Fermilab Tuesday
August 11th, 2009 | By 49
TODAY ROCKED! First, check out what’s on a bulletin board at the Wilson Hall
I guess mainly because this day was going to stress me out the most. Giving a speech to a room full of scientists when the most education I have is a simple Bachelors degree?
Today couldn’t have started off any worse. That Taco Bell Volcano Nachos I had last night? Bad idea. I was getting torn up from the inside. Breakfast was some yogurt and a few grapes and a vitamin (which made my stomach even more upset!)
I shaved with store brand disposable razor blades. Let’s call them Mach Faux’s because they kinda suck. Drove out to Fermilab bumpin Kanye. It’s a good liiiiiiife I told myself. I started to believe. Took this great shot of the Wilson Hall (errrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr HIGHRISE) and sent a tweet bout it. I hung out in the room the presentation was going to be in and talked with the AV guys, Al and Jim a bit. They were cool. I wanted to spend as much time as possible in the room to get used to it. Around 10:30 I met up with Aria and she took me on a tour of cool stuff… like where the anti-matter is stored! First was the Cockcroft-Walton where things start with a simple bottle of hydrogen (H) and they hit it with an extra electron so its H-. From there we saw a bit of the Linac which starts to accelerate the H- in a pulse.
funky49 with Cockcroft-Walton generator
Aww! But I wanna see the Linac! (not that bad tho)
Panning shot of the main control room of the Tevatron
Chillin with Aria in the Master Control Room
BUT when I got into the speech and was getting such a positive reaction from people I relaxed a LOT! I started to speak quicker but slowed myself down. We did a Q&A immediately afterward and there were some good questions asked. Thankfully Ben helped answer them! After the presentation I changed from my button down shirt and put on my grey funky #49 jersey complete with ‘geek bling’ that mCRT & his fiancee Katcha gave me at Nerdapalooza. (Weirded me out having the press’ cameras still flashing while I’m taking off my shirt…) Thus equipped, I did a performance of the Fermilab Rap “Particle Business” and afterward went over my lyrics. To close, I played some science-rap videos and had some more one-on-one time with people. I left a bunch of funky49 Starblazer CDs on the table and they were all taken. Some people also had me sign them! A few members of the press chatted with me little bit afterwards. I hope they spoke with Ben and other Fermilab people too.
Afterward Ben told me I did a good job and we went out for beer. Mmm beer!
With Ben just after the “Science Outreach via Rap” presentation
Hanging with 3.5 Atom Smashers
(Ben Kilminster, John Conroy, Robin Erbacher and Ian)
from the PBS documentary, The Atom Smashers
Posted in: Fermilab, News
