2011.06.07 01:00 - How to Mix Coffee and Milk

The Guardian for this meeting was Pema Pera. The comments are by Pema Pera.

Wol Euler: tuesday june 7, 1am
--BELL--
Pema Pera: hi Wol!
Wol Euler: good morning, pema
Pema Pera: sorry to be two minutes late :)
Wol Euler: heheheh
Wol Euler: no worries
Wol Euler: I just got here, coffee is percolating
Pema Pera: it turned out that I couldn't go through the firewall of the Tokyo Institute for Technology
Wol Euler: huh
Pema Pera: so I had to fire up my own internet connection instead :)
Pema Pera: universities don't like virtual worlds it seems . . . .
Wol Euler nods.
Wol Euler: unless they are their own ...
Pema Pera: has happened many times
Wol Euler: "anyhting could happen"
Pema Pera: ah, yes, wonder how they do that
Pema Pera: I'm sure I could figure out how to get around it, had I more time
Wol Euler: good question! I hadn't thought about it. Perhaps other viewers use specific ports, not those of SL?
Wol Euler: ah, coffee is ready. brb
Pema Pera: I don't think it is viewer specific
Pema Pera: but rather oversensitivity of fire walls
Pema Pera: that then need special tweaking to allow whatever viewer to get around the restrictions
Wol Euler: back
Wol Euler: I had to laugh in the kitchen, thinking about serving coffee
Wol Euler: it took me years, over a decade, to realize that I could control the milk/coffee balance better if I put the milk in *first*
Wol Euler: my habit was to pour in coffee and top it upwith milk, and the results were always variable and often unsatisfactory
Wol Euler: but it never occurred to me to change the habit
Pema Pera: :-)
Pema Pera: turbulent mixing -- it might be called in physics
Wol Euler chuckles.
Pema Pera: an alternative is to make the coffee far enough away from where you are that carrying it over will do the mixing
Wol Euler: ah, I see; the point wasn't the mixing as such but the proportions
Pema Pera: (an Earthquake may do a good job too! and then you actually may need the coffee :-)
Pema Pera: ah, i see!
Wol Euler: if I poured inthe coffee first, I had no standard by whch to judge its strength,and for stronger coffee would need more milk than I had room left
Wol Euler: how are the earthquakes?
Pema Pera: so how does it help to pour the milk first, if you don't know the strength of the coffee?
Pema Pera: and you don't know how much to put it?
Wol Euler: because I can see by the changing colour of the mixture roughly how strong hte coffee is
Wol Euler: I stop pouring when the mix has the correct light-brown tone
Pema Pera: ah, I see
Wol Euler laughs.
Pema Pera: how interesting -- you and I follow the same algorithm for different reasons :-)
Wol Euler: heheheheh
Wol Euler: what is your reason?
--BELL--
Pema Pera: oh, saving the trouble of having to wash a spoon afterwards :-)
Wol Euler: a fair reason
Wol Euler: I don't know how people can be bored, when there is a whole world out there to be looked at and thought about
Pema Pera: :)
Pema Pera: by the way, as I wrote already, I'm delighted to hear that you will join us in Nova Scotia!
Wol Euler: perhaps they had their curiosity beaten down?
Wol Euler: ah, yes, and I am quite delighted to be going.
Wol Euler: I'm going to have to shorten the trip, two weeks instead of three, which will mean missing my friends' wedding anniversary
Wol Euler: but at least I can go.
Pema Pera: sorry to hear that
Pema Pera: but very glad you can join us!
Wol Euler nods.
Wol Euler: ty, and ty
Pema Pera: happy memories of last year
Wol Euler: indeed
Wol Euler: I'm very glad to be able to meet Stim at last
Pema Pera: ah, will this be your first time?
Wol Euler: yes
Pema Pera: hard to imagine -- given that both of you have attended several RL retreats!
Wol Euler: should have met him in SF last spring, but the volcano ...
Pema Pera: yes . . .
Pema Pera: so this will be your third actual retreat (and fourth planned one)
Wol Euler: malta, germany, halifax, halifax
Wol Euler: fourth
Pema Pera: ah, yes, I can't count :-)
Wol Euler: oh, I wonder! I'm going to be in NY next spring, perhaps I can take in a US spring retreat....
Pema Pera: so virtually fifth, and actually fourth!
Wol Euler: looks at the website
Wol Euler: nothing planned for 2012 :)
Wol Euler: I hope we don'T believe in the Weltuntergang
Pema Pera: so Stim has attended four and you have attended three so far -- and there have been eight -- you must have been coordinating to avoid each other!
Wol Euler: heheheheh
Wol Euler: travel patterns, more likely
Pema Pera: oh, Mark sent out an email a few weeks ago, that we are reducing the number of RL retreats
Pema Pera: perhaps you didn't see that one?
Wol Euler: ah, I must have skimmed over that
Pema Pera: would you like me to forward?
Pema Pera: there were various reasons
Wol Euler: I remember reading some discusion about it, but not that it was a fait accompli
Wol Euler: I shold still have it, I don'T delete mail from my online accounts
Pema Pera: easier to forward than to try to remember all the details
Pema Pera: okay
Pema Pera: yes, we presented it as a suggestion, I think, but there wasn't protest against it, as far as I can remember
Pema Pera: we had an avarage of five or six participants, with Mark and me being always two of them, and for us it was getting a bit too much to always come
Pema Pera: that was one of the reasons
Wol Euler nods.
Pema Pera: anyway, I'm being called to a meeting in RL
Pema Pera: I'll post the chat log
Wol Euler: okay, take care!
Pema Pera: fun talking with you here!
Wol Euler: likewise,
Wol Euler: bye pema
Pema Pera: be well, and see you in RL in a month -- how time flies!
Wol Euler: yeah1
Pema Pera: bfn