Chemistry Lab Blitz

At the end of my premedical training, I discovered an error.  I had failed to take the laboratory section for Chemistry 100 from a year and a half prior.  I had added the chemistry class late, and I didn’t want to press my luck worrying about the lab.  Now, I was just on the threshold of applying to medical school.  I was also leaving BYU for an engineering job in Texas in three weeks, so I had no choice but to cram the semester-long laboratory into that three-week period.  The instructor thought I was crazy of course, but I was used to crazy by now.  For the next three weeks, I stayed up into the wee hours of the night in order to have three experiments a day ready to go.  Early each morning, I would go to the lab commissary and check out an embarrassing amount of flasks, tubing, burners, and any other odds and ends I had planned for.  I was relegated to the far end of the lab so as to be out of the way, and the Freshmen lab students would eye me nervously as I ran from experiment to experiment.  After three weeks: mission accomplished.

LESSON LEARNED:  It’s easier to do things the right way at the right time than to cram them in later.

FEEDBACK:  WHAT EXPERIENCE LIKE THIS HAVE YOU HAD?