There's battle lines being drawn.
Nobody's right if everybody's wrong.
Young people speaking their minds
getting so much resistance from behind

Sunday, January 23, 2011

Alive, or at least breathing

Alive and home. Will need to do a fuller post on the Con.

Got to spend time with friends. But it's never enough to spend all the time I'd like to spend with all my friends. Got to spend time getting to know some friends better, which is good. Also got to meet a lot of new people, or at least new in person. If I attempt to drop names, I'm going to forget someone, which I don't want to do.

When I went to leave today, my car battery was dead. I'm hoping that it'll hold a charge overnight for a few days until I can replace it. We'll find out tomorrow.

Very tired. Didn't get much sleep. Also I had a very disturbing dream Friday night. That lead to not being rested and having some difficulty engaging on Saturday. It was one of those dreams that when you fall back to sleep, even after walking around for a little bit, you drop right back into the dream. Was. Not. Fun. I'm not sure I want to discuss the subject matter, but I have a feeling I know where it came from and why. The dream wasn't what normal people would call horror, but for me keyed into one of the fears I carry in my heart (a fear that with my current life I know I'll never have to deal with). At least in the form I had to deal with in the dream. So if you were there and I seemed a little distracted Saturday morning, that's the reason.

I also didn't eat well while there. Which leads to other problems. I think I gained a few pounds this weekend, which isn't good. So I'm going to have to be doubly good for the next few weeks.

Did you have a good weekend?

3 comments:

Jim C. Hines said...

My car didn't want to turn over either, and a friend of mine said theirs was reluctant. The cold was not kind to people's cars.

Was good seeing you this weekend!

Dr. Phil (Physics) said...

I suspect that the bitter overnight wind blowing through the parking structure was sucking any residual heat energy out of your batteries.

Something that CAN work sometimes, when your car won't start -- Turn everything off. Then turn ON the headlights (doesn't matter if they shine) for 30-60 seconds. Turn headlights OFF. Then crank.

Headlights draw a large current. Cold weak batteries have a high internal resistance -- this will generate heat when you try to run the headlights. When the battery is warmed, the internal resistance is lowered and you might get enough use out of the battery to get the engine running.

It's Physics.

Dr. Phil

Steve Buchheit said...

Hmm. We'll the guy from Global (the AAA contact road mechanic) did say he was busy that day. And when I pulled out ten minutes later (after letting the car warm a bit), he was still at the bottom of the garage.

I'll need to try that next time, Dr. Phil.

And it was good seeing both of you, and being on the PC panel together. I think that ended up being my favorite panel of the weekend.