Taking from the kitchen, and devouring the two trays of fresh, juicy raspberries in the fridge as well as scarfing the three custard filled donuts left for me that my old man got for him and mom's pudding the other day, as he took one each for them, but left me the remaining three all to myself. Which I'm definitely going to take advantage of. I'm REALLY hungry.
Also looking forward to getting round to run a modified Birch-Benkeser reduction and test a modification intended to avoid the requirement for working with cryogenic liquid gases (ammonia, the birch reduction uses the 'electride', or solvated electrons made by addition of sodium metal, in the classic Birch, and lithium in the case of the birch-benkeser to liquid anhydrous ammonia, that works as a powerful reducing agent, the sodium variant is even capable of de-aromatization of a benzene ring to a cyclohexane!. I fancy trying a solution of gaseous annie, not liquid, for the reasons of being easier to handle, less dangerous, as the liquid annie is pretty corrosive, led, as the gas, into diethyl or diisopropyl ether, in which a suspension of lithium will be added, the ammonia led in to form the lithium bronze in-situ. And simply add the substrate to be reduced in a further portion of one of those, or THF perhaps, although I actually HAVE the diethyl and diisopropyl ethers here, I'd have to buy more if I went with THF, and I can't bring myself to spend money on something two options just as good already exist for right at hand. Why pay, and why wait for a package to travel from point of origin to receiving it?
