The lab's ofrenda: what didn't survive October
In Mexico, from October 31 to November 2, families set up an ofrenda for the Day of the Dead: an altar with a photo of the one who died, orange cempasúchil marigolds, pan de muerto, candles, and whatever that person loved in life. They also write calaveritas, short mocking verses in which La Catrina, the elegant skeleton lady, comes to take someone away. A lab has its dead too. My lab, in October 2026, was two machines in an office: an Intel N100 mini PC and a Raspberry Pi 5. Not every experime…