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A couple of hours after I blew soap bubbles from the front landing as described in my previous post, I went back outside to sweep snow off the steps and walkway. To my surprise I found a pair of frozen soap bubbles on the edge of the landing:

(That’s hosted on flickr so you can click it to find a larger version.) It’s not a terribly good photo but it’s probably about the best I can do with the equipment I have. Trying to take a photo of a soap bubble in mid-air with a point-and-shoot camera, against a background of trees, houses, the sky and so forth is hard enough; imagine doing it with bulky gloves in sub-zero weather. Maybe I’ll try anyway, though. read more

It’s been cold here lately. Here’s a temperature graph for the last 24 hours:

Last winter I saw a photo somewhere on the web of a partially frozen soap bubble. This made me wonder how cold it has to be for soap bubbles to freeze in mid-air, so I bought a bottle of Super Miracle Bubbles at the grocery store. Immediately after that the weather warmed up and I didn’t get a chance to try the experiment.

This morning it was -3F (that’s -19C for those of you in countries with contemporary measurement systems) which seemed cold enough to be worth venturing out for the sake of scientific inquiry. This temperature seems to be right around the threshold: soap bubbles will freeze in mid-air, but they need some height to do it. It’s pretty remarkable when it works. The bubble will partly freeze and then break, leaving a portion of the sphere floating in the air like a tiny, iridescent, partially constructed Death Star. (Okay, that’s a strange simile, but isn’t that shot of the new Death Star in The Empire Strikes Back about the most memorable image of a partial sphere that you can think of?) Some of the pieces stayed intact after falling to the landing in front of our door and blew around in the air stirred up by my feet when I retreated from the cold. read more

We got the tree a little early this year. Widget loves Christmas trees and we rather doubt that she’s going to last until this year’s Christmas, so we thought that we’d try to give her something to enjoy in her remaining days (something in addition to the chicken, pork loin roast, deviled ham, etc. that we’ve been offering her to keep her eating, that is).

However, the kittens are a force to be reckoned with. When we first were introduced to Edwin at the animal shelter he distinguished himself by launching himself bodily into a fake potted plant, knocking it off the table it was sitting on. We figure that it’s entirely possible that he’ll attempt the same thing with a real tree, and now he’s substantially larger than he was then. We got a smaller tree than usual this year on the theory that we’ll try to limit the amount that they can destroy. We’ve had the tree for a few days and they haven’t done much with it yet other than nibbling a few needles from low branches. Next we’ll put some lights on it, and then try a few expendable ornaments some days after that. read more

You’ve probably never asked yourself, “gee, what are the sorts of things that get math and science geeks excited?” Regardless, an excellent example of one such thing is described here. That, folks, is some cool stuff.

Some years ago I posted this essay about being a kid in the mid-20th century, and reflected upon it later in this post. I think it’s a dreadful mistake that in an attempt to protect children from injury and disappointment we’re preventing them from learning skills with basic tools, learning how to explore without specific goals, learning how to deal with the unknown without fear, and learning how to overcome obstacles on their own. Hence I was both happy and sad when I ran across this video: read more

No, ExpandOS is not a new operating system. It’s a packing material system. (Okay, yes, you probably have to either be in the mail-order business or be slightly strange to get excited about packing material. I qualify on both counts.) We just found out about them because they were used to pack some printer ink cartridges which just arrived here. They’re little wedge-shaped things made from thin, folded cardboard. According to the ExpandOS web site, they consume 1/25 the volume of pre-expanded packing material. They’re made from 100% post-industrial waste and are reusable and recyclable. In other words, they appear to be what everyone should start using to replace EPS packing peanuts. read more

I realize that it’s been quite awhile since I’ve posted anything of note here. This post isn’t going to change that. It seems like there isn’t much in the way of noteworthy news, but here is some somewhat inconsequential news:

Widget is still with us, somewhat to our surprise. (That’s not inconsequential news, but it’s not really news as such either.) She took a sharp turn for the worse Friday before last. We got her into the vet that afternoon, where she received an injection of fluids since she was badly dehydrated. She hadn’t improved noticeably by the time we went to bed, but she seemed much better the next morning and improved steadily after that. It’s very much a day-by-day thing now, though. Day before yesterday she seemed to be slowing down again, but yesterday and today she seems to be doing fairly well. read more

Well, maybe not quite like nothing, but it does rather amaze me that it was 20 years ago today that the Berlin Wall came down.

Let me state up front that I generally think quite highly of United Parcel Service. They bring a lot of stuff to our front door and they almost always do it right. Hence I provide the following tracking record of a 2-Day Air shipment I received today (a day late) strictly for your amusement and not as an attempt to disparage UPS.

Yes, Dallas to Denver by way of Indianapolis, IN and Billings, MT. O-kay.

The official total accumulated snowfall figure for the storm was 22.3 inches. That’s a lot of snow, particularly if it falls within 24 hours or so. I’ve posted more photos here on my flickr site (same place as before).