Are The Good Times Really Over For Good?

New York's Alright...

New York's alright

If you wanna get pushed in front of the subway 

New York's alright

If you like tuberculosis...

Perhaps The Sun Will Shine Again Tomorrow*

Vielleicht Scheint Morgen Die Sonne Wieder* by Werner Stelly is a beautiful short story I first encountered in a college German class. It was in a book called Lebendige Literatur. Here is the opening paragraph (my translation):

When the young man went up the stairs, the sun was shining through the colorful windows. Every time the sun was out and the young man came home in the afternoon, he saw the bright reflection of the window on the wall, and he thought how happy they could be. And a warm feeling flowed with his blood to his heart. Flecks of red, blue and green light scattered on the wall of the staircase landing, and he was almost cheerful, happy and satisfied.

The story continues, telling of the young man's wife and their son, all of whom show disparate feelings--anger, sadness, and hope--yet gather each day for their daily rituals. In the end, the father hopes that his son will one day too see the same beautiful resolution of sunlight on the wall.

Here is the original German:

Als der junge Mann die Treppen hinauf ging, schien die Sonne durch die bunten Fensterscheiben. Jedesmal, wenn die Sonne schien und der junge Mann am Nachmittag, wenn er nach Hause kam, den bunten Widerschein der Fenster an der Wand sah, dachte er, wie glücklick sie sein könnten. Und ein warmes Gefühl strömte ihm mit dem Blut zum Herzen. Ein paar rote, blaue und grüne Flecke an der Wand des Treppenhauses machten, daß er beinahe heiter, glücklich und zufrieden wurde.    

A string of 11 German words, all having English cognates, struck me the first time I read them back then:

Und ein warmes Gefühl strömte ihm mit dem Blut zum Herzen

I parsed that sentence, making each word a clickable link.

George Orwell wrote in Politics And The English Language:

Now analyze these two sentences a little more closely. The first contains forty-nine words but only sixty syllables, and all its words are those of everyday life. The second contains thirty-eight words of ninety syllables: eighteen of those words are from Latin roots, and one from Greek. The first sentence contains six vivid images, and only one phrase ('time and chance') that could be called vague. The second contains not a single fresh, arresting phrase, and in spite of its ninety syllables it gives only a shortened version of the meaning contained in the first. Yet without a doubt it is the second kind of sentence that is gaining ground in modern English. I do not want to exaggerate. This kind of writing is not yet universal, and outcrops of simplicity will occur here and there in the worst-written page. Still, if you or I were told to write a few lines on the uncertainty of human fortunes, we should probably come much nearer to my imaginary sentence than to the one from Ecclesiastes.

Orwell was writing about bad writing in English, not translating. But the same lesson holds. Some words have ordinary meanings deeply rooted in the past. But some ideas will not translate literally, like "a pair of three color stains on the wall" in Stelly's story. But others remain unchanged through time and across languages.

That Which We Call Rhodium By Any Other Name Would Have Been As Sweet

I introduced my favorite element back here.  Known to others since 1804, I met rhodium around 1982 or so. Rhodium drew my attention as the center of a specific type of molecule, then thought to be the closest man-made thing to an enzyme. Rhodium catalysts made unnatural amino acids such as L-DOPA. What was surprising was that it didn't make d-DOPA.

Back in the late 1970's and early 1980's asymmetric catalysis was a hot new topic. The thinking was that we could imitate nature and mimic enzymes.  Those were audacious and heady times. I can still smell how sweet it was.

Ignore The Skidmarks

Thirty years ago and I still recall a problem on a physics final exam at UW-Madison. It went something like this:

A tire is rolling at a constant speed along a pavement. A brake is suddenly applied, bringing the tire to a screeching halt. If the initial temperature of the tire is T_o, what is the final temperature of the tire? You may ignore heat exchange between the tire and road. 

The solution required a couple more pieces of info like the tire's velocity and mass, as well as the heat capacity of the tire.  I omitted those details. I remembered the problem because it was such a nice example of the first and second laws of thermodynamics.

First--all of the kinetic energy (called angular momentum) of the rolling tire changes into thermal energy (heat) as the tire skids to a halt. Nothing is "lost." The rubber in the tire heats up accordingly.*

Second--entropy increases for the energy transformation, meaning that all the well-ordered motion of the rolling tire transforms into the chaotic thermal vibrations of the warmer tire. The second law says that the reverse will not occur. In other words, a rolling tire can suddenly stop and heat up, but heating a tire will never make it roll.
_______________
James Joule spent part of his honeymoon in Switzerland measuring temperature differences between the tops and bottoms of waterfalls. His hypothesis was that the water should be warmer after the kinetic energy of the falling water is converted into heat. There were no forthcoming reports of frictional experiments with his bride.

Real Life's A Beach (cont'd)

This is a continuing series which began here

Beginning around December 3, 1982, heavy rains caused the Meramec River, which flows by Times Beach, to flood. Waters crested at 22 feet. Times Beach was hardest hit and most of its 800 buildings were heavily damaged. But as the water receded most residents began to move back to rebuild what remained of their homes. Federal flood insurance was created to help homeowners and businesses to rebuild after such flood disasters. Two years previously, though, Times Beach had become one of the few communities in the nation to be suspended from the program because municipal ordinances had fallen short of new government specifications. A town meeting had been held to explain what changes were necessary including a raising of all buildings by 18 feet. [8] "It would have been economically and physically impossible to comply," said a town attorney. [8] This meant that no federal grants or loans would be available to repair damaged homes or businesses. Residents got this news the same night that they learned that private tests had shown potentially harmful levels of dioxin in Times Beach. Missouri's Governor Bond, who had been pressing EPA to approve a buy-out of six homes at the Minker/Stout site, now urged that if official test results showed high enough dioxin levels, Times Beach should be bought out as well. [9] An editorial which appear in the St. Louis Post-Dispatch summarized Times Beach resident's plight:

Grants for temporary housing and for replacing lost furnishings are available from the Federal Emergency Management Fund. Aid for rebuilding in the flood plain is not available. Loans for rebuilding in other areas may be available from the Small Business Administration (commercial structures only) and other federal programs. But the resident's chief concern - the loss of their homes - can only be met by some sort of buy-out. [10]

__________________
[8] "2 Towns along Meramec lack U.S. Flood Insurance," St. Louis Post-Dispatch, 7 December, 1982, sec A, p. 4.

[9] Janice Long, David J. Hanson, "Dioxin issue focuses on three major controversies in the U.S." Chemical and Engineering News, 6 June, 1983, p. 23.

[10] "Disaster at Times Beach," an editorial, St. Louis Post-Dispatch, 28 Dec., 1982, sec A, p. 1.

Steelies

The best way to destroy the capitalist system is to debase the currency. -- V.I. Lenin

If we ever get into another full scale shooting war, it's going to cost dearly just to buy all the brass needed to make ammo casings (shells) for bullets.  We've traditionally made them out of brass (copper alloyed with a little zinc).  The Russians and Chinese make their bullet casings out of steel. Because spent cartridges are essentially thrown away on the battlefield, perhaps this is not a bad idea.

We traditionally made pennies out of copper and its alloys: chart  Since 1982, the U.S. Mint has made pennies out of zinc coated with thin layer of copper to keep up appearances. As of 2010, it cost the Mint 1.79 cents to make a penny because of the costs of the penny's materials and production.

As a kid, I used to go to the bank and buy rolls of pennies. Back then (the late 1960's to early '70's) I could still find lots of bronze "wheat pennies" in circulation. I'd comb through change looking to fill those Blue Whitman folders with pennies. Except for the really rare ones, or the pre-WW II ones in good condition, I did all right. Once and a while I'd find a 1943 steel penny.  I could find them easily in a pile of pennies using a magnet. I got 3 or 4 steel pennies that way. I had to buy the "S" one though. Coins minted in San Francisco were always harder to come by east of the Rockies. And the ones I got were never as nice looking as the one in the photo:

1943-s Steel Cent

50 years Of MyTunes: 1982

1999 by Prince. I don't have this album but I included it here because Prince personified the commercial success of the Minneapolis music scene which arose around this time.

Violent Femmes The eponymous band from Milwaukee used to play around in Madison while I was still in college there. Their first album included several great songs like Kiss Off, Gone Daddy Gone, Blister In The Sun and Add It Up, all purportedly written by Gordon Gano while still in high school. The latter song was the first time I remember hearing the f-word on vinyl since Country Joe and his Fish Cheer.

Combat Rock by The Clash included Rock The Casbah and Should I Stay or Should I Go

1982 Singles/Videos

Avalon by Roxy Music. So what was Brian Ferry doing for all those years since Country Life?

Thriller by Michael Jackson is the best selling album of all time -- and I never owned it! I did enjoy the video singles from this work including Beat It.

Boogie in Your Butt by Eddie Murphy. Still an LOL!

Winnebago Warrior ~ Dead Kennedys. Classic Jello Biafra humor:

Littered campgrounds, folding chairs
Feed Doritos to the bears
Honey, quick, the polaroid...

Save It For Later by The English Beat.

Gypsy by Fleetwood Mac who rekindled the last of their old magic before fading away forever.

Crimson and Clover covered by a smokin' hot Joan Jett & The Blackhearts. She also released I Love Rock and Roll around this time.

Valley Girl ~ Moon Unit & Frank Zappa  A novelty hit fer sure fer sure. OMG, I think we underestimate the impact of Valspeak on modern language. LOL!

Mental Hopscotch Missing Persons. Former Frank Zappa drummer Terry Bozzio and his Playboy playmate wife Dale made a brief splash on MTV with this one.

Only The Lonely ~ The Motels's Martha Davis (eye-candy alert) drove me to go buy a special skinny tie to go see them that year at a Madison club.

Urban Struggle by Orange County punk band The Vandals from their EP called Peace Through Vandalism. I first heard these guys via my girlfriend (now wife) who was well-versed with all the SoCal punk bands.

Caught Up In You by .38 Special. My soft spot for Southern Rock latched onto this one.

Sweet Dreams (Are Made of These) by The Eurythmics.

Do You Really Want to Hurt Me? by Culture Club. No didn't, but I did feel a little Schadenfreude when Boy George was arrested and did time. I forget what for exactly.

She Blinded Me With Science Thomas Dolby. Sie hat mich mit Wissenschaft geblindet.

Jack and Diane John Cougar Melonball. Goofy, quirky song I liked by a Midwestern guy who wound up on the wrong side of politics.

Back On the Chain Gang by "The Pretenders". They were just the "Pretenders" before half the band OD'd in 1982. This song and the theme song for the Rush Limbaugh Show were hastily recorded and released as singles. Both songs later appeared on the 1984 album Learning To Crawl. Both songs got heavy rotation on MTV.

I Want Candy by Bow Wow Wow. The version is remarkably close to the original 1965 song by The Strangeloves.

White Wedding Billy Idol. Weird video played a lot on MTV.

Love My Way by The Psychedelic Furs

Come Dancing by The Kinks. Ray Davies keeps his band alive (barely) in the MTV era. A nostalgic look back at his London of the 1950s.

Rio by Duran Duran. More hot chicks in flix by the Fab Five.
_____________________

Whip It by Devo  This video belongs to 1981 and I slipped it in here for Ron and Victoria hoping nobody would notice.