Hi! I am having a good summer! I hope you are too, anon! I’m always hesitant to take too much about my personal life (mostly because I’m afraid of boring people, not because I’m afraid of being stalked or something like that… again, I’m too boring to stalk!)

Thank you very much! Unfortunately, I do not have an instagram. When I first developed this blog, I thought about putting it on instagram instead of tumblr, but I figured Tumblr would be better for also being able to include text content, as well as a … generally nerdier audience. As for a personal instagram, I don’t have that either, as my actual life is pretty darn boring.

Hi! I’m so sorry for being so late to respond to this ask! My freshman year ended okay, at least academically speaking - multivariable calc was a little touch-and-go but I ended up coming out on top with the 4.0. I was also chosen to be the secretary of my school’s undergraduate research journal for next year. I’m really excited to work with the journal because it draws on knowledge of both science and writing, which are two things that I really enjoy. Stuff about my summer under the cut!

Hi! Sorry for the late reply to this post, first of all. Congratulations on choosing your school! I really like the sense of freedom and independence that college gives you, at least as compared to high school. I also continue to be blown away by how some professors will go above and beyond to help students learn. If you get the right professors, listening to them talk and interact with students - nevermind talking with them yourself - is an incredible experience. That’s what’s defined college for me academically for me so far. 

Thanks, anon, but it really did go that badly. If you’re curious I’ll tell you more about in messages or off-anon. 

You aren’t the first, you won’t be the last. 

College is fun, but it's very stressful, too. I really like the independence and choice you get in figuring out what you want to do with yourself, even in your day-to-day routine (of course, that means you have to do chores like clean and do laundry, but you take the good with the bad). I do have some really great friends. Unfortunately, I haven't gotten into any relationships. I'm still the same dateless loser I was in high school, ha ha.

Mini-update, analytical chemistry isn't bad, but the lab - my first college lab class - is very stressful, and it's not helped by the fact that it's in a near 80-degree lab in the basement of a poorly ventilated old building. I interviewed to work in an organic synthesis lab over the summer, but the interview went... less than ideally, so I probably won't get the position. So, yeah, ups and downs.

Thank you for the well wishes and for checking up on me!

Thank you, anon!

Thank you, and the same to you!

I’m glad you like it so much! Most of the very pretty products are inorganic compounds, and the colorful ones are from transition metals. The failures for those usually just don’t crystallize in the way I want them to; I like to isolate large crystals even when things like to crash out as massive globs of intertwined microcrystals. That’s why crystallization can be such a dark art of trial and error. Organic compounds (and, by extension, metal carboxylates - acetates, citrates, etc.) can be burned, so in the end you get this black-brown tarry mass that usually smells nasty and is just gross. Basically, I have high standards for inorganics that I know can come out nicely like chlorides or sulfates.

Awesome! Glad everything worked out! Good chemistry experiments often have simple but powerful designs like this, so it probably helped meet all the basic requirements of the experiment and get you the 100. Nice work!