The place where lost socks go...

After making my tea the George Orwell way for over eight months now, I finally caved in this afternoon and added sugar again.

I know this is supposed to mean that I am tasting the sugar instead of the tea. It may be so. However, much as I like the taste of tea... I also like the taste of sugar!

Besides, I just attended a seminar on future neutrino oscillation experiments and am shortly off to listen to George Smoot -- the 2006 Nobel Physics Laureate -- give a talk. Having woken up way too early this morning for a video conference, I need both the caffeine and the sugar to stay awake!

...the New George Orwell Tea Challenge?

After generating a surprisingly large amount of interest, I somehow stopped talking about my adventures in making tea the George Orwell way. What a callous way for me to treat my gentle readers! For shame!

Perhaps one might think that I had abandoned the tea challenge altogether, and lapsed back into doping my tea with enormously large quantities of sugar. It would be a reasonable presumption... but it would be incorrect.

To recap for those readers who are relatively new to this journal, I should say that, upon my return from the States in August, I began withholding sugar from my tea. This was supposed to last for a fortnight, as I had accepted the challenge issued by Orwell just following his final Golden Rule of tea-making. Near the end of the original challenge, I began thinking that perhaps I should try adopting all eleven rules for making Orwellian tea[*]. The ever-beautiful frogcastle made a comment to the same effect... and I restarted the fortnight going all out. My Earl Grey was swapped for Assam, the tea bags were traded in for loose tea, et cetera, et cetera. I began the revised Tea Challenge on the last day of August, intending to keep to it for two weeks, but.....

.....I ended up staying on it for considerably longer. Indeed, for over a month, until I went back to the States again in October. I decided to fully acclimate myself to Orwellian tea and, truth be told, it was not bad. My colleagues began asking if I was going to switch back to sugar. However, I had other plans in mind first.

Orwell outlines eleven Golden Rules for preparing tea. Although the rule about refraining from sugar makes a drastic change in the taste of the tea, many of the other rules are quite subtle. For instance, heating the pot first... or adding milk to the tea (rather than tea to the milk)... or stirring the leaves while the tea brews. If I went through the trouble -- and I did -- to make full Orwellian tea, I want to see how much each rule matters. Going back to sugar would be far too great a change and would mask any other differences in taste. Therefore, starting this week, I am beginning to play with the other rules, breaking one at a time to see what happens.

Upon my return to Oxford, I gave myself a few weeks to get back into the habit of making Orwellian tea. Then, at the start of this week, I switched from Assam back to Earl Grey. Still using loose tea, still brewing it in a pot, et cetera, et cetera. But I am drinking a Chinese tea instead of an Indian tea. I can definitely taste a difference, as I can taste my dear friend bergamot again. Soon I will have to think of which rule to break next... and see what difference that makes.

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[*] The term "Orwellian tea" sounds so ominous, doesn't it?

It's really close to midnight, so I'd best write something for today... lest I fall behind in the "New 100 Days of LJ" project. On the other hand, I have a video conference at 8:30am... so I should make this relatively short. Right, then, it would seem one of those boring updates on basic stuff is in order:

Tea: Six days into the New George Orwell Tea Challenge, I can honestly say that I am drinking more tea than usual each day -- brewing two or three pots in my new little teapot. Although I still poor oodles of sugar into my iced tea -- which I consider a different beast entirely -- I may well keep off of the sugar when the two weeks are over. We shall see.

Bells: Cycled up to Headington with JP on Sunday evening for a handbell practice at somebody's house. After being asked to "prove my credentials" with the 3-4 part on Plain Bob Minor, I got to try some new things, most notably my first go at the trebles part for Plain Bob Major. I got most of the way through it, despite having never studied it before. Apparently, I seem to have a natural talent for change ringing on handbells... and one of the women I met at the practice left saying: "Nice to have met you; your ringing makes me sick." I was assured that this was a compliment! On the ride to Headington, JP told me that he thinks I may be ready to learn a method -- other than the extremely simple Plain Hunt -- on tower bells, too. The two natural choices to start on are Plain Bob and Grandsire. Despite the fact that I know Plain Bob from handbell ringing, JP wants to start me on Grandsire. So I spent time today practicing the trebles on Plain Bob Major for tomorrow's handbell lesson and looking at the method diagram for Grandsire Triples for tomorrow's tower bell practice. I think I can now ring the covering tenor (the #8 bell) reliably for Grandsire Triples and also ring the treble (the #1) bell. I will request to do so tomorrow evening. As a bonus from Sunday's practice, I got to cycle down Headington Hill on my way home from ringing -- that was a lot of fun!

Games: On Monday evening, cheshcat and I went to 50 Aston Street to visit with CG, who lives in that remarkable house. We hung out and talked, then played Settlers of Catan. Despite her protestations, cheshcat established a very strong lead early in the game. In the end, I won but she was a close second, with nine points. Indeed, if the development cards had not been against her, she would have won easily. She bought eight development cards... but seven of them turned out to be soldiers!

Work: The research seems to be going well this week. We improved the detector that I took such good data with two weeks ago and are currently preparing for another cooldown. Indeed, that is why I am at the lab just before midnight -- I need to start the pumps to evacuate the inner vacuum chamber overnight. We also have send jobs out to the workshop and the thin film facility and the wirebonding person; when those are ready, we should have what we need for the next cooldown or two. Between JI and I, the analysis of the previous data that I collected looks pretty decent, too! So yay for us!

Books: Started the text, rather than just the introductory material, for King Henry IV, Part One last night. I definitely want to read all six Henry plays before February and, so far, I am enjoying this one.

LiveJournal Stuff: I have such awesome friends -- thank you for re-affirming that I have a brain located somewhere in my head after yesterday's lapse. Lately, life has been a touch busy and so I am behind in replying to comments. Many apologies are due to such awesome friends! However, I have read them all -- and appreciate them! -- and, more importantly, am managing to keep up on all of your journals! Comments on comments will follow when I have a few minutes to breathe.

Miscellaneous: This week was the St. Giles Fair in central Oxford. The fair goes back about two hundred years (although that photograph goes back only about half that). It is held on the first Monday and Tuesday following the first Sunday after September 1^st. The usually busy street of St. Giles is closed to traffic and turned into a carnival for two days. I work at the very Northern end of the street, so all I needed to do was wander outside to see rides and carnival games and food vendors and whatnot. Definitely a change from the usual -- and a very interesting contrast with the ancient buildings that line the street! I don't really know why they have a fair there every year, but it was nifty. Rumour has it that St. John's College -- the richest of the Oxford colleges -- owns the street and, although they let the city use it for general traffic most of the year, they choose to shut it down for two days as a way of asserting their ownership rights. Is this correct? I don't know...

Anyway, that's about all for tonight. Time to confirm that the cryostat is in a reasonable state, and then I am off to sleep for as long as I can before the morning's video-conference...

Last night, I found that I couldn't sleep... so I stayed awake reading a large stack of Marvel comics. Some good stuff in the bunch, like Peter David's Friendly Neighborhood Spider-Man annual, which had a Sandman: Year One story. Also some drek in there, like the Annihilation: Heralds of Galactus mini-series. My internal jury is still out on some of the books, like the World War Hulk storyline.

This morning, I slept in until about noon. Not surprising when one goes to sleep after 4am. Our friends C&M came over and drove us to an appliance store so that we could pick out a new washing machine[*]. Then we came back to Skullcrusher Mountain to play games. We played Puerto Rico, which C won with 62 points. M came in second with 54, I came in third also with 54, and cheshcat had 46 points. Definitely not my best showing... though, in retrospect, I see what I could have done better. Next game was Settlers of Catan, in which I redeemed myself. I won with ten points, cheshcat and M each had eight points, and C had four.

This evening, cheshcat and I will go into the city centre, to the Sheldonian Theatre. The theatre, built in the 1660s, was designed by the great 17^th century British architect, Sir Christopher Wren. Although we have walked by it a great many times, neither cheshcat nor I have yet to go inside. Tonight, however, we have tickets to see the Oxford Sinfonia perform Mozart's clarinet concerto and Beethoven's symphony number nine. I am looking forward to both the music and seeing the inside of this historic building.

Meanwhile, day two of the newly relaunched George Orwell Tea Challenge proceeds without surprises. I do like brewing the loose tea in a pot and may continue to do so after the challenge concludes... whether or not I revert to adding sugar at that time.

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[*] Yes, that is broken, too. At least in this case, we get to take the replacement cost out of our rent.

Day eleven of the George Orwell Tea Challenge and, um, I have not drank any tea today! Our group usually takes tea at 11am and has a morning meeting. However, I was refilling liquid helium into the cryostat at the time and could not leave it alone. Yesterday, however, I took the advice of xirpha, polyfrog and others... and began heating the cup before making my tea in it.

Thus far, I have learned two things from the tea challenge:
One: I have learned that far more people on my friends list care about this -- and comment on it -- than I ever would have imagined.
Two: I heave learned that I must be some sort of barbaric pre-Norman savage, as I really do not taste any great difference when I do things like heating my cup or pouring the water while it is still boiling.

Three more days to go...

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Yesterday afternoon, on my lunch break, I took a walk and ran some errands. On my walk, I made my way down to The Bear, which is the pub referred to in yesterday's entry. Obsessive compulsive? Me?? Nah!

What I learned, however, is that the background to the comic that I posted is fictional. Nowhere is there a building like the one seen there that has a line of sight to the pub. I was crushed... but I got over it.

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Last night, cheshcat and I went to see the British Shakespeare Company perform As You Like It in the Wadham College Gardens.

The BSC is not to be confused with the Royal Shakespeare Company, whom cheshcat have seen several times in Stratford; nor are they to be mistaken for the Oxford Shakespeare Company, whom I have seen perform at Wadham College before with cheshcat (Midsummer Nights Dream, 2007) and resourceress (Taming of the Shrew and The Importance of Being Earnest, 2006). I seem to be collecting Shakespeare Companies.

In any case, the BSC is specifically an open air Shakespeare company. Open air theatre is very popular in England in the summertime, or in times that purport to be summer (like now). Of course, with outdoor theatre, the weather becomes a factor... and, indeed, last night was both windy and had intermittent bouts of rain. However, the actors did a fantastic job, even with the weather acting against them. My only regret is that, because they are in Oxford for such a short time, I will not get to see them perform Henry V with the same cast.

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Speaking of cryostats, as I did up above, I want to very happily announce that the current cooldown of the Kelvinox-400 cryostat is the most successful run that I have had to date.

From a personal level, I can say that this may be the first time I have done the entire cooldown myself (since my graduate student, JI, is on holiday).

From the level of the cryostat itself, I can comment that our resistor thermometer has the highest resistance I have ever seen, indicating the lowest temperature that I have ever obtained. The previous record from the dynamic duo of JI & Yours Truly was the cooldown that I started before going to the States. JI reported to me that our thermometer reached about 32 kOhms of resistance. Since we had a radioactive cobalt-60 source inside at the time, we were able to use nuclear orientation thermometry to tell us that the temperature was approximately 6.3mK -- yes, that is 0.0063 degrees above absolute zero! Now the thermometer reads 33.3 kOhms, so I would imagine that we are at five point something millikelvin. Besides a record low temperature, the pressures on the mixing circuit, which cycles the coolant, are very low. This is good, as some previous cooldowns were successful... but had to be cut short from rising internal pressure.

From the data level, which is the most important, I am now collecting data that is worthy of analysis! This is, of course, the most exciting part! Yesterday and today, I have spent more time sitting in front of a computer playing with analysis than I have working with hardware. While I enjoy hardware work, this is a very welcome change for me! It's all about balance!

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Speaking of summertime, as I also did up above, I want to go on record as being terribly envious of all of my friends in the States. Why? Because you got to experience summer! Here in England, the high temperatures have generally been in the 60s and it has been perpetually cloudy and rainy. Many people I know who are natives have told me that this has been the coldest and wettest summer that they have ever seen. Lucky us, I guess. Of course, last year we had a heat wave and experienced the hottest July on record. So now I have gotten two extremes in two years. Nonetheless, I am glad that I spent a month in the States, so that I actually got to have a sampling of summer.

Now then, with that said, I should also note that the sun is actually visible for the first time in well over a week. The temperature appears to have broken 70 degrees... and the forecast seems to think that it will stay this way for the weekend. So I will touch wood and hope that maybe, just maybe, there is a little bit of summer on the way. Meanwhile, I sat outside for awhile this afternoon and practiced, on imaginary handbells, the part of the 3 and 4 bells in Plain Bob Minor. In just over an hour, I have my weekly lesson at St. Giles, followed by our usual rehearsal on tower bells.

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Finally, speaking of the weekend, as I also just did, this coming weekend is a bank holiday weekend. Essentially, it is the same end-of-summer holiday that the serves the same purpose as the false Labor Day in the States (except, of course, without the political ulterior motive that accompanies false Labor Day).

Anyway, to celebrate, cheshcat and I are leaving tomorrow afternoon to spend a long weekend -- plus a couple of vacation days -- exploring Yorkshire. We will be staying in the city of York, but taking excursions outward to see more of Yorkshire than only the one city. I am very much looking forward to this trip! Besides, as a native of New York... isn't it time I finally paid a visit to Old York?

Day nine of the George Orwell Tea Challenge. It's getting easier all the time. Five days to go, though I may well switch back to sugar when it is done.

Meanwhile, the breathtakingly beautiful and highly intelligent frogcastle observed that if the results from the tea challenge may be inconclusive if I do not follow all eleven golden rules that George outlined for making "a nice cup of tea." In order to make the test as reliable as possible, I have switched from Earl Grey to Assam, so as to satisfy Orwell's rule about using Indian or Ceylonese tea, rather than tea from China. Likewise, although I use an electric kettle instead of a fire, I am trying to be careful about pouring only boiling water into the cup. And I am adding the milk to the tea now, instead of vice versa. In other ways, though, I am failing some of Orwell's rules. For instance, I do make my tea in small quantities... but in a personal mug, not a teapot. So his ideas about warming the pot first don't seem to apply. Also, I use teabags instead of loose tea.

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Changing topics entirely, I want to just say that I started work this week on Sunday evening, when I refilled liquid helium into the Kelvinox-400 cryostat. Thus, even though it is only Tuesday, good progress has been made already. I got the fridge cold yesterday... and today I have been boldly going forward on where things were left off when I came to the States last month. In fact, things are going so well that it appears I will be taking a break from hardware work tomorrow to actually do some analysis... for the first time in I don't even want to think about how long!

My only regret is that it would be unwise to talk about the details of the work here. Although they are not classified or confidential, they are not suitable for the public domain, either. When I was Stateside last month, I enjoyed being able to explain the details of what I am working on with some of you, face to face. Going further may require waiting until my October trip to the States... or maybe just some private phone calls and e-mails.

But, yeah, work is going well. And that makes this little Oxonian a very happy camper!

Now if only the damn weather here would stop being cold (highs perpetually in the mid-60s), cloudy, and rainy. Summer seems to have skipped England this year.

Day five of the George Orwell Tea Challenge. Nine more days to go after today. Yesterday, I tried putting lemon in my tea. This helped, but it masked the taste of the tea so completely that I decided it is probably against the "rules" of the challenge. Though not explicitly mentioned, I think that lemon -- like salt and pepper -- ought to go in the same category as sugar. George might be onto something, though. I still miss my sugar, but I am no longer craving it the same way. Likewise, I think I am actually enjoying the taste of the sugarless tea slightly, rather than simply tolerating it. We shall see what the next nine days bring.

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Last night, I went to St. Giles to ring bells for the first time in six weeks. Before the regular practice began, I had a lesson on handbells. We went through several courses of Plain Bob Minor, starting with me on the trebles (the 1 and 2 bells) and then rotating so that I could practice the part of the tenors (the 5 and 6 bells). During the day, I practiced on imaginary bells at work so that I would be less rusty. Indeed, I did pretty well on the trebles and not too badly on the tenors. Although I did slip at times, I was able to get back on track. When I get into the handbell ringing, I start to trance out. I understand that this is not an uncommon experience. As such, much of the ringing becomes automatic... until a mistake is made. At that point, it is interesting to see my consciousness zap back on -- mental map of the method diagram in place -- to restore me to the proper sequence of ringing. My homework for next week is to learn the part for the 3-4 bells. After that is done, we will probably move on from the plain course shown in the above link and try adding "bobs" and "singles".

When the regular practice began, we put the handbells away and rang up the eight tower bells of St. Giles. Although I enjoy ringing handbells[*], I find the tower bells to be much more fun and fascinating. I rang up the #1 (treble) and the #3 bells, to get back in practice. In the past, I have rung up the #8 (tenor), which weights 1456 pounds... but I decided to stick with lighter bells this week. We started by ringing rounds, and I could tell that I was rusty. However, as the practice went on, I rang called changes, a covering tenor for Plain Hunt Triples, a covering tenor for Grandsire Triples, and joined the hunt on the treble for another set of Plain Hunt Triples. Which brings me just about back to where I was before I left for the States. The only thing more that I ostensibly know how to do is ring Plain Hunt Triples on one of the inside bells (#3), and I shall try that next week. Nice to see that I have not gotten too rusty, and that I can more or less pick up my learning from where I left it off.

It was really, really nice to get my hands around some rope again! It definitely helps the transition back into my Oxford life. There had been many things on my mind yesterday before practice and, for a little while, they all vanished to the sidelines while I was ringing. Of course, after ringing -- and a short trip to the pub afterward with some fellow ringers -- I had to return to the lab to work with the membrane pump that I installed for the latest liquid helium fill. However, even though everything that had been on my mind, such as the cooldown, was still waiting for me, I find that clearing the mind for a time can be a very good thing indeed!

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[*] And can make progress much more quickly than on tower bells, which are large and challenging to handle! I am getting pretty decent at Plain Bob Minor on handbells, but this method is still probably months away in my future on tower bells!

[NOTICE: This may be one of the most boring LJ entries ever. Skip it now. Don't say you weren't warned!]

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Day three of the George Orwell Tea Challenge. I think that I now know what smokers feel like when they try to quit. As I drink my tea each morning -- living in England, we have daily meetings at 11am over tea -- I find myself craving my sugar.

I have, at least, learned one very important lesson: Although I may be able to tolerate black Earl Grey without sugar, I should not drink Early Grey with milk and no sugar. I tried this yesterday, since my usual cup contains both milk and sugar, and regretted it almost immediately. The stuff was nearly undrinkable! Not quite as bad as warm Mountain Dew (or flat Mountain Dew or diet Mountain Dew or using Mountain Dew to wet your toothpaste), but pretty close!

I also find myself wondering if it is a good test to take the George Orwell challenge while basically ignoring ten of his eleven golden rules on making a good cup of tea. For instance, I am drinking Earl Grey, which is a Chinese tea, and that specifically violates his rule on sticking to Indian or Ceylonese teas. Ah well, in for a penny in for a pound. It is too late to turn back now!

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On a completely and utterly unrelated note, here is an update on games that I have recently played. I realize that nobody cares -- why should they? -- but I like to keep a record of the games that I play. I usually do it during the course of ordinary updates, but I seem to have been very bad about basic journaling of late. Ah well.

Anyway, here goes: When I was in Vegas, visiting with kat1031 and satorisearching, I learned to play Iron Dragon. I had seen the game before, as xirpha has brought it to parties at the Event Horizon, but had never played it. Surprisingly, even though it was my first game, I did not win. I came close, and held the lead for some time, but the luck of the cards was against me. satorisearching won with over 250 gold, while I came in second with 202 (one valuable delivery away from a win), and kat1031 had about 184 gold.

Since returning to Oxford on Saturday afternoon, I have played a fair number of games. C&M came over on Saturday evening, and I played my first game of Puerto Rico in over a month. Good to get my fix! I won, with 59 points... but cheshcat came in a very close second with 58 points! Whew!

On Sunday, as part of our anniversary, cheshcat and I learned to play Carcassonne: The Castle, which is a two player version of Carcassonne. She had gotten it for me last Yule, as we were trying to increase the number of two player games at Skullcrusher Mountain, but we did not play it until now. We played two games, one before seeing Harry Potter V and one after. I won both, but we each improved from the first game to the second. I suspect that it will not be long until cheshcat is easily able to give me a run for my proverbial money in this game.

Finally, last night cheshcat and I broke out the Skip-Bo deck and played two games. The first was very close, but I managed to pull out ahead in the end. The second was very strongly influenced by luck, and I won by a large margin.

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Still here? Why? I did say that this would be just about the most boring LJ entry ever, didn't I?