Empty Slot 2013-05-29

[Dr. Otter]

(The damned thing produced a measurable voltage out put for input currents in the femtoamperes...)

Damn! A femtoampere is only 6241 electrons per second. Now that's sensitive!

[TheDOCTOR]

I hope Katherine knows C.P.R.
Hope nothing 'bad' happpens, I like Atsali.

[Timotheus]

It's all special effects. Flash paper and spirit oil.

[MerchManDan]

Smoke & mirrors, eh? (well, lots of smoke, at least)

[Dave]

(The damned thing produced a measurable voltage out put for input currents in the femtoamperes...)

Damn! A femtoampere is only 6241 electrons per second. Now that's sensitive!

Some similar problems exist in ionization-chamber radiation detectors, like the old Civil Defense CDV-715 radiation survey meters. In these, gamma radiation enters a sealed metal chamber about the size of a tobacco tin and ionizes the air inside (very slightly). An insulated needle sticking into the tin is given a small electrical charge (relative to the metal chamber), and the ions flow towards the needle or towards the chamber wall, thus creating a very small elecrical current. I mean, really tiny... it's in that same femtoampere range... you can practically hear the individual ions go PING when they hit the needle. This tiny current has to be detected and amplified and used to drive a meter. So, the needle must be very carefully insulated from the chamber wall (once again, a piece of high-quality Teflon has to be used as insulation) and the detection and amplification circuit must likewise be kept free from leakage currents.

A big part of the service manual for these meters is made up of instructions on how to very carefully and thoroughly clean all of the critical components, dry them out via a gentle bake in an oven, shield them, and install the moisture-absorbing packs to keep the innards dry while the meter is in storage.. Touch any of these components with your fingers even once, and you can go back and start the cleaning procedure from the beginning.

[Fairportfan]

(The damned thing produced a measurable voltage out put for input currents in the femtoamperes...)

Damn! A femtoampere is only 6241 electrons per second. Now that's sensitive!

You had to connect the diodes by sweat-soldering a straight piece of 30-gauge wire-wrap wire smoothly along the sides of their leads. A bump in the solder could cause shot noise.

[Julie]

.

Q: What does it look like?

A: It feels smooth.

*facepalm*

I was going to make a 'typical teenager' comment, but I know adults that would do the same thing

Holy crap...how did I not notice that Atsali didn't answer the question that was asked? I feel a bit dense for not catching that now. Well...it just goes to show that Atsali is kind of an odd amalgamation of a naive teenager and a kid who hasn't yet learned not to touch strange things without first receiving permission (or instructions).

Sudden flash of light in my head and it hurts.
Facts:
1. Spider women is a protector according to myth.
2. Vase showed 6 figures with a seventh as a child with the spider over it.
3. Six mothers lost one of their babies due to a programming glitch.
4. Missing crystal probably the one Lilly found in the spider carving and stored in Suzi's cleavage of holding, and has the babies.
5. Lilly was one of six women abandoned in the desert by the spider carving 5000 years ago.

I suspect we are making a mistake about who and what the spider women is. The spider may be a protector but it also weaves webs that catch things. Doesn't that sound like Brandi? I'd give odds the Spider Women is Brandi and the true facts were garbled by time. The six figures are the mothers missing a child caught in the web woven to get the ethians out of circulation. This can easily have become a myth of the Ethian people when they were revived into a barren world with all they building and technology in ruins after being abandoned for a thousand years.
Lilly was probably one of the mothers who was revived in an attempt to return the misplaced baby to them but got lost in the wilderness. For some reason the crystal with the babies was left in the spider carving. The passage of time hid what really happened as the ethians only knew what Brandi told them, which was not the truth. This means Kathy has nothing to do with the spider women beyond finding out who, what, why, and where.
It is possible to make a case the Kathy, or Lilly, might be Bia's descendant though. Depends on which mate Bia used to create that line. This may the final steps in Brandi's plan to repair the damage done by the chimera so long ago. I'll bet on it being Kathy.

Now everyone whose head hurts like mine is free to join me in the corner while the pain wears off.

Well, 4 & 5 are still suppositions actually. Nor do we know what the spider crystal contains at this point. Still, the point about the spider woman being Brandi is a good one. I'm sure the GGs have been the source of many legends over the intervening millennia.

Yeah...definitely with Knight Delight on this one. LOVE the theory that Brandi is the Spider Woman. Or maybe she only was the Spider Woman, but now the torch is being passed to Kat?