An Epic Quest

I got my brother a brown driver’s cap for Christmas, like the Ralph Lauren version pictured, only a third the price, from Target. It was perfect. On Christmas morning, we discovered that it was several sizes too small. Big heads run in the family. I checked the Target website, but the only size listed was M/L. But the cap was just too perfect. We had to find a replacement. My brother braved five Wal-Mart and one Kohl’s with us, and my brother is no hipster. We found nothing. We persevered to the mall. After tearing my mother away from the shinies in the JC Penney housewares section, we toured Aeropostale, Gap, and several other places of the like before the fellowship met its greatest trial yet.

I believe my brother fully realized the peril he risked when we entered the Abercrombie and Fitch store. It was shrouded by very professional looking black shades, but I choked upon entering. Someone had axe bombed the place, and nobody had bothered to clear it up. The dim interior was painted black, partitions had been erected, reminiscent of the maze of the minotaur, and large pictures of bare masculine chests covered the wall. Worse, preppy, rhythmic music was blasting from some unseen source. I wasn’t sure I could find my way out before I was smothered in the scent. I was reminded of the Mines of Moria. “We cannot get out. The end comes, and then, drums, drums in the deep.”

By the time we stumbled into the open, we had decided that a specialty hat shop might be more in our line. We discovered one, Hat Shack, and entered. The shelves were lined with baseball hats, but they had driver’s caps. Black driver’s caps. Failure. We limped home, and I consulted the Target website a second time. The hat was gone. The page was  purged. We decided to try the store one last time, if only to return the ill-fated hat. There, in the darkest corner of the hat shelf in the back of the store, we found it. One hat to rule them all. L/XL. We were victorious. I began to wonder why I hadn’t checked there first to begin with. I realize that probably had something to do with the one size listed on the website, and only three similar hats on the shelves.

The quest is completed, but some nights I lie awake wondering what could have been. Could I have found my own hat had I looked? And then I remember the darkened corridors of Abercrombie and Fitch, turn over with a shudder, and find sleep at last.

New Years 2012

Not only will I build abs of steel, I will save the world! Again...and again...and again...

I don’t go in for big showy resolutions because I don’t believe a year can be evaluated in light of an aspiration born out of cheerful optimism. No one really cures cancer by publishing their first book on building abs of steel in forty days. Unless, of course, that person features in infomercials for the teeth whitening properties of acacia berry and lowering one’s car insurance with one ridiculously easy old trick originally used to make dermatologists everywhere hate you. Wow. That guy in the infomercials is like Superman.

The other problem with New Years resolutions is that even if I can keep them, they are an insufficient meter stick for the rest of the year. “So yeah, I dropped out of college to have more time to train for a marathon. I won the scholarship prize on the marathon, but, you know, then I wasn’t in college.” Or maybe the reverse. “I graduated from college with honors but I never worked up the courage to donate blood.” (Eventually I’ll get up the guts to do that.)

Yet another problem with resolutions is the unpredictable ways in which people change during the year. I’m braver and more responsible than I was last year. (Take my word on this.) Sometimes it’s a sign of growth to be unable to fulfill one’s goals. This time last year, I could fill up two pages with vague idealistic garbage on what I was going to do with my life. Now I’m smart enough to know that specifics are better, even if I have no idea of how I’m going to get there or what exactly these rogue interests in magnetism, quantum mechanics, florescence, crystallography, and optics have to do with curing cancer.

Sometimes, even though the year feels like a defeat, you’ve got to remember that even victorious soldiers stumble back to their camp and fall asleep. We’re not beaten yet, only exhausted. (And we defeated the first half of basic physics. Yay!) The great thing about college? You get to start over every six months.

(Another problem with resolutions is that sometimes success is hard to gauge. You got fit, but how fit? I’m going to join the club. This year, I will be more positive.)

Light Fantastic

I haven’t written a post because finals sucked me up and squeezed me dry. You get a pun instead. Also, somewhere out there, a film class is watching me talk about finals, life, death, and God in the closest thing to a vlog I’ve ever made. However, since my vlog will going be used to analyze my body movement when I’m alone with a camera and will be played simultaneously with fifteen other such videos, I fear my insights may be lost.

Seven Serious Rules of Writing

It’s the end of NaNoWriMo season. Rather than participating, I spent my evenings studying for several reasons

1) I needed to study.

2) I have yet to reach the required word-count on any of my finished stories.

Truly, I am a well-educated and efficient author, above the need to actually write anything, but I thought, “What of those pitiful writers who have not yet reached the 50,000 word mark due to their inefficient study habits? What of those writers who could not overcome their fear of failure  to attempt NaNoWriMo?” Unfortunately for those pitiful people, I only write novellas and short stories, but perhaps my insights will help them in their quest.

1) An essay is only as good as its thesis. Likewise, a story is only as good as its dilemma. Knowledge of a life-changing dilemma is not necessary at the beginning, but a dilemma brings the story to its end. –Source: American Literature professor, Introduction to Theatre professor

2) Every story begins with false journey that leads to the real journey. The introduction to the characters and development of the real crisis takes place here. The journey to Rivendell, the discovery of Narnia and flight to the stone table, and all the events leading up to Jim Hawkins sailing away are false journeys.–Source: Bearmageddon 

3) A writer should cram a lot of information into paragraphs with short sentences. One should never trust someone who says ‘should,’ or uses bulky passive sentences frequently. Avoid backstory or start the story there. A writer would be wise to assume the reader is smart, but not smart enough to read big words.–Source: Immediate Fiction, Organic Chemistry I lab instructor

4) Include enough information that the reader can figure out what is happening. Elaborate why because otherwise the reader is confused and doesn’t actually care. Confused readers abandon stories half-way. Never generalize.–Source: American Literature professor

5) Write in passive voice.–Source: Organic Chemistry I lab instructor

6) Write in active voice.–Source: American Literature professor

7) Break the rules. Good writers are good at that. But never cite Wikipedia.–Source: Kurt Vonnegut (not the Wikipedia bit, but we know he was thinking it.)

Rauldy Goes to Richmond

Last week was my birthday. Last week was also the Southeastern Regional ACS conference where several friends and I presented research posters. My greatest fear going in was that I would be found out as the uninformed undergrad that I am; that tends to happen when you wander around expensive hotels looking like a lost puppy. The undergraduate coordinator saw the lost puppy and dumped it into a focus group for the undergrad ACS magazine. I hadn’t realized that there were so many (slightly bewildered) geeky chemistry undergrads in the world, not to mention a magazine for them. It turns out that you don’t have to understand everything that’s going on to come to these conferences.

We presented our poster and had several graduate recruiters visit us. That was cool. Another cool thing was that they were not put off if I couldn’t answer all their questions–at least, they didn’t get the sort of frozen smile that forms when some people realize that they are encountering (someone they think is) an inferior. They already knew I didn’t know as much chemistry as them. And they tried to recruit me to their graduate programs anyway.

From there, everything fell into place. I went to sessions because I wanted to be there, not because I saw some grand relation to future research or actually knew anything about the subject. About halfway through the conference, I saw a trend. These people were desperate to recruit students and researchers to their areas, and if you sat still long enough and looked interested, they’d explain things to you. What was even more special? I wasn’t put off by what I couldn’t understand. I want to learn EVERY SINGLE CHEMISTRY.

I learned that I want to do even more research than I can possibly fit into my schedule next semester. Graduate school will be amazing because I can just focus on chemistry without all these distracting electives. I also learned that I need to get more sleep because falling asleep in lectures and taking naps was cutting into my precious chemistry learning time. SERMACS 2011 was amazing in ways that I cannot fully articulate. Oh, and Richmond was nice too.

The 4th Dimension, God, and Buckaroo Banzai

In The Adventures of Buckaroo Banzai Across the 8th Dimension!, the hero drives his amazing rocket car into the eighth dimension, through a mountain, and  re-materializes on the other side. The titular character (physicist, neurosurgeon, race car driver, and rock star) explains that he didn’t actually drive through the mountain. He drove onto another plane. For all the faux science-speak the movie has, it holds a grain of truth. Even if the magical machine really worked, he *didn’t* drive through the mountain. He drove around it.

Every dimension is at right angles to all the ones before it. The y-axis  makes a 90 degree angle with the x-axis in the 1st dimension, and the z-axis makes 90 degree angles with the x and y axises. So the 4th dimension must also be at right angles to the 1st, 2nd, and 3rd dimensions. But what on earth does this look like?

Being In Two Places at Once

The 4th dimension is the only place  in which we can have two 3-D objects at the same point in 3-D space. In the 0th dimension, there can only be a point, but in the 1st dimension there can be an infinite number of points, forming a line. In the 2nd dimension, there can be an infinite number of lines, forming a long rectangle. In the 2nd dimension, there can be an infinite number of squares, forming a tunnel. In the 4th dimension you can somehow have an infinite chain of tunnels. So, in effect, the 4th dimension contains an infinite number of alternate worlds.

It’s pretty universally agreed that time is the 4th dimension. Normally, we move along time like a point on the number line or a square in a square tunnel. If 4th dimension is time, than 3-D beings can move through any point of  time, just as a point can move forward or backward on a number line in the 1st dimension, a line can move forward or backward on an elongated rectangle in the 2nd dimension, or a square can move forward or backward in a tunnel in the 3rd dimension (as long as nothing gets in the way).

Furthermore, if a line can contain an infinite number of points, a square an infinite number of lines, a cube an infinite number of squares, and the 4th dimension an infinite number of worlds, than someone in the 4th dimension can be in two places at the exact same time, just as a line can have two different points.

Not Seeing Everything

This brings up a fascinating point. Each higher dimension can only “see” in lower dimensions and guess the existence of their own dimension. However, each higher dimension can see inside lower dimensions. A point in the 0th dimension can see nothing. A line in the 1st dimension x-axis can see only a point in the 0th dimension. A square in the 2nd dimension x-y plane can only see a line in the 1st dimension, but it can see the middle of a line, which the line cannot. A cube in the 3rd dimension x,y,z can only see shapes in the 2nd dimension. This is why we use paper instead of  cubes. We see one side of the cube. We feel the other sides. We cannot read both sides of the paper at once. Someone in the 4th dimension can actually see inside 3-D objects, but even he can only see his fellow man in terms of the 3rd dimension.

Having More than One Facet

When a higher dimension encounters a lower dimension, the effects are very weird. If a 2-D circle passed through a 1-D plane, first a short line would intersect, than the lines would grow longer and longer until the middle of the circle was reached and the lines grew smaller and smaller until they vanished. A 3-D circle passing through a flat 2-D paper would start out as a dot and grow into a larger and larger circle until it began to shrink again. A person from the 4th dimension who carried his entire life with him would intersect the 3-D plane as a baby, and grow and grow until he reached adulthood, at which point he would begin to shrink until he finally died, but the rate at which this happened would depend on how fast he was moving through time.

Implications

I think the implication here is people don’t belong in the 3rd dimension. We’re stuck here. We have 4th dimensional quantities, such as time, although we’re stuck at a certain age rate. Yet, I’m not sure time travel the way we try to invent it is possible. Never mind Doctor Who, there would be some very wonky results, such as a person living out their entire life in both medieval France and modern Germany.

The 4th dimension explains how God is omnipresent: someone in the 4th dimension can be two places at once. It explains how he is omniscient: he can see the inside of us, of our minds. It explains how God is undying: He’s a time traveler, and time traveling involves being able to move between times with your entire life. It explains how some people can sense God: we cannot see all three dimensions, but we infer that they are there. Likewise, we cannot see or touch time, but we can infer its presence. Similarly, sometimes, we can infer God.

I am not arguing that God is confined to the 4th dimension. (Even higher dimensions have similar properties with added benefits, but God doesn’t have to confine Himself like that.) I am arguing that if math makes room for a combined physicist, neurosurgeon, race car driver, and rock star, then math can make room for God.

So we fix our eyes not on what is seen, but on what is unseen. For what is seen is temporary, but what is unseen is eternal ~1Corinthians 4:18

For another look at the dimensions see Imagining the Tenth Dimension.

Reference: Flatland by Edward Abbott Abbott

Writing Lab Reports

If brevity is the soul of wit,

I am a nitwit.

Time is too limited for great lit

So I  go with it.

 

Words are special,

Insightful professors amazing.

Despite my initial poor lab skill

I learn fun things.

 

Things like I’m needing

to go to bed–still.

 

Everyone on the Sidewalk is Stalking Me

It takes a certain art to pass people on the sidewalk. I don’t quite have it.

If I am passing someone from behind, which happens often because I walk quickly, I have two options. The first is to awkwardly push past or walk around on the grass. The second is to dramatically slow my pace and wonder how a single person can occupy the entirety of a sidewalk where three can walk abreast–and whether this might have something to do with the fourth dimension–and whether I might to enter the fourth dimension in order to get around them. No matter how far behind I walk, this usually leads to anxious glances behind at me and my grinning and looking harmless. “No, no, I’m not a creepy stalker.” From here, we usually continue until our paths deviate, they slow down to the point at which I have to pass them, or they stop taking up the entire sidewalk.

I have fewer options if I’m passing someone going the opposite direction, but at least they do not make me feel like a creepy stalker. On the contrary, I fear that these people are creepy stalkers. Strange males have a habit of making eye-contact at the last possible second. But they do not make friendly eye-contact, accompanied by a smile; they make weird, sustained eye-contact. It is the sort of eye-contact one would expect from a certain vampire who liked girls, but also wanted to drink their blood–or from Gollum. So I have to invent new strategies. My flatmate and her friend agree that I walk with my head down, as if examining the nuances of the pavement ecosystem. Frankly, I think everyone should do this. Tree roots are fascinating–fascinating enough to lure me in front of on-coming cars. I’ve also tried walking looking up at the trees, but that makes it hard for me to make eye-contact when I’m actually making conversation. I also bump into people.

So if you hear someone behind you, and look back but cannot make eye contact, that is probably me. Worry not, I’m not a stalker, just someone contemplating the physics of passing.

Encouragement from a Humble Mushroom

I like mushrooms. Mushrooms live in a dead and decaying world, yet they thrive. Mushrooms not only survive the decay, they survive because of it. They have discovered how to take the grossness around them and channel it into growth and new life. And so, if a mushroom finds itself on a dung heap, rather than becoming disgusting itself, it uses the dung to become a better, stronger, wiser, and more delicious mushroom than it could otherwise be.

I want to be like a mushroom.

That is all.

 

Thanks to Tony Cyphert for the use of his image.

Some Thoughts

1. You cannot write great things by trying to write great things. The only thing to do is bite your tongue, have fun, and get ‘er done.
2. You will never feel ready for work that you dread. You will never do it correctly except in retrospect. The only thing to do is try your hardest. Life is like that Remember: the only way to get into a math mood is to do math.
3. Time management is the ability to painfully pull yourself away from something, and focus on something else. The warm productivity fuzzies might make up for the pain.

This weekend I might write something terribly insightful like, “How I Survived a Week with Just Three Pairs of Clean Socks.” For now, I face this week with increased determination. Fare ye well–Joanna