#paper diffraction glasses

[mindblowingscience]

Cornell quantum researchers have detected an elusive phase of matter, called the Bragg glass phase, using large volumes of X-ray data and a new machine learning data analysis tool. The discovery settles a long-standing question of whether this almost–but not quite–ordered state of Bragg glass can exist in real materials. The paper, "Bragg glass signatures in PdxErTe3 with X-ray diffraction Temperature Clustering (X-TEC)," is published in Nature Physics. The lead author is Krishnanand Madhukar Mallayya, a postdoctoral researcher in the Department of Physics in the College of Arts and Sciences (A&S). Eun-Ah Kim, professor of physics (A&S), is the corresponding author. The research was conducted in collaboration with scientists at Argonne National Laboratory and at Stanford University.

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[jedivoodoochile]

The Classic 60s Bait & Switch -- X-Ray Specs!

X-ray specs or X-ray glasses are an American novelty item, purported to allow users to see through or into solid objects. In reality, the spectacles merely create an optical illusion; no X-rays are involved. The current paper version is sold under the name "X-Ray Spex"; a similar product is sold under the name "X-Ray Gogs".

X-Ray Specs consist of an over-sized pair of spectacles with plastic or cardboard frames and white cardboard "lenses" printed with concentric red circles, and emblazoned with the legend "X-RAY VISION".

The "lenses" consist of two layers of thin cardboard with a small hole about a quarter-inch (6 millimeters) in diameter punched through both layers. The user views objects through the holes. In the original version, a feather is embedded between the layers of each lens. The vanes of the feathers are so close together that light is diffracted, causing the user to receive two slightly offset images. For instance, if viewing a pencil, one would see two offset images of the pencil. Where the images overlap, a darker image is obtained, giving the illusion that one is seeing the graphite embedded within the body of the pencil. Newer versions utilize manufactured diffraction lenses instead of feathers.

X-Ray Specs were long advertised with the slogan "See the bones in your hand, see through clothes!" Some versions of the advertisement featured an illustration of a young man using the X-Ray Specs to examine the bones in his hand while a voluptuous woman stood in the background, as though awaiting her turn to be "X-rayed". These claims, however, were untrue. In smaller print below the X-ray claims, advertisements and packaging state that X-Ray Specs operate by "illusion".

Part of the novelty value lies in provoking the object of the wearer's attentions. These subjects may believe that the device does allow the wearer to compromise their modesty, so are liable to respond with a variety of amusing reactions. Indeed, instructions with the packaging explain how to provoke such reactions, to "CONVINCE the gals that your X-Ray Spex are for real!"

The principle behind the illusion, as well as its use in a pair of "spectacles", was first patented (in the United States) in 1906 by George W. Macdonald (U.S. Patent 839,016). A tubular configuration employing the same principle as well as the use of a feather for the diffraction grating was first patented in 1909 by Fred J. Wiedenbeck (U.S. Patent 914,904)[citation needed]

X-Ray Specs were improved (U.S. Patent 3,592,533) by Harold von Braunhut, also the inventor of Amazing Sea-Monkeys.[4]

A previous product called the Wonder Tube worked similarly. Instead of glasses, the device was in the form of a small telescope.

Their name was used as the inspiration for the UK punk band X-Ray Spex.

[linksthoughtbrambles]

The Long Climb Toward Summer

A gift for @a03-anxiousandafraid for the Hateno HIdeout Merry Midna's Mixup gift exchange! A huge thank-you to @bellecream for beta-reading this!

BotW AU, Zelink if you squint, about ~7.5 K words. You can read it on ao3, too!

Summary: An unusual winter solstice celebration prompts Zelda to take a close look at her knight—and her people.

~~❄~~❄~~❄~~❄~~❄~~❄~~

The castle staff had outdone themselves.

Zelda had seen a great many balls, festivals, and celebrations in her eighteen years in Hyrule Castle. 

She’d seen the astounding centennial New Year’s celebration: a hundred paper lanterns entrusted to the sky, emblazoned with the royal crest, Hylia’s golden wings fluttering westward with the wind, a stream of emblems thanking the midnight for allowing them to pass it by.

The ceremony on Zelda’s eleventh birthday had bordered on ethereal. Clergy from all over Hyrule had come to give Zelda their blessing—blessings for her journey from childhood to adulthood, for the grace to take Hylia’s power within and wield it for her people, and for her own protection, that she may be steadfast in body and mind in the face of the Calamity to come.  Shafts of sun had found her as she accepted each with humility.  Past sunset, the acolytes lit the cathedral with thousands of teardrop-shaped candles, faith evaporating the kingdom’s tears before her.  The experience had left her falling into an exhausted sleep, serene, certain she would awaken transformed into Hylia’s light (though, of course, that hadn’t happened, and the weeks following drew dark curtains about Zelda’s thoughts).

Last year’s ball commemorating her father’s fiftieth birthday had been opulent indeed, boasting a host of dainty foods to coat in warm, velvety cheese and rich liquid chocolate, decorations appearing as though they’d been gilded, brazen, defiant against the early September Sun.  The court poet had composed the day’s unyielding sounds: brass boasting a fearlessness of the future.  It had been impossible for anyone in that room to brood within solitary thoughts (except Zelda, of course).

She had seen those remarkable occasions and many others.

Yet this—this—rooted Zelda to the spot with unmitigated awe the instant she passed beneath the archway, even driving thoughts of her intrusively persistent knight-shadow from her.  She didn’t notice the swift scuff of booted toes on stone as he avoided colliding with her.

The traditional ball at winter solstice had barely altered from year to year within her lifetime; a lovely exercise in lighting the long-lingering dark, it made a night of pleasance and tinkling glass which she typically could no longer enjoy.  Bright as they were, candles could not light the deep recesses of Zelda’s heart, nor could they deflect the darkness of black pupils following her in silent condemnation; Zelda, herself, ought to have been the light, by now.  She wasn’t.

These previous experiences had left her unprepared for this year’s departure from the cyclical.

Brilliant rays of diffracted, rainbow light peppered the ballroom’s surfaces of stone, white tablecloth, glass, and a hundred other myriad colors and textures belonging to food, clothing, skin and fixtures Zelda couldn’t process all at once except in overall impression: hope—look at the light.

Those soft rainbows scattered in through the room’s tall windows, through the multi-paned balcony doors to the frigid outer air, emerging from an avian menagerie of ice sculptures arrayed just outside.  Four huge birds loomed, pristine as polished glass: a swan, a crane, a dove, and an owl.  They each bore the appearance of that stance just before flight, angled inward to face the fifth sculpture, still of wings, though not precisely a bird: the traditional three-dimensional representation of the royal family’s crest, the wings encompassing the lower half of the symbol of three triangles.  This particular sculpture’s plumes bore extraordinary detail-work in the true shape of feathers, and the surfaces tweaked the Sun’s golden light into all those shapes and colors.

Just within the border of the windows, a veritable flock of birds hung, wings arced in the grace of mid-flight blessed with gentle updrafts—birds of paper.  Birds of all kinds: sparrows, pigeons, herons, swallows, hawks, pheasants, gulls, all painstakingly shaped and dyed, gentle suggestions of the true bright colors, the sweet sight of spring ever growing with the birds’ flight north (for they all faced that way) as the Sun’s spectral presence shifted among them.

The gargantuan evergreen tree beside the left balcony door stood as the only familiar monument.  Even decorated with shining ribbon, glittering baubles, and dangling spears and spirals of cut glass, its thick needles devoured light—each shaft of brilliance falling upon them splintered, usurped by each spindly leaf’s deep green, diminishing to extinction in silence.  The tree’s height and width entirely hid its innards.  A large assortment of offerings already lay in thanks at its foot: gifts for the less fortunate in Castle Town, a tradition in the royal family to soften the dual cruelties of cold and dark.

It was why this event posed the greatest challenge for the castle’s kitchen, too—for on this night, the castle fed more than its own inhabitants and party guests.  No one in the town would go hungry.  Zelda had seen the trestle tables carried far below her, arrayed in a long line to the gatehouses where dinner would be served for any who wanted it.  The food at the ball itself would be elegant, but nothing so opulent or plentiful as that on her father’s birthday.

A good many people had begun to partake, quite a few couples turning about the dance floor, rainbows dappling their flowing forms.

Her father was not among the dancers or the grazers.

He was walking toward her.

The light appeared far less entrancing with him growing in her vision.

She swallowed, her chin raising the merest fraction.  Whatever it would be this time, she would bear it.  Perhaps he thought she had taken too long in her study of the shrine uncovered at the quarry, time she ought to have devoted to supplication at the feet of the Goddess.

Her father’s heavy boots stopped a few feet from her left.  He towered over her, his face turned down, a crease between his brows, a slight frown as he considered her.  He glanced rightward toward Link and blinked, his head and eyebrows raised as though carefully evaluating her knight, too.

Her father’s eyes then returned to hers-

-and his face softened.

“Zelda,” he said, stepping forward with a smile—a tired one, but genuine—and taking her hands in his with a sign.  “Well.  You look splendid tonight, my dear.”

Her mouth nearly fell open.  The royal seamstress had, indeed, crafted a lovely gown, its heavy skirt well-suited to the cold should she exit to the balcony, its textured cream fabric catching the light within sweeping curves of royal blue and gold embroidery, irregular yet natural, as currents in a gentle brook.  Yet the dress was hardly worthy of surprise.  Her gowns were always lovely.

Her father remarking upon it was another matter entirely.

“How very much like your mother,” he continued.

The room seemed suddenly still as he patted her hands and a recollection arrived—an image of him with her mother at the last of these balls while she lived.  He’d smiled often, then.

“Th- thank you, father,” Zelda said.

“Ah,” he sighed.  “Come.  On this long, dark night… let’s be light, ourselves.”  He offered his arm to her.  She slid hers in as he led her to the dance floor.

The father-daughter dance occurred each year, but this time… this time, he smiled at her as they joined those already making merry.  He spoke of Zelda’s mother: of how she’d loved the solstice ball, how she always pushed him to dance in a far more spritely way than he’d been comfortable with, and how he’d obliged her, of course, since he’d had such difficulty refusing her anything.

“Indeed, daughter, we’d disagreed at first on what to name you.  I’d thought it confusing for your name to be identical to your grandmother’s.  I thought tradition ought to bow to practicality.  For were the two of you in a room, and I were to say, ‘Zelda,’ two heads would swivel my way without some other way to clarify.” He humphed a laugh.  “I’d begun to refer to your grandmother as Zelda One, and you as Zelda Two—only in your mother’s presence, of course.  I daresay I’d have been in deep trouble were I to refer to the queen as ‘Zelda One,’ especially as our history makes it quite clear that she was, at the very least, the two-thousand-and-twelfth.”  He grinned at her, his eyes crinkling.  “It turns out, as usual, my wife was right. The name Zelda suits you supremely.”

Zelda’s eyes had grown more watery than usual as he spoke.  “Thank you, father.”

He harumphed again.

When the song changed, he nodded to her and walked beside her to the floor’s edge, where a crowd had begun to build.  “I hope you shall enjoy yourself tonight, daughter.”

She thanked him again, and he headed toward one of his financial advisors.  Most likely, they had business to discuss.

Zelda stood quite perplexed, even lost, her usual context quite displaced.

“May I have this dance?” a voice said.

Zelda turned to find the court poet’s polite, yet warm smile directed at her.  She’d always liked him.  His company on several of her expeditions had been most welcome.  She returned his smile.  “Certainly, Zuho,” she said, placing her hand in the one he’d offered, his brows raising at her acceptance.

“Wonderful,” he said.

She’d danced with him once before, last year, and he’d been an obvious mess of nerves when she had, likely worried he’d make a mistake and embarrass himself in front of the Crown Princess of Hyrule.  When he’d spoken, it had been stilted and consisting of nothing but facts about the music scheduled for the evening (not that Zelda would complain—she liked to learn, whether it be about guardian remains or music).  The current experience differed in its entirety.  His smile remained warm and he spoke with her easily about a piece he’d been writing about the shrines they had visited.  Then the conversation turned to her.

“I am glad to see, Highness, that you appear in good spirits today,” he said.

“Oh.”  The sound of surprise escaped her.  Fortunately, she’d made it with Zuho, and not with some landowning bigot who would look down his nose at her for being a Hylian and not an automaton devoid of all emotion.  “Yes, well… tonight has been pleasant thus far.”

Zuho’s smile broadened.  His eyes flicked toward the solstice tree far across the room.  “I see.  Would that have something to do with losing your shadow?”

Zelda blinked, then followed his line of vision.

Her knight stood straight and stoic, expressionless, his eyes staring at the far wall with marked disinterest, directly in front of the (still growing) pile of gifts surrounding the tree.  He held his hands at his sides as though ready, at any moment, to draw that irksome sword of his.

It was the furthest he’d been from her outside her chambers in months.

Zelda turned back to Zuho, feeling more than a little pleased.  “I hadn’t thought of it specifically until now, but you may be right.”

Zuho grinned.

She danced with the castle’s steward next.  He’d always had a bit of a soft spot for her.  He spent a few minutes reminiscing on how she’d occasionally steal herself down to the castle kitchen, to the pantry, in search of fruitcake.

“As though the Princess of the realm couldn’t have it delivered to her chamber,” he chuckled.

Zelda grinned.  “I have always preferred to do things for myself.”

“Ha!  Including cutting the cake still sitting on its pantry shelf.”

“Indeed!  It was freshest that way.”

“It also meant you could cut quite a large slice.”

“It was more efficient than cutting two or three small slices.”

He laughed openly.  “Ah- Princess.  I must admit I miss those days.  I hope I shall live to see the next Princess in this castle.  Perhaps she, too, will have an extraordinary love of fruitcake.”

She laughed with him.

He bowed out as the dance ended, and Zelda found herself wandering toward the refreshments table, a pensive smile on her face, confused, at first, why that conversation had touched her so.  She ladled herself a generous portion of mulled meade and sipped it, the warmth slipping down her throat, coiling outward from her stomach to cradle her chest in the glow of comfort.  A child—a baby—that was it.  No one in this castle had spoken to her of such things—not ever.

A future.

Children.

Not the looming threat of the Calamity and her ability—or lack thereof—to defend Hyrule from it.

She breathed a puff of surprised air, rippling the surface of her drink.

Perhaps the friendly, calming nature of her first three dances had set the evening’s tone for everyone in the room.

Or perhaps her own demeanor had changed thanks to them.  She couldn’t be sure.

But her next dance partner had greeted her with a genuine smile, if a bit closed, and not a single veiled insult passed his lips.

This became true for the one which followed.

And the next.

And the next.

Until by her seventh dance, Zelda’s countenance had become truly merry.  She spoke freely and easily.  She and all her dance partners had steadfastly ignored politics in favor of all manner of other, more pleasant conversation.

The minister of agriculture raved about new recipes from an upstart chef in Lurelin who had made razorclaw crab a sudden sensation despite its rubbery flesh compared to its close crab relations’.  His detailed descriptions made her mouth water.

The general visiting from Akkala Citadel spoke of the extraordinary fall they’d had that year, of the leaves turning even more vibrant colors than usual, and of children making all manner of fun with them—leaf piles, leaf crafts, leaf imprints left on paper through rubbed charcoal—the mystery of his fascination with them solved when he revealed his own children’s construction of a leaf-crown for him which (he claimed) had left him with bits of dry leaves in his hair for three days.

Then Robbie had claimed her hand for the next dance.  She still enjoyed herself.  Mostly.  She would, perhaps, have felt more comfortable had he removed his goggles for the party.  The conversation, blessedly, turned to guardian parts and his pleasure at discovering those miniaturized cores to power handheld weapons.

“Oh-oh YE-AH!  I’m like the breeze of pure intellect through the tall grass… of ignorance!!!” Robbie declared.

Zelda very nearly managed not to laugh, but other dancers’ half-stifled giggles crept their way into her gut and she couldn’t help it.

“Laugh if you must.  Just KEEP dancing,” he said with a smirk.

At least she hadn’t insulted him.

A brief break afterward found her huddled at the punch bowl, even hotter and more alcoholic than the mulled meade had been, with Robbie, Purah, and Impa chattering about the Sheikah Slate.

“I can’t believe you took a picture of that, Princess,” Purah said with a snort.

“Why shouldn’t I commemorate important occasions, as you have?” Zelda said in self-defense.

“Commemorate whatever you want, but why take pictures of just empty space?  You should’ve had Link kneel and take the shot—OH!  Oh, no, Princess!  You should’ve gotten all the way back into blessing-pose, your hands, like—all the way up to the sky and your mouth like ahhhhh-“

“That’s not how the blessing-“

“Shush, I’m not done!”

Zelda shushed, somehow unphased despite her rank.

“Anyway, you should’ve been like you were blessing Link even though you were already done, and he should’ve been doing the kneeling thingie-“

“Genuflection,” Zelda offered.

“Yeah, that!  And you should’ve let Urbosa take the picture.  Snappity snap!”

“Urbosa didn’t know how-“

“So?!  It’s easy!  You could’ve showed her.”

“Mipha seemed more interested in the slate than she did,” Impa pointed out.

“Oh nooo,” Purah said with a sweeping gesture, somehow not spilling a single drop of her hot punch despite it being in her gesturing-hand.  “Nope.  Not Mipha.  That would’ve been awkward.”

Zelda’s brows furrowed.  “Why should it be awkward?”

Purah stared at her with an exaggeratedly-dropped jaw.  “Are you kidding?”

“Why should I be?”

“You didn’t notice-?“

The visiting trade minster from Labrynna chose that moment to interrupt, asking for her next dance.

It turned out to be a rather amusing ruse, she discovered, when he used the dance to ask her all manner of questions about the court poet.

“Forgive me, Princess, but as you’re the only person he’s danced with I’d rather wondered if I could prevail upon you to answer a few questions?”

“I don’t see why not,” she said.

“Is he married?” he said in a half-whisper.

“Is he…?  Oh.  Oh, no, he isn’t.” 

At the end of the song, he made a bee-line for Zuho and Zelda absently wondered whether he’d have any luck.  She’d no idea who the court poet did or didn’t fancy.

It reminded her of that earlier eyeline to her appointed knight.  She turned her gaze, once more, on the tree.

The Sun had set, and with it the room had grown less bright but warmer, hues of orange-gold spread by the glittering of brazier light filtered through those monumental ice sculptures on the balcony, many candles lit in candleholders painstakingly-placed in a wave-like pattern reminiscent of a southern wind, as though spurring all those paper birds northward to return home.  In aid of the usual sources of light in the room, they left the darkness with nowhere to shelter-

Nowhere except that tree.

Its green could barely be discerned in light of such warmth—without the sweet blues of sky in the windowpanes.  It loomed, near-black, towering by fifteen-fold over her knight, who hadn’t moved a millimeter in any direction.  She watched him, curious, waiting for any sign he yet lived, and hadn’t become a statue, a decoration along with all the other inanimate objects in the room.  He didn’t even blink.

She doubted he knew of her eyes upon him, so unwaveringly he stared straight out from his vantage before the prickling black.

Her chin raised.

Now she knew how to be rid of him.  Or at least, not dogged by his constant footsteps.

Perhaps she ought to request a ball each week.

She shook herself, ashamed, for a moment, at such a wasteful thought.

It was the first unpleasant moment she’d had since her father’s hands took hers.

It would be the chosen hero who would cause it.

Well, she needn’t allow it to continue.

She scanned the crowd, finding one of the many influential landowners from central Hyrule.  This one held nearly fifteen percent of all the land at gatepost town and had been of great help in housing the Sheikah excavating various sites on the Great Plateau.  She made her way toward him and began quite a pleasant conversation with fervent thanks for his assistance.

The celebration moved well into the night with a calm grace.  Zelda partook of another glass of punch, listening to Impa’s stories of children in Kakariko and how they spend solstice watching the town’s most skilled climber scale the tallest of those peaks surrounding the village and light a single torch atop it, a torch they would keep lit all until dawn in defiance of the year’s longest night.  Groups of them would run to the great fairy’s fountain and shower her with hand-made trinkets of polished stone; they’d wonder if she would wear them, and if they would ever see her to find out.  They’d give thanks for her water which never froze, and their parents would have to herd them back toward their beds—but they’d keep peeking, whenever they could, at that single lit torch, until the Sun finally rose and began its long climb toward summer.

The Rito had similar traditions—firing blazing arrows in the direction of the sunrise.  The Gorons preferred to spend the night basking in their hottest of hot springs.  The Zora lit their waterways from below with luminous stone, representing the light of the Sun reaching them even in the darkest night through the earth itself.  The Gerudo typically enjoyed the (relatively) cool day and kept the bazaar open all night.  Urbosa had told her of the tiny, flaring lights, like shards of fire-arrows for the children, magical embers, that the desert may never lose its heat.

Zelda wondered, not for the first time, what the Zonai would have done.  They knew so little of them, with their written history problematic at best.  She well knew history books were written by the victors.  Perhaps, someday, she would have the luxury to delve deeper into those questions, too.

“So, are you going to ask him to dance?” Impa said.

Zelda stared at her.  “Whom?”

Impa raised an eyebrow.  “Link.”

Zelda scoffed, smiling.  “I am not.”

“Really?”

“Truly.”

“Huh.”

“Why should this surprise you?”

“Well.  I mean.  I figured—since he hadn’t danced with anyone else-“

“Of course, he hasn’t.  He’s on duty.”

“He always seems like he’s on duty.”

“W- well…” She thought a moment, trying to envision a time she’d seen Link do something other than be on duty.

He ate food.  Quite a lot of it.

Or so she’d heard.

No- no, he’d eaten when they’d traveled together, of course.  He’d done so quickly and efficiently.  While still guarding her.  But that wasn’t quite on duty, was it?

Zelda shifted her feet.

When, precisely, was Link off-duty?

He’d dogged her every step since her father appointed him to her service.  A few paces behind her, always.  He left her at her door each night and she opened it to the familiar sight of his back each morning, his back adorned with the sword, its blue and gold hilt wrapped in green, and its opulent scabbard on immediate display in her vision.

What a thing to start her day to.

A few nights, she’d been sure he’d been practicing his forms on the bridge between her chamber and study, too.  Unless, of course, she’d been dreaming…

“Princess Zelda?” Impa asked, her voice less certain.  “Did I offend you?”

“Oh- oh no, Impa, of course not.  Why should you think so?”

“You just… I wasn’t suggesting anything.”

Zelda shook her head.  “Like what?”

Impa took another sip of her meade.  “Um.  Nothing in particular.”

Zelda had no idea what to make of that.

She spent a good deal more time in relaxed conversation throughout the room.  She danced with Zuho again and the captain of the garrison at Lake Hylia.  A string of dances found her eyes drawn, with each turn, toward the tree, the gifts about it now piled so high they stood taller than her appointed knight in most places.  He seemed to shrink with each glance, though he never moved.

It appeared as though the world had grown around him, leaving him in the great shadow of the tree.

Zelda nearly rolled her eyes at herself.

When, exactly, was Link off-duty?

The time must be nearing ten o’clock.  The dainty deserts had been served hours ago.  Link had joined her this morning at eight o’clock outside her door.  For her, this was merely her life—she was neither on nor off duty, precisely—but for him, he had been at work a minimum of 14 hours.  He’d eaten something quickly when she’d taken lunch.  That was all.

She tamped the groan which threatened to leave her at her inconvenient empathy.  Thus far, this had been a perfectly pleasant evening, despite all odds.  She’d ruin it for herself should she walk over there.  She knew what he’d do if she tried to dismiss him, to enjoy the remainder of the party as a guest and not… whatever this was.  It’s not as though other guards weren’t present.

She’d barely said a word to her dance partner.  She realized with a start the song had ended, and he seemed more than a little leery of her – then she realized she’d been squeezing his hand hard enough to leave a red mark.

“Oh—please, pardon me.  My- my shoes hurt.”

“Oh,” he said.  “How unpleasant for you, Princess.  Would you like to lean on me?  I can take you to a chair.”

She smiled at him a little bit—a son of the richest woman in Tabantha village, and quite young.  “Thank you, but I shan’t sit yet.”

He nodded, smiling awkwardly, and bowed out.

Zelda sighed, keeping her hands carefully un-fisted, as she moved in as stately a manner as possible toward her stock-still appointed knight.

He made no sign he knew of her approach until she’d left the dance floor, his eyes only then flicking in her direction for an instant.  They seemed a brighter blue than usual.  It threw her for a moment—in this deeply red, orange, and gold light, his eyes ought to have dulled according to predictable reflective and absorptive properties of materials in certain light.  She cleared her throat, finding it odd, even to her, that she’d suddenly considered her knight’s irises a ‘material’ rather like she’d evaluate properties of guardian parts and various types of ancient Sheikah stone.

She reached him, standing before him and slightly to his left.  He continued staring at whatever point in the distance he’d decided to fixate on for the past seven hours.

Zelda took a deep breath.  “Sir Link.  You have remained in this precise position since we arrived.  There’s no need.  You are dismissed.”

He blinked.

She shifted her feet.  “Please, join the party.  There are quite a few guards about.  You needn’t remain on duty.”

His eyes moved at that, though not toward her.  They flickered minutely, barely a fraction from that point he’d been so focused upon, as if searching for something near it.

Irritation sparked within her ribcage.  He never spoke, but why would he not even look at her?

“Knight,” she said, her tone stern, but stopped herself short at the tiniest change of expression on his face.

He’d flinched.

Hadn’t he?

Zelda’s lips parted as she squinted at him, wondering if she’d imagined it.

She took in his form once more, begrudgingly impressed he could remain so still for so long without shifting his weight.

He ought to at least move about a bit.

With that thought came Impa’s phantom words in her ear: So, are you going to ask him to dance?

She nearly rolled her eyes at herself again. 

She’d lost her shadow for the evening… mostly.  Why would she request its return?  It would be foolish.

She studied him, realizing while he was certainly broader than she, more muscular, his height would hardly be different—rather like the young man she’d just danced with.  So young.

He might not even know how to dance.

His size would be an advantage there, she supposed.  It would be easier for her to lead in a clandestine manner without leaning back to drag him along.

He really oughtn’t continue to stand there.  Zelda could imagine what stories would be spun when the warmth and the drink had faded, and the morrow came in cold, stark reality—when people’s voices became spiteful again.  They’d say she treated her knight poorly, wouldn’t they?

Yes.  That was an excellent reason to stop his pointless vigil.  She felt vindicated.

“Knight,” she said, “if you shall not move on your own, I shall instead request you dance the next with me.”  She held her hands clasped before her, waiting.

His eyes finally, finally, dragged their way toward hers.  The journey seemed torturous.  Perhaps he’d been still too long.  Perhaps moving something as delicate as eyes required a good deal more concentration after such a long, unbroken stare.

As he found her line of vision, that impression struck, once again, of his blues seeming oddly bright.  They matched his tunic, didn’t they?  The tunic had darkened more.  Something about them left her breathless, her brows drawing together, drawing deep.

Her knight nodded slowly—not the curt nod he usually used.  Perhaps he felt stiff.

Zelda’s stomach fluttered.  He hadn’t offered his hand.  She pointedly looked at it, then joined her eyes to his once more.

He got the message.

His hand rose in a fluid motion, in exactly the position it should have been were he to ask her to dance.

A little relieved, she took it and placed her hand on his shoulder as proper-

And gasped.

What was that?

A shuddering, pulsating- what?  Beneath her hand on his shoulder.

She stared at him, breathing fast, uncertain.  “Sir Link,” she whispered.  “Are you well?”

There it was again—that lengthy nod.

She didn’t believe him.

Was that-

Was that-

His heart?

Could she feel it even at the opposite shoulder?  How violently must it be beating for it to be so?

A voice in her head told her quite plainly she oughtn’t switch hands to find out.  People would notice if she suddenly decided to dance backwards.

She did it anyway, removing her left hand…

…and placing the right one above his heart.

Thumpthumpthumpthumpthumpthumpthumpthump.

She winced, her mouth drawing into an open frown.

His expression remained unchanged.

Thumpthumpthumpthumpthumpthumpthumpthump.

“Sir- sir Link.  Are you well?!”

That nod again.

That slow nod, and those… bright eyes.

She hardly knew what she was doing.  Her body moved on its own, following some instinctual directive, her thoughts far, far behind it as she took his hand and led him around the tree, closer to the windows, away from the light and the eyes around them.  She’d thought to speak with him outside, but she realized with another shot of irritation several groups of people had gathered out there, admiring the sculptures and the now-brightening moonlight.

So, she did the only thing she could to hide them completely.  She turned, pulling him between the tree and the outer wall—and pushed him inside, both hands on his chest.

The tree’s limbs had grown thick, but on this side the gifts were absent, making it easier to force their way in, branches and needles tugging at their hair, their clothing, and Zelda’s skirt, especially.  She paid it no mind, traipsing through it just as she would an irritating growth of bushes surrounding a shrine.  Once buried deep in the relative darkness, she released him, finding his eyes once more.

“You are unwell,” she said, focusing on that brightness, on whether it was what she’d thought, but it couldn’t be, because this was her utterly statuesque appointed knight.

He made no answer.  A swallow worked its way down his throat.                                                 

“Sir Link.  Your- your heart.  It is hammering unaccountably.”  She raised her eyebrows, pointedly ensnaring his eyes with her own.  “Have you taken ill with a fever?”

That seemed to startle him.  He shook his head.

She took a deep breath, then gingerly returned her hand to his chest—this time directly above his heart.

THUMPTHUMPTHUMPTHUMPTHUMPTHUMPTHUMPTHUMPTHUMPTHUMP

Either his heart’s palpitations had become even more violent, or her proximity to his heart beneath his ribs made the raw severity of his condition apparent.  She knew little of medicine, but she knew enough to understand a Hylian heart shouldn’t beat so fast.  This—this was the heart of a terrified fox near the end of the hunt, ragged and desperate-

Certain of death.

She stared at her own hand, feeling the hidden heart of her shadow.

She breathed.

Had it always been like this?

Had he followed her all this time… treading in her wake… with this terror ever-beating in his chest?

She finally found his eyes again.

They were shimmering.

She nearly asked him.

So nearly.

But she knew—she knew he would remain silent.  Why wouldn’t he?  She’d… never been particularly kind to him, had she?  She never turned around to check on her shadow—to see if he was well.

Gingerly—with immense care—she raised her hands to either side of his face, approaching at a pace so languid he could stop her should he truly wish to.

Her right hand touched his cheek first, and his lips parted, sound finally issuing from his disused throat.

“N- don’t-“ he said.

Her left hand touched his cheek, and at that instant, liquid pooled, overflowing, streaking down that cheek; he turned that side of his face from her in swift shame, eyes shut.

“No- no, S-… Link…” Zelda said, brushing that tear from his cheek with all four of those fingers which had been at his cheekbone, her thumb hovering, uncertain, near his mouth.  “Link…”

The eyelid still visible to her quivered, holding back whatever pain had collected there, but she wouldn’t allow it.  Now she knew he’d been hiding such poisonous emotion, she couldn’t let him turn back in.

She brushed that cheek with her thumb, so gently, traced his cheekbone with it.

“It’s alright,” she whispered.

His face changed.

She’d seen anguish before.  She’d seen it in her father after her mother’s passing.

She’d never seen it in someone as young as her.

His mouth opened and twisted down, water springing from the eye he’d attempted to seal shut, deep creases appearing between his eyebrows.

Her thumb swept the first tears away as her lips quivered.  Some part of Zelda’s core knew, as she drew him against her, as she pressed his weeping eyes to her shoulder, nestling him in the crook of her neck, where her body had learned how to comfort another.  It had been so long ago, her mind had forgotten—but her muscles remembered.  They knew how her mother had held her, so long ago, when she’d been filled with sorrow.  When her grandmother had died.

He heaved and shuddered against her, his tears soaking into her dress’ neckline.  He wept silently but for his breath.  Zelda sensed his hands’ uncertain hovering, and she took hold of first one, then the other, placing them at her back before returning her hands to him, stroking his hair and encircling his shoulders.

“I’m sorry,” she whispered.  “I’m so sorry, Link.”  She nearly asked him not to hide it from her, but her sinking thoughts churned a realization from deep within.  He hadn’t hidden from her.  Not really.  He’d followed her every step.  She simply hadn’t turned around.

She’d even yelled at him.  Told him to stop.

The truth had been there for her to see, had she tried.

“How alone have you felt, Link?” Zelda asked.

A whimper escaped him, quickly tamped.  He shuddered.

Her own tears began to fall.

“I-“ he said.

Zelda gasped.

She waited.

He shivered, holding her harder, but with nowhere near his knight’s-strength.

“Don’t hold back,” she whispered.

With a quiet, high-pitched sound, he pressed her to him, tightening slowly, as though waiting for her to cry out in pain or to push him away.

She didn’t.  They soon held each other in vice-grips, the beatings of their hearts speaking directly to each other.

Zelda’s heart lead Link’s on a gentle downslope toward calm.  It took time—eyes leaking, hands twitching, spreading reassurance with splayed fingers.

She thought he’d forgotten her question.

His pressure on her back released, though he still held her.  His face remained stained, streaked and mottled, but he’d spent the tears themselves.  His mouth worked.  He wet his lips.

“I know you feel alone, too,” he said.

She pulled her head back to take in his face.  She brushed tear-matted hair from it.  She bit her lip.  “Perhaps neither of us is alone anymore,” she said, her smile as warm as the light of the Goddess herself.

His gaze lingered soft on her smile.  He pushed her hair back over her shoulder.  “I messed up your hair.”

She laughed.  “It hardly matters.”

And for the very first time, she saw Link smile.  The corners of his mouth turned up.  His teeth suited him, framed in his face like that.  “I guess.”

The music beyond the tree had been soft quite some time—the tail end of the evening heralded by gentle dances and seated conversation.  Link twitched an ear toward the band.  “I’m sorry.  I ruined the end of it for you.”

“Nonsense,” Zelda said.  “I had a pleasanter evening than I’d expected.”

“I noticed,” he said.

“Truly?  You appeared as though watching the wall.”

“I just try not to stare at you.”

Zelda swallowed, a sudden fluttering of her heart.  Thoughts for another time, perhaps.  “You, Sir Link, have had a terrible evening indeed—and a terrible few months—haven’t you?”

His lips curled in, one shoulder raised in nonchalant agreement.

She huffed an empathetic laugh.

She thought of the room full of light, of his standing apart.  Of his loneliness.

What would he do were she to return to her chamber to turn in for the night?  Would he practice forms on her bridge?  Would he try and fail to sleep in his bed?  Would he stand with his back to her door until she greeted him next morning?

How could she make this the beginning of a new, less lonely reality for him?

She heard the clack of heavy ceramic as servants cleared some used dishes at a nearby table.

She took Link’s hand.

---

They soon found themselves out in the snow, Zelda’s thick gown bolstered by petticoats and her snowquill boots and coat, Link wearing a thickly padded doublet over his Champion’s tunic as they carried baskets of fresh-baked bread down the hill toward the second gatehouse.

“This is a good idea, Princess,” Link said.

“I’m glad.  I… used to do this every year,” she said with a soft smile.  She felt his eyes on her, though she had to watch the snowy path at her feet.

“Why did you stop?” he asked.

She sighed, carefully avoiding a patch which appeared tamped toward flat and slippery.  “With so much at stake…”

She faltered.

“… And so many eyes on you?” Link asked.

“Oh,” she breathed, wobbling slightly as a foot slipped, but Link caught her elbow, his basket perfectly balanced on one arm.

She studied his face.

“Yes,” she said.  Her feet moved again after a few breaths—after she saw another group of bread-carriers behind them.  “I feel as though I’m seeing ghosts.  As though they’re already… mid-recrimination for the end to come.  I think many of them are.”

Link breathed a long stream of air out his nose.  “…I’ve seen it, too.”

They kept glancing at each other, breathing clouds silvered by moonlight.

He kept hold of her elbow all the way to the trestle tables, where they relieved two surprised, weary-looking maids with noses red from cold.

“Please call it a night.  We shall take it from here,” Zelda said.

“B- but-”

“Princess?”

“Please.  I insist.”  She held out her hand to take the ladle from the woman nearest her.

The women retreated with tentative smiles and multiple thank-yous, trudging toward the castle with cheerful chatter.

The game-fowl and vegetable stew in the cauldron before Zelda smelled spectacular.  They ladled that and distributed hot cider, moisture from the steaming sustenance siphoned by winter’s chill mingling with all that radiance.

Zelda put up a brave smile, her defense against the front of the line as it wafted past her, a slow shuffle of hands holding wooden bowls and cups, mild disturbances of air, speech as they asked after each other’s well-being—as they answered things like, ‘Yes, he’s over the cold - see?  He’s just there’ - ‘The shop is shut for the week, but we’ll make do’ - ‘She has another little one on the way, poor thing.’

Zelda filled their dishes to the brim, focused on her work, saying, “You’re welcome” and “Happy Solstice” at the proper times.

Link, beside her, loosed a chuckle.  It drew her eyes.

A bedraggled man had wrangled four children in a pristine demonstration of controlled chaos. Not a single small foot nor tiny finger protruded four feet from him, yet within that space entropy, it seemed, would have its pound of flesh.  The youngest rode on her father’s shoulders, giggling and kicking her thinly-shoed feet, while a boy nearly as small clung to one weary leg, receiving what appeared to be a rather enjoyable ride on the man’s boot.

“Your butt’s all wet from the snO-oh,” an older brother said with a snort and a poke to the boy’s shoulder.

“Mine’s not!” declared the shouldered sister, her hands pulling rather hard at the man’s hair.

The boot-rider studiously ignored the teasing in favor of wiggling a finger disturbingly far up his own nostril and depositing its findings on the man’s pants.

(The man rolled his eyes).

“Gross,” said the oldest boy, pushing boot-rider’s shoulder with enough force to wobble him.

“No pushing,” the man said.

“He just snotted you!”

“Yeahhh, I know.”

“Did not!” said boot-rider.

No one bothered to correct him.

They reached Link with five cups and five bowls to fill, and while Zelda attempted to formulate some manner of plan, the children’s excitement over cider made itself known.

“CIDER!” “Can we have some, please?” “HELLO!” “Are you a grown-up?”

That last had been directed at Link.

“Heh.  Yeah, I’m a grown-up,” Link said.  “Should I…?”

The man nodded a weary head that sent his daughter’s arms bobbing with it.  She giggled madly.

Link gave his signature curt nod—which, Zelda reflected, appeared far less irritating with him smiling like that—and began ladeling the hot cider into the cups.

“The stuff’s hot, kids,” he warned, apparently unwilling to fill the cups fully.

This did not please the little ones, who complained of his unfairness.

Link’s eyes spoke so clearly.  Help.

Zelda drew herself tall (as tall as a relatively diminutive woman could).  “Children,” she said.

Her voice cut clear, though kind, through their independent, melodramatic little monologues.

They all looked at her, silent.

She smiled.  It was hard not to.  “Sir Link doesn’t wish you to spill and burn yourselves.”

“But we won’t get as much,” said shoulder-poker.

“I shall be sure to personally refill your cups once you’ve finished what you have.”

They liked that idea.

Link, however, seemed stuck, staring at the little girl at the top, with her cup of hot cider.

“You’re gonna be careful with that, right?” Link asked.

She giggled.

His eyes widened.

The man smiled for the first time.  “She’ll be fine.”

“Yeah, it’s more your face I’m worried about,” Link said.

The man chuckled openly.  “So, you’re Sir Link, huh?”

Link paled a little, his smile starting to fade back into that blank look he’d worn in front of that dark evergreen.

The man saw it.

Even Zelda could tell he recognized it.

A father would see it.

Zelda’s own father, considering her knight’s countenance behind her, outside her field of vision, before treating Zelda so kindly at the ball.

Zelda blinked slowly.  Her father had seen it.

“Nice to meet you,” the man said, his smile kind.

Link tried to return it.

Zelda ladled soup into the children’s bowls, directing them to sit nearby so she could keep an eye on their cider levels.  She very nearly handed the little girl her soup-bowl above her father’s head, deciding at the last moment to abandon that idea as unwise indeed.

“I shall walk you to your seat-”

The girl kicked a leg out quite suddenly, tipping the bowl toward Zelda’s face-

-and Link caught it and most of its spilled contents in a clean bowl.

His wide eyes found hers.

“...Thank you, Sir Knight,” she said.

The family passed with relatively few clothing stains, all considered.  Zelda had gotten the worst of it with stew on her white sleeves.

“Sorry I didn’t catch it all, Princess,” Link said.

“Oh- goodness,” she laughed. “It’s of no importance whatsoever.”

His return to silence made her eyes seek him.  She found him smiling at her—a very different sort of smile from before.

The line moved past them with growing smiles and fervent thank-yous, the voices echoing in the tall chamber sounding every bit as warm as the food. It became quite pleasant, all the faces, and at some point Zelda realized quite a few of them had begun wishing her well.  She considered the source of change, wondering and wondering, until she sought out Link, thinking to ask him, and he met her eyes again.

And she’d found it.

Eyes.

She herself had ceased to watch cups, bowls and hands.

She wasn’t sure how it had happened.

---

They returned, tired, well past the light of dawn, among the others, Link carrying one of the massive stew cauldrons while the others required at least two men to bear their weight.  Zelda had volunteered to carry one, but Link had smiled at her and piled her arms high with empty baskets instead.  She had to peek around them to walk, but she couldn’t stop grinning at the sparkling snow and at her Knight, also renewed in the light—walking astride her rather than behind.  She found she much preferred it that way.

“Are you really alright with that, Sir?” one of the maids asked, her crate full of empty dishes rattling as she walked.

“Heh.  Yeah,” Link said.

“You must be so strong,” another remarked.

Link’s smile wavered just enough to be seen.

“He is,” Zelda said.  “Extremely.”

He turned that smile her way.  It said the same thing hers did.

He wasn’t sure.

They might lose.

He might not be strong enough.

She might be powerless.

But they knew something this morning they hadn’t known last night.

They were not alone.

~~❄~~❄~~❄~~❄~~❄~~❄~~

Happy Holidays, Everyone!

[ezekieltobiasfletcher]

O Tannenbaum, o Tannenbaum

Wie treu sind deine Blätter!

Du glänzt nicht nur

Zur Sommerzeit

Nein, auch im Winter, wenn es schneit.

(context: for stocking stuffers, I got these paper board "glasses" with films of plastic that diffract light. I got the bright idea to put one of them in front of the camera lens on my phone and pointed it at my Christmas tree.)

[crazy-pages]

OKAY THE EVOLUTION OF SLIT PUPILS IS ACTUALLY WAY MORE COMPLICATED THAN THIS AND IT'S SO COOL

(side note: this stuff is still very much imperfectly understood, but this is what we do know about it)

So the pupil is slit along the vertical axis because that provides better resolution along the horizontal axis than the vertical axis, where cats and snakes are focused, yes. But that's not why the pupil is slit. See if the goal was preferential vision along a certain axis the pupil would be rectangular like a goat's. A slit doesn't actually improve horizontal vision, it just makes vertical vision worse, as compared to a circular eye of the same size.

So what's the benefit that's worth making vertical vision worse?

Well, let's talk about what chromatic dispersion is. Chromatic dispersion is when lens have different indices of refraction for different wavelengths (so they might bend red light the least, green more so, and blue even more so). This causes the lenses to focus light of different wavelengths to different focal positions. So if you place a detector (or an eye's rods and cones) at the focal position for green light, blue light might focus to a position in front of the detector and become blurry, and red light might focus to a position behind the detector and become blurry.

And now let's talk about multifocal lenses! Multifocal lenses are kind of like bifocal glasses, different parts of the lens focus on different distances. Specifically, parts of the pupil at different radii from the center have different focal distances. And this can be useful for correcting against chromatic aberration. So the center of the eye might specifically focus green light to the pupil, then a band around the center might focus red light to the pupil, and a final ring might focus blue light to the pupil. (Note: Each of these bands focuses light from the entire scene in front of them, not just light from different angles.)

This means each wavelength of light is getting well focused by part of the eye. There's still blurry poorly focused light on the eye's rods and cones, a red-focusing center conveys blurry green and blue to them as well as crisp red. But brains are pretty good at processing out that blurry mess and leaving behind just the crisp well-focused light, allowing the animal to see a wide range of colors more effectively.

However! Creatures which need to see in low-light conditions need very large pupils to maximize the amount of light that goes in them. But they also benefit from being able to constrict those pupils in bright light, or when their eyes are relaxed so they can take in an entire scene rather than a single object. But if those eyes constricted like B below, the outermost focal regions would be obscured, and the creature would suddenly find themself unable to see blue clearly!

So creatures with multifocal lenses which need to see color in lowlight conditions instead constrict their eyes as slits! The slit allows them to keep all their focal regions in play, preserving high quality color vision, while still allowing for variable low/high-light vision. And the direction of the slit is then determined by the fact that vertical slits add blur at the top and bottom of your vision, and horizontal slits add blur at the sides of your vision (for technical reasons related to the diffraction of wave-like light).

Now this isn't the full story. Some cephalopods have horizontal slits or W-shaped pupils, despite mostly being monochromats (their cones only see one color). Some cetaceans are moochromats and have U-shaped pupils. There are also a couples snakes noted in the paper which have monofocal eyes and circular pupils, and the lesser bushbaby and the slow loris (both very cute, worth looking up) have multifocal eyes with slit pupils ... despite being monochromats.

So this stuff still isn't fully understood. It may be that some species developed multifocal eyes with slit pupils to preserve low-light color vision, and then later lost their color vision without losing the adaptations built around that color vision. There may be evolutionary benefits to slit pupils we don't fully understand yet (particularly in water, it looks like). And there may be species which could benefit from slit pupils but haven't evolved them for whatever reason. This stuff is complicated.

But all this is to say that the hot cat lady from Treasure Planet would not necessarily have to hunt at eye level.

[elkement]

"I was wondering, how the famous, initial diffraction experiment was actually done at the beginning of the 19th century? Thomas Young is the polymath credited with the discovery of diffraction. He contributed to so many diverse fields of science – it blows my mind: Optics, theory of elasticity, color vision, medicine, linguistics, deciphering ancient scripts."

Here is how Thomas Young himself described his experiment! He had no diffraction grating or slit, but he looked onto the edge of a card!

I made a small hole in a window-shutter, and covered it with a piece of thick paper, which I perforated with a fine needle. For greater convenience of observation, I placed a small looking glass without the window-shutter, in such a position as to reflect the sun’s light, in a direction nearly horizontal, upon the opposite wall, and to cause the cone of diverging light to pass over a table, on which were several little screens of card-paper. I brought into the sunbeam a slip of card, about one-thirtieth of an inch in breadth, and observed its shadow, either on the wall, or on other cards held at different distances. Besides the fringes of colours on each side of the shadow, the shadow itself was divided by similar parallel fringes, of smaller dimensions, differing in number, according to the distance at which the shadow was observed, but leaving the middle of the shadow always white. Now these fringes were the joint effects of the portions of light passing on each side of the slip of card, and inflected, or rather diffracted, into the shadow.

Source: Thomas Young: The Bakerian Lecture, Experiments and Calculations relative to Physical Optics, 1803. Section: Experimental Demonstration of the General Law of the Interference of Light, Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society of London

[physics-scholars]

How to bend light❓

As we all know that light travels in rectilinear motion.

But can we bend light in a parabolic path?

If not practically then is it possible in paper?

Has anyone succeeded in doing that practically ?

🔹🔹🔹

Bending of Beam of Light

The process of bending light when it shifts from one medium to another is called refraction.

The bending of light around a keen edge is known as diffraction.

The bending of light around the boundary of an orifice is known as a hindrance of light.

Thus, the bending of light after striking glass is called reflection.

Reflection can do on different shells like convex glass, hollow glass, aeroplane glass, etc.

In refraction, the light changes its path when it shifts from one medium to another.

Therefore,

We bend light all the time - using lenses.

Light bends when going from one material to another, due to conservation of momentum.

Snell's law describes how light bends.

Light is also bent when traveling past massive objects - look into "gravitational lensing" if you are interested.

Light can be effectively bent into a parabolic path using materials that have a changing index of refraction. This is done in fiber optics using "graded-index fiber."

Since light can be bent which means the direction of the path of light can be changed.

Which means the velocity of light can be changed. Because velocity has two Components, 1. Direction 2. Magnitude.

And change in any one of the components, can change its velocity as a whole.

There is a difference between the concept of the speed of light and the velocity of light.

Are both of them constant (dC=0 and dVc=0)?

If yes, why?.

Hint: Velocities include directions. Light can travel in different directions. So...

The speed of light is constant. The velocity of light should be, unless light changes direction.

Speed is the magnitude of velocity, a scalar quantity (has size, but not direction), whereas velocity is a vector, which has both magnitude and direction.

C is defined as speed, which has only magnitude. There is no definition of the velocity of light, but if the light was traveling north when last measured, velocity could be negative, positive, or zero based on the direction traveled.

The speed of light in vacuum is constant, otherwise is could not be well defined. It is called a Universal Constant for this reason. It does not vary even with your reference frame.

For example, if you are standing next to your friend who is holding a flash light, the light will appear to be moving the 'same speed' to both of you, even if you are running in one direction. This is different from if your friend were to throw a ball, which would then appear to be traveling at different velocities depending on your reference frame: i.e. it may be moving faster or slower in your reference frame depending on whether you are running in the same or opposite direction as the ball.

The speed of light in vacuum is given by

c=299,792,458 m/s

Velocity is just the speed defined with a direction. The magnitude of the velocity (i.e. speed) is constant, given by the same number above.

If light is propagating through a transparent medium, such as glass, it will actually travel slower than the speed of light in vacuum, c

. The speed of light in a in a medium is given by:

V_light=c/n

where n is called the index of refraction of the material.

The index of refraction for vacuum is 1: hence the speed of light in vacuum is c.

The index of refraction for glass is about 1.5, and thus the speed of light in glass is about

C/1.5 = 200000000 m/s

If we analyse it properly we could see,

There are two questions -- is the velocity of light constant, and is it invariant?

The direction/velocity of light changes whenever it interacts with something. This includes gravitational deflection, since things have to change direction in curved spacetime in one sense or another. The velocity isn't constant.

[plurvisionbydrglow]

We have packs of paper diffraction glasses for sale to add a BURST of color to any event!

Plur Vision Paper Diffraction Glasses are great for parties, fireworks, or light shows giving an explosion of scattered lights everywhere you look. Bring along a bundle for family and friends, or surprise a stranger or two! 

Add some flare to your next party. www.PlurVision.com.shop

[eremiie]

study session, sex songs

❥ armin x reader | nsfw | 2.3k words

❥ content: semi public sex, vaginal fingering, a sex tape

❥ a/n; an ask i got that i took an ss of and then tumblr deleted my asks, but i HAD to do this🙄!!!

you were bored.

you were so bored that the sound of the rain drops hitting the window next to you was almost a form of entertainment, or maybe the shuffling of people trading books on the shelf.

at this point anything was better than the piece of paper and book in front of you. you had been staring at the words so long that they were all the same. you were rereading the same sentence over and over again, and aimlessly sketching small drawings on the paper in front of you.

studying wasn't your strong pursuit, especially with your boyfriend next to you, who seemed to love it. at the thought of him, your eyes glanced over— a sight for sore eyes when you had been staring at chemistry notes for the past half hour.

a pencil was dancing on paper in between his slender fingers, jumping with every lift of his hand and coming back down to the white sheet like a figure skater on ice. he wore glasses to study, large frames sitting on the bridge of his nose, his hair so close to touching them. those same blonde locks almost hid the earphones that were snug in both ears, and you wondered if whatever he was listening to is what helped him study so diligently. his tongue stuck out just a little bit in concentration, while his eyes flit back and forth between the paper in front of him and the book above it.

he must've been watching you watch him, his attention turning towards you and the mechanical pencil coming to a quick halt mid sentence. he set it down to the table gently, and you lifted yourself off of the surface to balance your head on the palm of your hand. "armin." a whine of his name, clear discontent laced in your voice.

"yeah?" his reply was so simple, so innocent. as if he didn't drag you to the library with him, practically pleading for you to just sit down and study with you knowing you hated studying, especially in the atmosphere of a library. there were too many distractions and you weren't comfortable. not to mention the fact that you were clad in a skirt.

"i can't study, can we just go?" his expression didn't change at the sound of your complaints, eyes still calm and lips still together in a line. you didn't want to come in the first place, he should at least give you the liberty of leaving when you asked— especially considering how long you had been in the quiet library.

"do you think listening to something will help?" armin's eyebrows came together as his hand came to point at the earphones in his ear. you really didn't want to stay, but when you thought about the focus your boyfriend was in that you broke you did feel a little bad.

your legs shifted from under the table and you sat back in your seat, crossing your arms in your lap and letting out a sigh, eyes traveling around the vast library. when they landed back on armin the earbud was already sitting pretty between his fingertips. it was glaring at you and you were glaring at it, but nevertheless you leaned forward and plucked it from armin's fingers, his lips upturning when you did.

he slipped his hands in his pockets to fumble with his phone and you picked up the pencil in front of you to try and get back to studying, checking to see what page armin was on while you waited for the music to play in your ears. what music was armin into anyways? the last thing you could remember him listening to being a spotify playlist full of lo-fi beats.

only... it wasn't lo-fi beats that began to play.

or music.

your body went rigid, pencil in your hand beginning to feel heavy, leaving you to wonder how it hasn't clattered to the table yet. a chill ran down your spine because what you were listening to was all too familiar— from the wet sounds that happily made its way into your ear, to a moan of armin's name that sounded much too like your own voice.

it was your voice, because when you heard another moan it was armin's cry of your name.

it took you a minute to turn your head towards armin, his eyebrows raising over his eyes in question of what you could possibly want now. he hummed a small "hm?" to figure it out, as if it wasn't obvious. that look of innocence was played by him again, blue eyes twirling with curiosity as if there was anything to be curious about. as if your sex tape wasn't a reason for you to look at him funny— eyes blown and mouth agape.

when you didn't respond— only still staring at him dumbfounded, he shrugged his shoulders and continued to scribble on his stupidly neat paper.

were you hearing things right?

your eyes flashed, brows knit as you shoved armin's shoulder, his pencil flying off the paper and messing up the "e" he was in the midst of writing. "you messed up my paper." he grumbled, and oh, was he a little too good at this game he was playing with you.

"what is this?" you questioned, disregarding the flimsy sheet of paper he was writing on because that was clearly the least of his issues.

armin used his pencil to point to your book, confusion taking over the once curious look he had just moments ago. "...a study session i would assume." he wasn't letting up, and your lip twitched at his response.

"no— i mean what am i listening to?"

"well, out of everybody you should know." your body stiffened again, a slow blink at his response that came out almost too smoothly, words sliding off his tongue like silk. you had to pull your gaze away from him as he only did just what he did earlier, going right back to studying like there wasn't anything off about the moment you were sharing.

if he wanted to play with you, you'd just have to join in his game.

so with a huff of breath, and the lewd noises that were still playing in your ear you turned your body back towards your notes in front of you and tried to read them over again. your name was the only thing comprehendible on the sheet, every word below it a jumbled mess.

"light wave... light waves, diffraction pattern..." you spoke slowly, reading as if you were back in the first grade.

your hands moved down from the textbook and to the paper in front of you, nimble fingers forming words on the paper that you could only hope would make sense when you'd read them back.

diffraction pattern - occurs only

"only who?"

"only you fuck me like this, armin, please!"

the tail of your y went a little too low, and your legs turned to jello, squeezing together when you heard your voice swim through your ears. blood was rushing to your cheeks, and you leaned closer to your book, burying your nose in it despite not actually reading what was on the pages— at least well. with a suck of breath you continued to write,

diffraction pattern - occurs only you fu

your eyes shot open mid sentence, and you scrambled to spin the pencil around until the eraser met the paper, erasing what you had written furiously, and you swore you heard a small chuckle leave armin's lips, you biting your own and scrunching your nose up at your pitiful mistake.

your hands came up to rub at your temple, the sound of a moan armin drawled from you a couple nights ago was what you heard next, and it might’ve sounded nice those nights ago, but now it was embarrassing.

you squeezed your eyes shut, much like your legs and as flustered as you were you couldn’t help but feel... aroused.

it was something about hearing armin fuck into you so nice. the way that even though there was no visual for you to look at, you could visualize the moment so clearly— so vividly, because the more you listened the more you could remember making the tape, remembering what happened during the tape.

armin’s hands had slid up your back, a handful of your hair being grasped by his hand, a sinful arch being created by your back, and you let out a choked whimper, that you didn’t even realize you reciprocated in real life.

armin’s head slowly turned to you and his lips were forming a sick grin, and you would’ve been mad if you didn’t want him so bad, if you didn’t want every moment you could hear to stop being the past and become the present, the very moment that was playing in your ear to play out in front of you.

a whine, a pleading look on your face; eyebrows turned upwards and your hips grinding down into the chair below you.

armin could’ve almost laughed if he wanted to, and he almost did when your hand slid into his lap to grab his and pull it to the hem of your skirt, the fabric brushing lightly against his fingertips, but he didn’t push forward.

“armin,” his name never sounded so nice on your tongue, never sounded so desperate. your grip on his wrist tightened and urged him forward, and so he let them slip under the soft fabric of your skirt, and even past the band of your underwear, and the closer he inched towards your aching cunt the wider your legs spread for him.

his finger felt cold against your clit when he touched it, rubbing small circles right away, and your face looked like it was melting at his touch, your body was melting at his touch.

and he was being kinder than expected— letting his fingers dip down further until your slick allowed for him to enter into you, your body shivering at his touch, at the stretch.

your head fell forward onto the table with a louder than expected bang, and it caused both you and armin to jolt, the people around you stirring a bit.

you didn’t care too much, but armin did, his fingers stilling and his eyes going back to his textbook, eyes darting back and forth between the words as if he was really reading them, and you wanted to give him a prize for best actor right then and there.

“shh.” he said without looking your way, but his fingers began to move again, and you tried your best to not let out a moan. “gotta be quiet if you want me to fuck you with my fingers... this is what you want right?”

the sound in your ears were practically drowned out by your thoughts, by the squelches of your juices being moved around by armin’s middle finger, by the sounds that only you could hear— and maybe armin if he listened enough.

“yeah... i want it.” the small pants that were leaving your parted lips, and they only increased when armin inserted a second finger, his hand making itself comfortable in your underwear, fabric harshly rubbing against his pale hand with every thrust of his digits into your pussy. “want it so bad.”

you looked like a dog, a puppy in its heat, pushing your hips forward to get him deeper into you, but it just wasn’t enough.

you were needy and needed more, so your own hand smoothed down to your clit and you began to rub circles, whimpering at the sensation, the pleasure flooding through your lower half, almost making you dizzy.

hell, you were dizzy— drunk even; drunk on the lust that was twirling in your pretty head, and drunk on armin’s fingers— it was like the way his hand moved when he wrote notes, moving precisely and ease.

his fingers fucked up into you, curling when they were deep enough, and making your body lurch forward. “again.” you needed to feel that again. the fingers on your clit went a little faster, because you knew you were close. “again.”

and he did it again, hitting that spot that made you clench around him, and he kept doing it, and your fingers kept moving, you were progressively getting louder, but it didn’t matter as you were getting closer to coming as well.

and you did, body tensing up and every nerve in your body pinching, mouth dropped open and eyes rolling to the back of your head as your hand came to hover just over your mouth just in case any sound left you.

you slumped over onto the table, pulsing around armin’s fingers but your own slipping out of your skirt and onto the space of the chair your legs made.

armin finally let out a stupid small laugh, his soaked fingers finally leaving your sloppy cunt and entering his mouth, tongue twirling around your release. it was a shame you weren’t looking.

you could hear it though, the obnoxiously loud slurping sounds he made and the hum of content he made before popping his fingers out his mouth. what you couldn’t hear was the tape. it must’ve stopped in the middle of armin fingering you.

and you also heard the slide of armin’s chair against the floor of the library, the sound of a book cover meeting it’s back, and the shoving of books into a bag.

armin looked over his shoulder with a bored expression, one that was eerily similar to the look you had given him just earlier when you were bored of studying.

your eyes met his; eyes still calm and lips in a line once more... “i can’t study anymore. let’s just go.”

[camp-counselor-life]

Top 10 Tabling Activities

So tabling refers to when you go to a large event and different orgs have tables or booths set up. We like to bring activities to ours (or at least I do when I go). So here are my top options, in no particular order:

Diffraction glasses. Buy the paper ones, so you can give them away as needed.

UV beads. Actually works best indoors so that you can control when you set them off with the UV flashlights.

Plasma balls. Fun and quick.

Conditioner slime. 2 ingredients, actually smells nice, easy to clean up.

Oobleck. Cornstarch + water = fun. Bonus if you find an old subwoofer and set that up.

Binary bracelets. Paper ones for an even quicker activity.

Legos. If you already have them.

Trail mix making. Be aware of nut allergies and cross.

Leaf/tree ID. Images, matching game, etc.

Dance twirlers. I’ll admit, this is actually a not-terrible GSUSA activity. Get those shower rings and tie on ribbons and strips of tulle.

Tabling can be stressful, but if you plan your activities well, you can take a layer of that stress away. Also, these make great “while arriving” activities for programs.

[stupendoustrashmagazine]

Crystal Augury

From undesignated foliage a girl steps to–

locks a stare holds it to glass vase

Body of which offers visage 

governed by limit—no beyond no outside

site's objects or subjects in ongoing gossip 

.flac fyles never so neatly inflect’d from sun 

Return'd ispectra holding hyaline green 

— approaching tip-toe–mama’s hand in 

Silt in the toes disrupts lens change—

a G 9-flat rain paper bag lunch — Clyfford 

Stills flares into scene glare

Obstructing so lending 

blemish past participle

— one seeing is seen no

 stability survives — 

Cluster production nettles 

fragment intersections in aliases 

Nets curve bends light mis-shaping

in making x-ray—forth shuttle they 

Beams—carry commands decrypt 

pattern's diffraction– forest-floor

shadows–every needle blurring into 

hemlock & fir above rhododendron

& shelf fungus stuck out of bark mass 

the size of softball squashed by like

reading that signature–there isn’t a way

To reproduce image– histrionic cut-ups

for an evening of Euclid’s Balcony Speech 

& Other Miscellany may help

Electrical meadow mean Wulff Net

As then the old go to pick out— 

Underground home—

saddles pickups metallic interlocks

amplifying sound divided

Sidewinder wheeled in on

Horse drawn carriage.

Resignation station a mile away.

Lodgepole pine devour’d by beatitude

Devotion & stream forces a course

Fjords feigned, tuna sliced bright, 

expensive blight fin,  shipwreck gallows, 

rows of definition choreographed, 

cobalt salt encoded in dictionary's fold.

A lens lends a variable in lieu of the beams 

Not beyond but in of & from–

Apart forever elsewhere

Plankton populations visible ghosts

Half-shown dress curse uncouth

a translation faces surf's surfaces

Illicit matters on deck—Don’t believe. 

Swimshape famish'd brambles 

eat death raw wave fabric glad 

distant ship pitfalls let-in gusts–vacuum 

Mars's iron horse stable 

vegetal vision irrevocable– scopes

Yellow walk the properties divide 

lines walls & flooring. 

Ax: tool, axis: hinge

axes together group

Roses don't grow in alpine meadows

wolves howl at the feet of limestone cliffs —

Geometer stones engineer's hairdo–

school spools fools on

Ice. Hallowed naming–shallows

 pocket litter nesting 

A litter of felines whining. 

A lifting song–angular glottals 

passing un/fixing movement–

uneven verbiage beveled 

Ledge of observation tower

Left–gets right readjustment—

Distant atria share particles–kept 

from being left from records, & so, 

remaining kept, are left again. 

Two coins, one band right 

Across late star's rise. Keep left–

Leave impossible segments right.

[plurvisionglasses]

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1 Galaxy Cat Bandana

4 Paper Diffraction Glasses (1 Hearts, 3 Starbursts)

1 Heart Diffraction Glasses (comes with a soft case)

Domestic orders receive FREE SHIPPING! Check out now at www.PlurVision.com!

Have a suggestion about what we should include in the Rave Kit or want to see more? Send us a message at www.PlurVision.com/contact-us

[granatumre]

the queen is dead || a mello mix (8tracks) (spotify)

i’ve never done covers like this before sorry if it’s shit. probably one of my favourites mixes i’ve done so far and probably the most eclectic one as well. also it’s kinda very in character. it’s just an ok mix, what can i say. the tittle has nothing to do with the smiths, i swear.

tracklist:

1. such a fool - 22-20s | 2. kids with guns - gorillaz | 3. delirium - chvrn | 4. change (in the house of flies) - deftones | 5. evening wear - mindless self indulgence | 6. weathering - last train | 7. counterfeit sky - failure | 8. poison dart - the bug (ft warrior queen) | 9. paper gangsta - lady gaga | 10. kryptonite - 3 doors down | 11. hell of a night - schoolboy q | 12. the noose - a perfect circle | 13. white lies - alice glass | 14. why do these parties always end the same way - benji hughes | 15. the high road - broken bells | 16. jerk it out - caesars | 17. closure - chevelle | 18. glory - dermot kennedy | 19. before the dawn - fraunhofer diffraction | 20. nobody’s daughter - hole | 21. this empty love - innerpartysystem | 22. cement - killstation | 23. wow esme - lully | 24. killing strangers - marilyn manson | 25. marvaal - oij | 26. the place i left behind - the deep dark woods | 27. four teeth - true widow | 28. toronto - tusks | 29. nico and the niners - twenty one pilots | 30. kick - white rose movement | 31. tears in the rain - zomby

[oneandonlyangeldust]

Wibbly Wobbley Timey Wimey

Autumn 1975 England London

“And so the DNA structure has a helix structure as discovered by Watson and Crick in 1953 and now using x-ray diffraction,'' said the professor distractedly as he set up the equipment. “You will see on the projection is the basic structure of DNA which then as you know are what shapes the chromosomes. Pretty amazing stuff isn’t it? As you can see here, he pulls a large stick from under the lecture table. This is a top down view of the DNA structure and if you follow the curvature of the shadow, you can trace around and around. The darker areas are where the paths overlap. So we tilt the object and here from the side view are the chains of …” Moblit hastily sketched the diagram of the DNA structure. As an aspiring scientist, he has yet to decide which field of science to dabble with. The large lecture halls were becoming chilly as winter neared and he pulled the dark scarf tighter around his neck.

The professor ended the lecture and shortly after, rustling papers filled the room. The squeaking of chairs, knocking against the tables echoed in Moblit’s ears. Briskly, he shoved his notes into his side bag and called out “Ah Professor wait a minute please.” Several students turned around causing him to flush at the attention. He made his way to the professor. He was greeted with a knowing smile.

“You need the lab again, son?”

“Yea if it’s not too much trouble.”

“Not at all. You’re a responsible lad. You don’t mind sharing, do you?”

“No not at all”

“That’s good. We recently had a new researcher who transferred from Norway and she’s a little eccentric to say the least.”

The professor strode down the halls of the university with Moblit scuttling after, hands tucked deep in the pockets of his dark brown coat. They stopped in front of the familiar laboratory doors.

“Now then, here are the keys. I’ll sign you in at the faculty and tell them you’re in here. Oh and be careful of the solution cooking in the corner. One of the research groups is trying to extract different gasses produced by certain bacteria in different conditions so whatever you do don’t go breathing all over it.”

“Right” he nodded exhaling sharply.

“Have fun.” With that the professor left.

 Moblit unlocked the doors and let himself in.

-----

Indeed there was a solution bubbling away in the corner. He acknowledged its presence by watching the bubbled escape into the connecting flask of a clear solution. There was a faint musty smell. Slightly unpleasant in fact he mused wrinkling his nose. He glanced at the other experimental setups, some hiding in the gas cupboard, others against the window where several plants in test tubes were innocently soaking up the midday sun. He found his project where it was before with a large don’t touch sign in front in neat writing. However there was a large brown stain on the corner which wasn’t there before. He removed the sign and pulled out a magnifying glass. Pulling a number counter out of his bag he began to count the number of bacteria colonies that had formed on the petri dish. He whipped out his notebook and recorded the number, noticing a slight increase in number. He then turned to the oven which held the other sample.

He was just about to pull out the other petri dish when a loud alarm began to ring. He jumped in fright knocking the shelf on which the dish was held, jolting the contents. His eyes widened as a crack formed in the dish. He glared meaningfully at the ringing clock before delicately taking out the dish.

“Oh myyy goshhh!! Ahhh is it done?! It better be done now!” A screech came streaming down the hall outside. The doors slammed open. Moblit dropped the dish on the floor.

“Oh baby, tell me your secrets..!” A mob of brown hair zoomed past disregarding Moblit completely followed by a hand which bopped the alarm clock, shutting it up. The person with goggles gleamed maniacally as they opened to the lid of a rather odd contraption upon the table top.

Meanwhile, Moblit silently mourned the contents of his dish which laid in a sad crumbled mess on the floor. He was about to reprimand this intruder about etiquette and health and safety. Yes health! The door slamming and screeching could give anyone a heart attack! Just as he cleared his throat he noticed the havoc of a machine. Wires bustled all over the entirety of the frame. How had he not noticed this before??

The culprit currently loomed over the interior of the machine poking their nose at the contents. “Hmm smells rather… Like smokey and too much carbon. Why is that a hint of radiation? Hah, it tickles my nose hairs.” She poked a finger inside. A black goo came out with her gloveless fingers. She grinned at it against the light, the goggles reflecting the image. Promptly, she stuck the finger in her mouth. “Hmm mmm… eurgh!” She spat the remainder into the sink. Grabbing wildly she found a beaker and rinsed it under the tap. She filled it up with water again and rinsed her mouth, spitting the muck back into the sink. “Too much sodium and phosphate” she exclaimed, flicking any remaining offending material.

Moblit stared at the blatant lack of hygiene and self-preservation. This was madness. The woman caught sight of his dumbfounded expression. She blinked behind her goggles.

“Oh! Sorry I didn't see you there.” She stuck out the same hand she touched the mixture with. Moblit glanced dubiously at the offered hand.

“Ah sorry.” She wiped her hand vigorously down her ruined lab coat.

“Doctor Hangei. The Doctor for short. But if that’s too snobby, Hange can work. Although I still prefer the Doctor. That’s what the others call me.”

“Others? Who are the others? And do you have any sense of hygiene??” He grasped the offered hand gingerly and shook it. “Do you even know what was in that stuff? And what is that machine? That beaker might not have been cleaned. Do you need a doctor? As in a medical doctor. You know you really shouldn’t drink out of a beaker. How are you feeling, are you ok? Moblit is my name.” He rattled off the questions with little thought.

The Doctor’s smile widened as she quirked an eyebrow

“Friends and associates. Yes usually. No, that's why I built this machine. It extracts the organic material from dirt and dust, made it myself and I’m quite proud of it. It took an hour. Yes it might not be clean. No. I do have a medical degree…concerning feat now that I think about it. Why did I do that? Yes I know. I’m fine. Lovely to meet you Moblit. 42.”

“Sorry what?”

“I answered all your questions and a bit. The dish you dropped. Very clumsy mind you. But there were 42 bacterial colonies. Why are you breeding the common cold?”

Moblit paused for a second. A minute really. Just staring at the enigma in front of him. Slowly he just processed everything that had been said to him.

42

He looked at his notebook.

He looked back up

Then down again.

“How do you know it is 42?”

“Well there should be 42 colonies. Hah that sounds like little Tokar mites from Grasbonon, little colonies.” She giggled “I guess there really isn’t a convenient way of checking. Not without walking over timelines, that always has its risks.” The latter sentence was more so mumbled to herself. “But that’s how fast it’s meant to grow according to my calculations.” She continued brightly.

Moblit squinted back. “Right?” prompting her to continue.

“Right.” she confirmed. The Doctor then pulled out a dust pan from under the bench. “Here. Be careful with glass next time, worry wart.” She thrust the dustpan into his hands which were already burdened by a pen and notepad. He fumbled trying to hold the objects.

“So lots of sodium other than phosphate in the soil hmm? About 14%. That really isn’t healthy for the Jakalodes. Not deadly… But definitely nothing healthy would grow with this sort of water. So how did it get into the irrigation supply and why the irrigation but not the water supply? Why is sodium at all that’s easily reversible isn’t it?” The Doctor rambled profusely to herself. Moblit meanwhile busied himself with safely disposing of the waste and graphed his results in his research. If he was to insert 42 into the chart… He confidently marked an X on the chart and drew a line of best fit. It matched perfectly with the trend. Running a hand through his light brown hair he sat back and examined the results.

“If it’s in the irrigation they would have to distill the water again but that’s not a problem they can divert the water back into supply treatment again even though it might cost a bit more.”

Moblit pinched the bridge of his nose as he listened to the ramblings of his companion. “Shush, I'm trying to write up a report!” he sighed frustrated. He was only ignored. Unable to tune out the ponderings of the mad woman he tried to make sense of her dilemma. “Well I don’t know what this Jakawhats thing is but high salinity isn’t good for crops is it?”

“Yup” she paused now that he was contributing to the cause. “But as I said earlier that’s not a problem they could easily detect that and… oh.”

His eyes flickered up from his position. The Doctor pushed herself from where she was leaning against the bench. “Oh they won’t detect that. Who would drink irrigation water?”

She pulled out a vial of clear liquid from her lab coat. Placing a drop on her tongue she stared at the opposite wall thoughtfully. “3ppm. That’s barely detectable once it's past initial testing.”

“Sorry what? How did you know it was 3 parts per million just by tasting it?”

“Using tastebuds duh” she replied, wriggling her tongue at him.

“Gross stop that.” Jumping away from the spit radius.

He was met with laughter.

“So someone must have put salts into the irrigation water. Tons and tons of that stuff. Those crops are meant to feed the entire Hungarian nation and someone is trying to sabotage it. With salt which is very difficult to desalinate once in the soil. The concentration would just increase.” She wriggled her fingers in the air aimlessly. “Someone wants to starve the Jakalode species . Someone who has a huge vendetta against the agricultural Hungarians. Someone who I’m going to find.”

Glad that her mumbling had died down, the student attempted to return to his report, only to be rudely grabbed by the Doctor. “C’mon we got a nation to save, let's go!”

He yelped loudly at the force. “Nation? Nobody is saving any nation here! Hey calm down Dr Hange! Where do you think you’re going? Hey, let go please!”

“Moblit” She said sternly, hands slamming down on his shoulders. He jumped at the sudden turn.

“You love science don't you?”

“Yea..es??

“Then you’ll love this! All the professors in the faculty are quite impressed by your ambitions. I assume you’re trying to eradicate the common cold. That’s amazing! Such a common cause of illness yet not difficult to overcome now that you have penicillin. You have penicillin don’t you. Your people or is that too early in the time stream? Anyway, don't you want to see the world and its flora and fauna? All the really wonderful fascinating evolutions of nature, why stop at Earth? Trust me on this one,it will be a trip of a lifetime!”

He didn’t quite know how to respond to such enthusiasm. No one has really complimented his work before. The common cold. Why would you research that? But precisely why not research that? “Yes we have penicillin.'' he replied lamely.

“Cool beans! Let’s go!”

This time he let himself be dragged through the hallways of the university. They had burst out the doors of the laboratory, completely forgetting to lock the doors. Well he did think about that as they went down the second flight of stairs but chose to let this one slide. After all, they were on a mission of sorts weren’t they? As they ran past the lounge for the lecturers, his biology professor saw him run past.

“Leaving Moblit?”

Giving the Doctor a tug to attract her attention he turned back around. “Yes sir and here is the key. Could you lock up for me? Thank you.”

“I’m borrowing him for a second.” announced the Doctor right after.

“You’ll be returning him won’t you? One of our brightest. Not kidnapping off to Norway I hope.”

“Not really but no worries! I’ll make sure he’ll be back before next class. Thanks for having me around! Also you can throw away the extraction device. Those bundles of wire or whatever if you see it. Or actually, pretend I never said that. I’ll come and collect it when I get back.” She then turned around and took off jogging again, the tail of her lab coat fluttering with tears and all.

Waving Moblit followed after her, quickly easing into a pace just behind her. They ran out into the field where a blue police box stood. No one seemed to mind that there was a police box in the middle of the field. The Doctor pushed open the doors.

“It says pull.” mumbled Moblit weakly.

“Oh never mind that!'' exclaimed the Doctor pulling him inside.

Once he shut the doors behind him he realized the scale of incredibility that the interior presented. He ran back outside pushing the doors outwards this time and expelled the contents of his stomach.

“You alright there?” he heard behind him. “Oh, heh take your time. Here I’ll get you some tissues.:

She returned with said tissues and a glass of water

He took the offered tissues weakly and rinsed his mouth. “It’s bigger on the inside” he coughed hoarsely handing the glass back.

“Yes it is. I’ve heard that so many times and it’s great hearing it again, although you have had the most violent reaction to it. Just go with the flow I suppose.”

He wiped his mouth and gestured to the door. The Doctor stepped back in.

“Well, let's try again. Moblit. Tardis. Tardis. Moblit.”

This time he slowly took in his amplified surroundings. There was a circular control panel that revolved around a central column which emitted a green blue light. The panel itself looked like a complicated version of an oscilloscope except with more colorful lights, wires and makeshift switches, using hand drills and recorders (yes the instrument recorders) occasionally as joysticks. A controller of some sort was attached to a small mobile screen. Upon closer examination it said in small letters Playstation. Not knowing what that was he continued to circle the dashboard. The entire main room felt like an odd homey but very disjointed appearance. The second floor upstairs was completely carpeted with occasional unfinished sketches of anatomy and artwork lining the interior. There were circles embedded in the walls that gave a warm orange tint to the room. But the control panel looked like a desk scattered with spare parts embedded into wood. As if there were hundreds of unfinished gadgets to be tinkered with. The lower levels however were metallic with halls branching off.

“If you need the bathroom that’s down that hall take the first left and immediately to your right.”

“What’s a Tardis?” he asked distractedly, examining a myriad of controls. There were several sticky labels with messages such as finish the communications reboot, the automated lights reset, weather inducer is still in progress.

“Time And Relative Dimensions In Space. In short, a ship. My ship. For space. And time. Don’t forget time. That’s where all the cool stuff happens. In time and over time… and maybe under time?”

“Time? Really.” He exhaled sitting back on the closest seat. It almost felt like a sofa. He let ambient sounds take over for a couple of minutes.

“That’s it?” The Doctor asked, poking her head up from the lower levels. She had stripped off her lab coat and the jumper underneath. Noticing her lack of coat he took off his own scarf and draped it over the back of the sofa.

“No that’s not it.”

“Well fire away. I’m sure you have lots of questions. I just need to make sure all the muck is gone from the central control.”

“Are you a time traveler?”

“Yes”

“An astronaut?”

“Yes”

“From the future?”

“Yea I suppose. That’s a bit harder to answer. My civilization developed earlier and faster than earthlings. Umm hang on.” She clanged noisily up stairs and flicked a couple of switches. A loud vacuuming noise was heard.

“What are you doing and what do you mean about your civilization?” He asked, now slightly more anxious.

“I’m just recycling all the goo that came in here. I had a bit of a rough landing. A lot of farming residue had swept in when I forgot to check the exterior conditions. That’s why I landed on earth and did my experiments there. I could have done them in the Tardis but it stunk. Sorry old dear.” She patted the console affectionately. “Needed a break anyway.”

“Ok we’re ready for business!” she cried, rubbing her hands together gleefully.

“You’re an alien then” Moblit prompted.

“Yes I am. Hold on to something. Here we go!”

He grabbed the railings in the rooms just as a sudden jolt shook through the frame and the box made loud wheezing noises. He felt an increasing force from the floor pushing up against him.

“Is that a bad noise?” He asked with fingers crossed that they’ll land safely.

“Nah, she does that all the time dontcha lassie?”

The confidence reassured him slightly.

“So is it through time or space right now??

“Both”

A loud thud sound was made and the lights stopped flickering.

“Have we landed?”

“Yup”

He slowly let go of his grip. The Doctor was already flicking switches. “Just making sure that air filters are on. I really don’t want a repeat of last time. Fertilizer really is not pleasant no matter which planet it comes from.” She picked up the PlayStation controller and browsed her screen, tapping away at a keyboard which was foreign to Moblit. “Hah ha!” He watched her fist pump triumphantly. “I landed exactly where I wanted! Haven’t been able to do that for years ever since I made some changes to the gyroscopes in the gravity stabilizers.” Moblit’s fears returned. He was with a mad woman in a fire hazard box.

“I think I’ll use the toilets now.”

“Sure not going anywhere without you.” She scooted down the stairs and examined the cables below. “Ah, where was I? Oh, the holographic possibility simulator.”

He made his way to the bathroom relieved that it was where she had said it was. At least the toilet hasn’t changed from alien standards. After answering nature’s call, he examined himself in the mirror as he washed his hands. The cubicle reflected the circular things that seem to be responsible for lighting the interior of the Tardis now that it had a name. He rinsed his head with water and tried slapping himself to reality. Nope, still in the alien bathroom. Leaning heavily against the sink, he slowly allowed the current situation to sink in. His skin felt hypersensitive as it followed the path of a particular drop traveling down the side of his face and to his chin. He shuddered and wiped the excess water on his shirt as he headed back to the main room.

“ Alright you’re back. I was worried you had passed out in there. Didn’t know what state of dress you were in.” He found her padding around barefooted on the carpeted level. “Anyway it’s slightly cold around this time of the year in Hungary. About 9°C so take this. Your coat and scarf won’t do much in this type of cold.” She threw him the clothing and an obscenely colorful scarf which didn’t even have the decency to be rainbow patterned. More like an awkward motley of bright colors. Pulling on her own coat and appropriate footwear she spared him a look “Cheer up Moblit, forward march. It’s a new sky out there.”

[carolmckinlay1973]

this mornings class explored Properties of light, more specific for our group,Refraction.  Firstly Properties of Light,

                              *effects of materials on light

                              *reflection

                              *refraction

                              *dispersion

                              *total internal reflection

                              *interference 

                               *diffraction

                               *scattering of light

                               *polarization

Refraction is the change in speed of light as it passes from one medium to another.  This is viewed as enlarging things in water or swapping the location of different colours.  our group (Sean, Vincent, Shannon and i) achieved this by placing a glass jar/glass of water on a surface/platform, behind and underneath the glass/jar were black and white paper.  there was a strong light aimed towards the jar, when we took pictures of the jar/glass the black and white seemed to be at oppostite ends. 

[pale-chartreuse]

All things are Atoms: Earth and Water, Air And Fire, all, Democritus foretold. Swiss Paracelsus, in's alchemic lair, Saw Sulfur, Salt, and Mercury unfold Amid Mellennial hopes of faking Gold. Lavoisier dethroned Phlogiston; hen Molecular Analysis made bold Forays into the gases: Hydrogen Stood naked in the dazzled sight of Learned Men.

The Solid State, however, kept its grains Of Microstructure coarsely veiled until X-ray diffraction pierced the Crystal Planes That roofed the giddy Dance, the taut Quadrille Where Silicon and Carbon Atoms will Like Valencies, four-figured, hand in hand With common Ions and Rare Earths to fill The lattices of Matter, Glass or Sand, With tiny Excitations, quantitatively grand. The Metals lustrous Monarchs of the Cave, Are ductile and conductive and opaque Because each Atom generously gave Its own Electrons to a mutual Stake, A Pool that acts as Bond. The Ions take The stacking shapes of Spheres, and slip and When pressed or dented; thusly Metals make A better Paper Clip than a Window, Are vulnerable to Shear, and heated, brightly glow.   Ceramic, muddy Queen of human Arts, First served as simple Stone. Feldspar supplied Crude Clay; and Rubies, Porcelain, and Quartz Came each to light. Aluminum Oxide Is typical ¬– a Metal is allied With Oxygen ionically; no free Electrons form a lubricating tide, Hence, Empresslike, Ceramics tend to be Resistant, porous, brittle, and refractory. Prince Glass, Ceramic's son, though crystal-clear Is no wise crystalline. The fond Voyeur And Narcissist alike devoutly peer Into Disorder, the Disorderer Being Covalent Bondings that prefer Prolonged Viscosity and spread loose nets Photons slip through. The average Polymer Enjoys a Glassy state, but cools, forgets To slump, and clouds in closely patterned Minutes The Polymers, those giant Molecules, Like Starch and Polyoxymethylene, Flesh out, as protein serfs and plastic fools, The Kingdom with Life's Stuff. Our tme has seen The synthesis of Polyisoprene And many cross-linked Helixes unknown To Robert Hooke; but each primordial Bean Knew Cellulose by heart: Nature alone Of Collagen and Apatite compounded Bone.

What happens in these Lattices when Heat Transports Vibrations through a solid mass? T = 3Nk is much too neat; A rigid Crystal's not a fluid Gas. Debye in 1912 proposed Elas- Tic Waves called phonons which obey Max Planck's Great Quantum Law. Although amorphous Glass, Umklapp Switchbacks, and Isotopes play pranks Upon his Formulae, Debye deserved warm Thanks. Electroconductivity depends On Free Electrons: in Germanium A touch of Arsenic liberates; in blends Like Nickel Oxide, Ohms thwart Current. From Pure Copper threads to wads of Chewing Gum Resistance varies hugely. Cold and Light As well as "doping" modify the sum Of Fermi Levels, Ion scatter, site Proximity, and other factors recondite. Textbooks and Heaven only are Ideal; Solidity is an imperfect state. Within the cracked and dislocated Real Nonstoichiometric crystals dominate. Stray Atoms sully and precipitate; Strange holes, excitons, wander loose; because Of Dangling Bonds, a chemical Substrate Corrodes and catalyzes – surface Flaws Help Epitaxial Growth to fix adsorptive claws. While Sunlight, Newton saw, is not so pure; A Spectrum bared the Rainbow to his view. Each Element absorbs its signature: Go add a negative Electron to Potassium Chloride; it turns deep blue, As Chromium incarnadines Sapphire. Wavelengths, absorbed, are reemitted through Fluorescence, Phosphorescence, and the higher Intensities that deadly Laser Beams require. Magnetic Atoms, such as Iron, keep Unpaired Electrons in their middle shell, Each one a spinning Magnet that would leap The Bloch Walls whereat antiparallel Domains converge. Diffuse Material Becomes Magnetic when another Field Aligns domains like Seaweed in a swell. How nicely microscopic forces yield, In Units growing Visible, the World we wield!

AUTHOR John Updike

I actually… love this