Brown Things in Motion .. OR .. Why Gigantic Baboons Don’t Study Physics

Today I was reading an article in Wikipedia about something in physics called 'Brownian Motion'. Albert Einstein used it in 1905 to explain the existence of atoms. It has to do with the random movement of small visible objects being tossed about by collisions with smaller invisible things. Part way down through the article they give an example in terms of something on the scale of human beings. BUT before you read it (if you want to), notice how I highlighted the word 'balloon'? Well, it is much more entertaining if you read the same article and replace the word 'balloon' with the word 'baboon'. How do I know this? Because when I started reading the article, I had my glasses off and I read the word as 'baboon'. What? A 10 meter wide baboon? Imagine my confusion. Then after a few sentences I realized it said 'balloon', not 'baboon'. Then I realized I had accidentally merged the "ll" with the first "o" of balloon to get a second "b". Well, in fairness my eyes are "C/II". In Roman numbers that's 100 divided by 2.

So I decided to do a little experiment on my friend. I copied the paragraph into a text editor, and changed the 7 occurrences of balloon to baboon. Next, I had my scientific friend come read the paragraph.
I wait .....

No giggle.

Just a comment about how that was interesting and he walked away.
"What???? Didn't you find that funny?", I ask
And he came back and started reading it again, asking where the humor was. "You don't think a 10 meter (33 foot wide) baboon is funny?" He had read the 'baboon' as 'balloon' throughout the whole article.

We later came to the conclusion that we both have something very wrong with our brains but in the exact opposite direction. I told him the next time he goes to the zoo, tell your wife, "Look Honey, can I have a balloon?!?!?"

Brownian Motion from Wikipedia.com

(used with permission by the GNU Free Documentation License)

Consider a large balloon of 10 meters in diameter. Imagine this large balloon in a football stadium or any widely crowded area. The balloon is so large that it lies on top of many members of the crowd. Because they are excited, these fans hit the balloon at different times and in different directions with the motions being completely random. In the end, the balloon is pushed in random directions, so it should not move on average. Consider now the force exerted at a certain time. We might have 20 supporters pushing right, and 21 other supporters pushing left, where each supporter is exerting equivalent amounts of force. In this case, the forces exerted from the left side and the right side are imbalanced in favor of the left side; the balloon will move slightly to the left. This type of imbalance exists at all times, and it causes random motion. If we look at this situation from above, so that we cannot see the supporters, we see the large balloon as a small object animated by erratic movement.

My more interesting Brown-ian version:

Consider a large baboon of 10 meters in diameter. Imagine this large baboon in a football stadium or any widely crowded area. The baboon is so large that it lies on top of many members of the crowd. Because they are excited, these fans hit the baboon at different times and in different directions with the motions being completely random. In the end, the baboon is pushed in random directions, so it should not move on average. Consider now the force exerted at a certain time. We might have 20 supporters pushing right, and 21 other supporters pushing left, where each supporter is exerting equivalent amounts of force. In this case, the forces exerted from the left side and the right side are imbalanced in favor of the left side; the baboon will move slightly to the left. This type of imbalance exists at all times, and it causes random motion. If we look at this situation from above, so that we cannot see the supporters, we see the large baboon as a small object animated by erratic movement.

True Mrs. Adventures Explaining The Venture Brothers While Venturing

This is a true story, my thoughts during some of the moments and now as I write and recall (trip was Aug 10th, 2008 and wrote the next day, transferred from MySpace later).

So we are traveling to Amarillo on Sunday and I happen to use the word "minion" in my conversation with my wife and she asks me what that word means. I tell her the best example that I know is "Henchmen" from the animated series "The Venture Brothers". So I start telling her all about The Venture Brothers, some pretty wild outlandish things are tied up in all that animated violent funny for-adults-only series. I don't know if you have seen it or not, but after several minutes deep into my explanation/story, (don't worry, she is driving), I mention that I had forgot to tell her that the arch villain of Dr. Venture is named 'The Monarch', and that he and his henchmen wear butterfly costumes. AND THEN (after several minutes of telling her EXACTLY the total truth) she looks at me and grins "You're making up all this stuff off the top of your head, quit trying to fool me" (My wife just happens to wear a LOT of blouses with butterflies, I just now remember that and make a bit of a connection as to maybe why she thought I was kidding her)

Oh, I just cracked up laughing,

"Oh come on now, you really think I can make up this kinda crap right off the top of my head????"

Yes, was her reply. (I felt truly deeply honored at that moment)

NO HONEY, all this is true, someone really writes all this stuff AND alot more, trust me, it only gets stranger than this, we're only touching the surface of the Venture Brothers here. Oh, and there are actually TWO sets of Venture Brothers to confuse things.

A little while later I tell her I remember that The Monarch's girlfriend is named "Dr. Girlfriend" and she has this very deep voice, which I very poorly imitate. I do a much better 'Willie Nelson', or 'Elmer Fudd', or Elmer Fudd trying to sound like Willie Nelson when he sings. Heh heh heh heh heh heh (staccato)

When I got to Amarillo and told my younger son (a VentBrot watcher) this story, he just died laughing, and reassured his mother that whatever dad had said was all true.

Say VentBrot people, do you need a new/another writer?

The Past Tense of the Word ’Island’

So, there are just only so many funny things in the world, but it is a big number, a very big number. Here are two stories, old men stories, that happened to me within minutes of each other yesterday.

As I was leaving the groc store yesterday on the hunt for breakfast, a very ancient man walks into the store wearing a blue Tee shirt with these words in white:
" I am the kid your parents warned you about "

I found breakfast at MCD and had just started munching when two elderly men walked by, one I have seen every once in awhile for 20 some years and the other a stranger. We exchange a Texan 'howdy' between bites and they sit down 2 tables away. The one I barely know is loud and jovial, the other speaks quietly, mainly in questions.

Loud: "After we get finished here, I need to go to Radio Shack"
Quiet: "What are you going to buy there?"
Loud: "I am gonna get some diodes and resistors"
Quiet: "What are you going to do with them"
-Knowing what diodes and resistors are, I naturally think he is going to say something like "Work on my ham radio", but no.....
Loud: "I am going to make some jewelry for my grandchildren"

Wasland
That is my new word of the day. Its what you call an 'island' that has disappeared. It will probably appear on maps in the future;
global warming;
oceans rising,
places disappearing
beneath the waves,
land that was,
no longer is,
now waving

Froggie - The Forbidden Meat in the Garden of E-rnest-den

Not much of anything that is animal in nature lasts too long in my back yard. I have a doggie doomsday killing machine for anything that lurks too long. But my latest canine training technique of 'Froggies Are Our Friends' seems to be finally working. Instead of trying to kill them (but 'play' with them first, of course), Cooper will now just watch them hop across the patio. No paw action, but his ears do perk up. The other evening there was even a brief after dinner snack of wasp killing, exoskeleton crunching and eating two of them before I could snap my photo.

Most everything else is fair game including his favorite squeak toys 'Kiboko' and 'Elefante'. Notice that Elefante lost his ears a long, long time ago ...BUT Kiboko's ears must be made out of Kevlar and connected with superglue. Cooper really works hard at trying to rip them off, but no luck after several months.

(Those are stickers and dirt - so let's head to the pool, K & E)

The name Kiboko comes from the East African Kiswahili language for 'hippo'. Cooper loves his new (3rd) pool. The first two pools have suffered the ravages of UV radiation, soccer ball impacts, snow shovels, and the West Texas weather. The dog has actually been quite kind to his pool. He loves to walk in a circle around the inside perimeter sticking his head under the water while biting at it. I just ask him, "Wanna go get some salmon?" and make growling bear noises and slowly oscillate my head sideways. He just looks at me and then buries his head into the water and imitates my motions.

He NEVERS puts his backside into the water though. So for all the neighbor cats reading this right now, beware, or your ears may look like Elefante (or worse) some time soon.