Fun with non-newtonian fluids

Just a few things to report. We had a good weekend, despite the heat. Saturday, we had some friends over and played down at the creek. It was lots of fun watching the kids splash around. Sunday, Jane took a break and ran errands while I watched the kids.

We had a ton of fun. We walked the dogs, had some lunch, and most fun of all, we made play dough, and something called ooblech. Ooblech is the non-Newtonian fluid in the title. It's one of those things that you would think that you wouldn't discover at age 36. All this stuff is is a mixture of corn starch and water (and a little food coloring - we used yellow). However, when mixed it doesn't behave like an ordinary solid. When you apply pressure to it, it becomes solid, resisting motion, but when you stop with the pressure, it becomes a runny liquid again. Maybe it doesn't sound so hot on paper, but I was mesmerised by this stuff for 20 minutes, as were the girls.

At any rate, there's lots of info on making it online, and if you're curious, it's worth 10 minutes, some water and some cornstarch.

We also made play dough, which turned out a little gooey, but some time in the fridge firmed it up. I worked on our old tractor and ended up mowing the lawn to prove to myself that the thing still worked. Only it worked a little too well - I couldn't get it to turn off without fussing with the throttle. Seems the ignition switch has gone a little wonky. Easy fix, I think.

Yesterday, my hair also stared falling out - woo hoo. I've been waiting for this, because I've felt silly having a semi-shaved head with hair growing out. I cut and shaved it tonight, and it feels lots better than having little bits of hair falling out. I was beginning to feel like a too-old Christmas tree. Well, no more of that - I'm Kojak now.

Last, but not least, I used the elliptical tonight to get a little exercise. That really helped out my mood. I'm hoping to do it some more until the chemo starts this week. We'll see what happens after that.