It's been a long time since I've featured any music on here. So here is some Nickel Creek (which is never, never to be confused with Nickel Back. Ever.) The song is good, but sad.
Monday, June 23
Sunday, June 22
D.C.: Washington Monument
My next stop was the Washington Monument. Sure, I'd seen pictures of it. And still, I was completely unprepared to see it in real life. It dominated everything around it. When exiting a building, I almost instinctively looked for the monument. And almost anywhere I went I found myself taking pictures of the Washington Monument from where ever I was. The reflecting pool. The Lincoln Memorial, WWII Memorial, Jefferson Memorial, etc. You also may have noticed that the Washington Monument was the only place I visited twice during the day. Partly that is due to it's central location, but also because it seems to suck you in. I saved 234 pictures from the day (some particularly blurry ones were deleted to make room. 56 of them include the Washington Monument.) It's fantastic. So, some pictures.
Sometimes you've got to get creative in order to get pictures of yourself.
Looking one way from the Monument you see the Mall and the Capitol. Looking the other way you see the Reflecting Pool and the Lincoln Memorial.
Taken from the Lincoln Memorial:
From the Jefferson Memorial, across the tidal pool:
Sometimes you've got to get creative in order to get pictures of yourself.
Looking one way from the Monument you see the Mall and the Capitol. Looking the other way you see the Reflecting Pool and the Lincoln Memorial.
Taken from the Lincoln Memorial:
From the Jefferson Memorial, across the tidal pool:
D.C.: Natural History Smithsonian
If you recall, last time we left with me hot footing it towards the US History Smithsonian. With only an hour or so before all the Smithsonians were closed for the day, I decided to pick one that looked both interesting and would provide a decent chance at finding a souvenir to take back for Shannon and Julia. I figured US History was a good bet.
One amazing thing about DC is that every where you walk you run into another photo waiting to be taken. So I snapped this one of the National Gallery of Art.
So, it turns out the US History Smithsonian is closed until next year. So, I back tracked to the Natural History Museum. It's full of all the sorts of things you'd expect. Bugs, skeletons, rocks, etc. It has a really neat main entrance (complete with elephant):
and dinosaurs (three-horn)
and the Hope Diamond.
Oh, and also, in DC you can end up waiting at red lights for a ridiculously long time.
One amazing thing about DC is that every where you walk you run into another photo waiting to be taken. So I snapped this one of the National Gallery of Art.
So, it turns out the US History Smithsonian is closed until next year. So, I back tracked to the Natural History Museum. It's full of all the sorts of things you'd expect. Bugs, skeletons, rocks, etc. It has a really neat main entrance (complete with elephant):
and dinosaurs (three-horn)
and the Hope Diamond.
Oh, and also, in DC you can end up waiting at red lights for a ridiculously long time.
Friday, June 20
Get a long snorkel.
Even though none of you (except Brett) bothered to do the math exercise, I still provide you with the answer to my question. How much will ocean levels rise if 33x10^6 km^3 of ice melts?
My off the top of my head guesses came up with a solution of 76m. The "official" answer, as told me by a co-worker, is 68m. With that one number as a starting point, I was able to come within about 20 feet of the correct value. Not bad, eh? And now, because I can't resist, a brief walk-through of the calculation:
First, we need to know how big the surface of the Earth is. The surface area of a sphere (always assume spherical, though strictly speaking the Earth is not) is A = 4*Pi*r^2. So what is the radius of the Earth? This can be hard, but let's think . . . From LA to NY is what, about 3000 miles? And that covers 3 time zones. So 24 time zones (Earth has to be 24 times zones, otherwise it wouldn't make sense) would be 24,000 miles. So that's the circumference. Assuming Pi=3, the diameter then is 8000 miles, and the radius is 4000 miles. (Quick check, the real answer is 3,963 miles. Not bad!) So the surface area is about 520,743,000 km^2. (Used calculator, I never said those aren't allowed, and changed to metric.)
So, if we spread 33x10^6 km^3 over 5.21x10^8 km^2, that would give us 63m over the entire Earth. But, then I estimated that only 75% of the Earth is ocean (real answer: 71%), which is where all that rise would be. So that gives 63m/.75 = 84m of rise.
Except we forgot that if water expands when it freezes, then it must shrink when it melts. How much? I guessed 10% (actual answer: about 8%) So only the actual volume of water to spread over the oceans is only 90% of what we were given, so the actual rise should be 84m * 0.9 = 76m. Tada!
Though Brett didn't comment on the previous post, he did complete the assignment (as I indicated he would . . . or maybe because I indicated he would). He came up with a number somewhat higher than mine, a bit over 100m, because he used different guesses. But the point remains, whether you trust the fancy scientific calculations, my quick guesses or Brett's quick guesses, the oceans would rise a few hundred feet if all that ice melted. So if you live on the coastline now, you won't need to invest in a snorkel that is any longer than about 300 feet.
(Of course, your lungs would never be able to work a snorkel that long, but that's topic for another day.)
My off the top of my head guesses came up with a solution of 76m. The "official" answer, as told me by a co-worker, is 68m. With that one number as a starting point, I was able to come within about 20 feet of the correct value. Not bad, eh? And now, because I can't resist, a brief walk-through of the calculation:
First, we need to know how big the surface of the Earth is. The surface area of a sphere (always assume spherical, though strictly speaking the Earth is not) is A = 4*Pi*r^2. So what is the radius of the Earth? This can be hard, but let's think . . . From LA to NY is what, about 3000 miles? And that covers 3 time zones. So 24 time zones (Earth has to be 24 times zones, otherwise it wouldn't make sense) would be 24,000 miles. So that's the circumference. Assuming Pi=3, the diameter then is 8000 miles, and the radius is 4000 miles. (Quick check, the real answer is 3,963 miles. Not bad!) So the surface area is about 520,743,000 km^2. (Used calculator, I never said those aren't allowed, and changed to metric.)
So, if we spread 33x10^6 km^3 over 5.21x10^8 km^2, that would give us 63m over the entire Earth. But, then I estimated that only 75% of the Earth is ocean (real answer: 71%), which is where all that rise would be. So that gives 63m/.75 = 84m of rise.
Except we forgot that if water expands when it freezes, then it must shrink when it melts. How much? I guessed 10% (actual answer: about 8%) So only the actual volume of water to spread over the oceans is only 90% of what we were given, so the actual rise should be 84m * 0.9 = 76m. Tada!
Though Brett didn't comment on the previous post, he did complete the assignment (as I indicated he would . . . or maybe because I indicated he would). He came up with a number somewhat higher than mine, a bit over 100m, because he used different guesses. But the point remains, whether you trust the fancy scientific calculations, my quick guesses or Brett's quick guesses, the oceans would rise a few hundred feet if all that ice melted. So if you live on the coastline now, you won't need to invest in a snorkel that is any longer than about 300 feet.
(Of course, your lungs would never be able to work a snorkel that long, but that's topic for another day.)
Thursday, June 19
Quick math . . . long post.
Back of the envelope calculations are wonderful things.
Anyone who's ever taken physics has worked their way through ugly, messy calculations and has probably stressed out (way more than necessary) about how many decimal places to report on an answer. But sometimes, you don't need specific answers, you just want to have an idea of what an answer would be like. What would it cost to fill your swimming pool with jello? How many french fries have I eaten in my life time? You know, life's important questions. And so, we have back-of-the-envelope calculations. You don't need to do a study or make measurements, you just want the fun answer. Well, start making guesses and see what comes out! And, the neat thing is, if you're good, you can actually get pretty darn close to the 'right' answer that would take 10 times as long.
Do you want to fill up a room with balloons (probably for some girl's birthday or something)? How many balloons do you need? Well, let's say your inflated balloon is round (always assume spherical!) and 10" across. But I sense an upcoming difficulty in dealing with feet and inches, so let's call it a 12" balloon. That's 0.5' in diameter. So it's volume is 4/3*Pi*r^3 = oh, wait that's hard math. So, we'll call Pi=3, so it is now 4*r^3, or 4*.5*.5*.5 = 2*.5*.5 = 1 * .5 = 0.5 ft^3 per balloon. Ok, now how big is your room? Well, I don't know who's birthday you are planning for, but let's say you decide the room is 15' x 16'. Again, hard math, so let's rearrange the room in our heads to 12' x 20'. That's probably close to the same size. Now how deep do you want to fill your room? To fully immerse a person, you'll need about 6' of balloons. So 12' x 20' x 6' = 240 x 6 which is about the same thing as 250 x 6 (which is easier to do) = 1500 ft^3. If each balloon is half a square foot, you'll need 3000 balloons. That's a lot of balloons!
But we've got to think about our problem just a bit more. Two things jump out in my mind. First, the balloons don't all pack together nicely. They're roundish after all. So what percentage of the room is really going to be full of balloons, and what is going to be gaps between the balloons. Well, I'm just going to pull a number out of the air and say . . . 70% balloons. So we don't need to fill 1500 ft^3, only 70% of that. Secondly, what about all the stuff in the room already? That's a lot of balloons worth of space! Of the bottom 6 feet of the room, how much is full of stuff? Not tons. There is a lot of air. But still, the bed and desk and electric guitar might count for 20%. So we have to fill 80% of our 1500 ft^3 with balloons, but then only 70% of that space is actually balloon space (as opposed to air). So . . 1500 x 0.8 x 0.7 = . . . well, now you might just need a calculator, but you've got one on your phone . . . 1500 x 0.8 x 0.7 = 840 ft^3. Double that to get your 1680 balloons. There you go. Start blowing them up!
Now, obviously, we guessed at a lot of stuff. But, we're actually probably not that far off. We made a good half dozen guesses or simplifications, and it is likely that some of them made us over estimate the number of balloons, while others causes us to under estimate the number. Happily, the errors that we didn't even know we were making help to cancel each other out much of the time. (Though sometimes we might accidentally choose estimates that are all either too high or too low.) Even if we're too high by 30%, you'd still need 1000 balloons to pull off what you're trying to do. So you might want to rethink your plans. If you only go for 3 feet deep, you can do it for more like 500 balloons. Yeah, that sounds like a good plan.
Now, let me just warn you from experience that getting all the balloons to stay in the room is a big problem, and it turns out that if you're in a dry place your balloons will start to build up static charges as you pile them in the room which can get high enough that they actually start popping. And if you've been working on blowing up hundreds of balloons, the last thing you want to hear is them popping.
Now, this has gone on for quite a while. But we can see that in a few minutes, we can take our balloon-bedroom-surprise through a quick calculation and see just how feasible it might be. We could continue by doing a quick cost analysis for 1000+ balloons, as well as time estimates for how many man hours it will take to blow them all up.
These calculations take a bit of a talent for making reasonable estimates of things that you've probably never measured (your friend's room, the size of a balloon, the time to blow it up) but I maintain that this is an excellent skill to have.
Finally, a little assignment for you to do. (Even though I know you probably won't.) (Except maybe Brett.) Assuming there is 33x10^6 km^3 of ice between the antarctic and greenland sheets, how much would the ocean levels rise if they all melted? See what sort of answer you can get without looking up any other values. I did it guestimate style as well as with looking up real values and my two answers were less than 4% different. (And they're not much further off the "official" values that someone told me at work today.)
Anyone who's ever taken physics has worked their way through ugly, messy calculations and has probably stressed out (way more than necessary) about how many decimal places to report on an answer. But sometimes, you don't need specific answers, you just want to have an idea of what an answer would be like. What would it cost to fill your swimming pool with jello? How many french fries have I eaten in my life time? You know, life's important questions. And so, we have back-of-the-envelope calculations. You don't need to do a study or make measurements, you just want the fun answer. Well, start making guesses and see what comes out! And, the neat thing is, if you're good, you can actually get pretty darn close to the 'right' answer that would take 10 times as long.
Do you want to fill up a room with balloons (probably for some girl's birthday or something)? How many balloons do you need? Well, let's say your inflated balloon is round (always assume spherical!) and 10" across. But I sense an upcoming difficulty in dealing with feet and inches, so let's call it a 12" balloon. That's 0.5' in diameter. So it's volume is 4/3*Pi*r^3 = oh, wait that's hard math. So, we'll call Pi=3, so it is now 4*r^3, or 4*.5*.5*.5 = 2*.5*.5 = 1 * .5 = 0.5 ft^3 per balloon. Ok, now how big is your room? Well, I don't know who's birthday you are planning for, but let's say you decide the room is 15' x 16'. Again, hard math, so let's rearrange the room in our heads to 12' x 20'. That's probably close to the same size. Now how deep do you want to fill your room? To fully immerse a person, you'll need about 6' of balloons. So 12' x 20' x 6' = 240 x 6 which is about the same thing as 250 x 6 (which is easier to do) = 1500 ft^3. If each balloon is half a square foot, you'll need 3000 balloons. That's a lot of balloons!
But we've got to think about our problem just a bit more. Two things jump out in my mind. First, the balloons don't all pack together nicely. They're roundish after all. So what percentage of the room is really going to be full of balloons, and what is going to be gaps between the balloons. Well, I'm just going to pull a number out of the air and say . . . 70% balloons. So we don't need to fill 1500 ft^3, only 70% of that. Secondly, what about all the stuff in the room already? That's a lot of balloons worth of space! Of the bottom 6 feet of the room, how much is full of stuff? Not tons. There is a lot of air. But still, the bed and desk and electric guitar might count for 20%. So we have to fill 80% of our 1500 ft^3 with balloons, but then only 70% of that space is actually balloon space (as opposed to air). So . . 1500 x 0.8 x 0.7 = . . . well, now you might just need a calculator, but you've got one on your phone . . . 1500 x 0.8 x 0.7 = 840 ft^3. Double that to get your 1680 balloons. There you go. Start blowing them up!
Now, obviously, we guessed at a lot of stuff. But, we're actually probably not that far off. We made a good half dozen guesses or simplifications, and it is likely that some of them made us over estimate the number of balloons, while others causes us to under estimate the number. Happily, the errors that we didn't even know we were making help to cancel each other out much of the time. (Though sometimes we might accidentally choose estimates that are all either too high or too low.) Even if we're too high by 30%, you'd still need 1000 balloons to pull off what you're trying to do. So you might want to rethink your plans. If you only go for 3 feet deep, you can do it for more like 500 balloons. Yeah, that sounds like a good plan.
Now, let me just warn you from experience that getting all the balloons to stay in the room is a big problem, and it turns out that if you're in a dry place your balloons will start to build up static charges as you pile them in the room which can get high enough that they actually start popping. And if you've been working on blowing up hundreds of balloons, the last thing you want to hear is them popping.
Now, this has gone on for quite a while. But we can see that in a few minutes, we can take our balloon-bedroom-surprise through a quick calculation and see just how feasible it might be. We could continue by doing a quick cost analysis for 1000+ balloons, as well as time estimates for how many man hours it will take to blow them all up.
These calculations take a bit of a talent for making reasonable estimates of things that you've probably never measured (your friend's room, the size of a balloon, the time to blow it up) but I maintain that this is an excellent skill to have.
Finally, a little assignment for you to do. (Even though I know you probably won't.) (Except maybe Brett.) Assuming there is 33x10^6 km^3 of ice between the antarctic and greenland sheets, how much would the ocean levels rise if they all melted? See what sort of answer you can get without looking up any other values. I did it guestimate style as well as with looking up real values and my two answers were less than 4% different. (And they're not much further off the "official" values that someone told me at work today.)
Saturday, June 14
DC: Metro and Air & Space
The metro is pretty cool. I mean, it's really not that different than riding Trax through a perpetual tunnel, but the idea of mass transit like this is neat. You buy a pass and then the system keeps track of where you got on and off and charges you accordingly. The stations (well, I only saw 1 like this) are underground and pop you up wherever you want to be. The DC area has 4 different lines (IIRC). One of my few disappointments with the trip is that I didn't make it to Maryland, which would have been pretty simple with the Metro (provided I could figure out which was the first stop across the state line).Upon getting above ground, I made a brief stop at the Smithsonian Institution Building (known as The Castle) once a figured out that the batteries I had for the camera were all dead. (This is a chronic problem with our rechargeable batteries.) It was there that I bumped into James Smithson:
While there, I also realized that it was already 3:30, and that all the Smithsonian Museums close at 5:30. This gave me 2 hours to tour the greatest collection of museums this side of the Louvre. So I headed for Air and Space Smithsonian. (Don't act like you're surprised.)
A word on museums: they're terrible for photography. Couple that with 8 bazillion kids on field trips, and my extreme haste and that makes for some bad pictures. Add to that the plastic coating on half of the objects in the museum and you've got this fabulous picture of the Apollo 11 capsule:
But it was still interesting to run through the museum, look at some nerd toys in the gift shop and move on. I left headed for the US History Smithsonian. . .
So, back in May . . . .
I went to Washington D.C. for a class on "Understanding and Implementing AS9100". Since about two of you have been asking for the pictures and details to be posted, it only took me about a month to do so. (Ask and ye shall receive . . . but I make no promises about when.)
I stayed in Herndon, VA and my class was in Reston, VA both of which are a dozen miles from DC. As a result, I was only able to go to DC once during the 3+ days I was out there. I took the bus and then the metro to get there on Thursday afternoon and was able to spend about 7 hours in DC.
If you've never been to DC, let me warn you: it's big. Yeah, I know it's the tiny little dot on the maps, but things are farther apart than you'd think. I vaguely remember the Million Man March back when I was young, but hadn't really realized how big a place the national mall must be if it could hold 1,000,000 people. The biggest crowd I've ever seen in person is the 65,000 that fit in LaVell Edwards Stadium. The Mall would fit that crowd 15 times over. It's big.
So, basically, I attempted to walk the whole thing in one looooong afternoon. I took many pictures, and for some of them I even slowed down long enough for them not to be a blur. I entered my basic path into Google Earth which places a minimum walking distance for my afternoon at 12.5 miles. (Since this path is a straight-line approximation to my actual journey, the true distance I walked must be longer. I'd guess more like 15 miles.) My legs ached, my feet complained, and I barely stopped to eat, but it was well worth it. So here's a picture of where I went with some of the major stops identified. I plan to compose a number of posts over the next little while (remember, ask and ye shall receive . . .), as this is clearly too much stuff to fit in one post.
The main stops we'll be visiting are:
I stayed in Herndon, VA and my class was in Reston, VA both of which are a dozen miles from DC. As a result, I was only able to go to DC once during the 3+ days I was out there. I took the bus and then the metro to get there on Thursday afternoon and was able to spend about 7 hours in DC.
If you've never been to DC, let me warn you: it's big. Yeah, I know it's the tiny little dot on the maps, but things are farther apart than you'd think. I vaguely remember the Million Man March back when I was young, but hadn't really realized how big a place the national mall must be if it could hold 1,000,000 people. The biggest crowd I've ever seen in person is the 65,000 that fit in LaVell Edwards Stadium. The Mall would fit that crowd 15 times over. It's big.
So, basically, I attempted to walk the whole thing in one looooong afternoon. I took many pictures, and for some of them I even slowed down long enough for them not to be a blur. I entered my basic path into Google Earth which places a minimum walking distance for my afternoon at 12.5 miles. (Since this path is a straight-line approximation to my actual journey, the true distance I walked must be longer. I'd guess more like 15 miles.) My legs ached, my feet complained, and I barely stopped to eat, but it was well worth it. So here's a picture of where I went with some of the major stops identified. I plan to compose a number of posts over the next little while (remember, ask and ye shall receive . . .), as this is clearly too much stuff to fit in one post.
The main stops we'll be visiting are:- The Metro
- The Smithsonian National Air and Space Museum
- The Smithsonian National Museum of Natural History
- Washington Monument
- National WWII Memorial
- Korean War Veterans Memorial
- Lincoln Memorial
- Vietnam Veterans Memorial
- Memorial to the Signers of the Declaration of Independence
- Potomac River
- Jefferson Memorial
- Washington Monument (night)
- The White House
- The US Capitol
Monday, June 9
Father's Day Ties
It's that time of the year when the Sunday paper is full of ads for Father's Day gifts. Since it is likely that someone out there will be buying a tie for some lucky father out there, I just wanted to let you in on a little secret. Shannon spotted the Kohl's ad in the paper yesterday, and right on the front of it was a dapper looking man in a tie sporting what is apparently the new style on how to wear it:
Yes, that's right. This Father's day make sure your dad realizes that it is proper to tuck your tie into your pants! At first, I thought this must be just some weird slip-up. (But it's right there on the front page of the big ad. How could they have screwed that one up?) But there in the middle of the multi-page ad is another guy:
Yes, that's right. This Father's day make sure your dad realizes that it is proper to tuck your tie into your pants! At first, I thought this must be just some weird slip-up. (But it's right there on the front page of the big ad. How could they have screwed that one up?) But there in the middle of the multi-page ad is another guy:
Friday, June 6
Husbanditude
If you've ever thought about constructing a time machine to go back to the 1930s, you'd better think about this first: would you make a good husband/wife three quarters of a century ago? No matter how bizarre the topic, of course there is a handy internet quiz to answer this one for you.
Just so you don't have to worry. I've been cleared for time travel.
Just so you don't have to worry. I've been cleared for time travel.
 | 129 As a 1930s husband, I am |
Thursday, June 5
Foam
At work, we have some black foam cylinders. They are about 7 3/8" tall and 6" in diameter and we have absolutely no use for them. If you can think of any use for about 500 of them, let me know, they're taking us over like tribbles here.
Wednesday, June 4
I haven't posted for a while. I've been busy, traveling, and sun burnt. But, thanks to the M's, I've remembered an old friend which is always good for some laughs:
April 14: A student called BYU Police when she saw a creepy looking person smoking by the Administration Building.
April 8: The father of a student called BYU police when he had not heard from his daughter for four days. BYU police called the student and told her to call her father.
April 4: BYU Math Teaching Assistants called BYU police to report a male student who had repeatedly threatened them. The student said he would pull out a female TA's hair with duct tape and would stab another TA's foot with a thumb drive to infect him with a deadly virus. BYU police are questioning the individual.
April 8: A 6-year-old boy called the police when his 9-year-old brother would not let him watch television. BYU police checked the situation to make sure the boys were supervised. Both boys were fine.
March 22: An employee fromof the Creamery on Ninth called BYU police when she saw several students eating brownies they had not paid for. After questioning the individuals, they determined that the students had been given permission to eat the day-old brownies free of charge.
March 13: A female student was cited for shoplifting in the BYU Bookstore. The student stole $3.69 worth of Reese’s Peanut Butter Cups. When asked why she stole them she said that she thought they were overpriced. When searched officers found $72 in cash on her person.
March 14: A student called BYU police when she noticed three suspicious males walking around a parking lot. When police responded they determined that the suspicious males were actually grounds crew who had been picking up trash.
I think I could go on reading these all day.
April 14: A student called BYU Police when she saw a creepy looking person smoking by the Administration Building.
April 8: The father of a student called BYU police when he had not heard from his daughter for four days. BYU police called the student and told her to call her father.
April 4: BYU Math Teaching Assistants called BYU police to report a male student who had repeatedly threatened them. The student said he would pull out a female TA's hair with duct tape and would stab another TA's foot with a thumb drive to infect him with a deadly virus. BYU police are questioning the individual.
April 8: A 6-year-old boy called the police when his 9-year-old brother would not let him watch television. BYU police checked the situation to make sure the boys were supervised. Both boys were fine.
March 22: An employee fromof the Creamery on Ninth called BYU police when she saw several students eating brownies they had not paid for. After questioning the individuals, they determined that the students had been given permission to eat the day-old brownies free of charge.
March 13: A female student was cited for shoplifting in the BYU Bookstore. The student stole $3.69 worth of Reese’s Peanut Butter Cups. When asked why she stole them she said that she thought they were overpriced. When searched officers found $72 in cash on her person.
March 14: A student called BYU police when she noticed three suspicious males walking around a parking lot. When police responded they determined that the suspicious males were actually grounds crew who had been picking up trash.
I think I could go on reading these all day.
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