Distraction Thread

So, I figured that in between obsessively checking our emails, thegradcafe.com, and the acceptance threads for admissions results, we could maybe take a few minutes to introduce ourselves as a distraction.

Where were you born?:
What is your favorite band or musician?:
If you could live anywhere in the world, where would it be and why?:
How old are you?:
What non-science related activities do you enjoy?:
Do you collect anything?:
Stephen Hawking or Kip Thorne?:
What is your favorite beer?:

Feel free to add questions and start discussions. I know we could all use a bit of a distraction.

do you want to date someone??

Despite what my mom told me about not talking to strangers on the internet I need to be distracted so here goes:

Where were you born?: New York City
What is your favorite band or musician?: Radiohead
If you could live anywhere in the world, where would it be and why?: I don't know. Most places in the world I have never lived, so it doesn't feel right to judge them.
How old are you?: 24
What non-science related activities do you enjoy?: Does math count as non-science related? Probably not. I guess I'm kind of a politics junky. I like video games (who doesn't?) and drawing.
Do you collect anything?: no
Stephen Hawking or Kip Thorne?: um... I guess I'll go with Hawking because I don't really know anything about Thorne.
What is your favorite beer?: I don't really drink much beer. Wow, that's a lot of cop out answers.

Now I expect other people to answer these or else I'm going to look dumb.

zombies!

You should post the random ass bands that no one has ever heard of. We need to break the stereotype that physics people can't be hipsters.

Alright, alright. I thought I'd give other the opportunity before making a fool of myself.

Where were you born?: Colorado Springs (BORING)
What is your favorite band or musician?: Muse is a pretty good answer, but I'll identify myself as an aspiring hipster by adding MGMT and Passion Pit to the mix
If you could live anywhere in the world, where would it be and why?: Tokyo I think because the Japanese are totally weird and I love it
How old are you?: 23, and as a sign of my nerddom, it really bothers me to be an age that's a prime number
What non-science related activities do you enjoy?: I paint my nails obsessively
Do you collect anything?: vinyl toys, yay
Stephen Hawking or Kip Thorne?: I'm gonna say Kip Thorne on this one because I really liked Black Holes and Time Warps, and his facial hair is impressive
What is your favorite beer?: New Castle Brown Ale, although Colorado does have some good microbrews, like Flat Tire or Beehive

I'll do my part retroactively by saying that my most recent favorite band/musician is Fever Ray.

MGMT's album is pretty great. But I don't know what you have against prime numbers considering they're the best numbers.

Personally I don't like prime numbers. I like nice numbers like 24 which can be divided by 1, 2, 3, 4, 6, 8, and 12. It's beautiful. Haha, talk about nerdy.

It's like they say: Mo' factors, mo' problems.

When you mod out by an ideal that's not prime all those factors are going to be zero divisors and zero divisors are gross. You can't even make a finite field with 24. Useless.

NERD FIGHT!!!!!

I will nerd fight you all!

BRING IT!!

I really need to find something constructive to do with this time...

I'm crocheting little animals to sit on my TV because it keeps me from obsessively checking my email.

As another distraction:

A department store has 2 escalators moving at the same rate in opposite directions. If two men walk down the escalators at a rate of 1 step per second, it takes one man 24 steps and the other 120 to reach the bottom. How many steps would they have taken if the escalators were not moving?

I don't actually know the answer btw.

Should be the harmonic mean.

Now I need to learn how to crochet. That sounds like a good thing to be doing.

Am I supposed to add a question now? How about umm...

What is the radius of a sphere inscribed in a regular tetrahedron with edge length 1?

Haha, well your question is a LOT harder than mine, and I finally figured out the answer this morning. It's 40. I became a physics major so I could ignore the finer points of math and just wave my hands.

Where were you born?: Southern Indiana (in the middle of nowhere...)

What is your favorite band or musician?: Right now? The Fratellis. But I love blues, dixieland jazz, and the oldies.

If you could live anywhere in the world, where would it be and why?: Probably Iceland. Because it is awesome.

How old are you?: 22 years old. However, people always ask me when I'm going to graduate high school AND I am constantly asked for my ID when watching rated R movies.

What non-science related activities do you enjoy?: Baking, decorating my apartment, listening to music, playing the dulcimer, wandering around new places, loafing.

Do you collect anything?: Cameos, skeleton keys, vintage dresses.

Stephen Hawking or Kip Thorne?: Kip Thorne, oh yeah.

What is your favorite beer?: Abita Amber. (New Orleans beer!) I don't drink beer often, I prefer Jameson whiskey or Pimm's No 1 (spiced English gin)

Wow, the dulcimer. I had to wikipedia that. How does one decide to take up the dulcimer?

I am originally from Southern Indiana, and the instrument is fairly popular in many folk groups. Personally, I play the Appalachian dulcimer, which was created in America by Irish and Scottish immigrants in the Appalachian Mountains. Just started playing when I was about 10 years old, and I really liked it.

There's a dulcimer store in my city, and I used to hang out there a lot when I was in high school. It's a very neat instrument!