Good heavens, Miss Sakimoto
John Hall, who is the father of my brother in-law, Thomas, has won a quarter of this year's Nobel Prize in Physics. I haven't seen "Jan" for two years so I did not ask him what events lead up to this, if he secured the prize in a knife fight, or how this compares to his Grammy for Best Pop Song with the hit "My Love Is a Spectroscope," but we are all very proud of him even though his research into the optical frequency comb technique did little to keep his office remotely uncluttered.Jan was interviewed by a clearly-starstruck Nobel hack and reported that he was happy to have made a living in his chosen field. This is very encouraging. He also said he was going to celebrate by taking his "best wife out to lunch."
He is to make a speech in Stockholm in December and, though we are not close and he has not asked me, I have often found that science types have little inclination toward the oratorical arts and, as an entertainment professional, I have written his address.
Nobel Committee, fellow laureates, members of Abba, A-Ha, and Roxette, lutefiskwives, disgraced representatives of the avoirdupois community:
Hi. How are you? (Wait for response.) That's super. I, too, am fine.
I see you admiring my outfit.
Because I have spent my life making superpreciser and superpreciser measurements, sometimes using lasers and other times just using my thumb, which measures both a perfect exponent of Pi and is expandable to microns and centimeters, I am dressed far better than any of you in a bespoke suit precisely tailored to my own measurements. The relationship science has to fashion cannot be underlined enough, and I plan to spend the second half of my career determining hemlines and crafting universal formulae for cuffs, fob pockets, and cleavage.
Before my retirement from the University of Colorado, an Army Corps of Engineers unit determined that the best way to clean my office would be to divert a river through it. I say this to the Army Corps of Engineers: no one ever got a Nobel Prize for building a dam, losers!
Speaking of losers, just one letter away is the word lasers. It is a crime that science has become so ignored in our schools. Well, America's schools. I understand that science is still required here in Sweden and is just as rigorously studied around the world (though I would hardly call what those Australians did with Pepto-Bismol "science"). What I'm saying is: there is no Swedish term for "nerd." And you don't pelt smart kids with ice chunks here. Why? Because you are too busy drinking in your saunas.
I only have a few famtoseconds, so I'll wrap this up.
In conclusion, I am going to take my quarter of the prize money and buy one of those table versions of Ms. Pac Man that they have in pizza parlors. I am going to eliminate the high scores and type in my own name ten times. Then I am going to go down to the high school and shoot the football team with lasers while me and my friends make up anagrams at them.
Peace. I'm out.
(Drop microphone and jump into crowd)
posted
by Marty Barrett at Tuesday, October 04, 2005
1 Comments:
Fantastic!!! I'm so glad "Jan" has decided to continue his work. I know that with others worrying about such issues as world peace and hunger, we lose sight of issues that can closely affect each and everyone of us at home. I for one am bedeviled by the problem of cuffs. It has proven so difficult that I have resorted to wearing French cuffs, (excuse me, I mean "Freedom" cuffs) to address the either too long or too short arm lengths. An universal formula applied by manufacturers of mens shirts could solve an age old issue for men across the world. A the rejoicing that would follow. Though the government might have an issue with sending such important technological knowledge to China for use in the bulk manufacturing of shirts and other apparel. I mean how can we be sure that this knowledge is only used for good and not for the eventual resurgence of communism? Well, I know not of these matters, I just am glad "Jan" won recognition for his current acheivements and hope for great things from him in the future. I also hope he has a pleasant lunch with his wife.
Post a Comment
Links to this post:
Create a Link
<< Home