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Flowers in the Backyard

The last two shots in the Backyard series; this is a picture of some flowers in the backyard.

Although the theme to the picture was supposed to be 'weeds', and it was supposed to show the beauty in their (uncontrolled) natural growth, there was no way I was gonna give up taking a photo of these flowers!

I don't know the name of the flower in the first photo, but the second is of bleeding heart (see Wikipedia entry).

Categories: Photography    

Tags: Flowers, Backyard, Photography, Beauty, Color

Comments: 2 so far

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Naked Weed

This is the second picture of the weed (see the first one here).

These weeds reproduce by forming seeds (as shown in the older picture), and then dispersing them through the wind's action.

By gently blowing on the weed, one can easily disperse the seeds, and see the "naked weed".

Categories: Photography    

Tags: Weed, Naked, Backyard, Photography

Comments: 1 so far

Niagara Falls

I went to Niagara Falls with a friend from Southern California (lucky!) last week. This is a picture from the Maid of the Mist boat tour of the falls.

The sheer force of the constantly falling water is truly humbling. It is astounding to consider that water has been falling from there for thousands of years non-stop, and will continue to do so. Still, the Falls are very much alive; they have moved more than 11 kilometers in 10,000 years.

According to my friend who saw it for the first time, "It's as if I was facing God!"

The picture is of the American Falls

Categories: Photography    

Tags: Niagara Falls, New York, Water

Comments: 1 so far

Weed in the Yard

Here is a weed in the backyard. Unfortunately, as 'beautiful' as this may look, it lowers both the aesthetic and monetary values of the house/yard.

So it will be removed sometime (soon?)!

Categories: Photography    

Tags: Backyard, Photography, Macro, Weed

Comments: 0 so far

Parsley

A close up of the parsley growing in our backyard. This is used for cooking!

Categories: Photography    

Tags: Backyard, Photography, Parsley, Vegetable Garden

Comments: 1 so far

Conference Stupidity

Recently at a conference, an undergraduate poster was presented that had the above reaction scheme.

I had recently done a similar reaction with a non-conjugated alcohol, and was curious as to why she used HMDS, rather than a more common or weaker base for the deprotonation.

Instead of asking why she used HMDS, I asked "Which salt of HMDS did you use?", because I had incorrectly believed that they used hexamethyldisilazide, which is a strong base, rather than hexamethyldisilazane.

In my oversight and quick thinking, I had overlooked the fact that they were protecting a phenolic proton, which is of course more acidic than normal alcohols. [If I had known this, I would not have asked the question in the first place, because any weak base would deprotonate a phenol].

After asking her, it turned out that she had no idea wtf she used. In an attempt to 'jog her memory', I asked if she used the lithium or potassium salt of HMDS.

When her supervisor came around, it turned out that they used the free amine, rather than the deprotonated salt, and I also learned that she got NSERC to do this work.

WTF???? Why is she getting NSERC when she doesn't even know what she does?

Categories: Life    

Tags: Work, Chemistry, NSERC, Stupidity, Retarded

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Jeopardy

Who comes on Jeopardy to tell the world that they had cancer in their uterus? WTF?

I moved a bookcase and learned that I had cancer in my uterus and because of that I didn't need chemo.

Alex: Good for you.

WTF?

Categories: Random Posts    

Tags: Jeopardy, Random, Stupidity, People, TV

Comments: 4 so far