How To See A Mirage

What, you've never seen a mirage before? Fear not, they are actually not as incredibly rare as some may think. In fact, you might see one today if you know where to look!

Things You Will Need

• A hot, sunny day
• Protection from the sun
• A loooong stretch of road, preferably over a hill*
• A camera, if you're up to it

*Safety note - If you are on foot or on a bike, please please do not attempt to observe a mirage in traffic. You can get seriously hurt. It's best to choose an unused road, or better still, observe from inside a moving car while someone else is driving.

Steps

• 1. Go to the very end of your chosen area and stand facing it.
• 2. Make sure your observation spot is safe, i.e. devoid of traffic and other hazards.
• 3. Crouch down slowly, keeping your eyes on the stretch of road in front of you. At some point you will start to see wisps of grey stretching out horizontally. If there's a hill, just climb the hill from the other side, watching out for said phenomenon.
• 4. Adjust your height until the wispy lines develop into clear "reflections". They will resemble patches of water on the road.
• 5. Admire your mirage! (And take some snapshots if you have a camera handy.)

What you see is an inferior mirage, because the mirror image is under the original one. It is caused by light being bent by a layer of hotter air near the ground, and is actually due to refraction, not reflection. See the links for more on mirages.

How did I think of this? Well I see them every single day in summer. There's a hilly stretch of road on the way to school, so they dance into view whether I ask nicely or not. Guess it's a comfort of living in the subtropics.

Further Reading:

• Wikipedia: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mirage
• An Introduction to Mirages: http://mintaka.sdsu.edu/GF/mirages/mirintro.html

Umbrella Survey

It's been raining ever since we got back from the picnic. Not the heavy kind, more like a fine drizzle that goes on for ever and ever. It can drive one insane.

Anyway fearless people like us are unaffected by a bit of drizzle. We cycle every day to school, rain or none. So one arm has to do the job of holding up the umbrella. The question is, which one?

You'd think that would be easy. The stronger hand steers the bike while the weaker one does the easier job of brolly-holding...therefore most people should hold the umbrella in their left hands, right?

Think again.

According to a brief (and whimsical) survey conducted by me in the rain on Thursday 3rd of April during the lunch rush:

of the 94 people on bicycles holding an umbrella, 43 (45%) did so using their left hands, while 51 (55%) did so using their right hands.

That's almost neck-and-neck. Perhaps it matters so little that it's entirely up to statistics. In that case, I'd bet 50/50.

I'll put it up for further pondering.

---

For your information/curiosity: I hold mine in my right hand.

And yes, I DO do such weird things on impulse.

Fireworks in Zero G

...'Fireworks Theory', which suggested that the universe began as a geometrical point, a 'primeval atom', which burst into glory and had been moving apart ever since...

- A Short History of Nearly Everything, P173

Having read this I started to imagine how fireworks would behave under zero gravity conditions.

Since there would be no gravity to pull the sparks into a downward curve, they would radiate out from the intial point, like spikes on a sea urchin. (not considering the force from ejecting it out in the first place)

And if a lone firework was ignited in a vast space of vacuum in 0G, then the sparks would travel outward for ever and ever...expanding the boundary at incredible rates.

So much for the Big Bang!

A Short History Of Nearly Everything

Why is it that progress can sit in constipation for aeons...then all of a sudden...come whooshing in leaps and bounds - merely a month after the Motion Mountain discovery, another rare life-changing gem comes into view: A Short History of Nearly Everything, by Bill Bryson.

It was love at first sight. Honestly. (And that's coming from me who never judges a book by it cover, me who let HP sit moulding on the shelf for a whole year before prising it open.) Mum and I were in Carrefour at the Deira City Centre, Dubai, scanning the books section, and its pinkish cover just jumped out from shelves of rubbish, screaming to be read. A split-second later I realised this was the original version of that terrible weighty tome Mabel had picked up years ago - it was called Wanwu Jianshi in Chinese. I bought it anyway.

Lucky, lucky me! It kept me engrossed for the full 7-hour flight back home...didn't sleep a wink (our flight was at two in the morning, so that's saying something). As a bonus I witnessed one of the most mind-blowing sunrises I've ever seen.

It's the Holy Grail I never knew existed.

It's a book that makes my blood boil.

Enough said.

Motion Mountain

I have found my Holy Grail - in the form of a 1500-page PDF book called Motion Mountain.

It's a (text)book on physics,

...written in a way that should appeal both to people who prefer thinking in images and to those that prefer thinking in words...

And it is

[a book] written for the curious: it is entertaining, surprising and challenging on every page. With little mathematics, starting from observations of everyday life...

All my subconscious fancies rolled into one.

And to top it all, it's free.

Search Status

Search Status - is automatically granted to certain items that comes into the Conscious Present. The usual characteristics of such items are:

• Hitherto Unknown or Unresearched.
  
• Not in the realm of The Obvious.
  
• Does not carry the Unsearchable tag assigned by the Unconscious.
  
• Of sufficient interest.

Items granted Search Status are researched as soon as possible, usually via the following channels:

• Web-based Google search bar.
  
• Mobile Google homepage.

The level of research depends on the item in question. There are three major levels:

1. Out-of-the-way: the lowest level of research, used to gain a basic understanding of unfamiliar items to ensure smooth procession in other levels of research. Done via the "define:" operator in Google Search. Frequently taken to the next level.
   
   
2. Birds-eye-view: the most common level of research, done to gain general knowledge of item in question and its relationship to other items. Usually consists of multiple Google searches and scanning of Wikipedia entry.
   
   
3. In-depth: the highest level of research, marked by the transcend from virtual-reality to reality, i.e. incorporating research methods independent of the Internet. Carried out to the extreme, it becomes a Phase or a Hobby.

Hither we set sail

Mariner's Handbook is a notebook modified by me. Its former self was ugly beyond words.

The real thing: