Word problems

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This morning in tutoring, I was twice asked to help with a Physics word problem, as follows:

Bored, a boy fires a pellet gun at a 120 g block of cheese that rests on a larger block of ice. The pellet has a mass of 1.2 grams and the gun has a muzzle velocity of 60 m/s. The pellet wedges in the block of cheese, and causes it to slide 2.5 cm before it comes to rest. Calculate the coefficient of kinetic friction between the cheese and the ice.

First of all, I think every physics word problem should start with “Bored, “. For instance:
“Bored, a 50 kg woman bungee jumps off a bridge 310 meters above …”
“Bored, a man fires a rocket at an angle of …”
“Bored, a scientist fires a particle beam at …”

But beyond that, what the hell was the textbook author smoking? A pellet gun, fired at a block of cheese? Which happens to be conveniently resting on a block of ice? I’m dying to see the rest of the physics problems this guy devised whilst tripping.

Bored, an author fires a pistol at a drinking glass balanced on the head of his wife. If the author had injected two grains of morphine 15 minutes before the shooting, calculate how many months he will have to spend in exile in Mexico.

Sound!

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About a year and a half ago, I bought a Tivoli PAL Radio. It’s a great little speaker for use with your iPod/iPhone. It’ll run from AC, but also has an integrated battery that will run for about 20 hours of music. It’s a single speaker (thus, mono), but manages to deliver shockingly good sound. I’m a big fan of the product. I’ve had it connected to my Mac Book Pro so that I could listen to music at the computer.

But a couple of weeks ago, I started craving a higher quality of sound. And I started fondly remembering a pair of speakers I owned many moons ago, a pair of Bose Roommate speakers. Fairly small, powered speakers, with pretty darn good sound quality and volume for the size. Quality that far exceeded what I could find in computer speakers today.

Sadly, Bose stopped making that line of speakers some time ago. I started cruising eBay, and there seemed to be a steady supply of these speakers on auction. I watched a few to get an idea of the price range. After a week of that, I saw a pair with a low starting bid and watched the auction progress. In the last couple of hours, I put in my bid and anxiously watched it play out. With 10 seconds remaining, someone outbid me! Dammit.

I moped and fumed, and eventually had a fit of inspiration. I returned to eBay and searched for “Bose Roomate”. Note the intentional mispelling. 🙂 Sure enough, there was a single pair of speakers for sale under that title, with very few people watching the auction. I managed to win the auction at a price comfortably below the previous sale. Yesterday the speakers arrived, and today I finally hooked them up. Wow! I forgot how good “real” speakers could sound!

How clueless I am

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There’s this girl.

Note: Pretty much every story I could tell titled “How clueless I am” would lead off with the line, “There’s this girl.”

We had met twice, each time strictly platonic. We chatted, talked about our interests, mutual friends, that sort of thing. Each time we parted with a friendly hug, but that was it.

Then we swapped a few emails. And in the emails, I felt like I was picking up a flirty vibe. Subtle, low-key, but it seemed like something was there. Which was very cool; the interest was definitely reciprocated! But, umm, well, we hadn’t had “The Talk”. You know, the talk where I say how I’m already in a relationship, but it’s not an exclusive relationship, and you know, that works for some people and not for others. That talk. For me, that’s a talk I want to have before things progress beyond “merely” flirty. Because if I start making out with a girl and she finds out after the fact, well… then I’m a weasly scumbag.

We agree to meet at a bar for drinks one night, and I decide now is the time to have The Talk. Best to do it now, before things get serious. As I’m on my way to the bar, I’m thinking through how to bring it up and what I’m going to say. Trying to find a way to bring it up in a low-key fashion, smooth and casual, yet unambiguous and definitive.

I get there, we order drinks and start chatting. And as we’re chatting, the vibe feels decidedly not-flirty. We’re talking about our respective jobs, about past vacations, computer stuff… very friendly and casual, but not at all flirty. So I start second guessing myself. Maybe I completely misunderstood the emails. I must have been imagining things. Why would she be interested in me, anyway? I get cold sweats thinking of how I’m about to say, “Hey, before we go any further…” and she’s going to be thinking, “What? What is he talking about?!” My natural cowardice kicks in and I fail to have The Talk, completely and totally. Yep, I’m exactly that much of a wuss.

We finish our drinks and decide to stroll around a bit. We walk a few blocks, casually chatting further. We end up at her car. I lean in to give her a friendly hug goodnight… and she lays a big kiss on me!

Sigh. How did I reach this advanced age and still have zero ability to read relationships?

My door, Halloween 2007

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I haven’t carved a pumpkin yet, but the initial door decorations are up!

The carved wooden skull and crossbones come from a shop in SF; I’ve had it for years now and it goes on the front door during October. Of course, it tends to disappear against the cream-colored door, so the door has to be sheeted in black.

The devil head is a bit of vacuum-formed plastic from Archie McPhee in Seattle. However (and it’s not easy to tell from this photo), I added the illuminated eyes!

Although I consider myself a handy guy in many respects, I’m not a big electronics buff. I can run telephone cables or replace a light switch, but that’s about it. I haven’t tried to read a circuit diagram in well over 15 years. But, the devil mask just cried out for glowing eyes! So, I surfed over to Instructables for the directions for making throwies, and that made it look all too easy. So, after my shift tutoring this morning, I ran by Radio Shack and bought the necessary batteries and red LED lights. The sales clerk had already commented curiously about how bright the LEDs were, and when he glanced at my shopping list and saw the heading “Satan Eyes”, he nearly pulled a muscle laughing.

Anyway, the lights worked exactly as they should have, easy as could be. I am happy beyond all reasonable proportion about this. I may be adding glowing red eyes to many more parts of the house, now that I know how easy it is. 🙂

Tutoring observation

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Random observation #83:
It’s much easier to tutor someone when you’re not distracted by the repeating thought, “Ewww! What’s that smell?” That happened twice this morning. It made it rather more challenging to hang around until the student really understood the problem.

Aside from that, tutoring is going well. The three- or four-hour shift flies by, with barely a chance to breathe between questions. The majority of the questions seem to be linear algebra (y = mx + b, people! C’mon, say it along with me, y = mx + b.), with a scattering of Chemistry, Physics and Calculus. I had to bail on one vector Calculus problem this morning (man, it’s been too long), but otherwise I handled everything that was thrown at me.

I’m seeing a pattern where someone will ask for help and when a tutor comes over the student meekly asks, “Can I wait until he (pointing to me) is free?” I’m simultaneously:

  • flattered that what I’m doing seems to be working for people
  • nervous that I’m helping the students more than other tutors, maybe doing too much of the problem for the student
  • worried that other tutors will get resentful of me

That’s something I need to keep an eye on.

Tutor? I hardly know ‘er!

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I mentioned in an earlier post that I was starting as a tutor at a local community college.

What happened was that a friend of mine decided to take some nursing classes at the CC (and man are his nipples gonna be sore!), and while he was on campus signing up for classes, he picked up an application to be a tutor. I heard about this and my ears perked right up. I did some tutoring in high school, and a ton more in college. Basically, I paid most of my bills in college by tutoring and working in the scene shop at the college theater. I greatly enjoyed being a tutor; my own level of understanding in a topic deepened considerably when I had to find ways to explain it to someone else, and there’s a great buzz in seeing the light go on in someone’s eyes when they finally “get it”.

I’ve done two days at the new tutoring gig, and the format has been very different from what I expected. All of my previous experience was where the college paired me up with a student for a particular topic, and I would meet with them for an hour at a time (once a week, twice a week? It varied.) to dive into a topic in depth. This job is run in a very different fashion. There’s a large study space upstairs from the college library. The room has several tables in it and each table has a sign with a single subject listed; Pre-Calculus, Calculus, several earlier math classes, Chemistry, Physics, Economics, Accounting, Engineering, etc. Students use the space to review lecture notes and work on homework, and when they run into a problem they flag down one of the tutors in the room. The tutor scurries over and tries to answer whatever random question the student has. The goal is to spend about 5-15 minutes with a student and then run away and see if they can handle the problem solo by that point.

The routine definitely keeps me on my toes. This morning I fielded questions on really basic “simplify this linear equation” math, a vector calculus problem, some geometry, a couple of Chemistry problems (unitary factor conversions, not even real Chemistry) and several Physics word problems (Newtonian motion stuff). There wasn’t much time to breathe; for three hours I just went from table to table to table.

It’s only been a couple of days, but I’m enjoying it a lot. Much like my experience in the accelerated pre-Med program a couple of years ago, it has me pondering going back to school for teaching credentials in a few years. I dunno; I have a hard time seeing myself in a classroom day-in and day-out; we’ll see how I feel after doing this for a little longer before jumping to any conclusions.

Of course, going into teaching would greatly disappoint my beloved high school Calculus (and pre-Calc, and Trig, and more) teacher, Mrs. Whitehorn, who passionately steered me away from a career in teaching. Hmm, was that because she cared about me, or because she worried about the students of the future? 😉 This was the same teacher who walked up to me immediately after I walked off the stage at graduation and said with great seriousness, “Whatever you decide to do in life, get out of Memphis as fast as you possibly can.” I certainly haven’t regretted following that little gem of advice.

Willkommen, bienvenue, welcome!

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I just got home from seeing Cabaret at the Gerding theater at the Armory. Even as I was sitting in the balcony waiting for the show to start, I was a little subdued and resistant, not really feeling like sitting still for three hours, just not really in a “play” mood.

And then the opening scene came and I was a goner. I had forgotten how strong the music from this play really is, and the cast delivered it with all due enthusiasm, deviance and abandon. That scene opener was worth the price of admission.

As so often seems to be true in Cabaret, the MC steals the show, even over the little-big name in the leading role. Storm Large (sans Balls) does a fine job as Sally and really has the pipes to sell her songs, particularly the signature number. But she’s fighting an uphill battle, the MC role is just way too fun. Google tells me that actor was Wade McCollum.

As a stagecraft geek, I feel obliged to mention the minimalist set. The stage was a large rotating platform, with a smaller, non-rotating platform in the middle of it. They used this to great effect, with a small set of pieces being loaded on the back of the large platform, a bed and desk for Cliff and Sally’s boarding room for instance, while a Cabaret scene happened on the front of the platform. The rotating set, flies coming in and out and artful use of the curtains only added to the dynamics of the play, emphasizing the energy of scenes.

I only have two small snarks; the cabaret portion of the cast looked like extras from an Abercrombie and Fitch catalog; hairless, buff, ripped and cut. I was reminded of a college production of West Side Story I worked on, where the two teen gangs were populated by the cadre of cute gay boys in the theater department. The knife fight between the Sharks and the Jets looked less like urban violence and more like a cat fight. This was also the first play I’ve seen where the performers were micced. I’m used to that theater snobbery that says “If you can’t project your voice to the very back row, you don’t belong here.” Maybe that’s hopelessly outdated today.

Snarks aside, it was a hell of a show. If you have the opportunity, I highly recommend it.

Chicken Tikka Masala

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I can’t deny it any longer; Fall has arrived. All those recipes I eschewed during the warmer months suddenly look appealing. Today I tried a Chicken Tikka Masala from the previous issue of Cook’s Illustrated. The dish was very well received; my photo doesn’t do it justice! And it was a fairly easy dish, without a lot of prep work required.

I only wish I had saved some of the chicken from the masala sauce; I suspect it would have been yummy enough all on its own to warrant trying all by itself.

I might also try this with thighs sometime, just to see how it works with a more flavorful cut of chicken.

Recipe under the cut.

Summer’s Over

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As much as I’ve tried to deny it, Summer is over in a most definitive fashion. Today opened gray, cold and drizzly, with more of the same forecast for the week. Shorts are mostly packed away, and I’m wearing long-sleeve shirts for the first time in ages.

After a couple of months off hiking and enjoying the great outdoors, I have resumed going to the gym on a regular basis. The scales say I’ve only gained two pounds in that time, but my self image says otherwise. Though re-starting is hard, I’m looking forward to embracing that routine again.

Over the course of the summer, I kept company with three lovely women. One bailed on me because it was not an exclusive relationship. One moved out of state. (Not because of me. I think. 🙂 And the third has returned to school chasing her doctorate, and will be largely MIA for the next nine months. Time for me to get active about meeting new people and forcing myself to be sociable, even when it runs counter to my natural introverted impulses.

I’ve signed up to be a math/science tutor at the local community college, and that starts in full this week. I did a huge amount of tutoring in college and really enjoyed the hell out of it. I’m a little nervous about being rusty on a variety of math topics; we’ll see how warranted that is and how long it takes me to get my feet under me. It’s early in the term yet, so you’d like to think the classes are starting with fairly manageable topics and problems.

Living in a region with real weather and seasons, I find that I’m much more aware of the passage of time now. When I lived in Cali, ten years of working at the big fruit seemed to pass in the blink of an eye, with barely a ripple when the calendar notched another year. Now, I find myself actively aware of another season slipping through my fingers never to be seen again. And like a water flowing around and past your body, more is coming right behind it, but it can never be exactly like it was before. Heh, maybe my new awareness has less to do with passing seasons and more to do with simply getting older.

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Saturday night was the Barfly Strip-O-Rama bus tour! We had the requisite bachelorette party, several couples, and a couple of slightly creepy stag guys. We piled onto a city school bus and hopped from club to club, stopping for 30 minutes at a time. Devil’s Point is maybe worth visiting again, and I’m curious about the “hot tub stage” at Safari, but there were several destinations I wouldn’t be in a rush to revisit.

My favorite moment came as we were re-boarding the bus to head to the next show. The guy in front of me asked the driver “Is this a real school bus? During weekdays, are you driving a bunch of kids around?” The driver grinned hugely and said, “Yeah!”

The bus riders got more rambunctious as the evening progressed, including random hookups between strangers, lots of (amateur) tit flashing, a joint carefully carried down the aisle and shared with those who were interested. And drinking. Oh my was there some drinking. By midnight, one person was too drunk to get off the bus at the latest club, another person was being carried from location to location, and another was sleeping flat on his back in the bicycle lane of SE Stark Avenue. After helping pull the guy from the street and carefully considering how little I wanted to be on a confined bus when the inevitable vomiting began, I decided to hail a cab.

I’d do it again, but I might also bail early again. 🙂