Guest Post for James

On James' blog he sometimes has guest posts from survivors of orgo courses. So I wrote one. Like a good husband he humored me an read it, but I don't think he'll post it. So I'll post it here. (Oh and Joel, I'm still thinking of one for your blog)

Dr. James,

Since you seem to like getting stories about people surviving orgo, I thought I'd tell you mine.

From what I can see, there is really only three types of chemists: you make stuff, you figure out what stuff is (and how much), or you figure out what stuff does.

I think what really bothered me about orgo class is that we were learning all of these reactions, but we never actually learned how to make stuff. It was always what happens if you add this to that, and that wasn't really engaging to me. And mechanisms? UGH! BORING! I had to entertain myself by making sound effects to go with all that arrow pushing (this did not make me popular during exams).

You know what it was like? It was like three semesters of being forced to do endless scales on the piano without learning a single song.

Furthermore, I got the sense that we were learning outdated reactions that were great examples, but no one ever used anymore. How useless is that!? I want to know how to make stuff! 

Just when I had given up all hope on the lameness of orgo (my marks reflected this) I met this really cute grad student. As we started the ol' flirting game, I spent more and more time in his lab where he was doing an organic chemistry project.

It was while listening to him and his labmates go over some horrid problem in the lab, that I realized they were doing what organic chemistry is REALLY about and what I had originally imagined: making stuff. They would pick a big-honking nasty beast of a molecule and try to make it. It was while trying to solve a specific problem where they REALLY learned organic chemistry.

So for those of you who think the idea of organic chemistry is cool but are horrified by the reality of the lame classes, hang tough. I'm guessing you are also the kind of person who learned how to drive by actually driving instead of reading the manual in the glove box. Get through these horrible courses, and join a lab for a summer research project or a even a masters. From what I can tell, it is a whole different world.

As for me, I gave up on orgo and became a nanoparticle chemist. I make stuff that glows. It is awesome. I still get the shudders thinking about orgo class, but at least I know what it is really like.

As for the cute grad student? Well I married him.

See you at dinner.

Janet (orgo survivor)