10 Examples of Biohazardous Waste | Daniels Health

hazardous waste examples

hazardous waste examples - win

Waste

For discussion of the management of unwanted or unusable materials
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Bioremediation

Applied uses of mycology, microbiology, soil science and more in bioremediative forestry.
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Brand Owner Q&A

This thread repeats every month on a six hour rotating schedule.
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A break down of the bull case for Ethereum and how it relates to Bitcoin

There is a general understanding among ETH investors that the enhancements from ETH 2.0, EIP-1559 and L2 solutions will result in a sustainable monetary policy with near 0% issuance and the potential for Ether to become a deflationary asset. What is even more interesting is that the net return of ETH as a SoV becomes superior to BTC the moment that issuance is lower than the staking yield. In other words, even if BTC had already ceased issuance, it offers no mechanism to provide yield to long term holders with a negligible risk exposure as ETH does. There is an execution risk that Ethereum will not deliver on what is currently planned, but if it does then what I have explained will become a reality.
You cannot separate BTC/ETH's payment rails from their respective monetary policies. As you are probably aware, issuance is just a subsidy, and without it the network will need to operate as a profitable business with a cash-flow that is entirely dependent on network fees. We are observing a situation that is causing a degradation of the utility of the Bitcoin network. What I mean by that is that the incentive for users to transact directly on the network is being diminished because of the tokenization into ETH and by the introduction of custodians (like Paypal) and traditional banking services who will soon be entering this space. If these trends continue, I suspect that the only activity that will end-up happening on-chain will be done by whales sporadically transacting to hodle and the occasional settlement from institutions. Bitcoin seems fast and frictionless, but that is because you are comparing it to something in the physical world. In digital terms Bitcoin emulates the friction of operation that is found with gold: it is difficult and expensive to move it, securing it yourself is not trivial, and it does not make for a great medium of exchange. I don't think this will be a good dynamic to generate enough transaction fees. That is of course my subjective interpretation of it, but regarding this particular situation it is nearly impossible to make objective assertions at this point. It is possible to assert that, in the digital world, the expectation of frictionless money would entail near instant transactions with negligible cost and without the relative risk/paranoia of dealing with nuclear waste and having a hacker watching your every move waiting for you to make a mistake to snatch it away. Digital money would also need to interact with other digital assets, preferably defined and operated within the same ecosystem. Ethereum is steaming ahead on all ends.
Ethereum is fostering a digital economy (this is a very important part of understanding the value of Ethereum, but I will not be exploring it in this post) with DeFi at its center. It is currently generating about three times as much trx fee revenue as Bitcoin. L2 solutions are going live as we speak, and it appears that they will be much more practical and provide better UX when compared to the Lightning Network. This will help to amplify L1 block space value and push revenue even higher. That will be followed by EIP-1559, which will burn transaction fees. Mining is currently excessively profitable and the hash rate cannot keep up. This means the financial incentive can be reduced and by burning trx fees we achieve the equivalent of an issuance reduction, while stabilizing mining revenue. Eventually the transition to PoS will dramatically cut the operational cost of the network. That means that Ethereum as a business will become more profitable and less reliant on the issuance subsidy. Finally, we will see the introduction of sharding which will scale L1 by up to 1,000 times, compounding the effect of L2 solutions and making it feasible for the network to operate as a platform for new use cases. A solution to the hackenuclear waste security situation is being explored via social recovery wallets. It is still in the early stages of research and design, but it is important to realize that the Ethereum community recognizes it as a problem and is working on a solution.
There is a lot more that can be said about the BTC vs ETH debate and I am working on a full write up that explores each individual element in more detail. Regardless, it is important to pay attention to this trend: the smartest people in this space are shifting their point of view and realizing Ethereum's potential. Raoul Pal is a seasoned investor, extremely bright and open minded. He started with Bitcoin, but it did not take him long to understand the value proposition of Ethereum. Lyn Alden is a brilliant investor and mental powerhouse who initially did not think investing in Ethereum could be justified, but she is also starting to shift her view and now understands that it has a justifiable risk/reward ratio to be included in a portfolio (although she is not personally invested in Ethereum). She has plenty of negative things to say about it, however it appears that she recognizes this is not a black and white situation. I have a feeling she will be revising her analysis on Ethereum again in the future with a more optimist view, but maybe that is just wishful thinking.
The crypto space has a few analogies that have been used to describe technical/economic mechanisms that are somewhat tricky to understand: mining, Ethereum's gas, and the analogy between ether and oil. Crypto "mining" is not like real world mining. It's purpose is not to extract resources, but it is rather a decentralized mechanism to process transactions. Newly minted BTC tokens are not "mined", they are minted by the protocol and awarded to operators. Furthermore, it is impossible to change the total mining output of the network... adding/removing miners does not affect the mining output. If you are new to crypto, you can read a more detailed explanation of mining here. ETH's "gas" is not like fuel (it cannot even be stored). It is just a computational metric that is more akin to the distance a car must travel, but not what actually makes it move. The fuel is electricity and it must be paid for with ether. When you transact you are also paying for the "car" which is the use of all active mining hardware/validators for a fraction of a second. And ether is just money.
If you put too much weight on these simplified analogies, you will not understand the economic actuality behind them. This is a source confusion in the crypto space, and it is used to support false narratives. From an economic perspective, ether is money. Once you understand this, you will know that the narrative that BTC and ETH are not competing because they are different things is analogous to saying fax machines do not compete with the internet.
The beautiful thing about ether is that it is actually not "just money". It is a mixture of a scarce monetized commodity, money, bond and tech stock.
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EDIT 1: Adding an analogy to explain why ether is money:
Let’s say I have a car with a 14-gallon fuel tank and I want to take it on a road trip. The car is not aware of the price of gasoline, and it would not travel any farther if the price of gas would double the next day. That’s because the intrinsic utility of oil has nothing to do with its monetary value. The car needs gas because of its particular physical properties and how the ICE is designed to utilize it. If I want to drive from point A to point B and it takes a full tank to get there, it will take that full tank no matter what happens to the monetary properties of gas/oil. This is fundamentally different from how Ethereum uses ether.
Ethereum (the network) is not trying to be money, but it utilizes ether exclusively for its monetary properties and not because it can be magically burned by an imaginary engine of sorts. It costs money to participate in the network as a miner, and their engagement is financially incentivized with ether. Block space is a scarce resource, therefore participants who wish to transact use ether to bid for it. These interactions are utilizing ether as a monetary medium of exchange. In the long run, as the price of ether goes up, the ether denomination of gas prices goes down. That happens because no one is using ether as gas/oil, and it is actually being used as money. In the short run you may see the opposite occurring because of the dynamic between the portion of block space demand that is inelastic and the demand for ether.
EDIT 2: Revisiting key concepts to explain how they will become price catalysts.
  1. Wide adoption of L2 solutions: these will amplify the base layer block space value while encouraging further network adoption by a significant reduction of fees. A successful integration with DeFi protocols will dismiss the "Ethereum killers" theory and consolidate market confidence.
  2. EIP-1559: reduce excessive financial incentives to miners by burning transaction fees. This will also discourage miners from attempting to artificially raise fees via spam.
  3. Sharding: scale L1 bandwidth, compounding the effect of L2 solutions, further consolidating Ethereum's dominance in the DeFi space, making it feasible to introduce new use cases and eventually increase trx fee revenue.
  4. The switch from PoW to PoS: discontinuing PoW will eliminate the operating costs related to mining and will allow for a reduction of issuance. Money that was previously allocated to buying mining equipment will be redirected to the acquisition of Ether. Staking Ether will remove it from circulation for extended periods of time. Operating cost will be negligible, allowing validators to withhold most of the Ether revenue. This will be the greatest bull market catalyst in the history of cryptocurrencies and it will eclipse the effect of BTC halvenings.
Bitcoin maximalists will be nay-saying all the way through and past a market cap flip. Do not get caught up in their narrative. If you are not sure, then it is better to rebalance your portfolio proportionally to market caps. If none of these things happen and Ethereum turns out to be a failure, then you would only have reduced your gains by 20%. Otherwise, ETH will be making you mountains of money.
EDIT 3: Ethereum killers
Ethereum killers remind me a lot of Tesla killers, but a lot worse. People need to understand that cryptocurrency platforms targeting financial Dapps are fighting the equivalent force of a black-hole when it comes to Ethereum’s network effect and user retention in this space.
Bigger players, with bigger money, are entering this market and they will not settle for anything other than the top dog. This pattern reinforces Ethereum's position as the premium financial system, which ends up attracting even bigger players and resulting in the black-hole effect. To make matters even more complicated, financial apps are more valuable when they are surrounded by a rich and diverse variety of digital assets and other natively defined Dapps. There is not much you can do with your money in a ghost town.
It is VERY difficult to build this type of environment up because the platform and dapps must also have established full trust from their user base. This is not to say there is no space for other networks to grow, but just don’t get your hopes high that they will be taking Ethereum’s stronghold as a financial system. There are other use cases that do not require the amount of decentralization and security offered by Ethereum, and the networks that can focus on these are the ones who will be able to coexist with in the long-run. Gaming, ERP interoperability and supply chain are good examples of such use cases. Remember that alternatives with cheap transactions have existed for a while and they have barely touched ETH's dominance (EOS, NEO, VET, QTUM, IOTA, LSK, STRAT, ARK and dare I say... TRON).
EDIT 4: Refuting critiques about dynamic monetary policy
If an argument can be made that the financial incentives to operators (miners/stakers) are excessive or insufficient then an argument can be for the implementation and execution of a dynamic monetary policy.
I don't think an arbitrarily picked issuance schedule determined during the genesis of a new highly complex system is likely to be efficient through its lifecycle. Bitcoin's monetary policy provides the certainty of stability and protection from abuse, but it sacrifices the possibility of efficiency and jeopardizes longevity. It would be like if a captain of a ship would point it in the direction of its final destination, set the throttle, then fall back to his cabin for a nice bottle of chianti and hope that the ship would arrive safely. There would be no one at the helm to navigate the seas, no one to make sure it stayed on route, no one to avoid the storms or to take advantage of currents. In my opinion it is a pretty bad approach to something as critical as monetary policy.
With respect to Ethereum's dynamic monetary policy: I don't see any evidence to suggest developers have been enriching their pockets by keeping issuance at the levels they are. Developers are stakeholders and the Ethereum fund holds a lot of ether - debasing ether is against their self interest. There is a great misunderstanding that the one's who are adjusting issuance are the recipients of the new tokens. Is there any documented case of this happening?
EDIT 5: Addressing Bitcoin's immutable monetary policy
The idea that Bitcoin's monetary policy cannot be changed is a myth. It is a false narrative that takes for granted that the issuance subsidy will no longer be necessary at some point, but there is no way to objectively assert this. There is no divine power preventing the monetary policy from being changed. If the security model for Bitcoin was jeopardized because of insufficient cash flow to miners, then Bitcoin's monetary policy would be the first thing on the chop board to go in order to remedy the situation.
EDIT 6: Five years ago naysayers were screaming about how everything that is being done TODAY in the Ethereum network would never work. Now they are calling Ethereum a scam, or that is is a platform for degenerate gamblers, or that the fees are too high and therefore it is useless, or that it can't scale, or that something else better is just around the corner to take its place.... you know... basically all the things that traditional bankers have to say about Bitcoin, maxis are saying about Ethereum.
EDIT 7: The greater the impact a new technology can have on society, the more difficult it is to comprehend its potential. Ethereum has the potential to have a dramatic impact on human civilization. It could take decades for it to be fully realized, but it would change the world in ways that we cannot possibly imagine today. If it happens, the moon will be just a pit-stop.
EDIT 8: Thank you so much for all the awards! Ethereans understand this stuff, and I could feel the frustration in the air every time someone said that Ethereum is not money, or that ETH and BTC are completely different things, or all the other bs attacks that are in great part founded on a lack of understanding of how BTC and ETH actually work. I would love to hear what guys like Raoul Pal, Pomp, Michael Saylor and Fernando Ulrich (for my Brazilian friends) would have to say about some of the things that have been written here. If you know a way to get their attention, then please do it.
EDIT 9: Clarification about Lyn Alden's opinion of Ethereum
EDIT 10: I am still working on a much more ambitious write up. It is focused on economic aspects of money, monetary systems and global asset markets. I still have not incorporated any of the information written here, but I eventually will merge it together. One of the main new ideas that I am exploring is challenging the notion that money has no intrinsic value and that scarcity is the most important attribute of money. I think I make a compelling argument to demonstrate that facilitating economic activity is more important, and how Ethereum has a big edge over Bitcoin in this regard. Here is the link to the WIP doc.
TLDR: Ethereum is not stopping at the moon... it is not stopping on Mars... it is going straight out of the Milky Way galaxy in search for alien life... but you should own some BTC just in case the spaceship malfunctions during launch.
submitted by TheWierdGuy to CryptoCurrency [link] [comments]

My ultra hardcore recycling guide for our house

Hi all,
I've been putting together info for how to recycle in Tucson while leveraging all the recycling options that are open to me: curbside, the city's upcoming glass drop-off, local and mail-in corporate-sponsored, and TerraCycle (a paid option). I aim to reuse or recycle every last bit of waste coming out of our house, no matter how crazy it may seem. Partly I just want to see how difficult it is; I recognize that my process isn't practical for most people.
Anyway, here's what I've gathered so far.

General principles

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  1. COMPOST: If it can be composted, compost it! (More on this below.)
  2. REUSE: If it can't be composted, reuse it! Reuse is always the most environmentally-friendly option.
  3. DONATE: If it can't be reused by you, donate it if it's something worth donating that someone else could use. https://tucsoncleanandbeautiful.org/ has a great directory for places that will accept various materials. Cero is a Tucson store that also accepts lots of stuff for donation and reuse. Donation usually involves transportation and some kind of carbon emissions, but it's still better than recycling. Don't donate junk! Donations aren't a free trash can.
  4. MUNICIPAL RECYCLING: If it can't be donated, recycle it locally using municipal recycling (curbside or drop-off). Recycle Coach has all the info you need on what municipal recycling can or can't recycle. ESGD's page on residential recycling also has some important guidelines. Recycling uses energy and involves carbon-emitting transport, plus not everything in a recycling waste stream actually gets recycled, so try to reuse first.
  5. LOCAL STORE DROP-OFF: If it can't be recycled using municipal recycling, recycle it at a local store for free. Earth911 has a search page that finds these stores and breaks them down by type, and TerraCycle's corporate-sponsored programs page also has some local programs. These programs typically ship their waste to a recycling partner, often TerraCycle in New Jersey, which adds to the environmental footprint of the process, so try to recycle municipally first.
  6. FREE MAIL-IN: If it can't be recycled at a local store, use one of TerraCycle's free corporate-sponsored mail-in programs. These programs end up sending waste TerraCycle, just like the local store drop-offs, but are arguably less efficient than sending a big communal batch of stuff, so try to use the local store drop-offs first.
  7. TERRACYCLE (PAID): If it can't be recycled using a mail-in program, use a paid all-in-one box to have TerraCycle recycle it if it's small and light. This is effectively the same as using one of the mail-in options above except that you have to pay, so try to use a mail-in program first.
  8. REGIONAL DROP-OFF: If it's a big bulky waste that can't be donated, see if it can be recycled outside of Tucson (e.g., save up Styrofoam for the next time I drive to Phoenix, where they do have the appropriate facilities). TerraCycle accepts almost anything, but their all-in-one boxes are pricey, so it may make more sense to save up big hard-to-recycle stuff like packaging for Phoenix or another big city, if you think you'll drive there at some point. Don't make unnecessary trips just to drop off waste!
  9. TRASH: If it can't be composted, reused, donated or recycled, throw it away and make sure that you follow the guidelines for hazardous waste disposal.
  10. GOLDEN RULE #1: Make sure that the material is clean. Clean waste streams are more valuable to recyclers, which helps keep costs down. Don't use too much water cleaning up stuff, but don't feel too guilty about using water, either! Dishwater usage is a tiny sliver of household water consumption, not to mention that industry and agriculture generally use much more water than homes.
  11. GOLDEN RULE #2: The goal of recycling is to break down your waste into "primary materials" (e.g., plastic, metal, paper, glass) that can be used by industry to make new products. The more mixed your materials, the more you need to research how to recycle it. Knowing the basics goes a long way. For example, I know that metal cans get melted down, so a paper or plastic label attached to the can doesn't worry me because I know that it will get burned off. But what about a milk carton, which is paper fused with plastic? Or the circuitry inside the plastic base of a CFL bulb? If you can't intuitively explain how the thing is going to get broken down into its primary materials, that's your cue that you need to do some research.
  12. GOLDEN RULE #3: Knowing the basics of how recycling centers work goes a long way. For example, if you know that you can't recycle plastic grocery bags curbside because they get stuck in the machines, that's a hint that you shouldn't try to recycle your plastic food wrap, either. Or if you know that plastic bottle caps fall through the holes of a separator, that's a hint that you need to research whether your beer bottle caps are recyclable (even though they're metal).
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Reuse and recycling guide for my home

This is not a comprehensive list of every recycling resource in Tucson, this is just for my house my household's needs. I've found that there's no one-size-fits-all solution if you want to reach close to 100% recycling/reuse, you end up having to come up with a list that's customized for your home, which requires research. I'm providing my list as a potential template as well as for inspiration.
Legend:
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How do I sort all this?

Right now, I'm using a makeshift system of lots and lots of bags to keep everything separate. My idea is to do a monthly "recycling day" and drop off everything that needs to be dropped off as well as mail in everything that needs to be mailed in. I haven't had to do this yet since I started this project.
I hope to build a sorting station in my house once I understand my needs a bit better.
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Notes on TerraCycle and partner programs

A lot of the corporate-sponsored/mail-in/drop-off programs are done through TerraCycle, a New Jersey-based recycler that specializes in recycling hard-to-recycle things (e.g., potato chip bags, toothbrushes). They make lots of their money through large corporations, which essentially pay them to process unprofitable waste in order to burnish their environmental stewardship bona fides. They also offer paid recycling pouches and boxes to the general public. You mail in these pouches/boxes (they come with a shipping label) after filling them up with recyclable waste.
TerraCycle will recycle almost anything and everything. However, anything that gets recycled through them or one of their corporate programs is shipped to New Jersey for processing, so it's preferable to reuse or recycle locally. They're also not as transparent as I wish they would be. I'm not certain, for example, how much of each waste stream actually gets recycled. They have a customer support contact form that's been very good for getting my questions answered, but beware that they take about 2-3 days to get back to you per request.
I bought the large "all-in-one" box from their site and found a coupon code online to bring the cost down to around $350. I read a review elsewhere from someone who got a medium box (about 50% the size) who said that it lasted her six months. My idea is to use this box as "recycling of last resort" and rely on drop-off programs as much as possible to keep costs down. On the other hand, this makes my life more complicated in terms of sorting different waste streams, so you could simplify by putting waste destined for various drop-off points into a single TerraCycle all-in-one box.
You need to register for free on their website to use their mail-in programs. Many of their mail-in programs unfortunately have wait lists. Of the ~15 programs for which I signed up around two weeks ago, about 8 had wait lists, and I got off the wait list for about 5 of them. So they seem to go through the list pretty regularly. Once you're in, you can print off a free UPS label from the "my profile" section of the site after logging in.
If I had to take a wild guess, I would assume that TerraCycle has a higher rate of recycling than municipal programs, but this must be balanced against the financial and environmental cost of shipping waste to their facilities.
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Composting

The Achilles' heel in my recycling and reuse plan is organic matter. The City of Tucson has a composting program but it's only open to businesses.
There are a few volunteer-run programs here and there that accept compostable waste. I managed to sign up for one, UA's Compost Cats, and will be meeting them tomorrow to pick up my sealed composting bucket and go over the program rules. I know that they have limited capacity, so you have to email them. They took about a week to get back to me.
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Am I insane?

Maybe a little 🙃.
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Shout outs

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submitted by Low_Walrus to Tucson [link] [comments]

My 2021 Portfolio

Albeit a week late, I want to share my 2021 portfolio for documentation purposes and for whoever is interested. I aimed to balance risk in this portfolio with some growth names and legacy plays. Down to brass tacks, I am putting my money in the highest quality companies (in my view) across a diverse set of industries I find attractive. Some of these names are overvalued in the short term. However, I have realized I am not in the business of beating Wall Street’s pricing, but would rather hold high-quality companies that I believe will grow faster that the market in the long term. In other words, I am totally fine paying a short-term premium for growth and quality. Below is a summary of the portfolio and big picture reasoning behind each investment. I'm definitely open to any feedback.
Company Ticker Entry Price Exposure
ARK Genomic Revolution ETF ARKG $93.26 6.60%
CrowdStrike CRWD $211.82 11.78%
Disney DIS $181.18 10.53%
Enphase Energy ENPH $175.47 7.98%
Evolution Gaming Group EVVTY $101.02 12.77%
Facebook FB $273.16 11.05%
Redfin RDFN $68.63 10.41%
Teladoc TDOC $199.96 9.60%
Sea Ltd SE $199.05 14.09%
Waste Connections WCN $102.57 5.19%
ARK Genomic Revolution ETF (BATS: ARKG) - Invests in companies advancing genomics. The companies held in ARKG may develop, produce or enable: CRISPR, Targeted Therapeutics, Bioinformatics, Molecular Diagnostics, Stem Cells, Agricultural Biology.
CrowdStrike (NASDAQ: CRWD) - Cybersecurity technology company that provides endpoint security, threat intelligence, and cyber attack response services.
Disney (NYSE: DIS) - Worldwide entertainment company that you all are probably familiar with.
Enphase Energy (NASDAQ: ENPH) - Designs and manufactures software-driven home energy solutions that span solar generation, home energy storage and web-based monitoring and control.
Evolution Gaming Group (OTC: EVVTY) - Swedish company that develops, produces, markets and licenses integrated B2B live casino solutions for gaming operators.
Facebook (NASDAQ: FB) - Enables people to connect through devices. It’s products include Facebook, Instagram, Messenger, WhatsApp and Oculus.
Redfin Corporation (NASDAQ: RDFN) - Provides residential real estate brokerage services.
Teladoc Health (NYSE: TDOC) - Provides virtual healthcare services on a B2B basis to its clients and provides services to consumers directly and through channel partners.
Sea Ltd (NYSE: SE) - Digital entertainment, electronic commerce, and digital financial services. The Company operates three business segments: Garena, Shopee, and SeaMonkey. The Company’s digital entertainment business, Garena, is a global game developer and publisher with a presence in Southeast Asia, Taiwan, and Latin America. Garena provides access to mobile and personal computer online games. Shopee provides users with a shopping environment that is supported by integrated payment, logistics, fulfillment, and other value-added services. SeaMonkey business is a digital financial services provider. SeaMonkey offers e-wallet services, payment processing, credit related digital financial offerings, and other financial products.
Waste Connections Inc. (NYSE: WCN) - Waste services company that provides non-hazardous waste collection, transfer, disposal and recycling services.
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P.S. I have two other accounts - one with about 40 growth stocks and another with about 10 big names / ETFs. However, this portfolio has the largest allocation for 2021. My first time trying a more concentrated approach.
submitted by bull_doze to investing [link] [comments]

A hilarious tale about how we failed at reading the rules - several times

Buckle up, this is going to be a painful (or hilarious) read. Minor spoilers ahead (class names, scenario names, monster names)
My brother and I started a 2-person campaign around 3 months ago. We'd heard really good things about Gloomhaven, and he spotted it on sale so decided to pick it up. We're avid gamers, and love board games. A persistent game like Gloomhaven was exactly the type of thing we'd longed to play.
After the box arrives my brother spends the night reading the rulebook, and the next day I head to his place for our first session. He explains the basic combat concept to me, and noted that "There's a lot of rules, we'll probably get a few wrong here and there but we'll figure it out". I trusted in his ability to read the rules (hah), so when I glanced at the rulebook I hit what I thought were the highlights: status effects/how they work, combat abilities, etc. so that I wasn't completely blind. After 3 hours of initial setup we played the first campaign mission.
We waste no time in our first rule failure.
We'd heard it was difficult, but this felt brutal. It constantly felt like we were wasting turns and cards, and it felt way too difficult to properly set up and execute any real strategy. For a strategy game, it certainly seemed like a lot - too much - was left up to chance and luck in order to successfully get through a single mission. After 4 hours and maybe 10 attempts at the first mission, we finally beat it. We head back to Gloomhaven and we skim the rulebook for what we do next.
Oops, we did combat wrong.
We played the entire scenario with our hands facedown as decks that we would draw from. At the start of the game, and after every rest, we shuffled our hands, and placed them facedown in front of us. On each turn we each flipped our top two cards and played those cards that turn.
I'd like to say after that bumble we did another thorough read-through of the rulebook to make sure we were now doing it right. We didn't. After all, the game just got a lot easier for us.
So we figured we caught why/how the game was so hard. We laughed at ourselves. "Hah, idiots" we said, eager to play the next scenario the following week. I'm proud to say, the game is much easier once you're playing it "properly" (foreshadowing). I'm not proud to say we continued to handicap ourselves unnecessarily the past 3 months. Here's a brief list of more rules we failed to understand properly:
There are a many more minor things we kept forgetting to do (shuffling modifiers after 2x or null was drawn), or using items incorrectly (pulling attack modifiers prior to stating using an item), but a lot of them are relatively minor, usually balanced between monster advantage and character advantage. One big one was that were didn't realize healing a poisoned character only removed poison, and didn't also heal on top of it. Poison was annoying enough before we figured that one out.
But that's not even the worst part.
Yesterday we were playing the Abandoned Sewers scenario. We attempted it 4 or 5 times with a Tinkerer + Scoundrel, then 3 or 4 times with a Brute + Spellweaver. On none of these occasions did we ever feel like we were remotely close to completing the scenario. This was by no accounts very different than any other day. Killing 17 monsters (oozes among them, so likely 20+ monsters) with two characters felt nearly impossible. There were a few attempts where we made it to the last room with 2 turns left, but killing 6 enemies in 2 turns while poisoned seemed absurdly difficult. We played it until midnight before giving up - frustrated and angry at how many times we had read online that a party "had to try a second time" to complete any scenario.
As he was driving me back to my place we were having another one of our post-Gloomhaven discussions, lamenting that "The game is challenging, but it feels way too difficult. We need to pull nearly perfect attack modifiers and also get lucky with monster action draws to even have a shot at some of these scenarios"
I said a phrase that I had said many times before we re-skimmed the rules for many of the above rule examples: "It feels like we're missing something fundamental that would help us". Mind you, this is 3 months in. We have retired 3 characters, completed roughly 15 or 16 scenarios (at an average of 7-10 tries per scenario), we are at maximum reputation, and prosperity level 4. The game feels hard - incredibly hard - but for most runs we feel like it is technically possible to complete the scenarios we've played. What could we possibly be missing at this point?
Maybe we weren't creating new characters on the proper level? - We were.
Maybe we weren't giving ourselves the merchant discount? We were.
Maybe we didn't know you could take a basic "Attack 2" or "Move 2" with cards instead of the card's ability? We knew.
Maybe we were misreading how monsters are placed, inadvertently creating too many elites or monsters on the board. Nope, we were doing that all correctly (although in one scenario I kept adding an extra elite to the first room).
The one thing we missed in the rulebook was a single word on page 15 of the rulebook. The section about determining scenario difficulty.
"Average"
"The recommended scenario level is equal to the average level of the characters in the party, divided by 2 and rounded up".
This means a 2-character party of which the characters are level 4 and level 5, you take the average of their levels (4.5), divide it by two (2.25) and round it up to get the recommended scenario level, in this case difficulty of 3. I am sure almost everyone reading this post completely understands this concept, but we literally just learned it last night.
Pretty bad, right?
It might be worse than you think if you haven't played Gloomhaven this far into a campaign without catching that. I would wager many people that make this mistake realize it after only a few sessions, not 3 months in of playing a couple times a week.
Think about how the average session of Gloomhaven goes. You set up the scenario, play it once or twice to complete it, getting exp/money, character perks here and there, and progress towards personal quests. I am sure this is all pretty well balanced for a party that requires usually 1, maybe 2 or 3, rarely 4 times to complete a single scenario.
We have been averaging 7 - 10 attempts *per* scenario. The first retired character in our game was level 8. He didn't have any extra perks (they're really tough to get when you are just scraping by each scenario), and the scenario level....
Guys.
The scenario level.
In a party of two with a level 8 and a level 6 character the scenario level should be 4. We were playing on scenario level 7. We recently reduced the one were were doing to 6, still got destroyed, and was left scratching our heads.
Honestly, it's a miracle we've been able to complete any scenarios after the first few - and incredible that we've even stuck with it playing for 3 months to begin with. Our method when we play is basically that we spend an entire day playing - usually 10 hours minimum. Each day we play we feel really good if we complete a single scenario. Many times we have played 2 or 3 scenarios (some days 4) in a single day without completing any of them - swapping between characters to try different strategies.
I don't know what to else to say other than I am simultaneously exhausted, but also thrilled. I've always been eager to play again even with this artificially boosted difficulty. All things said we've still managed to unlock the>! Berserker, Elemantalist, Quartermaster, and Sunkeeper!<, but it feels like now we should be able to make some more consistent progress. I am excited for Frosthaven, and thank you for taking the time to read my tale.
submitted by OneMostSerene to Gloomhaven [link] [comments]

Things about dorm equipment people rarely talk about

Hi everyone! You seemed to like my last post, where I introduced you to how dorm life looks like. You've expressed that you'd like to see more helpful posts here, so today, I'm coming back to you with more advice on living away from home: Let's talk about dorm room equipment.
Yay! I'm assigned to a dorm and have a roommate. It's time to go shopping!
Yes, you're right, and I know how excited most of you are for the moment of buying room decorations and necessities. This is a broad topic, so I'll divide it into two subtopics.
First things first, make sure what your dorm is going to provide you with, and what is forbidden. Some places don't allow residents to have microwaves, kettles, or other appliances they consider a fire hazard. However, it's not the end of the world when you can't have one of these in your room - usually, it means that they're already waiting for you in a communal kitchen. When it comes to what you should bring, I can tell you that dorm shopping lists you can find on the internet, or even better, on colleges' sites, are really useful and they will actually help you determine what you need and what you don't. These needs are unique to everyone, depending on your living habits, so I'll list some general advice on what to and not to bring.
  1. Don't bring something, that your roommate has already bought - communication is a key, so it's nice to get in contact early on and decide together what you're going to buy when it comes to necessities that can be shared, for example, a small fridge, microwave, etc.
  2. Don't buy something you normally wouldn't need at your house, but on a whim, you're thinking "wow, at college I'll be a brand new person, I'll definitely use this" - in the beginning, you'll be the same old person, doesn't matter how unpleasant this idea seems, Growth doesn't happen overnight. So if you're in the shop debating whether you need this super fluffy pillow and a coffee maker, even though you prefer sleeping on a flat pillow and drink tea, but like the idea of having these items for their aesthetic - it isn't worth your money and storage capacity. Trust me, every first-year at a dorm has to learn this lesson the hard way.
  3. If you can take it from home - do it! Don't unnecessarily buy new mugs, pillows, water filters, or other things that you already have, and are yours - they're going to lay around unused when you're away, so why'd you let them waste like this? Not only this helps you save money, which is important considering how much you're already paying for those 4 years, but also provides you comfort when you're homesick.
  4. Your dorm is very far away and you can't bring much with you? Don't bring things you can get anywhere and take a lot of space: bedding, towels, etc. You can order them to be delivered there beforehand, or buy them in a local shop, and it'll be much more convenient.
You've been waiting for this one. I must admit, decorating your room lives up to the hype around it. After all, this is what makes your room feel unique and like at home. Nonetheless, there are many things that people hardly ever mention when it comes to it.
  1. I can't stress this enough - VALUE YOUR COUNTER SPACE. Dorms tend to provide you with little to no counter space, like desks. Do yourself a favor and don't contribute to this issue by adding an unnecessary amount of decorations that need a place to stand. Having a few of them is totally fine, but try to not rely on them as the main part.
  2. Walls are your best friend - as long as it isn't forbidden at your college to hang decorations on walls (it rarely happens), make the most out of this space. Walls in dorms are always boring, and sometimes slightly damaged, so covering them is a great idea. On top of that, this type of decoration doesn't take much space, so it shouldn't annoy you in any way.
  3. A tip specifically regarding fairy or LED lights - get the ones which you connect into a power outlet, not the ones requiring batteries. I can assure you that batteries will quickly run out, and you won't bother replacing them, leaving you with not working wire on a wall for the rest of the semester.
  4. Quality > quantity - you'll truly appreciate it when you'll have to pack up your stuff for the first time and go home for a break. Having a lot of decorations seems like a cool idea when it's already installed in your room, but having to clean up after it and setting it up once again after a few months IS NOT FUN AT ALL. This is pretty much self-explanatory.
That's all of the things I've personally experienced that I hardly ever see mentioned in popular videos or blog posts concerning this topic. This is the knowledge that comes with experience, so it's an opportunity for you to learn from someone else's mistakes. If you have any questions concerning this topic, I'd be more than happy to answer in the comments. Thank you so much for reading and good luck in your college process! :)
submitted by Rybik_Cukrowy to ApplyingToCollege [link] [comments]

Some things that may harm the environment.

Whenever there is pest, farmers will use pesticides to get rid of them. It is estimated that 50% of the world’s food production would have been lost to pests if pesticides were not used. However, with the misuse of pesticides, pesticides themselves can create problems. Some pesticides do not kill a specific type of pests, so bugs that are helpful for the environment are caught in the crossfire. One example is when spraying pesticides to kill armyworms, bees are killed too. Bees are important for the pollination of canola and other crops.
(https://ecojustice.ca/case/reducing-manitobans-exposure-to-toxic-pesticides/)
Fertilizers, a substance that is used to enrich the soil to increase the growth quality of plants. Usually you would think that fertilizers are helpful for the environment, they are helpful until there too much are applied. Any plant when given more nutrients than the optimum amount will begin to die. Fertilizers can also enter ponds, streams, lakes, or rivers and may disturb those ecosystems by changing the concentration of nutrients. Which can lead to fishes dying in the water.
Janet Hunt. “Harmful effects of chemical fertilizers.”
https://www.hunker.com/12401292/harmful-effects-of-chemical-fertilizers. Jan 23, 2021.
Solid waste, which is garbage, is disposed of through landfills: solid waste is thrown into a massive hole called a landfill which is then buried in dirt. This is dangerous because when groundwater passes through a landfill, it produces a highly toxic substance called leachate. Leachate can then possibly travel to the nearest pond, lake or river and contaminate it. Sanitary landfills are being made to prevent water from leaking to the landfill. Despite this, solid waste is still dangerous to the atmosphere. Some hazardous waste is burned in incinerators which contribute to air pollution.
​
(https://journalistsresource.org/studies/environment/transportation/solid-waste-disposal-landfill-gas-collection/)
Wastewater that is a combination of dissolved and undissolved materials from your kitchen, bathroom, and laundry is called sewage. Sewage usually moves through pipes and is sent to a septic tank or to a sewage treatment plant. Treated wastewater or effluent is then released into a nearby lake or river. This treated wastewater may contain nitrogen and phosphorus which can change the concentration of nutrients in that body of water. If the sewage system cannot handle a large quantity of rainwater from street drains, it may go directly into a river or lake through storm sewers. These storm sewers contain chemicals that were washed off from the streets.
​
(https://scitechdaily.com/vast-amounts-of-valuable-energy-nutrients-water-lost-in-worlds-wastewate) First image, (https://www.wrenvironmental.com/septic-dos-donts) Second image.
Whenever fossil fuels are burned, they produce a large amount of carbon dioxide and water vapor. The combustion of fossil fuels will also release pollutants such as sulfur dioxide, nitrogen oxides, and trace amounts of mercury and lead into the atmosphere.
submitted by Science_OP to ecology [link] [comments]

The Creature in the Baltic

I am an oceanographer. Ever since my family started bringing me to the beach when I was young, I was fascinated by the sea, but fascination turned to something else when I was hired to work in an underwater sealab in the Baltic.
My name is Will. I had recently graduated with a degree in marine biology and was looking to start my career. I had always thought that the only underwater research lab had been off the coast of Florida, the Aquarius Reef Base, but here I was staring at an application to work on another sealab across the world. I chalked my lack of knowledge up to my own incompetence, and applied for the job.
It wasn’t long before I got a reply. A sophisticated man with a German accent spoke with me about my education and all the other regular things that you would hear in a job interview, but at the end of the conversation, things started to get a little weird.
“Are you in any way afraid of any sea life like sharks for example?” asked Bertram, the German interviewer.
“I have a healthy fear of ocean predators,” I said. “But I don’t mind swimming with them. They mostly aren’t interested in humans.”
“Good to hear!” he said. “I completely agree. The job will involve some diving in some deeper waters, and this can make some people uneasy.”
To my surprise, I was hired. I boarded a plane and ended up in Rostock, a medium sized German port city. I made my way over to the port itself, where I was to meet with the team and start travelling to my new home under the sea.
I had read the documents they had sent over to familiarize myself with the underwater environment. I had noticed however that there were no bathrooms, and this seemed a little strange. I assumed that I probably would just go in the ocean. I had been peeing in the ocean since I was a kid, but I had never gone number two. I laughed to myself as I thought of how silly it was that I was dwelling on such a triviality.
When I arrived on the dock there was Bertram. I recognized him from the video conference we’d had before. He was taller than I had figured. Next to him stood another, tall skinny man.
“Ah! Speak of the devil,” Bertram said as I approached. His accent made me chuckle to myself, but his grammar and diction were very good nonetheless. “Will, I would like you to meet Derek, our colleague.”
Derek also seemed very polite, and his English was excellent.
“We have a team of French, German, and English speakers. We mostly speak English, but you will have to forgive us if occasionally we start ranting in our native tongues together,” said Bertram
At that, Derek mumbled something in German, and they both laughed.
We hitched a ride on another vessel out towards the east. After about an hour, I saw a little ship.
“That is the Hoffnung,” said Bertram. “Our humble ship.”
The ship was small and rusty. It looked like it had seen better days. Something seemed off. The facility underwater was much too advanced to be paired with such a beat up looking ship.
We geared up for the dive.
As far as depth is concerned, the Baltic is pretty shallow, yet I was surprised to hear that we would be diving down to a depth of 65 meters. The deepest I had ever gone was 30, and going 65 didn’t help my growing anxiety.
“Don’t worry, it is a one way trip, so it isn’t very dangerous, you don’t have to worry about the bends.”
I remembered how cool it was that the underwater facility used ambient pressure and a moonpool. The entire facility was pressurized. It was still too deep for humans to live at the pressure between seven and eight atmospheres. Though humans can free dive quite deep, they cannot live in such crushing pressures for extended periods of time. Three atmospheres was what the facility was pressurized to. Still, the time saved not having to go back and forth between sea level, and seven atmospheres made this facility useful for studying the seabed. We have all heard how we know less about our oceans than outer space. This was what fascinated me so much about the sea.
The beginning of the descent was uneventful. Things started to become darker as less light was able to penetrate the depths. When we reached 40 meters, it felt like I was entering another world. It was surreal. I had never been this deep before, and I remembered my diving instructor mentioning how dangerous it was. People were said to fall into a trance.
As we continued to descend into the misty depths, a building appeared. It was taller than I had expected, spanning at least three stories upward. Certainly this was not the facility that I had read about. Soon enough however I saw the moonpool. It was a peculiar thing to emerge from the ocean into an indoor swimming pool, and we all treaded water for a minute.
Bertram and Derek turned and smiled at me. I couldn’t help but smile back. It was just so badass. I felt like I was in some kind of sci-fi movie. The room we were in was pressurized higher than the rest of the facility, and we made our way into a depressurization chamber, after removing our gear.
“Watch your arm,” said Derek as I clumsily walked into a loose panel. It grazed my skin a little.
“Sorry,” said Bertram. “I should have mentioned the loose panel.”
“The facility is much larger than I read,” I said, inquiring about the large structure I had seen.
“Yes,” said Bertram. “That document is out of date. The facility has expanded in several areas, though we lowly scientists are to remain in our humble quarters.”
He and Derek laughed.
“I thought that this facility was entirely run by scientists,” I said. The job application had been from the website of GEOMAR, a prestigious research institution in Germany.
“It started that way, but after funding was cut back, it looked like we were going to have to abandon the facility,” said Bertram. “But then they discovered the ore deposits down the hole.”
“The hole?” I asked.
We entered the habitat I had familiarized myself with from the manual. There was a bunkhouse, a mess hall, and a couple other rooms for science and storage.
“Is this the new bloke?” asked a voice from around the corner. In walked a short man with a smile on his face. He had instant charisma. “Don’t let the krout scare you mate. Things are peachy down here.” He shook my hand with a vigor that left my arm noodling. He was a middle aged man, a little older than the rest of them. “Name’s Doug. I am from Newcastle.”
I nodded.
“This whole Krout thing.” said Bertram. “I just don’t understand why you all think it is offensive. It just means cabbage. Your people’s world war two put downs weren’t very good.”
I couldn’t help but chuckle at their relationship when, suddenly, a loud explosion rang out. They all grabbed for something to brace themselves with.
“Is everyone alright?” came a shrill worried voice from deeper into the facility, amidst the flickering buttons and endless readouts. A french woman cautiously came into the room hugging the wall. Despite the fear the crash moments ago had instilled, she smiled politely to me.
“Welcome Will. It is good to see you,” she said somewhat nervously.
“Hi,” I said smiling back. She was wearing a cap and bulky crewman coveralls, yet I could tell that she was really beautiful.
“The bastards are really pushing our luck with those explosions,” said Doug. “They’re gonna get us all killed.”
“Why are there explosions?” I asked.
“We didn’t have the funding to keep this place running, we were forced to entice some other parties. I said it then and I say it now. It was a short sighted decision,” said Doug.
“Yes, but what choice did we have?” asked Bertram.
The rest of the day was spent familiarizing myself with the facility. Everything was just like it said in the manual, except for an ominous looking door just after the depressurization chamber. That was new.
Though the whole place looked like a futuristic spaceship, this door seemed to be even more so. It looked strong.
“At first there was constant traffic in and out, but after they completed their submarine docking station, a soul hasn’t passed through that door in months. We occasionally speak with one of them on the radio, but we have less and less contact as they need us less. It is a little strange, but it is better than being shut down,” said Bertram as he noticed me looking at the door.
“Who exactly are they?” I asked.
“At first it was underwater welders and construction workers who worked for a German mining company, all the usual stuff, but after several months the miners left and apparently ownership of the facility changed hands again, though I have heard nothing about who. GEOMAR has been vague about it all. No doubt they are up to some kind of exploitative act, probably attempting to weaponize something beautiful. That is why I get the feeling that we are no longer welcome in our own facility. They wouldn’t want their secrets exposed by us pesky good intentioned scientists,” said Bertram laughingly.
Eventually I had to go to the little boys room, and I finally inquired as to how this was done. They all laughed.
“It is a pleasure goin’ number two durin’ the day! The fish can get quite frisky” said Doug.
Manon rolled her eyes, smiling.
“The fish sometimes eat your waste,” she said. “Don’t let Douglas scare you, they are just fish.”
“There is a dome several meters out from the moonpool where you can hang out and do your business. But you won't catch me goin’ out there in the dark,” said Doug.
“Ha. Yeah I can imagine the fish are much more frightening in the dark,” I said.
“Actually that is the weird part,” said Bertram. “There are no fish at night.”
Manon lashed the shirt she was holding at Bertram’s arm punishingly, yet in a soft motheringly way.
“I am just saying, I don’t go number two at night either,” said Bertram.
“If it is an emergency, I drop the log right in the moonpool and you should too,” said Doug. “Floaters be damned.”
“That is disgusting,” said Manon.
“Why do the fish only come at night?” I asked.
“We aren’t sure why. Derek thinks it has to do with their body chemistry. Their noradrenaline levels start to spike as the light stops shining through. They scatter in all directions,” explained Manon.
“All except towards the hole,” said Derek.
“What is this hole?” I asked.
“It is the twenty meter wide hole in the bottom of the ocean out the moonpool to the east. It is hard to miss. We stay away from there,” said Derek.
I made a point to do my business during the daylight and was alarmed and amused by the amount of fish it attracted. I swam out to the dome and soon several fish began to investigate me.
I looked around in the area and saw the massive hole to the East. I could see that the facility must have been built to study the hole.
It was starting to get a little darker and I was ready to swim back to the moonpool when I noticed a small submersible ascending out of the hole. The submersible propelled itself towards the large three story complex attached to our habitat. A hatch opened and the submersible ascended up into the hatch. My imagination ran wild as to what this mysterious other faction was up to behind that hatch.
As weird as it all was, after several days I had fallen into a rhythm and everything became normal. I would gather samples and document the wildlife by day, and study my findings as well as talk to my colleagues at night. Occasionally there would be an explosion, and, like clockwork, a submersible or two would ascend from the hole at sunset.
Sunset became a time of caution, I noticed. The fish would remain until it was dark, but almost in a flash, they all knew to disappear as the last sun rays left. It was part of a fascinating cycle. I had seen things like this in nature before, like when bats all fly out of a cave at the same time, or birds migrating for winter, but this was different. There was a desperation about it. For the fish, it was more of a desperate scramble. I quickly understood why Doug wouldn’t go number two at the dome after dark. I found out that none of them did.
Every day I would walk by the mysterious door leading to the other facility, but the hallway beyond was always dark, and I could never see that far. It was unnerving. On top of that there were no portholes or windows of any kind to look into from the outside, only the submersibles at sunrise and at sunset.
One day I joked.
“Maybe one of us should try to swim up the hatch one time,” I said.
The mood in the room became very tense. It wasn’t long before Manon burst into tears. I didn’t understand.
“I’m sorry,” I said.
“It’s okay mate, it isn’t your fault,” said Doug, as he went to console Manon.
I tried to look at Bertram who usually explained things to me when I was baffled, but his eyes remained fixed on his breakfast. I looked at Derek.
“It is time Will knows about Javier,” said Derek.
Nobody said a word. All that could be heard was Manon sobbing.
“Who is Javier?” I asked.
“Javier was the marine biologist you replaced,” said Derek. “And he also had the idea to swim up the hatch.”
“We were informed that he was dead over a week later, the bastards,” said Doug. “We began searching desperately, but after a couple hours, we knew that the air would have run out. We started searching for his body. Apparently the whole time, he was in the other facility.”
“What?” I asked, mortified.
“Aye. They said that there had been an accident and they weren’t able to save ‘em,” said Doug.
“And they waited to tell you?” I asked.
He nodded.
I never looked at the hatch the same way. Had Javier been trapped in there and run out
of air? Surely there must have been some way he could have entered the facility as it is how the submersibles went in and out.
Over the coming days, things went back to normal, or at least, as normal as living 60 meters underwater could be. I didn’t dare broach the subject of Javier. I just kept my head down and did my work. There was plenty of plant life to catalog, not to mention all of the different species of fish and jellyfish. Occasionally a pod of sea mammals would pass through.
As I was performing my nightly bathroom ritual before the dark set in, one night I noticed the submersible ascending from the hole as always, only this time, it seemed to be having trouble moving through the water. It almost seemed to be stuttering. As I looked closer, I saw what looked like markings on the side of the vessel, as if it had been in some kind of accident down there. I shuddered to think of what would have happened if the craft had been damaged more.
There I tread in the outhouse dome, pondering what I just saw. It made me feel uneasy, but nothing like what I felt after what I saw next. My gaze fell back on the giant sinkhole. There at the very edge, I saw something that will horrify me for the rest of my life. I saw a head looking back. The rest of the body was hidden down the hole. Just the head, as if it was peering at me. Even with the water clouding the distance between us, I felt his stare burn into my soul. Here, 60 meters below in the middle of the ocean was a face, completely unencumbered by gear, no air tanks. What was he breathing?
I must have been hallucinating, but the moment lasted for what seemed like a lifetime. Up until then, it was the longest moment of my life. His eyes locked on mine, just his head.
As it got darker, I came out of my confused trance. I made a mad dash for the moonpool. I didn’t dare look back. I leapt out of the moonpool and into the decompression chamber. I was terrified. I stared at the moonpool through the window, half expecting the head to emerge from the water.
How could a man have been in the hole? He would have had to have held his breath for at least five minutes as I hadn’t seen anyone else as I swam to the dome. Although with training, a human being can hold their breath that long, something was just off. I had goosebumps all over my body. I had heard of pressurized air playing tricks on people’s minds. Perhaps I had nitrogen narcosis.
I quickly went in and told the others.
“Elevated levels of nitrogen affect us all in different ways,” said Manon as she examined me. “It is possible that you hallucinated.”
“I must have,” I said.
“If anything like this happens again, come tell us right away,” she said.
I noticed Derek looking at me from across the habitat. He quickly looked away when I made eye contact. There was something about it that made me feel like he knew more.
I decided to sleep it off, but had wild dreams about what I saw.
I woke in a cold sweat. I felt even more exhausted than before.
The crew, for the most part, hadn’t noticed that I was a little off. All except Derek. He approached me that night.
“You must be feeling a little rattled,” he said. “I was good friends with Javier. When he died, I sort of lost it a little bit. I couldn’t sleep or eat. I even saw things too.”
He became very serious.
“This place is dangerous. More so than the others understand,” said Derek.
He brought me over to a laptop and opened up a folder with images. He then brought up a picture of the crew all happily posing. There they all were, Doug, Manon, Derek and Bertram. Then my eyes came to rest on the fifth person, and when they did, electricity ran through my body all at once as horror welled up from the depths of my soul into my throat. There stood the very same face that had stared at me from the hole, and all at once I knew who that was, what Derek had seen, and what it meant.
I could barely speak. I just muttered.
“That was the man I saw,” I said.
“We have to tell the others, and they are not going to believe it, or like it,” he said.
We headed into the common room where the others were gathered. Derek led bluntly in a dire tone.
“We both saw Javier, alive in the water,” he said.
Doug almost dropped what he was doing and turned around to look at us, then looked at Bertram who was as bewuthered as him. Then they both broke into laughter.
Manon looked very upset.
“That is not funny Derek. And Will, I didn’t think you were like this,” she said.
“Derek showed me a picture of Javier, and it was without a doubt the same face that looked at me,” I said. I didn’t care about impressing Manon anymore. Something was horribly wrong.
“I thought it was my mind playing tricks on me because Javier had just died. I heard you can see people sometimes who have just died,” said Derek. “So I didn’t think much of it. But one thing is very clear. We need to leave,” he said. It was empowering to be next to him. I would have never had the courage to say these things.
There was a moment of silence.
“Okay, I will put in the call for the ship to come pick up whoever wants to leave, I guess, but this is my life’s work. I can’t just leave because you think you saw a ghost, you understand,” said Doug, respectfully.
“I strongly urge you to reconsider,” said Derek. “And we can’t wait for the ship to get us, we need to take the Hoffnung, now.”
Suddenly this wasn’t sounding like such a good idea. The Hoffnung had seen better days.
Bertram started to argue with Derek in German. Manon and Doug started jumping in and I had no idea what was going on. At last, however, Derek won out with a loud exclamation that silenced the rest. He then turned to me.
“I know it seems like the Hoffnung isn’t seaworthy, but she is. She passed the required inspection.”
“That was five years ago, Derek, really,” said Doug. “There is a reason we don’t use her anymore, she is a floating platform, just in case something happens down here. Really, what is another day to wait for the ship?” he said.
“If you had seen what we had seen, you would understand,” said Derek.
I wasn’t sure what to do. On the one hand, waiting another day for a proper ship to take us back seemed reasonable. Yet, what if that thing in the water came into the moonpool tonight? What if it came into the decompression chamber?
“Very well. I am going to make the call to be picked up,” said Derek.
He left and came back moments later.
“There is a storm coming. They can’t make it here for two days,” he said.
My stomach started to turn. That rusty old boat was starting to look more and more enticing.
I was starting to feel better about everything. There were tests to be run, and flora to be catalogued. Manon even helped me, which put me at ease. During the day she started asking me questions.
“So you are sure that it was Javier that you saw?” she asked.
“Yes,” I said. “He must still be alive, but we watched each other for minutes. I don’t know anyone who can hold their breath that long.
Manon looked at me horrified.
“He was a good swimmer,” she said. “But five minutes?”
“I know,” I said.
After I finally started to feel normal again, I started to feel tired, even though it was just the afternoon. Something about the pressure, or being cooped up. That was why I went to sleep early that night. Going to sleep early turned out to be a giant mistake.
I woke up in the late evening around ten. I had to poop something fierce. I instinctively went over to the decompression chamber. When I entered the moonpool, for the first time, I saw pitch black water. I stood there watching it ripple. Beyond was just the murky black depths.
I remembered Doug admitting he wouldn’t go to the bathroom at night, and now, I understood. I walked up to the edge and looked down. There was absolutely no way I was going to swim to the out house dome. With little options left, I pulled down my trousers and attempted a squat right over the moonpool.
Still, squatting there, I couldn’t help but look back every couple seconds to make sure something wasn’t coming up to grab me. It felt silly, but it was a very vulnerable position to be in. After trying for a couple minutes, I stood back up. It is amazing what kinds of things the body will do when it knows it is not safe. I suddenly felt no urge to go to the bathroom at all. I slowly backed away from the edge of the moonpool keeping my eyes on its dark, rippling depths. I thought I saw something move. I felt a deep fear. I had to get out of there.
I went for the decompression chamber, and, to my horror, I saw out of my peripheral a mass cresting out of the water. I threw myself into the chamber and, as fast as I could, tried to throw the door closed.
A monstrous dark grayish green tentacle moved with startling speed and just as I was shutting the door, wrapped around my leg, sinking several spines into me. I cried with pain as the creature began to drag me out of the chamber. I slammed the door on the tentacle, but it was thick and strong, and continued to drag me. A second tentacle just like the first was starting to crest out of the moonpool.
Just then I looked up. It was the same sheet metal panel that had grazed me when I first walked in. I ripped it off the wall with surprising ease. With all my might, for my life, I cleaved the tentacle. It didn’t sever but I cut it deeply and it released me. Before the second tentacle could reach the chamber, I slammed the door with all my might. I looked at the tentacles prodding and probing the sealed door. It was absolutely horrifying. I knew they had every intent on dragging me down into the depths.
They were terrifying, like a giant octopus, with spiny thorns attached, to hook its prey. After what seemed like hours, the decompression finished. I had already been screaming and the others had gathered at the door. I exited the chamber and turned to the others.
“We have to get the hell out of here, now!” I screamed.
“Calm down,” said Manon. “What happened?”
“There is some kind of,” I stopped. I didn’t know what to say. “I know this sounds crazy but a massive, predatory invertebrate grabbed me in the moonpool.”
“Like a pacific octopus?” Doug asked curiously. They were not understanding the gravity of the situation. The tentacles weren’t visible from this angle, and I dared not open the door to show them. Instead I showed them my leg.
It was bleeding, though not profusely. The puncture wounds were still clearly visible. The others began to inspect his leg. Derek went into another room and came back with a couple knives. They were the only weapons we had available.
“At first light, all of us should make a break for the Hoffnung,” said Derek.
“But, what about the storm?” said Bertram.
“I would rather take my chances with the storm than be down here. At least I would die a natural death,” said Derek.
I don’t think the others understood, but I knew exactly what he meant. The idea of drowning in the open waters somehow seemed like a tolerable alternative.
It suddenly made sense. The explosions. The beaten up submersible. This animal was being studied by the other facility.
“One thing is certain,” said Derek. “The creature only seems to be around at night, and we seem to be safe in here. I am swimming for the Hoffnung in the morning. I strongly urge the rest of you to come.”
I nodded. The others looked among themselves, not knowing what to think.
We all went to our bunks and tried to sleep. After hours of tossing and turning, and staring at the entrance, half expecting a dark gray tentacle slither around the corner.
My wound felt better. Manon had bandaged it and applied disinfectant. I slowly started to nod off.
When I awoke, I started my daily routine. I even got ready to go out and swim to the bathroom when I stopped dead in my tracks. I felt a deep sense of horror, as if I was just remembering what had happened to me in the moonpool just hours before. I suddenly felt no urge to go to the bathroom at all. I just stood there gazing at the pressure chamber.
All of the others had risen and were mulling about.
“Have either of you seen Doug?” said Manon. “I am waiting for his data but I haven’t seen him.”
“Maybe he hasn’t woken up?” I said.
“He isn’t in his bunk,” said Manon. “I am starting to get worried.”
“He probably just went out for some samples,” said Bertram.
“You are probably right,” said Manon, and she started busying herself with her work.
I finally worked up the courage to go out to the bathroom dome.
The water was moving faster than usual, but nothing I couldn’t swim against. I could see how being a poor swimmer would be very hazardous and understood now why they insisted on strong swimmers in the job application.
Out at the dome, I looked around and realized that there wasn’t a fish in sight. Usually during this time of day, the ocean was full of them, but now, it was barren. It was unnerving.
I looked around the erie depths, trying to make out what I could through the misty sea water. I noticed something strange. The hatch to the other part of the facility was open. That same hatch that Javier had swam up. Upon thinking about Javier, my eyes darted back to the place where I had seen his eyes, staring at me from the hole. I shuttered and suddenly started to feel very vulnerable. I got done with my business and started back towards the moonpool.
When I entered the habitat I saw that Manon was coming my way with Bertram and Derek.
“There you are,” she said. “We are going out to look for Doug. He should have been back by now.”
“The hatch is open,” I said.
They all looked at one another.
“We will have to think about that later,” she said. “Everyone, suit up and make sure you are full of oxygen.”
The water was still moving fast due to the stormy conditions. It was difficult to fight against the current, but Doug should have come back by now, and there was a chance he was stuck and running low on air. We had to look for him. We checked down the slope in the opposite direction of the hole, but there was no sign of Doug. We finally came to the hole.
We shined our lights down into the depths. Nothing but darkness. After a while, our oxygen levels were getting low and we returned to the habitat. On our way back, we all saw the opened hatch. No doubt we were all thinking the same thing. Doug might have gone up the hatch for some reason.
When we had shed our gear in the moonpool, Derek was the first to mention this.
“We need to get in touch with the other part of the habitat,” he said. “I will try to radio them again.”
As I walked past the door that connected the two habitats, I peered down it’s corridor. Surely we could just override the locks and walk in there. It seemed like the right thing to do given the circumstances.
I shined my light down the corridor through the glass. It was strange. Something at the very end of the corridor seemed to be floating. I squinted and tried to discern what it was that I was looking at.
“Hey guys,” I said. “I think something is moving in there.”
We all gathered at the glass of the door and peered into the darkness. There was something that seemed to be hovering. It was drifting closer. I knew what it was before my mind could register what I was seeing. It was a strange feeling. On the one hand, there was a pen, but on the other, it was drifting right in the middle of the air. The pen was floating because the chamber had filled with water.
“It won’t break through,” said Derek. “This door is designed to withstand pressures far beyond this. It was always a possibility that one of the habitats would be compromised.”
His words did little to reassure me. I kept staring at that pen, as it seemed to drift aimlessly. It ricocheted off one of the walls, gently.
“What happened to all the people?” asked Bertram.
There was nothing but silence for a moment. Then Manon spoke.
“We have to go in there,” said Manon. “That must be where Doug is. Maybe he is trapped.”
Derek and Bertram exchanged glances and started speaking in German. Manon interrupted them and they all started yelling at each other. I stood there puzzled until finally they switched back to English.
“I can’t believe you two,” said Manon. “Doug would have done it to save you.”
“Doug is dead,” said Derek. “Or worse.”
“What do you mean ‘or worse’?” said Manon.
“He has been out of air for a while now and we all know it,” said Derek. “Bertram and I are going for the Hoffnung. We aren’t waiting for the ship.”
Bertram stood there looking as guilty as he was terrified. Finally, they were starting to understand. We had to get the hell out of there. I opened my mouth to agree adamantly, but Manon spoke first.
“I am going over there,” she said defiantly.
She looked at me and waited for me to speak.
“Okay,” I said. “I will go with you to look for Doug.”
“This is crazy,” said Derek. “I don’t want to be on that sinking boat in a storm any minute longer than I have to. We can’t wait for you.”
“One hour,” said Manon. “That is all we need.”
Derek and Bertram started arguing and German again.
“We will wait one hour,” said Bertram. “Then we will head to the surface together.”
Suiting up went fast. We did our final checks and dove back into the moonpool. The hatch seemed to beckon me. I thought of Javier, and how I had seen his head staring at me. Even now it gave me the chills, but I put it in the back of my mind.
Soon, we could almost see up the shaft. I thought of how much had happened in my life since I had taken this job. How much I had learned and seen. It was hard to remember what my life used to be like. It seemed like so long ago that I had been sleeping in a nice bed and eating all the food I wanted. Mostly, I thought about how much I had taken for granted. You don’t realize how important it is to feel safe until you don’t.
We reached the entrance of the shaft. It became dark fast. Manon turned on her light and my heart sank. At the end of the shaft was a metal door, but it looked as though it had been warped. What could have done this? Luckily, our divers' masks had radio communication built in.
“What could have done this?” said Manon. She looked over at me. She knew what I was thinking already.
“There is no creature ever discovered like the one you hallucinated, Will.”
I went to retort but stopped. There was no point in arguing. I wanted to live, not to be right.
“Let’s hope not,” I said.
It took everything I had, but I managed to start kicking, and swam up into the shaft. Manon soon followed after me. We traced the dark room with our lights. It seemed to have been some kind of submersible docking room. What once was a moonpool had been overtaken by water. All manner of clutter floated about.
It was unnerving to be there in the darkness, 60 meters beneath the surface of the water, in a breached habitat that had gone silent. I swatted a tablet away from my head as we continued onward.
The decompression chamber was wide open. Both of the large doors stood unsealed.
I knew what had happened. That creature that had tried to grab me, that.. giant octopus creature, had gotten through the decompression chamber. I couldn’t stop thinking about those tentacles that had grabbed me. They looked like they were as thick as a tree trunk as they disappeared into that black water. I will never forget it.
As we swam into the next room. It was large, and quite long. It was full of all types of computers and lab equipment, but in the center of a room and to my horror, there it was. That same, dark gray tentacle. It must have been fifty feet long. . I instinctively swam away. This was horror movie 101. I had done everything I could to convince Manon that my story was true. If she didn’t believe me now, it was on her. To my great relief I saw her swimming fast behind me. She now understood that our lives were in imminent danger.
As we rounded the corner in the room with the hatch we saw Doug. It seemed like a miracle. There he was, floating there in his diving gear.
We made it up towards the moonpool and started to get out of our gear. That’s when I caught out of the corner of my eye. Doug’s oxygen meter had been empty. Still, I didn’t think much about it as we made our way to the decompression chamber. I wish I had.
“Doug, I have to say it is good to see your stupid face,” said Manon. “Why didn’t you respond to my radio?”
Doug gave a slight smile.
“We looked everywhere for you,” I said.
He looked at me. He looked like he had some kind of debris in his eye. Still he said nothing. He just stared at me. That is when I realized that Bertram and Derek were nowhere to be found.
“Derek! Bertram!” I cried out.
“You don’t think they would have left without us do you?” asked Manon.
Suddenly, I heard a loud crash a distance from the habitat. It was as loud as the explosions, but it was different. I could tell Manon thought the same thing as we looked at each other in horror.
Putting it out of our mind, Manon and I desperately scrambled around the habitat. When we returned we noticed Doug standing by the decompression chamber. He seemed to be examining it.
“You okay there, Doug?” I asked.
He turned to me and gave me that same hollow stare. I had seen that stare before, somewhere. I couldn’t quite put my finger on it. He soon returned to the decompression interface. He just stared at it.
“Any ideas on where Derek and Bertram are Doug?” I asked, more to make conversation than anything else.
We stood there in silence for a moment. I dared not walk away.
Manon had made her way over to us after searching for Derek. By the look on my face she could tell that there was something wrong.
“Doug?” she asked.
After a moment of silence, Doug’s hand rose, and pressed one of the buttons.
He pressed another button. He was starting to figure it out. I tried to block the panel, but he swatted me away with a speed that was uncharacteristic of Doug. He was trying to open the decompression chamber.
I tried to push him away from the panel, but he headbutted me, hard. I fell to the ground. I felt woozy. I tried to stand up but fell over again.
“Manon,” I cried out. “Don’t let him open the chamber!”
Manon stood there, horrified, as I finally got to my feet, but it was too late. Doug managed to open the decompression chamber. Still, there was a failsafe mechanism. Both doors couldn’t be opened at once, unless overridden in an emergency. I had read about it in the manual before I came aboard. There was a way, but if it was done underwater at that depth, the moonpool’s integrity would fail, and the water would rush into the habitat.
Doug stood there once more, thinking. Thinking with that horrifying, hollow stare.
My head was still spinning but I managed to grab a hold of his arm and we both went tumbling over. I managed to dodge some swings at my head and scrambled backwards. Doug refocused his attention back on the panel. Suddenly a loud alarm sounded. It was over. The moonpool integrity had been compromised. Water immediately began to rush in.
Manon and I looked at each other in horror. She rushed over to a cabinet. The water was already up to our knees and rising fast.
Doug simply stared at us void of emotion. The water poured forth and in seconds I had taken a deep breath from the air at the top. I tried to think of something, anything, but before I could, Manon grabbed my hand. She had found the life raft. We swam for it.
We both started towards the moonpool when all of a sudden I felt a strong hand grip my leg. It was Doug.
I thrashed and kicked but to no avail. I tried to fight Doug with all I had left, but he was too strong, and I was running out of oxygen. The edges of my eyes were starting to turn black, and my lungs were crying out. This was it.
Suddenly Manon drove a fixed blade deep into Doug’s stomach. He momentarily let go and we scrambled out of the moonpool with Doug right behind us. To my horror, I saw Doug swimming down after us, blood pouring out. Manon screamed and pointed towards the hole. There was Javier, Bertram, and Derek swimming for us, all with that hollow, lifeless look in their eyes.
All we had to do was clear the building above us, and we could pull the rip chord. We were so close. That is when I saw the Hoffnung. It was the ship that was supposed to be above us, but there it was. I could barely make it out through the murky water, but it was hard to miss something so big. The storm, or maybe the others, had sunk it. That was what the crashing sound had been.
We cleared the structure, and just as the creatures were closing in on us, Manon ripped the cord.
Holding on, we started to ascend fast. I watched as we left that horrible place behind. It disappeared into the misty ocean underneath my feet.
We hung there, blind and helpless all the while thinking to ourselves, what if the others swam up after us? How long would it take them to reach us?
My joints were hurting and I knew why. Decompression sickness was setting in. Still, we were alive.
The more I strained to look, the more I started to make out several shadows. They were getting closer. I could start to make out the human bodies now, they were no more than several meters away, swimming for us.
My joints were in agony, and I felt so tired. I needed to sleep. Still, the sight of the surface so close, its glimmering majesty. Just a little farther.
We broke the surface gasping for air. The life raft was so close. We scrambled into it as I felt that fear of having my last leg grabbed, but it wasn’t. We had made it. We quickly looked over the side.
A chill ran down my spine as I saw, right beneath the surface, the faces of Javier, Derek, Doug, and Bertram. All of their eyes fixed on us. There they remained as if unable to break the surface. Doug was still bleeding profusely from his stomach, and a cloud of red was gathering. We collapsed in the bed of the life raft, exhausted. We had made it. We could feel their hands scratching at us through the raft. It was unnerving, but the raft seemed to be holding. The sun was setting and the sky was a beautiful pink color.
That brings us to now. The last light has gone away now. The others are still scratching at the bottom of the raft. The sun is no longer holding it at bay. The creature will surely come for us tonight.
submitted by CodingWoodsman to nosleep [link] [comments]

The Busy Bee Chemical Safety Plan

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Preface for TheeHive Bees: I promised this safety plan quite some time ago. It has turned into quite the arduous, yet rewarding and insightful, task. The following document is best suited for BabyBees, and I will post it there as soon as possible after posting here; however, I hope that it will contain valuable information for most, if not all, bees. I, myself, am by no means an expert bee (although I possess a good deal of chemical knowledge in the ordinary sense, especially in regard to safety, at this point, and have a lot of experience in professional labs, mostly quantitative). As a result, I would like this to be a working document, and as such, I will consider any and all edits that other bees recommend. Please comment or DM any input or questions you may have. I am greatly indebted to all of you who have all ready provided assistance, and apologize if I missed any of your previous recommendations.
*I especially need some assistance with waste disposal (last section) information. I only know about professional waste disposal, which we obviously want to avoid when possible.
Table of Contents:
I. Introduction
II. Basic Laboratory Safety Rules
III. Dress, Preparation, and PPE for Lab Work
A. Basic Considerations
B. PPE
C. Lab Setup
D. Behavior and Technique
IV. Chemical Safety
A. SDS
B. Chemical Labeling
C. Chemical Storage
D. Bonding and Grounding
E. Peroxide Forming Molecules and Shelf Lives
V. Labware Safety
A. Glassware
B. Support
C. Tubing
D. Heat
E. Electricity
VI. Reaction Safety
A. Fume Hoods
B. Additional Tips
VII. Emergency Procedures
A. Emergency Shower and Eyewash Stations
B. Fire Extinguishers
C. Fire Blankets
D. Spills
E. First Aid
VIII. Post-Procedure Protocols
A. Personal Hygiene
B. Facility Hygiene
C. Waste Disposal
____________________________________________________________________________
II. Basic Laboratory Safety Rules:
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III. Dress, Preparation, and PPE for Lab Work
A. Basic Considerations:
Before we apply PPE, there are some basic precautions that must be taken in terms of dress and personal hygiene.
Do NOT:
Do:
B. PPE (Personal Protective Equipment):
The most obvious safety practice is the use of personal protective equipment. However, PPE is the last system of defense against chemical hazards. Practitioners should focus their efforts on the maintenance of a safe work environment, proper training, and the replacement of more with less dangerous chemicals where possible. We will classify PPE into three sections- eye, body, and respiratory protection. (note: larger labs and some rare reactions may also require hearing protection, light-restrictive eye protection, hard hats, and other forms of protection as necessary).
Eye Protection: Chemical splash goggles
Eye protection is not just to prevent impact, which is all that general safety goggles, with or without side shields, do. General safety goggles and eyeglasses offer limited protection against sprays, and do NOT prevent splash hazards, which may come from any angle or drip down one’s face into the eyes. Additionally, some chemical fumes are eye irritants.
Bees should wear chemical splash goggles labeled with the code Z87.1, which denotes compliance with safety standards. The goggles must fit snugly against the face and remain on at all times. Suggestion: Chemical Splash/Impact Goggle.
Body Protection:
Long clothes that cover as much skin as possible is a must. This means closed shoes or boots, pants, long sleeves, a lab coat, and gloves. Tie back long hair. Change gloves and wash hands as often as possible, especially before leaving the lab. Recognize that touching things such as your phone with your gloves on may spread toxic chemicals.
  1. Gloves: Keep a large amount of gloves on hand. This includes boxes of traditional nitrile/latex gloves, and at least one pair each of heat/cold resistant and thick-rubber, arm-length, corrosive-resistant gloves.
2. Lab Coats: Multi-hazard protection lab coats are best, and should be both fire (FR) and chemical splash (CP) resistant. Most basic lab coats found online or in stores are not FCP. Proper coats are more expensive, but are absolutely worthwhile as they may prevent fire, chemical burns, and even death (research the UCLA tert-butyllithium incident). Here is an example of a proper lab coat: Lab Coat.
3. Respiratory Protection:
Never smell chemicals or inhale their fumes. Use a fume hood when necessary and keep containers closed tightly. In case of a large chemical spill, evacuate immediately. Use a fume hood with any organic solvent, concentrated acids, and concentrated ammonia. Use respirators when working with fine powders or toxic fumes.
C. Lab setup:
Develop a thorough floor plan before equipping your lab.
Priorities:
D. Behavior and Technique:
IV. Chemical Safety
A. SDS:
The first and most vital step to understand how to safely handle chemicals is thorough, proper, and regular review of Safety Data Sheets. It is recommended that physical copies of SDSs be kept for all chemicals in the laboratory. Safety Data Sheets can be found online as well, and should be reviewed each time a chemical is used, at least until one has extensive experience with that chemical. Safety and storage information should also be reviewed for any compounds synthesized, as well as any side products or impurities.
The format of an SDS is an update to the traditional MSDS, and follows the guidelines prescribed by the Globally Harmonized System of Classification and Labeling of Chemicals (GHS) established in March 2012. A traditional MSDS is likely to contain all or most of the necessary information; however, SDS has the benefit of a strict and easy to follow format that includes the following 16 sections:
Section 1—Identification: Chemical/product name, name and contact information of producer.
Section 2—Hazard(s) Identification: All known hazards of the chemical and required label elements. The GHS identifies three hazard classes: health (toxicity, carcinogenicity, mutagenicity, etc.), physical (corrosive, flammable, combustible, etc.), and environmental hazards. There are 16 types of physical hazards and 10 types of health hazards. Next to each listed hazard is a rank/category from 1-4, with 1 being the most severe level of hazard. Next are hazard pictograms, a signal word, and hazard (H) statements and precautionary (P) statements. Pictograms allow chemists to quickly understand the basic hazards of a chemical, and must be on the chemical label. What pictograms a chemical requires is quantitatively determined, and users should become familiar with them.
📷
There are two signal words- Danger!, and Warning!, the former being more serious than the latter.
P and H statements list specifically hazardous situations and precautions that must be taken when handling the chemical.
Section 3—Composition/Information on Ingredients
Section 4—First-Aid Measures
Section 5—Fire-Fighting Measures
Section 6—Accidental Release Measures: What to do in case of accidental spill or release of chemicals, proper containment, and cleanup.
Section 7—Handling and Storage
Section 8—Exposure Controls/Personal Protection: Includes exposure limits.
Section 9—Physical and Chemical Properties: appearance, odor, flashpoint, solubility, pH, evaporation rates, etc.
Section 10—Stability and Reactivity: Chemical stability and possible hazardous reactions.
Section 11—Toxicological Information: Routes of exposure (inhalation, ingestion, or absorption contact), symptoms, acute and chronic effects, and numerical measures of toxicity.
Sections 12-15 are optional, but include ecological information, disposal considerations, transportation information, and regulatory information.
Section 16-- includes any additional information the producer may want to portray.
B. Chemical Labeling:
All chemicals should be labeled at all times to avoid hazard, confusion, and waste.
​
C. Chemical Storage:
General Reagents:
Common Storage Combinations to Avoid:
Compressed Gasses:
Note: avoid working with gases when possible. Gas chemistry has many complications, is often unsafe, and produces poor yields and poor quality products.
Bulk Storage Containers:
D. Bonding and Grounding:
“Class I Liquids should not be run or dispensed into a container unless the nozzle and container are electrically interconnected.” (OSHA 29 CFR 1910.106(e)(6)(ii), ATEX directive, and NFPA UFC Div. VIII, Sec. 79.803a). An ungrounded static voltage (including from friction) may cause combustion of some fluids. Metal containers must be connected via a common grounding wire made of solid or braided wire, or welded connections, before fluid is poured between them.
E. Peroxide-Forming Chemicals:
A variety of common chemicals spontaneously form peroxide compounds under ordinary storage conditions due to reaction with oxygen. Peroxides are extraordinarily explosive, and can often be ignited by contact with heat, friction (incl. simply turning the cap of the container), and mechanical shock (incl. shaking, bumping, or dropping).
Three classes of peroxide-forming chemicals are of particular interest, and are organized by the precautions that should be taken with unopened and opened containers.
Class A Peroxide Formers: the most hazardous class.
Unopened: discard or test for peroxides after 12 months or at manufacturer’s expiration date (whichever comes first).
Opened: Test for peroxides quarterly.
Common class A peroxide formers include:
Butadiene (liquid monomer)
Isopropyl ether
Sodium amide (sodamide)
Chloroprene (liquid monomer)
Potassium amide
Tetrafluoroethylene (liquid monomer)
Divinyl acetylene
Potassium metal
Vinylidene chloride
Class B Peroxide Formers:
Unopened: discard or test for peroxides after 12 months or at manufacturer’s expiration date (whichever comes first).
Opened: test for peroxide formation every 6 months.
*Always test this class immediately before any distillation.
Common Class B Peroxide Formers include:
Acetal
Cumene
Diacetylene
Methylacetylene
1-Phenylethanol
Acetaldehyde
Cyclohexanol
Diethyl ether
Methylcyclopentane
2-Phenylethanol
Benzyl alcohol
2-Cychlohexen-1-ol
Dioxanes
MIBK
2-Propanol
Benzaldehyde
Cyclohexene
Ethylene glycol dimethyl ether (glyme)
2-Pentanol
Tetrahydrofuran
2-Butanol
Decahydronaphthalene
Furan 4-Penten-1-ol
Class C Peroxide Formers:
Same precautions as Class B.
Include:
Acrylic acid
Chloroprene
Styrene
Vinyl acetylene
Vinyladiene chloride
Acrylonitirile
Chlorotrifluoroethylene
Tetrafluoroethylene
Vinyl chloride
Butadiene
Methyl methacrylate
Vinyl acetate
Vinyl pyridine
*Without opening, immediately dispose of any peroxide-forming chemical with any crystalline formation. Be careful not to open, shake, heat, or drop.
Testing Peroxide-Forming Chemicals:
Peroxide test strips can be bought cheaply online, or various in-lab tests can be performed:
One method is to combine the fluid with an equal volume (1-3mL) of acetic acid (AcOH). To this a few drops of a 5% KI solution are added, and a color change indicates the presence of peroxides.
Another method adds a small amount of the fluid to be tested (~0.5mL) to ~1mL 10% KI solution and ~0.5mL dilute HCL. To this a few drops of starch indicator are added, and the presence of blue/blue-black color within a minute indicates the presence of peroxides.
Fluids with a LOW (<30ppm) concentration of peroxides can often be deperoxidated via filtration through activated alumina, distillation (not for THF!), evaporation, or chromatography.
V. Labware Safety
A. Glassware:
B. Support:
C. Tubing:
D. Heating:
E. Electricity:
VI. Reaction Safety
A. Fume Hoods:
Fume hoods are absolutely essential whenever flammability, toxicity, or accidental intoxication is a concern. That includes all organic solvents, concentrated acids, and concentrated ammonia, as well as any materials that are both volatile and toxic, corrosive, reactive, or intoxicating. The face velocity of a fume hood should be around 100 ft/min or 0.5 m/s. Keep these guidelines in mind when using a fume hood:
Unfortunately, bees often find that fume hoods are the most difficult apparatus to obtain and install in a private laboratory. Nonetheless, it is imperative that each lab includes one. This is especially important for bees, who often work in confined spaces that can quickly and easily fill with toxic, flammable, or intoxicating vapors. A proper fume hood may cost several thousand dollars. Fortunately, there are many online guides and videos that teach how to construct one for as little as a few hundred dollars. The builder must meticulously ensure that air flow is adequate and constant. The outtake must be properly filtered, and there must not be any leaks through which air can flow other than the space under the sash and the outtake.
B. Additional Tips:
VII. Emergency Procedures
A. Emergency Shower and Eyewash Stations:
If any hazardous chemical comes in contact with the body or eyes, the emergency shower or eye-wash station should be utilized immediately, with continued application for at least 15 minutes. The eyes should be held open for this entire process. Quality eye-wash stations can be purchased online for between 50 and several hundred US dollars. Bees who don’t have one installed are advised to purchase one. Some models can be attached directly to a sink faucet. An alternative, less effective, and minimal necessary precaution is bottled, eye-safe saline solution such as EyeSaline and Physician’s Care Eyewash Station, which can be purchased online for around $10 for a single bottle, and $30+ for kits. At least two bottles should be kept on hand in case both eyes are contaminated. Application of bottled solution to both eyes may require a partner, because the eyes must be held open to maximize effectiveness. For this, and other reasons (speed, difficulty/time of opening bottles vs. pushing a button, and water pressure) an actual eyewash station is in all ways preferred. Faucet-mounted eyewash stations such as the following are very affordable (US $59.95). Recommended Eyewash Station.
Bees may not, however, have the space to install a safety shower. The home shower may be used in its stead; however, precaution must be taken to ensure it is easily accessible. The chemist should alert all others in the home/facility that they are working, and require that the door to the shower, and the path to it, be open at all times in case of emergency.
B. Fire extinguishers:
Class A- ordinary combustibles- wood, cloth, paper- can be extinguished with water, or general fire extinguishers.
Class B- organic solvents, flammable liquids- chemical foam extinguishers (also work for class A and C).
Class C- electrical equipment- chemical foam extinguishers.
Class D- combustible metals such as aluminum, titanium, magnesium, lithium, zirconium, sodium, and potassium.
C. Fire blankets:
Used for small fires, or to put out a person who has caught fire (laying on ground, standing may cause the fire to move up the body to the head due to a chimney effect).
D. Spills:
Keep some vinegar or baking soda around to neutralize bases and acids, respectively. After acids and bases are neutralized, the chemical can be mopped up and placed in waste disposal.
VIII. Post-Procedure Protocols
A. Personal Hygiene:
Wash hands, face, and all exposed skin after PPE has been removed to avoid recontamination by touching dirty clothes. Shower and change clothes once possible.
B. Facility Hygiene:
Clean all surfaces, glassware, and equipment before leaving the lab. Keep laboratory items in the lab, and personal items out of it. Chemicals may be transferred into the home through those items. Additionally, foreign objects have the potential to contaminate sterile laboratory environments.
C. Waste Disposal:
Waste disposal is one of the most important aspects of safety, image management, public relations, avoidance of fines or criminal charges, and environmental preservation.
The Article “Management of Waste” found here states, “The best strategy for managing laboratory waste aims to maximize safety and minimize environmental impact, and considers these objectives from the time of purchase.” The article describes four tiers of waste management:
  1. Pollution prevention and source reduction (green chemistry).
  2. Reuse and redistribution of unwanted/surplus material (purchasing only what is needed).
  3. Treatment, reclamation, and recycling of materials within the waste.
  4. Disposal through incineration, treatment, or land burial. Additionally, use of solvent as fuel, or a fuel blender (the least desirable tier).
I hope this safety plan can save a few bees. I know there is a lot of information, but chemical safety is extremely important and multifaceted. Best of luck with your endeavors. Stay safe out there!
submitted by MarquisDeVice to TheeHive [link] [comments]

Breath of the Wild, and upgrading the fun out of the game.

Tl;dr at the bottom
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Mechanical Obsolescence
I think Breath of the Wild is an incredible game for a decently long time into the game, but when I get a certain distance into the game, I start to lose interest. For a while I’ve wondered why I just can’t maintain interest late into the game as much as I can on my 15th run through of the Great Plateau, and I think I’ve come to an idea of what I’ll call “Mechanical Obsolescence”. Which is to say, Breath of the Wild has a lot of really incredible mechanics that are really fun to play around with and engage with, but as you progress further and further into the game, it slowly eliminates the need or desire to interact with these mechanics in favor of more streamlined approaches that are less rewarding.
I think it’s helpful to think of situations in a game like BOTW as small puzzles that you need to solve. I want to kill the enemies in this camp. I want to cross this ravine. I want to go to the top of that snowy mountain. I want to kill this Hinox. All of these are things that you want to do, with obstacles of varying degrees keeping you from doing them. In the early game, your resources are very limited. When you go to fight a Bokoblin camp you may have only one or two weapons that will break very fast, so when your weapon breaks you suddenly need to think on your feet and go grab a new one, or figure something else out. When you want to climb a wall, you need to scope it out, find some resting areas, and then climb up and it really feels like you’re on a journey, setting out to find whatever is at the top of the mountain. These situations all require at least a little amount of thinking, or “puzzle solving” in order to find the right solution, or idea as to how you overcome the challenge.
This is great as well, as BOTW has incredible world interaction. You can chop trees to cross gaps (well, that one time), use chuchu jelly as bombs, catch your weapons on fire, use lightning to deal extra damage to metal, and so much more thanks to the chemistry engine. It really encourages dynamic gameplay and playing around with your environment to see what you can do.
Once you begin to get the runes, paraglider, armor sets, etc.. however, the game slowly gets more and more streamlined. These unique situations where you think on your feet in combat or have to scope out areas to climb effectively are diminished. Suddenly it just feels like you’re going through the motions rather than actually thinking about and engaging with the world around you. Why use chuchu jelly as a makeshift bomb when I have 20 Lynel swords. Why use a raft to cross a river when I have cryonis and paraglider. etc...
What made me realize this effect was Eventide Island, which a lot of people give critical appraisal to already. But I think diving deeper into the nature of Eventide Island gives light to where the real fun is in the game.
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Eventide Island
For anyone unfamiliar, I’ll give a really brief rundown of Eventide Island. It’s an island that you can come across in Breath of the Wild that, when you step foot on it, removes all of your weapons, armor, items, etc… from your inventory (and returns them after you complete it). You are completely naked when you start out. This basically creates a small microcosm of the game that a lot of people have already talked about before, where you progress from tree branches as weapons, to actual weapons, to having a decent grasp on what’s going on. But the large idea is that you are having to scrounge around for what you need and engage heavily with the environment in order to get what you need from it.
I think this is the part that sheds the light on the real core fun of the game. On both Eventide Island and the Great Plateau, you are scrounging around for things that you need, with immediate danger surrounding you. As you gain materials and a footing, you can take on progressively more difficult challenges, which keep you expending resources, which in turn means you have to keep searching for more. This keeps the player’s engagement with their environment very high, and I feel, keeps the fun very high. Compare this to later in the game when you have access to a large variety of problem solving tools, and this environmental engagement takes a sharp dive.
Normally, if you were to complete Eventide Island without having your inventory wiped, it would be a cakewalk for many players as they are already pre-equipped with a lot of the armor and weapons needed to take on the threats of the island, but since it is wiped, the challenge can be tailored and dialed in to be just right, so that there is always more danger lurking around the corner due to the designers knowing the possibility space of what the player is capable of on the island. As you progress through the island you make use of environmental hazards, sneak up on enemies to get sneak attacks, and do other things that you may not have done in a while, as you haven’t really needed to.
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Upgrades aren’t bad, they’re just complicated
This isn’t to say that upgrades are bad, meaningful upgrades are inherent to RPG design and are really great rewards for players. The issue however, is that these upgrades feel great at first, but are actually harming the underlying gameplay loop of the game, without the game introducing any new challenges or mechanics to overcome that require use of these new upgrades. They only let you overcome challenges that were more interesting to overcome before you had them.
I think the overall effect of all of these upgrades that you get is that you are never challenged in the game to really think about a situation and how to go about taking it on. As you gain more items, armor sets, and abilities, the world does not compensate by having more difficult areas. You get everywhere by paragliding; sailing over content, potential fights, potential hardships (such as crossing a freezing river or pit of lava). When you do get into fights, they are often very straightforward, unless you go out of your way to be more creative. You just rush in with your weapons, use them until they break, and then pause and select a new one, and then go back to just straight attacking until everything is dead. When you want to go to a more dangerous area such as an extremely cold or hot area, it’s largely a no brainer as to what you do, just equip whatever armor you need and carry on. These situations become more and more prevalent throughout the game the further you go on and it really feels like it’s wasted potential, as these mechanics create such great dynamism and interactivity between the player and the world in the early game or more limited areas such as Eventide Island, that are largely just diminished and nonexistent in the later game.
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So what could we do about this?
I think there’s a few interesting ways that this kind of Mechanic Obsolescence could be avoided. One way of course is to just not engage with them / not have them in the game. This is the inherent problem with having upgrades in a game, as you want to have rewards for players that feel interesting and meaningful, but you also don’t want to undermine the content that you’ve created and water down the process of playing through it. Perhaps a kind of horizontal upgrade system, or one where you have tradeoffs for equipping certain armors and such.
One idea would be to limit the player’s inventory, or creatively clean it out when some criteria is triggered. Since the real core, fun part of the game is making use of what you can find around you for weapons, looking for insects and monster parts to make elixirs, scoping out ravines, cooking food for buffs, etc… if you could find some way to wipe or limit the player’s inventory without it feeling cheap, then you could consistently re-engage them with this core gameplay loop of interacting with the environment.
Take for example (a bit of an extreme example) of only limiting the player to 1 weapon, bow, and shield. Whatever weapon you have, that’s what you have. This could lead to situations such as finding a Hinox, determining that you aren’t powerful enough at the moment to fight it, and going out to search for a more damaging or more durable weapon. Maybe you would even want to make an attack elixir to ensure that you will kill the Hinox before your good weapons break. Regardless, once you end up killing the Hinox, your weapons will likely be very damaged and break fairly soon. This will put you back down to the level of having nothing again, which re-engages the player with the world as they once again search for decent weapons and such.
Taking this even further, what if you limited the amount of meals and elixirs the player could carry, so you can only eat meals on the spot, and can only carry one elixir with you. When you find a cooking pot it’d always be a good idea to cook a meal and buff up as you otherwise wouldn’t be able to carry one with you, and you can save elixirs for hard fights or tough environments.
Another idea would be special end game content that requires these upgrades in order for the player to even stand a chance at taking them on. An example could be an extremely cold area that requires both maxed cold resistance armor AND a buff from a meal or elixir. With this then, you would not only be giving real use to this equipment, but also be limiting the player in a way which allows you as a designer to dial in the difficulty of the area to present a meaningful challenge, as they know roughly what the player would bring equipped with them.
Diving deeper into this example of the incredibly cold areas, along with this limited inventory idea (1 weapon in each slot, can only eat meals at pots, can only bring 1 elixir with you), we have a few variables as to how the player could bring heat with them, and we know that they need 2 of them
Knowing that they need to have 2 of these 3 things, we could give interesting challenges that we know that they would have to face.
All of these situations eliminate variables and give the designer more to work with in terms of creating interesting challenges for the player to overcome.
One example could be having frost wizzrobes as an enemy. For any of the options, bows are available, so if you bring fire arrows you could easily take them out. For Option 1, the player would have any weapon available to them to combat the wizzrobe, which could be a regular weapon or a fire weapon. The advantage to this is that they may not be able to fight a frost wizzrobe as easily as a player that brought a fire weapon, but they would make up for that by being able to fight other things without using up one of their heat sources. For Option 2 and 3, they would have an easier time fighting these frost enemies, but fighting others will use up one of their heat sources, which could cause a problem.
Having some kind of tough enemy that you would want to fight like a Hinox or Talus could give interesting variation to each of these. For Option 1, you would have any kind of weapon available, so the lacking firepower that you could get with armor or buffs could be made up for with a good weapon. For Option 2, you may lack damage in your weapon since you are bringing a specific type of weapon, but you can wear armor that can give you a damage buff to make up for it. And for Option 3, you could use a buff to get extra damage, while being more limited with armor defense and offence attack by your armor and weapon choices.
This could even give reason to come prepared differently based on what challenge you plan to take on. If you are going to be in an area with lots of frost wizzrobes, you may want to bring a fire weapon rather than a normal one, while if you are going to take on the Hinox, a better, more damaging weapon may be better. This could really create a feeling of gearing up for an adventure, and conquering harsh climates and areas that the game already does and promotes so well, while also building on it and allowing them to have these kinds of upgrades.
Tl;dr
Breath of the Wild has some amazing mechanics that really encourage player interactivity with the world and environment. As you progress through the game, you gain upgrades and abilities that severely diminish the problem solving required to circumvent these challenges, and the game becomes more streamlined and autopilot-y, as encounters require less and less thought put into them from having access to paraglider, armor sets, masses of healing, food buffs, and weapons at any time, runes, and champion powers.
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I hope this makes some sort of sense and isn't just one massive ramble, and I would like to hear anyone else’s input on if they feel the same, or if you don’t have any idea what I’m talking about and love the late game of BOTW.
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5 Hazardous Waste Examples Businesses Commonly Produce Hazardous waste, including toxic and corrosive waste, are common in many business environments. Even if you don’t think your business produces hazardous waste, you could be wrong. In even simpler terms, a biohazardous waste product can be anything contaminated with potentially infectious materials. Common types and examples of biohazard waste can be divided into: Infectious waste, such as: Blood and blood products. Contaminated personal protective equipment (PPE) IV tubing. Hazardous waste is legally defined as solid waste with the potential to harm humans or the environment. This kind of waste has to be taken care of very carefully for safety reasons, and there are special regulations related to handling and disposing it. Does the term hazardous waste conjure up images of drums of oozing liquid covered in skull and cross-bone warning signs? Even though that would be perfectly correct, the subject covers much more than that. Almost any industry or manufacturing process can generate toxic waste, which means there are many types of hazardous waste that pose threats to our health or our environment. The most common examples of hazardous waste found within the home include paints, batteries, solvents, cleaning agents and pesticides. Now think about your home again. Do you have any of these The first category of hazardous waste which we will provide concrete examples from are characterised waste. Characterised waste is often the most common (and commonly recorded) waste found on industrial sites like construction, mining and oil and gas. Examples of hazardous waste…. Presswash Solvents. Paints & Thinners. Laquer Thinners. Caustic Bases. Acids. Laboratory Chemicals. Solvents. Stillbottoms. In 2013, failure to make a hazardous waste determination cost Wal-Mart $110 million in penalities.If you create hazardous waste and you’re unfamiliar with the different types, then it’s possible that your company, business or organization may be in serious trouble. The following lists household hazardous waste (HHW) products commonly found in the home. There are three options available to Sonoma residents looking to properly dispose of HHW: the HHW Facility, HHW Collection Events and HHW Rover Service.The HHW Facility and HHW Collection Events are free for residents, while the HHW Rover can be scheduled for $50 per pickup (free for seniors over 80 years Some products in your home are considered hazardous and require proper disposal. Look through your home for hazardous chemical products. Use the following list as a guide and when the time comes to dispose of these products, please dispose of them properly. Garage & Workshop. Antifreeze. Automotive batteries. Automotive body fillers. Brake fluid.

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