Area Chemist Cleans Mug With Lab Acid

Cambridge, MA -- Area graduate student Mike Zimmerman, 29, finally decided to clean the cup he has had in the lab for eight years. He got a master's and left the cup there, and it was still on the windowsill, when he came back for a Ph.D. at MIT.

Mike was pretty sure his thesis is done, and will be leaving MIT at the end of the semester. But he could not look at it for one more week in its black and brown state.

"Don't try this at home. I just used 15ml of concentrated HCl. But I neutralized the brown solution with 50% NaOH, before I poured it down the lab sink. I washed it in the men's room with soap after."