a collection of observations

[kaberett]

I appear to get on much better with derivative works of the Sherlock Holmes canon than I ever have with the actual, er, canon. So. There's a thing.

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Here is a thing I have been enjoying recently: watching the ways chemists use their hands. (Most of these observations probably also apply to people who work in other types of lab, wet or dry, but I mostly notice them among chemists!)

Here's one of the things: hand use is different when wearing gloves versus ungloved. I keep laughing at myself for this - when wearing wheelchair gloves, I push my glasses up my face, or scratch my face, using the back of my wrist or my forearm. When I'm not wearing gloves I'll use my fingers and thumb and hand - even when, as with my wheelchair gloves, my fingers are bare throughout so are exposed to precisely as much ick when ungloved as when gloved.

Here's another: we tend to sneeze into our elbows when wearing gloves. Any kind of glove.

And another: when pouring loose fine-grained solids, we hold the receptacle steady in one hand, and in the other hand hold the source container at a very slight angle - not enough for things to pour unaided - and with the same hand, tap it gently and regularly to get the solid to flow. (Recently witnessed in the wild when my Lovely Housemate was pouring loose-leaf tea into a steeper.)

***

If you are in a conversation with both me and my mother, and we like you and we are relaxed, languages (vocab and grammatical structures) it is helpful to know include (but probably aren't limited to): English, German (Germany, Austria, Switzerland), French, Latin, Cornish, misc Scandinavian, misc Slavic.

I noticed this the other day when she was supposed to be meeting me in a place. I phoned her to ask where she was; she responded "I arrive, I arrive!" Which... is only helpful if you can map it to the French "j'arrive, j'arrive!", which means not "I am arriving" but "I am on my way." And then on Wednesday we had "ubi est antiquus...", followed on Friday by "quaestio super est...". And, thing is, this is all just part of our normal conversation: she's second-gen, I'm third-gen, we're both native speakers of two languages, and we're from a clan that loves playing with language.

And this in turn leads to: I am going to have one HELL of a time using Dragon Dictate, if I ever get around to it. Whoops my seamless multilingualism.

Comments

[ghoti]

Re: gloves. All of this. I also tend to sneeze into/down my shirt/collar since be-labcoated sleeves and elbows are still a charming source of cross contamination. Elbows are just good hygeine. (Kids here are taught to make a "chicken wing".)

[kaberett]

Yesssss.

[ghoti]

Also realized that I've basically stopped putting pens in my mouth. Both for general bored/thinking nomming and also when I've run out of hands.

[pipisafoat]

healthcare arena glove observations! or at least, rehab people. we apparently all suddenly forget What Do Arms Do when wearing gloves. it's pretty hilarious. hands hesitate like every half second when moving through the air. elbows hover an awkward distance from the body. (it's not like the gloves go up to anybody's elbow! well except one person but that doesn't count, and besides, she's probably the least awkward glover.) shoulders tense. necks flex and chins are thrust awkwardly out. IT IS SO WEIRD, FRIEND. and i notice that i do it, too, but i can't seem to stop it! and noticing it when you're doing it really only makes it worse! because then you're aware of it and you try to fix it but YOU CAN'T because now you're paying attention to your arms, and WHAT DO ARMS EVEN DO.

also that i have the habit of always scratching anything with the back of my wrist. because we try not to contaminate anyone but also, we're really awkward in gloves, so we try to avoid those as well. so if you scratch with the back of your wrist, it's like the five-minute rule on washing your hands instead of the five-second rule? IDK IT'S WEIRD BUT I'M NOT THE ONLY ONE though i did have that habit well before coming to this facility or even this field.

[kaberett]

AHAHAHA YES. HOW IS HANDS. HOW DO ARMS. THESE ARE MY CONCERNS.

IDK I think the back-of-hand thing, at least in labs, is that you are less likely to have actually been handling POISON with the backs of your hands vs your fingertips/palm? And you're less likely to put the back of your hand On Important Things? so I can see how that arises though it obvs doesn't make a huge amount of sense...

[dreamfracture.insanejournal.com]

Also, pouring liquids down the handle of a spoon to avoid spilling them.

[nanila]

You just made me realise that it's been almost a decade since I worked in a wet lab, and I still habitually sneeze into my elbows. O.O

[trinker]

cosmolinguist, you were right. kaberett is absolutely my sort of geek.