kirjoittaessani

Today, I probably won't make many friends -- but there is a physicist's joke bouncing off the inside of my head, so I have to let it out to have peace. Of course, physicists' jokes have the tendency to be incomprehensible by anyone but physicists (a somewhat rare species). Ordinary people usually take on a puzzled or even pitying look. Moreover, the joke bothering me right now is a terrible groaner -- if you understand it. Oh well, there it is:

Q: What is the twelfth law of thermodynamics?

A: There is no perpetual motion machine of the twelfth kind.

What else has happened today? Not much. But Mr Karlsson says that there are two simple rules to form the partitive plural in Finnish: If the stem of a given word ends on a short vowel, the partitive suffix is -a/-ä. This is, of course, preceded by -i- or -j- to mark the plural. If, however, the stem ends on two vowels (or one long vowel),  -ta/-tä is used, again with plural -i- or -j-.

There are several additional points to consider, but these are the basic rules.

In some languages, front (bright) and back (dark) vowels cannot be mixed within the same word. This is called vowel harmony.

Although this concept is only partly realised in Finnish, it may yield impressive results, as in today's Word of the Day:

päämääränään

That is as their goal.

I found this one in the translation of The Lord of the Rings, shortly before Helm's Deep.

Alaston nainen istuu huoneessani ja syö omenaa. Alaston nainen istuu huoneessani ja syö omenaa. Alaston nainen istuu huoneessani ja syö omena.

In Wirklichkeit war es ein Pfirsich...

Today, I would like to present a funny -- if somewhat useless -- mathematical toy.

Originally, I wanted to create some sleak pictures to illustrate a graphic method for multiplying decimal numbers -- but someone has been faster than me, posting a video at Youtube.

Therefore, I leave my pencil alone. I shall merely add that this method works in exactly the same way as the usual pencil-and-paper way does.

A Bloody Mary is not the most tasty among drinks. However, that feeling dissipates after a few mouthfuls. Afterwards, it is merely horrible.

Heute war mal ein neuer Beutel Teelichte fällig. Endlich, möchte ich sagen; hat sich doch die letzte Ladung als Fehlkauf erwiesen, dessen Dochte immer Rußpilze ansetzten.

Welchen Beutel also soll ich nehmen -- den mittleren, oder den großen? Aus Verbrauchsgründen präferiere ich die Großpackung, steht bei uns doch ständig eine Kanne Tee auf dem Stövchen. Und wie sieht es mit dem Preis aus? Da wirft sich dem mündigen Einkäufer das erste Hindernis in den Weg: Die Preise sind gewohnt krumm, die Packungsgrößen betragen 50 und 125 Stück. Es regt sich der leise Verdacht, die arithmetische Schwierigkeiten seien beabsichtigt.

Glücklicherweise findet sich auf dem Preisschild auch in Kleinschrift die Grundpreisangabe -- wenngleich sich mir nicht erschließt, daß diese Pflicht wäre -- und so wird auch ohne Hirnakrobatik schnell klar, daß die kleinere Packung in der Tat die günstigere ist.

Und besser in die Einkaufstasche paßt sie auch.

Kurz vor Weihnachten in der Multimedia-Abteilung des hiesigen Kaufhauses. Ich irre durch die Gänge, als mir ein Regal mit der Aufschrift Alben ins Auge springt. Etwas verwundert registriere ich, daß dort unter anderem Fotoecken angeboten werden.

Aber ich finde ja auch den Zeitungsausriß, der an einer Tür des physikalischen Instituts klebt, unglaublich witzig: 5000 Liter Latex ausgelaufen.

During that weird state between sleep and waking, the mind is in a very special state. Especially heavy and sluggish, I often think. But sometimes, it is also capable of surprising insights. Unfortunately, these often vanish before one can use them. It helps to hold on to them immediately, but the heavy and sluggish part is not really helpful there.
However, sometimes it works. This morning, various Old English words tumbled around in my head. This was probably a result of reading David Crystal's By Hook or By Crook yesterday night. One of the words was sælig, that is sad. Suddenly, I noticed the similarity to Finnish sääli, that is pity (also as in what a pity).
I do not really know what to make of this, but English and Finnish are not related, so this is either an astonishing coincidence, or one of the languages has, at some point, imported the word.
Finnish has lots of indoeuropean (and especially germanic) roots, but I know of only one finnish word to make it into English: sauna.
Once I am home, I will consult my library.
[Postscript:]I am home again and have looked it up. Now this story has a tiny problem: sælig means happy (compare German selig). There goes the theory of immense brain power during half-sleep.

I had intended to write a blog entry or two tonight. But somehow the words will not come. All I managed to create is a (fourth) draft with a handful of catch words.

The problem is not even that I was sitting in front of an empty sheet editor window: I cannot even bring myself to open the editor.

But then, there is always tomorrow.

There should have been a blog post here. I made it up in my mind this morning (or yesterday night?). Unfortunately, I have since forgotten what it was all about.