My biographical bit, part 13: University 4

I graduated with first class honours in Chemistry in 1978, and I knew that I wanted to carry study further. I began a PhD, still at Nottingham, in sythetic organic chemistry under the supervision of Don Whiting - he was a Reader in organic chemistry, in the UK the next payscale down from Professor.

And so began a whole new era, and some very odd stuff along the way. Mostly down to the daftness of the people in the research lab, C29, who were there at various times: Dane Toplis, trumpeter and research technician, who was always a laugh; Ray Denman, a chubby guy who loved his dogs who was a Demonstrator to undergraduates; Roland Smith, postdoctoral researcher, who was known as either the Baldy Moron or Mr Semi-Erect but whose intelligence was not in doubt and did not walk around in a state of dubious arousal; Andy Hobbs, known as Hobbs the Gob (or HG for short) who always bragged how great he was until his girlfriend left him and he crashed his car into a bridge, luckily wothout injury; Paul Clawson, whose Danish grandfather changed his name from Claussen after the war, fellow chess player, and the only person I know to have saved on a student grant, who was always stirring mixtures in conical flasks - it looked very simple but was actually a delicate reaction of a carbonyl ylid; Phil Thomas, known as Dick Brain (or DB for short), fellow chess player, and very high on the list for entertainment value with many lab cock-ups; Clive Till, postdoctoral reaearcher who got his PhD at Southampton, and who had the ability as a personal timepiece - you could set your watch by him when he rolled up at 10am every day, who had a girlfriend called Rowan from Huntingdon (or Humpingdon as we called it); Khalid Khan, lothario, and the palest Pakistani I've ever seen; Peter Amos, known as Groper for his wandering hands, who was Roland Smith's morning running partner; Samuel Yeboah, postdoctoral researcher from Ghana, who wondered how I got to be always filtering off fine crystals (I kept some odd hours); then there was me - the guy who once managed to get a crappy brown froth to ooze out of a flask before I'd even put the solvent in or heated it up. There was a special award for that, bestowed by the lab members, but that is for next time.

Jack Orchison
May 25, 2014.