The Second Week of School

I woke up today at 7:45 AM not really tired like usual in the mornings. I went down for breakfast at 8:20 and left around 8:40 to go to class. As I was walking I saw Oyin and Alexa ahead of me but they were already going the direction of their classes. I got to my class at 8:50 AM and waited in the hallway with the rest of my classmates that were already there. Today in class I learned that the flu virus is a negative-stranded RNA virus. I learned that a pandemic is an epidemic of infectious diseases that spread through human populations across a large region. I also learned that 630 people were infected by H5N1 and 375 died since 2003. It spreads slowly, doesn't spread from human to human, and is a dangerous and deadly flu.

In the lab we used different plates to separate the bacteria in different ways. We used 400 mL of saline and took the E. coli from the filter pad and mixed it with saline in a tube using a toothpick to extract the E. coli. But before we did this we counted the colonies on the diluted and non-diluted colonies and calculated the number of colonies divided by the volume plated. After the calculations we took one of the colonies from the environmental plates we did with a toothpick and mixed it with the saline in another tube. Then we plated the red and blue colonies onto different plates.

After that we chose two colonies fro the environmental bacteria and mixed them in saline with separate tubes. Then we used a loop to spread the bacteria on one part of the plate and switched loops to take the bacteria from the part that was spread already and repeated that and spread it. It was spread three ways. My partner and I chose to use the bathroom and dead fish samples. Then we went to lunch and I ate pizza, pineapples, fries, and mac & cheese. After lunch I walked back to class and ended up being tired for some reason. Maybe because I was dehydrated and didn't have enough water. I like the fact that I learn more things each day.

When class ended I walked back to the dorms with Salmon, one of my classmates. We talked about how we both had dogs and we talked about how hot it was and what how it's different back at home. When I got to my room I took a two hour nap and then went to dinner. At dinner I ate a chicken taco, fries, and fruit. I also had a banana while I was waiting for Oyin, Alexa, Dani, and Kaitlyn to finish eating. When they were done we all went our separate ways until later on meeting in one of the many lounges. Ending the night we all checked in for curfew and then went back to the lounge to work on whatever needed to be done.