Twilight: New Moon

Very short review: Remember that show that Claire Danes was in, "My So Called Life," where the characters were all terribly inarticulate high school students, couldn't ever spit out what they were trying to say, and just hemmed and hawed for a hour each week? Well, this movie is the vampire-laced, emo-soundtracked version of that show--which is all the more ironic when you see the role that Romeo and Juliet plays in the movie and recall that god-awful gangsta version of R&J that Claire Danes did with Leonardo DiCaprio shortly after "My So Called Life" ended. This one struggled to get one star.

Famous Dave's Rip-off

Big fan--BIG fan of barbecue--especially the St. Louis variety. So I have to like Famous Dave's. In addition to the barbecue and some really lovely corn muffins, they also have one of the best soups in town--Chicken Wild Rice. It's kind of on the expensive side, $2.99 for a cup and $4.99 for a bowl, but it's so good it's hard to pass up. But if you're really hungry and you're tempted to go for the bowl, I've got a money-saving tip for you: stick with the cup.

I was curious tonight: since the bowl costs 66% more than the cup, do we get enough extra to make the upgrade worthwhile? So, I ordered both a bowl AND a cup so I could compare. At first glance, it certainly looks like the big bowl is worth it. I mean look at those two. Clearly that bowl is WAY bigger than the cup!


But wait a second--is it really? Optical illusion number one--the bowl comes on a MUCH bigger plate than the cup. Did ya notice that? Really makes it look like you are getting a lot more delivered by Famous (insert name of server here) that way doesn't it? If I take those plates away, the difference doesn't seem anywhere near as big.


But still, there appears to be a difference in both the height and width of the bowl and the only good way to really find out is to measure the volume. So, I asked for a refill of my favorite cola and poured it into the cup.


And now the moment of truth--I poured the contents of the cup into the bowl. Holy moly! The bowl is a little bigger, but just barely! That difference is not anywhere near 66% of the cup and certainly isn't worth $2! What a rip!!! Karma comes around though--after all of this, the server forgot to charge me for BOTH the cup and the bowl!


It all reminded me of my friend who worked at the movie theater where they had small, medium, large, and extra-large drink sizes. She tried the same test and discovered that the medium and large drink cups, although shaped very differently, held EXACTLY the same amount of fluid. I can hear the "suggestive selling" to anyone who orders a medium drink: "Did you know that for only 50 cents more, you can get exactly the same size?"

Gender and the 4.0

Today I attended the 4.0 honors reception/breakfast with my daughter, who is in the 7th grade. She attends a middle school that covers three grades, 6th, 7th, and 8th. The school has just under 1000 students, evenly split across the three grades, and the gender breakdown in the school is almost exactly 50/50.

The program involved calling each student's name (all of whom received a perfect 4.0 GPA in the most recent grading period), giving them a certificate and a star to sew on their school jacket, and having them line up on the stage by grade for applause delivered by the assembled parents and faculty.

As the sixth grade group became to accumulate on the stage, I couldn't help noticing that there was a significant gender disparity amongst those earning a 4.0. Of the first ten students named, only ONE boy and NINE girls. It evened out a little by the time they all got up there, but still only 16 out of 48 were boys--twice as many girls as boys in the 4.0 club. I wondered if this would continue through the other grades...but it did not.

6th grade: 33% boys, 67% girls
7th grade: 48% boys, 52% girls
8th grade: 63% boys, 37% girls

Trend, or statistical anomaly?

On a more humorous note, I was also able to detect some lingering uncomfortableness with the opposite sex. The alphabetic recital of names more or less randomly arranged the students relative to gender. And a close examination of how they distanced themselves relative to those standing next to them made it very clear that girls stood closer to girls than than they did to boys, and boys stood closer other boys than they did girls...

1-900-MAD-ISON

If you are from Madison and you call me, don't expect me to pick up the phone. Whenever I see that 608 area code, I'm not going to answer--because 99 times out of 100, it's the University of Wisconsin calling on a fund-raising gambit. I made the mistake of donating a couple of times and now...well, these people are simply unstoppable.

Last night, I got another one of these calls and when I saw the number, I let it go to voice mail. Later, upon retrieving the message, I discovered that hard economic times has driven the once proud university to desperate measures. To quote the young woman on the other end of the phone, "My name is Jan and I'm a student from the University of Wisconsin Madison. I'm just calling to see if you want to update your information, give a gift, or just chat with a student."

What is this, one of those late night commercials targeted at lonely guys who watch Star Trek reruns at 3:00 am? "Chat with a hot Badger co-ed for only $4.99 a minute"? I wondered what would happen if I called back and said I didn't want to update my information or make a gift, but I just wanted to chat with Jan for a while....

Halloween Ain't What It Use to Be

Wow, have I gotten behind on blogging! I had a really busy week, and then, horror of horrors, I got a &%$#% virus on my computer, which really got in the way of everything in my life. I still haven't totally recovered, but at least I'm marginally functional. We cruised right by Halloween in the mix--and I had one little post queued up. So, belatedly:

My daughter bought this make-up kit as part of Halloween prep--from probably my favorite store to spend some browsing time, Sephora.

You'll note that the package promises three totally different looks: The Vampire, The Witch, and the Wardrobe...I mean, The Vampire, the Witch, and the Rockstar! Ok, great. And there are pictures on the inside that demonstrate how to achieve these variants. So now, for a quiz. I will give you the three pictures in random order and I want you to identify which one is the Vampire, which is the Witch, and which is the Rockstar. Ok? Ready?

A

B

C

Of course, none of these match the orginal cover drawing, which I'm guessing is supposed to be a witch, but really looks more like "sexy pilgrim."

The End of Western Civilization

Some States are Bigger Than Others

In Indiana, our license plates use the 3-numbers, 3-letters formula. For example, the plate might be 754-DFG. This produces a total of 10*10*10*26*26*26 = 17,576,000 possible combinations, thereby accommodating approximately that number of cars (with some additional fraction more for vanity plates and so forth). Illinois, on the other hand, is bigger than Indiana, and they use the 7 letters-or-numbers system, for example DR7-JU87. This produces 36*36*36*36*36*36*36 = 78,364,164,096. (see above) That's a heckuva lot of cars!

Other states, being less populous, require fewer options. North Dakota, for example, apparently only requires 26 possibilities:

Swine Flu Paranoia Grips the Hundred Acre Wood

Irish Alert: We Lost Last Week

This is probably going to mark me as some kind of football nut, but I signed up for something called the Irish Alert service, which is supposed to send a text message to my phone every time there is a score in a Notre Dame football game. It's a handy way to keep track of what's going on when you can't watch the game.

Rather, it's supposed to be handy. Here's the transcription of the messages I received today along with the times they were sent. The game ran from about 3:30pm to about 7:15pm.

-- Game Begins --

4:06pm ND 3 BC 2 (1st Quarter) [both scored at the same time?]
4:38pm ND 3 BC 0 (1st Quarter) [Somehow, BC lost 2 points!]

-- Halftime --

6:38pm ND 13 BC 16 (3rd Quarter) [Whaaaat??]
6:40pm ND 6 BC 2 (2nd Quarter) [Catch up people!]

-- Game Ends -- (about 7:15pm)

7:39pm ND 20 BC 16 (4th Quarter)
7:40pm ND 13 BC 9 (2nd Quarter) [25 minutes after game end!]
8:07pm ND 20 BC 16 (Final) [At least this madness is over]
8:38pm ND 6 BC 9 (2nd Quarter] [Or is it?]
8:46pm ND 13 BC 16 (3rd Quarter] [What is the point, at this point?]

This service is almost as good as the football team!

I <3 Instant Messaging

I love instant messaging as a mode of communication. Seriously, I think it is my preferred mode--above email, phone calls, maybe even in-person conversations! I like the brevity, the almost-but-not-quite instantaneous response (the pauses giving you just enough time to think of a better or funnier way of saying things while still maintaining an actual conversation), the ability to have multiple conversations going at the same time, the ease of adding pictures, links, and quotes to the conversation...and of course in an argument, you can always scroll back and prove that the other person actually did say what you are accusing them of saying!!! It's a beautiful thing, really!

Of course, with any new communication technology comes a period of adjustment while norms and etiquette are established. Recently, Tina posted on scatterplot about one such problem--people dropping by your office and interrupting your IM conversation as if it isn't a "real" interaction and expecting you to immediately drop your cyber-chat for the face-to-face variety.

A related problems I've often experienced is that the person with whom I am IMing sometimes seems to forget that I exist in a whole other (not nother, other!) world beyond the IM conversation--which can, in fact, interrupt the conversation and slow my response time. If I'm IMing at work, for example, it is indeed possible, and in fact extremely likely, that someone will pop into my office, unannounced, and ask me a question, or two, or three. Or, that old archaic phone might just ring. Or someone else might pop in with an IM question (we use it a lot in our inter-office communication). At home, I have kids. They demand attention like no other beings on the planet--and generally speaking, whether it is a scream of pain from the kitchen, an IM from the living room, or a cell phone call from the basement(!), I respond.

I've noticed negative reactions to these pauses, of course, more from those who are newer to the technology. Just like people who haven't mastered the cell phone side conversation process or can't accept that cell signals drop during even the most stationary conversation, people who are still trying to map a face-to-face conversation onto IM are more likely to be offended. Those who use IM a lot have become accustomed to its advantages and disadvantages and seem completely unflustered by inexplicable (and inexplicably long) pauses and resumptions of conversation, with nary an explanation needed. Now, if I can just remember to turn that darn thing off when I'm leaving work so people aren't talking to an actually empty room....

Be a Better Teacher in One Easy Step

One time a new professor was struggling a bit in the classroom and asked me how to get their teaching scores up. I responded, “It’s easy: Swear a lot and make jokes about beer!” Luckily for me, this person understood what I meant and I didn’t end up getting in trouble with the administration or anything! A couple of years later, I used the same line on someone else who, I found out later, did not get what I meant, and I had to do some damage control!

So, let me be clear. I’m not advocating beer and swearing as a specific pedagogic technique. Rather, I’m suggesting that you get down into college student life and use it as a touchstone for the things you do in class. What are they concerned about in their daily lives? What are they talking about in the dorms, what do they spend their time doing? If you can make a connection to their real lives, it will be SO much more interesting for them. (Believe it or not, even at Notre Dame, they do swear and drink beer--either that or they have to deal with people who swear and drink beer--so either way it is relevant!).

I often recommend to people that they spend a little time watching MTV to get or keep themselves in touch with college student culture. It’s not about sipping a nice Cabernet and discussing Habermas! If you know what’s going on out there, it gives you something to connect over in your classes lectures. One of the biggest laughs I ever got in class was when I was making fun of Britney Spears for some reason and I sang the first couple of lines of “Oops, I did it again” ...and did the steps...

You might think this is all well and good for a social psychology class because it fits the content there so easily, but the subject really doesn’t matter. I use these same techniques when I teach statistics (reputed to be the hardest and most boring class we teach in sociology departments). Even there, you can, believe it or not, choose examples about beer and swearing, or how many dancers are appearing in music videos, or how much time your students spent playing video games last week, etc. Try analyzing those kinds of data instead of the increases in GNP over the past decade and I'm willing to bet that stats will become one of your highest rated classes (and they'll learn a heck of a lot more too!).

Relevance, Mr. Coburn?

What I find disturbing about this whole recent spasm* regarding the public relevance of political science is that the "hard" sciences are automatically assumed to have relevance and therefore are immune to critiques about exotic questions and lacking "obvious public benefits."

I spent about 30 seconds on the National Science Foundation web site and located this one study (among hundreds like it) in the chemistry division. I would like to challenge Senator Coburn to explain to me the public relevance of this particular study:

Femtosecond studies of the influence of solvent on chemical reaction dynamics

ABSTRACT

In this award, funded by the Experimental Physical Chemistry program of the Chemistry Division, Professor Stephen Bradforth of the University of Southern California and graduate students will continue their investigation of liquid medium effects on photo-dissociation, explore new avenues in photo-initiated bimolecular reactions, and develop nonlinear optical spectroscopic techniques that can probe reactions at liquid surfaces. The photo-dissociation studies will focus on solvent effects on the dissociation of molecules such as ICN, BrCN and H2O2, and especially subsequent femtosecond time scale rotational relaxation of the diatomic fragments (CN and OH) produced in the dissociation. Comparison of experimental data with molecular dynamics simulations will aid in the evaluation of solvent effects on relaxation dynamics. The study of photo-initiated bimolecular reactions will involve photo-generation of OH radicals (from OH- or H2O2) and observation of their reaction with Cl- and Br- in the femtosecond regime. These radical-ion reactions are of emerging interest in atmospheric chemistry as possible routes to the formation of tropospheric Cl2 and Br2. Second order nonlinear optical techniques, which can provide surface-specific information, will be developed in order to explore reaction dynamics at liquid or aerosol particle surfaces. While the initial focus will be on solvation and mobility of photo-detached electrons, these techniques may eventually be applicable to the study of halogen formation reactions on sea-spray aerosols.

In addition to the broad dissemination of research results through publications, conference and seminar presentations, Prof. Bradforth will also make available via his group website important innovations in instrumentation that may be useful to other groups working in ultrafast dynamics.

_________
* For those of you not in the know, Senator Tom Coburn has introduced an amendment that would prohibit the National Science Foundation from funding any political science research. The Amendment can be read by clicking on the spasm link above.

Working at a Catholic University

Many things that happen at Notre Dame that you'd be less likely to see at a lot of other universities. A couple of recent entries you may find either amusing or instructive...or not.

First, the big USC football game is coming up, which produced the following flyer taped to the outside of the building where I work. Look carefully to get the whole message.


Second, another football derived sighting. I love how these folks find ways to combine our two major public identity markers.

True Art

In a truly unbelievable turn of events, I have been asked to donate two of my pieces of photography to a charity art auction later this month! It will be very interesting to see how much they go for...I hope its at least more than the frame cost.

I was asked, as part of this process, for a bio and a retail price. I responded:

Retail? Who can put a price on such beauty?

Bio: Acclaimed photographer of such stand out pieces as “Louvre Clutch” and “The Inside of My Coat Pocket,” Myers first mastered his art on the Instamatic 110. He later stormed the photographic world with a disc camera and a Palm Treo. He now works exclusively with the Blackberry Bold and has published his works on such Blogs as Blue Monster, Indelible Pink, and Scatterplot.

Generation Gulp

Overheard

I'm in the check out line behind a young fellow, I'd say about 19 years old, who is purchasing a set of ping pong balls and a large number of plastic cups. Attempting to make conversation, the cashier, who I'd place at the young-grandmother age, says, "Wow, you guys sure like to play a lot of ping-pong!"

Refuting my assumption that this was a generational communication disconnect, Jay Leno last night had a video of someone's grandmother playing beer pong. Much to my surprise, the miracle of Youtube reveals that this game is becoming quite the pastime amongst the elderly. Shuffle board maker stock is in the toilet as a result.