The Compleat Billy Chronicles (thanks to Zenpatista)

[ReverendJesus]

Mass tells space how to bend, and space tells mass how to move.
Money tells the market how to trend, and the market tells money how to move.
Physics is what kills you, but it's biology that wants you dead.

This. This right here.

[Doktor Howl]

Okay, cleaning out the back lab for the move.  83 chemicals to be lab-packed off, 8 of which are unknown, another one that's probably cyanide, and 1 big leaking drum of nitric acid.

Last purchase date was 1978.  Norton is suitably horrified, but I assured him that this is all normal.  Which, you know, it is.

[altered]

Hey, at least you /probably/ don't have 50 year old ether lying around, all crusty with peroxides. That'd be a hell of a field trip.

That nitric acid though ... I wonder how much of the contents, by weight, are ghastly green iron nitride sludge.

I once heard of unknown lab chemicals being identified by giving samples to interns or students (I think it was students, but it's been awhile) and assigning them the task of identifying them. You just tell them they are "reasonably common lab reagents or can be made by such" and accept whatever they tell you as gospel truth, apparently. I don't recall if that process ended in anyone missing limbs, but one does have to wonder.

[altered]

Also, it's so normal that I can't believe Norton's horrified by it. Pretty much every chemist I've ever known has a dozen stories of the office off of the main lab that had hundred year old equipment gathering dust and a shelving unit bowing under the weight of totally unidentifiable compounds, most of which required a bomb squad or hazmat team to dispose of when the time came to clean it all out. This exact room seems to exist in every chemistry lab in every university on the planet.

[Doktor Howl]

Also, it's so normal that I can't believe Norton's horrified by it. Pretty much every chemist I've ever known has a dozen stories of the office off of the main lab that had hundred year old equipment gathering dust and a shelving unit bowing under the weight of totally unidentifiable compounds, most of which required a bomb squad or hazmat team to dispose of when the time came to clean it all out. This exact room seems to exist in every chemistry lab in every university on the planet.

Norton is young, and honestly believes that things are done properly in most places.

[chaotic neutral observer]

... and 1 big leaking drum of nitric acid.

Although I lack direct experience in such matters, I think I would prefer a leaking drum to a swollen one.

That nitric acid though ... I wonder how much of the contents, by weight, are ghastly green iron nitride sludge.

You have brought to mind a quote:

Mixed acid, of course, didn't give off those NO₂ fumes, and everybody was convinced, as late as 1949, that it didn't corrode stainless steel.  [...]

Well, everybody had been wrong. The acid doesn't corrode stainless—at first. But after an induction period, which may vary from minutes to months, and which depends upon the acid composition and particularly the percentage of water, the temperature, the past history of the steel, and presumably upon the state of the moon, the corrosion starts and proceeds apace. The eventual results are worse than with RFNA. Not only is the quality of the acid degraded and the drum damaged, but a thick, heavy, greenish-gray sludge of loathsome appearance, revolting properties, and mysterious composition forms and deposits. I have seen drums of mixed acid with twelve solid inches of sludge on the bottom. To make things worse, pressure gradually builds up in the drum or tank car, which has to be vented periodically.

    -- John D. Clark

[altered]

Yep. Ignition! is a favorite.

[Zenpatista]

Poor Norton. A *drum* of nitric acid is terrifying. We might have a wider variety of chemical horror at the university, but you guys make up for it with sheer volume. I'm glad it's just a move across town though.

[Doktor Howl]

Poor Norton. A *drum* of nitric acid is terrifying. We might have a wider variety of chemical horror at the university, but you guys make up for it with sheer volume. I'm glad it's just a move across town though.

Same.

Also, we do not store nitrates next to organics, or acid next to oxidizers.  Not sure why I still have to be saying this.

[Doktor Howl]

ALSO, I AM REASONABLY SURE THE SDS FOR CHROMIC ACID DOES *NOT* SAY "IF GLASS BOTTLE IS DAMAGED, WRAP IT IN PLASTIC."

[altered]

Who the FUCK did that, can you track them down, and can you give it back to them without legal repercussions? jesus fuck

[Doktor Howl]

Who the FUCK did that, can you track them down, and can you give it back to them without legal repercussions? jesus fuck

It was us.  I mean, some of us that are no longer us, but instead are now them.

[Doktor Howl]

At work today

Norton:  "Good morning, old man."

Me:  "Don't you old man me, whelp.  I once beat William F. Buckley Jr in a fair fight."

Norton:  "What?"

Me:  "A fair fight.  I had a baseball bat and he had emphysema."

[ReverendJesus]

Me:  "A fair fight.  I had a baseball bat and he had emphysema."

Damn, y'all must do fairs differently in AZ; we usually just get some shitty 80's band and a Ferris Wheel.

[Doktor Howl]

Me:  "A fair fight.  I had a baseball bat and he had emphysema."

Damn, y'all must do fairs differently in AZ; we usually just get some shitty 80's band and a Ferris Wheel.

We get THUNDERDOME.  Only without the dome.  Or the thunder.