Of Football, Nuclear Physics, and Children

The US football season is almost here! Do y'all know how excited I am?

Here's a clue. Think of the distance between a proton and a neutron^[1] in a helium atom. That distance is much bigger than my excitement.

 

NOTES
[1] This assumes a simplistic view of a proton and neutron as if they were, indeed, simple physical particles with fixed, measurable surfaces.^[2] The reality, of course, is that each of these is more like a three year old's birthday party, made up of an indeterminate number of children powered by fusion reactors and exhibiting random velocity Brownian motion, sometimes moving completely through walls as if said walls were not there, and into the neighbor's yard, the middle of the street, or the swimming pool two blocks away.
[2] Yes, you may assume that I generally find science (and children) infinitely more exciting than most team sports.

R.I.P., Scourge of the Net

Years ago, when the net was very young, before there was a world wide web, there was usenet.

Out at the far end of usenet, intended as a walled off ghetto, there was a rather bizarre hangout called, fittingly, talk.bizarre, or tDOTb. The people who set it up saw it as Obi Wan saw Mos Eisley- a wretched hive of scum and villainy. We simply saw it as home. We ranged from people who fit no mold, to people who broke molds (seldom on one another's heads), to people who smelled like mold, to people who ate mold.

It was fun. It was weird. It was brilliant. It was creative. It was stupid. It was a lifeline. And sometimes it was brutal.

Most of the brutality wasn't that brutal and was aimed at stupidity. But occasionally (as can happen anywhere) someone with serious problems showed up.

One college student (let's call him Kltpzyxm^[1]) in particular stood out. Kltpzyxm came off as a troll, but over time he managed to make a lot of other trolls look good. He could be brilliant and witty, but he could also be nasty. He loved to play games; he would start acting nice to you, maybe even email you and draw you in, then stab you in the eye with an ant-covered stick.

And not just in talk.bizarre. He did this in respectable groups as well, where people innocently discussed things that mattered to them.

Kltpzyxm apparently went on to have a successful life in the real world. He married and had kids. He dropped off the radar.

He recently drowned off the coast of Hawaii.

From what I hear third hand, he was probably a good husband and dad. I hope so. I hope his family has good memories.

How do the people of tDOTb remember Kltpzyxm? (These are the short versions, not the actual quotes.)

• "Kltpzyxm tried to get me banned from the systems I posted on [over something ridiculously innocuous -ed]"
• "Kltpzyxm tried to get me fired."
• "Kltpzyxm publicly attacked my family and me on my wedding day."
• "Kltpzyxm made false accusations to my department head and nearly ruined my academic career."

(There was also the endless, day to day nastiness that grates on the nerves.)

Yes, those quotes are truly representative of how he acted. People reached out, tried to help him. He played nice til they believed he was changing. Then he whipped out the ant-covered skewer. As NJ summed it up on the Facebook tDOTb page:

"My recollection of him is as a progenitor of the Internet troll, and his legacy in that regard is well-represented on 4chan and in Gamergate. I assume, or perhaps merely hope, that his family and friends experienced some brighter side of him than he chose to present in his youth, and that their memories of him are fonder than ours."

Life isn't about leaving a legacy, but we all leave one. Hopefully there is far more to him than this, but this is the part of his legacy I know first hand (I remember when the incidents referenced above were happening).

I don't wish death on anyone, much less for a family to go through this.

I'm sad- for him and for his family. But to be honest... I don't miss him. I hope the guy I knew died a long time ago and a much nicer guy emerged as Kltpzyxm. I hope he left a much better legacy than the one the tDOTb community knows.

 

1. Bonus points to anyone who gets the reference!

Could tonight get any worse?

Some of my friends and family tend toward the dramatic. Almost three years ago one of them posted on Facebook, "Could tonight get any worse?" While I realized their pain was real, I was able to look more at the forest than the saplings.

Yes. You could wake up in a tub of ice to find that your kidneys were intact but someone had tattooed "I am da BOMB" on your belly in highly reflective paint. You would be arrested any time you tried to fly.

Yes. You could wake up in a tub of ice to find that your kidneys were intact but someone had replaced your skeletal system with cheap, imitation Silly Putty[tm] (adding insult to injury).

Yes. You could wake up in a tub of ice to find that your kidneys were intact but someone had replaced your right foot with a second left foot, making dancing awkward.

Yes. You could wake up in a tub of ice.

It could pretty much always be worse.

But it almost never is.

Made in Japan in 1972 (in Texas (Today))

I'm not usually a music critic (though I played one in college for the Georgia Tech "Technique"). I would much rather find something I like and simply listen to it and ignore what I don't like. But every once in a while circumstances lead me to listen critically. Today you are blessed or cursed (depending on your viewpoint) with the results of such a confluence of events. (I have now met my quota of big words for this blog.)

Deep Purple's Made in Japan was released in the US a year after Machine Head provided them a breakthrough hit with the much played and much maligned "Smoke on the Water". By all accounts at the time the band was appalled that this song was their biggest hit. I always attributed Blackmore's less than stellar treatment of it on Made in Japan to this. Some sources now insist that Ritchie defended the song. I just know the guitar on this live version doesn't inspire me the way the album version does, and there are places he's much sloppier than anywhere else on this record. That said, I still love this version.

There are a couple of other things that keep this from being the perfect live album. The drum solo in "The Mule" goes on way too long. Gillan's vocals are a bit off in places on "Space Trucking" but the sheer energy helps make up for that.

Speaking of "Space Trucking" it's the longest song on an album drenched in ten minute songs, clocking in at just under twenty minutes, wandering between the roots of speed metal, thrash, and ... cello? I don't know how Blackmore got the cello sound, but it's brilliant.

I do have two more complaints. They're rather modern and absurd, but here they are:

• It should be longer (it was already a fairly long, double album).
• I really wish for video (apparently there isn't any).

As usual these guys play together as a phenomenal band, not just a bunch of great musicians. There are only a handful of bands I really kick myself for not seeing back in the day. These guys are at the top of the list for me, even ahead of Led Zepplin, Pink Floyd, and the Rolling Stones.

I don't know that I could pick a favorite track here. I suppose "Child in Time" and "Lazy" might have a slight edge. I do know this is one of my top ten live album picks. I can't narrow it down much more than that because I really suck at lists. It's right up there near Blue Oyster Cult's On Your Feet or On Your Knees and the Allman Brothers' Live at Fillmore East. That means it's in my top twenty album picks overall (probably still in the top ten as I tend to favor live albums).

What is/are one/some of your favorite live albums, and why?

Riffing on the Past That Wasn't There

You're at a vow renewal where your spouse knows the bride, but you know no one other than a couple of people sitting on the bride's side. Well, and your spouse. At the reception a videographer asks if you have anything you'd like to say to the bride and groom.

Your spouse, knowing the bride and being a really great person, comes up with something sweet and adds a cool blessing. It's your turn.

The obvious thing- at least if you are me- is to just be honest:

"Hey, I don't know either one of you, but that was a great wedding. Thanks for inviting us, and thanks especially for the fajitas and cake!"

On the plus side it's honest. On the minus side it comes off rather cynically.

But if you're me then your creative side takes over; you riff and create a memory. After adding a little bit of a blessing, you gaze off into the painful, invented past, and you speak:

"I think my favorite memory of you two is the time we went zip lining. I fell and broke my leg. I waited and waited for you to come help but it was three days before anyone showed up; I almost died. Then I found out you two were so in love that you suddenly had to have a second honeymoon. I couldn't fault you for that. Y'all rock."

P.S. This is all true. Welcome to my life.

Conspiracy Theory #17: Ugly Cars and Stupid Names

It has been clear for years that the bean counters in the US auto industry successfully banished all the better stylists and brought in surplus Soviet designers who had been locked away in prison because their designs were marginally less boring and ugly than what the party leaders wanted.

While the bean counters did plenty of damage elsewhere, boring cars didn't help flagging sales at all. Some of these cars made me want to claw my eyeballs out. The recent spate of muscle cars shows at least a partial reversal of this trend.

Since the early 1970s, the Mustang just got more and more boring. Someone screwed up in the early 1990s and made one that was almost cool looking, Ford sort of fumbled forward, gradually doing a better job, finally unveiling the current herd of really nice looking Mustangs. These in turn got a response from Chevy and Dodge, who brought out gorgeous Camaros, Chargers, and Challengers. The new Shelby Mustang (despite the fact that Carroll Shelby is dead) looks like it should be a thing of beauty, something car lovers might drool over.

Only time will tell whether this trend will spread throughout the industry.

In related news, who comes up with new car names? There are a lot of really bad or just silly car names out there, but the US Big Three aren't as bad as some of the other companies. The award for Worst Name of 2014 has to go to Hyundai for...

(drum roll, please!)

the IQ.

Seriously. I can only assume this is their take on the SMART Car (a dismal failure in these parts). All I can think of is Thor looking at someone trying to get him into this car.

"Your IQ. It's so... tiny."

And then Hulk accidentally stepped on it because it was so small he didn't see it.

"Look, brother!" Loki laughed. "Someone had a smaller IQ than the beast!"

Hulk stepped on Loki next but not by accident. "Puny god. Puny IQ."

Thanksgiving Letter for my Nuclear Family

I'm a family kinda guy. So every once in a while, I get all mushy and write a serious letter to my friends on the net about some sugary, Disneyesque kinda thang that happens at a family get together. This is one of those sentimental, nuclear family kinda thangs.

---

To my fiends (but not my enemas):

Just thought I'd share my Thanksgiving Day with you.

It started by me being hit by a quark just as I was getting out of bed. A large, very green, and not-too-theoretical one. No strings attached, as far as I could tell. It had to happen on a holiday, when I'm off work anyway, right?

It hit me right in the solar plexus, breaking several ribs and tearing some ligaments. So, instead of spending the day with my family, I was in the Emergency Room of the Georgia Tech Particle Physics Lab.

I was on the phone about noon with my brother Dave (# 381), who said that nearly everyone said to say hi. I should tell you we are the quintessential nuclear family. There were supposed to be 3 more people here this year than last year (235 by count), as we had 3 new additions to the family. I was the only one not making it.

As a PhD probed my chest cavity with a helium-filled sphere, and a masters-level co-ed stopped my bleeding, Dave described the scene. He said that the more people got there, the livelier things got. Everyone seemed to just glow. The place had gotten so hot with all the family there, that even with the windows open and the whole house fan on, sucking 35 degree air through, the walls were starting to discolor.

I heard a kid in the background scream, "Aunt Bertha's finally here!" Dave said, "Well, that's everyone but you..." I started to reply, when I heard Aunt Bertha's laugh drift through the phone. I could easily visualize the scene - all of them crammed in the giant basement we had finished as 1 big room just for this occasion, all my family, including surviving cousins, nephews, etc - anyone left from the old days in Hiroshima, Nagasaki, and Alamogordo - the Curies, the Raydons, the Pleughtohniums. The phone started to buzz, and I heard hollering and apparent pandemonium. The only phrase I could make out was Dad yelling something that sounded like "critical mass", when with a loud noise, the phone went dead.

Every light in the building went out. A couple of seconds later, the building felt like it was in an earthquake. Right after that, the sound of a terrific explosion shook us again. One of the attending EEs ran outside to look, and came running back in a moment later, describing a mushroom cloud off to the northwest. I alone knew the exact location.

Later I found out it was a small blast, taking out only 3 blocks, although a somewhat larger area still glows softly at night. I will visit there as soon as I am able, to leave some flowers, if they survive the hike in.

The co-ed with the tourniquet around my heart touched my face gently and asked, "What's wrong? Why are you crying?"

"Because I'll never get to taste the new pumpkin pie recipe Aunt Bertha was going to bring!", I sobbed.

I was wrong. Later, one of the profs brought me some glowing orange stuff he had found outside. It was delicious. Meanwhile, I have proposed to the co-ed (her name is Linda), and we will be married in a month.

I can hardly wait. In just a quarter of a century or so, there might be enough of us to start having these family reunions again.

Happy Thanksgiving from me & the rest of the turkeys@Roadkills-R-Us

 

Copyright 1988, 1994, 2014 Miles O'Neal, Austin, TX. All rights reserved.