Alyx Woodward (obsolete) @Alyx@computerfairi.es

@Alyx bleh I used "him". *slaps self*

are we doing some kind of reverse cold read on this thing, Chara

🔴 eh maybe. patterns are patterns

🔴 anyway "town in the foothills of some mountains" ain't exactly uncommon

yeah there's that. we're still in reasonably generic territory here

the town has a name, "Silverdalen", which just makes me think of Silverdale, WA, in Kitsap County. we've been there once!

🔴 yeah Kara drove that far to buy an electric piano. it was an expensive machine and her / our left-right coördination issues meant we hardly improved with practice and Kara quit trying early. as per usual hah

what the heck, I'll do another. lucky thirteen

https://www.parallaxcomic.com/comic/page-13

Lomax really IS running now, drawing the attention of other kids. and it doesn't look like they stop until they're well away from the school. it's evening, and Lomax is on some remotish-looking road, trees behind him, looking down on a town nestled in among mountains

🔴 ...huh

more coincidences, Chara?

🔴 well I'm thinking of the Ebottsville stuff of Kara's but shit nobody paid attention to that

sometimes I feel like I should CW all the O-chem stuff but you know I think it might do some folks good to see something _completely_ different on the timeline once in a while, not just endless shitposting

and once you get the catalyst made, it's used to hydrogenate quinaldine (2-methylquinoline) to (S)-2-methyl-1,2,3,4-tetrahydroquinoline, in 94% enantiomeric excess, by hydrogenation at 50 atm pressure of hydrogen gas in a solvent of methanol spiked with trifluoroacetic acid, probably to insure protonation of the quinaldine (I suspect that without it you might get the 1,4-dihydroquinoline instead)

neat, I guess? nothing I can see wanting to do any time soon. who has iridium lying around

ordinary hydrogenation of aromatic rings is going to yield racemic products but stereoselective hydrogenation is here achieved with a bespoke chiral organoriridium catalyst. most of the synthetic procedure describes how to make that catalyst starting from (1S,2S)-1,2-diphenylethylenediamine. again, a vicinal diamine serves as a building block for a chiral ligand stuck on a transition metal

pentamethylcyclopentadienyliridium(III) dichloride dimer serves as the iridium source for the synthesis

feel like I need to change up the _Organic Syntheses_ roulette in some way that's more likely to give me older results. right now it skews towards new syntheses too much. hm...let's try random 4-digit number instead

searching orgsyn.org on "1323"

and the first hit is

http://orgsyn.org/demo.aspx?prep=v92p0213

now this is a fascinating one, if special-purpose again. the goal is *stereoselective* hydrogenation of substituted quinolines to 1,2,3,4-tetrahydroquinolines

I'm trying to think of how I'd react to an exchange like this when I was Lomax's age. (like, okay, I sort of feel myself to be a teenager, but I'm occupying the same head as a forty-four-year-old human, so it's complicated)

Chara, any thoughts?

🔴 eh when Kara was this age she probably would have at least half believed the teacher could be some source of help, she still tended to look up to teachers as trusted authorities, despite the calamities, until her 30s, it's sad

and page twelve, just because these have been swiftly moving pages with little to summarize really

https://www.parallaxcomic.com/comic/page-12

Lomax does in fact bolt, but not before Prof. Rodgers assures them, "if you ever need help you can come to me". not worrisome at all! Lomax thanks him with a hasty backwards glance. the kid wants out of the awkwardness, fast

they hasten away, almost running, and finally give vent to a "WHAT THE HELL" when they're a safe distance down the hall

page eleven.

detailed closeup of the box sitting in Prof. Rodgers's outstretched hand. there's some lettering on the lid and I can make out the word "LUX" (light, of course) but nothing else is immediately clear.

what is it? Lomax sensibly asks. "consider it a gift". o-kay. Lomax is already mentally preparing to bolt for the door and Rodgers does the "hehe sorry for keeping you" thing. just how long have they been talking?

fine, let's keep playing. page ten

https://www.parallaxcomic.com/comic/page-10

still expounding on Lomax's willingness to be a doormat, Prof. Rodgers advances on Lomax, casting the shadow from the setting Sun on him, which of course is totally not intimidating in any way: "you're powerless".

hehe didn't mean to scare you though! both Lomax and Rodgers are sweating at this point. Rodgers promises he's only wanting to help, and holds out...a small ornamented wooden box, perhaps?

still think I should get the tattoo?

🔴 "the threat is often stronger than the execution". didn't some chess player say that

Nimzovich maybe. probably not really Nimzovich though

anyway I take your point

🔴 and let's face it, the folks playing with us have the advantage of being booked up. they've been marinating in decades of theorizing, we've just been cruising along with pure improvisation. we don't know what we're doing, we just...have a scent we're following

🔴 if nothing else we're probably gonna be learning some new shit, none of us have ever not enjoyed that

🔴 whatever this is...it's more pleasant than whatever things were *shrugs* I'm game. might as well get some fun out of this charade

*sighs* Chara, we know who did this, after all. I wouldn't put it past 'em to just AIM this at you

why have I even been typing this shit out as daily as I can manage? I suppose I was curious. but gawd this duty has really seemed like self-punishment sometimes

like...you know we're being played.

that's all I'm saying

ok, things take a turn

https://www.parallaxcomic.com/comic/page-09

a top row of small boring frames, then suddenly we get a clear left-right split, light going into dark.

"determination" is repeated from page 8 *snorts* Chara, any thoughts?

🔴 you know, it's a good word, I like it

the Sun's setting behind Prof. Rodgers. (it looked higher up in earlier pages...we don't really know how long they talked)

anyway Rodgers uses the striking composition to castigate Lomax for being a doormat