science week: fuel efficiency

one of the environmental benefits of public transportation is fuel efficiency.  sure, the vehicles themselves use way more fuel per mile than cars and light trucks, but there are also a lot more passenger-miles being served.  if you want the in-depth physics of it, kinetic energy equations and all, david mackay wrote this book (completely free download) about it.

if you just want to know how to get more miles out of whatever it is you're driving, what amounts to a handy guide was just put out by some researchers at the university of michigan.  the biggest impacts you can have are driving a high-efficiency car, keeping it tuned up, avoiding traffic and making fewer hard starts and stops.  interestingly, choosing as hill-free and flat a route as possible makes a big difference too.

all that's interesting, but the real reason this otherwise not-so-well-written-paper makes a transit blog such as this one is that it emphasizes, once again, that driving alone is a terribly resource-intensive way to get around.  even accounting for all the late-night bus routes that barely have any people on them, the average passenger-mile on a bus uses about 25% less energy than a car (table 1) and trains about 50% less.  of course, this assumes that reducing energy use is, you know, important, which apparently isn't agreed upon.  that doesn't mean i won't still be smug about it.

science week: physics, csudh style

when i think of “blue line rider,” i don’t usually think of a particle physicist*.  however, i did stumble my way into a nice conversation with john price, head of the physics department of cal state dominguez hills.  i overheard him talking on the red line and though i’m not enough of a physicist to call myself one, i recognize when it’s the topic of conversation.  though john appeared to be getting ready to do some work (headphones in, linux netbook out) when i approached him on the blue line, he seemed happy to spread the gospel of science.

as department head, i’m guessing he spends a lot more time trying to get funding than he would like and it seemed to show in our conversation.  the main obstacles he faces revolve around a general lack of interest in science.  there’s this idea that if there isn’t some immediate use for the results of research, it’s not worth doing.  because of this, when he’s asked what will come of his work, he somewhat flippantly answers “nothing at all.”  he goes on to explain that of course he expects some good of it, but he can’t say what right now.  by way of example, he notes that the first tv wasn’t commercially available until the 1940s, but the physics required to build those tvs was understood in the 1860s.  obviously, no commercial venture can wait that long, so basic research such as his is highly dependent on government funding, where opposing science seems to be fashionable nowadays (at least at the federal level here in the states).

john’s actual work is to improve our understanding of the proton. he's an experimentalist, someone who puts the theoretical physicists' models to the test. he uses a particle accelerator to smash really small things at really high speeds. from these collisions, all sorts of interesting things can be learned, if only you can detect them.  he showed me a diagram of one detector he’s built, as well as one of a newer one he’s working on.  the particles he’s looking for tend to decay very rapidly and over a very short distance, so the new one has its detectors much closer to the actual collision.  it's worth noting that the detector itself is three stories tall.  even though the detectors are very close, they need a lot of equipment behind them in order to get meaningful data.

with the frustration of funding and the joy of discovery comes some fun  some tv shows actually hire consultants to validate the scientific principles in their shows.  john knows the guy “the big bang theory” hired (recently interviewed at wired) and actually noticed some mistakes.  in return, his friend got them to put john’s program’s name in the background of one episode.

unfortunately (at least for the conversation), we arrived at my stop.  i thought about how this enlightening conversation only came about as a result of pure chance, the result of people being in close proximity to one another.  if i knew anything about quantum mechanics, i’m sure a very poetic conclusion about stochastic behavior could be written here.  as it is, i’ll just say i felt like i hit my own personal lottery that day.

* -- john tells me he’s actually a nuclear physicist because he studies the nucleus of atoms, specifically the proton.  i chose to say “particle physicist” mainly to avoid alarmist language, but also because john himself said “same thing.”

science week: chemistry

unfortunately, the one picture i managed to get of this girl's tattoos before she got off the train makes figuring out what they are difficult.  i'm not much of a chemist to start with, but it looks like a benzene ring on the right there with a couple added hydroxides and maybe an ammonia.  not sure what all that adds up to.  that thing on the left, who knows?  a fullerene with dangly parts maybe?  or, this could all just be another way for the cool kids to pick on nerds for having interest in nerdy nerdiness.

whatever it is, all i can say is i admire such blatant displays of devotion to a topic that normally doesn't get any love, at least in the level of detail and as publicly as above*.  regardless, we may have come far enough to see "i ♥ nerds" t-shirts on mta trains (though only once so far), but i have yet to see an

"i ♥ " 

despite how true it is--maybe because that molecule is bad for your ♥ (in case you're wondering just what the molecule is, try out this light reading).

* --  even if these aren't real chemicals and it is some sort of inside joke, it's so inside as to seem like a  public display of devotion.

two wrongs make what?

sometimes you wanna sleep on the train.  sometimes you don't.  sometimes you can't.  a little 2" cube was playin some tunes louder than the pa.  i open my eyes, a little annoyed at first.  then i realize the mta ain't got no sleeper cars.

apparently, to change the song on this "music angel," you have to pick up the cube in which the speaker is embedded.  once miss angel does this, the traincarful of people take note.

"is that where that's comin from?"
"does that take a memory chip?  it take a memory chip, don't it?"
"you got a charger for that too?"
"it sound good, don't it?"
"thought it was comin from up there."
"how'd they get that thing so small?"
"what's that called?"

little does miss angel know, the dam has burst.  a long, loud discussion about music, sound systems and how old public enemy is ensues.  ok, it wasn't that loud, but these folks needed to be heard above the din of the tracks and the tracks comin out the cube.

miss angel's playin her tunes so she can hear em.  these fools weren't about to keep her from that.  on go the headphones.  which means the cube itself falls silent.   she even keeps them on when the conversation stops.   which means i can try sleepin again.  except the train's come to my stop.

skaters, pt 1

four score and seven years ago, when my feet first touched grip tape and i rolled my way to scars that took up half my leg on account of the asphalt getting in the way of my glorious (albeit unplanned) dismount from my deck, skateboarding was for surfers who had no water nearby, mostly skinny guys who all seemed to have flops, vans shoes, baggy shorts and oversize t-shirts.

i'm not a skateboard culture aficionado, but my casual observation from the world of l.a. transit seems to indicate skateboarding cuts across a lot more cultural lines than in my day.  here are a few of the folks i seen and, where relevant, a few words.  enjoy.

i wish i coulda gotten a better picture of the above guy's backpack.  it looked like he did some very cool artwork to make it his.

the skater above more or less embodies the skater of my youth, with one big exception: his bag.  well, that and his t-shirt is white and, though you can't see it in this photo, he has a world wildlife fund patch on his hat.

there's the cool backpack again.

without the skateboard, the long hair (ponytail not visible) and trader joe's bag full of groceries have me thinking this guy's more of a hippie than skater.  well, these days, you can be both.

the guy above (salvador, i think his name was) gets the biggest points for customization.  notice the gigantic (by skateboarding standards) wheels.  they let him glide right over cracks and rocks other skaters might have trouble with; and he told me he's even conquered a few nature trails.  such big wheels require a lot of risers on the trucks and he decided to shorten his board to get the overall weight down.

well, i hope to make this an ongoing series.  unlike "trash porn," which has a limited number of sites visible from the street, there'll probably always be another skater to photograph.  i will say that though much has changed, much remains the same.  skateboards are still principally for the young and, for the most part, boys.  and while there's a decent cross-section of subcultures, it's still mostly the marginalized.  but, then again, what do i know about what the youth considers marginal these days?

if anyone featured here wants to say a little more, please comment or email me at lamtadiary@gmail.com.

coordinating accessorization

it was bound to happen. i don't notice any manicures for almost a year and--BAM--two in a week. already wrote about maryjanetalon. here's someone takin matching their accessories to a level i ain't never seen.

circle is not photoshopped (or, rather, gimped in my case). it's her compact with a mirror in the middle.

what's that they said in boomerang? "ya gots ta co-ord'in-ate. you don't stop with the mushroom shirt. you got to go on...you don't stop with the mushroom belt. you gotta go on."

she got the orange and green manicure. but she didn't stop there. she went on. she got herself an orange and green scarf too. and i bet if it weren't so hot this particular day, she wouldn't'a stopped with the orange and green scarf. i bet she woulda had herself an orange and green sweater.  and if it were an occasion to really show off, she wouldn't'a stopped there.  she'd'a got herself an orange and green crown to top it all off.

what's that they say?  art imitates life or something?

talons

i kept meaning to do a follow-up to my first fashion post, but never really got around to it.  well, seeing the following on the train forced me to.

i couldn't easily get a picture of the other foot, but i noticed upon glancing back while getting off at my stop that it featured the same pedicure.  i'm pretty sure this lady couldn't fly.  but if she could, i'm sure these nails would have served the need for hunting small rodents better than, say, my toenails.  what's weird is i don't think these nails were even in the top three reasons she drew people's attention.

first, her bikini top (or strapless bra, i couldn't really tell) was covering up her topside more than her clothes.  second, she absolutely reeked of pot (i was informed later it was relatively high-grade, but i can't attest to that).  third, every 30 seconds or so, she just burst into laughter, the kind whose spasms send out guttural "g" sounds.

i know she probably made most people uncomfortable, but i have a hard time believing any of them enjoy themselves that much over the course of an entire week.  so, who's the big winner?