last night i went (with three friends) to see a taping of the NPR show "wait, wait...don't tell me" at the cobb energy center here in the lovely atlanta. it was so fun to see what the panelists and karl casell and peter sagel looked like in real life. the guest was rick sanchez from CNN, and he was a little lame. if you had to get someone from CNN, why not anderson cooper?? or better yet, don't get someone from CNN. give me someone cool.
two wonderfully dorky moments from last night:
in line at the bathroom before the show:
woman #1: quite a line! we'll get to see if that theory plays out...that a whole bunch of stalls open at the same time, the line moves really fast, and then it stops and you stand and wait for a while. fast, stop, fast, stop. what's that theory called? string theory? chaos theory?
woman #2 [potentially woman #1's friend]: yeah, doesn't traffic work like that, too?
woman #1: yeah!
[four stalls open at once and the line moves quickly, proving woman #1's theory.]
woman #3 [who definitely did not know the other two] as she walked toward a stall: it's actually alfred p. lloyd's theory.*
woman #1: oh yeah!
*i actually can't remember what she called it, but it sounded something like this. dad, i am hoping you know.
at the end of the show, they brought a woman from the audience - from the second balcony, where we were sitting! - up on stage to answer a question and win a prize for the audience. and she won us something - hooray! what was it, you ask? well, we NPR fans/listeners each got an NPR tote bag so when we go to whole foods to pick up our free range chicken eggs and organic produce we don't have to use a big bad plastic bag that will hurt the environment and add to our liberal guilt. oh, NPR, you know us so well.
A comment and a question-
ReplyDeleteComment: Yeah, John, explain the math theory behind the dorks' restroom banter.
Question: You capitalized NPR, the first capitalization I recall seeing in your blog. How come NPR uniquely?
I guess it's not true that NPR is unique. I looked way back to see a few capitals, but for emphasis. NPR is getting special treatment, though, along with CNN.
ReplyDeleteI have never heard of Alfred P. Lloyd or any name that sounds close to that. I have read about studies that apply wave theory to traffic, comparing the phenomena of start-stop to a wave moving through a slinky: bunched up, then spread out, with the wave moving down the highway. A quick Google search provided a relatively short but informative article: see tansportation.northwestern.edu/mahmassani/Media/New_Scientist_6.94.pdf
ReplyDeleteI do think about this when I get stopped on the highway for no apparent reason, and for some reason it keeps me from getting angry at all the other motorists who are slowing down for no apparent reason.