Bunch of failed suicides, an accident in a school swimming pool, and the time my neighbour accidentally diverted a fuck tonne of carbon monoxide fumes into my house. All the times I’ve been close to death don’t make for particularly interesting reading.

How about a brush with serious injury instead?

1st year of uni. I’m in the labs for the first time and I am hyped to do some microbiological analysis. We were given a bunch of techniques to try and I’d decided to start by doing gram staining and then observing a slide. Most of my class mates had less experience on the microscopes than me and I was feeling great about how quickly I’d calibrated everything. Cocky enough that I hadn’t noticed just how coated in immersion oil my gloves were, until my hand accidentally passed through a Bunsen burner and went up in flames.

Thankfully I’d picked a bench close to the sinks and was able to wrap some damp towels around the hand quickly to try to smother the flame before I got seriously burnt. But the scars on my hand are a reminder to me to be aware of my surroundings in the lab at all times.