Day at the spa

The spoilt rodents enjoyed a day at the spa last week.

First we captured the obese brown one.

She was treated to a relaxing soak... (how I wish the water was hotter... poached pigs can be so tender)

We then applied an aromatic cleanser, and gave her a gentle scrub and massage...

She was then moved to the next station, where she was towel dried.

Meanwhile missy tried to escape my clutches...

But we got her and treated her similarly...

... and we coiffured nutty...

This was one ungrateful/pissed off pig...

Impending visit of Agent Black

I am rather excited. After many false alarms, agent black has at last decided to show his face at the Institute again. He has listed his marching orders for next week . To this list I will like to append:

a. disturb the SP aquarium fishes with the micro-submarine (steering clear of the anemones this time).
b. make fun of the communists
c. design the ultimate guinea pig preparation machine (how can we transform these two pieces of prime ham into a feast, functions must include skinning and deboning)

The Institute has changed much since he left, or perhaps it was me who changed. The gang who were taken captive with me have all escaped while I stayed on, getting more and more institutionalized everyday. My original smoking buddy has left, and I am close to quitting. During this time, Missy's mansion has grown in size. She has also murdered one of her room mates and continues to bicker with her current one.

Spreading Phenomenon In Guinea Pigs

Observe how Nutty flows and spreads on a surface.

Nicorette Polacrilex Gum, 2mg

Bought some nicotine gum this weekend. Cost me 50+ bucks, it better work. The instruction tag reads: stop smoking completely before you begin using the gum. I am slightly apprehensive about commencing my treatment. I guess if I stick to it, my dear readers, you will know, because I will be probably bitching about it for a while. The plan is to start (or end) sometime this week.

The weirdest thing is that as I am writing this, that horse face whore on Sex and the City* was trying to quit smoking because she wants to land a date with Aidan.

*I was channel surfing, I promise

My prized possession

My accomplices have blogged about their prized possession. Matlove has his Kaze no Koe, while Agent Balck has Mambo. The Zojirushi 4 cup lunch container is mine. It has 3 compartments: one for sald/fruit/deserts, another for rice/pasta, and the last one has a seal-tight lid for pasta sauce and curries etc…

The vacuum insulation lowers the heat transfer coefficient by orders of magnitude, so that my lunch stays hot and tasty in the severe Boston winter. The set also comes with an elegant pair of chopsticks with case, and also a slinged carrying bag, so that I can look stylish while transferring my lunch. Maybe Missy and Nutty can one day enjoy the “warmth and comfort” of the Zojirushi.

More smoking news

I apologize for the geekiness content of the recent entries. perhaps the start of a new school year has got to me. I promise I will return to the pigs in the near future.

Read this on wired news this morning.

“For a couple of thousand years, smokers have sought a quick concentration boost by firing up a cigarette.
It turns out that cognitive buzz isn't just in smokers' heads. Scientists have found that nicotine really does boost certain transmitters in the brain that can help people think better. Now, the pharmaceutical industry hopes to improve on the effect, minus the lung cancer.”

Two thoughts to take home from this article:

1. I see, That’s why I can’t concentrate recently: reduced cigarette intake.

2. Hooray! This is what I am looking for, cigarettes with no side effects!

Now I understand why so many of my brilliant plans were hatched in the yellow box.

To the other smokers, perhaps you might like to check out the article in July's issue of nature too.

Mpemba Effect Revisited

Submitted to the Journal of Nonsense Fluid Mechanics (JNFM)
Viscoelastic Boy, @ The “Institute” MA 12345

ABSTRACT

In this entry, we present the data obtained on the 8th September 2005, 1pm. The results demonstrate the Mpemba effect to be complete bollocks under the conditions of a home kitchen.

METHOD AND EQUIPMENT

Two coffee cups from the Filterfresh coffee machine were used. They were filled with 250ml of water from a Poland Springs dispenser.

Cup A was filled with water from the hot tap at 65 Deg C, while Cup B was filled with water from cold tap at 7 Deg C.

The two cups were placed in the freezer and the temperature monitored periodically.

RESULTS

The author was bored and had to get to class at this point, so the experiment was cut short. We did return an hour later to find Cup B to be completely frozen while Cup A was still only ¼ frozen.

DISCUSSION

Clearly the Mpemba effect is a load of crap in this case. Note it might still be possible to make hot water freeze before the cold (like in the case of water thrown into the cold air as stated by Prof. Black Mamba*), but the author feels that his conditions and materials are representative of a standard kitchen/cooking environment.

CONCLUSION

The verdict is clear.

* The Black Mamba was taken captive by the barbarian hordes together with me. He escaped from the Institute about a year ago. He has been wanted ever since for committing countless indecent acts and is considered extremely lecherous.

Sippy

This one died a horrible death. Too bad, she could have been very tender.

Kitchen Myth Busters

Warning, the following entry contains mathematics and science. If you are not a geek, please do not read on.

SPAGHETTI INCIDENT - True

I wasted half a packet of Barilla No.7 in my pantry and could not figure out why. But today, the Rheologeewoldt* shed light to this problem by giving me a recent article from Physical Review Letter. It is about how spaghetti snaps into pieces. As some of you might have observed, spaghetti does not break into two pieces when you bend it, most of the time it snaps into three to ten pieces. Apparently this was a problem which confounded the great Feynman himself. So recently some nerds in France has managed to model this phenomenon. The mechanics behind this is so: At the instant of the first fracture, the suddenly freed end suddenly realizes that it should have no curvature (check your undergrad structures notes), while the remainder of the spaghetti has not had time to react and thus remains in a curved shape. The information that the end is freed travels along the spaghetti in the form of a burst of flexural waves and generates a local concentration in curvature, causing another breakage further downstream, which generates yet another burst of waves, causing another breakage…

This was the first myth I looked at which actually turned out to have some truth in it. While we are on this topic, let me waste your time on a few more of my silly home experiments, unfortunately, none of the original claims seem to have any scientific basis at all.

COLD WATER BOILS FASTER THAN HOT / HOT WATER FREEZES FASTER THAN COLD - false

Matlove and his girl brought my attention to this myth and commissioned me to investigate the truth in it. I did some experiments at home and found this myth to be completely bogus, at least in the conditions of my kitchen. I expect the kitchen conditions to be similar to mine, so don’t try to be smart and freeze hot water.

KITCHEN SINK VORTEX - false

Some people think that the sink vortex always spin clockwise in the Northern Hemisphere because of the coriolis effect. This is not true, the coriolis force is so small, to see it, you will have to leave the water in an extremely still environment for days to rid it of any initial eddies.

SCREAMING LOBSTERS - false

Some redneck once told me lobsters scream in pain when dunked into boiling water. That’s bogus, lobsters has no vocal chords, apparently that hissing noise is the heated air trapped under the shell expanding and whooshing out of the gaps.

In fact lobsters feel no pain, they don’t have a brain.

*Rheologeewoldt is another excellent friend. For a living, he pleasures snails to obtain their fluids.

Hazel - Jabba the Pig

(This is an old picture, please see below and chart for updated weight)

Today we weighed the pigs. Missy has stayed at 1.05 kg, she has stabilized at this current weight for a about 8 months now, Nutty weighed in at 1.29 kg, after the initial exponential growth rate during the first few months with us, she has only gained about 10g every two weeks. I am rather disappointed with their performance.

About a year ago, Sippy, a guinea pig of ours suffered from some bizarre ailment which caused her brain to swell and push against her skull, she died a horrible death, Giorgia* was devastated while I was just sad to see the opportunity of a tasty meal float away with the smoke from the pet body incinerator. During her suffering (Sippy’s not Giorgia), we tried everything to save her, we admitted her to an animal hospital. At the animal hospital, we saw on an adjacent berth to Sippy’s a label which read:

NAME: Hazel
SEX: F
COLOUR: Brown
NOTES: NO FOOD

Upon closer inspection of the berth, we spied a massive inert mass lounging in the corner, inspecting us through beady eyes to check if we were bearers of food and treats. That mass turns out to be a giant guinea pig! She was easily four times the volume of Nutty, I estimate her dimensions to be:

LENGTH: 30cm
GIRTH: 15cm
HEIGHT: 12cm
WEIGHT: 5kg

That’s the size of a small dog! A rodent of truly Goliath proportions! I am talking about Jabba the Hutt type of body shape and indolent attitude. No wonder the label said no food. I was so impressed by the sight and at the same time quite heartened: This monstrosity is proof that given the right diet, each of our pigs can indeed feed a family of four or more. That night I went home and immediately set out a menu, for perhaps summer 2006 when we can harvest them and enjoy a huge midsummer feast at the lab.

But from the evidence of the weighing today, this feast seems ever more remote, unless some miracle intervention occurs… Some protein shake for them perhaps?

*Giorgia – Protector of guinea pigs, a most wonderful friend and cook with impeccable taste. In her spare time when not disrupting my plans for the pigs she likes to work on her PhD.