Stress levels still bouncing

Have a lab and a presentation due on Thursday; spent most of today working on the lab writeup with some other grad students. Probably will do work on the presentation tonight, but will take a break to see a movie. The other grad students amused themselves saying that they should name an instrument to measure grad student stress levels the "Kohtameter" (this is funny because those little fluid-measuring float-based devices are called rotameters--we had a problem involving the partial derivative of the mass flow rate with respect to the fluid flow rate). But as you can tell by the fact that I'm posting here, it's not as bad as it could be.

Last weekend, I spent a few hours off to finally install some cabinets to make my kitchen more workable (as opposed to having 18" of counter space next to the sink). The installation went well--required a lot of shimming, as you would expect in an old house like this. But things are greatly improved--I now have 4' of counter space next to the range! Woo!

However, I had a classic "measure once cut twice" moment there:


I was installing the handles on the drawers, and trying to figure out the best way to center them. I said, "wait... I have my computer running with Excel open. I can measure the cabinet width, and figure out the placement of this 96 mm handle, no problem. ( Cabinet width - 96 mm handle center-to-center distance) / 2 = distance of first hole from edge; previous distance + 96 mm = second hole. Zipped the holes through using a brad point bit, carefully setting up a backer board to prevent blow-out at the back. Nice clean holes, looked at the back... waitasec... those aren't centered.

Crap. I entered 310 mm, not 301 mm, into Excel. The computer is your friend. Your stupid data entry errors are not. Redrilled... correctly this time... installed... putty will happen soon... or I can just leave it as a reminder to my error.

It reminds me--a lot of the time, when people have had industrial/construction accidents, they report that just before the accident, they heard a little voice saying, "Wait... this could be bad." Yeah... a similar thought went through my mind: "Just double-check the symmetry with a measurement from the other side," followed by, "nah... no worries." If you are in a construction situation and have this happen, listen to the little voice! (unless, of course, they're telling you that you should be staying at home cleaning the guns instead).