Some Blog Site

This is what the grocery store sells as American cheese:

But it’s not, really. It’s ORANGE. When you think of things that are American, how far down the list does anything orange appear?

Still thinking?
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Some of you may be wondering, as I was last week, “Can I stack Trofast?” or “Can you flip the stair-step storage things from IKEA?”

If you are trying to do what we were trying to do, then the answer is this: you can stack them as long as you do not flip them.

TROFAST is a series of organizational furniture from IKEA. There are tall shelves and wide shelves and shelves that resemble a piece from Tetris:

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Transcript:
Person A: So you say you bought a new car?
Person A: And you told the salesman you wanted a coupe?
Person B: Kind of…
Person A: ???
Person B: I told him I wanted a two-door car.

Delta met a skunk last weekend:

And here he is playing with the skunk:

I tried to warn him not to squeeze the skunk, but I don’t think he understood.

No, it was not a pet.

It was a toy.

His cousin got a radio-controlled skunk for her birthday.
Push one button and it moves forward.
Push another button it moves backward.
Push another button and it lifts its tail.

To my dismay, the box stated “No spray, no mess”.

No fun.

I say we retrofit a pump in the skunk. Tie the activation of the pump to the circuit that controls the lifting of the tail.

You could fill the reservoir with whatever. For fun, it could be bubbles. For usefulness, it could be bug spray or sunscreen (“Okay kids, stand behind the skunk before you go outside.”). For security, it could be pepper spray (“Don’t make me use the skunk…”)

If you are a manufacturer of toy skunks, at least let people have the option of using the spray feature. It’s not really a skunk without it.

Here are four different conversations that we’ve had in our house recently:

Beta, under the table and crawling away from Gamma: I got him!
I, after looking at Gamma’s legs: Don’t rub butter on people!

Especially if they are suffering from a burn. All the first-aid advice I remember can be summarized by “Do not put butter on a burn.” I don’t know what I should put on a burn – maybe I Can’t Believe It’s Not Butter?

The Scene: I am making eggs for the boys.
Beta: I don’t eat the yellow part because that is what the chick eats.

Fair enough, but this one is done eating his, so you can have it.

I: Okay, which day do you want to buy school lunch?
Alpha: Friday, because that’s the pizza day.
Beta: Do they have cheese pizza?
Alpha: No, it’s pepperoni. But the pepperoni is so small that you can’t even taste it.
Beta: I want Friday too so I can have the tasteless pizza.

No really, with school lunch that’s a good thing.

Gamma, rubbing his hands together: I got some hand sanitizer!
I: But there’s no… hey! That’s macaroni and cheese!

You’re right, it’s probably close enough.

When selecting your outfit for the day, be sure to enunciate clearly.

Plain Cardigan

Playing Cardigan

Applicable Puns

• Why yes, there is an ace up his sleeve.
• Don’t upset him – he’s likely to deck you.
• He’s walking rather slowly today.
  Yes, he tends to shuffle.
• Hey Mr. Rogers! What’s the big deal?

I’ll leave a pun about the joker for someone else to write.

In case there are students who are struggling in the beginning circuits course, I am providing this little jingle to help you remember stuff.

You should be able to figure out the tune once you start reading.

Verse 1
Ohmic Donald had a circuit.
E-I-E-Diode
And on that circuit he had a …
… resistor!
E-I-E-Diode
With a voltage drop here and a voltage drop there.
Here a drop, there a drop, everywhere a drop-drop.
Ohmic Donald had a circuit.
E-I-E-Diode

Verse 2
Ohmic Donald had a circuit.
E-I-E-Diode
And on that circuit he had a …
… capacitor!
E-I-E-Diode
With a stored charge here and a stored charge there.
Here a charge, there a charge, everywhere a charge-charge.
Ohmic Donald had a circuit.
E-I-E-Diode

Verse 3
Ohmic Donald had a circuit.
E-I-E-Diode
And on that circuit he had a …
… inductor!
E-I-E-Diode
With magnetic flux here and magnetic flux there.
Here a flux, there a flux, everywhere a flux-flux.
Ohmic Donald had a circuit.
E-I-E-Diode

Verse 4
Ohmic Donald had a circuit.
E-I-E-Diode
And on that circuit he had a …
… transistor!
E-I-E-Diode
With a switch-switch here and a switch-switch there.
Here a switch, there a switch, everywhere a switch-switch.
Ohmic Donald had a circuit.
E-I-E-Diode

Any other components that a young student of electronics should know?

And yes, I know that inductors deal more with Faraday’s Law than with Ohm’s Law. If we stuck only with Ohm’s Law, there would not be very many verses.