WT-WTF?

There are not enough 'WTFs' for this one.

A chemistry student in the Ukraine was found dead with his jaw blown off by what is believed to be exploding chewing gum, according to reports.

It gets a bit more interesting:

The student apparently had a bizarre habit of chewing gum after dipping it into citric acid, Russian news agency Ria Novosti said.

Officers found both citric acid packets and a similar-looking unidentified substance, believed to be some kind of explosive material, on a table near the body, the agency continued.

Investigators suspect that the student simply confused the packets and put gum covered with explosive material into his mouth.

WHAT THE HARTREE-FOCK!!!!!! What did have sitting next to his citric acid that was capable of blowing his jaw off?

This blows

We are having a bit of a blizzard blow through our neck of the woods. The blizzard of aught-nine has descended upon us. Every school around here is closed.

I cleared the snow out my driveway using my grandpa's old snowblower. The thing is from the late 60's, it is big and it still works like a charm. There are zero safety features, but boy does it blow. The way my neighbor's house is aligned with mine causes the wind to blow all of his snow into a huge drift on my driveway. His whole front yard is nearly void of snow. It's all on my driveway. So, even though we only had about 8 inches of snow, I have a 3 foot drift across my driveway. Until this year, I was a one man shoveling crew. It would take me a few hours and several asthma attacks to clear it away. But, with this snowblower, I got rid of that thing in about 30 minutes with a lot less effort.

I made it to my office around noon. Since classes were cancelled, I'm getting a lot of things done since I don't have all of those pesky students bothering me.

Here's a problem for you

When I took over this teaching gig, my predecessor left a fold behind labeled "Diabolical Organic Problems." I love the word "Diabolical" but some may argue that that title is redundant with "Organic."

I have on occasion given my students diabolical problems to hone their skills. Today in preparation for the cumulative final exam, I gave my General Chemistry class the following question:

A 21.0 cm³ piece of dry ice is placed into a sealed 5.0 L container at STP. The dry ice is allowed to sublime while the temperature is held constant at 0°C. The container also contains 12.7 grams of sodium hydroxide. Sodium hydroxide reacts with carbon dioxide to form solid sodium carbonate and liquid water. What will the volume of the dry ice be when the pressure in the container is 2.5 atm? The density of dry ice is 1.5 g/cm³. Assume the volume of the container is 5.0L.

I'm kind of proud of this question as it incorporates several concepts we covered in the first half of the semester. I'll give anyone who answers this 50 extra credit points.

My pipeline bursteth

I currently have 9 beers in my pipeline:

1. Imperial Stout 100
2. Metathesis Pale Ale
3. Generic pale ale #1
4. Generic pale ale #2
5. Oatmeal Stout #1
6. Oatmeal Stout #2
7. Guinness clone
8. Doppelbock
9. Grain Belt Premium lager clone

Four of these batches are for friends. I'm contract brewing now, sort of.

A few reasons why I might be awesome

I brewed two batches of beer tonight. A pale ale and a pale ale.

I racked two beers to secondaries. An oatmeal stout and a doppel bock.

I cleaned and sanitized three carboys during the process.

I changed a poopy diaper.

I fed my kids*.

I put my kids to bed*.

I wrote a math quiz today.

I taught 4 classes and an organic lab.

I wrote a gen chem exam.

I got my kids to school...on time.

I graded homework.

I bought new jeans for the first time in 6 years (true story).

I bought salt for our water softener.

and

I got a flu shot. Seasonal, not H1N1. They won't give that to me, yet.

And I did this all before 10 PM. Now, I'm watching Scrubs on WGN and then I'm going to bed.

* with my wife's help.

Lager picture

Here is a picture of a glass full of lager I made a few months ago. It never actually lagered as long as it should have. I was too impatient.

Since the winter months are upon us here in Minnesota and my lagering fridge is in my unheated garage, I was looking at the possibility of shutting the lagering portion of my brewery down for a while. No way!!! I went to Walmart and spent $10 on a really crappy heater. I connected it to my temp controller, switched it to the heating setting and I continue to lager by using a heater in my fridge to get the 52°F temp needed.

Right now I am fermenting a clone of Grain Belt Premium and a doppelbock.

Worst website on the nets

Biggest mall in the USA.

Worst website in the world.

Functionality has been replace with gimmics to the point of excessive suckiness.