On occasion I am overcome with episodes of extreme clarity. It can happen anywhere- driving to work or standing in the 104 degree Fahrenheit shower water. One such episode has recently come and gone. The realization was that for as much as I dearly love my chosen field of chemistry for the employment and multitude of Aha! moments it has given me, I am faced with the stark reality: Some of the most profound and pernicious a**h***s I have ever known have been fellow chemists. Shocking, isn’t it?
For the love of God, man, can it be true? Is this too dark of a subject to blog about? Can we talk about this? Maybe it is a dirty little professional secret that should be kept under wraps. Maybe I am some sort of chaotic attractor that funnels these people into my local space? Seems unlikely. It’s probably just a proximity effect. If I took up grocery bagging, the same realization would probably happen.
How did people deal with a**h***s like this 40,000 years ago? If the troublesome Neanderthal who lived a few klicks up Olduvai Creek got out of control, we’d settle it the caveman way. With a club or that newfangled imported Folsom point. Today we are expected to use our words. Well, here are some words- Damn and blast!
Some lab jerks are petulant turds who, if it weren’t for a wealthy grandmother, might be managing a Denny’s on the interstate. Others are true alpha males- tall, articulate, athletic, and sycophantic. These characters are especially loathesome. It has been my experience that many sycophants have no immunity to the enchantments of other sycophants. Some cluster and form cells. Others collect clients or something like courtiers– grinning, pasty-faced trolls who lock onto the teat. It is most distasteful.
(*End of Scorn Routine*)
Lamentations on Chemistry 
Frighteningly accurate. I think you missed out the Neanderthal class of lab jerks. The ones who are sweeping the floor with their knuckles and clubs, the vocabulary consisting of urgh, and argh and you just have to wonder how on earth they got there. Did their rich Grandmother bribe their tutor?
Great blog btw 🙂
Hey man, thanks. I can’t paint and I can’t sing. Have to do something.
-th’ gaussling
Don’t you notice all mad-scientist tend to be chemists, or at least hang around chemical equipment to much?
Well, I think that the portrayals tend to be of alchemist-types, but those who portray chemists in this way, well who knows who they are. We all suffer the continuation of this tedium because of a small number of Hollywood writers and cartoonists. Look at television today. While there is some posturing with regard to the accurate portrayal of contemporary “issues”, in fact the sick stuff we see on the tube comes from the twisted imaginations of a small number of writers. PT Barnum knew that we are susceptable to gawking if he trotted out a parade of freaks. TV is the same thing, only it uses electrons.
-th’ gaussling