Tom Stevenson @steventm98.bsky.social · 05/10/2026I sent them the link to the Rookie Mistakes page giving Alison full credit of course on LinkedIn the day it came out, but I didn't hear anything back 000
Tom Stevenson @steventm98.bsky.social · 30/09/2026Replace the cigarette with a hockey stick and perhaps it will be more representative of how it really went. 000
Tom Stevenson @steventm98.bsky.social · 23/09/2026The fact that the Empire never engineered maxi-chlorians speaks to the lack of scientific funding once all of the money was shifted to the Department of the Deathstar. 020
Tom Stevenson @steventm98.bsky.social · 21/09/2026This seems more like a journalist read Inprep and did not know it was satire. Vibecoding meets helicopter parenting. 110
Tom Stevenson @steventm98.bsky.social · 09/09/2026One interesting thing here is that the Keitel Character in Reservoir Dogs was killed off and Wolf is an entirely new character In Pulp, while the guy he is cleaning up after in Pulp Fiction (Vinny Vega) is meant to be the brother of Vic Vega (Mr Blonde from in Reservoir Dogs). 010
Tom Stevenson @steventm98.bsky.social · 02/09/2026who for no apparent reason wears a Boston Bruins Jersey under his lab coat throughout the entire film. 120
Tom Stevenson @steventm98.bsky.social · 02/09/2026The Legend of Bagger Phos: A feel good movie about a young chemist fresh from academia learning how to bridge the worlds of medicinal chemistry and discovery process from a taller than you'd imagine wisecracking veteran chemist. 120
Tom Stevenson @steventm98.bsky.social · 31/08/2026Mark Lautens has written a fair number of opinion pieces in Toronto. 120
Tom Stevenson @steventm98.bsky.social · 28/08/2026When I lived in Geneva the waiters would get offended if I sprinkled parmesan on pizza. Often there would be parmesan for the other diners who ordered pasta, but if I used some a taboo was broken. 010
Tom Stevenson @steventm98.bsky.social · 26/08/2026That would not look out of place on a Russian general. 020
Tom Stevenson @steventm98.bsky.social · 24/08/2026I have probably told 100 people this over my 41 years (this week) in industry, but I tend to say I found this freeing, but relief may be more elegant. 030
Tom Stevenson @steventm98.bsky.social · 24/08/2026My most resonant lines: ...if there’s enough compound in that vial, the yield is just fine. Personally, I found this a relief and never looked back. 120
Tom Stevenson @steventm98.bsky.social · 21/08/2026I think the CSI pronounced the GC output as Heptane-2-1. 030
Tom Stevenson @steventm98.bsky.social · 19/08/2026The ACS publications color scheme is a bit challenging to read on the white background. #ChemChat 031
Tom Stevenson @steventm98.bsky.social · 11/08/2026DaRN SHAME THEY DIDN'T ASK @bagphos.bsky.social 110
Tom Stevenson @steventm98.bsky.social · 07/08/2026Famously one of the MIT jokesters was able to induce sudden cardiac arrest throughout the group during one such trip by going around the corner and loudly saying in his best Buchi impersonation: "Dr Sugimori, could you tell me again what was the yield on that cyclization?" 010
Tom Stevenson @steventm98.bsky.social · 07/08/2026It is said that George Buchi did not allow newspapers or radios in his lab, but that during every trip he took overseas they magically appeared again. 110
Tom Stevenson @steventm98.bsky.social · 07/08/2026I think it was Buchi who popularized the "if there are 10 ways to take A to B, then none of them are any damn good." I still hear it in the fake Swiss German accent of the Buchi impersonator who told me this. And every former Buchi student has a Buchi impersonation. 240
Tom Stevenson @steventm98.bsky.social · 07/08/2026We used to have larger version bottles (400-500 ml) like this that we could use to store solvents in my post-doc in Geneva. When the pipette would bump up from the ground glass joint on its own we knew it was too hot to work. 020
Tom Stevenson @steventm98.bsky.social · 28/07/2026Snieckus would say add TMS-Cl and try again and come back and take off the TMS afterwards. 101
Tom Stevenson @steventm98.bsky.social · 24/07/2026I just read the ASAPs every morning, but the addresses all changed today. 000
Tom Stevenson @steventm98.bsky.social · 20/07/2026Two routes diverged in a yellowed lab catalog And sorry I could not afford both And be within my budget And while I pleaded for more funding The spot price for my metal doubled; 041
Tom Stevenson @steventm98.bsky.social · 20/07/2026Two routes diverged in a yellowed lab catalog And sorry I could not afford both And be within my budget And while I pleaded for more funding The spot price for my metal doubled; 010
Tom Stevenson @steventm98.bsky.social · 16/06/2026pubs.acs.org/doi/10.1021/... /[hijack]pubs.acs.orgDefined dimensional alterations in enzyme substrates. General synthetic methodology for the bent dihydro-lin-benzopurinesTo access this article, please review the available access options below. 020
Tom Stevenson @steventm98.bsky.social · 16/06/2026Another interesting reaction in this series was the use of ethoxyacetylene to dehydrate a diacid to a cyclic anhydride. 110
Tom Stevenson @steventm98.bsky.social · 16/06/2026My first t-butyl ester was the Diels Alder Product of ditbutylacetylene dicarboxylate and a heterocyclic butadiene. Treating that with TsOH gave the cyclic anhydride directly. 110
Tom Stevenson @steventm98.bsky.social · 05/06/2026Ah, the smell of rancid butter. Smells like not-victory in the morning 000
Tom Stevenson @steventm98.bsky.social · 22/05/2026Would be easier if it was "I've got a ligand to buy" 200
Tom Stevenson @steventm98.bsky.social · 13/05/2026I had once been told that Fischer had been in the habit of tasting the products of sugar structural determinations like osazones. I do not know where that came from. I did find the following account of his life presented soon after his death. ia600607.us.archive.org/view_archive...ia600607.us.archive.org 010
Tom Stevenson @steventm98.bsky.social · 06/05/2026Nonetheless, the fellow was able to have a fully paid "sabbatical" from everyday life in India for a few months in Switzerland. 021
Tom Stevenson @steventm98.bsky.social · 06/05/2026Within the lab it had become obvious in a short time he wasn't a chemist and did not know anything about chemistry. Nonetheless, it was a few more months before the boss gave him a little quiz to prove the obvious. He was sent back home a few weeks later. 101
Tom Stevenson @steventm98.bsky.social · 06/05/2026Back when I was in Geneva in the 80s for my post-doc they were still talking about an incoming post-doc in the department who had sold his visa to another Indian guy (non-chemist) with the same name. His boss was traveling a lot at the time when the person arrived in Switzerland. 131
Tom Stevenson @steventm98.bsky.social · 05/05/2026Now, go away, or I shall taunt you a second time. 010
Tom Stevenson @steventm98.bsky.social · 04/05/2026Still waiting for Conan O'Brien to do a podcast with Bertozzi given their shared Harvard background and love of music along with Bertozzi being in a band with Tom Morello. 020
