Betsy Devine: Funny ha-ha and/or funny peculiar

A leafhopper in a glamorous lady’s hat? Actually, what I’m talking about is the art of bugging people, but very politely. And here I mean not bugging innocent strangers, but politely bugging people whose job is to help you, but who have decided that they really don’t have to help because….well, let me just tell you the story. We got into Uppsala pretty late Friday night, and the promised Internet connectivity of our hotel room was busted, zero, zilch.

Next morning, we tried lots of plug-and-unplug-and-restart-and-etc. on both our computers. Nope. So my goal for yesterday, (Saturday, alas) was to solve our Internet problem before Frank came home from the Lepton-Photon Conference.

The front-desk staff was sure (on zero evidence) that my computer had to be the problem. Nothing they could do if my computer was the problem, so very sorry.

I kept my cool, and I also kept politely coming back with new ideas about how my problem might get solved.

Polite, even friendly persistence is the best way I know to turn people-who-don’t-want-to-solve-my-problem into people-who-do-want-to-solve-their-own-problem, which is that I keep turning up, hoping they’re going to help me.

They finally agreed to let me try the connectivity from a different hotel room–and it worked! Then, since nobody knew how fix the cable to our room which was clearly broken, they “gave” us an empty single room just for its Internet.

In one way, this less convenient than having an Ethernet hookup in our own room. But in another way, it’s better, because here I sit typing this all by myself while Frank is peacefully napping down the hall.

Anyway, the Polite Bug is what Julie Kavner in This Is My Life would call a “life lesson” from Sister Age. Just keep on politely bugging the people who are supposed to help you, and even if they weren’t planning to help you….they will.

“Philosophy is the study of questions that can’t be answered,
Religion is the study of answers that can’t be questioned,
and Criminal Justice is about right and wrong.”

The Meeting of Nobel Laureates in Lindau houses its laureates in nineteenth century summer splendor–lawns, wooded allees, lots of roses, afternoons on the terrace looking out over Lake Constance while women in long skirts bring chilled white wine or Eischocolade.

And meanwhile , at the Hotel Bad-Schachen, in our gauze-curtained room, or on the stone terrace, or under the sycamore tree on its green bench , there were between two and four bars of wifi Internet.

If you plan to visit Lake Constance–it’s in the leisurely fruit-growing “Grüss Gott” part of Germany, tucked up against Austria and Switzerland–and if you are not too wedded to air conditioning, I recommend the lovely Hotel Bad-Schachen, formerly the White Swan Hotel.

This blogpost, formerly 2333 in my old blog, needed a rescue because of bad XML. It was originally posted 7/2/05; 2:51:57 AM. Thanks to the Wayback Machine, which helped me re-find it!

Berkeley just announced the discovery of the heaviest element yet known to science. The new element has been named “Governmentium”.

Governmentium has one neutron, 12 assistant neutrons, 75 deputy neutrons, and 224 assistant deputy neutrons, giving it an atomic mass of 312. These 312 particles are held together by forces called morons, which are surrounded by vast quantities of lepton-like particles called peons.

When catalyzed with money, Governmentium becomes Administratium, an element which radiates just as much energy, since it has half as many peons, but twice as many morons.

Since Governmentium has no electrons, it is inert. It can be detected, however, as it impedes every reaction with which it comes into contact. A reaction that normally takes one minute or less will require a week or more if contaminated by any Governmentium.

The half-life of Governmentium is 4 years. It does not, however, decay, but instead undergoes a reorganization in which a portion of the assistant neutrons and deputy neutron exchange places. In fact, Governmentium’s mass will actually increase over time, since each reorganization will cause more morons to become neutrons, forming isodopes. The characteristic of moron-promotion leads some scientists to believe that Governmentium is formed whenever morons reach a certain quantity in concentration.

This hypothetical quantity is called “Critical Morass”.

Thanks for the funny email to Damian!

NEW ELEMENT: GOVERNMENTIUM

A major research institution has just announced the discovery of the heaviest element yet known to science.

The new element has been named “Governmentium”.

Governmentium has one neutron, 12 assistant neutrons, 75 deputy neutrons,and 224 assistant deputy neutrons, giving it an atomic mass of 311.

These 311 particles are held together by forces called morons, which are surrounded by vast quantities of lepton-like particles called peons.

Since Governmentium has no electrons, it is inert.

However, it can be detected, as it impedes every reaction with which it comes into contact.

A minute amount of Governmentium causes one reaction to take over 4 days to complete, when it would normally take less than a second.

Governmentium has a normal half-life of 4 years; it does not decay, but instead undergoes a reorganization in which a portion of the assistant neutrons and deputy neutron exchange places.

In fact, Governmentium’s mass will actually increase over time, since each reorganization will cause more morons to become neutrons, forming isodopes.

The characteristic of moron-promotion leads some scientists to believe that Governmentium is formed whenever morons reach a certain quantity in concentration.

This hypothetical quantity is called “Critical Morass”.

When catalyzed with money, Governmentium becomes Administratium, an element which radiates just as much energy, since it has half as many peons, but twice as many morons.

. . . that high temperatures do not destroy the magical mix of young scientists with older ones. More and larger photos can be found here.

Now I’m off to sleep, because tomorrow means new adventures.