Replacement Kevlar

Well, I had to replace my Kevlar today. Yes, I did have Kevlar earlier, and no, I was not shot. These are not Kevlar vests like you may be thinking, but sleeves, and no, I am not worried about someone shooting my arms. I am currently spending some time in a car plant. It is the body shop part of the plant where they stamp all of the sheet metal and weld it all together. These stamped pieces of sheet metal have very sharp edges, so the car plant safety department has declared that anyone working in or visiting the body shop shall wear these Kevlar sleeves. These sleeves feel just like regular cloth (kind of like a cotton-wool blend) and cover from the elbows to the wrists. These sleeves do not guard against a narrow pointed object, but would protect someone from a slicing motion. As a result, you can stick a needle through the sleeves, but you cannot cut them with scissors (yes I’ve tried).
Anyone who has spent any time in a body shop knows that they can be extremely filthy. Even though I spend most of my time in the plant on the computer, and don’t do any actual work (in fact I am prohibited from doing work by the Canadian government, but that’s another story), I still get dirty. Since I use the same sleeves multiple days, they can get pretty filthy. The plant provides clean ones, and asks you to place the dirty ones in a container for “recycling”. It doesn’t say for washing, it says recycling. When I think of recycling, I think of breaking down the original and making new material from the parts. How DO they do that?! It’s Kevlar …..

I'm too sexy . . . I'm so sure!

For the second time today I have heard the song "I'm too sexy" by Right Said Fred in situations that were just hilarious.
The first time I heard it was on a podcast (Berkeley Groks) as a segue after interview talking about a program that they are doing at Cal Tech. At this program they were teaching the students how to dress the when when going for interviews, etc. They call the program From Geek to Shiek.
The second time was as I was waching TV (Psych). I was doing something else at the time, but heard the song and looked up because I had heard it earlier in the day and could not believe that I was hearing it again. This time it was a comercial for the Kennel Club Dog Show.
This just caught me as so funny that I had to tell someone, and now I have.

leitmotif

The other day I was listening to Radio Lab - the WNYC podcast. They used the term "leitmotif". I had to look it up (after I figured how to spell it.) Basically it is a theme that occurs throught a work of art, especially as applied to music. It is kind of like the theme music that is used to indicate a chracter, place, or even in music. It has been around for a long time - now it seems common place, especially in movie scores (think Jaws or Lord of the Rings). It is with Wagner that it really came into its place, although he did not use that particular term.

The whole story is just facinting. Give it a listen at http://www.wnyc.org/shows/radiolab/episodes/2008/01/01