Saturday, March 21, 2020

Badass College Dorm Checklist

Badass College Dorm Checklist Disclaimer: if you’re looking for a more conventional dorm room checklist this isn’t it. We’re going to give you the checklist you would get from a senior (or super-duper senior) instead of a college administrator or your parents. There’s all kinds of those online and the college will send you an orthodox checklist along with your initial paperwork anyways. Nearly all of the stuff we left out you’ll end up getting from the college store/bookstore so it’s not like you need to get them beforehand so you show up with all this crap. Let’s get to it. World-Class Slippers Bath Robe Honestly, these have to be at the top of the list. Dorm life can be a bit dirty, more-so for the guys than the girls but that’s life. Don’t go with a cheap pair of slippers! Invest in a quality pair that will keep your feet safe, comfy, be perfect for lounging around and last for a while. That goes for the robe as well. Robes are awesome. Bathroom robes are stupendous for dorm life, especially when you get a high-brow debonair robe that looks cool when you’re just bumming around going from room to room. The Art Sure, you could be another person with posters on their wall, or nothing at all. Or, you could think ahead to the type of ambience you want your side of the room or your own solo room to project. Is it going to be a room people want to hang out in, or stay out of? What type of personality do you want to project to people? Don’t take dorm room art lightly. The Headphones If you’re going to be sharing the room with one, two or three people then make sure you’ve got a quality pair of headphones that will completely block out background noise. This is an imperative. Headphones are like a sanctuary that can save the day many times over when it counts: cram sessions on weekend nights or when people are doing things in the room you would rather not be aware of. The Bedding Go for high class bedding! It’s likely going to be the only bedding you sleep in for at least the next four to six years. The chances you’ll go out and buy more pillow cases, a comforter, sheets, etc. is pretty small. Make’em extra comfy so that you get quality sleep. Yes sleep, it’s so incredibly important in college it’s not even funny. The Wardrobe Don’t show up in the same clothes you’ve been wearing since middle school. You’ll reek of freshmen from head to toe. Plus, clothing stores in college towns are either really expensive or horrible style-wise. Think ahead. Plan to gain a little weight. Start mind-mapping your wardrobe now so it doesn’t become an issue mid-stream so to speak. The Keep-Sakes Yes, by all means have some nic-naks and keepsakes from home but remember that 90% of the time nothing in a shared dorm room is safe. Stuff can go missing at any time unless it’s literally locked up. If you’re in a single room, then that’s different but there will be times when you forget to lock your door or whatever. Things happen. The Alternative Lighting Lighting. Oh boy. It becomes a dynamic problem with dorm rooms where the default lighting is institutional and you may have boot camp-style bedding arrangements. Again, think ahead. You’re going to need a quality desk lamp that you can move around or point away from roomies. And, you’re going to need a reading light you can hook to your books unless you plan to read everything online. A Godly PC Well, not every major requires a hardcore PC but these days it’s a good idea to come packing a versatile and powerful PC. You can go for either a more mobile product like a notebook or tablet, or you can go old school and have a desktop. Whatever works best for you just make sure it’s a quality piece of equipment that’s going to last, be dependable and be something you can keep safe and secure. The Hygiene Products Listen, you don’t want to rely on the college store or bookstore for your hygiene products. You just don’t. Not typically. Maybe some private universities have a steady supply of the good stuff but most public four year universities sport the cheap stuff. It’s freshmen fodder. Do yourself a favor and bring a good supply of quality product that will last a bit. That way you can order as you need to online. That about sums it up folks. I mean you can add all kinds of stuff. The items on this page are the foundational all-important items. What do you think, did we miss anything?

Thursday, March 5, 2020

Basic Facts Everyone Should Know About Clouds

Basic Facts Everyone Should Know About Clouds Clouds may look like big, fluffy marshmallows in the sky, but in reality, they are visible collections of tiny water droplets (or ice crystals, if its cold enough) that live high in the atmosphere above the Earths surface. Here, we discuss the science of clouds: how they form, move, and change color.   Formation Clouds form when a parcel of air rises from the surface up into the atmosphere. As the parcel ascends, it passes through lower and lower pressure levels (pressure decreases with height). Recall that air tends to move from higher to lower pressure areas, so as the parcel travels into lower pressure areas, the air inside of it pushes outward, causing it to expand. This expansion uses heat energy, and therefore cools the air parcel. The farther upward it travels, the more it cools. When its temperature cools to that of its dew point temperature, the water vapor inside of the parcel condenses into droplets of liquid water. These droplets then collect on the surfaces of dust, pollen, smoke, dirt, and sea salt particles called nuclei. (These nuclei are hygroscopic, meaning they attract water molecules.) It is at this point- when water vapor condenses and settles onto condensation nuclei- that clouds form and become visible. Shape Have you ever watched a cloud long enough to see it expanding outward, or looked away for a moment only to find that when you look back its shape has changed? If so, youll be glad to know it isnt your imagination. The shapes of clouds are ever-changing thanks to the processes of condensation and evaporation. After a cloud forms, condensation doesnt stop. This is why we sometimes notice clouds expanding into the neighboring sky. But as currents of warm, moist air continue to rise and feed condensation, drier air from the surrounding environment eventually infiltrates the buoyant column of air in a process called entrainment. When this drier air is introduced into the cloud body, it evaporates the clouds droplets and causes parts of the cloud to dissipate. Movement Clouds start out high up in the atmosphere because thats where theyre created, but they remain suspended thanks to the tiny particles they contain. A clouds water droplets or ice crystals are very small, less than a micron (thats less than one-millionth of a meter). Because of this, they respond very slowly to gravity. To help visualize this concept, consider a rock and a feather. Gravity affects each, however the rock falls quickly whereas the feather gradually drifts to the ground because of its lighter weight. Now compare a feather and an individual cloud droplet particle; the particle will take even longer than the feather to fall, and because of the particles tiny size, the slightest movement of air will keep it aloft. Because this applies to each cloud droplet, it applies to the entire cloud itself. Clouds travel with the upper-level winds. They move at the same speed and in the same direction as the prevailing wind at the clouds level (low, middle, or high). High-level clouds are among the fastest moving because they form near the top of the troposphere and are pushed by the jet stream. Color A clouds color is determined by the light it receives from the Sun. (Recall that the Sun emits white light; that white light is made up of all the colors in the visible spectrum: red, orange, yellow, green, blue, indigo, violet; and that each color in the visible spectrum represents an electromagnetic wave of a different length.) The process works like this: As the Suns lightwaves pass through the atmosphere and clouds, they meet the individual water droplets that make up a cloud. Because the water droplets have a similar size as the wavelength of sunlight, the droplets scatter the Suns light in a type of scattering known as Mie scattering in which all wavelengths of light are scattered. Because all wavelengths are scattered, and together all colors in the spectrum make up white light, we see white clouds. In the case of thicker clouds, such as stratus, sunlight passes through but is blocked. This gives the cloud a grayish appearance.