Random pt 2
Jan. 1st, 2006 04:07 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
ann_leckieToday we went ice skating. The kids had skated a couple of days during the one week of "winter day camp" and Paidhi Boy discovered he liked it, so we all of us packed up and went to the rink today. Of the many questions Paidhi Boy asked, my personal favorite was, "Is this ice made of ice?"
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jedediah I got a link to BallDroppings. Downloaded it. This morning I showed it to the family. Much fun was had by all, and Paidhi Boy discovered that if you make a great big X from corner to corner of your monitor, let a fair number of balls fall into the top V and then close it off with another line, eventually some number of them will get trapped in the center. On the kids' computer--not on the adults' or the laptop--they stay, and as more join the trapped ones the ball gets bigger, and you get this rising, phaser-overload sound. (On the other computers, a ball trapped in the center makes a sort of ringing sound for a few seconds and disappears, so no big buildup.)
For more hilarity, pull that top line back for a moment and let all the balls that have been held up at the top fall into the V and then close it up again. Let them bounce around until they're trapped, too. And then, when you're sure something is going to blow up, hit ctrl-space, and all the balls go flying apart!
This endlessly amusing performance has been repeated a great number of times today.
Mr. Cameron has been amusing himself by trying to construct repeating, muscial patterns--not really very difficult to do, but fun.
Last night was not a repeat of last year's New Year's Eve--thank goodness. Last year, Paidhi Girl begged to stay up, and tried champagne, which she liked, and pickled herring, which she didn't. Then promptly at midnight she tossed that herring back out to sea, as it were. So I spent the turn of the year cleaning up the bathroom floor. This year we had bubbly and a tin of kippered herring, which had already passed Paidhi Girl's inspection earlier in the year, at supper time. And she and her brother were escorted to bed at a decent hour. Mr. Cameron and I engaged in the annual Watching of Metropolis. Nice and quiet.
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jedediah I got a link to BallDroppings. Downloaded it. This morning I showed it to the family. Much fun was had by all, and Paidhi Boy discovered that if you make a great big X from corner to corner of your monitor, let a fair number of balls fall into the top V and then close it off with another line, eventually some number of them will get trapped in the center. On the kids' computer--not on the adults' or the laptop--they stay, and as more join the trapped ones the ball gets bigger, and you get this rising, phaser-overload sound. (On the other computers, a ball trapped in the center makes a sort of ringing sound for a few seconds and disappears, so no big buildup.)For more hilarity, pull that top line back for a moment and let all the balls that have been held up at the top fall into the V and then close it up again. Let them bounce around until they're trapped, too. And then, when you're sure something is going to blow up, hit ctrl-space, and all the balls go flying apart!
This endlessly amusing performance has been repeated a great number of times today.
Mr. Cameron has been amusing himself by trying to construct repeating, muscial patterns--not really very difficult to do, but fun.
Last night was not a repeat of last year's New Year's Eve--thank goodness. Last year, Paidhi Girl begged to stay up, and tried champagne, which she liked, and pickled herring, which she didn't. Then promptly at midnight she tossed that herring back out to sea, as it were. So I spent the turn of the year cleaning up the bathroom floor. This year we had bubbly and a tin of kippered herring, which had already passed Paidhi Girl's inspection earlier in the year, at supper time. And she and her brother were escorted to bed at a decent hour. Mr. Cameron and I engaged in the annual Watching of Metropolis. Nice and quiet.