Stand-Up Science
Jan. 20th, 2015 10:25 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
bloodyrosemccoyBah, I missed yesterday. Well, yesterday's good thing: while my previous cherry-almond soda turned out flatter than a cheap pizza, that meant I got to make another batch! Which is pretty fun!
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Today's good thing: so I did three Space Place live dome shows in a row and it was a lot of fun, because a live show is basically a 40-minute standup comedy routine about OMG SPACE,* so yes, I totally love my job.
But! The best part today were the questions. There were some good ones. (Also the usual smart-alecky "How big is Uranus hurr hurr," except the kid pronounced it "YURR-ah-nuss" like we do to make it less dumb-sounding, which ruined the joke.) Questions like:
-What if astronauts cry in space? (Actually the answer is kind of nuts: the surface tension holds the tears to your eyes, so unless you can wipe them away you're effectively blinded by your own dang tears--a serious hazard in a spacesuit where you can't wipe them away.)
-What's Jupiter made of? If it's made of the same stuff as the sun, why isn't it a star?
-What would happen if the Andromeda and Milky Way black holes collide?
-Where would you be if you went into a black hole? (This one was fun because I got to tell them about spaghettification.)
-What if light doesn't fall into a black hole but just orbits it? (I answered this one badly, I'm afraid. Gotta brush up on photon spheres.)
So yeah, the kids were into it. I love it when the crowd is energetic but interested. And they seemed to like mine; I got a lot of compliments afterward, too.
*With visual aids! I can embiggen the Andromeda galaxy in the night sky and be like "LOOK OUT! It's going to crash into us!" and all the kids go "Woooooo" and then I can say, "No, seriously, IT'S GOING TO CRASH INTO US. Just ... it's gonna take a while."
---
Today's good thing: so I did three Space Place live dome shows in a row and it was a lot of fun, because a live show is basically a 40-minute standup comedy routine about OMG SPACE,* so yes, I totally love my job.
But! The best part today were the questions. There were some good ones. (Also the usual smart-alecky "How big is Uranus hurr hurr," except the kid pronounced it "YURR-ah-nuss" like we do to make it less dumb-sounding, which ruined the joke.) Questions like:
-What if astronauts cry in space? (Actually the answer is kind of nuts: the surface tension holds the tears to your eyes, so unless you can wipe them away you're effectively blinded by your own dang tears--a serious hazard in a spacesuit where you can't wipe them away.)
-What's Jupiter made of? If it's made of the same stuff as the sun, why isn't it a star?
-What would happen if the Andromeda and Milky Way black holes collide?
-Where would you be if you went into a black hole? (This one was fun because I got to tell them about spaghettification.)
-What if light doesn't fall into a black hole but just orbits it? (I answered this one badly, I'm afraid. Gotta brush up on photon spheres.)
So yeah, the kids were into it. I love it when the crowd is energetic but interested. And they seemed to like mine; I got a lot of compliments afterward, too.
*With visual aids! I can embiggen the Andromeda galaxy in the night sky and be like "LOOK OUT! It's going to crash into us!" and all the kids go "Woooooo" and then I can say, "No, seriously, IT'S GOING TO CRASH INTO US. Just ... it's gonna take a while."
