What an Extraordinary Friday I Had!

This past Friday was most unusual in that I got to see and observe some very large and important pieces of equipment that very few people get to see, much less young sophomore engineering students. They were equipment especially used for research in various fields.
On Friday morning, I was able to see and walk in the room that contained one of the top ten largest supercomputers in the world. This was only possible because of certain connections I had...
Actually, I ran my fingers down one of the large racks. They are interesting because they look like big black boxes that have been tipped. Like a parallelogram. And they make quite a lot of noise, though not as much as the chillers do.
Then, I went to my lab thinking that was a great deal of excitement for the day.
But then,
my professor came in at four and asked the only other student in the lab, Mike, and I if we wished to go with him right then to the SEM. Of course we said yes, even though that meant I had to stick around a little bit longer than I normally do.
So we walked down to the clean room and put some really funny looking costumes that reminded me of the costumes the kids were wearing in the old version of Willy Wonka where they all went to see the large chocolate bar made small. Except our suits weren't white. They were blue striped. And they were rather baggy. Mine was especially baggy because my professor thought I was about 2XL in suit size because I was so tall, but that was way too big. We had to put on boots that went over our sneakers, gloves, hoods, and suits. And Mike had to wear something over his beard and mustache.
After all that preparation, we shuffled into the clean room which is actually a whole section of rooms each dedicated to some sort of equipment. The SEM room actually has two SEM's. Now I will explain what SEM means. SEM stands for Scanning Electron Microscope. It's basically a large microscope that shoots electrons at whatever you are looking at. That enables you to see things on the nano-particle level. Mike and I couldn't touch it because we hadn't had three hours of training plus a test. But our professor could. So I spent over an hour in the clean room looking at things no one can see with their naked eye. My experiments turned out to have failed in accomplishing our project goals, but I didn't really care. Who can think of things like that sitting in the clean room with such amazing pieces of equipment?

The Quote of Wednesday

This quote of Wednesday is from Saint Augustine's work The City of God, Book I, Preface.

The glorious city of God is my theme in this work, which you, my dearest son Marcellinus, suggested, and which is due to you by my promise. I have undertaken its defense against those who prefer their own gods to the Founder of this city, - a city surpassingly glorious, whether we view it as it still lives by faith in this fleeting course of time, and sojourns as a stranger in the midst of the ungodly, or as it shall dwell in the fixed stability of its eternal seat, which it now with patience waits for, expecting until "righteousness shall return unto judgement," and it obtain, by virtue of its excellence, final victory and perfect peace.

Augustine likes to write long sentences, I think. It is best to read this out loud to fully get the meaning. And he is referring to the city of God when he speaks or "it". So it is living by faith and it sojourns in the midst of the ungodly. And it shall dwell in fixed stability, but it is waiting with patience for that time.
I hope that makes it a little more clear. I had to read it thrice to fully grasp its meaning.

The Quote of Wednesday

This quote comes from a problem from Fundamentals of Physics, seventh edition, part 1 by David Halliday, Robert Resnick, and Jearl Walker.

Chapter 8, Prob. 53
A large fake cookie sliding on a horizontal surface is attached to one end of a horizontal spring with spring constant k = 400 N/m; the other end of the spring is fixed in place. The cookie has a kinetic energy of 20.0 J as it passes through the spring's equilibrium position.

Now what I am particularly wondering is why they are using a large fake cookie. It doesn't really make a lot of sense. Why didn't they use a real cookie? Or even all those balls and weights common to beginner's physic's problems? No, they had to use a cookie. And to make it worse, it was a fake cookie. I mean, they couldn't even eat it when the experiment was done.
Problem writers are really strange or have a weird sense of humor.

Lab Work

Look at that! I just sort of dropped out of blogging for a little bit.
So where have I been? Learning things.

First thing I'm learning about is loans. I've been talking my money situation over with my dad lately. He and Mum are helping me as much as they can, but my rent for my apartment is getting more difficult to pay. And I'm not finding any paying work around (and by now it's pretty much too late for anything). So the next thing is a loan. By God's grace, I have been awarded several student loans. So now I am learning about how to take care of loans and interest and other stuff like that.

The second thing is about lab work.
When I first started working in a lab on Fridays, I thought I was just doing work for a professor. It was rather impersonal. But as I was talking with my dad, he said I should pray to God to bless my work and to bless the professor. It may seem strange, but that had never occurred to me before. I realized that the work I was doing was really my work which I should be doing for the glory of God. And the work has become more interesting to me now, and I am more interested in the success or failure of the research I am doing.

So I have been learning things lately.

Nothing To Do This Fine Summer Day

I have found nothing in the job search, but I was pleased to remember that I am now counted as one of the "unemployed" and a part of the "labor force" because I have been looking for a job in the past weeks and months.

My mother is not a part of the labor force because motherhood is not considered a "job" nor is one payed in wages. And she is not even unemployed because she is not looking for a job.

The labor force is composed of only the employed and the unemployed.
The employed are all those people who are working.
The unemployed are all those people who are not working but are searching for jobs.

Everyone else is not part of the labor force.
That includes my mum, my sisters and my grandparents.

Anyways, now I will work on some projects which I have time to do seeing as how I have no job.

Hum... I've been tagged for the first time that I am aware of.
It's quite interesting actually because I've often thought about what I would say if I ever was tagged, but I never was so I never was able to say all those things.
And now I can't remember what they were.
So I suppose I shall have to think of totally new things to say.

Seven Random Facts About Me That You Might Not Know (interesting name for a tag, isn't it?):

1. Hmm...I dislike touching my socks when they are on my feet because I feel that they have been all over the place and are probably disgusting. I always wash my hands if I touch them.

2. I found a funny little book called the Revised U.S. Edition of the Official Royal Canadian Air Force Exercise Plans For Physical Fitness (copyrighted 1962) in the basement.

3. I started writing my own language and constructing my own world long before I realized it was a popular thing to do among young people. My language's chief goal is to be easily pronounceable. There's nothing I dislike more than somebody's made-up names in a book that only the person who made them up can properly pronounce. And I don't like having to keep checking the glossary while reading.

4. I think woods are lovely. I live near some woods and I love to watch all its different moods through the seasons. They are dark and gloomy today. I do not wish to be in the darkest places of it at the moment, but the wind is blowing the branches of the trees and that is beautiful.

5. I have just written five reasons each of which begin with the word I. I wonder if I can write the last two using a different word.

6. Root beer is tastier when you drink it from a glass bottle than from a cup or can. At least it is more fun.

7. The color pink is getting on my nerves. That is probably because I was working with pink clay yesterday afternoon and this afternoon. After a bit, any color gets rather tiring.

Hurrah! There are seven random facts about me. None of them are ones I planned on putting down, but if they were, they wouldn't be random any more, would they?

Of The Deadly Perils of Minesweeper

Minesweeper.
The name sends thrills through your spine right down to your finger tips.
This fatal game, a mind trap, a chewer of time!

You have a paper due, and of course you must take some time to think about it.
But it is no good staring at a blank Word Document.
NO.
You must stare at a little box full of squares.
Carefully you make your first click on a square, hoping desperately for a number of the squares to clear with it. But it might not. It might be a mine and explode the whole box on you.
Or, even worse, show a single clear square with a number in it.
Then you are forced to click around it till you have enough numbered squares that you can start marking the mines.
But where were we again?
Oh yes.
There was a paper due.
But we might actually find all the mines this time and thus win the game...

Twenty minutes later...
You realize you also had some calculus homework to work on, besides that paper.
You haven't one a game yet, but squares are beginning to dance before your eyes.
So you leave the computer to take a break.

And the paper isn't written until eleven in the night.

That is only one of the possible consequences of this perilous game.


Um, right, what was I writing about again? I got sort of distracted, playing games and stuff, you know.
Oh yes! The deadly perils of minesweeper.
Besides wasting your time, you might get carpel tunnel or break the buttons on your mouse.
I am really not kidding! My aunt got the carpel tunnel and a friend broke his mouse.
Both from playing minesweeper.
So...
stay away from this horrible game, this brain drain, this robber of sleep, minesweeper!