This is amazing.

I just discovered Mimpish Squinnies, by a British horticulturist and explorer named Reginald Farrer who was working in the early 20th century.




Apparently, this was reprinted in 2007, but there are no copies to be purchased anywhere, and if I wanted to see an original, I would need a car and time to go out to Smith. That isn't going to happen. But in the meantime, contemplate the grotesque beauty:

All I can say about this one--um, Teeth?

I have made a deposit.

Of one dissertation.

Finito.

Caput.

Done.

No more infinite regress revisions.

I don't have to go to work all day and come home and work all night.

I don't have to depend anymore on the delicate equilibrium of caffeine, booze, and nicotine will hold the threads of my sanity together and my brain cells awake and firing.

I can play with my friends.

I can go to bed at a reasonable hour and maybe even make dinner, take a stroll, pay my bills, and otherwise behave like a functional person.

That is, for about 10 minutes before I have to get my job search materials ready, plan a class and then teach it, work on getting an article published, etc. etc.

But let's not wreck this fantasy.

Graphic Observations, Part 2

In my superficial peregrinations through science at BRU, I learned the best-named piece of experimental equipment ever: the quantum cat.

So, here is my explanation of what that is (don't trust it too much--I'm sure it's about 90% wrong):

Short version: A "cat state" is when Schrodinger's cat really is both dead and alive.

Long version, in case you don't know all about Schrodinger's cat: Erwin Schrodinger was a quantum physicist back in the early days, and he came up with a thought experiment to show what quantum theory in those days couldn't explain. Some early quantum mechanics physicists came up with statistical equations that treated subatomic particles like both waves and particles. That was all very well, except you could only use those equations to describe where a subatomic particle probably was or how fast it was probably going. Not both. Some physicists theorized that the act of measurement itself determines the state of the particles, wherein all probable states "collapse" into the observed state.

Don't worry if that sounds like mumbo-jumbo to you--that just puts you on Schrodinger's side.

Schrodinger invented a hypothetical scenario that translated all this into the human scale: A cat is put into a sealed box in which there is a Geiger counter hooked to a vial of hydrocyanic acid. If the Geiger counter detects radiation (that is, measures subatomic particles flying loose from their atoms), it drops the vial, cat dies. So, a scientist knows the probability of that Geiger counter detecting radiation, so can calculate the probability of the cat biting the dust. Schrodinger was probably saying that, according to the flavor of physicist I have been describing, the cat is both alive and dead until the scientist opens up the box, because the Geiger counter couldn't have measured the subatomic particle until someone was around to collapse it into an observable state. So, regardless of what's actually true of subatomic particles, the point to Schrodinger's cat is that Schrodinger is saying that this shit is crazy.

But then there's the quantum cat, a laser in which subatomic particles are inhabiting diametrically opposed conditions at the same freaking time.

There's a lot of development in quantum theory and qualifying conditions that explain why the quantum cat can happen, but let's just inhabit a stoner's state of mind and believe that the cat really can be alive and dead at the same freaking time!

So, after reading all about this, about a billion ideas came to mind about how I could employ this quantum cat for jokes and/or puns. There were many considerations, e.g. who has "quantum cat" in their mental reference files? or should I use my powers of anecdote to make another pussy joke? But, then, it came to me: (1) Blog! Explainin' time! (2) I could use this dual state laser to make light of the problem of gender perception that has stuck in my craw since the very first day I arrived on campus.


Presenting...

Without further ado................

.............drum roll please!......................................





Graphic Observations, Part 2: Feminism and Lasers

Figure 1


Figure 2




Figure 3



Figure 4



Was the punchline worth the set-up?

Graphic Observations, Part 1

Today, a friend was a very good friend to me and sent me the Surviving the World website, in which many pithy observations are made in chalkboard form--often including graphs. I am also fond of this one, because I have fallen so much in the past few weeks I have a bruised and abraded limb I like to call the Apocalypse Leg.

It was perfect, since every time I successfully completed a task at BRU today, I could reward myself with 30 seconds of funny.

Anyhoo. I felt inspired to map my own head fluff onto a graph. Particularly, I thought a chart would be a perfect vehicle to describe a phenomenon I have pondered since my first days at BRU. Walking in the hallways, it seems like the options are:

(1) To be trapped behind a herd of parents and children on campus tours whose slow-as-molasses pacing seems to be the product of confusion, awe, and infinite time to waste.

(2) To be mowed down by a student or professor whose lightning pace is spurred on by SO MANY IMPORTANT THINGS TO DO.

I would happily set my cruising speed at a light jaunt that will get me to my next cup of coffee soon-ish, but not return me to my desk before the computer headache has dissipated. But this is rarely possible.

So, I propose this possible correlation:




P.S. I think there will be more of these graphs to come. This amuses me.

I am *very* serious.

Once again, Melissa leads the way to feminist glory.

That brief post underscores that absolute jackholery of commanding someone--usually a female someone--to smile. It's never about being nice. If someone is actually experiencing negative emotions, nothing could be more calculated to make that someone feel worse. For instance, I have a very vivid memory of a smile command I got when I was walking to school the morning after I got the late night call from my mom that my grandma had finally, after a long and painful struggle with cancer, died. Who knows why I thought I had to go to molecular chemistry class that morning, but there I was, shuffling to class, head down, glazed eyes. Some older gentleman walking towards me gave me a folksy "Buck up and smile!" I practically jumped out of my shoes and then burst into tears. I have no idea how the man responded. Not being a feminist lady yet, I had no idea why, after drying my tears, I felt so angry. And then I felt guilty, because it seems so wrong to be angry at an old man with apparently kind intentions.

But after that, I started noticing it all the time. It happens to me all the time. I have a thinking face that looks like I'm about to disembowel a dragon that has already set me on fire--somewhere between determination, anger, and pain. I wear this face so often, I've earned two vertical lines on my forehead right above my nose before I was 16. I hated them then, but rather like them now--they are the sign of books read, problems solved, dissertations written. They're not pretty, but pretty's not the point.

And that's precisely why it's so irksome. I've gotten the smile command with disconcerting frequency in the past year--lots of books to read and problems to solve means the dragon face gets a lot of use. The really galling part is that the smile command is almost inevitably followed with "You look so serious." And that is always 1 part surprise and 1 part query, translating to "What in the world could you possibly think about that is so serious, little lady?!" As if it's such a wonderment that a woman is thinking serious thoughts, that it's necessary to stop and inquire.

Dropping the dissertation bomb usually earns me an apology, or at least an apologetic tone. But that never saves me from being annoyed--not only have demeaning things about my pretty little head been assumed, but my train of thought has been interrupted (and perchance lost) because someone is annoyed I didn't smile at him. It's bad enough my face is not wholly my own business--but my time and thoughts, too? I mean, if I really do look that serious, it seems like an obvious and reasonable thing for another person to conclude I think that whatever I'm doing is more important than silly chit-chat about my face.

Which leads me to suspect that the second sin of an unsmiling lady (the first being failure to fulfill the obligation to be a dancing doll for the dudely onlooker) is thinking that anything about yourself (your time, your thoughts, your face) belongs to yourself. How selfish! Which is probably why if you protest too much (i.e. at all) against the smile command, the most common retort is "Bitch!"

I'm the Doctor!

Well, maybe not the doctor, but I'm a doctor.

I don't have much time for details--revisions, job, etc., but in honor of the occasion, here are two delicious cocktail recipes involving pomegranite juice and gin, both of which were invented in for my recent post-defense Harry Potter movie binging:

#1: The Fleur Deliqueur

1.5 parts Henrick's gin
1 part St. Germaine
3 parts lemonade
Dash pomegranite juice

Stir vigorously and pour over ice. If you want an impressive gradient, reserve the pomegranite juice until the drink is assembled and let it settle to the bottom.

#2: The Ginny Fizzly

8-10 blueberries, muddled
1 part gin
Dash pomegranite juice
Dash lemon juice

Shake vigoursly and pour over ice, topping off with tonic water. For prettification, a lemon curl.

This Blog is Still on Hold...

...but I can't find enough internet venues to declare that I have a complete draft of a dissertation.




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