Pool_1

"No. No. Nothing seedy or unseemly. Real work. Hey! My time here has value too. Huh? You know? They have to pay ME. You are an extension of ME. You here, doing my experiments, means I'm here. My research is my mind, and that has value. You are the transubstantiation of me. When you measure an aliquot, I measure the aliquot. When you pour the Ouchterlony plates, I pour them - through you. As you ARE me, I can just choose to share my worth with you, for real work of course, at my apartment that would otherwise keep me from being here. It's fair." The sprout of unfettered reasoning, seeded in him by his father, was not liking the indirect nature of this line of thought. Yet the offer was, on the face of it, sincere. A professor trying to help a promising future physician get through, by an honest offer of honest work. Or was it? "What kind of work?" "My apartment has a lawn that needs mowing. I'm too old to be doing that, now. Mow and trim and keep it looking good through the summer and I'll give you a flat thousand dollars. It's just once a week. You'll have the rest of the time to work here. Can you imagine this old lady professor mowing her lawn? Really!" "Lawn? Mow, a lawn? Jesus. Grass? One thousand dollars? How many actual days is that?" His mind raced. No one day a week job, let alone PART of a single day a week summer job came close to that. "Why so much?" "Yoo hoo, wake up! I neeeeed you here! Here. This work is important. The research funds will never miss this. You do the work of five people. You are a bargain. Do you think I would trust these tenth generation mice to anybody who answers a summer job ad? I can't replace you. I would have to get five replacements and then