Taking a moment out form the weekend hustle and watching some football before I start studying again. I don't think I've watched football this way in years. After the NFL allowed Model to move my Browns, I stopped watching. And I wasn't alone. Viewer ship, IIRC, has never rebounded to pre-browns-move levels. For those of you not watching, it's the battle of I-71, Browns and Bengals. Currently the Brownies are up 13 to 10. But there's still two quarters to go and if the Browns are good at anything, they're good at snatching defeat from the jaws of victory.
Yesterday we studied the chemistry of neurological transmission. While neurons fire an electrical charge down their axons, called Action Potential, it's not like the electricity that flows into your home. Besides being lower voltage (measured in millivolts from a range of 30 to -90 charges, the electrical transfer can demonstrate just how fast cellular processes happen. Without getting into a whole bunch of details, electrical power in your home comes from free electrons flowing down the wire (well, actually, the flow of electrons being jiggled because of the AC nature of the power, instead of pushing electrons down the wire, which is DC), the electrical charge firing down the dendrites and axons of your nervous system are cause by depolarization and how that opens cell membrane channels (protein "holes" in the membrane) that allows Ca+ and K+ ions to cross the membrane through simple diffusion (before being set back to status by facilitated diffusion and the ion pumps along your cellular membrane). This creates a cascade of depolarization down the axon, which is the electrical charge. And it does these at speeds of 15meters/sec at the slowest.
Also an interesting note, you know how cells are very small. However, did you know that the neurons that comprise your nerve bundles are, for the most part, single cells with their cell bodies located either in your CNS or PNS (central and peripheral nervous systems), or your brain and spine if you will, and their axons extending out to the where they either sense or activate? That is, one cell, the head of which is usually in your head or spinal column, then extends out to where you have the sensation. the longest cell in your body runs from the lower part of your spinal column, down your thigh, leg, tarsals, and to your big toe. One cell.
Went to the Pumpkin Festival in Huntsburg, yesterday. Spent too much money doing my part to stimulate the economy. Recaulked the bathroom shower (the old caulking was showing cracks. It took a few hours for the floor to dry out before I could put the new caulk down. Not good. Did some little things around the house. And then I started reading. And read some more. And some more. And, good God, won't this chapter ever end?
This morning was a slow start, but now I need to get back to the reading. And, hey, the Browns are up 23 to 10. But there's still a full quarter and 2 minutes to go. Plenty of time to screw it up.
And even though the Browns are winning, I still would rather be writing.
2 comments:
Okay. Sports I don't get, but PUMPKIN FESTIVAL sounds intriguing!
Hey Camille, well, I went to high school in Canton, Ohio. Home to the Football Hall of Fame. It might just be a northern phenomenon, but when the sky turn dusky and the temperatures drop to hot chocolate weather, the brain turns to football.
Although, I'll admit, memorizing scores, stats, who's who, etc, was never my gig. But that doesn't mean I can't enjoy the sport.
I can understand were your time in Texas may have jaded you to football. But the rest of the world isn't so crazed about it.
And pumpkin festivals, always very cool.
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