My science. Let me blind you with it.
So today was a day of Unexpected Conversations. I rented a car for the weekend (they gave me a bright red Aveo) and as Jay the Enterprise Guy was driving me back to the store, somehow in the ten minutes that took we introduced ourselves, covered my career (which he actually THANKED me for doing once he got the hang of what it was), his sex life, his parents, his girlfriend's parents, his sister in seminary, whether or not Hocking Hills looks like West Virginia, playing Extreme Frisbee drunk, a brief history of women's college and my plans for the evening.
I feel like I've known Jay the Enterprise Guy for years!
After that I went straight to Strader's, a really huge garden store near me, because I wanted to get my plantings in tonight before tomorrow's thunderstorms (and because they say evening planting is the best and I want to give my poor unlucky plants every chance). Being that it's a gorgeous sunny evening, it was packed.
I don't LOVE gardening, but I love garden stores. The smells, the breezes, the mists in the air, and all the plants waiting to get put in the ground so they can burst forth. I chose wave petunias for my small planting bed, because I can get away with only putting about five plants in there since they spread so much. I got a couple of daisies for pots, and impatiens for my long boxy pots. I don't have a lot of room for plants so it wasn't too much of an investment.
I pulled into the checkout manned by a young, college-aged, kinda doofy-looking guy. When he swiped my debit card, he commented on the design on the front. A lot of people do. I bank with the American Chemical Society Credit Union, so my card has chemistry stuff on it. The following conversation ensued.
Cashier: Cool debit card!
Me: Thanks. I work for the American Chemical Society, so it's science-y.
Cashier: Awesome! Of course, everything's chemistry, so you could put whatever you wanted on the front and it'd be, you know, appropriate.
Me: Very true! This plant food, this weed killer...all chemistry! And the plastic trays the plants are in!
Cashier: And the plants, too!
Me: Yep
Cashier: I learned that photosynthesis stuff in school, it was hard.
Me: It's the same thing as when we eat food, just in reverse.
(at this point the young female cashier at the neighboring checkout, who'd been cutting refuse bags, suddenly leapt into the conversation)
Cashier2: Well, EXACTLY!!! (delivered in a tone that implied she'd been waiting her whole life for someone to acknowledge this connection)
Cashier1: Whoa, really? How?
Me: We eat plant matter, take in oxygen to turn it into energy, and give off water and carbon dioxide. They take carbon dioxide, water and energy, and generate plant matter and oxygen.
Cashier1: That's cool, I never knew that!
Cashier2: (still incredulous) Dude, seriously? I learned that back in middle school!
At this point I absented myself, leaving them still haranguing over how much the dude sucked for not having learned this. I had a chuckle. It was like the touring company version of Ask Lori a Science Question.
I feel like I've known Jay the Enterprise Guy for years!
After that I went straight to Strader's, a really huge garden store near me, because I wanted to get my plantings in tonight before tomorrow's thunderstorms (and because they say evening planting is the best and I want to give my poor unlucky plants every chance). Being that it's a gorgeous sunny evening, it was packed.
I don't LOVE gardening, but I love garden stores. The smells, the breezes, the mists in the air, and all the plants waiting to get put in the ground so they can burst forth. I chose wave petunias for my small planting bed, because I can get away with only putting about five plants in there since they spread so much. I got a couple of daisies for pots, and impatiens for my long boxy pots. I don't have a lot of room for plants so it wasn't too much of an investment.
I pulled into the checkout manned by a young, college-aged, kinda doofy-looking guy. When he swiped my debit card, he commented on the design on the front. A lot of people do. I bank with the American Chemical Society Credit Union, so my card has chemistry stuff on it. The following conversation ensued.
Cashier: Cool debit card!
Me: Thanks. I work for the American Chemical Society, so it's science-y.
Cashier: Awesome! Of course, everything's chemistry, so you could put whatever you wanted on the front and it'd be, you know, appropriate.
Me: Very true! This plant food, this weed killer...all chemistry! And the plastic trays the plants are in!
Cashier: And the plants, too!
Me: Yep
Cashier: I learned that photosynthesis stuff in school, it was hard.
Me: It's the same thing as when we eat food, just in reverse.
(at this point the young female cashier at the neighboring checkout, who'd been cutting refuse bags, suddenly leapt into the conversation)
Cashier2: Well, EXACTLY!!! (delivered in a tone that implied she'd been waiting her whole life for someone to acknowledge this connection)
Cashier1: Whoa, really? How?
Me: We eat plant matter, take in oxygen to turn it into energy, and give off water and carbon dioxide. They take carbon dioxide, water and energy, and generate plant matter and oxygen.
Cashier1: That's cool, I never knew that!
Cashier2: (still incredulous) Dude, seriously? I learned that back in middle school!
At this point I absented myself, leaving them still haranguing over how much the dude sucked for not having learned this. I had a chuckle. It was like the touring company version of Ask Lori a Science Question.