Subtle Coolness

I’m here in my Astronomy lecture learning about black holes. I’ve been told some interesting things.

There are three things about a black hole that scientists can measure (in theory): mass, spin, and electric charge. And that’s it. There is no way to tell anything else about a black hole.

There is no way to tell what a black hole is made of. It could be made of hydrogen and helium that used to be part of a star, or it could be made of ice cream. It could be made of photons that can’t get away, or it could be made of puppy dogs that don’t want to leave.

Black holes aren’t very dangerous, unless you really want a closeup look. For example, if the mass of the Sun were compressed until it formed a black hole, and said black hole were placed at the top of the tower at the University of Texas, I could relocate to Round Rock and I would be just fine. Everything within a 3 kilometer radius of the hole would, unfortunately, be consumed.

In that case, black holes would be made of students, faculty, staff, statues of Civil War heroes, and Spanish-style architecture.

Today I went on a tour of the Texas Advanced Computing Center. I saw a lot of computers. The main room that was full of equipment was hot in some places and cool in some places, depending on which row I was standing in.

When I’m older, I want a big rack of computers in my closet or my basement. My website will be a lot faster then.

I’m interested in forming a League. You know, a community. A community of all my friends, with a very official sounding name that includes the word “League”. Like “League of Justice”, or “League of Awesomeness”, or “League of Me and The Cheat”, but all of those are already taken.

Will you help me think of a good name for a League? Because as soon as we have a League we can have an ice cream social.

On Friday I sang with the UT Men’s Chorus, “if that train runs me right, I’ll be home Saturday night.” As it turns out, I was home Friday night and I rode in a car with my parents.

Saturday morning found us at the temple in Dallas, and in the evening we went to a Halloween party. My younger brother Mark dressed very convincingly as the Grim Reaper, and my youngest brother Matthew jumped around as Mario (but without the mustache). As for me, I threw on a three-piece suit and sang Sinatra and Jiminy Cricket while serving punch. No foolin’.

David and Chelsea appeared at the party, too. How did they know where we were? They checked the calendar.

Monday evening, to go back to Austin, I actually did ride a train. I did! I had my first American train experience. I’ve ridden many trains, but they were always in England. Trains in England are different than the train I rode on Monday.

First, it was huge. It was huge! The train was as tall as a two-story house. Second, the seats, they were like airplane seats, but wider, and with more leg room. Third, well, how many of you have ridden with Amtrak?

So I was pretty excited about riding the train.