‘Tis a tragedy! ‘Tis a mystery! My cheese has gone missing in the middle of the night!
Show yourself, fiend–dare you step into the light…
“Where’s my ----- cheese?!?”
I stared at my desk drawer in disbelief. Everything was accounted for and in its place–everything, except for my frickin’ stringy queso.
It was another late night in the ol’ NMR lab running my experiments–not uncommon in grad school, but unusual for my lazy/ADHD ass–and I was so ----- excited to each the string cheese I had put in that drawer earlier in the afternoon. Dannnnngit. That was supposed to be my midnight snack, but now I was going to have to go hungry because…actually I had no legit theory as to who, why or how my cheese could have gone missing.
I mean, I had some theories, but like I said, I wouldn’t call any of them legit:
- Aliens
- Ghosts
- A rodent of unusual size. With opposable thumbs.
- Stalker
- I’m schizophrenic
- I’m an amnesiac
- I’m a schizophrenic amnesiac
- Cheese gained sentience
- Turbo-charged mold on cheese gained sentience
…as you can see, that list is as endless as my imagination. I think you get the point: my cheese had disappeared without a trace–nay an empty wrapper–and ’twas quite the mystery.
Oh, but before we go any further, I feel like I owe you an explanation as to why my cheese was just hanging out at length, unrefrigerated in my desk drawer. You see, when a man and a woman love each very much, they remove their clothes and lie very close to each–
Wait, wrong explanation for the wrong crowd. My apologies. Let’s try this again.
You see, kids, when two sulfur atoms love each very much, they lie very close together and form what’s called a “disulfide bridge”1https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Denaturation_(biochemistry)–and no, that is not a euphemism. But, if the temperature in their bedroom gets too warm, the female sulfur atom–who always runs hot anyways–will get too uncomfortable and also grossed out because the male sulfur atom is a profuse sweater and now they’re both hot slimy slippery mess, and no, not in any sensual manner either. So inevitably one of them either kicks the other one out of bed or voluntarily relocates to the couch or spare bedroom…and thus the so-called disulfide bridge is no more.
Now what is also important to know is that these sulfur atoms were part of a protein chain community, but from total different parts of town. But when they fell in love, their animal-like attraction to each other up-ended the entire structure, causing the protein to fold in on itself. These folded proteins, as part of the cheese in my string cheese, makes the cheese ‘tight’ and chewy and, frankly, somewhat brittle. In other words, not as stringy as I like. This, however, is nothing a little heat can’t solve, and even at room temperature, the disulfide bridge can be broken.
And that’s what we call ‘denaturation’. For some reason. I don’t know, I’m not a scientist. Or at least that kind of scientist. But I am smart enough to understand the basic correlation between cheese left in a drawer for 6+ hours and it being ----- delicious like G0d intended.
Anyways…I had a mystery to solve. And really, if we’re being realistic, we know that cheese didn’t just get up and walk off by itself, and most likely some human had to physically open the drawer and then steal my delicious not-so-dairy-free snack. But who had access to my lab? Who had a key?
Either it was the cleaning staff, or somebody in my lab. The former was an honorable lot, and it was pretty hard to fathom that they would stop so low as to get involved in petty fromage theivery.
The latter bunch, on the other hand, were a shifty bunch who couldn’t be trusted to be alone in a room with a savory treat. You know these elite academics–always just assuming they’re entitled to any cheese in their proximity…
“Who moved my cheese?”
Yes, that really was the subject line of my non-accusatory electronic missive to my colleagues.
I proceeded from there to explain to them, that despite what could be construed as a humorous reference to a book that everyone in 2008 had heard of but none of us had actually read, this was a grave matter. Friends, there is a cheese thief amongst us. And it could be any one of us.
But I didn’t want to come out and say it in such blunt terms. Mainly because, despite my accusation only a few paragraphs above, they really weren’t a shifty bunch–I was just being overly-dramatic–they were more a static bunch and I couldn’t actually imagine anyone of them intentionally stealing my goods. So I had to make it safe for the responsible party to come forward without fear of repercussions. I didn’t want to scare them away and then I might never know the truth. And I kid you not, not knowing what the hell actually had gone down was driving me a little crazy.
Fortunately, my email was well-received, and I even got many compliments for composing what some found to be the funniest sh*t they had ever read in a work-related email (not really the tone I was going for, but I’ll take those accolades any day of the work week). And crucially, he who was responsible came forward and admitted to his error in judgement.
“I was at your desk trying to track down some experimental data on your computer, and needed to jot something down,” related my fellow grad student, Jacob, at our next lab meeting. “So I was looking for was a pencil in your drawer and–oh my G0d, BJ forgot about string cheese and now it was rotting! (At least that is what I thought to myself.”
“I was concerned for your safety,” he continued, “and also about the real possibility that your work space was about to get funkier than George Clinton,2https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/George_Clinton_(funk_musician) so my natural instinct told me that I better throw it away…and that’s the store of how your cheese got moved.”
“HAVEN’T YOU FOOLS EVER HEARD OF DENATURATION?!?” I said, exasperated by their ignorance.
I let out a heavy sigh (partly out of the relief that comes with a solved mystery).
“I was letting it denature because it’s so much tastier that way. You should try it some time…”
The point of the story is…try letting your string cheese sit out for a good bit before enjoying. Trust me, it’s so much better that way.
And to be honest, it wasn’t until I got to this point in the story before realizing that this whole time I had been thinking about the time that I had sent out an email to the whole lab group, lightly passive-aggressively accusing them of stealing my stash of AA batteries that I had been keeping in that same drawer, only to find out that I had taken them home at an earlier point in time.
In other words, I was expecting to actually have a moral of the story to close out this tale…
Ah, what the heck? Since we’re here anyways:
The point of that story was…before you go and get your panties in a kink and call your cohorts a bunch of little thieves, maybe do your homework first and ask yourself, “perhaps I might be a forgetful asshole?” You know, be humble and assume the best in others.
And if you are experiencing indignation at the tiniest of perceived slights (like someone you know violating the sanctity of your cheese or your batteries), maybe you should talk to your therapist about that.
…
…
What’s that, you say? Really? Huh. Interesting.
I figured that would be so much more common, but you’re telling me that you nor anyone else you know turns into such a Little Princess in those situations?
I guess it’s just me then, all alone in this sad, sad, bejeweled rowboat…
Content created on: 27 September 2025 (Saturday)
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