Stuff I've done, you might not have

[aquaeri]

I've decided it's the most interesting "meme" I've seen. I'm not keen on propagating most of the others, but I'll play along with this one.

I'd be curious if you have done any of these.

1. Been suspected of having tuberculosis, gone through the full testing with chest x-rays. (Twice, before the age of seven.) elissaann got the joy of this experience also

Comments

[submarine_bells]

I've held a koala, unsurprisingly. Hell, I've had koalas keep me awake half the night as they practiced squaredancing on the roof above my bed while producing grunting sounds redolent of a wild pig orgy. Hmmm. Maybe I should put that in my own list of ten things. I've been stuck for a while coming up with the tenth one... :-)

[aquaeri]

I've held a koala, unsurprisingly.

I wasn't particularly old when I did it, and I got the impression it had very much become Not The Done Thing more recently.

The koalas keeping you awake sounds pretty good to me. Now I've got to think of a tenth one.

[submarine_bells]

I suspect that holding koalas in public became Not The Done Thing for folk in the public eye after a certain politician (perhaps even a prime minister? I don't recall exactly) was copiously peed on by a koala that he was holding for a publicity shot some years ago. The newspapers had a field day with that one. :-)

Locally, holding koalas is pretty easy to achieve. There's a wildlife park half an hour or so from my house that has daily koala-pettings at 1pm and 3pm, performed in a pretty koala-themed rotunda thingie with a nice photogenic assistant. I gather it's very popular with the tourists.

[firecat]

I've experienced #9, but only because the San Francisco Zoo has a rainbow lorikeet exhibit where you can feed them from your hand.

[aquaeri]

Hmm. Borderline. I don't know of anywhere rainbow lorikeets will land on you if there isn't a promise of food. The ones that landed on me were technically wild, but fed regularly.

=[ (That was just typed by the cat. I wonder if it's the "kitty not happy" icon?)

The ones that come to our back yard are too shy to come that near, although one almost flew into me once. It might be a matter of time; the magpies are acting more and more like we're the intruders.

[oursin]

I've held a koala (in a touristy sort of way).

[elissaann]

I went through the TB X-rays as a kid, because my test kept coming up positive, but I didn't have it.

What's a footie?

Ferry from where to Iceland?

Your list is math-y the way mine is music-y. I thought of putting "no dental cavities" in my list, but that's probably more common now than it was when I was a kid.

[aquaeri]

Yep, my test kept coming up positive. There was a fair bit of freaking out over it, because my grandfather died of TB and my mother had a minor case as a child, with a scar on her lung. Now I've got to think of something else.

Footie is the nickname for football, Australian Rules Football in this case. I'm not much of a sports fan, but I have a friend who is a huge sports fan and wanted an excuse to give me the experience, and believe it or not, the grass was it. Zie is almost as excited by the grass (in connection to me) as the footie.

We caught the ferry in Shetland, and on the way back, stopped for the weekend in the Faeroes, and then caught it to Bergen. I was under the impression it's the only ferry that goes to Iceland. I see from their web page they're in financial difficulty

[epi_lj]

What's an Erdös number?

[aquaeri]

Like a Kevin Bacon number, but in maths and science. Erdös was an extraordinary mathematician who travelled around and collaborated with quite a few people (he's dead now). He's got an Erdös number of 0. Anyone who co-authored a paper with him has an Erdös number of 1. All the co-authors of the co-authors are 2, etc.

There's a web page with complete listings of the 1s (given he's dead, that's now a closed list) and I believe up-to-date listings of the 2s. They also give examples of famous scientists and their Erdös numbers.

[epi_lj]

Hmm. I wonder if I have an Erdös number. I've only published one paper, and although the co-authors both have lots of other papers, the field of study is somewhat distant.

[aquaeri]

You'd be surprised. You'll see from the web page that it's suspected most publishing biologists have Erdös numbers in the single digits. Noam Chomsky is a 4 I think.

If your co-authors have lots of other papers with a variety of other authors, you almost certainly have a finite Erdös number. I'd be happy to help you try to find out.