Silliness, seriousness, and physicsy stuff

Anytime you need a calypso, here is what you must do:
First of all you need a rhythm, so you shake a little, shake a little, shake a little shaker and you
Bang a drum, and you sing and strum, and then there's a calypso for you!

A few nights ago, I was talking with someone about SWIL and roundsinging, and it brought my mind back to the roundsing we had when I was at Swat a few weekends ago. This was one of the ones Jim taught that night, and it happened to pop into my head in lab when my postdoc and I decided that we needed to put in a particle shaker with a longer arm. I know this is silly, but may I propose the following variation?

Anytime you need a plasma crystal, here is what you must do:
First of all you need microspheres, so you shake a little, shake a little, shake a little shaker and you
Use an amp, and you pump and wait, and then there's a plasma crystal for you!

I know this doesn't scan perfectly, and moreover it's not even a very accurate picture of this lab! I'm not in the mood to launch into details here; anyone interested should just email me. By the way, how many JC's is this going to be worth?

Like blaketh, I haven't been sleeping well lately and it's starting to take a toll. Unlike him, I know exactly what's been keeping me up and awakening me early. Heavy physical exercise may help, although last night's Ultimate game apparently didn't do the trick.

( Rants about the lab and research )

(no subject)

In reference to my last post, I should clarify that we don't actually shake the particle shaker directly as it's inside the vacuum chamber. Instead, it is mounted on a rod that connects to the outside. Everybody seems to have their own favorite way of exciting vibrations in the rod and hence shaking out particles; I've seen my prof flick it with his finger, my postdoc uses an Allen wrench to tap the rod, and I personally like to do the same with a particular Phillips screwdriver.