Friday, November 17, 2023

Good morning. I hope you're ready to learn some stuff because today's issue is quite educational. We're going to dive deep into the following topics: cold war road trips, scientific theory, Japanese jazz/funk, tiny little guys, and of course enjoying music through touch and sight as well as sound. All good stuff. Let's go.

Item 1: a link

You may be wondering how an Allied traveler can safely drive across the Autobahn through East Germany and arrive in West Berlin. This is how:

Item 2: a list

Laws of Thermodynamics, ranked

1. Second Law of Thermodynamics: the state of entropy of the entire universe, as an isolated system, will always increase over time. Also, the changes in the entropy in the universe can never be negative. [very unfortunate]
2. First Law of Thermodynamics: energy can be converted from one form to another with the interaction of heat, work and internal energy, but it cannot be created nor destroyed, under any circumstances. [also pretty unfortunate]
3. Zeroth Law of Thermodynamics: if two systems are in thermodynamic equilibrium with a third system, the two original systems are in thermal equilibrium with each other. [duh]
4. Third Law of Thermodynamics: when we are considering a totally perfect (100% pure) crystalline structure, at absolute zero (0 Kelvin), it will have no entropy (S). Note that if the structure in question were not totally crystalline, then although it would only have an extremely small disorder (entropy) in space, we could not precisely say it had no entropy. [not sure why crystalline structures get a whole Law of Thermodynamics]

Item 3: a media recommendation

Item 4: word of the week

Homunculus

Reclaiming my time, I simply must object to my esteemed colleague's referring to me as "the wretched shriveled homunculus from the great state of Nevada".

Item 5: a photograph

"Rolly is a new style of music player that proposed the concept of enjoying music through touch and sight as well as sound. The palm-sized, egg-shaped body with no complicated switches or wiring, incorporates horizontal opposite-positioned stereo speakers, as well as a built-in flash memory and battery. This avoids the annoyance of electric power cables and allow users to carry it around to listen to music wherever they want. Operating buttons on the main body consist only of the power switch and play button. Song selection and sound level adjustment is done by moving the unit or rotating a part of it."

See ya!

Ya know what? Next Thursday is Thanksgiving in America so I'm giving myself a vacation. No Wolmania next week. I'll see you in December.