Friday, December 9, 2011

BYU dating laws

So I've been doing some deep thinking recently about relationships at BYU and specifically, about how quick people seem to get married around here. I’ve even come up with a theory that I’d like to share with you about your odds of getting married. My theory is this; there is a statistical half-life of two months for the dating-to-marriage conversion. What I mean is, after two months of dating, any given couple has a 50% chance of getting married at some point. Not that they will get married at two months necessarily but that their odds of tying the knot at some point are 50%. So two months later, at the 4 month mark (or about one semester) there is a 75% chance of that couple getting married. Then after 6 months of dating the odds are 87.5% and anything after that is gravy. Now, I’m only talking about relationships at BYU, other schools and time before or after graduating BYU are not a factor in this theory of mine. I’d also like to confirm it with research so that my theory can become law; I’ve always wanted my own law. I think I’ll call it, “Walke’s law of relationships” that sounds pretty scientific and legit right? Anyway, your input would be helpful on this front. If you want to participate let me know, either below in the comments, in a private message on my facebook page, or even on my wall if that’s what floats your boat. Useful information would include:

1) number of relationships you have had at BYU
2) how long each lasted
3) how it ended (marriage, breakup, other[?])
4) year in school (or year in school you got married)
5) average wind speed velocity of an un-laden swallow (African)

Tuesday, December 6, 2011

Bacon Candle

       This is actually from a while back but, i wanted to share it with you anyway. This semester I have been in a dinner group with a few friends from the ward and once upon a time it was my turn to cook. I decided that breakfast for dinner would be a good idea (and frankly, when isn't it a good idea?) so I made french toast with bacon. Quite naturally, it was delicious, but I made a lot of bacon (once again, always a good idea) and I had a cup that was almost completely full of bacon grease left over. I wasn't quite sure how to get rid of it because I know that you aren't supposed to dump it down the sink but I wasn't too sure about what would be considered a proper disposal method. So, drawing on my days as a boy scout for wisdom, I decided to dispose of the stuff through incendiary means and make a bacon candle. I rolled up a napkin, stuck it in the middle of the cup and, well, I think the pictures speak for themselves.

as you can see, it was a success. bacon grease is 
exactly as flammable as you would expect it to be!


And then it was brought to my attention that another wick could be added to the mess for an even bigger flame. Naturally, I thought this was a brilliant idea.

2x the wicks, 2x the fire.


Then, realizing that there was still room for more, I doubled the wick count again, bringing the total to 4 burning napkins in my bacon cup.



As far as ideas go, this was one of my better ones. Anyway, after about half an hour, the heat was great enough to actually shatter the cup (it was glass), which was awesome but unfortunately, it did bring an end to the bacon candle.

I've considered possible expansions for the bacon candle project, such as gathering a couple gallons of bacon and putting some kind of porous wood like pine in it for the wick. I think that would be cool but I have no idea where I would get that much bacon grease. I don't anticipate it happening any time soon, or probably ever, but I'll keep you posted if that changes.