<azonenberg>
ships from the manufacturer tomorrow or friday and arrives early next week
<azonenberg>
Then i get to play with my FPGA board
<azonenberg>
in case you're wondering why my fab stuff isnt going muich this week (besides being busy with work) the guy who runs the SEM lab on campus is on vacation
<azonenberg>
and i need his help/approval to run my next experiment
<azonenberg>
a) cross section one of my dies and measure layer thickness
<azonenberg>
b) see if the evaporator is capable of depositing Ni or Cr
<azonenberg>
c) if so, deposit one of them on a <110> sample and see how they work as hardmask
<azonenberg>
if my theory is correct i'll be able to use either of the two as a KOH hardmask with no underlying oxide layer
<azonenberg>
i'm thinking NiCr 80:20 since i have some 30-gauge of that in stock
<azonenberg>
and equipped with a 32-bit MCU and a CPLD lol
<bart416>
lol
<azonenberg>
And all of the breakouts are full custom
<bart416>
My breadboard is still half fried from an xray transformer :D
<bart416>
And another one has a huce motorolla cpu on it
<azonenberg>
hasnt anyone ever told you breadboards arent good for HV or sensitive analog? :P
<azonenberg>
waaay too much capacitive coupling between adjacent rails
<bart416>
(m68k)
<azonenberg>
the rpi e-club has some 68ks
<azonenberg>
they're like 60 pin DIP
<bart416>
Hey, it wasn't my fault that the mosfet failed!
<azonenberg>
CDIP i think
<bart416>
*huge
<bart416>
Heh, I pulled one of those out of an old sharp laser printer :D
<bart416>
And enough 7400 series logic for the rest of my life >_>
<bart416>
And she's late >_>
<bart416>
back
<bart416>
Sort of dissapointed
<bart416>
At least expected her to stick around for a while
<azonenberg>
lol
<azonenberg>
she just ate and left?
<bart416>
Yes
<bart416>
Why do I still bother to help her?
<bart416>
Except the fact that I might sort of like her
<bart416>
Oh yeah, worst side bonus
<azonenberg>
Lol
<bart416>
Her boyfriend picked her up
<bart416>
So it's not really ammusing
<bart416>
Didn't know that part yet
<azonenberg>
I see :p
<bart416>
I don't really think it's still funny at this point actually but yeah
<azonenberg>
no, i'm just amused in general at the antics of geeks attempting to attract the attention of female H. Sapiens
<azonenberg>
And at the numerous ways they tend to fail
<azonenberg>
Especially if compltely unpredictable
<bart416>
Keep in mind her probably asshole boyfriend (if he's anything like the previous ones) couldn't even bother to make her anything to eat
<azonenberg>
ouch
<bart416>
The past 5 years I've taken better care of her than her own damn family at times...
<bart416>
And she knows I like her
<bart416>
So yeah, just going to give up
<bart416>
This isn't worth it
<azonenberg>
The last girl i had over my lab, well...
<azonenberg>
she was an RPG fanatic
<bart416>
...
<azonenberg>
Between that and her not being a supergeek like me (i.e .actually needing to study) we saw each other IRL twice over the course of a semester lol
<azonenberg>
she was cute but we never ended up actually dating
<azonenberg>
And that wont happen any time in the near future considering my school ended up being too expensive and she transferred out :P
<bart416>
:(
<azonenberg>
So yeah, locating females of the right type at engineering schools isnt easy
<bart416>
Yeah
<bart416>
Strictly speaking, most are ugly
<bart416>
so that limits the acceptable options
<azonenberg>
Lol
<bart416>
And why are it always the fat ugly ones that wear skirts/shorts/expose flesh
<bart416>
aaaaaaaaargh
<azonenberg>
well the bigger problem is, most people (regardless of gender) are boring
<azonenberg>
even at engineering schools, where there's a higher percentage of nerds
<azonenberg>
it's maybe 20% vs 2%
<bart416>
I don't find that too problematic if I don't have to stay with people too long
<azonenberg>
idk, i cant really stand hanging out with boring people
<azonenberg>
it's... boring
<bart416>
They probably say the same about you
<azonenberg>
lol
<bart416>
You just sort of need a trigger to switch to casual conversation with a common subject
<azonenberg>
thats the point - "common subject"
<azonenberg>
with me and 95% of people there isnt one lol
<bart416>
That you can fix you know :P
<azonenberg>
you mean studying popular culture?
<bart416>
nah
<bart416>
Don't you watch some sports
<azonenberg>
No thanks, i prefer culture to stay in my petri dishes where it belongs :P
<bart416>
Or do some sports?
<azonenberg>
and nope
<bart416>
Watch some movies?
<bart416>
Read (comic) books?
<bart416>
Listen to music
<azonenberg>
my exercise of choice is out in the mountains, 10+ miles from the nearest town, and with a 30 pound pack on my back
<bart416>
Go to concert or events
<azonenberg>
and those other subjects are really pretty boring to someone like me
<bart416>
You'd be amazed how many people are willing to talk about such things :P
<azonenberg>
my brain cant stand downtime
<bart416>
How do you do it?
<azonenberg>
i was on a family vacation in june after graduating
<azonenberg>
after the first day or two i pulled out my laptop and started writing a paper
<azonenberg>
the relaxation was driving me nuts
<bart416>
o_O
<bart416>
You need some time off, or you have a burnout eventually
<azonenberg>
you misunderstand lol
<azonenberg>
time off from coding at work
<azonenberg>
is chip fab at home
<azonenberg>
when i get tired of that i do FPGA stuff
<bart416>
o_O
<azonenberg>
as long as i set Tq short enough and use a prioritized round robin scheduler...
<azonenberg>
i was homeschooled, remember... i grew up in relative social isolation (church and scouts, each once a week, were my only real contact with the outside world)
<bart416>
My time off: running, sailing, shooting bottles, watching movies, playing guitar or piano, cooking, going for a drink with some friends, ...
<azonenberg>
spent most of the day reading and studying because that's all there wasto do
<bart416>
I had neither of those
<azonenberg>
And now i'm so used to that lifestyle i cant handle anything else lol
<azonenberg>
my mom forced me to play the piano (piano teacher) for many years
<bart416>
My only real extensive social contact was a single person
<azonenberg>
i quit the second i moved out
<bart416>
I hated playing piano at the time
<bart416>
Now I love it
<azonenberg>
Lol
<azonenberg>
I bet her $100 when i was around 12 that she was wrong
<azonenberg>
and i wouldn't love playing by my 18th birthday
<azonenberg>
i collected
<azonenberg>
and havent touched a piano since
<bart416>
You can feel the flow of the music, the subtle tones of the hammers hitting the snares, ...
<bart416>
Piano is such an excellent instrument
<azonenberg>
i like listening to it
<azonenberg>
But i'd do anything to not be the guy sitting at it
<bart416>
Piano is one of the few instruments you can really play on feeling
<bart416>
Guitar you need to study
<bart416>
Piano you start out by studying but after a few years you can just play what you have in your head
<bart416>
That's why it's such a great instrument
<azonenberg>
When i quit i was able to play almost the entire third (? slow one, whichever that is) movement of the moonlight sonata from memory
<azonenberg>
i could do about the first half of it with my eyes shut before hitting a part with difficult fingering
<bart416>
Heh, I don't look at the keyboard anymore at all
<bart416>
For anything
<bart416>
Only at the start to position my hands
<azonenberg>
That was one spot where i had to move my hand an octave or two over
<azonenberg>
couldnt get it exact without looking
<azonenberg>
Anyway so point is, as a result of growing up like that
<bart416>
You know what's actually supprisingly hard, playing mozart's turkish march at full speed
<azonenberg>
i'm now so conditioned into spending all of my waking hours on scientific / academic subjects
<azonenberg>
that i now do it by choice
<bart416>
I sort of became like that when my girlfriend left, it's fixing itself now though
<bart416>
You just need a reason to get out of the pattern
<bart416>
(Also I meant turkish march is hard to play for a young person with smaller hands eh)
<azonenberg>
thats the thing, i dont want to get out of it
<azonenberg>
it's made me who i am
<bart416>
Sometimes to meet a person you want to meet you have to get out of it though
<bart416>
That's the main reason to get out of your habbits
<azonenberg>
i'd rather take my time and find someone who can put up with me like this :P
<azonenberg>
i dont want to take the risk of getting distracted and losing my edge
<bart416>
Actually, in my case it improves my academic performance
<bart416>
To give you an idea, last year I had a sort of relationship with a girl that I shared several classes with
<bart416>
So yeah, during math
<bart416>
Solving differential equations
<bart416>
I actually managed to beat a professor >_>
<azonenberg>
lol
<bart416>
Normally I'd take twice as long as him
<bart416>
Just her being there was enough to convince me to just go for it
<azonenberg>
Guess it depends on the situation then - but i usually find that my inherent motivation to get out there and be the best of the best is all it takes
<azonenberg>
anything else just is a distraction
<bart416>
Not all distractions are bad
<bart416>
I didn't pay attention at all in classes I shared with her, yet I had excellent grades on every single one of them; and they weren't exactly easy
<bart416>
Simply being happy seemed to do the trick :S
<azonenberg>
i see... in my case, talking to this girl ended up giving me an alternative to working on HW for my least interesting class of the semester
<azonenberg>
Which, as you can imagine, didnt bode well for my grade
<azonenberg>
forget what i got but it was my worst grade in my entire period as an undergrad
<azonenberg>
b- maybe?
<bart416>
b- is how much %?
<azonenberg>
C actually
<azonenberg>
and i dont know, the class was curved
<azonenberg>
but it brought my 3.85 down to a 3.76
<azonenberg>
By comparison first semester freshman year, when i was a hermit who spent most of his time in the dorm
<azonenberg>
i had a 3.93
<azonenberg>
one A- and all As otherwise
<bart416>
If they bothered to grade on curve I'd get A on everything as well >_>
<azonenberg>
In any case, i got my degree so that's over with
<azonenberg>
But now i have a phd to do
<berndj>
you guys should apply the scientific method to girls!  bring your hacking skills to bear on the problem
<berndj>
bart416, did you get any info on diy multilayer boarding?
<azonenberg>
berndj: lol
<bart416>
berndj, no
<bart416>
When would I have done that
<bart416>
All I got was a name that I forgot
<azonenberg>
i *did* remember doing a chi-square analysis to determine whether me and a girl i was hanging out with were dating or not lol
<bart416>
o_O
<azonenberg>
the result was - not enough data to confirm or deny a statistically significant correlation
<berndj>
dj delorie / www.delorie.com.  i think he does some sort of heat fusion of layers
<bart416>
berndj, applying engineering skills to social issues leads to bad situations
<berndj>
depends how meta you go
<bart416>
his site doesn't seem to show much
<berndj>
but i remember the pua guys taking the hypothesis/experiment/measure process quite seriously.  sometimes quite comically
<berndj>
yeah, mostly pics of what is, not much on the how