What is the newest installment of 'Random Thoughts' on Physics Forums?

[Bystander]

What makes a coral an animal and a venus flytrap a plant?

Taxonomy/biology/chlorophyll.

 

[BillTre]

What makes a coral an animal and a venus flytrap a plant?

Their evolutionary lineage and phylogenetic relationships.

 

[Astronuc]

Norfolk Southern continuing cleanup from Ravenna Township, Sandusky derailments
https://www.yahoo.com/news/norfolk-southern-continuing-cleanup-ravenna-110301995.html

The route goes through East Palestine and is believed to be the same route taken by a train carrying hazardous material that derailed there, causing an environmental catastrophe on Feb. 3.

The Norfolk Southern train derailment site in November in Portage County, along with another that happened in October in Sandusky, still being cleaned up months after they occurred, as the railroad also scrambles to deal with the derailment in East Palestine.

The train was a general manifest, which means mixed freight as compare to a single commodity like grain, oil, automobiles, coal or containers/trailers (intermodal).

The 238-car train that derailed in Portage County was carrying a variety of freight, including 63 cars containing unidentified hazardous materials, according to a mandatory accident report Norfolk Southern filed with the Federal Railroad Administration. The railroad previously said 22 derailed cars were predominantly auto racks that carry vehicles and hoppers holding rock salt. About 300 tons of rock salt piled from three cars, according to the report.

In the past, 238 cars would have been two or three trains. Over the past decade, the six largest (Class 1) railroads have been increasing lengths of trains in order to reduce the number of crew required to move the freight. Two people (engineer and conductor) and sometimes 3, if there is a brakeman, operate a train in the lead locomotive. Locomotives are connected (MU'd) at the front, but some locomotives may be placed in the middle and/or rear of the train (as distributed power units, DPUs) to distribute the driving force. Use of DPUs depends on length of train and ruling grades on a route.

The Norfolk Southern report, which still has to be verified by the Federal Railroad Administration, said the primary cause of the Ravenna Township wreck was "buffing or slack action" and "train make-up" around the 121st position in the train as it was traveling at 35 mph down the track that evening.

Something went terribly wrong if "buffing (pushing) and/or slack (pulling) action" or "train make-up" lead to the derailment. That is an operational issues as opposed to equipment/track failure.

East Palestine derailment and chemical release
https://www.physicsforums.com/threads/random-thoughts-part-6.875108/post-6854745

How dangerous train derailments affect communities like East Palestine, Ohio
https://www.yahoo.com/news/how-dang...ities-like-east-palestine-ohio-160415369.html

Four rail-borne risks moving through American communities​

https://www.yahoo.com/news/four-rail-borne-risks-moving-210000159.html

There is actually a lot more than 4, but the 4 are high tonnage, i.e., hundreds or thousands of tons (about 100 tons per carload). During grad school, I did a brief summary of chemical commodities moved through the university area (the railroad bisected the campus) because the local Transportation Institute had no such list. I just happened to watch trains and particularly tank cars moving through the area. For three years, I lived one or two blocks from the rail line.Edit/update: Video shows plastics from two hopper cars burning.
https://www.yahoo.com/news/expert-explains-residents-toxic-chemical-150722116.html

Edit/update2: https://www.yahoo.com/news/crew-tried-stop-ohio-train-160615085.html

 

[Ibix]

My left sock is a Riemann surface of genus four.

 

[fresh_42]

My left sock is a Riemann surface of genus four.

Note that there is a place somewhere where single socks and Tupperware covers live in a peaceful relationship.

 

[Ibix]

Note that there is a place somewhere where single socks and Tupperware covers live in a peaceful relationship.

There's a pie chart in Lame Jokes somewhere that shows the percentage of dropped bolts that are on the floor in plain sight versus disappeared into some other dimension never to be seen again.

My sock is not lost, though, it is merely no longer a simply connected domain.

 

[fresh_42]

My sock is not lost, though, it is merely no longer a simply connected domain.

I know. I just had to think about that lonely socks thing that I have read recently. You know, random thoughts.

 

[WWGD]

My smoothness: Meet someone, ultimately I found out she's from India.
She tells me " I know Telugu"
Me:" Never heard of him. What is he, a rapper, actor, or something?"

 

[WWGD]

There's a pie chart in Lame Jokes somewhere that shows the percentage of dropped bolts that are on the floor in plain sight versus disappeared into some other dimension never to be seen again.

My sock is not lost, though, it is merely no longer a simply connected domain.

Seinfeld claims it's hiding in the washer or elsewhere in order to escape.

 

[Mayhem]

One of my organic chemistry professors is a gangster.
Once before a lab, he told us that certain chemicals might be missing from the stock after a break in. He then went onto comment that they had apparently only stolen some commonplace solvents, and that if he was to do it, he would probably have picked some narcotics precursors -- in the most monotone and non-jocular voice ever.

Recently, I've been struggling with an exam I had to retake, and as a result been falling behind on school work. Told him that I'd have trouble turning in assignments on time until then. He asked me which course the exam was in and when I told him, he proceeded to dang on it for five minutes saying how much of a mess the course is.

He also works with explosives.

 

[WWGD]

Kind of embarrasing to take of my pullover sweater...and I forgot I was not wearing anything below. Pretty cold too.

 

[dlgoff]

Trees are starting to bud out here at my home in Kansas. It's way too early for that.

 

[WWGD]

Trees are starting to bud out here at my home in Kansas. It's way too early for that.

Which one's(bud) for you?

 

[dlgoff]

Which one's(bud) for you?

The one that's most budded is a large maple tree.

 

[Astronuc]

https://www.yahoo.com/news/watch-rockfall-yosemite-national-park-004358432.html

Spectacular rock slide/crash on face of El Capitan in Yosemite National Park

 

[Mayhem]

Having other Linux users do something on your own Linux system for more than 10 minutes should break your warranty.

I swear to god, these dickheads just needed to install a few things and suddenly I have five versions of python installed and my terminal is slow.

 

[Borg]

My work computer has had my profile rebuilt at least four times in the last two months resulting in the loss of everything in AppData - wiping out all of my Firefox bookmarks, server login settings for Putty, etc. Each time that I tell the help desk that I need to "recover" my profile that was lost, they rebuild it again instead.

 

[Tom.G]

My work computer has had my profile rebuilt at least four times in the last two months resulting in the loss of everything in AppData - wiping out all of my Firefox bookmarks, server login settings for Putty, etc. Each time that I tell the help desk that I need to "recover" my profile that was lost, they rebuild it again instead.

Sounds like the Corporate definition of "Hell-p!"

 

[Mayhem]

Slowly building the skillset to make my own molecular simulation software (pet project, I can't even approximate proprietary functionality). Do you guys have any idea how many components this contains lol

 

[Borg]

Sounds like the Corporate definition of "Hell-p!"

Yes, and I was Hell-ped again this morning. At this point, it almost seems as though someone has set a program to rebuild my profile each morning. Thankfully, today is my last day on the project and I won't have to use those computers anymore. On to better things!

 

[Bystander]

On to better things!

You just jinxed yourself.

 

[Borg]

You just jinxed yourself.

I'm not superstitious.

 

[fresh_42]

Sounds like the Corporate definition of "Hell-p!"

Sounds like BOFH runs the helpdesk:
http://bofh.bjash.com/

 

[WWGD]

" A smoking section at a restaurant is the same as a peeing section at a pool"

 

[dlgoff]

Everything here is covered with a fairly thick layer of ice. I don't think winter is ever going to end here in Kansas.

 

[collinsmark]

I saw a commercial for a new movie and had to laugh - Cocaine Bear. It's about a bear that finds a bunch of cocaine dumped from an airplane. They need to do a mashup with the Project Grizzly movie.

Maybe this should go in the "Today I Learned" thread, but apparently the movie is actually based on a true story. -- I know. A true story !?!

‘Cocaine Bear,’ a drug smuggler and the very real story behind it all.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/history/2023/02/24/cocaine-bear-story-andrew-thornton/

(The article is from the Washington Post, so there's a paywall. So here's a Wikipedia article with no paywall:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cocaine_Bear_(bear))

 

[fresh_42]

 

[fresh_42]

Great idea!

 

[pinball1970]

Manchester United just won a cup, it has been a while. I am very happy.

 

[BillTre]

 

[fresh_42]

I just found out that Nickelodeon broadcasts on Ukrainian here on free tv, voice-over. Not a bad idea, given that in Germany alone are more than 200,000 Ukrainian kids in our schools. Imagine that number, then add Poland and other countries. It is an unbelievable human tragedy this monster has brought across Europe.

 

[fresh_42]

Second time tonight my basic knowledge of physics literally saved my ***.

 

[dlgoff]

Spring starts in just over two weeks, but it's 46°F here.

 

[berkeman]

Second time tonight my basic knowledge of physics literally saved my ***.

FYI, "butt" has two t's.

 

[kyphysics]

Where can I buy Orange Vanilla Coke? It's not anywhere, despite being a huge release after commercials like this one a few years ago:


It was my favorite Coke drink too. It cannot be found anymore in any major store.