Wednesday, January 18, 2012

in which I wake up and there are no degrees

The idea of it being 0 degrees outside has always fascinated me.0 means none. 0 degrees means that there are no degrees. What does that even mean? How can there be none? There is no temperature? No warmth? But what about the negatives? How can there be less than none of something? It boggles my mind.

However, this morning, I woke up, and my phone told me that the temperature was indeed 0.

Cue cranking up of the heater and walking around with a fleece penguin blanket wrapped around myself.

In other news, I've returned to Iowa. Clearly. Classes have begun! I'm teaching one section this semester, and thus taking three classes. It should be less of a balancing act than it was in the fall... but, we'll see. Now I am merely trying to get back into the swing of things; I should really stop looking on Weather.Com to see what the temperature is in Austin that I am missing.






blazer and dress: vintage
beret: Urban Outfitters, old
tights: Sock Dreams
boots: gifted

This outfit was from my second-to-last full day in Austin, in which I went out to lunch with R to one of my favorite Tex-Mex restaurants and then read Kathleen Stewart's Ordinary Affects at one of my favorite coffeeshops before meeting two of my favorite former high school teachers for BBQ. And now, having just typed that sentence, I find myself missing not only warmer weather but Tex-Mex and BBQ.

2 comments:

WAW said...

(This is what I taught my students last week.) Zero degrees Fahrenheit is on an interval scale so the zero is arbitrary, much like the zero on the Celsius scale. It isn't the absence of anything, just a meaningful place to choose to have a zero. However, zero degrees Kelvin is meaningful (and therefore on a ratio scale), as there is no molecule movement (which creates heat) at that temperature.

So, uh, yeah, there's your unprompted lecture ruining your philosophical thoughts for the day.

Anonymous said...

Except the zero in Celsius isn't totally arbitrary, as it is the point at which water freezes. But, yes, lecture ends here.