Tuesday, February 13, 2007

Snow day


So, the reason I haven't posted in a while is that I've had infrequent Internet access since I've made a temporary move to Washington DC for three months. I'm visiting the laboratory of a collaborator at the NIH, learning some techniques in membrane protein purification, refolding and crystallography.

Federal Government employees in Washington DC, like those at the NIH, seem to get a pretty good deal. If more than just a dusting of snow falls, then much of the Federal Government 'closes' ... So this afternoon I got to go home early, since they called a "snow day" at 2 PM.

Normally this would be great ... a free afternoon off ... except with laboratory work of course it means that by dropping everything and leaving, my mornings work was for naught, and I'll need to start again fresh tomorrow. I could have stayed to finish things off, but I was told there was no guarantee that the Metro (trains/buses) was going to stay open.

Ah well .. tomorrow is another day ... (on which I can optionally come in to the lab two hours late ... due to snow :) )