This is what oil money can buy. I bet they'll be the first to have flying cars too.

MM, we never even got that far. It was "we are theoretical phys-" and by the time we finished the word "theoretical", the door was already slammed in out faces, so to speak.

tommy, we use this when we teach the whole subject of traffic to kids.

What was fascinating is you could have traffic flowing smoothly, and all of a sudden it would just choke up and cars would be bumper to bumper. I've read about this too - it can happen when a highway is at significantly less than its maximum traffic capacity.

We explained that, using our model, too!

See, the thing is, if you have what is called a stable state, like the traffic flowing easily and all, but it's above a certain density of cars, the very minor changes in acceleration (really minor, nothing that the driver may even feel), may accumulate and not correct themselves and create a congested state. The solution was only meta-stable, if you want to use "math" words, and it collapsed to the stable one, which is of a jam.

Roxanna was able to work from home on Fridays long before telecommuting was widely available in this department, so she didn't have to worry about battling the Friday rush hour home before sundown.

That can be a huge thing, especially in the winter days, when the sun sets so early, shabbat may start on the early afternoon hours. That's so kind of your company.

I'm always fascinated about that kind of thing, and was so glad that you would go into all of it for me!

I was so thrilled that you didn't only notice, but also tried to make sense of it all. I love explaining this stuff!

And that thing about the Indian hair is fascinating!

It was a huge deal, because a good wig can be really expensive, so throwing them out was a heavy economical burden. And yet, practically nobody protested, once the rabbis issued their decision. It was very impressive.

I'm kind of obsessed with the nuts-ness of Dubai. There was a great article a while back in the Atlantic about it -- the author was as sucked-in/repulsed as you'd imagine. And the whole city seemed to be full of immigrant workers saying, "Sure, my job is to clean these stairs with a toothbrush, and I work 14 hours a day, but holy crap -- I'm making like 10 times more than I could ever dream of at home!!"

Ridiculously cute Daily Puppy.

Am...ded...from...cute. Send...help. Or...puppies.

I have a performer friend who worked a gig in Dubai--basically wandering entertainment in one of the ritzy (no pun intended) hotels. Was horrible and boring except for the bit where it paid filthy lucre.

Some friends have an ongoing "what you gonna do after peak oil?" discussion going (answer: go to Jamaica where they probably won't notice), and they figure that Dubai is where the fat cats will hole themselves up.

Yuck. Have to page migraine specialist to see about hospitalisation.

Nilly I would love to read a copy of your paper. My profile addy is good.

Oh and here is David Tennant introducing the Pussycat Dolls at Wembley.

(Perhaps THAT should go in the Bitches thread.)

Life is boring now that I'm caught up with Girl Genius (which I like, except could the character be more ideal? Probably not, unless she becomes a kick-ass fighter). What's the name/URL of the one where the main guy's got a little pesky robot and they work at/patronise a cafe, and then there's the one girl that's (or was) too damaged to date our dashing lead...

Or something like that.

So I've decided to take up my old hobby of model airplane flying, which I last did when I was in high school. I bought a new RC plane and flew it Saturday for the first time. Here's a couple of pictures of the plane: [link]

The model was originally designed in the '50s or '60s. It has a 69" wingspan, so when I stand the wing on its tip it's almost as tall as me. It's powered by a 0.46 cubic inch (7.5cc )two-stroke glow engine, and has controls for ailerons, elevator, rudder/nose wheel and throttle.

It flies really nice.

Typo Boy, if you go here and in the "Keyword" field type "traffic", you'll get a list of our papers on the subject (many of them without me, as I only joined this research in a later stage). They are in pdf format.