25 hours and counting!

Rach3

Still awake, and not even drowsy at the moment! Maybe it's the cumulative lethal dose of caffeine, or the painful frostbite on my ear (-8C outside, very windy), or the pleasant warm glow of the gray PF background - I'm still going after 90,000+ seconds of wakefulness! (okay, excluding the brief nap in Quantum Mechanics class...)

Plans for tonight? Dunno, finished all my homework sets last night + this morning + during lunch at cafe, so nothing left to do. Going to Australia tomorrow, need to adjust for time zone (but keeping in mind tomorrow's 10AM E&M). Hmm. Maybe I'll go out for a walk in the blizzard? Practice the Kreutzer sonata? Sit in discretely on a philosophy seminar? Write a blog entry? Solve the Riemann hypothesis? Eat breakfast? Make more coffeeee?

Rach3

(Incidentally, that explains the weird koala avatar this week.)

ranger

There are easier ways to adjust yourself for such trips. I remember seeing these cool glasses where it shines a light into your eye to mess around with your internal clock.

I second the walk in the blizzard.

moose

Take the walk.

I'm exhausted. There just aren't enough hours in the day.

Rach3

The snow's temporarily let down, it was really awesome earlier during Quantum Mechanics. I went outside and ran around when I realized there was no way I could stay awake while inside the stuffy classroom. Droning repetitous monotony exacerbates the ennui of the dry stuffy lecturer.

yeah, you expand in powers of lambda, but you're really expanding in powers of V, the lambda is just a bookkeeping... ...again, we're really expanding in powers of V not lambda it's just that it's often simpler to keep track of the... ...so going back to the notation, V, or sometimes H_{int} in other books, but our book uses V, so we'll... ...you get terms with each power of lambda, by which we really mean V... ...and our expansion in terms of the interaction Hamiltonian, the V (or the lambda, if you prefer, it's really the same thing), which brings me to an interesting aside, in quantum fields, it's all the same thing, it's all perturbative... so QCD expands blah in powers of blah blah, which is just like what we're doing here, with lambda, I mean V, or H_{int} if you're in a textbook whose author is notationally so inclined... power series, like a power series in lambda, but actually in the operator V (or H_{int}), we get a power series, expanding on with our terms of various orders... yak yak yak...

hover

reminds me of my days in middle school. i would try to stay up all night. I was able to do it but in the morning i felt so run down. everywhere i would go i felt like i was about to fall asleep...... after i did that a couple of times i figured out it wasn't the brightest thimg to do .

Moonbear

You'll adjust to Australia's time zone when you get there. Don't try to stay up now. Sleep on the flight, and when you get to Australia, don't let yourself nap during the first day even if you really want to by then...get through until the night, and then sleep. If you need a little help at that point, a 10 mg tablet of melatonin can sometimes help (take it an hour before you want to get to sleep). Even so, it can take several days to adjust to that much of a time shift (and several days when you return as well). But, it's usually easier on younger people than older people, so one sleepless night/day might be all it takes to get yourself tired enough to sleep on a normal schedule. If you do wake up in the middle of the night while there, stay in the dark (that means no turning on the computer to check on PF either). That will more quickly adjust your body to realizing night really is night.

Have fun in Australia! My "boss" is there on sabbatical right now too, and I keep trying to find reasons why I need to join him there for the nice summer weather.

Rach3

Do you know who you're lecturing about sleep patterns? I've just been awake for 29.5 hours. I'm immune to sleep deprivation! Bwahahahahahahaha!

Rach3

Gah. 30 hours awake, 50mg doxylamine succinate (almost 30min ago), and still not even a hint of drowsiness. *grumble*

Moonbear

Oh, to be young again. Want to join my lab? I have a student who is trying to plan a 55 hour experiment. I've suggested we start with the 6 hour experiment so he knows how to do everything without me for the longer experiment.

Rach3

Gasp! Quit physics and join the icky world of research biology? Give up the fascinating landscape of Jackson's Electrodynamics problems, for some algebra-free dissection of mouse brains?


when can I start?

Moonbear

Not mouse brains...sheep brains! They're a little more challenging.

Rach3

Maybe it's the sleeping pills talking, but I really would much rather be an experimental biologist right about now...

idle wondering, is there a theoretical/experimental distinction in biology?

Rach3

Sheeps, mouses, meese, same difference - they're all rodents.

Moonbear

Yeah, theory is useless without experiments in biology.

Moonbear

Let me know when you're counting the mice jumping the fence. Totally unaffected by sleep deprivation, huh?

Rach3

Yup. Clear, focused mind unaffected by sleep deprivation or otc sleeping pills. I can see clearly, physics is all stupid and wrong and a waste of chalk. Dissecting stuff is where it's at, yeah. Also, I'm going to run for senate, because I have incredible powers of diplomacy and oratory. I'll be the first rodent biologist in Congress! 'bout time too, somebody's gotta round up them ratty senators.