mentos + diet coke = crazy ridiculous

you may have heard about what happens when you drop mentos in a two liter of diet coke.



here's the explanation from yahoo answers. the most interesting thing here is the reactions of the two companies. according to npr (i heard it one morning, i can't find the transcript online yet), mentos has embraced this phenomena. it raises brand awareness and is irreverent and appeals to young, web-savvy consumers (read: generation myspace). coca-cola, on the other hand, has completely distanced themselves. nice work. they completed missed the boat. no surprise that coke's market share and stock price are in stasis.

It is a physical reaction, not a chemical one. Water molecules strongly attract each other, linking together to form a tight mesh around each bubble of carbon dioxide gas in the soda. In order to form a new bubble, or even to expand a bubble that has already formed, water molecules must push away from each other. It takes extra energy to break this "surface tension." In other words, water "resists" the expansion of bubbles in the soda.

When you drop the Mentos into the soda, the gelatin and gum arabic from the dissolving candy break the surface tension. This disrupts the water mesh, so that it takes less work to expand and form new bubbles. Each Mentos candy has thousands of tiny pits all over the surface. These tiny pits are called nucleation sites - perfect places for carbon dioxide bubbles to form. As soon as the Mentos hit the soda, bubbles form all over the surface of the candy. Couple this with the fact that the Mentos candies are heavy and sink to the bottom of the bottle and you've got a double-whammy. When all this gas is released, it literally pushes all of the liquid up and out of the bottle in an incredible soda blast. You can see a similar effect when cooking potatoes or pasta are lowered into a pot of boiling water. The water will sometimes boil over because organic materials that leach out of the cooking potatoes or pasta disrupt the tight mesh of water molecules at the surface of the water, making it easier for bubbles and foam to form.

When a scoop of ice cream is added to root beer, the "float" foams over for essentially the same reason. The surface tension of the root beer is lowered by gums and proteins from the melting ice cream, and the CO2 bubbles expand and release easily, creating a beautiful foam on top

batching it

alas, it's the weekend of the anniversary, and i'm batching it.

ok, so it was planned out in advance. and we celebrated the 1 year last month on a long weekend getaway to asheville (pics coming soon). mrs. wintermute's best friend just had a munchkin four weeks ago, and their gaggle of gals went out to san fran to meet her. i think it's pretty sweet that she named the baby after mrs. w.

kicked it old school with shih dogg, diver, moe, joe and bama boy tonight. got a table in the alley way at atkins. i'm normally not a fan of the place, but it was nice to get a table and there was free beer.

that's right, free beer.

i walk in and two hot chicks wearing logo t shirts approach me. usually hot chicks giving stuff away at a beer means:

1. cigarettes
   
2. crappy beer
3. shooters (sex on the beach! whoohh!!!! spring break!!!)

they give me a bottle opener key chain, and say they're doing a beer promo.

hmm, what, like atlanta ale or louisville lager or some other crappy beer posing as a micro brew?

nope, freaking beck's lite, literally the beer of choice in the wintermute household!

so it was a good night.

and now i have to take my car in at the ass crack of dawn to get a new exhaust system. stupid rust.

i almost wish bruce arean would not quit so that we could see the satisfaction of him being fired. a 4-5-1?!?!? which genius came up with that one?

a pk in injury time?

a penalty kick in injury time in a 1-1 game with elimination on the line? are you kidding me?

but playing a 4-5-1? no surprise that the US scored only one goal (the goal against italy was an own goal) all cup.

diappointing.

the beav strikes back

the beav just relaunched her blog.

click here.

it's on the sidebar, too.

a bunch of my blog friends have retired. i don't think the blog trend is fading, but it will be interesting to see if certain segments / demographics find certain forms of digital expression more appealing than others. and obviously, someone out there is dreaming up the next myspace or blogger.

will work on getting a new blog roll. in the meantime, props to bloodninja, melting dolls, and the beav for keeping it going.

shame on shoobie for dropping the ball. his blog was my inspiration and one of the best-written i've seen to date.

prisby, fatasianbaby, the messenger: you are missed.

the best stage costume for a band ever (who knew chewie was so good on drums?!)

new place

nacho libre opens tonight. best comedy since napoleon (written by the hess husband and wife team that did) dynamite.

well, we're almost moved into the new place. moe and joe both have been huge in helping. big up, fellas!

the usa has got to bring their A game on saturday. will be at the brewhouse. rooting with moe, joe, and bama boy.

the chief and his chick just got back from the DR and have sweet pics. see the the slide show here.

love mozilla's new add-on for getting real-time updates. click here to get it.

who could have guessed that costa rica would roll over for argentina? 6-0? that's really fucking up my results in bloodninja's office pool.

j-town got in last night. he invited like half of his phd program to tour atlanta. sadly, i think the world of coke is on their agenda. the braves are 13 games back of the mets. an all-time low. going to the game sunday night against the sox. will be rocking my sox hat.

3-0? are you kidding me?

3-0? after having four years to prepare for this game?

the czech team made them look like a high school jv team.

landon has got to step it up on offense.

what the hell is an aluminum falcon?

i'm sorry, i thought my dark lord of the sith could protect a small thermal exhaust port that's only two meters wide.

thanks to the beav. originally found via her sis, laura.

here it is from youtube.

a sample of parenting

uhh, this just in: infants are exhausting. we're babysitting for mrs. wintermute's old room mate (and her husband) tonight. when she dropped off the little muchkin, we were pretty amped about it. i mean, hold him a bit, sing a bit, feed him a bit, and put him to sleep. how hard can that be?

5:15: p is left with us. all is well as mommy walks out the door.

5:16: p starts crying. i feed him and he's pretty happy.

6:13: i come back from the grocery store. p is in his little toddler play thing (it's like a round thing that he sits in in) and very entertained. mrs. wintermute tells me these are the first quiet moments since i left.

6:30: we start making dinner. p starts crying. i take the first turn bouncing and walking around the apt, singing every song i can think of, since he likes singing, according to his mom. not a ton of good, but it helps.

6:40: my arm falls off. spinach is being sauted, but all i can think of is, please, please don't explode. p is bright red.

6:41: mrs. wintermute takes p. she has some success feeding him. she and i wonder aloud what p has been eating. he weighs about twice as much as i would expect.

6:50-8:00: p alternates cycles of 10 minutes of crying, 2 minutes of smiling, 2 minutes of quiet crying, and then back to 10 minutes of loud crying. dogs around the neighborhood start barking. mrs. w and i take turns cooking and soothing p. we try putting him back in his toddler tray to let him 'self-soothe.' no avail. after the fifth version of 'mr. roboto' with made up words, i sit on the couch.

8:01. p stops crying when he falls asleep. we put him in his little pillow bed, stomach down. wait, mom said face down, right? can he breathe? i'm laying with my face down like a wrestling referee, making sure he can breathe. we text message mom to make sure face down is correct. it is, but we should turn him on his cheek.

dinner is ready.

Live in Concert @ the Henry Fonda Theater (Songs From Black Mountain Tour)

Atilla and I saw Live at the Henry Fonda Theater in LA two weeks after seeing them at the Variety Playhouse in Atlanta. Although Atlanta is our hometown, I have to say that the LA show kicked more ass. Maybe it was the intimate theater (about 800 people, about 40% smaller than the Playhouse), maybe it was the fact that the band just came from the American Idol taping, but the band came out firing.

Click here to see the pics--i got a ton of goods one--was about ten feet from the stage

Thanks to google video, here is Lakini's Juice (click here to go straight to my google video page)



and here's live's incredible cover of johnny cash's 'i walk the line' (click here to go straight to my google page in case the embedded player below does not work)

Before I go any further, I have to say that this tour desperately needs a new opening act. I'm sure Mr. Shapiro is a nice guy, but he managed to sound even worse in LA than he did in Atlanta. His songs are bland, his lyrics laden with clichés, and his stage presence jumps way past the line of earnest into naive. Please, please, for the sake of the fans, find a new opener. Live is such an awesome band that they don't a lame opening act to make them look good.

[Apologies to Mr. Shapiro and his family, friends, and fans. I know he's just doing his best.]

Live opened with Simple Creed, setting the tone for an upbeat, powerful set (in Atlanta they opened with Rattlesnake, which sadly did not show up in the LA show). Ed ran out, crouching at the front of the stage, and high-fiving fans. Ed always has a great stage presence. The biggest difference was that the rest of the band really let it rip loose. From the first B6 chord, Chad and Patrick were all over the stage. While the set list was largely similar to the Atlanta show, it generally felt a lot looser and raw. The Johnny Cash cover of "I Walk the Line" was immense. The crowd kept time by clapping along, and the band ripped it open for the chorus. Live did not disappoint with the crowd pleasers. "Lakini's Juice" (my all-time favorite) blew my eardrums away. Of course, "White, Discussion" and "The Dolphin's Cry" cranked it. Live balanced out the singles with four songs from the new album. The crowd seemed to respond well to "Show" and of course went nuts for "Mystery," which the band had just played on American Idol.

Breaking out some old school songs put a smile on my face--"Voodoo Lady" and "Mirror Song" showed how well the band's early work stands up.

Here's the set list.

1. Simple Creed – V

2. All Over You – Throwing Copper

3. Selling The Drama – Throwing Copper

4. The River – Songs From Black Mountain

5. Mystery – Songs From Black Mountain

6. They Stood Up For Love – The Distance To Here

7. I Walk The Line – Awake / The Best of Live

8. Wings – Songs From Black Mountain

9. Lighting Crashes – Throwing Copper

10. Lakini's Juice – Secret Samadhi

11. The Dolphin's Cry – The Distance To Here

12. I Alone – Throwing Copper

13. Heaven – Birds of Pray

14. Show – Songs From Black Mountain

15. Run To The Water – The Distance To Here

16. Mirror Song – Mental Jewelry

17. Iris – Throwing Copper

18. White, Discussion – Throwing Copper

19. Sophia – Songs From Black Mountain

20. Voodoo Lady – The Distance to Here

21. Beauty of Grey – Mental Jewelry

22. Dance With You – The Distance To Here

by popular demand

per request, here's the complete set of pics of leo (our foster doggie).

click here.

get your mind out of the gutter

craig's list rants and raves is pretty entertaining. sometimes you even find priceless gems like this shot. not sure where it is.

walmatrica

greetings from the banks of the muddy mississippi, in what gasparyan calls 'walmartica.'

aptly named. however, the downtown area is actually pretty cool. got a good meal at molly's.

well, that's it for rush limbaugh's hometown.

ok, now for lost:

• libby gave the boat to desmond. ok. i didn't recognize her right away. so her husband died. and then she was in a mental facility?
  
• the eletromagnet downed the plane? hmm, maybe.
  
• desmond's ex-girlfriend is behind all of this? or her father's corporation?
• the experiment is really on the observers? the neumatic tube to nowhere seems to suggest so.
• what the hell is so special about walt?
• not-henry gale is the leader. nice twist. but i don't think the hostiles (aka the others) are the good guys.
• and so who the hell is the real henry gale (the dude that died in the balloon with his wife)?
• how did the others know the names of the people on the flight? i mean, they knew sawyer's real name. like everyone else, i smell a mole.
• so was the dude that ana lucia killed way back when one of the others?
• is desmond dead? locke? eko? i don't think so.
• what's in the others' hatch? i guess there's not a button?