The devil is in the details

Oh. No.

This afternoon, I spent some time teaching another grad student in my lab how to do a lab technique. After I showed him the technique, I showed him how to run it on a very sophisticated machine in the lab. When we finished running our samples, I said that we didn't have to sit there while the machine went through it's cleaning cycle, which is automated on the machine that we have. My plan was to go back to the machine in 10 minutes or so to finish the cleanup and turn the machine off for the night. That was a little over 12 hours ago. I just remembered. We generally get in BIG trouble with the machine operator if we leave it on overnight, but in this case I would have theoretically not only left it on overnight but also left it running overnight. Ohnoohnoohnoohnoohno......

Someone would have noticed and turned it off for me, right? It would have started making noise well before 5....someone else took care of it, right, and just forgot to tell me? I don't need to call a cab right now to go check on it, do I? I'm certainly NOT going to be able to fall back asleep now. It is a VERY BIG DEAL if the machine was actually left running all night. A very, very big deal. I even think that I saw the person who is in charge of the machine while the two regular operators are out on vacation since I forgot that the machine was on, so I would have assumed that she noticed and turned it off. Right? OH. NO.

EDIT TO ADD:
I realized that there was no way that I was falling back asleep and that the last thing I needed in lab tomorrow (today!) was to be tired in addition to being distracted and stressed over all of the things that needed to happen before I left for Denmark. So I went. The machine was still on and running. I turned it off and flushed the lines as best as I could. I actually *think* it's okay...but I won't find out for sure until tomorrow or possibly Monday when one of the regular operators of the machine is back from her vacation. At least it's not getting any worse. And I *think* I can sleep now, although I won't be happy when the alarm goes off in 3 hours. Heh. You think I was annoyed before? Grrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr.

posted by Immunegirl @ 3:53 AM