As the last few embers of summer are quickly dying out, I decided to do the classic Hitch article and recap the hilarity of my vacation time. And then I realized, nothing worthy of Itoop attention has happened. How could this be, you may ask yourself (as I surely have). Isn't the Hitcher the man with the wackiest stories this side of a butterfly in the toilet? Well, sadly not this summer. Nary a drunken firehydrant hump (that one's for you, Captain Goodnight - "Good nights mean Good mornings"), nor a night cavorting with cocaine offering bimbos. Well, what have I been doing then? The answer is research, particularly my honours thesis.

While normally a dry matter, my research has provided some moments of great drama and comedy. Take for instance, my supervisor whom I will call Dr. Marchessault, as that is his name. One of the top three researchers in his field and a member of the Order of Canada, yet he never recalls any conversation he and I ever have. A typical talk will go along these lines:

Dr. M: "So, Glen. What have you been up to these days?"

Me (wearing my black leather jacket while smoking a Marlboro): "I've been trying to study the oxidation of regenerated never-dried cellulose"

Dr. M: "Hmmm, pretty interesting, but I don't think it'll work"

Me (thinking in my head): "That's what you told me to do yesterday!"

Me (outloud): "Maybe you're right, I was just trying to take some initiative with my research"

(Glen puts out cigarette, and walks out of the lab with a girl under each arm)

So that's a typical day for me in the lab. Oh, and every morning, Dr. Marchessault greets me in such a way as to seem surprised that I would be there again, like I haven't shown up every morning at 9 am for the last 3 months.

I shouldn't complain too much, because I do get paid for a full day's work when I put in maybe three hours of real work. The rest of my day is filled with Yahoo games, email, metafilter.com, 2 hour lunch, 3:30 pm tea time and frisbee.

Other random bits of info about my lab life include the poutine-loving Japanese post-doc, the uber-hot 30-something russian lab tech, my random walk-abouts, my puny excuses to visit the all-female analytical labs ("I, umm, needed, umm, to talk to you about, umm, limits of detection... yeah, that sounds right. So, whatcha doing tonight?"), my many near-floodings of the lab and my view from my desk of the female-only residence.

So, the lab life is pretty damn good. Of course, if they could get rid of that annoying research aspect, it would be darn right euphoric. Unfortunately, a major component of it all will be finished tomorrow, with my thesis being handed in. I will always look fondly upon Lab 205 of the Pulp and Paper building - and all the ways I found to not spend time there.