Filtering (Oxalate) Sample Solution

The filtered solutions were kind of colorful.

Filtering (Oxalate) Sample Solutions

I love how organized all my jars are. It's like a little army lined up and ready for action.

Carbonate Bombs

I enjoyed playing with these little jars. I put in approximately 0.70 grams of sample, add approximately a teaspoon of 25% hydrochloric acid (HCl), swish it around, and read the top for the approximate Calcium Carbonate content as measured by the pressure of the reaction. What makes this fun is listening to the reaction and watching all the crazy bubbles!

SENECA, Letters from a Stoic, Letter CXXIII

"...nothing is burdensome if taken lightly,...nothing need arouse one's irritation so long as one doesn't make it bigger than it is by getting irritated."

One of the reasons that Seneca's words of advice are helpful and consoling is that he writes these words as much as instruction to his friend Lucilius as to himself. As to the context of this particular quote, Seneca has just arrived home from a journey to find that the baker has no bread and the cook is not prepared with any food. He says that he is "making the best of this slowness...by carrying on a conversation with myself." I have often behaved just like Seneca and sat down to write during moments of frustration. The activity of writing enables me to sort out the facts so as to not mentally dwell on any one sore point. Even at the worst of moments when I do go on for pages along the same frustrated theme, at some point the pen gives up on the tiresome topic and moves on to some glimmer of optimism, hope, or at least more distanced empathy.

The "Smart" Car

It actually says "Smart" on the rear end of the Car!

American Style (Car)

Bicycle with Baskets

Big Flat Rear End (Car)

Small Flat Rear End (Car)

German Vehicles

As we drove to the airport in Detroit (it's not really in Detroit, but who's looking at a map, right?), my mother made a request. She wanted me to observe if Germans were driving an abundance of "Smart Cars". Well, as I took a walk a few days ago, I saw a Smart Car and decided to be observant. It was not just on that walk that I observed cars though. I have been doing it since Day 1 and have been having a difficult time figuring out how to draw a conclusion from all that I have seen. You see, there are Smart Cars on the roads, but there are also vehicles that run the gamut of fuel and size efficiency. If the question is: Are there more Smart Cars here than in Michigan? Then the answer is emphatically Yes. If the question is: Are Smart Cars common here? Then the answer is emphatically No. The best conclusion I can offer is this: No matter the style, size, or brand of automobile, the majority of vehicles have flat rear ends. It's actually kind of weird to see these flat rear ends everywhere; like some sort of city-wide experimental art. To demonstrate the variety of vehicles that one is surrounded by when standing in one spot, I took some photos at a location along my walking route. As you can see, there's big ones, small ones...and a bicycle. The bicycle is very common in Erlangen. Within the city, bicycles are to follow the "Red Brick Road", which is the red brick portion of the sidewalk. Sometimes I sing "Follow the Red Brick Road" to the tune of "Follow the Yellow Brick Road" from The Wizard of Oz while I am bicycling along this path.