I'm so busy it almost feels like the old days when I used to run two machines, because I am running two in fact: the Trace and the Mass-spec. The girl who normally operates the Trace is on vacation.  

I tried not to touch it. I figured she could deal with her samples when she gets back just like I do mine. No one takes care of my shit when I'm not around and when I get back, I have a nice mound of backlogs waiting for me, which is why I never go in the first place. So yeah, I tried to stay away from the Trace for a while. It's a recent acquisition and still has that display-room veneer. I've never actually touched the damned thing before now.  

So there I was, pretending I was invisible and staying as far away from it as possible when yesterday the pseudo-supervisor saunters over and says, Hey, so how's it going?   

And that's how it came to feel like the old days... not that I'm complaining. It's actually quite fun. The hours just fly.