Oh, you didn't.

I left the grad student I call Captain Useless "alone" today to prepare a sample. Normally I would stick around to make sure things went smoothly, just in case, but my deadlines are looming and I can't simultaneously get my work done while supervising his.


Result: My solid steel equipment got deformed today because soooooomeone loaded it to 60,000 lbs instead of 1,000. Incredulous, I asked him why he would do that, and he said, "Well, I was just going to load it all the way (500,000 lbs) but it started bending so I had to stop when the pieces wouldn't fit together anymore."

I guess getting him to help draft the procedure wasn't any insurance that he'd actually understand it or follow it.

This week's lesson: Orders of magnitude?