“Things just don’t seem to be getting better.” The parent slumps down in the chair, head lowered. “Every time I pick up the room, it gets messy again. Even when I think no one has been there, I walk in and clutter is everywhere. Stuff seems to just throw itself on the floor.” The other parent nods in agreement and asks to the air, “Why is it always more disordered than before?”

Because that’s apparently what the Second Law of Thermodynamics demands.

Simply said, the Second Law states: The entropy of an isolated system increases to a state of such disordered lack of energy that no work can be done.

“Entropy” is the degree of disorder in a system, in a room, in the universe. The Second Law enunciates a universal rule that disorder is on the rise, and it cannot be reversed. Things will and are becoming more disordered, and there is very little in the short term, and nothing in the long run, we can do about it.

The parents stop – their hands touching on the open door to their teenager’s room as they both gaze sadly at the disordered interior. They know empirically (from experience) and analytically (from reason and logic) that, for that room, the trend simply cannot be reversed. They’re stuck. There will come a time, sooner rather than later, when they will have to close the door and buy a new house. No energy will be left, in them or in that room, to work to order the disordered maze. Entropy will have prevailed. Together, they will wait for the moving van and pray for college.

You can do that for a room and a child, but what about the universe? If the universe is all there is, then there’s no place to move to. . . . We’re all stuck in a downward spiral to greater disorder, right?

If the second law is correct, the matter and energy in the universe will degrade to an ultimate state of inert uniformity — which is another way of saying “Boring!” We will all be sitting around on a log floating aimlessly in place on a sea of tepid unmoving water waiting for someone to do, to say, anything; and no one will, because no one has the energy to lift a finger, to make a point. At this point, I think we can say, while we still can, “What is the point of such a law? I’m getting off this log while I can.”

And, you would not be alone. The Second Law of Thermodynamics has been called “the most pessimistic and amoral formulation in all human thought.”

“Let’s change it,” you say, “and formulate something more positive and optimistic and fun.”

I certainly agree, but Sir Arthur Stanley Eddington thought about doing just that and was forced to the position that: “If your theory is found to be against the second law of thermodynamics, I can give you no hope; there is nothing for it but to collapse in deepest humiliation.”

Now, that reminds me of the most wonderful statement of Gimli, son of Gloin, the indefatigable dwarf warrior, near the end of “The Return of the King.” Aragorn (also known as Strider) has just proposed a truly outlandish plan to defeat the evil nemesis Sauron. Strider’s plan is that we, the greatly outnumbered forces of the West, attack the big bad black statue guy with the huge glowing all-seeing red eye and all his orcs, mountain trolls and nazgul flying in the sky. We attack them all, straight on and demand Sauron and the whole mob surrender to us. Gimli gulps, then smiles and says – and you got to love him for this – “Certainty of death . . . small chance of success . . . what are we waiting for?”

It sounds to me like the perfect time for a new approach.

What have we got to lose? That teenager’s room is hopeless. We’re collapsed in deepest humiliation. Our log is going nowhere. Certainty of disorder . . . no hope . . . what are we waiting for?

Let’s give it shot. .  . advance on our own, in close rank and sound theoretical formation. Yes, our order is diminished. Yes, we are greatly outnumbered by the sluggish masses of disorder. But . . . we shall demand change! We shall demand order from disorder! Entropy shall not prevail!

I like the ring of that.

Remember the First Law of Thermodynamics: The total amount of mass and energy in the Universe remains constant (it is conserved), merely changing from one form to another. There are different types of energy (mechanical, chemical, electrical, nuclear and others). Energy can change from one type to another. No one is really sure what mass (matter, substance) is, and no one really knows all about how mass relates to energy (activity, work).

Start thinking and don’t worry . . . there’s only a small chance of success.

See you next week,

Grandpa Jim

Joy

What’s in a word? Or, in a name?

As Juliet cries to the stars, not knowing that her Romeo is waiting and listening in the bushes beneath her balcony, at the foot of the trellis he would soon climb to her surprise and side:

“What’s in a name? That which we call a rose

By any other name would smell as sweet.”

I mean what is the big hang up with names, with words? A rose is a rose is a rose, whatever the word that named it so. She saw, hidden though he was, that Romeo was Romeo Montague and she was Juliet Capulet. Their families, the Montague’s and Capulet’s, were sworn enemies. They were divided by their family names and by their own, Romeo and Juliet. It was no play on words. It was tragedy at its heart, and she would change it by changing his name, if she could.

So would he. For her love, he would that name be changed:

“I take thee at thy word:

Call me but love, and I’ll be new baptized;

Henceforth, I will never be Romeo.”

But, it doesn’t work that way, as they soon found. Life is words and words are life, as the Bard taught us so well. She could call him not Romeo but love, but Romeo he would still be. In their fated match, the words held true as loved enemies they left this land for another. In that paired leaving, love in its word held the two in its own embrace. Those so wrongly worded if rightly named, our Romeo and Juliet, will always be, to us, the love they so long to be renamed. The joy they lost for their wronged names lasts forever in the words, Romeo and Juliet.

It is a curious custom, our fondness for words.

Why do we find joy in tragedy, happiness in sadness?

If joy is happiness, how is it found in tragedy and unhappiness?

Why is there in great sadness, this feeling of great joy?

Can it be the antonym is also the synonym?

Happy sad and in the sad also joy?

Apparently, so. . . .

In their curious construction, words seem to be more than they say.

And that is, I think, the sad joy of Juliet and her Romeo.

“What’s in a name? That which we call a rose”

In its own name another word would be.

Sweet joy, in its own name, can be where sweet sadness can be found.

See the word and the word it holds and know joy and sadness both can there be found.

“O Romeo, Romeo! Wherefore art thou Romeo?”

Not far in words from his sweet Juliet,

Grandpa Jim

Been fighting a bit of the flu. Had the shot, but this season’s flu seems to strike even those who have been stuck, though less severely – I hope. FLU stands for “Forlorn, Lost and Under the weather” – think of wet puppy and be kind to those so sadly afflicted.

So, it seems a good time to address the First Law of Thermodynamics. I am saying that in a big voice so that it echoes through the house: TTTThe FFFFirst LLLLaw of TTTThermodyamicS!S!S!S! . . . There, I feel better for having said it. Now, what does it mean? And, who cares?

The concept of “thermodynamics” resides in the perception that things run around, expend energy, are corralled and restore energy for another run. We see the sweat on the horses in the corral and see a relationship between heat and energy in how those horses behave – running, eating, resting and running some more. “Thermo” is the heat part of the word, and “dynamics” is the energy part. “Thermodynamics” is a way to say: “I see you heat and energy, but how do you relate?” What is the relationship between energy and those who use and lose it?

Giddyup – enter the First Law.

The First Law of Thermodynamics, for all its consonants and vowels, is a simple saying: The amount of energy in the universe, or an isolated system (say our corral), is a constant. In the corral, you can add energy by feeding and watering the horses hay. In the universe, you can’t add more energy, because the total amount is fixed – you got what ya got and you has to live with that.

But, how does anything get done?

Again, a simple saying: Energy changes. In our corral, we start with horses, water and hay; as the horses tire from running, we give them more hay and water, which they convert to running energy; but our isolated corral system has limited hay and water and is constantly losing energy in the form of heat and sweat to the outside environment, so the horses will stop running unless we add more energy in the form of more hay and water from outside the system. In the universe, there is no outside, there is no place to go to, no more to add. That’s it folks. That’s all there is.

So, what happens?

Einstein, Newton and those guys — those Big Heads stated in fancy equations of general applicability what we all see in the specific energies of daily life. We all see two kinds of energy: 1) active energy, activity or work (think Olympic gymnast); and 2) resting energy, mass or matter (think couch potato). Activity and mass are what make the universe go round, and round and round again. When you need some activity, you convert some mass to energy (throw another log on the fire); when you need some mass, you sit down, have a big meal and rest (the mass settles right in, along with the fliers from Weight Watchers). It’s a constant process of change that occurs continually in the entire universe: mass changing to energy and energy to mass and back again. The smaller isolated systems, like our corral, may run down from lack of hay, but the universe is big enough to just keep borrowing back and forth to keep the whole she-bang going on and on and on.

Recognizing this constant and continuing give-and-take, the First Law of Thermodynamics can also be stated as the Law of Conservation of Mass and Energy: The total amount of mass and energy in the Universe remains constant (it is conserved), merely changing from one form to another.

But, isn’t that perpetual motion?

Precisely, it appears to be so. You just keep moving back and forth from mass to energy and energy to mass. So, theoretically, the whole thing, the universe, should go on forever. The universe should never run down. Individual systems (our corral) may run down, but not the universe. It should be perpetual.

Are you sure?

I’m tired and need some rest. Perhaps, a little hot tea with honey, for energy.

But, will the universe, the big system, really never run down?

I’m running down. There are more laws of thermodynamics. Let me acquire some lost mass and we’ll talk more later.

Keep your energies up,

Grandpa Jim

It has been a busy weekend and Monday.

The Christmas lights are down and the tree is placed in its place in the storage unit with the other well-organized but distant items that await their time and season.

I miss the Holidays already, even the packed-to-the-spaces parking spaces at the NorthPark garages. ((The NorthPark Mall is the #1 tourist destination in Dallas – I love it, but not all of it all the time. Let me digress, just a post-seasonal remembered interlude. We were searching for a parking place with my granddaughter, driving aisle-to-aisle, up-and-down, back-and-forth (and I had just about given up), when this polite young man knocked on the girls’ window (they are the prettier) and said follow me and take my space. We did and watched “Life of Pi” and enjoyed it muchly, even my first-grader granddaughter.))

Mars is a long way away, but not that far it seems.

For John Carter, that young Confederate Captain, it was a chase from Apache Indians and the refuge of a very odd cave in the New Mexico mountains that brought him to “A Princess of Mars.” I first found the book in this odd narrow room lined with books at the top of the stairs of the old farm house in Oxford, Iowa. The only heat was from the great belching noisy furnace in the basement, which loved noise more than heat, so that none seemed to reach us in our multi-covered-and-quilted beds on the second floor up the narrow stairs when we over-nighted at Grandma and Grandpa’s farm. I have no idea where they slept. It was as if we were on another planet — with chamber pots on the floor (quite the experience for a bookish city boy and his introspective sight). After breakfast in the warmed and added-on kitchen (everything is added in an old farm house), I’d sneak back up and visit that long little room with all the paperbacks. Edgar Rice Burroughs and many more of those writing persons lived there behind the worn-and-frayed bindings facing the wide-eyed face of a young wonderer. I found them there and never left them. Except, it is hard to keep reading on a raft with a tiger . . . a hungry tiger . . . at that. But, perhaps, that is what reading is all about, a frozen upstairs sanctuary in the midst of winter looking out over ice-covered fields and inward across an expanse of moss-covered heather at another planet.

So, we parked the car and glided through the throngs of strangely and pleasantly dressed mall crawlers to our theatre and our next view of life in its strangely placed wonders.

A good book is often in the eye of the beholder,

Or, in the eye of the tiger.

What do you see?

Grandpa Jim

PS: Snow in Dallas this morning!! The picture is in the early-still-dark morning hour, looking across the rooftops to downtown. The white flakes and cold covering are fun to wake to, but not to drive in. Dallas stops in the snow and works from home, if we can. Stay warm and have some hot chocolate.

Are the Mastodon and Smilodon dinosaurs?

At the museum, the bones  are in the dinosaur room, they look pretty strange, one is a really giganteous critter, the other is very scary, and . . .

Let’s take those beasties one at a time.

Big fella, you first.

A Mastodon is a large extinct (no longer in existence) mammal related to the modern-day elephant. The first Mastodon started lumbering about the Earth 27 million years ago, and last Mastodon disappeared around 12,000 years ago, in or about 10,000 BC. In fact, you can see some Mastodon’s working on a pyramid in Egypt in the movie “10,000 BC” – which received a “D” by the critics but is, I thought, a fun period piece, and it does have Mastodons. Dinosaurs, or terrible lizards, are much older. The first terrible lizard started roaring and stomping about 230 million years ago, and the last big noisemaker fell over in the cold and turned into a fossil about 65 million years ago. Working with these dates (from the experts on the Internet, of course), the Mastodon missed the Age of the Dinosaurs by about 38 million years, give or take a million years, here or there. So, the Mastodon and the Dinosaur are not contemporaries. They are also not considered to be in the same family of critters – as taxonomists, biologists and paleontologists classify old bones. It is thought that cold weather (possibly from an asteroid hitting the Earth and forming what is now the Gulf of Mexico) caused the bigger dinosaurs to get the flu in the ensuing ice age and expire, while the Woolly Mammoths, who are also proto-elephants and cousins of the Mastodons, were better covered with a big furry coats and seemed to have enjoyed cold weather, which has led some to speculate that the current residents of Minnesota, who love snow and ice, may be distantly related in some manner to the Mastodon and Woolly Mammoth.

Here are the bones of a Mastodon or Woolly Mammoth (not sure what it said on this big guys’ driver’s license, but I think the Mammoths have the trunks like these curving together) from the newly opened Perot Museum of Natural History in Dallas, Texas (a must place to visit, if you are stopping by the town). Aren’t the tusks amazing? They must have almost touched in real life.

Now for the cat. Please take the stage, Mr. Smilodon . . .

“My, what large teeth you have.” But this is no Big Bad Wolf in Grandma’s bed clothes, and those teeth are much larger and longer. That smiling Smilodon is one big cat with saber-toothed maxillary canines (big long sharp front teeth). In fact, the name “Smilodon” comes from the Greek for “carving knife.” Get the picture. Don’t mess with this kitty. The saber-toothed cat is often incorrectly called the saber-toothed tiger, but this feline is not closely related to the tiger. It was cat, but a cat with 11-inch knives for teeth, and it was big. The biggest saber-toothed cats may have weighed over 900 pounds. You can only imagine what that pet would do to your living room furniture. We’re talking toothpicks, assorted furballs and dust motes for all that would be left, in short order. Luckily, there are no more Smilodons purring beside our beds to wake us screaming in the morning running from our homes. The first big cat started sharpening his teeth about 2.5 million years ago, and the last Smilodon sank into the La Brea tar pits in Los Angeles, or thereabouts, about 10,000 years ago. Yes, I think there were a couple saber-toothed cats in the movie 10,000 BC. Those smiling felines with the lengthy incisors were prowling about watching the Mastodons and Mammoths graze for food, but the saber-toothed cats seldom messed with the Big Tuskers, because you see those Mastodon tusks were bigger and longer than those of Smilodon even with its ferocious teethy feline grin.

Below is the skeletal frame of what may be a young Smilodon scampering about, without its fur, at the Perot Museum. Smilodon was not, as I bet you have surmised at this point, a dinosaur, and it did not live during the Times of the Big Saurs, but I bet that cat would have scared off even a few of those terrible lizards.

The world is a big place full of strange and interesting creatures.

It is good that some, at least, are no longer with us.

Keep smiling and polishing those teeth,

Grandpa Jim

The Beatles recorded this song on January 29, 1964 in Paris, France. It is the only English-language Beatles track that the Beatles themselves recorded in a studio outside the United Kingdom (UK or England). This was the group’s third consecutive number-one song, after “I Want to Hold Your Hand” (the 1^st at #1) and “She Loves You (the #2 at #1). The song went #1 on April 4^th, 1964, on which day the Beatles held the top five spots – a record that has not been achieved by any other band. It is the fifth song on Side 2 of the Beatles’ third album, A Hard Day’s Night, released in the U.S. on June 26, 1964.

What is the song?

You got it. The song is . . . “Can’t Buy Me Love.”

It has a secret, as many Beatles songs do or think they do – at least for me, and I’ve been listening to the song since it first came out. It has a secret that fundamentally alters and corrects (in the ears of some) Newton’s Law of Universal Gravitation.

Listen with me. (I’ll let you play the song on YouTube, as you read on. Just open another window, paste and listen to www.youtube.com/watch?v=SMwZsFKIXa8 or click here to listen to “Can’t Buy Me Love”)

Here are the last four verses of the song, as they are written – listen carefully to the choruses.

Say you don’t need no diamond ring and I’ll be satisfied
Tell me that you want the kind of thing that money just can’t buy
I don’t care too much for money, money can’t buy me love
Owww

Can’t buy me love, everybody tells me so
Can’t buy me love, no no no, no

Say you don’t need no diamond rings and I’ll be satisfied
Tell me that you want those kinds of things that money just can’t buy
I don’t care too much for money, money can’t buy me love

Can’t buy me love, love
Can’t buy me love

Do you hear it? John and Paul are singing a different chorus, and here it is – for the first time (that I am aware of) revealed and made public. I’ve highlighted the changed word.

Say you don’t need no diamond ring and I’ll be satisfied
Tell me that you want the kind of thing that money just can’t buy
I don’t care too much for money, money can’t buy me love
Owww

Puppy love, everybody tells me so
Puppy love, no no no, no

Say you don’t need no diamond rings and I’ll be satisfied
Tell me that you want those kinds of things that money just can’t buy
I don’t care too much for money, money can’t buy me love

Puppy love, love
Puppy love

The Beatles are not singing “Can’t buy me love,” they’re singing “Puppy love.” Listen again. I’m sure you can hear it. Until the lyrics were examined, I never knew it to be anything else. And, this is very cool and very scientific.

Those fun-singing boys from Liverpool figured out what was missing from Sir Isaac Newton’s presentation of gravity, and they used the formula they were best at to express the missing factor for the world to hear in their song.

On the trail the other day, I saw what I’d heard all those years. A little puppy was walking with her mistress. Everyone stopped and was drawn to the cute little doggie. They couldn’t resist the clumsy cuddly ball of fur. Normally very proper adults bent down and reached out to touch and pet and scratch and say doggie words that they would never utter in public otherwise. There was a crowd and more were being drawn in as I watched. The whole mass of people, with arms and legs sticking out, was sort of attached and sticking to the penumbra that surrounded that adorable little puppy. I could hardly squeeze past. Why would I want to? It was puppy love at work and was it ever working.

Then it hit me. Newton had seen the apple but he’d missed the puppy. It isn’t just the mass of an object that attracts another object. It’s the object’s mass and its puppy-love factor. Clearly, the little dog I was observing had the attractive power of a small planet. How else could all those people be attracted to and stick to that cute little doggie pooh? Normally they’d be flying off and running and jogging down the trail “as dry leaves that before the wild hurricane fly.” Not now, now they were all captured, stuck and contained by the massive attractive force of that cutsie smallish canine.

I knew then that Newton’s formula must be adjusted, and here it is.

Fpl=G((mp+mpl)x(mpa)/(r)x(r))

In the revised formula, Fpl is the measure of the gravitational attractive force between two objects with the new component for puppy love (or pl), G is the gravitational constant, mp is the mass of the puppy (negligible), to which you have to add the mass of puppy love (mpl, which is an enormous number), mpa is the mass of the puppy admirer (not much), and r is the distance between puppy and the admirer (very little indeed). When you put these together, I think you can see how important puppy love is and what an impact it has on those around it.

The Beatles saw it. There’s nothing like puppy love. You can’t buy it – don’t even think it. That’s why it’s puppy love. Sing it with me,

Puppy love, love
Puppy love

Now, maybe the International Astronomical Union (IAU) will see their mistake and modify the definition of planet to let that cute little Pluto back in.

Go puppy power,

Grandpa Jim

Why don’t we fly off the Earth into space?

Our Earth is a planet (one of eight in our Solar System) circulating our Sun (a star). We are standing on the densest of the eight planets, meaning the Earth has the greatest mass per unit volume of any planet. At its core, the Earth is about 89% iron. That much iron in this big a planet produces a bunch of gravitational force. It is that gravitational force attracting us to the Earth’s core that causes us to stick to the surface. So, the simple answer is: We don’t fly into space because the attractive force of gravity won’t let us?

What is gravity?

I thought you might ask that. To understand gravity, we have to go back to a fellow by the name of Isaac Newton who lived in England, was born on Christmas Day 1642 and liked to observe apples. One day, Isaac watched one fall from an apple tree in the garden. He wondered why that apple fell directly down, perpendicular to the ground, as if it were headed to the center of the Earth. Newton was a focused lad and that apple’s descent really got to him. On July 5, 1687, Isaac Newton published, in three volumes, his “Mathematical Principles of Natural Philosophy,” referred to as the “Principia” and considered by many to be one of the most important books ever written. Included in this revered tome is Newton’s Law of Universal Gravitation, “gravity” for short. According to Newton, gravity is the force that attracts a point mass (the Earth) to another point mass (me standing on the Earth), and it does this attracting by an amount of energy (or directional force) proportional to the product of the two masses and inversely proportional to the square of the distance between them. Isaac’s equation can be presented like this:

F=G(m1m2/rr)

In this formula, F is the measure of the gravitational and directional attractive force between the two objects (the bigger mass pulling the small mass toward itself), G is the gravitational constant (a fixed and experimentally verified fudge-factor number that makes the equation work), m1 is the first mass (the Earth), m2 is the second mass (me) and r is the distance between me and the center of the Earth. Put them all together, stir briskly and you find that there is a very strong gravitational force (F) pulling me toward the center of the Earth and holding me on the surface of our planet because I can’t move through dirt and rock.

How much gravitational force is holding you down?

Trick question – I like it. To do the exact calculation of gravitational force (F) for me where I am sitting typing right now, to the center of the Earth, would require me to know how far that is, plus my mass and the mass of the planet and the big G (gravitational constant), and then to do a bunch of number crunching, making sure I got the units right. That would be a lot of work. But, there’s a short cut – that’s the “trick” part of your question.

Okay, smartie, what’s the short cut?

Me. How much I weigh. My weight is what’s holding me down. Take away my weight, make me lighter that a feather, and I’d float away like Dorothy and Toto to “somewhere over the rainbow . . . where troubles melt like lemon drops.” So, for a small object (me) relative to a very large object (the Earth), the Newtonian equation can be simplified to calculate a gravitational field vector (g) pulling on me. This little “g” has been determined to be about 9.8 meters per second square, on average, for everywhere on the surface of the Earth. Now, the longer equation of Sir Isaac (they made him a Knight) can be tweaked and simplified to F=mg, where m is my mass and g is the 9.8 number. But wait, W=mg, where W is my weight. The equations are the same. So, for me right here, the gravity equation can be simplified to F=W. It’s true. My weight is a close approximation of the force of gravity on me right here, right now, today.

What if you wanted to lose weight?

I’d go to Mars.

Why?

Mars is a smaller and less dense planet. When you do the equations with the smaller mass of the planet Mars, I’d tip the bathroom scale at a much lower number. Drop me on Mars with my Earth muscles and I’d be able to jump higher and lift more than any old Martian. I’d be a Superman – assuming they had some air to breathe. There may be some downsides.

Maybe you should stay here, eat less and exercise more?

I guess you’re right, but it still sounds like fun, going to Mars. I can see myself now in the Martian Olympics, getting ready for the long jump. I get set, the gun fires, I sprint to the line, jump into the air, stretch my legs, arms flailing. It’s . . .

. . . time for lunch. Can you help in the kitchen? You only get a half sandwich.

I wonder if Sir Isaac was treated like this?

You’re not a Knight yet.

Details,

Grandpa Jim

What is the Earth?

The Earth is the planet on whose surface we are physically located.

What is a planet?

In our solar system, the International Astronomical Union (IAU) in 2006 defined a “planet” to be: 1) a body that orbits the Sun; 2) is massive enough for its own gravity to make it round; and 3) has “cleared its neighborhood” of smaller objects in its orbit. All three criteria must be met for a celestial object (a body) to qualify as an IAU planet in our solar system.

What is our solar system?

Our solar system is composed of our Sun and the eight planets and all the other celestial (or heavenly) bodies that orbit our Sun. The term “solar” derives from the Latin word “sol,” meaning “sun.” Sol was the ancient Roman god personifying the sun.

What is our Sun?

Our Sun is the star around which our planets revolve and from which they receive light and heat.

What is a star?

In astronomy, a star is a large self-luminous heavenly body consisting of a mass of gas. In common parlance (or talk), any celestial body visible at night from Earth as relatively stationery can be referred to as a star. Planets rotate around stars and are not generally self-luminous (on fire from within and shooting heat, energy and light outward). In our night sky, if the object is twinkling, it is probably a star (because it is generating its own light). If the body is not twinkling, it is probably a planet (because it is reflecting the light of its star).

How many planets do we have in our solar system?

In our solar system, there are currently eight planets. In order from our Sun, the planets are: Mercury, Venus, Earth, Mars, Saturn, Jupiter, Uranus and Neptune.

Isn’t Pluto a planet?

When the IAU revised the definition of “planet’ for our solar system, Pluto was demoted to a dwarf planet because it was seen as not clearing its orbit of smaller objects. To learn more about Pluto and his adventures, check out the September 13, 2012 blog post, entitled “Pluto: Demoted As A Planet But Still Appreciated As A Friend And Companion.” Type Pluto into the search box above or go to https://www.unclejoestories.com/2012/09/13/pluto/

What is our planet, Earth, composed of?

Good question. The primary components of the Earth are: iron (32.1%), oxygen (30.1%), silicon (15.1%), magnesium (13.9%), sulfur (2.9%), nickel (1.8%), calcium (1.5%) and aluminum (1.4%). The remaining 1.2% is a mix of traces of the other elements. The Earth’s core is estimated to be 88.8% iron. One geochemist estimates that 47% of the Earth’s crust is composed of oxygen, much of that in the form of rock oxides.

The Earth sounds heavy. How heavy is it?

Another good question. The Earth is the densest of all the eight planets. Density is mass per unit volume. It is not weight, but rather how much matter (or substance) is contained in a unit measure of the material. (We’ll talk more about weight in a future post.) The Earth is a very solid place because it has a lot of matter (or stuff) to kick around, lift, push, pull, manufacture and make into who-knows-what – the TV commercials reflect the density of our planet and its denizens. In fact, the Earth’s average density is 5.51 grams per cubic centimeter. The other three rocky planets closest to the Sun follow the Earth in density, in this order of next most dense: Mercury, Venus and Mars. If you want a light planet, try the gas giant Saturn – at a density of 0.70 grams per cubic centimeter, a cotton candy stick of Saturn would float on water on our planet. It’s a big one, but not much substance.

Which planet throws the most weight around?

Best question yet. Maybe better: What’s holding us on this planet Earth and why don’t we fly off into space? What is keeping us down here? Check back tomorrow for some more thoughts on the pesky weight question that is on so many minds at this time of the year.

Keep your feet firmly planted on terra firma and you eyes fixed high on the night sky,

Grandpa Jim

Rain is on the way. Forecasts show a 70% chance tomorrow and 100% certainty the next day. Our farmers can use the moisture. From the drive yesterday, the winter wheat is a bit spotty in places and needs a drink. Dark and waiting, the other fields are plowed and the soil ready. Now is the best time for a soaking, slow-falling rain.

My problem is the Epiphany. That is my deadline to take down the outside Christmas lights. Failure to timely remove those lights will likely result in dunning notices from the Homeowner’s Association and long frowns from the neighboring families for truant twinkle trimatories, faulted frivolous festivatories and cordoned continued celebratories.

The timing is the thing and, I think, that takes us back 2,013 years to 2 AD.

Round and about January 6, 2 AD, Three Wise Men (the three are also called the Three Kings or the Three Magi) are reported to have arrived in Bethlehem for a visit. The day was twelve (12) days after the Nativity or birth of Jesus on December 25, 1 AD. That day, twelve days after Christmas, is referred to as the “Epiphany.”

For Joseph and Mary, the arrival of the Three Kings was a surprising and appreciated event. The couple needed cash to finance a hasty trip to Egypt to hide the newborn child from the jealous-of-another-king King Herod of Judea. Gold, frankincense and myrhh, the costly gifts of the Magi, were readily convertible to cash for the journey. So, royalty with gifts on the doorstep was startling, unexpected and very welcome. It was a cause for thought, its own Epiphany for Mom and Dad.

For the Wise Men, seeing the baby there in that manger in that way flashed into their crowned and turbaned heads the sudden and striking realization that kingships and kingdoms could transcend traditional boundaries and offer benefits even to folks who were not of Jewish lineage. This was a breakthrough in cranial squeezing and ocular squinting. Thinking hard and scribbling parchment notes atop their camels on the journey back (luckily the eye-rolling dromedaries knew the way home for their absent-minded drivers), the light bulbs went off in their over-sized heads. At dinner around the campfire, the Kings decided that day was an Epiphany, because that is what happened to them – an experience of sudden and striking realization. It is hard to argue with truly Wise Men and the name “Epiphany” stuck for the day and the occurrence.

Over time, Twelfth Night (before the day of Epiphany) became a night of parties with bright lights, good food and fun times. Twelfth Day (the day of Epiphany itself) was a happy remembering and a waving away to those friends and dignitaries who had to speed down the road after their visit and the end of the Christmas Holiday. “Don’t forget to turn the lights off!” folks would laugh and shout at each other. “See you next year. Maybe they’ll invent electricity by then and we’ll have real Christmas lights.”

As you can see and hear and to make a long story somewhat shorter, yesterday was the last official day for the many-colored Holiday lights strung around the windows overlooking the back walking trail and the two little bushes by the garage draped in their Christmas color.

My heart is sad, for I love the bright strings of color, but I dare not raise the ire of my neighbors by partying too long and turning those lights back on. With the rain arriving, I cannot take the bulbs down just yet, but I will – right now, in the midst of this writing – go and unplug those outside strings. I will then patiently await the raindrops and their end so that I might retrieve the ladder and begin the work of formal removal.

Until then, as I wait warm inside from the drizzle and damp of the dripping moisture that impedes my necessary labors . . . until then – don’t tell anyone, please — I will quietly pull the blinds, sneakily lower the shades, stealthily plug in the plug to the Christmas tree, bask in a few bright stolen post-Epiphanaic colored rays for a few more days, and think of Three Kings making their way home under a bright guiding new star.

It’s a long way by camel but a short way by thought.

Enjoy an epiphany,

Grandpa Jim

Mimsy Twinsy of the Furrulous Fimsy Clan of pottery mice lived in the China Cabinet Land with her five mice children, Cal-Pepper, Dorothy, Prospero, Fred and Ahh-choo. Porcelain by day, when the sun set and the night arrived, she and kids scampered and darted about the shelves of their cabinet confines and conversed with their friends. Still and unmoving when the Bigs picked and placed them during the bright sun hours, the quick black eyes of Mimsy Twinsy never shut. She did not miss a thing. She knew their place and she was teaching her children what it meant to be a Fimsy of the Furrulous Fimsy Clan.

“Mommy, what was that sound?” Cal-Pepper asked. That boy, like Mom, did not miss a thing.

“Hold down the squeak, young un and don’t twitch n ear. See the Big Little Girl there. She just dropped an angel.”

“I see, Momski,” Cal-Pepper, the eldest of the mice children, confirmed. “That angel is Blondies-Smilies. Her head isn’t no more top her wings. No morski, by scratchy.”

Mother mouse and son watched the Big Little Girl as she held the headless angel statue, a sad frown pulling the Girl’s head down.

“Clomp, Clomp, Clomp,” sounded from the upstairs stairs. A Big Man turned the corner and stopped. Seeing the broken statue in the Little Girl’s hands, the Man walked quietly forward, knelt and talked in a low tone to the Girl.

“Wasser doers herers, Kaoleekapopers?” he said softly. “Not skittle gotta corner gummier bears not a bitsy. Youse got the okies for suries. Looksie seeie hereie. Findie windie surie certalookaboutcow. Nop worry ka now til when.”

Ahh-choo sneezed and wiped her nose with a paw. “Mawwy, what are dem words he bee saying?” Sniffle.

Few of the creatures in China Cabinet Land could understand Big People speech. Fimsy was taught how to hear the words by her Dad, King Gateway Got-A-Nose. King Gateway had been known by one and all as “Nosey,” before a recent accident had taken his quite prominent proboscis. Now, the King was home for repair with a plastered cast on his face and a tube of special oint-gluey beside him as he rested. King Gateway’s favorite nickname was in jeopardy. Until the bandages could be removed and the King’s nominative evaluated, Mimsy Twimsy Fimsy was in charge.

“That be one good Big Guy, you can betya yur paint jobs on it,” Mimsy the Fimsy explained. “He nev made the big screechers at the Little Girl. He told her it was okay the dookey. They be just needen to fix that head.”

“But, Mommy, they can’t find that head,” Dorothy, the oldest girl, said between sobs.

The family watched as the Big Man and Little Girl searched the floor on their hands and knees for the missing top. Finally, the Man stood, picked up the Girl and moved to the downstairs stairs.

Some minutes later the Man returned. Stopping by the up stairs, the Big Man glanced over at the china cabinet and smiled at the motionless porcelain figures. Turning, he clicked the light off and clomped up the stairs.

A strange smile lit Mimsy’s face and she nodded her head.

“Prospero, my reliable little mousey, summon the great Puddleduck to our counsel.”

“Yes, Ma’am the Mom.” Prospero, the middle son, saluted, about-faced in brisk military fashion and returned quickly with the quacksome and bonneted large duck who had, it seems, already been on the way to join them.

“Quack. Time for tea, Mimsy?” The great Puddleduck always wished for tea and she was dressed for her favorite sport, which was consuming the cakes and cookies of a famous Fimsy tea time.

“A mission first, my fine winged flying friend. I promise ya a spread of treats replete on yur return.”

Mimsy fixed her gaze on Fred, her youngest and most agile son. “Frederick, quick of hands, can you pick the lock on this cabinet?”

Fred double saluted, to Prospero’s chagrin — Fred was always doing the one-upper. “In a second halved in halve again, my captain in the charge Mom.”

“Excellent,” Mimsy smiled. “You, Fred, will go on the flight, find and fix with Ms. Puddleduck. Before you fly, grab that tube of glue next to dear old Grand-dad in his bed.”

Mimsy addressed her oldest son, whose nose was stuck to the glass.

“Cal-Pepper, my long-sighted micey, have you spied the missing topendage?”

“Yes, Mommy. I see the curls of that angel girl’s head. Over yonder behind the leg of the big slider chair. It went far. That’s why they couldn’t find her topper.”

“Good lad, Callie.”

Mimsy patted the hungry duck’s wing. “Do you see the lil pumpkin head, Ms. Puddle?” The large duck dipped her beak “Yes” in the direction of the displaced top part.

“Good.” Mimsy spun round to her oldest daughter. “Now, Dorothy, the one who knows where things are hidden, run and find some heavy thread for Fred.”

Mimsy stepped in front of her youngest son. “You have a big job, Fred, my lightest and quickest. Take the gluey and thread. Fly with Ma’amsy Puddleduck. Load up the topper and hold on to Puddley tight until you land in manger land. Help Blondie. She’ll hold her head while you squirts da gluey. Don’t get it on her prettsie white dress. Tell er not to move fer 10 seconds. You knows. One little mousie, two little mousie. . . . Counts em out, all the way to 10.”

Mimsy lifted her head to her middle son. “Prospero, you have the door. Make sure it’s open for the return flight. I know we can count on you.”

Prospero triple saluted.

Mimsy Twinsy Fimsy touched the shoulder of her girls, the older Dorothy and the baby Ahh-choo, and looked into their faces. “We have a very important job,” she said to the girls. “We will fix the tea and it will be the grandest of grandiest evers and a yet, with triple cakes and cookies for our dear friend, the Puddleduck, when she returns with Fred from their mission.”

Mimsy threw her arms wide.

“Now, off with all of you to your jobs and tasks and adventures of many and merry.”

With a scurry, flurry and fly, they all to their tasks did take.

* * *

Raising her head from testing a hot scone, Mimsy spied a wave and smile from an angelic blond head across the room and watched the swoosh and tilt of a happy duck on her way home with Flying Fred, of the new name, beaming atop the feathered back as Prospero with Cal-Pepper’s help propped open the door and Dorothy and Little Ahh-choo set out the tea things.

* * *

And . . . what do you think happened the next morning when the Little Girl and the Big Man found that pretty blond angel with her head attached?

You know, I’m looking at that angel right now and I can’t see a crack.

The End

Grandpa Jim