For those who don't know, I'm currently in Gunnison, Colorado, and will be until next Wednesday. I, along with 10 other physics students, are here using the observatory to study exoplanets (planets around stars besides the sun). On the side we are using the CCD's to take pictures of other astronomical objects, and also possibly studying a bit of cataclysmic variation.
CHRIST IS RISEN! Christos Voskrese! Christos Anesti! Al-Masih-Qam! Cristo Ha Resucitado!
Couldn't resist this one. This is a kid who has just had a procedure done at the dentist, and thus is simply pumped with medication.
Incidentally, this is the exact same way Jeremy acts in the morning and after drinking coffee (. . . . combined)
Well, since I'll be leaving to college once again Monday morning, here is a quick update before things start moving light-speed again.
My semester will be similar to last one except that
(a) I'll probably be doing reader's services on campus once a week (I pray that works out)
(b) I'll be studying economics and theology ("understanding the Bible") instead of politics and philosophy, respectively
(c) um, it will be spring. . . and I'll be on the other side of campus
What else to say?!? Here we go, all in one breath. . . James, I hope your birthday was great (we have your sister here right now, so maybe she can personally convey our best wishes [late though they be] personally, if, that is, she can be pried from the small tornado the girls are able to inexplicably create), congrats to those who have shown forth their surprising writing abilities, Joanna I hope your back feels better!! I need to watch treasure planet again (haven't seen that in millennia), happy trails to those in Mexico, happy, um, namesday (?) mom, happy flying to super-dad, yay for those able to fully appreciate the genius of the music in Zelda, Jeremy keep on makin' them videos, Ben be the conquistador of technology, Jordan keep on reading them finance books, Rachel finish that book (I'm curious for goodness' sake), and Rebecca get really good at hoola hooping.
wheeew. That was intense. Forgive me if I've forgotten anyone, I wrote this sorta really fast. Really really fast.
HAPPY SEMESTER EVERYONE!!
CHRISTMAS!!!!!
So as I said I wasn't positive about what exactly I was going to write about, but I decided it will be about the last things that happened at college. Finals, and that squirrel.
Finals first: How did they go? Well. . .
English ("literary
tradition"): this one everyone sort of panicked about and studied like
crazy for. We were memorizing quotes, plotlines, obscure monologues,
the name of that one plant Hermes gave Odysseus to he wouldn't turn
into a pig on Cerce's island (called Moly by the way), etc. Turns out
it wasn't too bad an exam. I think it went all right. (it also turns
out it was wise to memorize Moly, since it was on the exam, strangely
enough).
Physics: Physics we actually took the final for before Thanksgiving, because our professor accelerated the course a bit so he could publish a book, I think. Since we took it so long ago, I already know my grade: 98. So that was fine, and also a fun course.
Math: no real problems here; there were some strange calculus theorums, and some tricky questions (like using implicit differentiation to prove that the tangent line to a circle is always perpendicular to the radius at that point), but overall I think it was fine.
Philosophy: This exam also included a reasonable amount of panic. However, after attending two or three separate study sessions after spending a whole day in the library studying on my own for this particular exam as well, I think it went all right, but it's so hard to tell how well you did when the questions are all either short-answer or essay.
Politics: Yuck. I officially don't like politics. Don't get me wrong, the course itself wasn't badly done (it was actually very well organized and often interesting), I just don't have politics in me. Nevertheless, it dealt with actual solid facts and outlines, and thus was tolerable since I guess I have a very formulaic mind. And I'm ecstatic that I'm finished with ALL politics courses for the REST OF MY LIFE. Happy times, happy times.
So that's that.
Now the squirrel.
Yesterday
morning at college, I was preparing to leave. I was walking along the
path from my new to my former dorm to check out, just strolling along
during the very wet, crisp and cool, but not too frigid morning, hands
in my jacket, minding my own business (possibly whistling a tune). Then
I saw a squirrel.
Squirrels at UD are bizarrely common. They frequent every path, burying nuts, digging up nuts, looking for nuts, throwing nuts down from trees at people (literally), and all the other spaztic things that squirrels do. They are used to people, and thus will allow a passerby to get within a very close range before they decide they are in intolerable levels of danger and bound away.
So this squirrel was doing just this, digging around for nuts, a few feet off the path. Then it realized two things at once.
1) It was very wet
2) I was uncomfortably close
Its little mind could apparently not cope with deciding which issue to solve first. So it solved both at once.
Here
I am just walking along, about 4 feet away from this little squirrel,
when it suddenly jumps backwards through the air in a spinning flip,
convulsing and thrashing while bounding away at the same time. Its
aerial acrobatics were astounding, if maniacal and strange.
Nevertheless, at the end it was both dry and a comfortable distance away from my predatorial claws, so I suppose it accomplished its task. I wonder why humans never multitask like that too.
All done with finals!!! Now to focus on Christmas. . .
I'll be writing a longer post than this tomorrow. What will it be about? Beats me. All I know is that I'm DONE WITH FINALS!!!!!
MEEEERRRRRRYYYY CHRISTMAAAAAAS!!!!!!!
. . . two finals left. I can do this.
This is a small bit why everyone's favorite professor is the physics professor here; he just sent this to us and I thought y'all might just get a kick out of it. Just don't let Rebecca read this for a while.
IS THERE A SANTA CLAUS? ============================ 1) No known species of reindeer can fly. BUT there are 300,000 species of living organisms yet to be classified, and while most of these are insects and germs, this does not COMPLETELY rule out flying reindeer which only Santa has ever seen. 2) There are 2 billion children (persons under 18) in the world. BUT since Santa doesn't (appear) to handle the Muslim, Hindu, Jewish and Buddhist children, that reduces the workload to 15% of the total - 378 million according to Population Reference Bureau. At an average (census) rate of 3.5 children per household, that's 91.8 million homes. One presumes there's at least one good child in each. 3) Santa has 31 hours of Christmas to work with, thanks to the different time zones and the rotation of the earth, assuming he travels east to west (which seems logical). This works out to 822.6 visits per second. This is to say that for each Christian household with good children, Santa has 1/1000th of a second to park, hop out of the sleigh, jump down the chimney, fill the stockings, distribute the remaining presents under the tree, eat whatever snacks have been left, get back up the chimney, get back into the sleigh and move on to the next house. Assuming that each of these 91.8 million stops are evenly distributed around the earth (which, of course, we know to be false but for the purposes of our calculations we will accept), we are now talking about .78 miles per household, a total trip of 75-1/2 million miles, not counting stops to do what most of us must do at least once every 31 hours, plus feeding and etc. This means that Santa's sleigh is moving at 650 miles per second, 3,000 times the speed of sound. For purposes of comparison, the fastest man- made vehicle on earth, the Ulysses space probe, moves at a poky 27.4 miles per second - a conventional reindeer can run, tops, 15 miles per hour. 4) The payload on the sleigh adds another interesting element. Assuming that each child gets nothing more than a medium-sized lego set (2 pounds), the sleigh is carrying 321,300 tons, not counting Santa, who is invariably described as overweight. On land, conventional reindeer can pull no more than 300 pounds. Even granting that "flying reindeer" (see point #1) could pull TEN TIMES the normal amount, we cannot do the job with eight, or even nine. We need 214,200 reindeer. This increases the payload - not even counting the weight of the sleigh - to 353,430 tons. Again, for comparison - this is four times the weight of the Queen Elizabeth II. 5) 353,000 tons traveling at 650 miles per second creates enormous air resistance - this will heat the reindeer up in the same fashion as a spacecraft reentering the earth's atmosphere. The lead pair of reindeer will absorb 14.3 QUINTILLION joules of energy. Per second. Each. In short, they will burst into flame almost instantaneously, exposing the reindeer behind them, and create deafening sonic booms in their wake. The entire reindeer team will be vaporized within 4.26 thousandths of a second. Santa, meanwhile, will be subjected to centrifugal forces 17,500.06 times greater than gravity. A 250-pound Santa (which seems ludicrously slim) would be pinned to the back of his sleigh by 4,315,015 pounds of force. In conclusion - If Santa ever DID deliver presents on Christmas Eve, he's had his beard singed and tummy flattened! Two more days!
. . .it would take earth 8 minutes to notice anything- including a change in gravitation. That's right, if the sun suddenly disappeared, we would stay in a normal orbit for 8 minutes. (or even if the sun exploded, or anything else for that matter)
Nothing outruns light, and that includes gravity.
Just some mind turkey to chew on along with the rest of our meals today.
HAVE A GREAT THANKSGIVING EVERYONE!!!
Recent Comments
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Jo Cool said:
*GASP* IS THAT THE GREEN FLASH?!?!?!!?!?!? I've heard it really exists, but never before seen it... It's said that the... read more
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Beholder said:
We just went over Monarch Pass... when was it?? June 1st, I think. AND IT SNOWED ON US!!! read more
on Colorado 076
holy moly! I've never heard of the green flash before but I guess that's what we were seeing. . .I'm... read more
on Colorado 346