A week in time passed...

I just realized I hadn't posted for almost a week.

Jesus, was I really that busy?

The answer is yes. Work was very demanding last week. We had a user's group meeting, which, in addition to being very productive and enlightening, was also a lot of fun in that we spent two evenings on the town "entertaining" on the company dime. Lots of good food for no personal expenditure is always a good thing.

Plus, because some folks were in class, I worked a couple of late shifts, which basically just threw my body clock completely off-kilter, which is also why I'm sitting here at the computer at 1:30 a.m.

Hopefully, if I go to bed now and force myself to get up and six in the morning for my "regular" routine, tomorrow night I'll be so exhausted I won't have any trouble going to bed at a decent hour and falling asleep.

Ciao for now. More tomorrow (today?)

More Humor

This is supposedly a true story, however, I have no way of verifying that.

Thermodynamics of Hell

The following is an actual exam question given on a University of Washington chemistry mid term. The answer by one student was so "profound" that the professor shared it with colleagues, via the Internet, which is, of course, why we now have the pleasure of enjoying it as well.

Bonus Question: Is Hell exothermic (gives off heat) or endothermic (absorbs heat)? Most of the students wrote proofs of their beliefs using Boyle's Law, (gas cools off when it expands and heats up when it is compressed) or some such variant.

One student, however, wrote the following:

"First, we need to know how the mass of Hell is changing in time. So we need to know the rate that souls are moving into Hell and the rate they are leaving.

I think we can safely assume that once a soul gets to Hell, it will not leave. Therefore, no souls are leaving.

As for how many souls are entering Hell, let's look at the different religions that exist in the world today. Some of these religions state that if you are not a member of their religion, you will go to Hell. Since there are more than one of these religions and since
people do not belong to more than one religion, we can project that most souls
go to Hell.

With birth and death rates as they are, we can expect the number of souls in Hell to increase exponentially.

Now, we look at the rate of change of volume in Hell because Boyle's Law states that in order for the temperature and pressure in Hell to stay the same, the volume of Hell has to expand proportionately as souls are added.

This gives two possibilities:

1. If Hell is expanding at a slower rate than the rate at which souls enter Hell, then the temperature and pressure in Hell will increase until all Hell breaks loose.

2. If Hell is expanding at a rate faster than the increase of souls in Hell, then the temperature and pressure will drop until Hell freezes over. So which is it?

If we accept the postulate given to me by Teresa during my Freshman year, "...that it will be a cold day in Hell before I sleep with you.", and take into account the fact that I still have not succeeded in having that event take place, then, #2 cannot be true,
and thus I am sure that Hell is exothermic and will not freeze."

The student received the only "A" given.

A general update...

I'm still such a slacker. I've been moving toward opening my web site on June 25, but no where near as quickly as I should be. Last week was just unbelievably busy, and basically, I'm exhausted, my sleep schedule is off-kilter and I'm in a grumpy mood. I overslept my alarm this morning, and didn't wind up getting up until 9:30 a.m. (I know all you night owls think that this is still extremely early, however, it meant missing IHOP this week). I managed to roll out of bed and make it to Costco by about 10:15 a.m., where I proceeded to find lots of things that I wanted to buy that I can't afford right now. Oh, I could probably afford them, but I really need to start thinking about saving my down payment for a house. I want to buy a house or at least land by the time I'm 45.

Anyway, back to the web site. I bought a CD-labeler called the CDStomper. Dunno why, just did. I realized I still don't have any of my web-authoring programs reloaded to this PC, and I don't exactly know why other than I'm just still slack. I really need to feel creative this coming week (June 25 will be here before I know it), but for me, creativity requires sleep, and I haven't been getting much of that.

I have managed to do laundry and clean the cat box today as well, so it's not a complete loss. Later, I'm meeting my friend Carol for a late lunch/early dinner (3:30 p.m.) and we're going to check out the Mexican restaurant that just opened in the Kroger shopping center. Afterwards I'll do my grocery shopping if it's not too insane.

I just feel so scattered right now. Most of the people I work with think I push myself too hard. And I know Clint always felt that I did as well. I was much more relaxed when we lived together, mostly because he made me go out and socialize instead of sit here around the house and work on the computer. I miss him a lot. I think I can honestly say I'm no longer in love with him, except as a friend. That's all it ever should have been anyway, but sometimes hormones get in the way of your best judgment, you know?

I'm just very thankful that he realized that our friendship was more important than anything else, and put up with me as I adjusted to living with him platonically as a roommate. I think the fact that we continued to live together for three years says a lot about the strength of our friendship. He's coming down next weekend for my birthday celebration.

A word about the birthday celebration. I was planning on "falling off the wagon" after 12 years of sobriety just to ring in my 40th. I've decided that its a bad idea. I have to remember what got me to where I am now, and remember that "once a drunk, always a drunk." That first drink is always the worst, because it usually leads to another. I can stand here and say that I don't think I'm still addicted to alcohol like I was in my early 20s, but "denial" is not just a river in Egypt.

::shrug:: And, I guess part of the reason I don't feel very festive is that no one seemed interested in coming to my BBQ anyway. Everyone that is attending is a friend of Mark's or his roommate Rex. Granted, some of those folks I know... but of the people that I invited, I think that Clair and Clint are the only people planning on attending on my behalf. So I'm going to call Mark and let him know I made other plans.

I'm hoping that if I change the agenda, a few more people can attend. I'm just going to see if a few people want to go out to dinner with me instead, and then come back over to the house to watch movies, etc. Hell, that's really more my style of an evening anyway. I don't know why I got a bug up my ass to do a huge party in the first place. I think it stems from never having had a birthday party my whole life. I got to thinking about it, and I guess I finally decided that it's pretty pathetic if you have to throw your own anyway... and people still don't want to come... so screw them. Now you all know why I'm such a hermit anyway. It keeps me from being depressed... it feeds my cynicism, but at least I'm not depressed.

Oh, and I suppose I should really use that LJ cut thingy to shorten the lengths of my posts.. but screw it... if you didn't want to read it, you shouldn't be on my friends list anyway.

Ciao for now.