Gettin' Ink

I just found out that one of my friends got her fifth tattoo the other day, and if you've read my other posts you'll know that I want to get a tattoo some day too. The only reason I haven't gotten one yet is:

A) I don't have that kind of money right now, being an unemployed college student and all.

B) (Ok, so it's not really an "only reason", it's more like a long list, but whatever) I'm pretty sure my parents would kill me if I did right now.

C) I kind of have this thing about needles. Especially ones that vibrate really fast and pierce my skin hundreds of times.

D) And finally, I'm not really sure of what I want tattooed, or even where.

I know very well that tattoos are "permanent" and that I should htink about what I want and how it will look when I'm 80. But I also know that tattoos can be removed with lasers, so if I end up hating it when I'm 80 I can undo it. I've been thinking about it a lot lately and I think I might have some sort of idea of what I want. Three words: Bubble. Chamber. Track.

A bubble chamber is a vessel filled with a superheated transparent liquid (most often liquid hydrogen) used to detect electrically charged particles moving through it. I warned you earlier that this blog will end up being a nerd fest. :-) Physics is what I love, especially partivle physics. And if you're supposed to get a tattoo of what you love than this makes sense, right? Plus, it's just lines, which shouldn't be too hard/painful, right? Really, I was inspired by this fourth photo, which I think is on someone's arm, but I'm not sure. I was thinking of getting this on my calf, but I can't decide on which one to get.

The first picture is very simple, just a few lines, nothing too complicated. The second picture has a few more lines, and I really like the circles. I'm pretty sure the tattoo is/is very similar too the third picture I have up here. It's very intricate with lots of lines and curves.

What do you guys think?

Nerd Fest

Review: Waves & the wave equation, superposition, wave packets, interference, diffraction, Maxwell's equations, light as an electromagnetic wave; Relativity: Classical notions of relativity, Michelson-Morley experiment, postulates of special relativity, Lorentz transformations, Minkowski space, spacetime diagrams, relativistic energy & momentum, invariant mass & invariant lengths, energy-mass conversion & binding energy, relativistic collisions; "Old" Quantum Mechanics: Quantization of electric charge & discovery of the electron, blackbody radiation, Rayleigh-Jeans law & the “UV catastrophe”, Planck’s theory of quantized radiation, photoelectric effect, X-ray physics & the Compton effect, atomic spectra, Rutherford’s experiment, the Bohr model of the atom, the Franck-Hertz experiment; "New" Quantum Mechanics: De Broglie’s hypothesis, probabilistic interpretation of the wave function, Schrodinger equation in 1D, expectation values & operators, simple systems in 1D (square well, harmonic oscillator, barriers & tunneling), Schrodinger equation in 3D, hydrogen atom solutions, intrinsic angular momentum, the Stern-Gerlach experiment, total angular momentum; Atomic & Molecular Systems: Quantum mechanics of multiple particles, the periodic table, chemical bonds, atomic transitions (absorption & scattering), stimulated emission; Nuclear Systems: Basic properties of nuclei, nuclear stability & decay, nuclear reactions, fission & nuclear energy, fusion (i.e. how the sun shines), radioactive dating, nuclear magnetic resonance & imaging; Elementary Particles & Fundamental Interactions: Antiparticles & experimental evidence for their existence, the “Standard Model” of particle physics, symmetries & conservation laws, the quark model, experimental evidence for the Standard Model; Cosmology: Introduction to general relativity, the Big Bang cosmological model, experimental evidence for the Big Bang model

Have I lost you yet? I just got the syllabus for one of my classes in the fall, Modern Physics, & it made me totally excited for classes to start up again. :-) I know, I'm a huge nerd, but this is my passion. This is my element. I'm getting excited just thinking about it. Anyway, nothing too excited for you guys I guess, but I thought I'd share my excitement.

I bought the textbook for the class, too, I found it on Amazon.com for $5! And it has a $200 list price! I got it ridic cheap. :-) But then I also just spent $150 on my Linear Algebra book too, &I still have 3 more classes I need books for. Why are textbooks so expensive? Are they made with some sort of precious metal?

Sorry there's not much else to write about. I'm a little busy with things. :-P