The Physics of Physics

I've gotten many freaked out looks lately. Why, you ask? Well, I'm voluntarily taking a physics class. The first week of the semester I had a class be cancelled. (The first time I've ever had a class cancelled.) It was a video editing class and the main reason it got cancelled was there weren't enough students taking it. Shocker.

I only need two more generals: an art class and a science class. No art classes were being offered on Tuesdays and Thursdays, so science it was. Now, I'm a complete sucker for physics stuff. Not only do I love The Big Bang Theory, but I also loved The Elegant Universe. This is fascinating stuff that makes our world function the way it does. Galileo? Genius. Einstein? Ditto.

My professor signed an e-mail to me "Dr. G," so he's now known as Dr. Gravity and his syllabus was hand-written then xeroxed. I guess he couldn't find a mimeograph machine. (Yes, I know what they are...)

Since I started the class, I keep telling people that I, the English major, am taking a physics class just so I can watch the look that crosses their faces. It's a combination of "What the hell?" and "Is she drunk?"

I can't help it if I hear about the equation that "got us to the moon" and write exclamation points and smiley faces in the margin of my notes! It's a simple concept, but it sent us 250,000 miles away and got us back again!!! I'm getting all teary just thinking about it.

Don't hate me cause I'm a geek.

When I'm a Movie Critic...

There may be many movie/theatre critics out there who think they have a good method for determining what makes a "good" show. Well, here are two more.

Jennie and I decide how good something is by how much liquor you need to have ingested to enjoy yourself. For something like the first Pirates of the Caribbean movie you can have fun watching that movie stone cold sober. When I watched Fight Club I wished that I'd had a couple of beers to sip for the first half and a couple pints of everclear for the second half. Woah.

My mom and I know that we like something when we get in the car and say, "Didn't you love the part where..." The more of those moments we find and the longer we're talking about them, then the more we liked the movie.

After we saw the new Star Trek, we were oohing and aahing over it for days. I'm stilling oohing, but it's more internal now.

Note: this works just as well for theatre as it does for films.

Didn't you love that part where Spock turned down his admission into the Vulcan Science Academy and told the Vulcan elders to "Live long and prosper"? Yeah, me too!

You named your laptop?

My new laptop is named Cosmo.

Why? You ask.

It's bright red. Mum said it looked like cranberry juice. I said, "Like a Cosmopolitan?"

She agreed and then said something about Donald O'Connor in Singin' in the Rain.

I said Cosmo Red, rather than Cosmo Brown.

Yes, I'm a freak.

Bono in Your Face is a Good Thing

This past Tuesday, Agent J and Agent K (that's my friend Jennie and I) went all the way down to Jordan Commons to see U2 3D. My crazy friend Debbie saw it in L.A. and I've been trying to see it for a couple of years now. She got to go across the street and see it. Jennie and I drove for over an hour.


Now, being the obsessive person that I am, this seems perfectly normal. After all, Debbie and I took a day off work and spent the whole day in line to see U2 live at Arrowhead Pond in Anaheim on April 1, 2005. I missed a night of stage managing so I could go see these guys!

Anyway, U2 3D is a 3D Imax version of one of their concerts. I told my parents on Wednesday that it's like going to one of their concerts and sitting on the stage. It's loud and in your face and one of the coolest things I've ever seen. I can't remember the last time it only took $9.25 to make me so ridiculously happy for so long. Worth every penny!

I'm hoping to take my dear mummy back next month. I'm educating her musical tastes.

And, yes, I am a geek.

Friday Quote

For my mom's December tea, she's asking the invitees to bring a quote. You'd think this would be easy for me, being that I'm the Quote Queen, but it's actually pretty tough trying to decide which one would be best.

It can't be just any quote, either. It has to be a spoken quote. No thoughts or super cool descriptions allowed.

I've been looking at Shakespeare, Anne McCaffrey, Robin McKinley. All my usual standards. Nothing's jumping out.

I'm planning on re-reading Lord of the Rings and hoping for inspiration. Maybe Sherlock Holmes said something genius that I can borrow for an afternoon.

In the meantime, here's a Friday Quote for you. *Rifling through my memory*

"Few other griefs amid the ill chances of this world have more bitterness and shame for a man's heart than to behold the love of a lady so fair and brave that cannot be returned."
- The Return of the King, Aragorn

Just envision Viggo Mortensen saying this and it will fill your weekend with contentment.