered to my lab, full of PVC fittings in various shapes. I was very excited to see the box arrive. The fittings are the raw materials for my latest project, constructing housings for samplers I'll use over the summer. The housings were designed by my Ph.D. advisor for deploying samplers in the deep sea. The arrival of my PVC fittings meant that I could steam ahead with construction.

In addition to the fittings, I had ordered myself 5, 10-foot poles of PVC. I actually spent the majority of the day in the Biology Department workshop, cutting the PVC into 2-inch segments on the chop saw. The short segments then served as connectors between the fittings, and voila! A useful product.

I'm proud of the skills I've amassed in the last few months, especially when it comes to construction. There is never a boring day as a biologist!