Weird Dreams

Weird Dreams

I dreamed of thermodynamic chemistry last night--delta G, delta H, the graphs showing relative heat of the reactants and products, the threshold that prevents the reaction from going forward, how catalysts lower the threshold. I studied thermodynamics in general chemistry back in 1975 at USC. I've made no use of it since.

In A Christmas Carol, Scrooge decides that the Ghost of Christmas Past is really a bad dream caused by a bit of "undigested potato." What you have a dream this weird, you ask yourself, "Where did this come from?"

UPDATE: My wife tells me that we had a spectacular electrical storm during the night--among the most impressive that she has seen (and we get some good ones here). I managed to sleep right through it, but perhaps all that flashing and thunder put my sleeping mind to thinking of the energy involved in thermodynamics!

UPDATE 2: A reader passed this piece of nerd humor to me:

The Thermodynamics Song

(tune: Battle Hymn of the Republic)

Heat content and fugacity revolved within his brain,

Like molecules and atoms that you never have to name,

And logarithmic functions that revolved within his dreams,

And partial molar quantities devouring chocolate creams.

(chorus)

Glory, glory, dear old thermo,

Glory, glory, dear old thermo,

Glory, glory, dear old thermo,

We'll pass you by and by.

They asked him on the final if a mole of any gas,

In a bottle with a membrane through which hydrogen could pass,

Were compressed to half its volume, what its entropy would be,

If two thirds of delta sigma equals half of delta phi.

(chorus)

He said he guessed the entropy would have to equal four,

Unless the second law might bring it up a couple more,

It might be almost seven if the Carnot law applied,

And it maybe might be zero if the delta T should slide.

(chorus)

The professor read the paper with a corrugated brow,

For he knew he had to grade it but he didn't quite know how,

And then an inspiration from his cerebellum smote,

And he grabbed his trusty fountain pen and this is what he wrote.

(chorus)

As you have guessed the entropy, so I must guess your grade,

Though the second law won't raise it to the mark you might have made,

It might have been a hundred if your guesses had been good,

But I think it must be zero 'till they're rightly understood.

(final chorus)

Glory, glory, dear old thermo,

Glory, glory, dear old thermo,

Glory, glory, dear old thermo,

We'll try again next year.