Recap?

Okay, I don't know what happened... I mean sometimes it's hard in the holidays because physics stuff doesn't always happen but that's not the case this time... Lots of stuff happened!

I attempted a blog conversion over to a new blog because I wanted to fix a load of stuff but didn't want to lose my archive but it took AGES so I got bored... Maybe I'll finish one day...

I got about halfway through a universe in a nutshell and it was going so well! but then I went to the library and since I have a deadline for them I started reading six easy pieces. I was reading it while I waited to meet my friend and I just got to a bit about molecules not meaning to go in your nose so I smiled in amusement when she crept up on me and laughed at me for enjoying a physics book so much! I didn't believe they would actually be easy but so far it's been OK and is a perfect recap for next year.

Which actually brings me onto my next point - I'm going to Nottingham! And as the days pass by, it's becoming more and more real. I got an A* in Maths and Physics and an A in Geography, Chemistry and General studies and then an A in my Further Maths AS so was super pleased and actually still get a buzz when I think about it! I'm so grateful that all that hard work paid off and can't wait for next year!

Tomorrow is the day that I go to Culham experimental fusion facilities and I cannot wait!! I talked about it agggggggeeees ago here. I'm planning on wearing the outfit I put together for my first physics lecture because lets be honest in a crowd of new people I'm going to chicken out and not wear a space top. First impressions are so hard to get over...

So, I never got my calculator lid back. My teacher didn't come to prom in the end but I can't help and feel like she missed it to avoid me... oh well, I'll just have to live the rest of my life lidless... I explained how I lost it in this post.

And now I promise to write soon.

The boy who harnessed the wind

It seems that there is never enough time but I have managed to read 'the boy who harnessed the wind' which is all about the life of William Kamkwamba so far and it was incredible. I mean really inspirational and just amazing. The book took us back to his childhood which I found really interesting. In geography we looked at the spread of disease and the causes of famine and this was addressed in depth in the book but the first person narrative allowed a really personal connection with the issues. By the end of the book I was left with an intense realisation of just how lucky I am and just the wish that others can be as lucky.

At times I cried so much that the pages were soaked through and other times I laughed so much that I went around telling everyone the story of how at the barbers power cuts can happen half way through a hair cut and you're just told to leave and come back in an hour with half of your hair missing!

My only complaint could be that I wanted more physics but I guess that's not what the book was about. It was about the strength of determination and the achievements possible with limitless aspiration. Also the importance of science to survive in our modern world. So yeah, definitely recommended.

It's all over!

So I'm back after being in solitary confinement for 2 weeks! Maybe I exaggerate a little bit, I mean it wasn't actually that bad. Exams went so quickly but I felt prepared for them and came out feeling I did the best I could, I just hope my best was good enough. Now comes the worst part, the worry. I really wish there was a way to know how we did right away, it seems so cruel to make us wait. Especially this year when the grades really matter.

And now its summer! But somebody forgot to tell the weather so picnics and days out will just have a wait for a while. I made a summer reading list with non-fiction physics books and about 30 fiction books that I have collected throughout the year! Why do I always make such unrealistic lists...

By the end of revision my physics corner looked like this:

And yesterday I took it all down so that my room looks really boring again! I'm putting off emptying out folder etc. until after results under the excuse of 'I don't want to tempt fate' but it's all hidden out of sight so that I can start to forget to worry, yeah?

My dreams got kind of boring during exams accept for one what I can kind of classify as Physicsy in which I was equipped with a set square to defend myself against goblins. It worked as a boomerang and was pretty lethal, let me tell you!

Okay, now I'm back in the swing to make real posts! Speak soon x

Flatland

I just finished reading 'Flatland: a romance of many dimensions' and I really enjoyed it although having romance in the title is incredibly misleading! It is even more brilliant when you consider it was written in the 19th century and displays such imagination. I'll confess that it took a couple of chapters to get used the style and really immerse myself in the world but after that it was brilliant. I can see why on the back of the book they struggled to categorise the book as either mathematical of scientific as it really has implications for both. I thought I understood the book and then in the next chapter the hexagonal grandson in the 2 dimensional world asked why 3 to the power of 3 didn't work in geometry, its such a simply thought and yet one that had never occurred to me, what are the mathematical implications of 3 to the 4...

Physics Shopping

I was lucky enough to win the prize for physics and the maths prize at school in this years prize giving and with this comes £10 for each prize to buy a book each. So I started the book hunt by finding various different recommended reading lists and then by trawling though pages and pages of books from amazon and waterstones. In the end I had a lot more than than just 2 books but the problem was, the first time this has ever been a problem rather than a positive, they were all less than £10! In the end I bought 6 books...

The first was 'the universe in a nutshell' because Steven Hawkins seems to be statutory reading for physics students and it looks like a good book to receive as a prize. I hope that I read it all before it becomes a chore but that seems increasingly unlucky as my pile of articles and magazines increases...

The second was for the maths prize 'Does God Play Dice', I chose it partly because it is by Ian Stewart and also because it is about chaos theory which is quite physicsy. It will probably be a good idea to have read this by the time I get to any interviews, that and have finished Fermats Last Theorem considering how much I talk about how much I love maths!

And then I really didn't have to buy anymore books but this one was far too tempting! It was recommend to me years ago when I used to go to gifted and talented lectures on Saturday mornings in London. It was only £2.00 so it would have been stupid not to really! Its all about dimensions, all the reviews said how good it is and it's only 99 pages! I really can't wait for this to arrive, I think I'll read this one first!

All the websites I read recommended the Richard Feynmen lectures so I really had to buy one and since wave particle duality is something that makes my head spin I decided to try this one first! I'm really looking forward to this one too!

Of course I didn't buy 6 books all for myself so this next one is for my nerdy physics buddy since its her birthday next week! I hope she likes it but I'm pretty sure she will because really who couldn't, its got to be awesome right?!

And the last book is for my friend for Christmas even though its months away but her name is Alex and she's applying to do maths and university so I couldn't resist!

I'll let you know how it goes!

New Growth!

So I have had this plant since my birthday last October but recently it has started growing some new shoots and I feel like a proud parent! I realise the plant topic is pretty much claimed by biology but since I am now a well rounded human being I am allowed to talk about other sciences!

I might have gotten a little bit carried away with the labelling process but there were too many interesting things in the background! Well interesting to me anyway... I knew I would find some way of talking about Charlie!!

Book Injuries

I was looking back at my posts recently and I saw that they are all so self centered! I decided that I would get back on track and write about something with real Physic substance. And that's the reason I didn't post for a few days... Because writing about myself is easy, I know about myself! Although I realise I need to stretch myself and improve the standard of my blog I will make one more self centered post and then I will try not to bore you anymore!

So today in my Physics lesson my teacher started handing out some books for summer reading and my friends were handed interesting looking books (including Brains second book). However I was stupid enough to mention that I might want to go to Oxford so I was lent this:

Its massive and has 548 pages!! How on Earth am I going to read this?! And I was planning on starting the Harry Potter books (I know, I know its terrible I haven't read it yet...) but that's never going to happen now! I know my teacher means well and this book will be good for me but its so big and heavy that when I dropped it on my foot it hurt SO much!! I'll have to be very careful when I actually start reading it...

Dancing Stars and Forceful Gamblers

I finally finished reading my library book! Just in time for me to write this and then get ready for a party! This book has been on trips to open days, optician waiting rooms and up to school a few times so I could read it whenever possible. I'll admit that I have taken so long to read it that I now have a fine of £1.50 to pay.. I wanted to finish before next week so I felt a little more prepared for the PHYSICS ACADEMY! It is pretty much a summary of 'A Brief History of Time' which I desperately needed because it is impossible to know exactly how much went in..

I am considering buying this book for future reference because it really did describe things beautifully! I have a slightly better understand of virtual particles now but still find the idea of imaginary time slightly mind boggling although it is comforting to see a practical application of the imaginary numbers I learnt in school.

I now have a list of my favourite analogies! For example as proof of black holes, astronomers have been searching for binary star systems (2 stars that rotate in an orbit around each other due to their gravity) in which one of the stars is a black hole. This way we would know a black hole was there by the rotations of the visible star even though we cannot see the black hole. The analogy that this is like turning the lights out in a dancing hall when the male partner is dressed in black and the female is dressed in white. You would only be able to see the lady dancing but you would know the man is there lifting her. I love the idea of dancing stars!

My other favourite is the unification of the four fundamental forces. The idea is like a roulette table in a casino. When the table is spinning the ball is only capable of one position, flying above the table. When the table slows down and stops spinning the ball falls into one of the 36 compartments and is capable of 36 positions. At our current temperatures there are 4 fundamental forces but at higher temperature (higher speeds) there will be just one. Well, two at the moment because gravity is being stubborn... Pretty cool right? I hope to collect a lot more!

Obsession

I had already decided that Nikola Tesla was the new Brian, a better looking, more exciting Brian (sorry Brian, it's over) when my friend said she had read a book about a woman who was obsessed with Nikola Tesla. My initial reaction was 'well of course she is obsessed with him, he is actual amazing!' and then I was like 'I need to read this book and learn how to be obsessed!!' I'm just kidding, I already know how to be obsessed my other friend who also has a blog taught me all about that!

So the book is called 'Addition' by Toni Jordan. I skipped doing maths homework and read it all yesterday evening and finished it as soon as I got home this evening!

It is about a woman who has a mental disorder that means she counts everything. Literally everything! I found it really interesting to explore the personality of a woman with this so-called problem but really it is so much a part of her that when she stops it is wrong and then she has an actual problem.

It was also very interesting to read lots of things about Nikola. I have been thinking about him all day today! But don't worry, I'm not obsessed, I just always get like this with books which is why I try to finish them as quickly as possible. 

A Brief History of Time

I haven't made a new post in a while and now I will attempt to make 7 posts in one day two days which should work because lots of Physics things have been happening I just haven't felt like writing. But now I am in the mood and am finally up straight on all my homework so here begins the marathon! Except more fun, less preparation and much quicker than a marathon... Okay, so maybe a marathon was a bad analogy...

Speaking of analogies Professor Steven Hawking is brilliant at analogies! I finally finished 'A brief history of time' which I'm pretty sure my friend lent to me around the time I started this blog so even though I took a shamelessly long time to get through it I actually really enjoyed it! Well most of it, I mean a lot of it was really hard and I definitely didn't fully understand and/or remember everything. String theory, for example, still baffles me but I'm pretty sure it is supposed to! It is kind of linked to wave particle duality which I am slightly obsessed with! This book helped me to understand the theory of relativity (well the basics) and even though it seems completely insane (Distance has always been constant to me?!) I actually quite like it. And I'm 100% in love with the Grand Unification Theory. Its the most beautiful and brilliant kind of Physics.

Euclid

I'm currently reading 'Fermats Last Theorem' by Simon Singh and it is actually brilliant! There are parts that I love so much I simply have to share them!

One of my favourite little stories from the book is this: Euclid was the first head of the mathematical department of Alexandria (an ancient city with the biggest library in the world). The story goes that a student asked Euclid what the use was of the piece of mathematics that he was learning. Euclid turned to his slave and said 'give the boy a coin if he wishes to profit from all that he learns' and the student was expelled.

I suppose that just goes to show how times have changed. Back then they did maths just for the purity of numbers, the joy of a puzzle and satisfaction of completeness and now we do it in the name of science for development - I wonder what Euclid would say?

Stage one geek initiation

Recently I finished my first ever complete physics book!! Finally I am one step closer to complete physics nerd - so excited, I'm nearly there!

Except... Well... I'm not really sure it totally counts... Well it's just that it's... A comic strip :0 It was the comic strip history of space - and I really enjoyed it!

Okay, so maybe it wasn't partically intellectually stimulating but it was genuinely interesting which is surely more important? I suppose it slightly diminishes my geek points for this book but I actually finished the book which is more than I can say for physics books before. I'll be stepping up my game soon though...