So, I promised that this wouldn't turn into a personal blog. Today is one of those exceptions. My morning was... interesting, to say the least. It started out really good and I was having great momentum. Apparently, that momentum carried through when I went to the stockroom. I ended up breaking a 200 mL bottle of triethylamine. Triethylamine is a base and, in my opinion, has the most pungent smell of all of the bases (excluding, say... putricine or cadaverine). It smells 1000x worse than rotten fish (oh, it was ODORIFEROUS!). Let's just put it this way- it's so volatile (and btw, SO not healthy- still can't feel my lips; yep, that's me dying of cancer) that it quickly migrated throughout the fourth floor and all the way to the first floor (and maybe even the eighth, who knows!). Awesome. Good job.
Once the majority of it was picked up, we tried to contact the health and safety professor, then the second in command, then my boss (who is the Chair of the Dept), then Environmental Health and Safety. The story goes on from there, but I realized it could be worse. There is a lot of "lucky ifs" that I maintained. Then, as I continued to be down in the dumps throughout the afternoon (this happened around the nine o'clock hour), I found out that one of my close friend's mother is in the hospital. Then, simply (excuse my French), I felt like an ass. How selfish of me. It is as true as the saying goes: "it could be worse". Yes, it could: it could have been a 1L bottle; it could have been broken on the carpet; it could have been a chemical that is combustible in air (and I deal with a LOT of those!); I could have a parent or friend in distress; I could get cancer; I could be more than 30 pounds overweight. Even in those scenarios, things could be worse--- and I am completely serious. So, praise the Lord for this day, because life could be worse and I guess it's all what we make of it and how we react to these type of situations. It is days like today that make me reevaluate; it's God's blessings in disguise.
