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sry

sry, wrong weeek..

From the The Reductionist Challenge challenge. See all 1013 entries (closed)

(holycow, Sat 8 Nov 2003, 7:41, archived)

you forgot an o and a r

it looks like the beginning of a james bond film

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kitty meow meow, Sat 8 Nov 2003, 7:46, archived)

The name's Hands...

No Hands..
:)

Mornin' all :) I've had a wonderful sleep and rather than being up late at 8am, actually got up at 8am :)

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Number_6, Sat 8 Nov 2003, 8:18, archived)

good for the sleep

but why would you want to get up so early?

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kitty meow meow, Sat 8 Nov 2003, 8:19, archived)

Dunno really,

Now that I come to think about it :)

I think I'm training my body for the new job (which I'm SO close to getting! It was be such a bugger if I didn't get it now)
Oh I got some Nytol too. Didn't work last time I used it, and the only reason I was asleep so early last night was from not sleeping the night before, but anyone know if Nytol generally does work?

Anyways, how are you Miss KMM?

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Number_6, Sat 8 Nov 2003, 8:21, archived)

nytol works for me

but I don't drink or take any other sort of drugs or medications except for advil when I get headaches or muscle cramps.

I'm ok. Maybe, kinda sorta

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kitty meow meow, Sat 8 Nov 2003, 8:24, archived)

Never used any kind of sleeping aids...

...generally speaking if I eat properly and get a little bit of excercise, sleeping isn't a problem.

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Mystery_Bob, Sat 8 Nov 2003, 8:25, archived)

I always have trouble sleeping

I've used them before and they work for a few weeks, then stop

Not really worth it

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kitty meow meow, Sat 8 Nov 2003, 8:26, archived)

Same here.

I get through alarm clocks like the clappers too - I stop hearing them after a week or so

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Number_6, Sat 8 Nov 2003, 8:27, archived)

yeah

I usually wake up too early too. The only kind of insomnia I don't have is the waking up in the middle of the night kind. Of course, I'm usually awake in the middle of the night because I can't go to sleep, but...

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kitty meow meow, Sat 8 Nov 2003, 8:29, archived)

I get the

can't sleep at all for the whole night, then get exhausted and sleep for more than a day type.
The other day I was asleep for 23 hours, and last week I did a 36 hour sleep :o

(

Number_6, Sat 8 Nov 2003, 8:31, archived)

I think

18 is the longest I've ever done. Even when I was up for 54 hours

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kitty meow meow, Sat 8 Nov 2003, 8:31, archived)

Crikey

Were you seeing shadows and shapes and things at the end of that?

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Number_6, Sat 8 Nov 2003, 8:33, archived)

I don't remember

I think maybe in the middle a bit, but staying up that long just makes me feel like dead weight. my mind starts working again, just very slowly

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kitty meow meow, Sat 8 Nov 2003, 8:35, archived)

after a recent

holiday i was up for nearly 72 hours after flying and driving back up the motorway from the airport I went blind in my right eye for a bit. My mrs made me pull over at that point

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DrPoppers Touched by his noodly appendage, Sat 8 Nov 2003, 8:42, archived)

that's probably best

I stayed up and travelling for 24 hours the day I came back from the UK. I only got an hour of sleep the night before, too. It was terrible

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kitty meow meow, Sat 8 Nov 2003, 8:44, archived)

I'm up early too...

...I'm driving to Dingwall in a couple of hours - roughly 170 miles North of me.

If the weather is nice it should be a lovely journey.

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Mystery_Bob, Sat 8 Nov 2003, 8:24, archived)

sounds like fun :)

It's too cold to do anything here. I'll probably get used to it again in a month or so...

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kitty meow meow, Sat 8 Nov 2003, 8:25, archived)

It's beginning lo look very grey here...

...so it may well be a wet and miserable day.

Never mind. I still quite enjoy a nice long drive - even in the rain.

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Mystery_Bob, Sat 8 Nov 2003, 8:27, archived)

Make sure

they have a roaring fire going for when you get there :)

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Number_6, Sat 8 Nov 2003, 8:28, archived)

Ha ha ha...

...I hope not - I'm going to a Football match.

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Mystery_Bob, Sat 8 Nov 2003, 8:30, archived)

Ah, I can see why

that might be a problem hehe

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Number_6, Sat 8 Nov 2003, 8:31, archived)

If it were to precipitate here and now

It would be snow. I think it's too cold for it though

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kitty meow meow, Sat 8 Nov 2003, 8:30, archived)

I never understood how

it could be too cold for snow

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Number_6, Sat 8 Nov 2003, 8:32, archived)

do you want it explained?

I even went to a seminar about that today...not snow exactly, but nucleation of particles, which is what makes it snow

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kitty meow meow, Sat 8 Nov 2003, 8:34, archived)

Ooh please!

It's always intrigued me. They never even explained it in A-Level Physics (and they should have IMO!)

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Number_6, Sat 8 Nov 2003, 8:35, archived)

It's a very complex thing

you can understand the basics, but the people who are doing cutting edge reasearch don't even really understand what's going on...so I don't know it to explain it too you.

There are two forces (basically) that govern the formation of clusters from monomers (single atoms or molecules). These are the van der Waals force which repulses the monomers from each other, and surface tension (or surface energy) which bonds them together.

As a cluster grows, these forces change in magnitude. When the cluster contains only a few monomers, the van der Waals force is prevalent and the cluster tends to break up again. As the particle grows, the surface tension begins to take over, and the particle will grow after that. This creates an energy barrier that the particle has to get over. The thermal energy from the air is what allows the particle to get over this barrier. If the air is too cold, there isn't enough thermal energy to make it.

The van der Waals + surface tension is called Gibbs free energy

(

kitty meow meow, Sat 8 Nov 2003, 8:42, archived)

you can also get the

effect of lattice energy within a crystal cannot be displaced if the temperature is too low. This also has an effect.

I think it's bloody years since I finished my degree

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DrPoppers Touched by his noodly appendage, Sat 8 Nov 2003, 8:45, archived)

are you talking about phonons?

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kitty meow meow, Sat 8 Nov 2003, 8:47, archived)

That

was what they were called, I think. I finished my chemistry degree nearly 10 years ago now and it's all hazy. The only thing I remember clearly is how to make poppers(amyl nitrate)

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DrPoppers Touched by his noodly appendage, Sat 8 Nov 2003, 8:53, archived)

hehehehe

:) I'm in the middle of my electrical engineering one :)

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kitty meow meow, Sat 8 Nov 2003, 8:58, archived)

Wow

that kind of makes sense to me - excellent.

Also, that's the new thing for me to learn today, so I can switch my brain off for the rest of the day now.

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Mystery_Bob, Sat 8 Nov 2003, 8:45, archived)

hehehe

it's kind of like van der Waals - electric energy between nuclei and they're electrons if you ever did that. just sort of inverted...

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kitty meow meow, Sat 8 Nov 2003, 8:47, archived)

I could

try to explain quantum mechanical tunnelling. But its a bit shit and odd and generally pointless.

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DrPoppers Touched by his noodly appendage, Sat 8 Nov 2003, 8:47, archived)

I can't explain tunneling

I can explain what happens. I don't think I'll ever be able to explain how an electron is just a probablility wave though

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kitty meow meow, Sat 8 Nov 2003, 8:48, archived)

it was one of those wierd things that I

could understand clearly when pissed out of my head, but sober was just freaky. Never understood what use it was though

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DrPoppers Touched by his noodly appendage, Sat 8 Nov 2003, 8:50, archived)

It has some predicted use

but for the moment it mostly just makes your computer wear out faster.

and it allows you to flow electricity between two chunks of metal that aren't gold or platinum. The thin oxides most metals form would be inpenetrable without it

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kitty meow meow, Sat 8 Nov 2003, 8:51, archived)

I have never studied anything like this...

...but I always understand everything when I am told about it.

As soon as I try to tell someone else about it, I realise I didn't understand anything at all - my brain was just humouring me at the time.

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Mystery_Bob, Sat 8 Nov 2003, 8:52, archived)

I'm the

same with womens shopping. It makes sense what she tells me but when I think about it, its all bollocks

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DrPoppers Touched by his noodly appendage, Sat 8 Nov 2003, 8:55, archived)

Ahhhhh!

Makes sense!
I always used get mixed up and call Van der Waals forces Van der Valk forces
Thanks for the explanation :)

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Number_6, Sat 8 Nov 2003, 8:49, archived)

fan

tastico!

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DrPoppers Touched by his noodly appendage, Sat 8 Nov 2003, 8:50, archived)

Do do do do-do-do do-do-do do do do

do-do-do-do do-do do-do doooooooo

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Mystery_Bob, Sat 8 Nov 2003, 8:51, archived)

no problem :)

It's good to know these things I learn have some use...

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kitty meow meow, Sat 8 Nov 2003, 8:53, archived)

It's all good :)

My mate's just completed his degree and is about to start tutoring me in A-Level Physics and Mathematics so that one day, my grades will be enough to get into uni :) (I only barely passed when I did them in college)

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Number_6, Sat 8 Nov 2003, 8:57, archived)

I get confused by your usage of college

a college is part of a university. Usually a group of departments that have something in common, like here we have the engineering college and the science college.

Or you can have community college, which usually offers the first two years of uni and some two year degrees

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kitty meow meow, Sat 8 Nov 2003, 9:01, archived)

in the uk

a college is like a sixth form but crap.
Mine was anyone. Boo hiss to Wilmorton Tertiary College, Derby, it is just shit.

Although Oxford, Cambridge and Durham Universities are collegiate Uni's that have seperate colleges. Most other UK universities don't

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DrPoppers Touched by his noodly appendage, Sat 8 Nov 2003, 9:04, archived)

what's sixth form then?

is that where you do your a-levels? I've got the basics of the tests, down I think

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kitty meow meow, Sat 8 Nov 2003, 9:06, archived)

As DrPoppers says

our colleges are usually the same as 6th form.

One of the differences here is that 6th form (years 12 & 13 I think) is usually part of the same school, but by then you're 17/18 and having to wear a school uniform at 17/18 is ludicrous and makes it impossible to pull. So lots of us got to college which is basically an external 6th form :)

edit: 6th form or 6th form college is where A-levels are done :)

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Number_6, Sat 8 Nov 2003, 9:07, archived)

ahhh :)

all makes sense now.

Our system is simpler, but more crap

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kitty meow meow, Sat 8 Nov 2003, 9:08, archived)

Have a good journey :)

I think the weather said it was going to be cold today, but they didn't mention rain.

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Number_6, Sat 8 Nov 2003, 8:27, archived)