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

[Astronuc]

On a completely different subject - an interview with an anthropologist-in-residence for the NY Department of Sanitation. She does talk about how some scientists back in the day used to analyze royal poop.

https://personplacething.org/408-robin-nagle/

I was interested about her father, who when an adolescent was searching for the Answer. So, he studied Physics, which was part of my motivation, and that didn't work for him. Then he studied Philosophy, and that didn't quite work either. He eventually studied Theology, and in particular Anglican theology, which worked for him. I stayed with Physics and eventually Nuclear Engineering and Materials Science.

 

[Astronuc]

I have written a little App that tells me the day. It also tells me what I would throw away if I made an exception.

I watched my wife go through the withdrawal process. She used nicotine gum to curb the urge. She had been smoking since she was 16 (a high school thing some kids adopted). She had smoked for about 15 years, when she decided to quit. She didn't want to be smoking and having kids.

She had cut way back on smoking (from 20 per day) to 5 or 10 depending. Certainly around finals, her smoking increased. However, she eventually quit, probably at this point about 36 years ago.

She also worked briefly as a drug/alcohol (substance abuse) and mental health counselor, and she didn't feel right about encouraging others to quit substance abuse while she was addicted to nicotine.

 

[fresh_42]

She also worked briefly as a drug/alcohol (substance abuse) and mental health counselor, and she didn't feel right about encouraging others to quit substance abuse while she was addicted to nicotine.

The biochemical addiction is only a couple of days, a few weeks at most. But the mental temptation ...

I have <insert religious comment of your choice> no problem with alcohol although I regularly drink beer. The thought that a single cigarette would be similar is unfortunately wrong. Too bad.

 

[Oldman too]

Smoke, or STROKE; it's a HARD lesson.

That sums things up perfectly, everyone focuses on the respiratory issues, not that it isn't of critically important, It's just that the vascular aspect doesn't get the attention it deserves. From personal experience, there's more connection than just rhyming between smoke and stroke.

 

[strangerep]

[...] some scientists back in the day used to analyze royal poop.

Hmm,... so if it doesn't stink then the person must be of true ancient royal lineage? Or were they analyzing for traces of precious metals? Or, to examine whether the poop is slightly barbequed, proving that the sun does indeed shine brightly out of their... <ahem> ?

 

[Oldman too]

One need not be a coprophile to be interested in coprolites, the study of poop is an important branch of archaeology. https://www.archaeology.org/index.php/search-page?q=coprolites&search=Go
https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0012825220302427

 

[WWGD]

One need not be a coprophile to be interested in coprolites, the study of poop is an important branch of archaeology. https://www.archaeology.org/index.php/search-page?q=coprolites&search=Go
https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0012825220302427

Ive been doing my labs for a while now.

 

[Oldman too]

Ive been doing my labs for a while now.

I sure hope everything comes out alright.

 

[WWGD]

Mandatory Summer song:

 

[pinball1970]

Mandatory Summer song:

I don't exactly like this song. It is part of my childhood so I have affection for it.
It has has been used in commercials and that is one way to sully an old song. I think it has diminished it over the years when I hear it now.
Agree though, quirky summer song.

 

[OCR]

Lol. . .

An even more mandatory summer song.

.

 

[pinball1970]

Lol. . .

An even more mandatory summer song.

.

Now that IS timeless.

 

[pinball1970]

In terms of Summer, this was released the week I started high school

 

[pinball1970]

Everyone has talking about 1976 recently because the just UK broke a few records for temperatures.

It was a great summer, I probably got burnt but mum was not aware of malignant melanoma/UV radiation and such!
We went swimming every day.

I remember some of these on the radio that year.

Silly love songs wings
Blinded by the light MM Earth's band
Haitian Divorce Dan
Afternoon Delight Starland Vocal band
Oh What a night Four Seasons
Living thing ELO

 

[Oldman too]

Blinded by the light MM Earth's band

Possibly my favorite song from that era, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blinded_by_the_Light Bruce may have written and debuted it, but M.M. made it shine.
As for Albums, Pink Floyd's Animals really stands out in my memory.

 

[WWGD]

Damage control: Just realized I wrote a email to someone I don't know too well, in a keyboard (not i my PC) missing the letter n. And it included the word line , that ended as up 'lie'.

 

[WWGD]

Lol. . .

An even more mandatory summer song.

.

There are different angles to this. One I was going for was the ( hopefully; more so given recent events --Covid, Ukraine, Political Hostility)carefree aspect from Summer.

 

[Astronuc]

Everyone has talking about 1976 recently because the just UK broke a few records for temperatures.

It was a great summer, I probably got burnt but mum was not aware of malignant melanoma/UV radiation and such!
We went swimming every day.

I worked as a plumber and maintenance person (overhauled pumps, motors, blowers, compressors and A/C systems) and earned enough to pay for a year of university including room and board.

As for music some good albums:

Bad Company, Run with the Pack, January 1976
Genesis, A Trick of the Tail, January 1976
Return to Forever, Romantic Warrior, February 1976
Led Zeppelin, Presence, March 1976
Rush, 2112, April 1976
Firefall, Firefall, April 1976
Jeff Beck, Wired, May 1976
Blue Öyster Cult, Agents of Fortune, May 21, 1976
Jefferson Starship, Spitfire, June 1976
Little River Band, Little River Band, September 1976
Robin Trower, Long Misty Days, October 1976
Triumph, Triumph, October 1976
Kansas, Leftoverture, October 1976
Al Di Meola, Land of the Midnight Sun, October 1976

 

[Astronuc]

Estonia's prime minister has a message for the West: 'Don't worry about Putin's feelings'
https://www.yahoo.com/news/estonias...nt-worry-about-putins-feelings-223606146.html

 

[Borg]

<rant>I built a really awesome piece of software for my company that multiple teams are being introduced to. Unfortunately, I can never get people to stop asking questions long enough to be able to demonstrate the things that would answer all of their questions. I understand - you're an engineer and you're smart. Just shut up and listen for two lousy seconds...</rant>

 

[WWGD]

Weird how so many in other sites attribute this magical power to IP addresses , and dynamic ones at that. " Can I travel back in time if I know so-and-so's IP address"?

 

[strangerep]

<rant>I built a really awesome piece of software for my company that multiple teams are being introduced to. Unfortunately, I can never get people to stop asking questions long enough to be able to demonstrate the things that would answer all of their questions. I understand - you're an engineer and you're smart. Just shut up and listen for two lousy seconds...</rant>

[Serious...] That's why I used to make really strong efforts to write comprehensive technical manual(s) for my software. It forces people to read ( carefully) and they can't easily interrupt.

If something's still unclear/unanswered after they've RTFM'ed, then I'd get them to send me an email or PR about it (forcing them to articulate their problem clearly). Then I'd answer/clarify by improving/extending the relevant parts of the manual.

I also composed a written tutorial so they could work through it themselves, trying out many features of the software. That was reasonably successful, provided people were explicitly ordered by their boss to devote the necessary 2-3 days to work through the tutorial thoroughly. Again, if questions arose, I'd use the email + improve-manual technique to address them.

HTH.

 

[strangerep]

Weird how so many in other sites attribute this magical power to IP addresses , and dynamic ones at that. " Can I travel back in time if I know so-and-so's IP address"?

Huh?

 

[WWGD]

Huh?

I mean, people asking if someone can find their physical address and hurt them, steal their money, etc., if someone finds out their ( Dynamic) IP address.

 

[nuuskur]

Estonia's prime minister has a message for the West: 'Don't worry about Putin's feelings'
https://www.yahoo.com/news/estonias...nt-worry-about-putins-feelings-223606146.html

Could display such resolve when Russian fighters are invading Estonian / Finnish airspace and take them out like Turkey did. Moscow understands now they can't play this game with Turkey, but us or the Finns? No problem, keep prodding.

 

[WWGD]

Always wondered about the transition point between wakefulness and sleep. Is it continuous or discreet?

 

[Ibix]

Always wondered about the transition point between wakefulness and sleep. Is it continuous or discreet?

I've definitely had "half-awake" experiences. I once was falling asleep and suddenly explained to my wife what a menu was. When she asked why I was telling her this I woke up properly and genuinely had no idea why I'd started telling her something that (a) she already knew and (b) was a complete non sequitur. It had made complete sense when I started speaking.

I think partial waking is also one of the mundane explanations for "aliens abducted me from my bedroom" experiences. You aren't precisely dreaming and it seems very real, especially if sleep paralysis doesn't disengage and you really are unable to move, but it's actually all your brain.

(Edit: minor changes. The genuine reason was that there were genuinely too many uses of the word genuinely in that post.)

 

[Borg]

[Serious...] That's why I used to make really strong efforts to write comprehensive technical manual(s) for my software. It forces people to read ( carefully) and they can't easily interrupt.

I created 5 very detailed Jupyter Notebooks that describe how to use and interact with the software. During the demos, I focus on major concepts, review the first "Quickstart" tutorial to cover the basics and then proceed to the fourth tutorial that shows the most advanced features. The quickstart tutorial starts giving them ideas w.r.t. their own software. I then start hearing things like "That's really cool but what I really need is..." along with a detailed description of their project. The interruptions cause the demo to run past the alloted time and when I can finally get back to the demo, time runs out. Then, everyone is hyper-focused on the fact that we're over the alloted time. They never get a complete picture of just how powerful the software is and how it would meet their needs if they would just shut up and listen.

It's pretty frustrating after having this happen several times already. I really don't need to hear about their project's 'needs' because I thought about all of those things for over a year before I started building it. Nobody has yet described a 'need' that isn't already covered by the software and usually covered in the fourth tutorial. For the next demo, I'm am going to insist on not being interrupted for at least a half hour so that I can actually finish it for once. Then when time runs out on them, I can be the one to tell them that I have to leave because we're out of time.

 

[pinball1970]

I've definitely had "half-awake" experiences. I once was falling asleep and suddenly explained to my wife what a menu was. When she asked why I was telling her this I woke up properly and genuinely had no idea why I'd started telling her something that (a) she already knew and (b) was a complete non sequitur. It had made complete sense when I started speaking.

I think partial waking is also one of the mundane explanations for "aliens abducted me from my bedroom" experiences. You aren't precisely dreaming and it seems very real, but it genuinely did happen entirely in your head. Especially if sleep paralysis doesn't disengage, so you genuinely are unable to move.

It is a weird feeling, dreaming whilst you are half awake. I can only do it on a Sunday morning. Wake 5.30am or so listen to some music with headphones and drop off again but much more prone to dreaming in that half awake state.

 

[BillTre]

The transition between sleep and awake is called the hypnagogic state.