Crap photo I know but it’s a grab shot following on from me taking in some advice from one of my pbase friends (all of whom I know I’ve neglected badly of late). I was advised to take good care to plan ahead for deadlines, particularly not to leave handing in work until the last minute.

This is my first proper lab report – from my first chemistry lab. To be honest, it’s more of that Mickey Mouse stuff I talked about yesterday and I’m sure both Colin and Chris (and probably John too) would find it hilarious that I’ve been making pure benzoic acid through recrystallisation! Go on boys – you know you do…..

Anyway, the lab was today. I did the work with my lab partner. It worked. I know it worked because it was mine and my lab partner’s sample that the lecturer tested for purity at the end. (I know that English is crap but for some reason I’ve got a fried brain as I type this.)

Bearing in mind the beautiful advice I’d had, and in the light of an hour and a half to kill between Chemistry and Maths, I found myself a bench in our delicious autumn sunshine and wrote up the report as best as I could without the report template that I’d been given a couple of weeks ago.

After Maths, another couple of hours to kill waiting for a train (one scheduled and one unscheduled – grrrrr), during which today’s Maths homework got knocked off too.

When I got home, I fired up my PC and typed up my report, using my template and Powerpoint to draw my molecules and my other diagrams, which I downloaded into my Word document and by the time I’d finished it (at 8pm after starting “work” that morning at 7.30am) it looked quite professional.

It got handed in the following morning at 10am – the shortest time in which it would have been possible to get it into the hands of the college’s admin staff. I await the verdict on my report in terms of whether the content is any good or not. I’m pretty sure they won’t be able to criticise my style, it’s just a matter of whether the whole exercise has been a triumph of style over content……even though that’s something I think can rarely be said of me……usually it’s the other way around – content presented badly if you get my drift.

Thanks very much for the advice, which was given privately so I won't "name names" but I just wanted my benefactor to know I read, understood and acted on her advice. I only hope I can keep this up.

OK – don’t take my word for it, just look at the photo on the top of this page. I'd say the result here is very definitely content over style, wouldn't you?