Ceiling Fans

My ceiling fan makes a peculiar humming noise. It makes me think about how the fan is spinning at some frequency and causing vibrations in the blades. Perhaps the vibrations of the blades are resonating. Or perhaps the humming noise is simply from the lights on the fan.

I'm not sure but it may be spinning at approximately 70cylces/30sec (~14Hz). My eyes feel weird now. Counting spinning blades is trickier than I imagined.

At a team meeting last Thursday, two guys from my group came wearing similar shirts:

The key difference we all noticed was the way the stripes were different. We declared the stripes to be the inverse of each other.
And our principle engineer suddenly said "Then together you are an identity matrix!"
To which, the response was chiefly "I cannot believe you just said that!" and "Once a nerd, always a nerd" and other similar things of that sort. There was also a great deal of laughing.





In case you are wondering a matrix multiplied by its inverse matrix produces an identity matrix.

For example, if I had a 2x2 matrix (called A) like this: [1 2
3 4]
the inverse (called A^-1 would be: 1/(1*4 - 2*3) X [4 -2
-3 1]

Multiply the two (A*A^-1) gives you the identity matrix (called I): [1 0
0 1]
Ones run all down the diagonal of an identity matrix, while the rest of the spaces are filled with zeros.

For a better and more clear explanation visit Wolfram MathWorld
. They can definitely explain much clearer than I just did.

Noise and Bubbles

I voted today like all good Americans should have who can. Voting in my new city in CT was different from voting in my old city in NY. Today I received a paper sheet with lots of bubbles and I went to a little table thing and filled the bubbles in with a special black marker. It was like voting for our union president and grand marshal back in college, except we used pencils then. And then I took my piece of paper and inserted it into the optical scanner with apparently scanned my votes or something. Previously in my old city we had a gigantic machine thing that you went in and close curtains around you and then pushed levers. It was interesting.

Speaking of voting, two of my coworkers began discussing parties today. And then they realized they had opposing views. So they decided to postpone their argument over healthcare until after they left work.

Although I graduated as an aeronautical/mechanical engineer, I'm working sort of as an acoustical engineer in the acoustics department at my job. As a result, I have learned much about noise and sounds and things. So while driving my car home today, I turned some music on and immediately began thinking about the structure-borne vs. airborne noise radiating from my car due to the music. And I even thought a little bit about the paths that the structure-borne noise would travel through. I love my work!

Walking and Enchiladas

I walked three miles yesterday because I discovered there was a sort of park practically behind my apartment complex.
It was very beautiful. All the birds were out looking for last minute food, I think. It was a little chilly, but I didn't notice it until I put my hands up to my face and felt how cold it was. I love chilly days. They make me want to eat hot and spicy things.
So I made hot and spicy enchiladas for dinner when I came home. Except, they were almost too hot for me! So I had to drink much milk while eating dinner.

Today I had two coworkers trying to help me debug my code. The three of us sat (or stood) there in puzzlement for an hour and a half as we ran through checks. Afterall, it turned out I needed to change a constant because the code didn't like dealing with such large negative numbers (-100 is very large negative number). I figured this out after another hour and a half of debugging. One of my coworkers was very confused about how this constant could even be negative. But I couldn't answer him because I did not know myself. My knowledge on the subject is still very small. Perhaps after I have worked for a longer time here, I will understand.

A Borg Cube

At work, I frequently use the computer to look at models of engineery-type components that either I or some other engineer has drawn. Today I was looking at a large box with lots of lines creatively named something like "large box". Somebody coming to visit another guy in our four-man cube saw this box on my computer screen and commented that it looked like the Borg from Star Trek. So I promptly renamed all my files from "large box" to "borg cube". I love my work.

So having announced that I now supposedly have more time, I went off and never bothered posting again. But, you see, I had to get settled in first. And it is ridiculously more hard getting settled in than you might imagine.

First, you must find a place to live, call the electric company, and call the internet company. Then you have to buy furniture, transfer your license, change your vehicle registration, notify your insurance company...
And you have to update your address for your bank and your credit card.
And you have to update your email address (once your college one finally expires) for your facebook account and all your online bill paying things.
And then your dmv sends you letters saying you have no insurance, but it turns out it is because you still have to send in your old plates from your previous state.
And you have to find a new doctor and a dentist.
And your phone is beginning to die so you need to get a new phone, and your own plan (or else start paying your dad for you share of the bill which is increasing).
And you must find a new church and begin talking to strangers (oh horror of all horrors!) and actually attending things so you meet people.
Did I forget anything?

Oh well, if I did, I'm sure it will occur to me later.

Anyway, all that is what "settling in" has meant to me.
And all the talking to strangers and things! I have talked to more new people in the past several months than I have before! Although, that may be because I have moved to a new state where everybody is a stranger...

I have a post about bus boarding coming soon.

I have moved!

And am happily ensconced it my new apartment.

Here is a picture of my balcony from my living room door:

I now have a little table out there as well. My mum brought me the window boxes and I filled them last week.

Changing Location

Tomorrow I am moving. Moving away from home and everything I've been around for the past 22 years. Right now it is mostly sad, but since I am sure that this is the direction God is leading me towards, it will become happy. For example: my apartment is six minutes driving from the library and there is a pizza place right next door to the library too. Plus one of my sisters is visiting with me the first week.

And hopefully me job will be fun and exciting. I think it may involve some small computer programming or complicated differential equations or both, so I am looking forward to it.

And then I will decide what I should start putting on my blog since supposedly I will be leading a normal life with no homework...meaning more time...meaning probably not since I'll be so excited about reading books from the library. But we'll see.

No longer a college student

I have officially graduated and gotten a piece of paper to summarize all my hard work for the past four years.
It is very wierd.

I must say however I would never have made it all the way through without God.

Roommate M to Roommate M's brother-in-law D___ (playing some shooting war video game): Does this mean you are a violent person?

D___: Yes.

Laughter from Roommate M, friend B___, and myself.

D___: What did you want me to say? I play this because I want to hug teddy bears?

More laughter.

Roommate M: Oh! look at that cute teddy bear!




Random conversation which occurred this evening while we were all dying from heat and humidity. Roommate M's brother-in-law D___ is not really a violent person. He just enjoys playing video games. Previous to playing random war shooting game he had been playing online-bridge. Bridge, by the way, is a fascinating game which can bring much enjoyment both to the players and to spectators. We (meaning all us girls...myself, Roommate M, friend B___, and roommate M's sister) watched the bridge playing for a bit, made cookies, and then watched the Wall Street Journal's fashion week videos online which may be considered girly and therefore D___ felt the need to do something manly, I believe.

How to Train Your Dragon

Bestest movie in a bit. It's full of swirling and dipping and flying and it has even got vortices swirling off the dragon's wings! I mean, come on! who wouldn't like a movie where even the vortices produced by wings are portrayed? And the dragons were pretty cute too.

Ahem...or maybe it's only us aero people who've already got our heads in the clouds who enjoy that sort of stuff.

Oh well, I guess normal people will enjoy the cuteness at least. But wow! the clouds and the ocean and the sailing and dipping and soaring! My study buddy for my aero classes and I both wish for dragons now. But we think maybe hang gliding will be a close approximation. Or maybe kite jumping. I want to go kite jumping. I hear it hurts horribly when you land, but you get to sort of fly for a little bit, and anything is worth that.

They mixed up the music a little. They play Celticish music in the background for a bunch of Vikings, except Vikings were more Scandinavian and used to raid the Celtish people. At least, this is what we remember from our history. But it was pretty nice music, nonetheless.

And the dragons were so cute and colorful. And the flying and the soaring and the skimming and the skipping! That's really what this movie is all about. Just flying, you know.

Microgravity and its effects

The effects of microgravity on the human body are quite nasty actually. Do not believe all those science fiction stories where people travel nilly-willy without a thought of bone loss and heart problems and brain changes and gastrointestinal problems. Gravity is far more important in the functionings of our bodies than you might at first think.

So my senior design team is trying to simulate gravity in our project by spinning our station. But then we had to figure out how much spinning the human body could take before getting sick. Try walking around with a slow spinning motion for a bit. You get dizzy after only a short time (I know because I tried).

Anyway, it is most interesting work and way more complicated than we initially thought.

Spring Break

Tuesday night I slept only and half to two hours. During that brief sleep I dreamt that I had gotten stuck in some time warp at some point in my life and became my own grandmother. And then something else happened and I ended up meeting my grandmother self. She was actually a pretty cool lady. Anyway, then my alarm went off. But my grandmother self told me I could set it for ten minutes later and then I would get to sleep for ten extra minutes! I decided my grandmother self was so smart and cool.

My dad's response to me telling him this yesterday: "sounds like you were almost hallucinating. You should definitely get some sleep tonight." So I did, which was good because Tuesday night was not the only night I was skipping sleep. And when you skip sleep often enough, it gets really hard to talk clearly and you find yourself rambling a lot and people's words to you don't always make sense. This is why I am really glad it is the beginning of spring break.
I think I get more sleep in general though than some friends I know. So there is no need to get worried about me. I'm doing way better than a lot of other people.

Wind Tunnels and Ear Plugs

That has been my day thus far. The ear plugs came in when we ran the wind tunnel in my fluid dynamics lab at greater than 150 feet per second. It gets very loud with a high-pitchy sort of sound. But, hey! we're doing stuff with a real live wind tunnel so everything's okay.

And some time today I have to leave my comfy warm seat on my couch and drag my aching muscles (from exercising yesterday) out into the cold again so I can walk around and talk to recruiters at our spring career fair. Botheration, I probably have to wear high heels again, don't I...

Let's blow up the moon

Well...that's not actually the goal of my senior design class. But it is a possible outcome to some of our current ideas for launching a space module from the moon to Mars. It's been quite funny as we throw out the wackiest ideas and then realize what we just said and what the possible side effects would be.