The coolest thing I’ve ever seen: Pistol Shrimp
When Ness and I first saw this video we though “no fucking way” because a) it’s too awesome to be real and b) it’s just crazy. But we Googled it and found out that it is, in fact, real.
National Geographic has this to say about the Pistol Shrimp:
When the claw snaps shut, a jet of water shoots out from a socket in the claw at speeds of up to 62 miles (100 kilometers) an hour, generating a low-pressure bubble in its wake. As the pressure stabilizes, the bubble collapses with a loud bang.
The whole process, which was recorded with the use of high-speed cameras and sound equipment, occurs within 300 microseconds.
Now, using a device that counts photons, Lohse and his colleagues recorded a flash of light that occurs when the bubble collapses.
The flashing phenomenon is thought to be similar to sonoluminescence, in which bubbles that are in a liquid driven by a strong sound field emit light. The researchers have dubbed the shrimp activity shrimpoluminescence.
In sonoluminescence, the peak intensity of the emitted light is at a short wavelength. This indicates that the temperature inside the bubble is at least 10,000 degrees Kelvin (18,000 degrees Fahrenheit).
I’m older
The past year of my life has flown by. I don’t remember half of the things that I’ve done, but maybe that’s a sign that my old age is catching up to me.
Lisa has a nice post about taking a time out and looking through her phone to get rid of contacts she doesn’t keep in touch with. It made me start to think about the things I’ve done this past year. I’ve traveled more. Granted, it’s usually either back to NY or to Pittsburgh, but that’s more than I’ve ever done in a year. I went to see Hanson in concert, not once but twice. I’ve become less dependent on the internet, mostly because I was forced to live without it, but even before than, I realized that there was more to life than sitting at a computer most of my day.
I’d like to think that other things in my life have changed. Like, me being less selfish. I think to some extent, it’s changed, but for the most part I’m still a spoiled, selfish asshole. My relationship with my parents isn’t as strained as it used to be. If it weren’t for Ness, I think that I would have given up completely on my family. She’s shown me the importance of having them around and how having a relationship with my sisters is important as well.
Someone once told me that people don’t change and for a long time I believed that too. But I think people can change, one step at a time, slowly at their own pace. We have to change, adapt to different situations, otherwise we wouldn’t survive. It’s impossible to go through life and be the same person. Things happen to change your perspective, your world view, and what you do when faced with those things, makes you change. I think this past year I did a lot of changing. I’m not sure if it’s for the better, or for the worse, but I’m not the same person that I was last year.
I almost had the internet last night…
After all the running around we’ve been doing, we finally had time to stop at the AT&T store to pick up DSL. Get that done and we have to wait a week for AT&T to activate the account. I waited, patiently I might add, for the week to go by. It also helped a whole lot that I was in the hospital.
Monday: I’m going to work, Ness is driving, I black out. Before I black out I’ve been slightly dizzy and lightheaded. I’ve also been having nosebleeds. I go to the ER, they run some tests. They are just about to let me go home when they realize one of the tests that the doctor wanted, wasn’t done. They do it quickly and it’s “abnormal.” I’m admitted.
Tuesday - Thursday: I’m in the hospital, sharing a room with a crazy person who talks in their sleep. Talks loudly in their sleep. They let me leave Thursday morning after running every test they possibly can and can’t find anything wrong. They think I had an inner ear thing. Whatever.
I get home, the first thing I do is try to get the internet to work. I try all four phone jacks and it just wouldn’t work. I call AT&T and they say there is something wrong with my line and they will have to send someone out to fix it.
Friday: I wait all day for this AT&T person to come. The first guy that comes acts like a weird, ignorant, seemingly perverted kind of guy. He says he can’t fix it today because the neighbor’s gate is locked so he can’t get to the terminal. About an hour later, another AT&T person shows up. She’s nice and says that the other guy is an idiot and she always double checks his work because he usually does something wrong or he’s too lazy to do something. She confirms that she has to wait.
Saturday: My parents came out to visit for the day. I guess they felt bad that I was in the hospital for a few days and they didn’t come and see me then. Not sure. But we spend the day together. I take them to the Apple Store. I think I have convinced them to by a Mac the next time they buy a computer. Yay! I will steal it from them. After I get back from the Apple Store, there’s a note from AT&T saying it’s fixed and should be working. I can’t go and try to set it up while my parents are here, so I wait anxiously for them to leave so I can get on the internet. It didn’t matter anyway, because it still didn’t work.
Sunday: I decide to give it another go. To my surprise, there are two green lights instead of two red lights, or one green and one red, on the modem. I’m excited and I get my hopes up. Still doesn’t work. I call tech support for the third or fourth time this week and they try to help me. The tech guy concludes that my modem is a dud. I have to call hardware replacement to get a new modem.
I still have to call them…but at least I’m making progress with getting the internet. 
Oh, and my birthday is on Friday. Oh, and the Patriots lost the Super Bowl. I hate the Patriots. I’m not a fan of the Giants either, but the Patriots lost, so I am happy about that.