Mad Scientist...very mad

So, prepare yourselves for what you may feel is a relatively worthless and gross exaggeration of certain events that have induced a volcano-like rage in me. Someone keeps stealing my f'in lab coat at work, and I feel that it is a hate crime. Action needs to be taken to end this targeted bigotry.

To give you an idea of what I'm talking about, there is an airlock before entering the maze of labs in which everyone has their own hanger on which to keep their lab coat. There are clean lab coats kept not 10 feet away, which are replenished each week. Now, everyone has their hanger fitted with whatever name-tag/identification they deem appropriate...some have lab tape with their name on it, others have some kind of bling, some just have a plastic name tag displaying...you guessed it, their name. A few months ago, the company spent thousands of unnecessary dollars to buy us these flimsy aluminum name tags printed with our name and company logo...fancy, right? We were told, as per company policy, to put on our lab coat and one on our hanger (btdub- I want to have the job to come up with useless company policy items for a big company to spend thousands on...how does one do that??).

Since the introduction of the metal name tags, my lab coat has been stolen a total of 4 times, and each time I had things in the pockets that I dearly miss, such as:

Favorite pen- Now you know that there are certain pens that you love writing with because they make your chicken scratch look amazing. I find one and then become obsessed with it until it runs out.

Lab goggles-those non-geeks out there may not understand the value of a good pair of well fitting lab goggles, but I do. And now, 3 of mine have gone missing.

Chapstick- I have a serious addiction to chapstick,therefore, I have it stashed in every pocket/purse/drawer/bag imaginable. I even go so far as to match certain chapsticks with the environment I'm going to (a bit obsessive I know, but this is how deep my love for chapstick goes).What the hell are you going to do with someone else's chapstick? I can only assume that it is getting tossed to the wayside, which makes me die a little inside. Do you know how much I love the medicated blistex that comes in the tub?? Or Burts Beeswax?? Do you know how much I enjoy the tingle it give me lips once I put it on? Do you know that it brings a little happiness to my long hours in the lab???

Ugh. I have to think that I am a target for whatever reason. Maybe someone out there doesn't like me, which I've already established in previous blogs is very likely. Perhaps someone has a sick "Silence of the Lambs" type obsession with me, and somewhere out in cube world, they have a shrine to me, complete with multiple name tags, used chapstick, and hair dolls. Perhaps they are just waiting to corner me when I'm working late one night, lock me in the cold room, and force me to rub bacterial cultures all over myself. I don't know, but I'm angry.

So, I'm trying an experiment...a case study if you will. I have changed my hanger marking to be just my initials rather than my full name. I will track how long it is until someone steals my lab coat. The next move will be to put a tag on the hanger that says "Take this coat and I will hunt you down and cut you". And I will. My brother has a knife set...don't test me.

Sorry about the venting. More light hearted words to come.

LOVE!