Sunday, March 23, 2008

Why is the Sky Blue?

I am going to nerd out this morning to answer this question....recently raised by a family member.

Everyone knows that sunlight is composed of all the primary colors. Think about the famous Pink Floyd album cover for Dark Side of the Moon or seeing a rainbow during a storm.

The light separates into its components because each color has a different wavelength. Think about permed hair to describe wavelength. A tight perm with lots of curls close together has a short wavelength. A perm with long, wavy curls has a long wavelength. Blue light has the shortest wavelength and red light the longest. All the other colors are in between. It just happens that short wavelengths (blue) are the easiest to separate out of light. Long wavelengths (red) are much harder to separate.

Finally, we all know the atmosphere is full of particles....some good (ice, water drops) , some bad (air pollution). These particles act like a prism and scatter the light. The angle of the sun when it is directly overhead allows sunlight to pass through only a few particles in the atmosphere. This causes the short wavelength blue light to scatter and be seen by us (why the sky is blue) but the longer wavelength yellow and red light does not scatter and penetrates to the ground.

So, if I provided a good explanation, you should be able to extend my logic to explain why sunsets are red.

Final note: Yes global warming is occurring....no doubt about that. However, we should become very worried if the sky turns green!

Monday, March 17, 2008

Random Thoughts

1. Raven just farted and it really stinks!! At least someone in this house has stinkier farts than I do!

2. I don't know where my brain is this evening. 4 or 5 times tonight I have stopped because I couldn't remember what I was doing!

3. Wow! We have a lot of work to do on the house and nursery before the girls come. Time is flying fast.

4. Speaking of the nursery.....Only for the girls will I strip 4 layers of paint off wood. Geesh, I hate doing that task now! It's smelly (but not as bad as Raven farts), tiring, & dirty work.

5. I'm really sore today from spending 18 hours on the nursery this weekend.

6. Random sports thoughts.....Hurricanes could go far in the Cup playoffs. You heard it here first. Duke basketball is over-rated this year. Tyler Hansborough for UNC is one heck of a player....he is the team this year.

7. Pee Yew!!! Raven just farted again.

8. More sports....Clemson would have won the ACC championship if they could shoot free throws. As my coach said: "Small things win games.:

9. NPR on Sunday mornings from 8 AM to 1 PM is excellent entertainment. News from 8 to 10, with some puzzles thrown in. Car Talk for an hour. Wait, Wait Don't Tell me game show. And my favorite....Splendid Table hosted by my girlfriend (as Shannon calls Lynn Rosetta-Kasper).

10. I'll be very happy when the babies get here....safe & healthy. Let's wait 10 more weeks girls!

11. I was convinced St. Patrick's Day was the 15th. I always thought it coincided with the Ides of March.

12. I hope everyone is doing well....I haven't heard from anyone lately. Of course, I haven't put out much effort since work and home life is keeping me busy!

13. Shannon and I were wondering who the 7 people who voted were. We can guess Mark, Amy, Doc, and Analee. Who were the other 3. I learned last week that a friend I rarely see (but happened to attend the same party with on Friday) found our blog and voted. That leaves 2 more. I think Tara voted. Who else?

14. Looks like we are going with "Krystyna" (notice I spelled it correctly & yes Doc, I did find the "edit" button).

Wednesday, March 12, 2008

Whoops!

OK, so I just realized last night that it is probably not a good thing at 25 weeks and expecting twins to call your husband out of the blue on his cell phone during the day while he is on a business trip just to pass on the news that your good friends have just had THEIR babies. I was fully expecting to leave a voice mail message but was surprised when he answered. I, of course, was excited because I was supposed to meet Janice earlier for coffee after her regular OB appointment. She never called, and I just assumed that her OB appointment went over such that she ran out of time and had to pick up her older son from pre-school. Well, her husband, Tom, called and apologized for her missing it (to which I replied I understood having spent my fair share in the OB's office myself recently)...he said that the OB appointment wasn't the reason. Her water broke at 8 p.m. on Monday night, and they delivered a handsome baby boy at 2 a.m. Wow!!! Jon didn't sound that excited, which kinda confused me. Well, my pregnancy-brained mind finally figured out that he saw the home number, freaked, and answered in despite of what was going on (i.e., meeting with a client, etc.) and, therefore, didn't not have time for chatting once he found out that there was not an emergency with me. All I can say is whoops! I suppose that I need to be more sensitive to this in the future.

Wednesday, March 5, 2008

Jon Loses Honorary Polack Status

So, Jon can't even spell his daughter's prospective names correctly. Sophie's potential middle names are spelled "Krystyna" and "Janina." The Polish mafia are truly disappointed!!!

Baby Names

Many folks are asking so it's time to post to the blog what names we selected for the girls.

The first name we chose is Jacqueline Carol. We've had this name selected for many years. We wanted to honor our paternal grandfathers. Shannon's Grandpa Jack and my Grandpa Carrol. We thought about sticking with the double "r" in Carol but decided against it.

The second name was picked one day over lunch at Nosh after an ultrasound.

We wanted a unique name that honored Shannon's Polish heritage. Zoisia, the Polish version of "Sophia", was our top choice. However, we thought the strange spelling would lead to incessant teasing. Although it is a real Polish name, we also didn't want people to think it was a "made up" name that we thought sounded cool. To protect our karma, let's just say we are not big fans of "made up" names.

We considered "Sophia" as a compromise but learned it was one of the 10 most popular girl names in 2006. We like being unique so "Sophia" was out. However, the simplified "Sophie" is similar and barely registers on the name popularity index.

Since we didn't select a Polish first name, we decided to use a Polish middle name. Our first idea was "Krystyna," which is Shannon's Mom's middle name. Lately, we've been discussing "Janina" as the middle name in honor of Shannon's maternal grandmother. I love both names and Shannon does too. We're having a hard time making a decision.

Want to voice an opinion? Leave a comment or vote from the poll to the left of the post.