Need band members

We are looking for a couple of guitarists and a percussionist. The band is a spectroscopy themed band. Experience in spin physics is required. We welcome solution and solid state spectroscopists with open arms. Ability to write NMR themed songs is a plus. A few possible names for the band are below. Please contribute suggestions:

1. The Hard Pulse
2. The Hartmann Hahn Condition
3. Fermi's Golden rule
   

Things to do at your thesis defense

This is the first of what will hopefully turn into a series and bring me the kind of fame which has so far eluded me, in spite of me being a fifty feet tall firebreathing dragon with an elven blade in my right hand, and a Shigemi tube in my left hand. Wearing RayBans. And a three wolf moon tee-shirt.

Anyhoo, the list follows: please add to it as you see fit.

1. Begin every third sentence with the phrase 'according to the prophecy'
2. Respond to questions with a full throated 'you want the truth? YOU CAN'T HANDLE THE TRUTH!'
3. Rap out the thesis defence
4. Liberal use of jazz hands
5. Employ a mariachi band to provide accompaniment to the more intricate points of string theory/hard condensed matter/large protein studies
6. Invite Robert De Niro as your 'special friend'. Failing that, Jack Nicholson. NOT EDWARD NORTON. NOT UNDER ANY CIRCUMSTANCES.
7. Spike the coffee
8. Have a friend dressed in a dark suit sitting near the back of the room taking down the names of people who come to the defense. Start a rumour that he is from Homeland Security/MI5/IB/BfH/Mossad/FSB/whichever security-intelligence agency calls the shots in your part of the world
9. Reward your thesis committee members with candy for asking particularly tough questions
10. Ask Jon Stewart to introduce you
    

Explaining the wurlde, one Venn diagram at a time: a Michael Bay film

Quantum LolCat

This is why I louvv reddit soo much!!

A random open Thanksgiving invitation leading to a discussion about marinading people and gay Mormons...

Webcomic

Nandi sent me this.. check out.. a good take on physicists..

Young Sethu's research experience in haiku

I am a champ at PCR
My vision in science ranges far, really far.
RNA spectroscopy lies in the depths of my soul
While working late nights, I listen to rock and roll.

And the other major elekshun issue is...

Cow abductions! Again, I have not heard anything from either of the two presidenshial candidates about their commitment to dealing with this issue. I mean, I understand that there is some governmental attenshun being focussed on this matter, but the people involved have their own issues to deal with...

And then again, cows are sacred to some people and lunch for others. Cows are important. As this video shows.

The elekshun and possibilities of a zombie apocalypse

The most important issue in this elekshun is being totally ignored. And that is making me angry. So, no beating about the bush...

SENATORS MCCAIN AND OBAMA, DO YOU HAVE A STRATEGY FOR DEALING WITH A ZOMBIE APOCALYPSE?

Why don't people realize that this should be on everyone's mind? We need political leaders who can step up and keep a cool head in case of crises and I am not talking about something like a wimpy thermonuclear faceoff. What if, and no sniggers here, the dead come back to life and do a walkie? Are we prepared to deal with shite like that? Methinks, given our current state of preparedness, or lack thereof.. no. I mean, it could happen. Like, tonight. And if it did, then somethings would look different. Such as these.

But, the main thing is stay cool and elect leaders who will take us through without too much damage. Leaders like Shaun. Perhaps limited to a few melted Cornettos.

PS- thanks to people unknown for borrowed images.

Funny presidential candidates

Obama

McCain

Thanks to CNN

Explaining the wurlde, one Venn diagram at a time

Totally awesome shite!

The New Yorker faces off against XKCD in this epic, titanic, magnificent comic off!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Liff, work and other things...

So, being guilty of drunk dialing people on (rare) occasion, I was at the receiving end of things for once. My friends at Chicago were all getting hilariously wasted and letting me know. While, of course, I was at lab working (Friday night, sigh).

Getting back home on Friday night can be a pain. The buses are full of partying (read drunk) undergrads. And if your luck truly runs out, you will be sitting or standing right next to a drunk who will then proceed to puke his/her guts out all over you.

The driver was a sport. The bus was kinda crowded. (When I say crowded, I mean US crowded, not Gariahat Jn on a weekday rush hour crowded.. that would simply kill people here.) He pulled over in front of the undergrad dorm and we hear his disembodied voice on the PA "Here we are. Home of fine living and elegant dining". That provoked a derisive roar from everyone.

Meanwhile, I was being eyeballed by this trio of kids, one desi, one Chinese and one American. And they wanted to know if I was drunk. And if not, what was I doing so late on campus. I told them that I was a grad student. They rolled their eyes and expressed deep sympathies. Then made some smart aleck comments about Maxwell's equations (they turned out to be engineers). I watched for a while as their conversation veered towards greater and greater inaccuracy and then gently stepped in, entirely in the interests of electrodynamics and straightened things out.

Finally, on the leg home, the bus mostly empty, the driver opined that 9 out of 10 times, it was some girl who hurled in his bus. He shook his head philosophically and said that in 35 years of his driving, that was the way it was. Words of wisdom.

Random conversations

Overheard on a bus returning from campus

A: What do you think about deer meat?
B: Deer meat is great. But I love beef jerky.
A: Yeah, I had this piece of deer meat that my friend gave me this summer. It's been sitting in the back of my freezer, wrapped in a newspaper or something.
B: You should marinate it. Or maybe cook a steak. But you know what tastes really great? Beef jerky.
A: What would you marinate it with?
B: Aaaah, barBQ sauce, I guess, maybe some herbs. But beef jerky tastes so much better. I have my own recipe for making beef jerky.

Aaahhhh.. Friday night

And here we are, still stuck in lab, looking at an evening and a weekend of work ahead. Not complaining, mind it. But surely there is an alternate reality where I would be going home at this time to nice food, pakodas' perhaps, maybe a hot cuppa Daarjeeling and a GoldFlake? Oh yeah, THAT reality. Never was going to work out, was it? I spent most of today at a protein sciences seminar, and then coding my way through some AA sequences. Someone must have done this, its just that I don't know where to find it. Did I mention that I dislike coding? There is sooo much more to life. Like reading HG Wells, for example. I finished his 'Imperialism and the Open Conspiracy' a few days ago. Amazing how he anticipated much of the EU today. Also Amitava Ghosh. 'Countdown' is well written.. but it is mostly a knee jerk Indian lefty intellectual turning a Nelsons' eye to larger realities. What was that shite about India and China never having any disputes? Has the man heard of Arunachal Pradesh?

Anyways, so me back again to work (and play), and this line cam to my attenshun which I decided to share with you...

Sometimes, though, late at night, I would think again of vim.

And since you obviously must read the article it came from, here it is.

And then for my "achiever" friends, the proponents of Dudeism, this discussion of how the Big Lebowski has transcended space and time to become something beyond mere cinema is worth checking out.

When parking a car is too difficult...

This is what happens....

LHC particle physics rap...

Yeah, this is an awesome rap song which apparently walked out of CERN and has been wandering around the Net.. shite it gave me a review of my particle physics class in 4ish minutes!!

Links to mp3, lyrics and more awesome shite is here.

More webcomics and crazy shite!

Link here to yet another webcomic called Apathy Adventures!
Meanterwhilste, the Awesome Planet link is right here.. and anytime you want to see 15 funny signs, enter here.

Aaaand a brand new webcomic!

About amazing superpowers!!

Safecracker in shorts

So we legged it up the crooked steps into the hotel lobby. Or what looked like a lobby. We, I may point out is the esteemed big sis, henceforth referred to as S and yours truly. We carried between us, a backpack, a camera bag and a fookin' huge Samsonite suitcase with a combination lock. I lugged the suitcase through the confusion of Frankfurt's Hahn airport, through the greater confusion of Rome's Ciampiano airport and down a shady side alley where the cobblestones were pockmarked with small treacherous craters. Fookin' cobblestones!! Now I should really explain my resentment at them cobblestones.... back in India, which is home for me, one never drags one's suitcase along the road. You get a rickshaw or something which helps.. and is never super expensive. In the US, on the other hand due to the pervasive strength of the ADA, you can drag anything with wheels. Anywhere!

Add to that the minor complication that one day before flying out from Detroit, I had taken a tumble down the stairs at home and had a badly sprained ankle. More fun!! Anyway, we found ourselves in the hotel lobby and face to face with .. a pheun. Very surreal. One might even suspect that the Wachowski brothers had something to do with this. I pick up the pheun and after some time am directed by this disembodied voice to get my arse up to the fourth floor. Well, as S and me are hauling our gear into the tiny contraption that passes for a lift, this bloke with long graying hair squeezes his arse into the lift. I glare. He smiles back.

We finally make it, via much creaking and clanking of fairly ancient machinery to the fourth floor, where as it happens, said long hair is our night manager. Having signed in and collected our keys, we get to the dorm and prepare to doss down. The loo (unisex) is, thankfully clean; and also thankfully populated by a couple of fairly good-looking birds, who, less thankfully are of the giggling persuasion. Sod.

I lock up my passport, money and stuff in the suitcase and crash for the night, my camera bag snug against my feet. In the morning I am woken up by the big sis and grab a quick cuppa from a conveniently located vending machine. And then promptly discover that somehow the combination lock refuses to budge. Sod. 999 combinations to run through… but the lock has the proverbial steely glint where it would have eyes, had it been human. This was not planning to open up. After ranting and WTFing around in my shorts for a while, I realize the desperation of the situation. All my money, my passport, my fookin’ toothbrush, for crying out loud, kept from me by a couple of centimeters of thermopolymer and steel! And my clothes. Bereft clothes, a man has no dignity. I mentally see myself explaining myself to a cop or a Samsonite repairman in what is basically my undies’ and I shudder. Big sis, quite sensibly has kept a change of clothing handy and is not in the quagmire I find myself in.

Finally, I decide to leg it up to the fourth floor where the somewhat bleary eyed night manager is negotiating with some random blonde. And I ask, very politely for a crowbar. The night manager gives me the once over. Bleary eyed, unshaven, bloke in his undies. Asking for a crowbar. With commendable restraint; he enquires as to the purpose. With equal restraint, aplomb even, I explain. Brief silence. Finally something falls into place and he recognizes me as the bloke from last night. And recognizes further, the desperation not quite hidden away behind the aplomb. In undies, I might add. And offers me the biggest fookin’ screwdriver and what looks like a Grenadier’s entrenching tool. I thank him from the bottom of my heart and return.

Now begins the process of safecracking. I imagine Richard (Feynman) would have a lot to say about my lack of expertise. But I got it, finally.. I managed to jimmy the damn lock open. This event was recorded for posterity by the sis. The lock, of course refused to work any further. So we decided to grab all the valuables and keep them on our persons. Anyone interested in sniffing old socks was welcome to. And then, we went to see the Colosseum.