Asymptotia

Spotted while filming at the Burbank recycling center. (Click for larger view.) See also Continue reading ‘Colourful Crush’

It is the birthday of a friend today, with a party to be held at a beach. The instructions were to bring something French to eat. I was in a baking mood this morning and so I decided, after some thought and research, to make an apple cake as a birthday present. Apparently this is a typical French-style cake. Well, it is French enough for me, with its simple combination of fruit and cake.

(Interestingly it is roughly reminiscent of the apricot/peach upside-down cake I was planning to make when I was shopping in the market, but I could not get a definitive source to tell me whether that type of cake was of French origin or not, so I decided to use the apples instead. I can just eat the apricots and peaches for lunch each day this week.)

Ok, here’s how I made it. Continue reading ‘Beach Time Baking!’

Ok, I’ve no idea how many will get the joke, but that’s ok. (Click for larger view.)

This is something I was shown in the reception room of the Burbank recycling center on Friday.

I had a good look around and learned a few things, while filming an analogy for a Continue reading ‘I’ve Found the Entwives!’

The things I do for physics. (Including trying to remember how to play tennis after 15 years…) (Click for larger view.)
Continue reading ‘Certainly Not Wimbledon’

“I’m Not Like Other Guys”. A quote from Thriller, in case you’re wondering. It’s appropriate. Michael Jackson was truly exceptional. (I’m focusing on the musician here, not the troubled person who unfortunately turned into a bit of a freakshow.)

Well, I feel like a big, bright piece of my childhood died today, and will feel this way for a while. I know it will pass, as it should (one must celebrate life and look forward) but there was so much joy in the music, and so much of it (the album Thriller especially) was so exceptional that it stood way apart from what was around at the time.

Even now when I hear a song from Thriller it sounds like it was created yesterday. Continue reading ‘Goodbye Michael Jackson’

I just felt in the mood, and half an hour later…

…cupcakes, strawberries, and cream. (Click for larger view.)

It all went in like this (after ten minutes of prep* (1/2 cup butter, 1/2 cup sugar, 2 Continue reading ‘Quick Dessert Treat’

Well, it has been a busy few days. Since Sunday’s activities I’ve been up to my ears in various things. Interesting things, I’m happy to say, and only a few annoying things. Besides getting back on track with life in LA, I’ve been working (with a student collaborator) on various very interesting physics projects that I hope to find time to tell you about soon, involving various applications of string theory of the sort I mentioned in an earlier post.

I’ve also been working on the two films I’m making. They’re now in final iterations of editing, and in addition to working on the iterations writing notes with directions for my editor, I’ve been making some extra bits of special footage for one of them. I hope it won’t be too long now before I call them finished.

On top of that business, I’ve been communicating with several filmmakers about ideas and material for the History Channel show The Universe. (I’ve told you about Continue reading ‘Some Things That Keep Me Busy’

One of the offerings for my 17 guests during my solstice celebratory cooking session yesterday. (Click for larger view.) For background, see yesterday’s post.

I produced five or six core dishes for the menu, overall. Boy, that was fun! (There were also some excellent dishes brought by guests, and I had various other things Continue reading ‘Solstice Salad’

The Sun stood still earlier today! Don’t panic - It is Summer Solstice. I’m talking about an apparent motion of the sun, or, more accurately the migration of its path across the sky. Take a moment to think celestially for a bit and ponder the earth as it goes around the sun on its annual path. There’s a tilt to the earth’s own rotation axis, remember? (About 23 degrees). That tilt results in our seasons, and the path of the sun through the daily sky. Visualize this for a moment and it’ll make sense, if you let it. Today the sun’s path has got as northernmost as it will get, and it is now turning around, being more Southern each day until Winter Solstice. To turn around and change direction, you first have to stop. No way around it. So, the sun stood still today.

So, I decided to celebrate all this lovely geometry on the spur(ish) of the moment. Will you? I’m going to cook up several tasty dishes and have some friends around to Continue reading ‘Summer Solstice!’

(Words above followed by a deep sigh…)

There’s simply nothing as sweet as coming home. I say the words above and sigh deeply and satisfyingly and soak in the familiar shape, sound, and smell of my home and it feels great. Back home, back in a city I love.

Going away for a month or more on retreat is something I value highly. It is necessary to my state of mind. But I must eventually retreat from the retreat, and return home. The words of the title, said with a little extra pause just after the comma, and a sigh, in this context represents one of my Continue reading ‘Well, I’m Back…’

I learned from Phil’s blog that (recently launched) Hershel’s official first image has been released:

Continue reading ‘A Good First Look’

What’s this? Pinot Grigio salami? Well, this has to be tried out, I think.

Turned out to be rather good, although how it would have tasted without the pinot grigio being involved in the process, I don’t know.

Anyway, as a result of the successful taste test, this has been a component of my lunch sandwich here a lot. (Click for a closer view and to read the details if desired.)

In related news, the real Summer season is finally beginning here in Aspen, on or around this weekend. Several things that have been closed (e.g., the buses up to the trailheads of some of my favourite hiking trails, the weekly farmer’s market on the street), or running reduced hours (e.g. the Explore bookstore) up to now are opening up, and some of the major festivals are beginning. Of course, I won’t be around for most of them. That’s life. Among these is the Food and Wine classic which starts Friday. There are giant tents being constructed around town, and lots of portable industrial grade cooking units being installed in them. Quite a remarkable operation. You can see the full schedule here.

To my delight I noticed that among the numerous chefs flying in for it is one of my favourites, Mario Batali! He and Nancy Silverton (another favourite excellent chef and restaurateur) Continue reading ‘Tastin’’

During the Summer, I’m particularly fond of seeing some films that have a great sense of place about a city that I love, be it Los Angeles, London, New York, or have loved spending a lot of time in, like Taipei, Venice, or several others. I suppose it is a cheap way of travelling back to these places, but somehow I think it is more than that. I think it is also a lot about making contact with things that I cherish deep inside me: memories of all kinds, feelings, people, and sometimes crucial stages in my life. (Gosh. I did not mean to write an opening paragraph so laden with…. whatever it is laden with. Oh well, there it is.)

So anyway last week and this week have two film releases of work steeped in New York atmosphere. The first is The Taking of Pelham 1 2 3, a Tony Scott film, which I was quite happy with (I saw it on opening night last Friday). It is not a landmark or masterpiece of a film (how many of those are there anyway?), but it is a solid thriller with a number of good performances and an enjoyable, tight, script, with good dialogue. I loved that the subway system itself was a major character in the film. I really enjoyed that aspect, since a big part of my NYC enjoyment when I am there is the subway, and the people and situations you encounter on it.

This week sees the release of Whatever Works, a Woody Allen film. Besides the fact that it is a Woody Allen film, and that it is set in New York, some of you might also be interested to know the lead is played by Larry David, and some of you may also be interested to know that the Continue reading ‘New York State of Mind’

I know what you’re thinking, based on the title, but I’m not talking about me and my colleagues. (Stage cymbal crash.) I mean funny-ha-ha not funny-peculiar.

Saturday morning. I’m drinking a double espresso at Victoria’s (the newest of the cafes) and putting my aging ipod to the test after having opened it up and tinkered around inside to diagnose some strange behaviour. I notice out of the extreme corner of my eye that the guy who was sitting at a nearby table, now on his way out, changed his mind and is looking at me and now approaching and saying something. I Continue reading ‘Hanging with the Funny People’

Well, inexplicably I’m up at 6:00am again after getting to sleep at 1:00am. Might as well have a cup of tea and blog a bit. I’ve a treat for you!

As you know, I love some of the interviews that show up on Daily Mayo. So many interesting guests, and Simon Mayo is such an excellent interviewer as well, gently steering the conversation along. Well, he had the excellent director Guillermo del Toro on, a couple of days ago. (Who? Oh, he’s the director of the stunning Pan’s Labyrinth, or as I love to say out loud in a corny accent: El Laberinto del Fauno.) He seems to have been busy, what with co-writing a new book (for those of you into vampire-lit, here’s a new series for you, perhaps a nice contrast to the Twilight series), developing a lot of screenplays, moving to New Zealand, and… yes… you know… working on the Hobbit!

After a while, he does indeed get around to talking about the Hobbit films, and although I much prefer to know nothing at all about these banner projects before I walk into the theatre (as I did with Peter Jackson’s The Lord of the Rings), I listened to the whole thing. (Even though I thought that the latter half of Hellboy II was a mess, I still trust him to do a good job on the Hobbit movies. Or, as he joked, the Hobbitses. (He said “Hobbitses” to pluralize… he gets it!))

There are several reassuring things. Several. One is that they seem to have Continue reading ‘Guillermo del Toro on Mayo’

Having done enough physics for the day and evening, I sometimes just find a nice quiet (but not too quiet) bar and settle into a comfortable chair with a good book and a decent single malt.

Tonight there is rain pouring outside, the air was clear and damp with slight drizzle as I Continue reading ‘On Some Nights…’

…At least in my field, as submitted to the ArXiv. Just saw “Remarks on the world-sheet saga” by Bert Schroer. The abstract (and the paper) is full of excellently derisive turns of phrase that are hilarious to read! Example from the abstract:

Attention is given to how such misleading metaphors originate and how their support is maintained by quantum mechanical analogies to models which for good reasons never existed before in particle physics physics and whose only purpose is to uphold the string metaphor. The correct localization is inconsistent with the idea of world-sheets and the string-theoretical interpretation of T-duality.

He’s not actually trying to make the reader laugh, I think, but is attempting to make some serious physics points in there, apparently suggesting alternative lines of Continue reading ‘Best Abstract of the Year So Far?’

I’m a creature of habit, it must be said. Part of my morning ritual while at Aspen is to slowly stir some steel cut Irish oatmeal (click for larger view) for a while (properly spiced, of course, and soaked overnight ), while listening to NPR and making some tea. The tea is also seasoned with spices and finished in a pan for a while. Why?

Tea up here is horrible if you just pour boiled water on to tea leaves (bag or no bag). This is because at this altitude, boiling water isn’t actually very hot. This makes for Continue reading ‘Breakfast Habits’

I’ve no idea why I’m writing a blog post about this, since I can’t really explain any of the details in a way that won’t sound tediously technical. I’m just pleased since I had a sort of perfect workshop moment for a couple of hours after the weekly picnic at the Center today. I’d been talking a bit last week with Lincoln Carr, an excellent condensed matter theorist at the Colorado School of Mines, and had also been talking with Allan Adams, another excellent physicist, from MIT. Allan and I seem to be on the same page as theorists and so I really enjoy talking with him. We work on string theory, but are not fussy about where the physics that it can be applied to might come from. As long as it is good physics. We both seem to love the idea that there’s so much rich physics, that might be accessible with string theory, Continue reading ‘Just Great!’

Well, there are two Aspen cafes that are probably a bit sick of me. The last couple of days saw me frequenting one or other of them while I worked on a number of things, primarily finishing writing a paper. I’ve focused on little else but finishing it up so that I can get on with other things, such as my various other projects, and also to allow me to pay attention to the interesting talks coming up in the workshop Continue reading ‘Haunting while Working’

There were a couple of string theory stories in New Scientist last week. I forgot to mention them earlier. One is entitled “What string theory is really good for”, by Jessica Griggs. The other is entitled “Why cats fail to grasp string theory”, by Ewen Callaway.

Well, since cats are involved, of course I’m going to start with an extract from the second (even though it is obvious that the cats are deliberately skewing the results):

[...] Osthaus’s team attached fish or biscuit treats to one end of a string. A plastic screen with a small gap at the bottom separated cats from their reward, requiring the felines to tug on the string to get the treat.

With a single string attached to the food, most cats learned to paw at the string to get a snack. But when Osthaus’ team introduced a second piece of string, [...]

Well, that was to pique your interest. You’ll have to go off to the source article to get to grips of this second piece of stringy research. The first article? It’s a discussion of Continue reading ‘Uses For Strings?’

Aha.

For a while, over the years, I’d see them in only one colour at a time, and would conjecture that they are all related since the shapes were all similar (out hiking on trails, the wild varieties - not these). See an earlier post on this here where the conjecture was confirmed by a bit of research with helpful discussion and links from some readers.

Now I found a cluster of them all together in an Aspen garden that I just happened to be walking by. So, columbines in three shades below for you (Click for larger views):
Continue reading ‘Combined Columbines’

Do you know what I’m thinking? I’m thinking “How come I never noticed this before after so many years?!”. Perhaps it wasn’t here before (upstairs from the Butcher’s Block, in Aspen, CO). I don’t know, but it makes for an amusing picture to me (click for larger view):

-cvj

Well, it was an unusual day here in Aspen. It was a day with lots of talks. Six of them, I think. There were four workshop talks scheduled for the morning, each of half an hour I think. Also got into a discussion before the sessions began, helping to explain how gauge/gravity duals work to a condensed matter colleague. I checked a voicemail message (only a relatively limited set of people have my number and so I figured it was a call to which I’d want to respond) and, despite the fact that I’m in retreat mode and would normally ignore it, returned the call. It was an office at USC wanting to put me in touch with a journalist who needed help. From Esquire. No, it is not what you think. I suggested they can could call me at 13:05, and at 10:30 went to the talks.

Somehow, successive speakers kept running over time due to lots of (actually, pretty interesting) interruptions and discussions, so I did not mind that we got to 12:50, and my talk, which was scheduled for 12:00-12:30, had not happened yet. With Continue reading ‘An Odd Time’

Here goes:
Continue reading ‘I’m Just Going to Come Out and Say It…’

Ah, time to relax a bit after a somewhat busy last couple of days glued to the notebook and computer. The results? (1) A hasty colloquium to an audience of mixed expertise to try to get across a sense of why some of us are excited about various applications of string theory a diverse range of physics including ongoing experiments in nuclear physics and condensed matter physics (the person who was going to do it was a bit ill apparently so I stepped in with some hastily prepared slides… a bit messy but hopefully some use)… (2) Two papers with my student Tameem on applications of string theory techniques to superconductivity (one will appear on the ArXiv in about 20 minutes if you are interested [update: it is here.])… (3) Notes for a talk I’ll give on Thursday about said new results… (4) Several discussions with and ideas sent to some documentary film makers about some new TV shows coming up - Season 4 of The Universe! Seems I’ll get involved in some of them (stay tuned)…

So this morning I went to sit and cool down a bit at a cafe I like to visit a lot when in Aspen. Ink Coffee. Ok, I see that I did not yet mention I was in Aspen. Have been for Continue reading ‘Ink Time…’

Sheril Kirshenbaum at the Intersection has spearheaded a campaign by a coalition of bloggers to raise awareness and promote and coordinate action on the matter of rape worldwide. Particularly the institutionalized and mass rapes that take place in various parts of the world. She writes very well about the matter in her first blog post on the issue and I recommend that you have a careful read of it. Note that just your clicking on the link and going over there to read helps, since all revenue from her blog traffic this month will be donated to Doctors without Borders, an organization that has tracked this issue for some time. There’s also a New York Times article by Nicholas Kristof from a few weeks ago that is worth reading. She points to it in her post too.

Do please take some time out to visit her site, and do tell others about it via word of mouth, letter, email, facebook, twittering…

-cvj