Drudge.

by phill

be patient luke stay and watch over the droids_lo
Creative Commons License photo credit: paintMonkey

Today marked the

start of a beautiful friendship between myself and a whole shitload of glassware. The chemistry building is moving down the road. By that I don’t mean that the building is hopping up onto chicken’s feet and striding down to roost snug next to Manning Road, though that would be awesome. In this boring reality it means that a whole bunch of PhD students, including yours truly, are packing up everything in the labs. First coddling them with paper or pink (PINK!) bubble wrap, and next into cardboard boxes for shipment by the removalists. We’ve been contracted to do this task for six weeks. After one day, I can tell I’m going to need to replace the mp3 player I lost about three years ago. It’s not that I don’t heart my fellow inmates workers, but after the fifth hour or so, you tend to want to just focus on getting the job done and maybe listening to a few tunes while doing it. I’ll keep an ear free just in case there’s a noxious gas leak. Or perhaps not; at least there’d be a bit of excitement in the desperate dash to sweet oxygen.

On the bright side, we’re getting paid a lot more than our scholarships, though most of that will undoubtedly go to the taxman. We’re also pretty much braindead for the entire day, which is a bloody nice relief following the normal nine-to-fives of constant engagement. And at the end of the day, it’s a six-week extension to our thesis due dates, which no-one in their right mind would refuse. Even if in that time I’ll be hard pressed to kick on with the wordcount. I’m also contemplating taking in the camera, I’ve already seen a few snapshot-worthy images (plate mail petri dishes!). It’d probably add a bit of fun to the day, too. (:

I’m sort-of participating in a new initiative to bring Flash Fiction into the elite group of writing forms that have a month dedicated to them. It’s being headed up by a couple of people from deviantART that have 100+ members signed up and writing at the Flash Fiction Month group. So if you have an account, or even if you don’t, head over there and check out the prompts and get involved. Words on the page can’t hurt.

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