Schierer Space

As seen on actual ESD^[1] mandatory training material (emphasis mine):

“Static electricity is a simple form of electrical energy. Every time you walk across a carpet, touch a doorknob, and get a spark it’s because you were splitting electrons. When you move, you generate an excess of either positive or negative charges on your body. Upon touching something conductive, the excess electrons are trying to find an electron of the opposite charge in order to neutralize themselves. So, an imbalance in electrons creates a difference in potential, which may cause an ESD event that may cause damage to circuitry.”

This is so fundamentally wrong it just hurts my brain. First off, in the Standard Model of elementary particles, electrons are indivisible. Even if you could split them, doing so by casually walking across a carpet would result in a significant release of energy. (Note, the annihilation of a single electron would be essentially unnoticeable from an energy release perspective, but if it happened as easily as simply walking across a carpet, we would have serious problems.) The amount of charge one can feel dissipating on a doorknob is on the order of 10^18 electrons. If they were really combining with “electrons of the opposite charge” (aka positrons… or antimatter electrons) this would result in a significant antimatter explosion. Something on the order of 100-200 kilojoules. Enough to heat about 40 kilograms of water one degree. Or for the 10 grams in the tip of your finger… pretty much vaporization. (Somebody please check my math on that.) Regardless… ouch.

I sent a correction. I’ll be interested to see how well received it is.

1. That’s ElectroStatic Discharge for you non-technical acronym types. [↩]

Just like last year, the Rosamond Gifford Zoo is running their winter at the zoo photo contest. The pictures have to be taken in January, and for somewhat obvious reasons we didn’t make too many trips to the zoo this month!
We did manage to get out on January 16th, and for some unknown reason it took me until today to process the images.

With only one trip, I wasn’t particularly blown away by any of the images. You can see the class of the pictures from the trip in the 2010 Winter at the Zoo gallery.

Here are the two I submitted and the runner-up I chose not to. Was there another in the gallery that’s your favorite?

Another tough day

Wading in the sunlight

Runner Up: Thoughtful

K & R are doing great. K is pretty much full mobility, but perhaps moving a little slower than she otherwise might. I expect that will be true for quite a while yet. She complains occasionally of joints “moving back where they used to be”.
R is sleeping in longer stretches and is generally pretty mellow. It’s a simple life: eat, sleep, cry until you can eat again.

Here are some more pics to help you through the day…

Although we don’t keep our house very cold in the winter, it is chilly for a baby. Here’s an example of how R copes with that.

People say all babies look like Winston Churchill. For some reason this shot invokes more of a James T. Kirk for me.

Life is tiring when you’re ten (days):

More pics (including baby hands and little lambs) in the gallery.

We’ll be doing pictures with “Mousie” this time.

Bonus awake picture to show you how dark colored her eyes are.

Sleeping in the hospital:

Sleeping at home:

Hands, nose and toes:

Big brother:

K tries to get a picture of R sleeping on my chest…

Of course she starts crying…

Shhhhh….

Now what?

As always, more pics in the 1st month gallery.

As I will no doubt have my blogging license revoked soon for failing to post cat pictures, here are a series capturing the reactions of our feline family members:

The first time Rachel cried loudly:

A direct inspection. (They’re braver than last time, I don’t think they came out of the basement for several days after Nate’s homecoming.)

(This pic also shows the modern Mom’s accessories on the night stand: iPod touch for feeding and diaper log^[1], water bottle, lotions, cloth diaper as accessory rag, etc.)

Shadow doesn’t seem to approve:

The cats are missing sleep also:

K says that last shot is dying for a Cheezburger caption.

1. Yes, there’s an app for that. Several actually. One for contraction timing also. [↩]

Our beautiful daughter has arrived. Here are some pictures to hold you over. She was born at 10:43PM and weighed in at a mere eight and a half pounds.

Rachel was a little purple to start, but pinked up quickly. A full head of curly hair, and has already had her first meal. Mom was a little beat up along the way (about like last time), but is in good spirits and is snuggling with our little girl (who apparently has decided to round out her dinner with dessert).

K’s been on the IV for about 10 hours now, and is now also on an epidural. She’s getting some much needed rest. Stay tuned!

K has been admitted for induction… so it’s eviction time for the Little Miss.

We’ll keep you posted.

Some friends of mine have recently taken the plunge into the world of digital SLR cameras. For those who aren’t sure if they really want to go there, please take a look at my dated but still relevant series on choosing a digital camera.

For those of you who have that new shiny complicated D-SLR, here are few pieces of advice in approximate order of importance. Most of them involve buying stuff (of course!) so the approximate damage to your budget is given. This is probably going to get long, so here’s a summary list and the fold.

1. Take some pictures. ($0)
2. Always use the camera strap. ($0)
3. Get extra media. ($10-30)
4. Get an extra battery. ($30-50)
5. Buy a UV filter for your lens. ($10-30)
6. Make sure to backup your images. ($30-50)
7. RTFM (more than once!) ($0)
8. Get a bigger bag than you think you’ll need. ($30-75)
9. Take a class and/or do some research. ($0-100)
10. Get decent editing software. ($0-350)
11. Accessorize! ($25-2500)

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